Top 5 On Friday – Planet Desert Rock (the final 6 bands!)
As I close out this series on the Planet Desert Rock Weekend Festival, I have six final bands to highlight. In order to not leave out any bands, this top five on Friday segment will have six. As the final days are approaching, I can’t express enough about how excited and pumped up that I am for being able to attend this event. This will be my first multiple day excursion for a music festival. I have attended many long/ all day festivals before but not four consecutive nights in a row. This is gonna be epic! I must applaud John Gist for orchestrating this amazing endeavor and being able to pivot when bands had to cancel out. So here are the final six bands in no particular order. I hope to see and meet a lot of like minded individuals at Planet Desert Rock, that are as passionate as I am about the heavy underground music scene. Here we go!
DIRTY STREETS
Dirty Streets are a three-piece hard rocking blues band based in Memphis, Tennessee. About a month ago, I went into a deep dive into their discography and I was very impressed with their sound. Dirty Streets features Justin Toland on guitar and vocals, Thomas Storz on bass, and Andrew Denham on drums. Their album releases include: 2009’s Portrait of a Man, 2011’s Movements, 2013’s Blades of Grass, 2015’s White Horse, 2018’s Distractions, 2020’s Rough and Tumble (live), and 2022’s Who’s Gonna Love You. The band does an amazing cover of “Stayin’ Alive” too! This is definitely a great and talented band that I look forward to seeing live.
https://www.dirtystreetsmusic.com
https://dirtystreets.bandcamp.com/music
https://www.facebook.com/share/1FQuoCeGPc/?mibextid=wwXIfr
WESTING
Westing is a four-piece heavy rock band from Visalia, California. They play a seventies style of hard rock reminiscent of Led Zeppelin, etc. The band consists of Ben McLeod on lead guitar, Daniel Story Rice on guitar, vocals, and keys, Hayden Doyel on bass, and Cody Tarbell on drums and engineer. When they started, they were called Slow Season, and released three full length albums under that name: 2014’s Mountain, 2015’s Self Titled, and 2016’s Westing. They went on a hiatus as Slow Season after their 2016 album and rebranded as Westing in late 2021 to signify a new chapter. They released their debut in 2023 (under the Westing moniker) called Future. They have a fantastic sound of classic seventies style hard rock with a modern day twist. Similar to the Dirty Streets, I had to do a deep dive into this band to discover what they are all about. Another excellent addition to a super stacked event!
https://westingband.bandcamp.com
https://www.facebook.com/share/17H9aqaJXW/?mibextid=wwXIfr
SPACESLUG
Spaceslug is like stoner rock royalty in this current heavy underground music scene. Before they were announced, I was already immersed into their sound and was finally understanding why people were in such awe of this band. They’re amazing! Spaceslug is a three-piece cosmic stoner doom band from Wroclaw, Poland. Consisting of Bartosz Janik on guitar and vocals, Jan Rutka on bass and vocals, and Kamil Ziółkowski on drums and vocals, the band formed in 2015. Their album releases includes 2016’s Lemanis, 2017’s Time Travel Dilemma, 2017’s Mountains & Reminiscence, 2018’s Eye The Tide, 2019’s Reign Of The Orion, 2020’s Leftovers EP, 2021’s Memorial, and 2024’s Out Of Water. They were also featured on a couple of compilations too. Last year, the band remastered their landmark debut album Lemanis (review here) with three bonus tracks in addition to the original seven songs. The word on the street is that they will be performing Lemanis in its entirety at the event. I am beyond excited to witness this because that debut album is a special kind of awesome that I am craving to feel. The band is closing out the show as the headlining act for Sunday night.
https://spaceslug.bandcamp.com
https://www.facebook.com/share/17fT4szeCk/?mibextid=wwXIfr
BASK
Bask was another “new” band for me to discover. I somehow missed hearing them and realized that they released a new album called The Turning (review here), this past August. I was very impressed with their sound and proceeded to check out their other recordings. Bask is a heavy psychedelic stoner rock band from Asheville, North Carolina. Formed in 2012, the current lineup consists of Zeb Camp on guitar and vocals, Ray Worth on guitar, Jesse Van Note on bass, Scott Middleton on drums, and Jed Willis on pedal steel. The band have released four full length albums including: 2014’s American Hollow, 2017’s Ramble Beyond, 2019’s III, and their latest 2025’s The Turning. They definitely have an expansive and unique sound that will be amazing to experience live.
https://basknc.bandcamp.com/music
https://www.facebook.com/share/1F5qXhW7nC/?mibextid=wwXIfr
KIND
When it was announced that Kind would be playing this festival, I was floored! They are one of my favorite current bands in this scene. I have seen them play live three times now and they are absolutely incredible! The Boston based band formed in 2013. They are a super group of sorts featuring former Elder drummer Matt Couto, former Milligram, Hackman, Roadsaw ,Black Pyramid, Slapshot, The Scimitar, and Blackwolfgoat, guitarist Darryl Shepard, former Rozamov bassistTom Corino, and current Sasquatch (drummer) and Roadsaw singer, Craig Riggs on vocals. They have three full length albums including 2015’s Rocket Science, 2020’s Mental Nudge, and 2023’s Close Encounters (review here). Kind always puts on a devastating performance and I expect them to deliver the same heavy riff rocking doom that they are known for. They just released a new single called “The Lean” on November 25th 2025, on all streaming platforms.
https://kindrocks.bandcamp.com
https://www.facebook.com/share/1DH6r73XXS/?mibextid=wwXIfr
WOLFTOOTH
I was sad to hear that Bone Church had dropped off from the event. The slot was promptly filled by Wolftooth. They are a stoner/ heavy metal band from Richmond, Indiana. The midwestern quartet features Chris Sullivan on vocals and guitar, Jeff Cole on guitar, Terry McDaniel on bass, and Casey Wainwright on drums. They have released 2018’s Self Titled, 2020’s Valhalla, 2021’s Blood & Iron, and their latest, 2025’s Wizard’s Light (review here).Wizard’s Light was just released on November 21st via Ripple Music. Wolftooth has a cool sound that brings me back to the good heavy metal that came out in the late eighties and early nineties. The stoner and doom components are there but subtle and it enhances the sound nicely. They have some hard pounding rhythms, soaring vocals, and excellent guitar leads. The band will be playing on Friday night, as part of the Ripple Music showcase.
https://wolftooth.bandcamp.com
https://ripplemusic.bandcamp.com/album/wizards-light
https://www.facebook.com/share/1AiFudTaPi/?mibextid=wwXIfr
So that concludes my segment on the Planet Desert Rock Weekend festival of 2026. The next time that I will be writing about this event will be reviewing all the band’s live performances. If you want to follow the trail of posts from when I started writing about this then check out these links (part 1, part 2, part 3, and part 4). As you can see, there has been some significant lineup changes since this event was announced, almost a year ago. The two biggest let downs for me is when MOOCH and Bone Church dropped off. However, John Gist found suitable replacements and added some killer additions to an already stacked lineup. Fingers crossed that no other band will bail out of this festival. Thank you for reading these write ups and I will do my best to cover this event as it plays out. To say that I am excited for this is a grave understatement. I have a feeling that the Planet Desert Rock Weekend will be an epic adventure with fantastic bands and people alike. The heavy underground music scene has never been more massive and varied as it is now. Go get your tickets and witness the true essence of heavy stoner/ riff rock music, with some of the finest bands in existence today. TICKETS
