Gexa Energy Pavilion sold 85,145 tickets to concerts, including Mumford & Sons, in the first half of 2016
Photo by Brian Ullrich
It's been a good year thus far for Gexa Energy Pavilion. Dallas' open-air venue ranks as one of the top amphitheaters in the world, based on the number of tickets sold in the first six months of 2016.
According to Pollstar, Gexa's ticket sales totaled 85,145 for concerts from January 1 through June 30, good enough for a No. 12 ranking. The eclectic lineup in the first half of the year included Mumford & Sons, Dave Matthews Band, Daryl Hall & John Oates, and more.
The Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion, outside of Houston, ranks No. 1 in the world, with 203,092 ticket sales in the first half of the year. The Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles; Waldbühne Berlin in Germany; Red Rocks Amphitheatre in Morrison, Colorado; and BB&T Pavilion in Camden, New Jersey round out the top five.
Other Texas venues on the list include Austin360 Amphitheater in Austin (No. 42) and Whitewater Amphitheater in New Braunfels (No. 48).
Upcoming shows at Gexa include the sold-out Dixie Chicks concert and Gwen Stefani in August.
As winners of the Tiny Desk Contest, Cure for Paranoia will record their own Tiny Desk concert and go on tour.
Few live recording studios or musical web series have the cultural sway of NPR's Tiny Desk, and a Dallas band is poised to make an impactful debut: Cure For Paranoia, an alternative hip-hop project by rapper Cameron McCloud and producers Tomahawk Jonez and Jay Analo, has won the high-stakes annual Tiny Desk Contest for 2026.
They'll record their official Tiny Desk show "soon," the announcement by NPR says.
Winning the concert also means Cure for Paranoia is going on tour. The only Texas stop will be at Emo's Austin on June 24.
Tiny Desk is known for platforming both niche and majorly successful artists — NPR posted a new Foo Fighters set on YouTube on May 13 — for stripped-down sets that are literally played behind former All Things Considered director Bob Boilen's old desk. (Fun fact for Texans: Tiny Desk was created because folk artist Laura Gibson was disappointed with the sound at her South by Southwest show in Austin in 2008, and she wanted a redo.)
Most artists who appear on Tiny Desk more than 15 years later are already well-known, at least in their specific circles. But the Tiny Desk Contest, which launched in 2015, helps a growing group of newer, unsigned artists get their foot in the door. Contestants record one video of them performing a single song behind a desk, and a jury of radio staff and musicians chooses their favorite.
In their audition video, Cure for Paranoia gathered 11 musicians around a truly tiny desk and in front of downtown Dallas' iconic gigantic eyeball sculpture. They played the song "No Brainer," a frenetic track that starts with clever boasts and becomes a criticism of racism in the United States.
McCloud, a pre-school teacher, is known independently of Cure for Paranoia for rapping to his social media following about politics and current events. Some of those lyrics made it into "No Brainer." He says he started the group because he found that music was more helpful than medication for coping with bipolar depression and paranoid schizophrenia.
Alex Marrero, host of the Austin-based KUTX show Horizontes, was one of the judges this year. He was impressed with the visuals in Cure for Paranoia's audition.
“When this popped up, I immediately felt something different," he wrote in a blurb for the announcement. "It just jumped out. The visuals were super cool and creative, BUT I could still totally envision them bringing the heat behind the Desk.”
Madison McFerrin, jazz vocalist and daughter of the famous singer Bobby McFerrin, was one of the musical judges.
"Cure For Paranoia’s energy is infectious, fresh and distinctly theirs — exactly what you want in a Contest winner!" she wrote.
McCloud's post on Instagram announcing the group's win has only been up for three hours at the time of this article's publication, and it already has more than 8,000 likes. The YouTube audition has garnered 74,000 views.
