The momentum kept up for the second day of the Stagecoach Festival on Saturday (Apr. 26) in Indio, Calif., as it proved to be a huge day for breakout performers of the past year celebrating their recent triumphs with some of their biggest shows to date.
Rising country-grunge (crunge?) star Koe Wetzel made his first appearance at Stagecoach, while Shaboozey one-upped his previous year’s debut at one of the festival’s side stages by commanding a huge crowd on the main (“Mane”) stage. And of course, the biggest celebration of all was held by Jelly Roll, who not also surpassed his crowd from the year before by a near-exponential margin with his well-received and widely watched headlining gig, but brought along a near-unheard-of number of special guests to help commemorate the occasion — including Shaboozey himself.
But in addition to the still-exploding class of country breakout artists looking to become the genre’s new A-listers, plenty of hitmakers from days of yore were also present and accounted for on the festival’s second day — including a number who come from outside of the world of country. A pair of such acts with RIAA diamond-certified albums — turn-of-the-century post-grungers Creed and 2000s blockbuster rapper Nelly — delighted fans with their nostalgic throwback sets, while ’60s chart-toppers Tommy James and the Shondells showed that they had plenty of gas left in the tank as well.
Here’s eight of the best things we saw across the second day of the 18th Stagecoach Festival, with one more day still to account for this weekend.
