Once again, Philadelphia music fans can look forward to a Drugcember to remember.
Next month, Philly rock band The War On Drugs will renew a tradition that has been on hiatus since 2022. It will perform a trio of fundraising shows to benefit the Fund for the School District of Philadelphia, the nonprofit that raises money and coordinates investments into Philadelphia Schools.
The Adam Granduciel-led seven piece band, that won a best rock album Grammy for A Deeper Understanding in 2018, will play three nights at Johnny Brenda’s in Fishtown, from Dec. 18-20.
The 250 capacity club — which the band first played on the venue’s opening weekend in 2006 — is several magnitudes smaller that the amphitheater, arena, and festival stages the Drugs typically plays in venues around the world.
Drugcember to Remember debuted in 2018 and became an annual Philly three-show tradition through 2022, with the exception of the COVID shutdown year of 2020.
But it hadn’t taken place since 2022, and seemed in danger of being gone for good, with Granduciel now living on Los Angeles and bassist and original members Dave Hartley in North Carolina.
Granduciel said in a statement that the return to the treasured tradition is a way to reaffirm its Philadelphia identity.
The flyer for The War on Drugs’ 2025 ‘A Drugcember to Remember’ benefit shows at Johnny Brenda’s on Dec. 18-20.
“This has been a year end highlight for me since we started doing it in 2018,” said the guitarist and songwriter who stepped out as a producer in 2025 on Craig Finn’s Always Been and Sam Fender’s People Watching. “Three rock shows at our old local hangout benefiting the Philadelphia School System. This band wouldn’t exist if not for the vibrant Philadelphia music community that has supported us from the beginning and we are very grateful for it.”
The War On Drugs’ most recent studio album, I Don’t Live Here Anymore, came out in 2021. Last year, they released the in-concert recording Live Drugs Again.
Its most recent Philadelphia performance was in the summer of 2024, sharing a bill with the National at the Mann Center in Fairmount Park. Besides the Drugcember shows, the only two dates on the band’s schedule are at festivals in Spain and Portugal in July 2026.
A Drugcember To Remember will raise funds through ticket sales and also the sale of exclusive items though Philadelphia businesses, including Elixr Coffee, Sacred Vice Brewing, Room Shop, Uncle Ron’s Candles, and Kinetic Skateboarding/Nocturnal Skate Shop.
Ticket for the Johnny Brenda’s shows go on sale at 10 a.m. Friday Nov. 21 at thewarondrugs.net/tour.
This week in Philly music kicks off in Fishtown with six-time Grammy nominee Leon Thomas, continues in Atlantic City with a Brandy and Monica throwback pop double bill, and continues in North Philly with rising R&B singer and Justin Bieber producer Dijon.
Austin, Texas, hard rock band Die Spitz play the First Unitarian Church on Wednesday.
Wednesday, Nov. 19
Die Spitz
The music gets started on Wednesday with the four women of Austin, Texas. hard rock foursome Die Spitz, who recorded their unrelenting new album Something to Consume at Studio 4 in Conshohocken with producer Will Yip. Boone, N.C., queer punk duo Babe Haven opens. (8 p.m., First Unitarian Church, 2125 Chestnut St., r5productions.com)
Leon Thomas
There weren’t a lot of surprises among the big names with the most nominations when the Grammys were announced this month. Kendrick Lamar and Lady Gaga topped the list, but Leon Thomas, who got six nods along with Bad Bunny and Sabrina Carpenter, was the surprise underdog.
The crooner and producer, who got his start as a Broadway child actor and star of Nickelodeon’s Victorious, is up for album of the year for Mutt, as well as best new artist and R&B performance for his viral NPR Tiny Desk version of the album’s title song — in which he compares himself unfavorably to a dog. His “Mutts Don’t Heel” tour comes to the Fillmore on Wednesday. (8 p.m., the Fillmore, 29 E. Allen St., livenation.com)
Also: There’s live music at Old City vinyl listening room 48 Record Bar. James Everhart of Cosmic Guilt teams with New York songwriter Keenan O’Meara on Wednesday; Hannah Taylor sings and Jake Zubkoff plays keys on Sunday.
Hannah Cohen plays Johnny Brenda’s on Thursday. Her new album is “Earthstar Mountain.”
Thursday, Nov. 20
Hannah Cohen
Hannah Cohen’s Earthstar Mountain is a dreamy, pastoral album that also delivers a sweet kick. She recorded it with producer partner Sam Evian at their studio in a barn in upstate New York. With Sufjan Stevens and Clairo guesting, it’s a 2025 standout releaser. (Salami Rose Joe Louis opens. 8 p.m., Johnny Brenda’s, 1201 Frankford Ave., johnnybrendas.com)
The New Mastersounds
British funkateers the New Mastersounds are saying goodbye — at least for a while. The band whose tight Hammond organ-heavy soul-jazz sound bears the influences of Philly keyboard greats Jimmy Smith and Jimmy McGriff, plays its “Ta-Ta for Now” tour on Thursday. (8 p.m., Ardmore Music Hall, 23 E. Lancaster Ave., Ardmore, tixr.com)
Now, Gallo has a new album that takes him in a more personal direction, called Checkmate, his second on the Kill Rock Stars label. It’s filled with subtly evocative folk-flavored, even jazzy, music that detours from the bruising garage rock he’s become known for. Gallo plays Free at Noon at Ardmore Music Hall. (Noon, Ardmore Music Hall, eventbrite.com)
Brandy and Monica performing in Indianapolis in October on “The Boy Is Mine Tour,” which comes to Atlantic City’s Boardwalk Hall on Saturday.
Bar Italia
This month’s edition of David Pianka’s Making Time dance party has an intriguing live band headliner in Bar Italia, the London-based trio named after an iconic Soho coffee bar. The band’s new album, Some Like It Hot, wears the influence of Brit-pop band Pulp on its sleeve. New York rock band Voyeur also plays, along with sets by Dave P., Mario Cotto, Shai FM, and K Wata. (9 p.m., Warehouse on Watts, 923 N. Watts St., wowphilly.com)
Stinking Lizaveta
Longstanding West Philly doom metal trio Stinking Lizaveta‘s name was inspired by a character in Fyodor Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov. The band released its 1996 album Hopelessness and Shame — recorded by the late Steve Albini — on vinyl for the first time this March. On Friday, they headline Johnny Brenda’s with Deathbird Earth and Channls. (8 p.m., Johnny Brenda’s, 1201 Frankford Ave., johnnybrendas.com)
Tom Morello
Rage Against the Machine guitarist Tom Morello plays the Music Box at the Borgata in Atlantic City. It will be an agit-pop act of resistance in a hotel casino within earshot of chiming slot machines. Morello’s repertoire is made up of roiling Rage songs, Woody Guthrie, MC5, and John Lennon and Yoko Ono covers, plus originals in his rabble-rousing folk singer mode as the Nightwatchman. He’ll have a full band behind him, plus the help of San Diego hip-hop group the Neighborhood Kids as his special guests. (9 p.m., Music Box at the Borgata, 1 Borgata Way, Atlantic City, ticketmaster.com)
Saturday, Nov. 22
Mo Lowda & the Humble
Philly quarter Mo Lowda & the Humble closes out a five-month North American tour for its new album, Tailing the Ghost, with a hometown show. (8 p.m., Union Transfer, 1026 Spring Garden St., utphilly.com)
Brandy and Monica
Back in 1988, Brandy and Monica played out a feud over a dude in the worldwide hit “The Boy Is Mine,” which was cowritten and coproduced by South Jersey’s Rodney “Darkchild” Jerkins. Twenty-seven years later, the pop-R&B singers are on a concert tour together that also features Destiny’s Child’s Kelly Rowland, Muni Long, and 2025 American Idol winner Jamal Roberts. The tour is presented by the Black Promoters Collective. (8 p.m., Jim Whelan Boardwalk Hall, 2301 Boardwalk, Atlantic City, boardwalkhall.com)
Grammy-nominated singer and producer Dijon plays the Met Philly on Sunday.
Sunday, Nov. 23
Dijon
Dijon released his debut Absolutely in 2021 and has quickly made his mark. He regularly works with Mk.gee, the guitarist and songwriter with whom he shares a twitchy, low-fi sensibility. He’s also teamed with Bon Iver and Justin Bieber and is up for producer of the year and album of the year at the Grammys. Sometimes, he sounds like Prince.
His new album Baby! is a joyous, shape-shifting adventure. Two measures of how hip he is at the moment: He’s among the musicians with roles in Paul Thomas Anderson’s One Battle After Another, and on Dec. 6 will be musical guest on Saturday Night Live. He plays the Met Philly on Sunday. (8 p.m., Met Philly, 858 N. Broad St., ticketmaster.com)
Amy LaVere and Will Sexton
Memphis wife-and-husband duo Amy LaVere and Will Sexton are Americana artists who specialize in a brand of smoky Southern noir, perhaps best exemplified by LaVere’s “Killing Him,” about trying to rid oneself of a bad boyfriend only to find that he comes back to haunt you. (8 p.m., 118 North, 118 N. Wayne Ave., Wayne, tixr.com)
Katie Crutchfield and MJ Lenderman have struck up a fruitful collaboration as leading lights of the indie Americana music scene. And now, the two singer-guitarists are joining forces for a tour that will bring them to the Met Philly on April 18.
Crutchfield, who records as Waxahatchee, a sobriquet taken from the name of a creek near where she grew up in Alabama, released one of the most acclaimed albums of 2024 in Tigers Blood.
For most of the 2010s, Waxahatchee lived in West Philly. She moved here from Brooklyn along with her identical twin Allison, with whom she formed the band P.S. Eliot when they were teenagers growing up in Birmingham, Ala.
On Halloween, the Crutchfield sisters surprise released a new album under the band name Snocaps, a super group of sorts that also includes Lenderman and producer, multi-instrumentalist Brad Cook.
Next month, Snocaps is doing a brief tour with shows in New York, Los Angeles, and Chicago, but no plans to play Philadelphia.
Which makes this Waxahatchee-Lenderman date at the Met the next best — or maybe even a better — thing than a Snocaps tour. It will include Waxahatchee and Lenderman solo sets, and also feature them playing together.
That most likely will include collabs like Tigers Blood’s “Right Back to It” and well as tracks from the top-flight Snocaps album, which moves Crutchfield back into more of a rock and roll direction than her more recent country-flavored songs.
Lenderman also had a recent moment of social media virality when he brought then New York City mayoral candidate and music nerd Zohran Mamdani on stage at Brooklyn Steel.
Via PLUS1.org, $1 from each ticket sold for the Waxahatchee-Lenderman show at the Met will go to support community-driven nonprofits that work to increase access to nutritious food and housing resources.
