Last week Riot Fest organizers announced they were moving their annual multiday punk blowout from Humboldt Park to Douglas Park in North Lawndale, and tonight the festival has released a large portion of the lineup. The big names playing Douglas Park in September include 90s hitmakers No Doubt, indie kings Modest Mouse, and unclassifiable heavyweights Faith No More. Exciting, sure, but many of the names that have caught my eye are further down the bill, mixed in among perennial favorites (Gwar, Andrew W.K.) and bands I forgot existed (Airborne Toxic Event). At the top of my list are a smattering of reunited 90s acts—including Drive Like Jehu, L7, and Babes in Toyland. The lineup also has taken in plenty of big-name reggae acts such as Jimmy Cliff, Lee “Scratch” Perry, and Damian “Jr. Gong” Marley. The hip-hop acts are some of the strongest bookings: two of the biggest names on the bill, Snoop Dogg and Ice Cube, will perform a couple stone-cold classics in full—Doggystyle and a remix of Straight Outta Compton, respectively.
Elsewhere on the bill are big Brits (Billy Idol, Echo & The Bunnymen), Bootsy Collins‘s Rubber Band, Anthrax, and a smattering of fantastic young pop-punk and emo groups. Some of the best of those young bands call Chicago home—though upstarts Real Friends and Knuckle Puck, who are among the brightest of the newest wave of pop-punk bands, call the south suburbs home. Some of the other local acts on the bill are Psalm One, Alex Wiley, White Mystery, Into It. Over It., Meat Wave, and Lawrence Arms. Gossip Wolf correctly guessed five of the acts on the bill—Modest Mouse, Drive Like Jehu, Doomtree, Desaparecidos, and Gwar. The folks at Riot Fest threw in a few joke names at the bottom of the bill such as The Municipal Drainage Project, which is clearly referencing the recent tensions between Riot Fest organizers and Alderman Roberto Maldonado regarding the cleanup of the park after last year’s Riot Fest. Take a look at the full lineup below—more acts will be announced as we get closer to the festival date.
