The Star-Packed Lineup for Houston’s Winter Music Festival is Revealed: Day for Night’s Surprise Major Acts Are …

Omar Afra, co-curator (along with Chris Wise) of the concert lineup for this year’s edition of Day for Night, has hyped year two of the winter music festival as “the second moon landing.” We’ll let fellow music fans be the judge of that, but no doubt: The second year of the arts + music festival has grown exponentially in 12 months, and no one was messing around with this year’s freshly announced lineup.

Aphex Twin. Bjork. Run the Jewels. Travis Scott. Blood Orange. Ariel Pink. Butthole Surfers. The Jesus and Mary Chain. Little Dragon. Blonde Redhead. Squarepusher. Thundercat. Kamasi Washington. Unknown Mortal Orchestra. Washed Out. John Carpenter (yes that John Carpenter). Lightning Bolt. Arca. Lower Dens. Oneohtrix Point Never. Clams Casino. Matmos. Mykki Blanco. Sophie. Fat Tony. Welcome to Houston (Slim Thug, Bun B, Lil Flip, Paul Wall). DJ Windows 98 (Win Butler). S U R V I V E (the breakout band who scored the hit Netflix show Stranger Things).

A lineup like that (these are just my cherry-picked fave names) doesn’t need any kind of introduction or introspection. In addition to a world-class music selection, Day for Night has brought some top names from the art/digital/immersive reality worlds, curated by Alex Czetwertynski: United Visual Artists, NONOTAK, Björk Digital (a unique touring show featuring VR elements courtesy the Icelandic artist), Damien Echols (of the West Memphis Three), Ezra Miller, Robert Seidel, Golan Levin, and Shoplifter.

Taking place December 17 and 18 at the historic Barbara Jordan Post Office on 401 Franklin across 1.5 million square feet and three stages, Day for Night’s second year has taken a step we could not have predicted it could take in the span of one year.

Aphex Twin (aka Richard D. James) the most influential and innovative electronic artist of all time, will play his first show in the U.S. in eight years, and his first show in Texas in two decades (carrying a theme from year one, when New Order played their first U.S. show in 20 years at Day for Night’s inaugural frame). Travis Scott, a Missouri City native, will no doubt have another trademark raucous performance as a homecoming victory lap for his past two successful years, first with 2015’s Rodeo and the recently released Birds in the Trap Sing McKnight, which just debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 last week. San Antonio’s Butthole Surfers will be reuniting at Day for Night, playing their first show in five years.

Carrying the torch of the mission of DFN (an exploration of space, time, light, and sound), many of the acts skew toward the electronic and progressive, fitting with the chilly air of winter in Houston (the only appropriate time to have an outdoor festival) and the unique venues that thus far the festival has encompassed. Count us excited to definitely catch Aphex Twin, but also especially: Blood Orange (aka Devonte Hynes), touring behind his excellent Freetown Sound album from the summer (I really hope this means a Lorely Rodriguez special appearance is in the cards); provocateur and pop-deconstructionist Ariel Pink; ’80s post-punk icons the Jesus and Mary Chain (their wall of sound fuzz was always more my style than New Order); producer and Kanye West-collaborator Arca; Daniel Lopatin, wild electronic-collagist genius behind Oneohtrix Point Never; and Clams Casino, beat-maker fresh off his 32 Levels double-record this year and one of the most challenging producers co-existing in electronic and hip-hop.

The festival is once again brought to you by Free Press Houston and New York-based Work-Order, masterminded by Keira Alexandra and Houstonian Kiffer Keegan. The full line-up and ticket info can be found here.