Hot August Music Festival just released a strong lineup including some of our favorite national and regional talents. Look no further than Thievery Corporation. They are one of my favorite bands to see live, particularly at festivals. They thrive in the live setting, taking you across the globe in just a couples hours with their mind-bending lounge music. This large group of Thieves truly understand the art of live concert performance.
Then there is Joe Russo’s Almost Dead…let’s face it… Joe Russo’s Almost Dead is arguably one of the best Dead cover projects ever. If you’re like me, you’ll see them any time, any where.
The rest of the lineup is stacked. Absolutely no fillers here. We have three great electrified string bands- Railroad Earth, Leftover Salmon and Eastman String Band. Some gritty blues driven sounds from Samantha Fish.
And don’t forget about The Revivalists. The NOLA-based band have been making waves in the scene. Not that they’ve been a secret, but they’ve been growing exponetially and were featured in Rolling Stone this month. David Shaw leads the band through countless moods and tempos in a high energy rock performance that lends itself to the emphasis of the lyrics.
Cabinet has the string aspect as well, but also offers some blends of reggae and jam at times. JP Biondo (Pap) of Cabinet recently told John Mikeska in an interview “There’s no specific leader in Cabinet, for sure. It often changes from song-to-song. There’ll be a song, for instance, that Todd [fiddle player] will be leading and clearly in charge of the jam. And then there’ll be a song that Pappy leads. And for that song, Pap’s in charge. But it isn’t really an in-charge kind of thing. It’s very free. It’s nice that it’s easy for that to happen with the guys. We’re very lucky to have that.” That kind of trust and chemistry onstage can go a long way.
Last but certainly not least is LITZ. Kudos to the promoters for this pick– we are big fans. (LITZ was voted one of the best rising talents by our readership in 2015). These guys actually just released an album today (April 1). Be sure to get not sleep on this set, this band is bound to do some big things! In fact, they just opened for Twiddle at the 9:30 Club.
Tickets are on sale today, for more information visit the Hot August Official Website.
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