Of the larger music festivals in America, the Bourbon and Beyond Festival has over the last several years emerged as the very best. Last year 140,000 came to this festival, and I doubt it was less this year, which features not only classic rock, but all sorts of recent rock artists, country artists old and new, bluegrass artists, and crossover artists like Billy Strings, Blues artists like Buddy Guy, some Hip Hop artists, some r+b artists, some wild cards (this year it was 81 year old Wayne Newton– believe it or not). The festival in fact has a mission of giving visibility to all the different bourbon distilleries in Kentucky, which seem to multiplying like rabbits in the last decade. The end result is big bucks spent on headlining artists, and all sorts of merch sellers, and of course food— all sorts of food, with celebrity chefs showing up and doing demonstrations. This festival is one stop shopping for a lot of different things.
This year the headliners included Bruno Mars, Jon Batiste, and Blondie, as well as Baby Face, Hozier, Duran Duran, Train, the Black Keys, the Black Crowes, Brandi Carlile, the Killers, Bastille, Brittany Howard of Alabama Shakes, the Avett Brothers, and many up and coming artists like Maggie Rose, or The Inhalers which is a band fronted by the son of Bono (yes another band from Dublin led by a Hewson). One of the charms of this festival is getting to hear some excellent up and coming artists, as well as your favorite headliners. The festival last four days barring atrocious weather since it is housed at an outdoor venue— the Festival Grounds near the Convention Center and Freedom Hall. Unfortunately, three years ago the Festival became Mudstock due to lots of rain and the final day of the festival was cancelled, which meant we didn’t get to see Sting and other headliners— bummer dude. Here and in the next post you get to see some of the performers. But first of all, some candidate shots of me and my sister at the T Mobile pavilion, and kudos to those people— a nice pavilion sheltered from the sun, free patches and popsicles, comfy seats to watch the shows, and various T Mobile deals… which I already took advantage of some years ago and again this year with my phone upgrade to a 23 Ultra+. Basically it’s a world class camera that is also a computer and phone as well.
And here’s a shot of the ever growing crowd and we got closer and closer to headliner time in the evening.
If you are wondering about the food there was good BBQ, but my favorite was New England Lobster rolls, and lobster bisque— yum. There was also all sorts of fast food, and junk food, not to mention gelato and ice cream and fruit flavored popsicles. The food below, showed up in front of me…. but fortunately it was for someone else because besides being a caloric disaster, I can’t eat hot jalapenos.
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