SHAKY KNEES 2021: The Saturday Edition – Day 2 Review

On Saturday at Shaky Knees Music Festival, the first immediate standout was the weather. Although the festival looks to move back to it’s usual Spring spot in 2022 and likely beyond, it would be hard to look back and deny that the climate wasn’t just better. No day felt better out there than Saturday, and Central Park felt notably fuller than it had on Friday.

Check out our SHAKY KNEES 2021: The Friday Edition – Day 1 Review here

Check out our SHAKY KNEES 2021: The Sunday Edition – Day 3 Review here

Check out our SHAKY KNEES 2021: From The Photog – Top 14 Sets here

Standout Acts, Saturday Edition

If Friday was a day filled with expectations – I felt like I just could not miss Frankie and the Witchfingers, could not miss Ty Segall – then Saturday was one of those great festival days where, frankly, I was up for whatever. 

Like Glove the day prior, Geese were an early Saturday standout. This time last year, they were finishing high school. After a few self-produced tracks hit the internet, and caught the right people’s attention, they fielded record label offers from 4AD and Sub Pop, before signing with a joint deal with PIAS and Partisan Records, the label that got Fontaines D.C. and Idles onto the map. Today, they are among the up-and-comers in rock and roll. Check out “Low Era” or “Disco” and tell me this band won’t be back, playing the 5:30 p.m. slot in a year or two.

In transit from one stage to the next, I heard Arlo Parks and thought (incorrectly, obviously since they didn’t play until Sunday) that it was Tennis. That case of mistaken identity plays in my mind as quite a compliment for the 21-year-old Parks, the UK-based artist whose debut studio album Collapsed in Sunbeams released in 2021 to critical acclaim. Nobody nails that chill, coffee shop indie pop vibe quite like Tennis, but Parks has it in spades herself, particularly live. 

Also, when it comes to nailing a vibe, move Neil Francis way up your list of 1970s throwbacks rock musicians. Prior to the festival, I had significantly underrated how good he would prove to be, I think because classic rock style musicians are so few and far between by now – we are literally fifty years since the 70s, which is nuts because the music from that era still feels so formative to current rock culture – that a lot of the modern bands who appeal to a classic rock aesthetic are maybe cosplaying a little bit, or don’t back up the look with the sound. Straight up: Neil Francis backs it up. His live set was authentic rock and roll, features him and his band ripping through original rock tracks that would feel totally at home in the 1970s alongside the greats of that era. It reminded me very much of the Black Crowes shows I saw a generation ago.  Add “Prometheus” and “Changes, Pts. 1&2” to your playlist, and circle back with Neil Francis when he returns to Atlanta in February.  

Mercury Rev has been around since the 1990s, but their brand of driving, sonic rock still fits nicely into the mix at Shaky Knees. The band played a song called “Central Park East” which felt appropriate there in Atlanta’s own Central Park and finished strong on a few tracks from their standout ’98 album Deserter’s Songs, with “Holes” in particular stealing the show.

A while back, I did this record of the month club that at one point sent me the Cloud Nothings album Attack on Memory. I’m not too deep into the world of punk rock at all, but Cloud Nothings totally caught my eye on that album. Seeing them live at Shaky Knees for the first time, a decade after that album, I was reminded that bands from all genres can absolutely rock. Their sound was more mature, and their efforts more intentional, but the same masterful, sonic punk guitars that built Cloud Nothings’ reputation were on full display.  

Overheard at Shaky: 

“Wait you are saying that the WVH in Mammoth WVH stands for Wolfgang Van Halen, as in that is Eddie Van Halen’s kid?” 

And yeah, he sure is. A little background for the uninitiated – Wolfgang played bass in Van Halen from 2006 until the band disbanded in 2020 upon Eddie’s death. A year later, Wolfgang is back with the Mammoth project and churning out hard rock that bounces back and forth between sludgy, hard driving metal, and the garish confidence of 80s-style hair metal. Mostly the former though.

If one thing was clear to me after seeing so many younger girls in Garbage tee shirts out there on Saturday, it’s that Shirley Manson is still an iconic female empowerment star more than 20 years later. Also, “I Think I’m Paranoid” is still a banger. All props to Manson, who was frankly ahead of her time in the 90s.

Another band that stole the show on Shaky weekend was The Hives. Their set is well produced, entertaining and electric. But nothing from the festival was funnier than lead singer Howlin’ Pelle introducing the band to the crowd… 

“Atlantis! I am so glad you made it out of the bottom of the sea. Ladies, gentlemen. Ladies and gentleman! Please enjoy the best performance of your life by the best band ever.” 

Atlantis! Still makes me laugh.

Speaking of best bands… once you’ve seen Portugal. The Man at a venue like The Earl, their arena/festival presence makes a lot more sense. I love The Earl, because when a big, famous capable band plays there, it shows in a way you can see and feel. Like they’re too big for the stage. It’s also cool when smaller bands on the rise plays The Earl and kill it, because you get the exact same feeling. So there’s this way to gauge a bands spectral power by having them play the Earl. Best venue in Atlanta, change my mind.

Anyways, PTM are one of the most underrated bands around and at Shaky. They feel like a headliner playing one or two slots too early. Their set on the main stage wasn’t so different from their set at the Earl, it was just to a bigger crowd, and outdoors. They rock, don’t sleep on PTM just because they get played on FM radio.

At the same time as PTM, Atlanta’s local upstart Lunar Vacation played the Criminal stage. For indie heads, Lunar Vacation is very much a band on the rise. A few years ago, the members — Grace Repasky, Maggie Geeslin, Matteo De Lurgio, and Connor Dowd—were in high school at St. Pius. 

“If there were others at St. Pius who liked to creatively express themselves, and liked good music, we found each other pretty quick,” lead singer Repasky told Open Ears.

Lunar Vacation is just the right band in the right place for 2021. They sound like right now; a slice of what is current and relevant in the indie scene: jangly guitars washed out in reverb, gazey lyrics and a hopeful disposition. Lunar Vacation’s debut album Inside Every Fig is a Dead Wasp is out this Friday via Keeled Scales (one of the best up and coming record labels around based out of Austin), they played the 7:45 p.m. slot at Shaky to a wild crowd, and the future looks very bright for these kids hitting their stride.

The rest of Saturday was punctuated by a real turn up. First came the barfight personified that is Idles. The band is touring on a forthcoming album entitled Crawler. Their new stuff hit just as hard as the old stuff, and the old stuff still feels raw and real a few years down the road. There probably isn’t amore unique band on the Shaky lineup than Idles, except maybe Black Midi. These kinds of bands, they just aren’t like other bands. Idles have already sold-out their 2022 UK tour, it’s easy to see why.

Closing the night on the Piedmont stage was Alice Cooper, who clearly won the set design award for the weekend. His team transformed the stage into a castle dungeon, complete with stone stairs to a balcony where Cooper ominously appeared to look down from above and sing a few lines of vaguely gothic and threating classic rock. The whole experience was theatrical. Imagine Scar from the Lion King getting an hour on the Piedmont Stage. Letting yourself go along with the vanity of theatrics was real fun. The kids and the old timers alike had a blast playing along. And his performance was backed by the show stopping Nita Strauss and a team of capable touring musicians. A living legend, it was just cool to see Alice f—ing Cooper in the flesh.

The night ended on the Peachtree stage with Run The Jewels, who whipped the crowd into the biggest headliner frenzy of the weekend. It’s rare to see hip-hop at Shaky Knees, but I think Run the Jewels is the most relevant band in America today. Killer Mike is more than just a rapper. He is an activist, a champion of people and family, the de-facto voice of Atlanta and a tireless advocate for empowerment, voting rights and anti-racism. The RTJ project matters. Killer Mike and El P matter. The message they share on stage and in their tracks – it lends voice to things that must be said. In a world where headliners tend to tour on old hits, this shit was important, and I like important things on the big stage. The set banged hard and the beats were straight up electric, and Killer Mike announced a new show, Love and Respect with Killer Mike coming to PBS in Atlanta. Tune in.

All photos by Mike Gerry