What a Rush – Rush South Music Fest Brings Big Names, Bigger Possibilities to Columbus

Seeing the line-up for the first big-time music festival Columbus has had in a good, long while was, well, a rush.

Rush South Music Fest & Outdoor Games features two stages along Columbus’ vibrant riverfront in Woodruff Park, where an electrifying lineup of local and national artists will perform. The two-day festival will show off Columbus on a global stage, with the ICF Freestyle Kayaking World Championship bringing hundreds of competitors from dozens of countries to town for a jam-packed weekend looking to build upon that hydro-powered synergy.

Gates to the music stages open at 2 p.m. Saturday and Sunday, October 14 and 15. Next door, Free Fest opens at 10 both mornings and offers families a place to enjoy food and drinks, arts and crafts and a no-charge creative and meditative experience at the Zen Zone.

“Bloom where you are planted,” the sage ones say. Rush South is something Columbus needs. Something Columbus deserves. Rush South signals bigger possibilities in Columbus. But, to flourish, we have to nourish. So get off your ass, buy a ticket and take the ride.

Saturday, October 14

JD Clayton
3:30 p.m. Move to Meaningful Stage
waves of psychedelic melodies drifting over depraved workingman poetry
JD Clayton embodies New School Nashville’s earnest, genre-bending approach to making music. Sho’ nuff Southern, Clayton is a troubadour with tunes that’d be right at home on Kissin’ 99.3, a touch of tender John Denver folk, and a few rockers that groove to hippie drug-culture departures from reality.

Lloyd Buchanan & Cubed Roots
4:30 p.m. Lit Vodka Stage
sophisticated funk grooving to good-times gospel
We’re lucky Lloyd Buchanan is a homeboy. A friendly longtime fixture of the Columbus music scene, the Talbot County native grew up under strict gospel-only orders. Seeing Billy Preston play the B3 blew his mind at age 19 and set this incredible talent on an upward trajectory that’s taken him around the world playing in bands with big followings in The Heavy and Brittany Howard (Alabama Shakes before she went solo in 2018). However, he still manages to play in his church and local gigs, both solo and with the fun and funky Cubed Roots band.

Lilly Hiatt
6 p.m. Lit Vodka Stage
brash up-tempo indie rock, country and punk evoking strong emotion
Lilly Hiatt sings with the world-weary voice of an angel. The daughter of singer-songwriter legend Lilly Hiatt, her captivating duality reveals itself through songwriting that ranges from F you feminist rangers to introspection so deep and dark it glows with the angsty embers of hell. Split personality shows up again in a developing career marked by intentional, well crafted albums produced by top talents (Cage the Elephant, Shovels and Rope) as well as a freewheeling, defiant stage presence that puts her on the road with the likes of the always bad-ass Drive-By Truckers.

Lone Bellow
7 p.m. Move to Meaningful Stage
A decade into their life as a band, the three dudes in Lone Bellow are known for dreamy vocal harmonies, real-talk lyrics, and expertly crafted studio albums with producers Aaron Dessner (The National) and 8-time Grammy winner (and Ellaville, Georgia’s own) Dave Cobb (Chris Stapleton). They took a leap of faith last year with Love Songs for Losers — recorded in the late, great Roy Orbison’s home and produced by his ghost — to create a meditative vibe across songs that are sad, subversive, and sublime.

Dawes
9 p.m. Move to Meaningful Stage
intelligent indie-rock grooves
You get struck by the great lengths Rush South organizers went to in assembling the talent when you look at indie icons Dawes’ tour dates and see lil’ ol’ Columbus, Georgia tucked in between San Francisco’s renowned Hardly Strictly Bluegrass fest and a show in Tokyo, Japan. Here’s to hoping Dawes’ “All Your Favorite Bands” lives on forever as the eternal anthem of the annual Rush South in Columbus, Georgia.

Sunday, October 15

Playing for Good set feat. Shelby Brothers, Velvet Cab, and Ivey Ruth Jones
2:30 p.m. Lit Vodka Stage
hometown heroes (and heroine)

Festival organizers this summer wisely, thankfully added this delicious trio of ascendant local acts to the line-up, collectively billed as Playing for Good. The Shelby Brothers — Jesse Shelby (guitar and vocals), Hank Shelby (guitar and vocals), DB Woolbright (drums), and Luke Martz (bass) — deliver laid-back grooves and uplifting messages often delivered at times through nasty fuzz-rock jams. The band serves as a centrifugal force in the local music scene, recording and releasing lots of local music via the Might As Well label.

Velvet Cab is a pure joy to watch perform, as the boys Luke Martz (bass and vocals), Scottie Declue (guitar and vocals), Jacob Declue (guitar and vocals), and Jeremy Cosper (drums) have clearly spent some serious time in the woodshed the last few years, blasting off in recent gigs with monster riffs and rhymes where the magic in music lives. Backed here by her longtime running partners the Shelby Brothers, songstress Ivey Ruth Jones’ powerful pipes are perfect for belting out both rotgut rockers and wistful pop ditties. She’s recently shared her talents for songcraft in the new single “Drowning My Good” (co-written with Jesse Shelby) and “This Is Me” (written by her father, Rick Roper).

Rissi Palmer
3:30 p.m. Move to Meaningful Stage
indescribable (in a cool, cool way)
Growing up in a family with Georgia roots that loved country and R&B, Rissi Palmer’s unique style of Southern soul has enough crossover appeal to put on her stages with everyone from Taylor Swift to the Eagles. Simple pop fun marks catchy singles “Seeds” and “The Best Day” and hit you like a cool breeze, leaving you feeling light and uplifted.

Jontavious Willis
4:15 p.m. Lit Vodka Stage
vintage Georgia blues with soulful grace by throw-back generational talent
Beloved counter-culture bluesman Taj Mahal called Jontavious Willis “my wonderboy, the wunderkind” before most folks in the prodigy’s native Chattahoochee Valley ever heard his name. The secret was out after Willis’ sophomore album Spectacular Class in 2020 earned a Grammy nomination for Best Traditional Blues. Good thing the Mount Pilgrim Baptist Church choir sensation at age 14 heard Muddy Waters’ “Hoochie Coochie Man” and was hooked. Still only in his 20s, Willis has earned devoted fans around the world for his raw talent and refined mastery of his chosen artform.

Maggie Rose
5 p.m. Move to Meaningful Stage
high-concept, high-quality sassy soul
It’s fitting that Maggie Rose is coming to Columbus right after she plays Americana Fest in Nashville. Her soulful mix of country, blues, folk and rock is as good as it gets in the cross-pollinated genre at home in her adopted hometown of Nashville, where her big punk energy has baptized a legion of believers.

The Texas Gentlemen
5:45 p.m. Lit Vodka Stage
unpretentious party music with deeper-level lyricism resonating in your boogie shoes
Think of the Texas Gentlemen as a jamband that can write and play succinct, and very good, songs. Because the boys can most def jam on infectious beats laid under a twisted twang and tales of life’s gutterballs (“Pain”) and strikes (“Habbie Doobie”, “Bare Maximum”). These gents are much more established and dialed in than when they played the Loft 8 years ago so it’ll be a thrill to have them back.

Paul Cauthen
7:30 p.m. Move to Meaningful Stage
midnight rhinestone drugstore urban cowboy gone mad
Pull up Spotify, search “Cocaine Country Dancing.” It’s disco glitz, it’s a bizarro Studio 54 set in Tennessee, it’s Paul Cauthern in his mirror suit and a cowboy hat. Fresh off acclaimed 2022 album Country Comes Down, Cauthen is bringing his unhinged spectacle to Columbus – the only place in the world where folks line dance to rap. That’s when you realize, ‘Holy shit, this show is gonna be freakin’ awesome!’

Gov’t Mule
9 p.m. Move to Meaningful Stage
filthy barnyard jams emanating frequencies of telepathic empathy
An Allman Brothers spin-off formed in the mid-90s, Gov’t Mule fought their way to the undisputed heavyweight champions of the Southern jam/rock world. Frontman Warren Haynes’ booming baritone voice is at home in covers from Al Green to Black Sabbath and his shred-tastic Gibson guitar drives dozens of stellar originals with moods from sinister to sublime.

By Frank Etheridge