written by Danny Smith
photo by Don Idio
For whatever reason, I only made it to Sunday of Shaky Beats last year. It was still an awesome day as I recall seeing TJ Mizell spinning alongside A$AP Ferg, the legendary Nas, and Big Gigantic closing out the festival in funky fashion. Cinco de Mayo weekend, Shaky Beats is coming back to Atlanta, Georgia for its second year. Once again thousands of attendees will gather downtown at Centennial Olympic Park to celebrate in unison.
The Georgia heat is detrimental to festival season, DRINK WATER! With the festival moved up a few weeks from last year’s date, hopefully it will be a little cooler. It makes dynamics interesting jamming in the middle of a city. There isn’t much umbra with all the skyscrapers and concrete around, DRINK WATER! It is nice though because you are in the middle of Atlanta and have access to ample amount of food and entertainment once the speakers stop bumping.
As for the music, I can reminiscence about a few performances by several artists in the lineup for Shaky Beats this year:
- Sitting and watching Kaskade’s superb light show on a hill at TomorrowWorld 14’ (R.I.P.)
- Bobbin to Bonobo’s Cirrus at Okeechobee last year. Bonobo was something like the calm before the storm point that Saturday. Epic experience.
- Atlanta, home to Swag Surfin’, Ludacris, Migos, amongst tons of other musical talents. It was great bringing in the New Year at Lights All Night while RL Grime was dropping ATL beats during his set. He made Dallas feel like Atlanta for a whole few minutes.
- Zeds Dead baby. Zeds Dead.
Those are just a few sets I look forward to hearing. Maybe we can get a DJ Diesel cameo…(cough cough, could be sick!)