Yonder Mountain Sring Band

High on the heels of the latest big announcement, the 2009 edition of the annual Wakarusa Music & Camping Festival has announced its first round of artists set to perform at the four-day event. Topping the bill with "two big sets" a piece are newgrass stalwarts Yonder Mountain String Band and electro-rockers Sound Tribe Sector 9. Late night spots were rewarded to two Waka-veterans including funksters Galactic, whom switched out their late-night spot last year with the tardy Cake, and virtuoso rock guitarist Buckethead, whom always pulls in a rather large crowd. Many bands will be playing the recently relocated festival for the first time this year including classic hip-hop group Digable Planets, the Trey Spruance (Faith No More/Mr. Bungle) fronted Secret Chiefs 3 and legendary reggae rhythm duo Sly & Robbie. As always, many more jambands are confirmed for the June 4th-7th, northwest Arkansas event.

See the full list of initial artists after the jump

Rothbury's schedule was released on Thursday, much to the excitement of the BOT crew. (Particularly me, as I'm missing the beginning of our festival season this weekend.) I've been looking forward to Rothbury since this year's inaugural event was announced, and perusing the schedule makes me wish it were July 3rd already.

Judging from the lineup, I knew that I would run into a few scheduling conflicts, but I have to admit that I almost became physically ill when I saw that Modest Mouse and Yonder Mountain String Band feat. Jon Fishman are playing directly against each other. Of all the bands appearing at Rothbury, those were the two sets that I most wanted to see in their entirety. I didn't get to see Yonder when they were in Houston this past February, and I was incredibly disappointed to learn that their ACL set competes with Iron & Wine's, so I was banking on getting my newgrass on in July. But I've been desperately needing to see Modest Mouse ever since I fell in love with We Were Dead Before the Ship Even Sank, so...what to do? Guess I'll figure it out when I get there, as we all know that the best-laid festival plans often go awry.

View the full Rothbury Festival schedule at http://www.rothburyfestival.com/festival_schedule.php.

Warehouse Live played host to Yonder Mountain String Band on Saturday, February 2nd. The standard start time of 9 pm was posted, bringing the band to the stage without delay. The BOT crew consisting of Eggs, Toast and Doughnut were in full effect. We happened to be stuck outside for the opening tune, "Sideshow Blues", waiting to get our tickets sorted out. Once inside, we were greeted by a busy venue, although navigation was quite easy as the energy had yet to pick up. Soon the lack of steam would not be a problem.

Check out Toast and Eggs' review and pictures from the show