Boston’s premiere music festival made its return over Memorial Day Weekend with three more days loaded with music, local food vendors (caviar lobster roll anyone?), brand installations, throwback drink options (RC Cola anyone??), rain and mud. Lots and lots of mud (trench foot anyone???).

New additions and changes made ahead of the gates opening included the triumphant return of the Arena stage! Past editions have used the indoor space as a venue for DJs, a film festival (curated by Natalie Portman), and a variety of standup comedy performers. This year, it hosted a collection of Berklee College Jazz Musicians who held down the stage throughout the weekend. 

Another major change since last year, is the removal of the long-embattled Red Stage. Having gained a reputation of poor sound quality, the stage also created crowd bottlenecks due to its cornered positioning. So, the festival decided to do away with the stage completely, leaving the entire north side of the grounds to the Green stage. This provided ample room for crowds to form, easier access to different bars/bathrooms and overall created a more comfortable experience. To address possible wait times in between sets due to the lack of a second stage on the north side, the festival employed a turntable stage system. This allowed crews to change over one side of the stage, while the other side performed, before rotating into the next act.

Kicking off Friday, country/southern rock music reigned supreme as undercard performers Holy Roller, Wilderado, and Max McNown took the Green stage before headliners Megan Moroney and Luke Combs closed out the evening. A younger crowd of country heads packed into the Harvard Athletic Complex donned with boots and ponchos as the weather continued falling down on Friday’s festivities. But the rain never keeps the concert goers of New England down (just ask Taylor Swift), as performers powered through the precipitation. Other standout sets from the evening included Sheryl Crow and T-Pain. Both delivered crowd-pleasing sets to the eager (and soaked) attendees, while the local flavor was on full display with music from Battlemode, Future Teens, Latrell James and Megan From Work.

Saturday continued on with less rain and slightly more sun. In between small showers, the rays would peek through to remind us that it is Memorial Day Weekend after all. Setting off with the visually and sonically striking Sofia Isella on the green stage, the music continued throughout the afternoon with a strong focus on Emo and early 2000s bops. The Maine started us off before going into All Time Low, Cage the Elephant, Avril Lavigne and Fall Out Boy. By the time FOB took the stage, the emo takeover had completed, the face paint was out and it was time to mosh. The Blue Stage went down a different path with performances from Lucius, Amble, James Bay & The Black Crowes and the Orange Stage continued to focus on local talent with sets from Pinklids, Sidebody, Rebuilder and Simon Robert French.

Sunday rolled around with the weekend’s strongest lineup and best weather. Rain and clouds finally gave way to some sun and a nice breeze as attendees came in for one final day of music and vibes. If Friday was country and Saturday was Emo, then Sunday was a mixture of Dad rock and indie jams. Standout earlier sets included a frenetic and humorous turn from Spin Doctors, a joyous display from Goth Babe and a triumphant set from Remi Wolf that began with some fatal sound flaws before powering through to greatness

The demographic seemed to shift to the older side as the sun went down before Sublime and Tom Morello took the Green and Blue stages respectively. Don’t get me wrong, there were plenty of children still present (hopefully avoiding the smoke clouds during “Santeria”) but the evening was definitely for the Millennials/Dads of Boston than anyone else. Public Enemy attracted a large crowd as they shut down the Blue Stage while Cape Cod favorites Vampire Weekend returned to the Boston Calling main stage for the first time since 2013. Showcasing tracks off their recent album Only God Was Above Us, Koenig & Co. still made time for Boston fave “Walcott” before handing things over to Dave Matthews Band to close out 2025! 

With measures taken to ensure crowd safety implemented and recognized, festival goers were able to breathe a sigh of relief. However, there remains a feeling of inconsistency across the lineup with a notable lack of indie, pop and hip-hop music, three genres that BC used to be known for. While the absence of a Red Stage allowed for more space, it wasn’t hard to notice that crowds in general were smaller than last year’s edition – something that could be easily attributed to a lack of lineup relevancy. Boston has never been seen as a country music focused area and indie/hip-hop/pop genres tend to do very well due to the population of college kids around the city. So, why does Boston Calling keep steering further away from its roots, toward another world in which it can’t seem to find its footing?