The B-52s & Devo Throw One Last Neon-Splattered “Cosmic De-Evolution” Weekend At Hollywood Bowl [Photos/Videos]

If the Cosmic De-Evolution Tour between The B-52s and Devo really is the end of the neon age—the last great mirror-ball mutiny where art-punk, New Wave, and dance-rock crash the same party—then what better place to continue their collective send-off than the Hollywood Bowl? Over two crisp nights in the hills above Los Angeles, two of the most iconic bands to come out of the 1980s fused their intertwining farewells into a single radiant thesis: that the future these bands imagined (smart, weird, ecstatic, subversive) did, in fact, arrive, and it was right there under the Bowl’s arches, still dancing.

The bands’ 11-date co-headline run is so much more than a lap of honor. It’s a handshake across time between two groups who bent pop into something angular and sly, and made the radio safe for freaks and free thinkers. The B-52s’ technicolor surf-sci-fi and Devo’s chrome-plated satire helped birth entire sonic ecosystems (i.e. post-punk, New Wave, art-pop, electro-rock), and their fingerprints are everywhere: in club music’s bones, in indie’s left-turn instincts, in every festival lineup that treats costumes like a second drum kit. The Bowl got the deluxe edition, with two nights of cosmic music under the stars.

Lene Lovich opened both shows like a time traveler freshly tuned, sounding eerily unchanged from her heyday. Her performance was a reminder that the “future shock” voice of the underground never actually ages, but rather keeps getting rediscovered.

If Kraftwerk started the synth-pop factory, Devo began the walkout. The Akron-bred architects of de-evolution hit the stage like a malfunctioning assembly line, full of precision, panic, and punchlines. The narrative wasn’t a setlist so much as a staged argument featuring videos, slogans, and wardrobe shifts, one that kept reasserting their core idea: that systems break people, but art breaks systems.

They opened with “Don’t Shoot (I’m a Man)” through “Peek-A-Boo!” and “That’s Good”, the band toggling between sardonic grins and clenched-jaw urgency. The first costume turn brought the classic energy domes for “Girl U Want” and, of course, “Whip It”. (When a band’s own critique of consumer reflex becomes a consumer reflex… well, that’s Devo’s joke, too.)

A stark Carl Sagan clip expanded the universe on screen before the band re-emerged in yellow jumpsuits for “Uncontrollable Urge” and “Mongoloid”, the late-’70s squall that still sounds like a brighter tomorrow arguing with itself.

Gerald Casale, the band’s co-founder and co-vocalist, asked the Bowl audience if they thought de-evolution is real (the weekend’s most rhetorical question) and the answer arrived in chant form with “Jocko Homo”. Another cutscene begat another uniform, as the band re-emerged in black DEVO tees while Mark Mothersbaugh took a victory lap through the aisles, grinning like the class valedictorian of subversion. By “Smart Patrol/Mr. DNA” and “Gates of Steel”, the band had transformed parody into power, then closed their corporate-anthem/flag-graphic sequence in vinyl vests, spelling out D-E-V-O beneath a fractured “Star-Spangled Banner.”

The band’s abbreviated set closed with “Freedom of Choice”, before Casale shouted out the nationwide “No Kings” marches that had taken place earlier that day. Once again, Devo’s credentials as a subversive outfit were renewed.

Where Devo argues, The B-52s invite listeners to the weirdest, warmest house party on the block. Their Bowl arrival began with a PSA from a campy skeleton with a wig, which included such instructions as “dance your asses off” and “put away your damn cell phones.” It was a mission statement from a band that’s always treated fun as sacred ritual.

The song choices were less about chronology than community. “Cosmic Thing” rang like an affirmation: you survived the late century, now paint it yellow and dance. “Mesopotamia” landed with its familiar wink and Kate Pierson in full, ringing command. “Give Me Back My Man” swung the spotlight to Cindy Wilson, voice elastic and evergreen. From there, the set mapped the band’s own mythology: Athens to New York, punk at their heels, a tour debut of “Deadbeat Club” pointing home with Polaroid clarity; and “Roam” spreading its arms as Kate and Cindy belted out in unison.

By the time “Private Idaho”, “Love Shack”, and “Planet Claire” crashed the runway, the Bowl felt less like an amphitheater and more like a communal rec room stapled to a UFO. “Rock Lobster” sent a costumed crustacean boogieing across the stage and 17,000 people into synchronized absurdity. In 2025, it was proof that joy can still be organized.

The beauty of these Bowl nights was the shared history and vibes between these two iconic bands. Devo distilled dread into wit, asking hard questions with rigid angles and rubber smiles. The B-52s alchemized anxiety into ecstatic inclusion, a confetti cannon for the soul. Together they framed the last gasp of the 20th century (and a lot of the first quarter of the 21st) as a dance performed while poking holes in authority.

The production doubled down on that theme: Devo’s training films and uniform shifts vs. the B-52s’ DIY video montages and technicolor props, one band imploring an interrogation of the machine, the other teaching fans to throw the kind of party that makes machines irrelevant. Either way, the audience left lighter and sharper for it.

Farewells, like fashions, tend to boomerang. The B-52s’ extended goodbye, which started in 2022, has included a Vegas residency and now this coast-to-coast swan song. Devo’s “50 Years of De-Evolution” keeps writing new chapters because the message keeps finding new readers.

These Bowl shows felt definitive not because they were the last in Los Angeles for these bands, but because they were complete. They formed a two-band syllabus on how we got from club basements and art spaces to stadium singalongs without losing the plot.

That said, there’s just a little more party left to throw, with upcoming dates in Charlotte (October 24th), Alpharetta, Georgia (October 25th), Austin (November 1st). and The Woodlands, Texas (November 2nd). After that, the neon baton passes to every act they inspired. But for two perfect nights in Los Angeles, the originators showed the world how it’s done.

Devo – “Girl U Want” – 10/18/25

[Video: Concert Fanatic]