Reasons to Wreck: Shagwuf.
Wreckfest is less than 2 months away and as promised we’re previewing the bands, the music and the storylines coming to this first ever IX Art Park Charlottesville Music Festival.
We’ll be there on site in the Cvillesoundchecklounge©, holding your hand every step of the way, sometimes putting free goodies in that hand, fully immersed with you in this Wreck which takes place Sat and Sun Sept 20-21.
Now, the next Wreckfest band in focus: the one and only Shagwuf.
In case you’ve been living under a rock in the Rockfish River like some kind of stone fly nymph and don’t know them, this Cville 3-piece outfit self-describes as psychedelic rock, swampy, with a lot of glam—heavy hitting, drop-tuning, sludgey stuff. Shiny and glam on one side, gritty and sludgey on the other. These kids were on the front side of today’s heavy resurgence years ago, before anyone saw it coming.
So much has been written about Shagwuf — their charasmatic front person / bass player Sally Rose Monnes, guitarist and lead singer Sweet Pete Stallings and drummer Pablo Daniel Olivieri. RVA Magazine and their readers voted them “Best Rock Band”. They bagged an NPR Song of the Day award. And Spin Magazine called them “Charlottesville’s Best Band,” describing Sally Rose as “acrobatic”.
Which honestly does not do justice to this ridiculously athletic rockstar’s stage presence. To watch Sally Rose is to feel like you’re doing a half crossfit / half hi-intensity yoga workout with them at their gym.
We’ve talked about what Pink famously calls “Rock Moves” and she could have been talking about Sally Rose.
If you think of Pete Townsend’s SG “windmill”, Chuck Berry’s “duckwalk”, Jimi lighting his strat on fire on stage, St. Vincent’s hyper femine, and at the same time, hyper masculine “strut”, or Pink and her fly rig, these are classic, epic “Rock Moves”. If you haven’t seen Shagwuf tear it up and Sally Rose just fackin’ go ballistic on stage, you haven’t lived yet and you haven’t experienced some of the best Rock Moves on either side of the Blue Ridge.
And you have one of your best reasons to go to wreckfestcville.com and get your tickets now.
We caught up with Shagwuf this past Friday night at Durty Nelly’s, in the middle of a kickass lineup that included the Prabir Trio and Wes Parker (Old Hank had to miss Wes. Long story short, a good buddy was getting his big toe amputated and Old Hank was asked to pose as a grief-stricken family member and sneak the patient’s Clint Eastwood style cigarillos into the hospital during the staff shift change! Sorry Wes, we’ll get you next time!)
While they played a satisfying range of cuts off 2024’s Tres Animals and catalog faves, the song that put a cherry on this hot fudge sundae of a night was just an unbelievably ferocious version of Cassolette off of 2016’s !Salvaje!
They brought Prabir and his sitar on stage, where he whipped out a Raga that fit like a glove with the Em key Sally Rose and Pete were pounding on. And they proceeded to make old Durty Nelly’s bricks and morter groan a little.
And for fans that pour over the words:
There’s no regret
There’s only art in life and death
While I’m trying to forget
Cassolette!
How does the Queen put the king in check?
Cassolette!
That, fellow nerds, is a rock and roll chess reference and a nod to the power of the Queen!
See it in the video above. And do not miss seeing Shagwuf in September at Wreckfest.
You’re gonna wanna stay tuned. Next up, we snagged an exclusive pre-show interview with our newest Commonwealth fave — Uga Buga!!!
OK, whatever you do, please take care of your toes people,
Old Hank
