Remi Wolf @ WeHo Pride's Outloud Music Festival 2025

Lizzo, Remi Wolf, Kim Petras, Paris Hilton, Honey Dijon, Tommy Genisis,  and a whole bunch of Drag Queens sashayed across the stages at WeHo Pride's OutLoud Music Fest last weekend to kick off Pride month 2025! Last year the event went out with a big bang as LGBTQA+ iconic superstar Kylie Minogue closed out the show, so needless to say there were some big shoes to fill this year. 

Remi Wolf @ WeHo Pride’s Outloud June 1st, 2025
photo by Nikki DeMartini

Less than one month before the festivities in WeHo this year, JJLA annouced that due to medical reasons Lil Nas X would no longer be playing Outloud Music Festival. 

The Sunday night headliner slated to close out the show experienced partial facial paralysis which is a symptom of Bell’s Palsy. The onset of Bells Palsy can be caused by stress. On top of headling a music festival, Lil Nas X  is a homosexual black man in American during the current Trump administration, it's not hard to understand why might be stressed. The reason and diagnosis of his face paralysis is not clear.

 

Though a stretch from the sparkly pop, queer icon status sensations Outloud attendees have grown accustom to seeing headline the show, the soul-funk pop songstress Remi Wolf stepped up to the occasion. She's made a name for herself in the indie music scene yet is a rising star in the queer comunity: Remi Wolf's counter culture style and pyschedelic sound would offer some diversity to the inclusionary event. 

The 29 year old singer/songwriter from Palo Alto, California took to the stage half an hour after Hilton hotel hieress turned reality TV star turned DJ turned singer Paris Hilton. A flamboyant juxtoposition to round-out Outloud 2025, if you will, on the first official night of Pride month this year. 

Remi and her full band were a few songs into the set by the time I made it to the main stage crowd which had dwidled down considerably since Paris's set. I often wonder how artsists feel performing to smaller crowds in bigger settings and like think they're humbled to be playing to loyal fans as well as some potenial new ones. Though admittedly not the most familiar with her repotire, Remi Wolf has been on my live show bucket list for a little bit. A bit of a lull in my busy work day at WeHo Pride meant I could see what the buzz is about for myself. 

Remi Wolf @ WeHo Pride’s Outloud June 1st, 2025
photo by Nikki DeMartini

Almost as soon as setting eyes on them while they were playing the "Frog Rock" I sensed something was off. Remi was working the stage while singing but she wasn't working the crowd. Then by mid song she was gone leaving her band to finish the song. It was unclear to me if this is how the song goes or if it was a special live version or if it was something else entirely. The answer came as soon as a teary eyed Remi Wolf reappeared on stage visably and vocally unhappy. The singer's in-ears were not working properly which meant she couldn't hear herself while she performed. She was met with uplifting chants of her first name and encouraging applause before she qued the next song.  

Admist dropping a few F-bombs in frusteration she proceeded to rip the in-ears out, telling the crowd she would do her best to carry on with the rest of the show while also graciously thanking all of us for being there. Explaining the situation as her "worst fucking nightmare" she told the crowd that the next song "Is kind of about this. Sometimes you can feel like hot, goddamn shit and sometimes you can feel like the most ugly beast in the fucking world and that's ok because that's the duality of this fucking life we've been given." The song was "Sexy Villian" off her 2021 debut album, Juno. 

Remi Wolf @ WeHo Pride’s Outloud June 1st, 2025
photo by Nikki DeMartini

How brave of her. What we witnessed was an artist being real with the people there to experience her craft first hand. That frustration was pain she felt for not being able to give us her best and not having any control over it. It's unclear if her in-ears not working was a technical mishap from the festival side or not but from my perspective, I thought she sounded fine. It also wasn't lost on me that right before her, Paris Hilton was so obviously lipsyncing her entire set with no major hiccups, yet a singer and a live band had different fate. The headliner closing out the festival no less. Not to discredit Paris and the fun had watching her performance but sorry not sorry, Paris Hilton is no artist and Remi Wolf is; furthermore, she's probably had to work harder and sacrafice a lot more to get to where she is than Paris ever will. 

I saw a few folks singing along to "Sexy Villian" and the front lady was right, there probably isn't a more apropos song in her catelog for that moment we all shared that night.

Once the song was over, I slowly started to make my back to work but was stopped in my tracks when my ears heard the oh so familiar start of Fleetwood Mac's, "Dreams". Remi Wolf was taking a stab at a great and I was all for it. Again Remi Wolf showed folks at Outloud just how brave she is: it wasn't the best and it wasn't the worst.  Another woman singing the lyrics "women they will come and they will go" at a Gay Pride celebration was another thing in the few minutes of the Remi Wolf set I saw that wasn't lost on me. Remi Wolf does indentify bisexual after all. And on that note, it was time for me to get back to work. 

In another uncontrolable twist of fate, Remi Roo as I like to call Remi Wolf's Insanely Fire 1970's Pool Party Superjam at Bonnaroo, featuring Outloud 2025' Friday night soft open headliner Maren Morris, was suppose to happen in THIS tent on Saturday June 14th. Unfortunately the beloved festival in Manchester, Tennesse was canceld for the third time in the last five years (since promoter Superfly's involvement with the festival ended and became souly a Live Nation and  C3 Presents  show) on Friday the 13th. 

It is said that things happen in threes...
Hopefully some good luck is heading Remi's way soon. I for one hope I'm lucky enough to catch a one off show of hers sometime soon.