After going on hiatus last year, the three-day Gem & Jam EDM festival returns to Tucson this weekend with a full slate of artists from around the country and our own backyard.
The 13th annual festival takes up the Pima County Fairgrounds Friday, Jan. 31, to Sunday, Feb. 2, on four stages that include an indoor stage and one devoted to artists from Arizona, said organizer Josh Pollack, a partner in the festival’s parent company GNJ, LLC.
The event planner’s partners hail from California and Colorado, Pollack said, and have been putting on the festival for the past 14 years. The event was first held downtown then moved to the Slaughterhouse on West Grant Road before relocating to the Pima County Fairgrounds. This will be the third festival held at the fairgrounds, Pollack said.
This year’s lineup includes more than 70 acts from around the country including Tipper, Big Gigantic, The Floozies, and The Flying Skulls, as well as regional acts Desert Dwellers from New Mexico and self-professed ski rockers Tenth Mountain Division out of Boulder, Colorado.
Pollack said they expect as many as 15,000 people will attend over the three days, a number they hope to grow in time.
“Hopefully the festival will continue to grow and expand,” he said, noting that the festival is only taking up a fraction of the fairgrounds.
Gem & Jam is one of two big music festivals in Tucson. The smaller festival Dusk, with a couple dozen artists, brought thousands of fans to downtown for its fourth annual event last October. Gem & Jam is four or five times as big, with about 75 acts spread over the three days.
“I think that Tucson is a really great city for these types of events,” he said.
The festival also features dozens of vendors and artists selling gems, minerals and monster hot dogs from booths throughout the fairgrounds. Many festival-goers reserve camp spots in the 640-acre fairgrounds, turning the event into a music-filled winter staycation.
Gem & Jam is not affiliated with the Tucson Gem & Mineral Show or any of the dozens of gem shows scattered throughout downtown.
But Pollack said they offer shuttle service for festival-goers to the gem shows.
Pollack said Gem & Jam this year will include an art auction, with half the proceeds benefitting Many Mouths One Stomach, the nonprofit arts collective that organizes the annual All Souls Procession.
