Shaky Beats, the electronic dance music festival founded by Shaky Knees creator, Tim Sweetwood and hosted by C3 Presents is back for it’s 3rd straight year and this time the festival was located in the Central Park area of Midtown, Atlanta. A great multi-stage venue located in the heart of town.
London on Da Track
The festival kicked off on Friday afternoon with a ton of great performances. London Holmes, or London on Da Track as he’s known has produced or worked with people like Young Thug, Drake, 2 Chainz and Gucci Mane, had a blistering set that had the crowd jumping the entire set.
Quinn XCII
Quinn XCII was one of the big crowd favorites today. Promoting his most recently released record, The Story of Us, Quinn XCII’s set was a cool mixture of pop, reggae and rap. With so many pop touches in his music he had a ton of the crowd singing along the entire time with an energy that really made the songs leap from record to stage.
Luda
Ludacris, Atlanta native and hip-hop superstar absolutely ripped the lid off of the main stage of the festival with a ton of throwback hits like “Welcome to Atlanta,” “Southern Hospitality,” “Area Codes” and “Act a Fool.” A one-hour set flew by quick leaving the crowd wanting more.
G Jones
G Jones kicked off his ferocious set with “Fuck What You’ve Heard” and never looked back as the crowd went absolutely insane, bouncing against the metal barricade at the front of the stage sending a huge plume of dust into the air.
Dillon Francis
Closing out the night on the 2 main stages we’re two of the biggest names out there in the EDM scene, Dillon Francis and Marshmello. Dillon Francis’ set was a fantastic mixture of reggaeton, house, and touches of trap mixed together with a fantastic pop sensibility that drew a huge and passionate crowd to the Piedmont stage for the final performance on that stage.
Marshmello
Christopher Comstock, known professionally as Marshmello played Shaky Beats back in 2016 on a side stage, but in 2018 the headlining slot was all his. As the Dillon Francis set ended the entire festival migrated to the Peachtree stage for a killer set of dance music, stunning visuals and great vibes. The crowd was engaged from the very first drop.
Herobust
A few other outstanding sets we caught today were, Thriftworks’ chill dubstep, throbbing bass and creative transitions, Ployd’s throbbing beats, laid back stage presence amd experimental beats and local favorite, Herobust’s huge party-gone-wild set of slamming bass tracks.
Written by and all photos by John McNicholas. Check out more of John’s photos from Shaky Beats Day 1:
