W.S. Walcott Medicine Show

The Green River Festival 2025

The Green River Festival has been going strong since 1986, back when it was primarily a hot air balloon festival with roots music as a side note.  Over the last 49 years, it has morphed away from the balloon thing and into a full fledged music festival aimed at the Americana roots music scene.  Its hard to believe that up until this year’s event I was relatively unaware of the festival and looking back at some of the past artists combined with the amazing time I enjoyed at this year’s festivities, I can only say “shame on me” for sleeping on this majestic slice of happiness nestled in the bucolic rolling hills of Western Massachusetts.  In addition to my having been relatively unaware of the festival itself, I was also very unfamiliar with the Western MA region in general.  Yeah, I’d visited Mount Holyoke and Amherst College on crazy weekend road trips back in my college days but lets be honest, those weekends of excess leave all that much of an impression besides the parties and bars of those college towns.  This was in fact my first trip to the region since those young and dumb years and let me just say that once again, shame on me.

Friday, June 20, 2025 – Day One:

Enough on the backstory though.  This year’s 49th edition of the festival began on Friday afternoon with local favorites and a late addition to the lineup, The Gaslight Tinkers with their brand of high energy old time fiddle music infused with caribbean and afrocentric rhythms over on the Dean’s Beans Stage.  Going into Friday’s schedule I had preemptively decided that I was going to attempt to catch as many of the first day acts as humanly possible.  I ended up doing a pretty good job of it, if I do say so myself.  

After the Tinkers, I bustled over to the Back Porch Stage to catch the end of Coral Moons set of light spirited breezy indie pop.  Following Coral Moons’s set it was a brisk walk over to the main stage for Torres’s set.  I will be the first to admit that I was deeply saddened when Julien Baker dropped off of their and

Torres’s summer tour.  I had caught the Baker/Torres pop up show earlier in the year at Mercury Lounge and I was incredibly stoked to see them perform the new material again, after a few months of getting used to it.  In any event, I can’t blame Julien one iota for her decision and truly hope things are getting better for them.  All of that being said, I would hardly call the set that Torres offered up a disappointment, actually it was fantastic.  

Back over to the Porch Stage for what turned out to be the highlight of Friday’s musical guests and certainly one of the highlights of the entire weekend for me, as California’s neo-bluegrass ensemble A.J. Lee & Blue Summit offered up a wonderful collection of country and bluegrass music that had at least half of the crowd Texas Two Stepping along to their bright energetic tunes.  I would be remiss if I didn’t mention how absolutely beautiful A.J. Lee’s heartbreakingly wistful vocals are…completely breathtaking.  

I will be the first to say, I was not all that familiar with the next three acts I would catch.  First was Lost Film over at the Roundhouse stage.  Lost Film was one of the more distinct bands of the weekend for me with their 90’s alternative sound, a sound which wasn’t all that in sync with the rest of the offerings of the weekend.  Nonetheless their set was a terrific respite from the rootsier nature of the other acts as well as a welcome relief from the blistering sun being as the Roundhouse was the only indoor stage of the festival.  After Lost Film it was a short walk back to

The Porch for Ocie Elliott, the duo of British Columbians, Jon Middleton and Sierra Lundy.  Ocie’s set of wistfully lilting dream pop was a breath of fresh air and reminded me quite a bit of early Widowspeak.

Kabaka Pyramid over at Dean’s Beans was a sharp turn to the left following Ocie Elliott with his hip hop infused dancehall reggae.  Kabaka and his band with their infectious grooves had the crowd swaying and dancing like it was a sweaty smoke filled Trenchtown street party.

Closing out the first day’s festivities over on the main stage was Friday’s headliner Mt. Joy.  I was somewhat familiar with Mt. Joy and their poppy variation of roots music.  After

years of grinding it out on the touring circuit the hard work is certainly paying off for the band as they now sell out large arenas world wide in addition to getting the largest font on the festival posters they’re playing these days.  Their closeout set on Friday night proved to me that they most certainly deserve the platitudes which have been coming their way of late.  With a powerful stage presence that overflows with confidence and self assurance, lead singer and guitarist, Matt Quinn is a dominating frontman who really knows how to play to the crowd.  A crowd which I might add, at least in the front, was 90% Gen Z females who were beside themselves as they sang and danced themselves to tears along with Quinn.  Mt. Joy were an absolute joy to watch as they looked to be having at least as much performing as those in the crowd were having watching and listening to them

Green River Day One Slideshow-

Saturday, June 21, 2025 – Day Two:

I knew from the get-go that Saturday was going to be a marathon, with music commencing at noon rather than the 4 PM start the previous day. With that in mind, I knew that I couldn’t possibly try to get around nearly as much as I had on Friday, not if I intended to make it all the way to Courtney Barnett’s closing set. As such I intended to make a concerted effort not to spread myself as thin as Friday. Well that was a novel plan to say the least. There were afterall 15 total bands scheduled to play on Saturday (not counting the children oriented lineup scheduled for the Roundhouse) and I had penciled in 12 of them as being interested in them. When it was all said and done, I’d seen (at the very least), bits and pieces (if not the entire sets) of 11 of those 12. So much for the idea of pacing myself and not spreading myself so thin.

Highlights from my Saturday included of course the opening set from The Funky Dawgz, a New Orleans style brass band out of Connecticut. I mean, who doesn’t love a brass band getting the party started.

After catching some of Olive Klug’s set on The Porch as well as Thee Sinceers over on The Main Stage, I made my way back to the Porch for Stephen Kellogg.  Kellogg, who is a western MA native, combines a certain amount of humor and wit within as well as around his poignant story songs.  With a musical style that immediately reminded me of an early 70’s John Prine meets a Southeastern era Jason Isbell, Kellogg for sure is a very good song writer.  His performance on The Porch Stage comprised a set of 10 songs, each one better than the last.

Milwaukee
Satisfied Man
The Waitress
Song for Daughters
Kiss the Ring
4th of July
Sweet Sophia
Imagine
Old Friend
Thanksgiving

Kellogg, whose songs largely deal with everyday rural life are very family-centric and tying in with this theme, he would bring his daughter Sophia on stage to help him perform the song “Sweet Sophia” which he wrote as an ode to his first born quite a few years ago.  As touching a moment as that was, the next tune would dwarf it.  Putting his guitar down and with Sophia providing piano accompaniment, Stephen with a reference to the overnight US bombing of Iran performed a moving rendition of John Lennon’s “Imagine”.  I for one generally speaking find the covering of this song to be trite and cliche ridden.  Not so on this particular Saturday afternoon.  Kellogg nailed it with a beautiful and earnest interpretation which literally had him (and many in the audience) in tears.  He would follow “Imagine” up with the duet “Old Friend” which is the opening track on his newly released album To you, old friend.  On the album he recorded it with Lori McKenna but here it was Sophia who had the honor to sing along.  I’m not sure if there’s much more for me to say besides that this early afternoon set from Stephen Kellogg was one of my favorite sets of the young weekend thus far.  And it would retain that standing as the weekend progressed.

Following Kellogg’s memorable set, it was off to the Main Stage to catch long time favorite, Illuminati Hotties, a band which I’ve enjoyed thoroughly via their recorded output but for one reason or another had never gotten a chance to see live.  Taking the stage with each band member wearing the same multicolored shirt which is featured on their latest LP, Sarah Tudzin and the rest of the Hotties came in flying HOT.  With a set largely culled from 2024’s POWER LP along with this year’s EP, Nickel On The Fountain Floor, they offered up a classic mid 20’s set of modern punk pop that had the sun drenched crowd jumping up and down despite the incessant heat.  Opening up with the slow burner “Can’t Be Still”, the opening track from POWER, by the time the chorus of: 

Oh, when things are moving too slow

Ah

Oh, got places I wanna go

Ah

Ooh, I can’t be alone now

Show me how

I can’t be still

I can’t be still

I can’t be still

I can’t be

I can’t be still

I can’t be still

I can’t be still

I can’t be

Not only was Sarah maniacally jumping up and down but so was the entire band, not to even mention the ecstatic crowd.  Other highlights from their super energized set were their ramshackle take on 2021’s “Pool Hopping”, the snot nosed punk anthem “Wreck My Life” which they originally recorded with help from members of PUP.  I mean, who can’t love a song that opens with the line, “your favorite band is full of shit”?  Then there was “Skateboard Tattoo” their churning rocker which goes from 0 to 60 in seconds on a slow day, but on this Saturday afternoon they started at 60 and kept the foot on the pedal until they were careening at what felt like the speed of sound.  Closing the set out with “Didn’t” the collaboration with Cavetown off of POWER which starts off with a repetitive bass line reminiscent of “Sex & Candy” from Marcy Playground, except instead of moving into a sweet refrain that S&C does, “Didn’t” boils over into a grungy sludgy caldron of rock and roll stew.  To make a long story short, Illuminati Hotties were everything I expected and then some.  I can’t wait to catch them in the fall when they’re hitting the road with The Beths.

I wasn’t planning on catching Leyla McCalla’s set over at The Porch but at the last minute I decided to see why over there.  Of course my original plan of missing her set had nothing to do with any kind of lack of admiration for Leyla as an artist.  On the contrary, I’ve seen her numerous times in Brooklyn and know that she’s a regular around the Jalopy Theatre and Brooklyn Folk scene so I figured that if I had to miss any artists it ought to be one that I’ll have other opportunities to see in the future.  Well, thankfully I pissed all over that thought process and elected to catch her set and holy mother of folk, am I glad I did.  Accompanied by guitar, bass and drums, Leyla and crew PUT.ON.A.SHOW!  The set started out pretty much straight ahead blues but it didn’t take long for her and the band to display her Haitian roots as they delved deeper and deeper into some incredible afro-carribean jamming.  Leyla is of course adept at numerous instruments and throughout the course of the magical set she played not only electric and acoustic guitar but also cello and banjo.  All in all, her set on The Porch Stage with the sun setting stage right, was truly other-worldly.  The interplay between Leyla (regardless what she was playing) and the rest of her band was emotional in such a positive way that I don’t think there was a single person in the crowd afterwards who wasn’t smiling from ear to ear.

After McCalla’s magical set I was off for the Main Stage for what would turn out to be the only time all weekend when I would stay at a particular stage for 2 sets in a row, thus forgoing catching any other acts on one of the other stages…in hindsight, it was 100% the right call.  First up was a woman who I didn’t know all that much about but a friend who resides in her hometown of Rochester, NY had told me that Danielle Ponder was a set which I could not miss.  Having the utmost respect for his opinion, I summarily made sure that Ponder’s set was not missed.  Before I go any further, he was 1000% correct.  Danielle Ponder’s set of old school soul and R&B was absolutely amazing.  Danielle has one of the most powerfully resonant voices I heard in quite some time and on top of that, she has a self deprecating on stage sense of humor that had the crowd in stitches laughing when they weren’t staring with jaw dropping amazement as she sang the shit out of every song she took on.  By the time Danielle tackled a cover song which I have previously thought of as irredeemable, I had already been mesmerized and transfixed by her set.  However, when she started singing this faux opus from the most overrated band of my lifetime, I became stunned.  She managed to transfix “Creep” from being a dyonisian nightmarish hell hole of a song into a majestically transcendent “open up the gates of heaven” thing of beauty.  In any event, I am officially in the Danielle Ponder camp.  Ponder, who prior to her taking the music business by storm was a practicing defense attorney in Rochester and is proof positive that when we chase our dreams, those dreams can indeed come true.

Following Ponder on the main stage was Kevin Morby.  I’m a huge fan of Kevin’s but hadn’t seen him for quite a long time.  For his set, I elected to hang out on the rail for the whole set rather than venture into the photo pit for the first  three songs and was quite glad that I chose to do so.  While Morby’s music isn’t necessarily made of getting up and dancing, he does exude a groove to whatever he plays that is quite inspiring and thought provoking.  With his meditative vocal style and his understated guitar playing, it’s hard to pin him down but nonetheless, he always manages to hypnotise his crowd, not in a trippy jam band kind of way but in a more contemplative and ethereal sense.  His rendition of “City Music” from his album of the same name from back in 2017 was the perfect example of his taking his audience on that aforementioned galactic excursion into the abyss.  What a terrific set.

My second to last artist on Saturday brings to light my only complaint about this year’s Green River Festival.  Kathleen Edwards on the Back Porch Stage was a mistake.  While I understand that Edwards’s musical style fit the Porch from a thematic point of view and probably did not mesh that well with what was going on over at The Dean’s Beans Stage, the Porch was just too small a space for all of the people who showed up to see Kathleen and her band’s power charged set.  Her set was BY FAR the most crowded (uncomfortably so) of any act I got to see all weekend and unfortunately it did dampen what was a truly fantastic show from Edwards. Opening things up with the bouncy and uplifting “Glenfern” from 2020’s Total Freedom album. Edwards is so much fun to see with a whimsical style that just plain flat out forces one to smile and groove to the sounds.  All told, she and the band played a set comprised of 14 songs from a cross section of her oeuvre, touching upon all of her studio albums (minus her covers album that she released earlier this year).

Closing out Saturday night was Courtney Barnett, who was probably the artist I was looking most forward to seeing over the weekend.  Courtney, who hails from Australia hasn’t done any significant touring in the past year or so, so I was particularly stoked to see her on the Green RIver Fest schedule.  While I had seen Barnett at the Patti Smith tribute show earlier in the year doing a phenomenal cover of Patti’s “Redondo Beach”, I hadn’t seen her do a full show since her majestic yet very different showcase of her End Of The Day soundtrack album.  I’d have to go even further back to when I’d seen Courtney performing a traditional set of her music.  Needless to say, I was quite excited.

The set commenced with “Avant Gardener” followed by the first of two new songs, “Stay In Your Lane”.  Much later in the 18 song set we would get another new one called “Mantis”.  But this wasn’t a night for experimenting with new stuff, this was all about dusting off the cobwebs and rocking out on the tried and true. With a pretty much even cross section of songs from Things Take Time, Tell Me How You Really Feel, Sometimes I Sit and Sea Of Split Peas I can’t imagine anyone in attendance was unhappy with the song selection.  And if the song selection wasn’t enough to satisfy everyone, Barnett’s sheer intensity was something to behold.  I’ve seen Courtney enough times to know what to expect from her and I can honestly say that I have never seen her play with such a ferocious tenacity.  Barnett’s guitar playing was completely off the charts.  It was like a caged animal after being set free, complete and utter destruction except in this case the only thing being destroyed were the frets on Courtney’s guitar.  It’s always easy to leave a great show and think right away that it was the best I’ve ever seen so and so.  Leaving the fairgrounds on Saturday night, that is exactly how I felt.  And then on Sunday morning while discussing the show with a fellow photographer, he unsolicited said right off the bat, “The best set I’ve ever seen from Barnett”.  This gave me a little more assurance that it probably was, and now as I sit writing this 2 weeks after the fact, I still feel the same way.  Courtney Barnett lit the stage up on Saturday night at Green River Festival with the best show these two sets of eyes and ears have ever seen and heard from her.

SETLIST-

    Avant Gardener

    Stay In Your Lane

    City Looks Pretty

    Small Poppies

    Need a Little Time

    Nameless, Faceless

    Rae Street

    History Eraser

    Lance Jr

    Depreston

    Turning Green

    Pedestrian at Best

    I’m Not Your Mother, I’m Not Your Bitch

    Elevator Operator

    Mantis

    Before You Gotta Go

    Write a List of Things to Look Forward To

    Nobody Really Cares If You Don’t Go to the Party
Meaningless Addendum:   There might not be any better feeling than standing in a crowd of thousand upon thousands of people each and everyone of them screaming the refrain “I’m not your mother, I’m your bitch”!

Green River Day Two Slideshow-

Sunday, June 22, 2025 – Day Three:

The beginning to my Sunday was a true treat.  After being recommended to me by a friend down in TN, I made sure I got to the fairgrounds early enough to catch Truman Sinclair on The Back Porch Stage…and holy cow am I glad I did.  Truman hails from LA but was born and raised in Chicago.  He and his band had been out on the road for a couple of weeks prior to Green River in support of Truman’s latest release, American Recordings which dropped back in February.  Before I get into Sinclair’s terrific set, let me just say that American Recordings is an album that you ought to be paying attention to.  It will almost certainly be a top ten contender for me when the end of the year comes around.  As far as the set itself was concerned, Sinclair’s band consisted of himself on acoustic guitar along with a bass and drums.  Truman manages to do a great balancing act between showing confidence and comfort on stage while also being humble and appreciative for everyone who was in attendance for this set as well as all who had come out and supported his shows throughout the tour.  To give you an idea of how well he’s being received, he had just come to Green River fresh off of a sold out headline gig at Brooklyn’s Union Pool, his first headlining show ever in NY…no small accomplishment.    Sinclair cut his teeth in the music business with his emo band, Frat Mouse and that emo feel can definitely come across in his solo work as well.  It’s an emo inflection mixed with a slacker bend, along the lines of the band Florry’s earlier work.  During Truman’s introduction to his tune, “Joel Roberts” about the protagonist of the song killing a man in defense of his god daughter, much along the thematic lines of Tim Barry’s well known tune “Dog Bumped”, Sinclair explained that the “Roberts” song is pretty much the sole reason he was at Green River in the first place.  I’m not sure of the details but evidently “Joel Roberts” became an internet sensation with virtually little if any marketing efforts and thus people started paying attention to him.  Even though his set was dominated by songs from the American Recordings album as it should have, I did find it impressively refreshing that while on the road the last few weeks Truman has been a writing machine and he played at least 2 or 3 songs which he had just finished writing since he and the band had been on the road.  What was even more surprising than his productively writing new material while on tour was the fact that he had the confidence to perform these brand new songs live on stage.  The bottom line as far as Truman Sinclair is concerned is that I am officially won over and now consider myself a big fan, as all of you should as well.

After catching a couple of tunes from Chaparelle on The Main Stage I made my way back to the Back Porch to catch Merce Lemon and their band.  I’ve got to be honest, I’ve been hearing great things about Lemon and I do like the latest album, Watch Me Drive Them Dogs Wild but when I saw Merce (solo) open for the Felice Brothers last December I was somewhat underwhelmed.  As such I was looking forward to seeing Lemon with a band backing up to see if that made much of a difference.  To make it short and sweet, the band made a huge difference and this was a whole different experience than I had gotten last year.  While Merce’s stage presence and presentation is still a bit sullen and flat, the band manages to bring a life into the material that made for quite an enjoyable show.

I made a quick stop off over at the Dean’s Beans stage to catch a song or two from Chicha Libre and was fortunate to get to hear one of the better covers of the weekend when the band performed a cumbia version of The Clash’s “Clampdown” which had everyone (myself included) in the crowd dancing and singing along.

At this point it was time to head over to the main stage where teenage guitar prodigy Grace Bowers was scheduled to perform her magic along with her band The Hodge Podge.  Truth be told, while their style of funky blues didn’t do much for me, I do have to say that Bowers can shred a guitar.  I mean this girl can PLAY!  How a 19 year old has accumulated the chops that she has, is truly beyond my imagination.  She certainly won me over as a talented beyond her years artist that is someone to keep your eyes and ears on going forward.

With just 3 more acts on my agenda, the weekend was clearly winding down but those last 3 performers would prove to be quite a triumvirate.  The first of the three would be none other than everyone’s current favorite slacker/stoner artist, MJ Lenderman. Ever since his critically acclaimed debut, Boat Songs and then his sophomore blockbuster, Manning Fireworks, Jake and his band the Wind have been one of the hottest commodities on the Indie music circuit, and they have taken full advantage of this by pretty much touring non stop over the course of the last couple of years.  Following in the footsteps of clear influential precursors like Neil Young & Crazy Horse as well as Pavement with long drawn out guitar solos filled with tons of reverb and feedback, its such a pleasure to watch the back and forth between Jake, fellow guitarist Jon Samuels and pedal steel extraordinaire, Xander Chelmis.  To no one’s surprise Lenderman would bring Katie Crutchfield out on stage for “She’s Leaving”, the song she collaborated on from Manning Fireworks.  This would be the first of a cavalcade of 7 songs that would close out their set and ultimately bring the crowd to near pandemonium.

Upon completion of MJ Lenderman and The Winds’ monster set, I had to hightail it over to the Back Porch Stage for the band which I refer to as the “Darlins of The SEC”, Futurebirds.  Reason being, that aside from hailing from Athens, GA, the home of The UGA Bulldogs, The Futurebirds have made a huge name for themselves touring around the Southeast, more often than not hitting all of those SEC campuses.  Its gotten to the point that whenever they’re playing in NYC, its almost guaranteed that the entire front section of the crowd is going to be transplanted southern kids who are now working in the metro area, a genuine college homecoming.  Needless to say Womz and Carter were, in what other bands would consider, rare for, but for The Birds it’s just another show.  And I don’t mean “just another show” in a derogatory way by any stretch.  When it comes to the Futurebirds, just another show means an extravaganza of pure unadulterated southern rock & roll.  It’s always a huge party with these guys and Sunday evening in western MA, they did not disappoint.  Of course you could tell as soon as the boys took to the stage to Alan Jackson’s “Chatahoochee” with everyone of the guys either laughing their asses off or grinning ear to ear that they were stoked to raise some hell.  And raise hell is exactly what they did, in classic Futurebirds fashion.

Which brings me to the closing act of the weekend, Katie Crutchfield AKA Waxahatchee. I for one have been following Katie’s career since she first released American Weekend and was playing the Williamsburg DIY circuit of clubs like Glasslands, Death By Audio, Suburbia, Silent Barn and 285 Kent back in the early twenty-teens.  Needless to say, Katie has come a long way “Tigers Blood”that shy introverted singer songwriter standing alone behind her guitar on those makeshift stages.  Today, Katie and Waxahatchee has morphed into a wonderfully powerful and confident performer that has managed to maintain that waiflike innocence of the past while having grown and matured into a tour du force on stage.  Katie’s set started out with “3 Sisters” the opening track to last year’s blockbuster LP Tigers Blood and watching her come out and immediately capture the attention of every single person on that field in front of the main stage was so wonderful.  The song starts out slow but by midway through, it builds up momentum and by its end you could see all over Katie’s face how happy and proud she was with where she has landed…pretty much the top of the world in the Americana stratosphere. Her set was comprised more than half by songs from her two most recent albums, Tigers Blood and Saint Cloud.  This was no surprise considering that these two albums were the two which catapulted her to stardom.  About midway through the resplendent set Katie was joined onstage by MJ Lenderman for harmony duties, first on their hit “Right Back To It” as well as the tune which follows it on the LP, “Burns Out At Midnight”.  MJ would leave the stage after those two songs but would later return along with his entire band, The Wind as well as Merce Lemon and members of their band for a raucous party sing-a-long to “Tigers Blood”.  But before that, Katie did a beautiful cover of Kathleen Edwards’ “Six O’Clock News” which the night before Kathleen had played and dedicated to Katie during her set.  Katie would introduce the tune as her paying it forward to Edwards.

Green River Day 3 Slideshow-

Green River Festival 2025 Wrap Up

So there you have it, my experience from a musical perspective in a rather large nut shell. But I would be grossly negligent if I left this little diatribe off with just that. After all was said and done, after 3 sweltering days of amazing music in the hot sun, I came to realize that Green River Festival, as it turns out is way more than just a music festival. As you can see from the photos in the GRF Candid Shots Slideshow, the weekend is quite the family affair. All weekend long there were kids frolicking all over the place, some accompanied by doting parents and some older ones left on their own to wander and explore and experience things at their pace. Furthermore, while I didn’t pay too much attention to it all but there seemed to be activities and entertainment all weekend squarely directed at the kids.

Another thing which I would be remiss if I didn’t mention was the food selection. The expanse and variety of food trucks spread out on the fairgrounds was truly special. From dumplings to BBQ brisket, from Indian street fare to coal oven artisinal pizza, if you had a hankering for something, chances are you could find it if you just looked around. Of course at an event like this, all of those food options wouldn’t mean a hoot if there weren’t facilities available to sit and enjoy. Needless to say the tents provided a perfect respite for sitting and savoring the delicious fares as well as a more than welcome escape from the insufferable sun.

As long as we’re talking about facilities, the fine folks at Green River did a fantastic job of providing a plethora of water stations where one could refill their water bottles. And with all of that H2O consumption, it was a pleasure to find that the port-a-potties were not only plentiful but also very well maintained.

As it turns out, it seemed throughout the weekend that the organizers of the festival left no stone unturned when it came to preparations. One last thing I’d like to mention which I found to be incredibly helpful and convenient was the bicycle valet. I personally stayed in a AirBnB a short distance away from the fairgrounds and it was awesome to be able to bike the 10 minute ride back and forth each day and have a secure place to leave my wheels.

So there you have it. One man’s opinion, Green River Festival 2025 was a fantastic experience and I’m already planning on next year.

Green River Festival 2025 Candid Shots Slideshow-