Four days, dozens of acts, and one Daft Punk tribute by a full orchestra – Rifflandia’s 15th edition is anything but routine.
Organizers unveiled the 2025 lineup Wednesday morning, confirming a four-day run in September with a genre-bending mix of acts. Alessia Cara, Public Enemy, Descendents, Maribou State, Sleater-Kinney, NxWorries, The Dead South, and Walk Off The Earth are among the names slated to perform at the Matullia Lands at Rock Bay from Sept. 11-14.
Also announced: a Daft Punk tribute performance by the Victoria Symphony, arguably one of the festival’s boldest bookings to date.
“It’s something I’ve personally wanted to do for a long time,” Nick Blasko, president and CEO of Rifflandia Entertainment Co., told Victoria News. “It’s exciting for us to be able to include a classical performance like that – it really expands the edges of what the festival can be.”
The 2025 edition marks the second straight year Rifflandia will take place entirely at the Rock Bay site. After experimenting with a two-weekend, two-venue format in 2023, organizers scaled back in 2024 to a single site and single weekend – changes Blasko said were driven by both logistics and audience experience.
This year’s return to a four-day format marks another pivot, and the additional breathing room allowed organizers to be more deliberate in their programming.
“We had a little more space and time to work with this year because we added the Thursday,” said Blasko. “A lot of these artists are ones we’ve tried to book for years – it’s usually a multi-year journey to get them. So when it all comes together, it feels like a small miracle.”
The lineup leans heavily on diversity, something Rifflandia has gradually made a bigger part of its identity. It’s not unusual to see folk, hip-hop, electronic and rock acts playing back-to-back sets – and that unpredictability is by design.
“I call it the tight turns of programming,” Blasko said. “You might have a folk artist followed by a hip-hop act, then an electronic set. That’s part of the adventure. And this year, it includes classical too.”
Rifflandia was first staged in 2008 and has since weathered a pandemic, a volatile music industry, and a constantly shifting cultural landscape. Blasko credits the festival’s longevity to its values, its willingness to adapt – and its audience.
“We’re crossing multiple generations now,” he said. “You have people who started coming in their 20s and are now in their 40s, showing up with their kids. That kind of community doesn’t just happen. It builds year after year.”
This year’s edition will be the 15th festival since Rifflandia launched. And after 18 years in the game, organizers say the vision remains the same.
“We just try to stay true to what matters to us – diverse music, taking programming risks, and reflecting the fabric of Victoria,” Blasko said. “And hopefully giving people a few great days they’ll remember.”
Tickets for the festival officially go on sale on Friday, May 9.
