Staff report
The fifth annual Muddy Roots Festival will be held Friday through Sunday at the June Bug Boogie Ranch in Cookeville, Tennessee.
The three-day camping festival aims to showcase over 80 acts from a variety of genres ranging from country to punk rock, including artists such as punk forefathers The Sonics, grunge veterans Mudhoney and roots music revivalist Pokey LaFarge.
Aside from music, the festival grounds will feature events such as the Movember Beard Competition, a burlesque cabaret and even church services Sunday morning. There will also be nightly showings of Hard Soil – The Muddy Roots of American
Music, a documentary on American Roots music. Perks festival attendees can expect from Muddy Roots include free camping, free hot showers and the ability to “B.Y.O.B.” if he or she of legal drinking age. Tents are also available to rent on-site.
In addition to the weekend’s activities, there will be an additional event Thursday evening featuring a showing of Hard Soil and performances by Woody Pines and Jayke Orvis & The Broken Band for the price of an additional cover charge.
Additional artists playing the festival include The Blasters, Bobby Bare, The Weirdos, The Monsters, The Legendary Shack Shakers, ANTiSEEN and more.
Acts that have performed at the festival in previous years include Black Flag, Revered Horton Heat, Wanda Jackson and Shooter Jennings.
For updates and photos from Muddy Roots, follow us here on www.mtsusidelines.com or on Twitter at @Sidelines_Life or on Facebook at MTSU Sidelines.
To contact Lifestyles editor, John Connor Coulston at [email protected]
I’m an MTSU student, and I actually got to volunteer at the Muddy Roots festival this year. Even being someone who was born and raised in Metro Nashville, I had never heard of this festival prior to this past spring semester. I went with a group of friends/volunteers, but I was added to the mix at the last minute. I volunteered to be the last volunteer, if you will. As volunteers, we were given one of the cabins that they provide for sleeping arrangements. The cabin, we were told, slept four people. We had twelve total people, so the rest of us were camping. None of us knowing anything about the festival arrived there early Friday afternoon, checked in, and proceeded to our cabin. It was TINY. There were two bunk beds inside and that was it. However, it was air conditioned, so that was definitely a plus. It ended up being a respectable lodging option in the end though because on Saturday afternoon, there were two monsoons, by my definition anyway. It rained and rained, and the entire festival site was left extremely muddy, living up to the festival’s name. We volunteers had quite long, hard days, and we had a few complications over the entirety of the trip, on top of the unfortunate weather, but all-in-all it was a worthwhile and positive experience, for me at least. We helped work two of the three stages at the festival, and we made connections with some of the most amazing and talented people. Many of the acts at Muddy Roots were quite different, but very entertaining and enjoyable people. I think in future years for volunteering it will surely be even better because we now know what to expect and we can better prepare ourselves each time we revisit. As a trial and error, I would say that it went well.