Blackwater Music Festival – Preview

Blackwater Music Festival is back at the Southeast’s favorite festival venue, the Spirit of the Suwannee Music Park in Live Oak, FL. Moving to the last weekend in September (9/22-24) from last year’s mid-August dates should bode well for the body as the soul searches for musical enlightenment.

Although it’s been a longtime home to great gatherings like Magnolia Fest, Spring Fest, Wannee and Bear Creek; Spirit of the Suwannee has really stepped up in the last year or so adding new events such as 311′s Pow-Wow, Purple Hatter’s Ball and advancing the Jambando series. However, none of those have brought the deluge of diverse national, regional and local talent to the state of Florida that Blackwater Music Fest has in its first two years.

Thursday finds four BLP vets on the amazing Amphitheater Stage. If you haven’t been there, this stage is among the most beautiful natural amphitheaters in, dare I say, the world. The hill is stepped with railroad ties for the massive oaks adorned with Spanish moss akin to the flare of the festival freaks who hang hammocks at every angle from the trees which give the nearby town its name.

Jacksonville jamtronic heroes, Greenhouse Lounge kick things off with their first of two sets at the fitting time of – cough, cough – 4:20pm. Then one man wrecking crew, Zach Deputy, takes over for a nice long set of his uplifting signature soulful funk. The SE’s premiere jam-juggernaut, Perpetual Groove, bats third setting the stage for EOTO rage, hard touring electro side project of the String Cheese Incident’s drum duo.

The festival proper really gets things rolling right on Friday with a steady flow of eclectic music spread over four stages that continues through Saturday. The stages seem to capture a certain theme consistent over the two days.

The Music Hall features some of the area’s top live-tronic acts including brothers-in-arms Greenhouse Lounge and Sir Charles, Miami’s fast rising Sounduo and AURA vet Noise [ORG] on Friday; and Jax rep Lucky Costello and Crunchay Sunday/Monday’s own Vlad the Inhaler before Dubconscious spin-off FLT RSK and Atlanta super group Up Until Now which features STS9’s David Murphy. This stage runs 12:30-8:30pm each day.

The BLP highlights on The Front Porch Stage come early on Saturday with The Fritz, who comes back down from the mountains of western North Carolina to their former stomping ground, and the swampy funk rock of Saltwater Grass. Le BLORR (Bastard Lovechild of Rock n Roll) is a high-energy drums/guitar-synth duo that I’ve been dying to see. Wait til ya get a load of them.

The Amphitheater Stage ups the ante all day, each day. I’ve heard great things from our Tally rooted fam about Catfish Alliance, Zoogma is a BLP favorite who we were proud to add to our AURA line-up for the second year and Ghostland Observatory leaves a trail of dead wherever they travel – all of which perform on Friday. Saturday Amp kicks off with the liquid crew. Fresh off their record release party at the Culture Room, Aquaphonics will be the splash of water in the rising camp’s face. Cohorts of the odd, That 1 Guy and Buckethead, grace the stage throughout the day, and it would be surprising if they didn’t share it at some point.

The Meadow Stage mainly emanates a reggae/beach rock vibe with Passafire, Iration and Easy Star on Friday and Ballyhoo and Pepper on Saturday. But both nights top out with more electronic flare with mash-up master Girl Talk on Friday and smooth sounds of STS9 on Saturday.

This two and a half day fest takes an approach that most others don’t and ends on Saturday, keeping it real for those that would like to have Sunday off for travel and recovery before returning to the real world Monday morning. All in all, this a great, manageable event for the Florida festival family with enough heavy hitters to attract attendees from any corner of the country…Blackwater Music Festival is definitely an experience worth exploring in the blurry blackwater border area between Florida and Georgia. Hope to see you there!