Photo Gallery: Opening Night of Music in the Park

On Friday night, Music in the Park returned to San Jose’s Plaza de Cesar Chavez with a diverse range of rockers. 

Following a moving land acknowledgement from the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe, Tommy Stinson, founding bassist of Minneapolis punk upstarts the Replacements, serenaded the crowd with a set of whiskey-stained acoustic ballads. 

Comedian and TV host W. Kamau Bell introduced the next group as the greatest band in the world “in my opinion.” The boundary shattering Living Colour band was in rare form, celebrating drummer William Calhoun’s birthday and shredding through a setlist of classics. 

Finally, alt-rock hitmakers Soul Asylum gave the audience a career worth of material, with selections from 2020’s Hurry Up and Wait, back through the ‘80s, plus one “Runaway Train.”