Saturday in the Park climbs to new heights

When the Classic Rock 99.5 radio hosts asked from the bandshell if there were any first-time attendees in the crowd at this year’s Saturday in the Park music festival, my hand was raised high.

Saturday in the Park , or SITP, is one of Iowa’s longest-running music festivals, and I’ve missed some pretty phenomenal free acts in the past — Fetty Wap, Kacey Musgraves and even Aretha Franklin are just a few of the big names that have visited. And with a fresh byline at IPR and a media pass hooked to my hip, I was ready to join the 33-year-old party.

SITP touts itself as the music fest closest to the Fourth of July, and the remnants of the holiday could be seen — and heard — just by walking up to the entrance. Kids popped the last of their bangsnaps while parents ran lemonade stands and offered parking spaces in their driveways for $10 a car.

After stepping through some fairly lax security (expedited by the festival’s clear-bag-only policy) and a much-appreciated misting tent, I ventured to the festival's main stage, where I caught some of Nikki Lane ’s mid-afternoon set. It was still early in the day, and festival-goers were just beginning to fill the seats and mark their spots in the bowl-shaped space with lawn chairs while the country singer dazzled in a star-spangled getup. I grooved my way across the bowl to “First High,” from her 2022 album, Denim & Diamonds .

I’m typically a festival fashionista, but with the eclectic mix of genres, I wasn’t sure whether to break out my cowboy boots, my heaviest combats or my crunchiest sandals. I’m grateful to have opted for plain sneakers — though hiking boots to trek the hills separating the two stages would have been just as helpful. There were plenty of white maxi-skirted Gen-Zs, complete with digital cameras in their hands, for headliners Del Water Gap and Bleachers later in the evening, but for most attendees, an SITP tee from a past year completed the festival ensemble.

I’d spoken with SITP’s co-founder David Bernstein ahead of the fest, who told me he’s gotten complaints before about the festival’s disinterest in sticking to a particular genre or catering to a certain age group. Unlike the indie-alt paradise of Hinterland or the big country bashes held in the state throughout the summer, Saturday in the Park has been headlined by genre-diverse acts ranging from Flo-Rida to Earth, Wind & Fire. Personally, I didn’t see much to grumble about. The fest packed 16 acts into one day, and as I’d been told by Bernstein earlier, the mix meant waves of crowds came and went between the two stages (which also meant that making it to the front row before Bleachers came on was a piece of funnel cake).

Of course, reaching the barricade made no guarantee of a good view of the musicians — even Bleachers' front man Jack Antonoff made a comment about how high the stage was above the crowd. And once the sun started to set and the main stage bowl was filled, I had to make the hard decision as to whether keep my place or sneak a chance to see Twista’s set on the Abe Stage just over the hill. And for my decision, I intensely regret missing Twista turn his crowd into a massive sing-along party to Vanessa Carlton’s “A Thousand Miles.”

Let’s break down some major acts of the day:

Mike Campbell and the Dirty Knobs kept it (kind of) clean

The Heartbreaker’s Mike Campbell is still rocking out and paying tribute to his late friend and songwriting partner Tom Petty with his old bar band, the Dirty Knobs.

Wearing his vagabond floppy hat, sunglasses and a loose tie in a nod to the band's latest album , Campbell and the band rocked the crowd with their original songs, like their cowbell-heavy song “Sugar” from their 2020 album, Wreckless Abandon , plus classics from Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, like “Runnin’ Down a Dream, ” co-written by Campbell. The set was long and the band got a bit rough and rowdy, with Campbell tossing out a few crude remarks here and there, but they kept to their promise to the crowd to “keep it kind of clean.”

Del Water Gap stayed dry

Fresh off a performance the previous night at Wooly’s in Des Moines, Del Water Gap warmed up the crowd as the evening began to cool.

Lead singer S. Holden Jaffe, sporting a Canadian tuxedo and camouflage hat, was barely still for the band's set of fewer than a dozen songs. He crouched, sprinted and spun his way nonstop to each side of the stage. At one point, he was dangling his feet off the edge of the stage while crooning to the audience, and by the end of the final song, “Ode to a Conversation Stuck in Your Throat,” he’d handily scaled the bandshell’s industrial framing — and *almost* nailed the dismount.

The band was last seen performing in Iowa in a downpour at last year’s Hinterland, which Jaffe recalled backstage as one of his favorite performances ever. You can catch Del Water Gap on tour the rest of the summer with Niall Horan .

'Still Tippin’' at The Abe Stage

Located down a large hill, past a long strip of jewelry, clothing and ashiatsu vendors dubbed ‘Arts Alley,’ the Abe Stage hosted a pageant of high energy acts from hip-hop and metal to reggae. Abraham Lincoln’s giant inflatable head — no hat — stared out into the crowd as it grew and grew.

Since its inception, the Abe Stage has been a proving ground and an aspiration for rappers in the Sioux City area in particular. This year was no different. Sioux City rapper YOUNG OC3AN inaugurated the 2024 Abe Stage, followed by other local hip-hop artists TRYPLYTZ and RVRND.

Later on, Black Joe Lewis treated the audience to a blend of funk and soul befitting a post-Fourth of July celebration, and even extended his set by two songs for those who needed more time to dance.

Nighttime at the Abe Stage served unbridled hip-hop, with a mighty twofer of Houston hitmaker Paul Wall and Chicago’s preeminent fast-rapper Twista .

Wall performed excerpts from all his most popular tracks and paid special tribute to Lil’ Keke and the late UGK icon Pimp C. Wall also heard and delivered on myriad Iowans’ pleas on Facebook to perform “Girl.”

By the time Twista came out, Grandview Park was more people than park. The K-Town Kamikaze, back in Iowa for his second time in as many months, performed a similar line-up to his headline set at My Waterloo Days, and the Sioux City festival crowd was just as appreciative.

Bleachers brought the studio to the stage

Beneath the warm glow of a “Recording Studio in Use” box dangling from above, indie-pop band Bleachers served the now-swollen Main Stage crowd a string of their old — and brand new — songs that all felt fresh.

Jack Antonoff, a producer for not only Taylor Swift, but also Lana Del Rey, Lorde and Sabrina Carpenter, is a name that's practically inescapable nowadays. But even if you're tired of hearing it attached to the work of many of pop's leading women, his set proved once more that he's the real deal — and that he's earned his place among the industry greats.

Bernstein had described the band’s lively performance style — "heavy on the horns" — to me in our earlier conversation, but it was an experience to watch them do it live.

“The stage is really high, the bowl is really big,” said a beaming Antonoff, whose high-energy performance was so equally animated and theatrical, it felt like a musical.

The band’s sound, embellished by not one, but two dazzling saxophonists, built a delicious blend of indie, pop and early rock that has to be seen to be believed.