2025 Impact 50 Honoree: Paul Tollett

PAUL TOLLETT
President & CEO
Goldenvoice

COACHELLA COMEBACK: Lady Gaga, Green Day, Post Malone Silence Any Doubters.
DON’T BE CRUEL: GV Continues Development of Niche Genre Fests.

Largely considered the bellwether North American multi-genre festival and official kick-off to music festival season, Coachella roared back in a big way in 2025, silencing any doubts or naysayers pointing to last year’s event selling out slower than usual or losing any hype. Led by a slam-dunk reemergence of Lady Gaga as one of the world’s biggest headliners, this year’s event continues to show the two-weekend SoCal shindig is capable of morphing and evolving while remaining one of the “it” festivals that somehow manages to be all things to all music fans, from discovery to current trends and anchored by the world’s biggest music stars.

A new addition debuting in 2024 was the Goldenvoice hosted Surf Club. Hosted at the Palm Springs Surf Club again in 2025, the festival featured DJ sets from artists like Rico Nasty and Sara Landry and professional surf competitions in a giant wave pool.
Meanwhile, Stagecoach, the country sister event to Coachella that started in 2007, continues to both ride and guide the explosion of country music while adding crossover appeal with fun sets from T-Pain, Nelly, Sammy Hagar and Shaboozey (who also played Coachella), proving country is more than a music genre.

At the other end of the Goldenvoice pool was dark wave music at Cruel World Festival at Pasadena’s Brookside grounds on 26 acres adjacent to The Rose Bowl. Tollett described the May 17 outing as the most ambitious yet, with expanded stages and a diverse lineup, including New Order and Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds. In all, this year’s “Gothella” included 35 artists across four stages with an estimated attendance of 35,000.

Other recent additions to the Goldenvoice festival portfolio include reggae fest Cali Vibes, 88 Rising-partnered Head In The Clouds, electronic festival Portola Music Festival, millennial-leaning Just Like Heaven, and Tyler the Creator’s Camp Flog Gnaw Carnival.

Goldenvoice, an AEG subsidiary, also owns and operates several music venues, including the Fonda Theatre, El Rey Theatre, Shrine Auditorium, Frost Amphitheater, The Novo and others.