After a Friday marked by great music and anodyne statements onstage, Saturday brought even better music at Riot Fest and rockers stepping up to condemn the nation’s turn toward authoritarianism.
Jack White was the exemplar on both fronts, turning in a searing hour-long set he kicked off with a cover of Stooges’ “T.V. Eye” before proclaiming, “Ain’t no MAGA fascists in control tonight. Ain’t no ICE gestapo in control tonight. Rock and roll is in control tonight.”
White clearly relished the fully engaged crowd, favoring them early on with a wry smile and finger wag after a particularly raucous response as if to say, ok, we can have some fun here.
That vibe culminated in an audience collab on “Seven Nation Army” that elevated the warhorse above the sports-stadium gutter it’s been rolling around in and left everyone screaming for more at the end of what really should have been booked as a 90-minute set.
Meanwhile, White unveiled a menacing “Icky Thump” that was easily the best rendition of the song I’ve seen in the many years I’ve been catching his shows. He let his spiky guitar licks do most of the talking, but there was an unmistakable bite to to his delivery of the lyrics:
White Americans, what? Nothing better to doWhy don’t you kick yourself out? You’re an immigrant too
Earlier in the day, Gwar, the band of costumed interstellar miscreants that make KISS look like a kiddie act, rolled out skits in which Vladimir Putin confirmed that Trump got on his knees for him during the Alaska summit, and one in which “a self-appointed Intergalactic Citizenship Enforcer, ICE for short” attempted to deport Gwar from Earth because they were illegal space aliens.
The huge crowd at the small Rebel Stage, which underscored that Gwar easily could have handled a later slot on a bigger stage, ate it all up, along with massive amounts of hideous orange liquid spewed from various body parts of the band members as they whipped through a pleasing set of thrash punk.
There was plenty of other music on tap Saturday, including Helmet’s righteous wall of guitars, James finally getting to a joyous “Laid” with a stage full of fans after a fairly nondescript afternoon set, and the goofballs of Weezer closing out the night with amiable, crowd-pleasing renditions of the hits that raised only one question: Why were these guys following Jack White? It was kind of like booking Johnny Cash as the opener for Mel Tillis, but you do you, Riot Fest.
Which brings us to Saturday’s culmination of a decade-spanning joke in the form of John Stamos, arch Riot Fest frienemy, finally making an appearance, jumping behind the kit and playing some hammy rhythm guitar for The Beach Boys in a set that required everyone to turn off their critical instincts and just enjoy the cheese or, in this case, butter.
(Fun Friday moment from the iconic Butter Stamos statue at the fest: A woman snuck a hand in to touch it and said, “It’s not butter,” to which her friend replied, “Damn,” apparently not understanding the physics of letting butter sit outside on an 83 degree day.)
When Stamos finally stepped up to the mic to bask in the moment during the twilight set, he started by saying, “It’s been over a decade with these sonofabitches goofing on me, and it’s been the sweetest, honestly the most fun, kind-hearted thing that anyone’s ever done and I’m so grateful to all of you for showing up and ribbing me all these years. You’ve kept me humble and you’ve let me be part of this family I’m so grateful to … and the great crew here at Riot Fart, I call it.”
So there’s that.
Then Stamos got a little political in what was almost certainly not an awkwardly scripted moment: “Discord is at an all-time high and decency at an all-time low, but thank God we have the Beach Boys music and Riot Fest to get us through, right?”
And then Jerry Lewis and Ed McMahon came out to give an update on the donation totals before Charo played flamenco guitar.
We kid because we… love? Maybe John Stamos can come back to Riot Fest in another ten years. Actually, why not make it twenty.
On tap for the Sunday finale: The Effigies, Smoking Popes, The Ataris, The Linda Lindas, Dehd (recently seen opening for Jack White at the Salt Shed), Bad Religion, Idles and Green Day–plus a late-night aftershow at Metro with Buzzcocks, Marky Ramone and Naked Raygun.
See you there.
Riot Fest runs through September 21 at Douglass Park.
Photo by Jason Pendleton
