BUCKETHEAD
TUE JUN 2 | 8 PM | VICTORY NORTH
Don’t let the KFC headgear, mask, and “raised by chickens and escaped the coop” schtick throw you. Few guitar players can match the virtuoso skill level of Buckethead. He’s one of those players too good and too restless to stick with one band. Like Steve Vai, who worked with David Lee Roth and his complete opposite John Lydon in Public Image Limited, or Alex Skolnick who plays in thrash metal veterans Testament while also leading a killer jazz trio, Buckethead dips into many bands.
He was a semi-formal member of Guns N’ Roses when Axl Rose shat out Chinese Democracy, played in Praxis with Bill Laswell, and joined Les Claypool in Colonel Claypool’s Bucket of Bernie Brains, among several others.
Restlessness is also evident in the 31 formal studio albums he’s released and the astounding 808 “Pike” albums, self-released mini albums. Yes, eight hundred and eight over about 15 years, a pace just a hair ahead of one per week. There are also 262 live Pike albums.
For guitar players, the show is practically a must-attend event. For anyone interested in what heretofore unknown things can be done with a guitar, it’s a no-brainer. There isn’t anyone as prolific, and the talent to venue-size ratio is off the charts. You also might want to wear your own bucket on your head so you have something handy to catch your melting face.
WITHERED + THE BLACK STRAIN + XENOBILE
TUE JUN 2 | 8 PM | THE WORMHOLE
Peter Criss passionately sings “Darkness will fall on the city” on Black Diamond, but that reference to street sleaze, hookers, and survival is not the kind of darkness this show brings to Savannah. Oddly not scheduled for 6/6/2026, the darkness here is the ethereal type. Think feelings of foreboding, despair, and hopelessness set to music.
Atlanta’s Withered spreads the morbid cacophony with death, doom, and sludge metal, all blackened and beastly enough to make Immortal, Mayhem, and Quorthon beam with pride at their descendants.
The Black Strain is the sludgiest of the bunch, a duo that plods and pounds like the slower Celtic Frost.
Atlanta’s Xenobile might have the best self-description Take Five has seen in quite a while. If you like it extra heavy and loud, and you don’t take it too seriously, “ignorant death metal” should present the possibility you’re about to see your new favorite band. Kudos for the honesty.
BILL. + KALEIDOSCOPE CRUX + BREATHWISH
SUN JUN 7 | 7 PM | SENTIENT BEAN
Some shoegaze bands lay a delicate melody over the wall of guitars, balancing the ugly and the pretty. Like The Smashing Pumpkins on Melon Collie and the Infinite Sadness, Tampa’s bill. doesn't stick to that formula exclusively. Their gaze is often seen through a harsher lens, with post-rock, noise, and glitchy electronics that fill the soundscape to the meniscus. They do keep it melodic at times, but overall it’s firmly in the harder end of the genre’s spectrum. For a “child of” reference, it could be the brat of My Bloody Valentine and The Stone Roses.
Kaleidoscope Crux, from Lafayette, LA, put some grind on the fuzzy guitars and place them up front. An inspired mix of Sebadoh’s pop sensibility and Dinosaur Jr’s You’re Living All Over Me riffage, one hopes it’s a sign of promising things to come in the relentless ‘90s alt-rock revival.
If you’ve been pining for an optimal combination of math rock and emo, newer Savannah band Breathwish is the answer to your prayers. The mixed-genre act features gobs of earnestness, former Holy Ghost Tabernacle Choir bassist and music instructor Aaron Cooler, and all the formulas and tabulations check out.
TRAUMA CODE + MOURNE + LILY PAD + SORRY FOR THE MESS
SAT JUN 6 | 5 PM | COASTAL EMPIRE BEER CO.
June, the sixth month of the year, on the 6th of the month, in the year 2026. Get where this is going?
Kublai Kanine’s 6•6•6 show is an all-ages celebration of Ol’ Scratch’s favorite number. The four-band lineup provides the soundtrack to Hell, replete with screaming, agony, and violence.
Trauma Code, from Jacksonville, wrecked the Bean back in February and have their sights set on leveling Coastal Empire with relentless, pounding metalcore that might get subtle for three or four milliseconds before you feel like your head is being pulled off your neck.
The hardcore of Brunswick’s Mourne rages with the apocalyptic fury of a hungry foodie driving down that way from Savannah and finding both Willie’s Wee-nee Wagon and Sal’s Neighborhood Pizza closed.
North Georgia’s mixed-gender Lily Pad combines big, stomping metal with a completely-disgusted-with-humanity vibe that takes anger to new levels.
Sorry For The Mess alternate between warp-speed tempos in the Cryptic Slaughter range and punishing breakdowns that threaten anyone standing still with medieval torture.
GUAP
SAT JUN 6 | 9 PM | BROUGHTON STREET BOWL & BREW
Georgia has a jam band history as rich as it is long. One can make a strong argument that The Allman Bros. are foundational, like the roots of a tree. Live, they take their songs to unknown places with dual guitar improvisation, expanding and reinterpreting their Southern rock and blues catalog.
A decade later, Widespread Panic was founded in Athens around the time The Grateful Dead had their Touch of Grey resurgence and blew up when the early ‘90s neo-hippie band revolution solidified. Soon after, Perpetual Groove crossed the millennium on their way to jam band royalty status.
Guap would like to join the party and get Atlanta in on all the fun Macon, Athens, and Savannah have had launching such stalwarts. Like P-Groove, they add a touch of electronics to their progressive jam. Closing in on two years as a live act, video evidence confirms they have the chops and the imagination to stretch out their originals properly, or give covers like Bob Dylan’s All Along the Watchtower or Herbie Hancock’s Cantaloupe Island the Guap treatment.
By Frank Ricci