This year’s third annual festival will take place from May 18-20, directly on and next to the beach at the popular destination on the Gulf of Mexico.

Other notable artists playing the event this year include Randy Newman, String Cheese Incident, Mavis Staples, Steve Winwood, Dr. Dog, Skrillex, STS9 and Coheed & Cambria. The Flaming Lips will appear at the festival to perform the entirety of Pink Floyd’s classic Dark Side of the Moon album.

The first Hangout Festival was held in 2010, when it hosted 13,000 to 15,000 attendees per day. By 2011, the festival had grown to the point that ticket sales had to be limited to 35,000 per day, and the official website of the event notes that the cap will be the same this year. The Associated Press reports that the 2011 festival generated around $30 million for the economy in the area around Gulf Shores.

The announcement of this year’s lineup comes just days after the 2011 edition of the festival was named “Best Festival of the Year” at the Pollstar Concert Industry Awards in Los Angeles. In a news release, event founder Shaul Zislin described the award as an “honor.”

“We are humbled that, after only two years since we started the Hangout Music Fest from the ground up, we are being rewarded with ‘Best Festival of the Year,’” he said.

As the above sampling of artists indicates, the festival has again booked an eclectic assortment of artists, as it has come to be known for in previous years. In addition to jam bands like Dave Matthews and String Cheese, the festival also adds industrial artists (Skrillex) and classic performers (Randy Newman), among other genres.

Sting announced that he will join the Dave Matthews Band and indie rock group My Morning Jacket for a cover of “You’re a Big Girl Now,” off Dylan’s 1975 masterpiece Blood on the Tracks. Another collaboration will find alt-country singer-songwriter Lucinda Williams teaming up with Los Angeles punk band Bad Religion to cover “Tryin’ to Get to Heaven” from 1997’s Time Out of Mind.

Although it may not be too much of a stretch to imagine Adele performing a Dylan cover—in this case “To Make You Feel My Love,” also from Time Out of Mind—Ke$ha could seem like a stretch due to the stylistic difference between her music and Dylan’s, though she says this is not necessarily the case.

When the Nashville pop singer recently spoke to Rolling Stone about the project she said, “When you think of me, you wouldn’t think of Bob Dylan. My music is more about going crazy than politics. But he’s a huge influence—he writes his own music and means what he says. I write my own music and I…mean every word I sing.”

Patti Smith will contribute “Drifter’s Escape,” from 1967’s John Wesley Harding, and punk/hardcore band Rise Against will cover the protest classic “Ballad of Hollis Brown.”

The album is set to be released in the United Kingdom on November 21 and the following day in the United States. Amnesty International was formed in London in 1961 and has grown into one of the largest and most well-known human rights organizations working today.

This November, the two guitarists will revive their acoustic set for a pair of shows in New York and Connecticut. The New York City show is a charity concert that will be held at the United Palace Theatre on November 18. Attendees will be able to go to Matthews website and donate the full value of their ticket to the charity of their choice. The Connecticut show will take place the following night at the Oakdale Theatre in Wallingford, Conn.

Matthews was a bartender at “Millers” club in Charlottesville, Va. in the early 1990s when he met and befriended Reynolds, who often played the club with his instrumental band TR3 (Tim Reynolds 3). Reynolds encouraged the shy Matthews to put together a band to perform the songs he had written. Though Reynolds declined the offer to join the band full-time, he often toured with the band and performed acoustic shows with Matthews. In 2008, he joined the Dave Matthews band as a full-time touring lead guitarist.

Live at Luther College debuted at number two on the Billboard 200 album chart and has since been certified platinum. The show was recorded in 1996, and featured many songs from the album Crash, which wasn’t yet available at the time of the performance. With the success of Crash, the acoustic album became a success and introduced many Dave Matthews fans to Tim Reynolds, who often kept his name out of the DMB spotlight.

Since Live at Luther College, the pair has released two more official live albums as a duo, Live at Radio City in 2007, and Live in Las Vegas in 2010.

Joining Neil Young for the weekend celebration will be Beck, Mumford and Sons, Dave Matthews, Eddie Vedder, Arcade Fire and Los Invisibles with Carlos Santana.

Other performers listed on the official site of the concert include Diana Krall, the jazz queen, who will be performing on Saturday and Sunday performers Foo Fighters and Tony Bennett. It appears all the stars are showing up to support the cause near to Young’s heart.

The benefit concert is a fundraiser for the special school that was started in 1986 by Neil Young and his wife Pegi to help Ben, their son. On hand to help launch the inaugural concert were heavy hitters like Crosby, Stills & Nash, Tom Petty and Bruce Springsteen. The show has become a staple for music lovers, which has taken place every year except for 1987.

On September 16, tickets will be going on sale at Live Nation. The concert proceeds will help to assist children with communication needs and disabilities.

All three nights will be headlined by the Dave Matthew Band, just like the other stops on the caravan. In addition Dispatch, which reunited recently, will be performing on Friday as well as Saturday. The remainder of the lineup has not been announced yet. However, given touring commitments and the like, we can assume many of the previously scheduled acts for the festival on Governors Island won’t be performing on Randall’s Island.

In terms of tickets, VIP Packages, GA, 3-day and single day tickets for the canceled Governors Island Dave Matthew Band Caravan will be valid to Randall’s Island corresponding date. In addition, starting on September 3 a public on-sale will be held for non-ticket holders. Refund and complete ticketing information is available at dmbcaravan.com.

Previously, organizers announced that the Dave Matthew Band’s only performances this year would be the Caravan four festivals. Two other Caravan events are scheduled for Atlantic City at Bader Field on June 24-26 and Chicago’s Lakeside on July 8-10.

According to a recent press release, other featured performers for the Governors Island lineup at New York Harbor include David Wax Museum, Vieux Farka Toure, The Head and the Heart, Bela Fleck & the Flecktones, Robert Randolph & the Family Band, Josh Ritter & the Royal City Band, Shorty & Orleans Avenue, Gogol Bordello, The Roots and Dispatch among others

The Washington show bill, which will be the only appearance of the Dave Matthews Band on the West Coast this year, will also feature Lindsay Fuller, The Moondoggies, The Belle Brigade, Blind Pilot, Josh Ritter & the Royal City band, Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeros, Gogol Bordello, John Butler Trio, The Roots and Dispatch.

Like all Caravan festivals, a full set will be played by the Dave Matthews Band each night. The festival will be featuring music from several stages.

On April 29, tickets will be going on sale for the show in New York to the general public. Onsales for the show in Washington will go on sale on May 6. Citi card holders and fan club members of DMB Warehouse will be able to purchase presale tickets. Visit DMBCaravan.com for more details.

Other Chicago acts include Ben Folds, Emmylou Harris, Amos Lee, Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeroes, The Flaming Lips (who will perform the Pink Floyd album “Dark Side of the Moon”), Kid Cudi, O.A.R., Ray LaMontagne, David Gray and many more.

The Atlantic City lineup will include Guster, Grace Potter & the Nocturnals, Warren Haynes Band, Michael Franti & Spearhead, Thievery Corporation, Lee, Dr. Dog, Bassnectar, Damian “Jr. Gong” Marley, O.A.R., The Flaming Lips, Ray Montagne and David Gray among others.

It will be the only Midwest performances for the Dave Matthews band this year. The lineup will also include Gary Clark Jr., Mu’tet from Jeff Coffin, Dumpstaphunk from Ivan Neville, Bobby Long, Mariachi El Bronx, Alberta Cross, Vieux Fark Toure, TR3, Dirty Dozen Brass Band, Blind Pilot, the Wailers, Soulive, Soja, the Jayhawks, Black Dub from Daniel Lanois, Spearhead & Michael Franti, Drive By Truckers, Gomez, The Dap Kings & Sharon Jones, Special Sauce & G. Love, Ben Folds, Emmylou Harris, Amos Lee, the Magnetic Zeros & Edward Sharpe, the Flaming Lips’ performance of “Dark Side of the Moon” by Pink Floyd, Kid Cudi, O.A.R., Ray LaMontagne and David Gray. The Saturday Summer Camp Stage will features artists who will also be performing at Summer Camp Music Festival this year. Special performances will also be featured at Lakeside Caravan from Stefan Lessard and Carter Beauford, who are members of the Dave Matthews Band, along with an acoustic set from Tim Reynolds and Dave Matthews. More acts will be announced shortly along with the release of a complete festival schedule.

On March 9, the first Caravan fests of four was announced. It will take place at Bader Field, which is the old site for Atlantic City’s Municipal Airport, on June 24-26. The shows have been conceived to be destination events where fans can come to the Dave Matthews Band instead of the band visiting 60 or more cities as part of a traditional tour. Announcements for August and September Caravans are still to come.

Tickets for the event in Chicago, as they were in Atlantic City, will only be made available in the form of three day passes. A ticket request period online for the festival in Chicago starts on April 7. Requests can be made by visiting warehouse.davematthewsband.com. A presale for Citi card members will start on April 11.

According to the Warehouse fan website, The DMB is going to perform at four “mini-festivals” later this year that are being touted as the Dave Matthews Band Caravan.

According to the group itself that gave a comment to Billboard.biz, “2011 is our 20th anniversary as a band and we want to celebrate by playing music together. While we are still taking the year off from touring, we have decided to plan four multi-day, multi-artist music events that will take place this summer. We will be sending out save the date emails and announcing more information soon but we wanted to share the news with our fans first.”

As of right now, the group has only indicated where and when the 2 first mini-festivals will be. This is probably a move to allow their plans time to make travel arrangements. So far, the two events will be held on June 24-26 and on July 8-10. The first one will be located in the Northeast/Mid-Atlantic area and the second will be located in the Midwest area. The two other events are slated for August and September, but the specific dates are unknown. DMB is going to be the headlining act for each concert. The group intends to release more information soon.

During the years of 2000 through 2009, DMB has made more money than any other band in the world, based on information from Billboard Boxscore. In 2010 alone, they make in excess of $62 million and attracted over 1 million fans, so deciding not to tour this year is a huge decision. In December, 2009, Dave Matthews hinted at the idea that DMB could play live together in 2011.

Matthews said, “Next year, although we’re not going to hop on the same train of buses and drive around North America, I have no doubt that we’re going to get together, whether it’s in front of people or whether it’s in some room somewhere, and make music together, because this is my second family.”

Apparently, they made the choice to include an audience…a very big audience.

Pre-orders of “Live in New York” come with “The Big Apple Bonus Disc” featuring four songs performed at the Citi Field July 16 show.  Pre-orders will run until November 5.

On November 2 the Dave Matthews Band is launching their Fall US tour in Buffalo, NY at HSBC Arena.  The next evening, on November 3, the band will make their first appearance ever in Uniondale, NY at Nassau Coliseum.  The band during the tour will also play back to back two night stands.  On November 9-10 they will be at TD Garden in Boston.  On November 12-13 they will play at Madison Square Garden in New York City.  Tickets are currently on sale for the tour.  It will wrap up with two shows on November 19 and 20 in Charlottesville, VA at the John Paul Jones Arena.

The new slate of dates will have the band heading to the east coast in November which includes two day gigs both in NYC’s Madison Square Garden and in their home turf in Virginia as the tour’s last stop.

Meanwhile, the band will continue to hit the road tomorrow, September 10, in Woodlands, TX as they reach the homestretch of the west coast and Midwest leg of their tour, which will wrap up with a two-nighter in Chicago on September 17 and 18.

The band is also scheduled to hit overseas with their lone international gig on October 10 in Brazil.

At present, advance tickets are initially exclusively available to members of the official DMB fan club through its website, while regular tickets will be publicly available starting on September 24.

The band continues to do the road work in support of their latest release, “Big Whiskey and the GrooGrux King” which came out last year and peaked at no.1 at the Billboard 200.  Last spring, the band announced via their website that they’ll be taking the entire 2011 and the first half of 2012 off as they go on break from the touring scene.

2010 Dave Matthews Concert Tour
September 2010
10 – The Woodlands, TX – The Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion
11 – Dallas, TX – Superpages.com Center
14 – Omaha, NE – Qwest Center Omaha
15 – Saint Paul, MN – Xcel Energy Center
17, 18 – Chicago, IL – Wrigley Field

October 2010
10 – Sao Paulo, Brazil – Fazenda Maeda

November 2010
2 – Buffalo, NY – HSBC Arena
3 – Uniondale, NY – Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum
5 – Albany, NY – Times Union Center
6 – Philadelphia, PA – Wells Fargo Center
9, 10 – Boston, MA – TD Garden
12, 13 – New York, NY – Madison Square Garden Arena
16 – Atlanta, GA – Philips Arena
17 – Charleston, SC – North Charleston Coliseum
19, 20 – Charlottesville, VA – John Paul Jones Arena