Head to these mesmerising live shows: A bunch of must-see concerts, gigs and music-soaked soirees are coming to Brisbane this weekend, and we are primed and ready for some live tunes. Valley party palace The Zoo will host Oasis tribute band Definitely Oasis on Thursday, Mini Skirt, Girl and Girl, Square and Doggie Heaven for the Colossus 4th Birthday on Thursday, Arches on Saturday and Bed By Nine on Sunday, an event that showcases some of Brisbane’s best local emerging artists paired with delectable pizza and sangria combos from Zoopreme Pizzeria. Scintillating showcase Matador will be hitting The Tivoli this weekend, while The Princess Theatre welcomes Sunnyboys on Friday and some of the UK’s biggest drag stars on Sunday. You can go your own way at The Triffid on Friday, which is once again hosting Dreams – Fleetwood Mac and Stevie Nicks Show on Friday, Biscuit Factory featuring INFEKT, Eliminate and OLIVERSE on Saturday, and Eurovision favourites Voyager on Sunday. Spacey Jane is coming to Fortitude Music Hall for three huge shows from Wednesday to Friday, while indie pop trio AJR is taking the stage on Sunday. Gang of Youths will headline a superstar line-up of homegrown heroes at Sandstone Point Hotel on Saturday for A More Perfect Union, while Felons Barrel Hall will see Those Folk deliver joyful melodies on Thursday, Romero perform pop-punk bangers on Friday, and Birman Randy + The Ivory Street Preachers serve up jazz and soul beats on Sunday.

Have a purr-fect day at this pet expo: Bring your furry friends for a day of fun at Pet Expo at Ripley Town Centre this Saturday. Get your paws on the best in pet products, information and services at an array of market stalls that are guaranteed to get tails wagging. You can also join in on activities and workshops for both humans and pets, including live music and face painting for the kids. Get your pup involved in free pawcasso art, the doggy ball pit and bubble fun! Keep an eye out for Cluedo the Qld Police Dog mascot who will also be making his way around the expo, as well as Gumtree Greys, which is on the lookout for greyhound foster carers. For more info, head here.

Fly high at this massive kite festival: The Brisbane Kite Festival will be a fantastic day for the whole family with the most spectacular kites flying high over the skies of Brisbane. Families can bring their own kites or buy them on the day and join in the kite-flying fun. There will also be food stalls, rides and face painting. The best part? Entry is free!

Explore the bayside ‘burbs of Sandgate and Shorncliffe: Since 2010, Brisbane Open House has opened the doors of some of the most iconic structures in the city. After having to pivot in 2020 and not being able to go ahead in 2021, it’s a welcome return for our favourite annual architecture-focused festival. This year sees some exciting new activations kick off including the introduction of Villages of Brisbane, held on Sunday August 21 in and around the bayside suburbs of Sandgate and Shorncliffe. Attendees will be treated to a program full of picture-perfect buildings (including Sacred Heart Church, Shorncliffe Railway Station, Sandgate Museum, Sandgate Town Hall and more), guided walking tours and a brain-tingling speaker series. To find out more please visit the Brisbane Open House website.

Celebrate the legacy of Australian art song at this concert: Females will be at the forefront of Opera Queensland’s spellbinding new show Homegrown, which will take over the Opera Queensland Studio on Friday August 19 and Saturday August 20. Presented in partnership with Brisbane Music Festival, this two-night song spectacular has been exclusively composed by Australian women – talk about girl power! Homegrown is also part of Opera Queensland’s Studio Series, a selection of intimate concerts where singers can connect with audiences in a more personal way. Recent Opera Queensland Young Artist and starry songstress Rebecca Cassidy will take the stage with gifted pianist Alex Raineri to present an entrancing program celebrating the legacy of Australian art song, with performances that explore themes of nature, motherhood and a deep spiritual connection to place. To grab a ticket to Homegrown, head on over to the Opera Queensland website.

Catch Yo! Mafia at Treasury Brisbane: Helping you to level up your weekend is Treasury Brisbane, which has got a ripper roster of headline entertainment locked in. The best part? It’s live and free at LiveWire 24/7 Sports Bar. This Friday welcomes Yo! Mafia to the inner-city venue A renowned sneaker freak and hip-hop junkie, YO! MAFIA has been killing them on the wheels of steel for a whopping 20 years. She has solidified her place as one of Australia’s premier Party/Open Format DJs, possessing an incredible ability to blend and mix a variety of genres into one big party set. Her signature genre-smashing sets have seen her named Official Hit FM/ Fox FM’s RNB Fridays Live Tour DJ while also supporting a wide range of A-list artists. Before you don your best dancing fit, learn more here.

Take in live tunes at this music-filled picnic: Grab a blanket, picnic basket and bring a group of mates to enjoy an afternoon of Gigs & Picnics in The City this Saturday from 12:00–4:00 pm. You’ll find food trucks and live music at this free monthly event in the City Botanic Gardens. Think mellow jazz sounds, modern reggae and dub vibes, gypsy swing and more, against a beautiful backdrop of the City Botanic Gardens!

Cure your cravings at this festival celebrating bacon: All things bacon will be celebrated at the fourth annual BaconFest in Kingaroy from August 19–21. While the festival celebrates everything porcine, it also highlights the importance of buying 100 percent Australian pork product. Discover the joy of bacon fries and bacon ice-cream at a two-day food market featuring specialist food trucks, attend a bacon-eating competition, or learn from the best in the business at cooking demonstrations and masterclasses. Bacon lovers with a flair for fashion may want to enter a BaconFest pinup pageant or Beard of BaconFest contest conducted by popular pinup icon Bettie Butcher. There’s even a Rasher’s Rush cycling and running event along the South Burnett Rail Trail and special activities for little piglets with a corner of the festival devoted to kids. For more information, visit the BaconFest website.

Join Brisbane artist Rob Rek in his bird-filled garden of art this weekend: Calling all art lovers! This Friday, you are invited to join renowned Brisbane artist Rob Rek in his latest garden of art, Jardin D’Amour, at Portside Wharf. Step into a multi-sensory menagerie where his award-winning delicate bird portraits mingle among large scale abstract botanical paintings and other subjects of ethereal beauty. In this exhibition the artist will debut his unique fusion artworks – reworked giclee bird prints adorned with his signature floral motifs, crowns and other graffiti decals. Special guest Manko, an exotic blue and gold Macaw, will be in the gallery to gladly pose with guests for selfies. To register your attendance, head to the Eventbrite website.

Watch Queensland Symphony Orchestra show off superfamous tunes: You don’t need to know your Mozart from your Beethoven to enjoy classical music, and Queensland Symphony Orchestra is putting on one heck of a show to prove just this! The sensational music ensemble will be bringing out the big guns to deliver Superfamous, a concert full of the most iconic and beloved classical music numbers. Expect spine-tingling magic, jaw-dropping grandeur and a guaranteed good time with music from Mozart, John Williams and Beethoven – all headed up by esteemed conductor Guy Noble. Look forward to Debussy’s dreamy Clair de Lune, Tchaikovsky’s dramatic Swan Lake, the poignant Gabriel’s Oboe from The Mission, and so much more. You’re sure to recognise these famous pieces from the big screen or pop culture, and now you can experience them live on stage. Book your tickets now on the Queensland Symphony Orchestra website for a dose of marvellous music and a glamorous night out.

Traverse through a 700-sqm mirror maze: Brisbane Powerhouse is set to come alive with colour, creativity and culture this year as part of its new outdoor events program. The first exciting activation set to make waves at the precinct is installation artist Keith Courtney’s mesmerising mirror maze Kaleidoscope, an immersive artwork of glass, steel, mirrors and moving prisms that visitors can traverse through. The eye-popping installation is taking the traditional funfair attraction, a house of mirrors, and turning it on its head. A sparkling crystal palace by day, Kaleidoscope uses a colour field of ever-changing light to both treat and disorientate the senses once the sun sets. Kaleidoscope will take residence on the riverside Performance Lawn at Brisbane Powerhouse from August 12 to October 3, with up to 25 sessions daily. Tickets are $16.50 per person and can be purchased on the Brisbane Powerhouse website.

Enjoy some free live tunes: Sit back, relax and treat your ears to some live tunes at Sounds by Starlight at Westfield Chermside this August. The Dome will be beautifully lit up, while an array of Brisbane’s best classic pop, jazz and swing musicians fill the air with groove-worthy songs. Think Elvis, Aretha Franklin, Billy Joel, Ella Fitzgerald and much more! This weekend will welcome the Jazz Quintet and roaming LED performers on Thursday, The Mood Music Swing Band on Friday and the 10-piece UQ Big Band on Saturday. Plus, Westfield Plus members can get their faces painted for free under the Dome while enjoying the music. Hungry folk can indulge in a delicious dinner from one of Chermside’s many restaurants, including Casa Cibo, El Camino, Gun Shop Café, Kinn+Derm, Little Singapore, Betty’s Burgers, Momo Chicken & Beer, Hong Kong Lane and many more. To learn more, head to the Westfield Chermside website. 

Gather your culture-loving gang and head to the Gold Coast for BLEACH* Festival: The Gold Coast’s much-loved contemporary arts festival is back for its 11th iteration in 2022! Get ready to experience a captivating array of art, live music, dance, performance and culinary events at BLEACH* Festival. Running from Thursday August 11 until Sunday August 21, BLEACH* is bringing more than 233 artists, 94 performers and 36 events to four main hubs across the Gold Coast. Attendees can expect 11 days of pulsating performance, contrasting stories of grand spectacle with the intimate moments that underscore a contemporary Gold Coast. To check out the full program, head to the BLEACH* Festival website.

Check out this nature-inspire exhibition: From August 3–31, art lovers can take their peepers on a cultural journey with help from breathtaking art pop-up The Love of Life. Created by three talented local Brisbane artists, Mabina Alaka, Ken Kikkawa and Hiroaki Eba, the installation was inspired by QAGOMA’s thread-filled exhibition Chiharu Shiota: The Soul Trembles. The exhibition combines a number of dazzling elements including live florals, clay and fabric creations that pay tribute to nature and utilise traditional Japanese techniques – you’ll be able to find man-made orchid trees using sphagnum moss and rainforest frogs crafted from clay. The Love of Life is open to the public Monday to Sunday from 7:00 am to 8:00 pm. Go have a gander now! If you’re feeling thirsty, head upstairs to Tenya Japanese Restaurant where you can try the limited-edition ‘The Love of Life’ cocktail, available for the month of August.

Catch Queensland Theatre’s newest production: Coming to the Bille Brown Theatre from August 13 to September 3, The Almighty Sometimes follows the story of Anna (played by Melissa Kahraman), a young woman who was diagnosed as a child with mental illness. Now 18, Anna has long been on a cocktail of prescription pills and she wants to know what life is like without medication. Penned by Australian playwright Kendall Feaver, directed by Daniel Evans and starring a super-talented array of actors, this multi-award-winning play will pull at your heartstrings while highlighting the important issue of mental health – especially amongst young people. Seriously captivating and with sprinkles of humour, The Almighty Sometimes is a must-see! To grab a ticket, head to the Queensland Theatre website.

Put on your glass slippers for this magical show: Rodgers + Hammerstein’s Cinderella is taking over QPAC! This huge production features incredible orchestrations, jaw-dropping transformations and all the moments you love – the pumpkin, the glass slipper, the masked ball and more – plus some surprising new twists. Be transported as you rediscover some of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s most beloved songs, including ‘In My Own Little Corner’, ‘Impossible/It’s Possible’ and ‘Ten Minutes Ago’ in this hilarious and romantic experience for anyone who’s ever had a dream. Get your tickets at the QPAC website.

Be amazed by this part show, part bar: If you like your cocktails served with a side of enchantment and neon-lit charm, then pull up a seat at the Maho Magic Bar and prepare for a night that will leave you bewitched. Straight from the streets of Tokyo (and with a stop off on the Gold Coast), the Magic Makers from Maho Magic Bar are finally coming to Brisbane for a limited time and are ready to serve up delicious drinks and mystifying magic tricks. From Wednesday to Sunday for a strictly limited season, lovers of magic can settle in for a 60-minute performance session at the bar, sipping on a menu of curated authentic Japanese drinks while being wowed by Japan’s best close-up magicians. Head here to secure your spot at the bar before it disappears before your eyes.

Drink up this champagne-soaked cabaret: Go digging in your wardrobe and free your most sparkly outfit from the dark confines of hardly-ever-wear, as Blanc de Blanc Encore is shimmying its way back into our city as part of Brisbane Festival’s 2022 early event program. You can expect the usual suspects to turn up at its new Northshore home, Twilight Electric, including aerialists, comedians, singers and dancers, all who have performed around the world to adoring crowds. This is one Gatsby-esque party that’s worth your presence. Secure your seat at this hedonistic hub by visiting the Twilight Electric website.

Indulge your senses at this bottomless wine and high cheese experience: Few phrases get us as excited as ‘bottomless wine’ and ‘truffle-infused cheese’. Both are on offer at La Valle this month, as the Fortitude Valley wine bar hosts an indulgent fromage and vino-centric series every Saturday. This weekend, guests will be able to gorge on a tiered cheese tower (loaded with sweet and savoury truffle-infused morsels) while enjoying two hours of bottomless wine for only $55 per person. The High Cheese tower will boast truffle and fontina cheese arancini balls, truffle whipped mascarpone focaccia, house made truffle brie slices, and four-cheese croquettes with truffle aioli. The offer is available every Saturday in July, with seatings from 11:00 am, 12:00 pm and 1:00 pm. More details and bookings can be found on the La Valle website.

Explore a hidden underwater world in this immersive experience: Prepare to deep dive into an enchanting undersea world as a new bucket-list-worthy experience is swimming into our city this month. Love Lust Lost is the latest production from theatre collective Broad Encounters, the same folks who brought the Edgar Allan Poe-inspired theatre experience A Midnight Visit to Brisbane in 2021. Guests can expect to once again be transported to an otherworldly dreamscape, where they can discover 38 different spaces and a cast of seven stellar performers. These rooms will be filled with everything from song and spoken word to dance, circus and film – and a whole lot of skin. Oh, and we’ve heard that there’s a secret bar submerged somewhere in the experience, so keep an eye out on your escapade if you’re feeling thirsty. Want to dip your toes in Love Lust Lost’s water? Tickets are on sale now online, with shows kicking off from July 13.

Experience the magic of Disney coming to Brisbane in this enchanting exhibition: Fans of Mickey, Minnie, Elsa, Anna and everyone in between are sure to adore Queensland Museum’s newest exhibition, Disney: The Magic of Animation. This kid- and adult-friendly exhibition will draw back the curtain on almost 100 years of the Walt Disney Animation Studios, revealing the magic and hard work behind scenes of your favourite animated films. From pencil to paper and now computer-generated wonder, visitors will be able to take a step inside some timeless scenes from their favourite movies and discover how animators use colour to express emotions, and the technical skills of crafting character and storytelling to breathe life into the studio’s memorable stories and characters. To grab your tickets, head to the Queensland Museum website.

Check out this spellbinding solo showcase from Chiharu Shiota: Currently on display at QAGOMA, The Soul Trembles is the largest solo exhibition of thread-weaving artist Chiharu Shiota’s work to date – and it’s an art-filled ‘gram-worthy adventure, to say the least. Best known for her mammoth installations featuring millions of black, white and red threads, Chiharu creates works that express the intangible experiences of life – memories, dreams, anxiety and silence. The exhibition will highlight Chiharu’s practice across large-scale installations, sculptures, video performance, photography and drawing. In other words, this is one immersive exhibition that must be seen to be believed. To purchase a timed ticket, head to the QAGOMA website.

Discover jewellery designer Margot McKinney’s World of Wonder: Currently on at Museum of Brisbane, World of Wonder: Margot McKinney is a mesmerising celebration of the brand that is Margot McKinney, as well as the inspirations behind Margot’s designs – from Queensland’s coral reefs to the rich colours found on safari in Tanzania. You’ll be able to set your eyes upon a treasure chest of jewels – from magnificent opals and eye-catching pearls to rare, exotic gems like blue tanzanite, lilac amethyst and pink tourmalines. To learn more about this eye-catching exhibition, pop over to the Museum of Brisbane website. If you really want to level up your experience, pull up a chair at the World of Wonder High Tea and Tour.  In this exclusive experience, you will be taken on a guided tour of the sparkling exhibition, World of Wonder: Margot McKinney, before returning to MoB’s jewel-toned Dome Lounge for a luxe high-tea experience.

Try out this pop-up immersive experience: Brisbane’s most ‘grammable experience – Imaginaria – has extended its run! This stunning immersive play experience combines audio-visual art, inflatable architecture, light installations and futuristic gamification suitable for all ages. Visitors are invited to step inside, slip off their shoes and engage with AI projections, sensor-triggered LED waves, giant silk parachute canopies, cosmic gardens, an anti-gravity sunset, an electronic hall of mirrors and a digital wishing well that whispers your greatest desires. Ready to step into a world of mind-blowing visual excess? You can grab your tickets to Imaginaria now through Ticketmaster.

Shop up a storm at these weekend markets: If you’re eager to stroll through some stalls and stock up on some fresh fruit and veg, be sure check out these markets happening – Saturday Fresh Market, Riverside Markets, Kelvin Grove Village Market, Jan Powers Farmers Markets, Davies Park Market, Carseldine Markets and the Redcliffe Markets. For delicious dinnertime eats, Eat Street Northshore is on for your snacking pleasure on Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights.