Railbird Fest Throws Fans for a Loop with 2025 Headliners

The annual Railbird Festival in Lexington, Kentucky just announced its 2025 lineup for May 31st to June 1st, and it includes an excellent crop of top-of-the-line independent country and roots artists.
This includes Cody Jinks, Sierra Ferrell, Wyatt Flores, Blackberry Smoke, The Castellows, Ole 60, and many more. Railbird organizers have also clearly been doing their homework, and booked some overlooked, and under-the-radar bands worthy of the opportunity, namely Saving Country Music Songwriter of the Year Jesse Welles, as well as one of Austin’s greatest bands, Rattlesnake Milk.
These artists and bands are what you would expect from the C3 Presents Railbird Fest, which since the beginning has focused more on independent country artists as opposed to mainstream names. But it’s the headliners Railbird has announced that have return patrons chirping, and wondering how they fit with the festival’s undercard.
Lainey Wilson isn’t too far out of left field. After all, for a mainstream country artist, she still has a more traditional sound, and has been featured at independent country festivals before. Believe it or not, you could even see a universe where Shaboozey could be a unique change of pace for the fest, especially if he features some of his more rootsy material (which he’s also apparently wanting to lean more into).
But Bailey Zimmerman, and especially Jelly Roll feel almost like poison pills for a lineup that primarily focuses on non country radio-supported artists. Zimmerman is like the TEMU version of Morgan Wallen, and we’re about a year past people being tired of the overexposure and constant ram rodding of Jelly Roll down our throats.
As one commenter on Facebook said, “That’s one way to make sure the fest isn’t oversold! Went from a nice alt country/ rock fest to mainstream country….ruined the whole thing you had going!”
But as another points out, “Look past the headlines yall, Red Clay Strays, Ole 60, Noeline Hoffman, Treaty Oak Revival just to name a few up and comers on this list that are so good and genuine to their music. Give them a listen if unfamiliar, that’s why I’m going.”
In some ways, you feel sorry for Railbird and other independent-oriented country music festivals. Even as independent artists and bands continue to surge, the amount of top headliners for a major festival is somewhat thin. With Zach Bryan saying he’s not going to tour much in 2025, Billy Strings and Tyler Childers focusing more on their own headliner shows, and Cody Jinks and the Turnpike Troubadours coming back down to reality a little bit, there’s not many names to choose from.
But a strong case could be made you’d fare better putting performers like Sierra Ferrell and The Red Clay Strays at the very top of your poster as opposed to overpaying for Jelly Roll. Along with Charley Crockett, 2025 feels like the year these performers graduate to legitimate headliners, and The Red Clay Strays already have.
Railbird has some incredible names playing the festival in 2025, offering both a ton of top-line independent country entertainment, along with plenty of things to discover. It’s just a shame Jelly Roll, Shaboozey, and Bailey Zimmerman will distract from how good this lineup actually is. Most independent country fans would rather listen to a straight up hip-hop artists than pop country’s poorer versions of one.
The presale is now up at railbirdfest.com .

January 22, 2025 @ 10:38 am
Gone last several years and I don’t get it. The secondary acts they have are amazing, but the headliners minus RCS and to some extent Lainey are just so far out of left field from what they usually do. I’ll pass this year even though Bingham is on my bucket list.
January 22, 2025 @ 10:40 am
And to add on after the shit show Zimmerman had at Like Bryan’s last week even more of a reason not to go
January 22, 2025 @ 10:47 am
This is what I say about festivals all the time. There are artists fans might not like but will tolerate, and then there are poison pills. This lineup includes multiple poison pills.
January 22, 2025 @ 11:23 am
Agreed, the thing is the pop country crowd will buy up the tickets me and other regulars won’t use, it will be a sell out and next year there probably will be another evolution of the line up to cater to that crowd more.
January 22, 2025 @ 8:00 pm
And they’re the headliners, which means long, prominent and unavoidable sets, unless you tap out before the headliners start – which I guess could appeal to some but certainly would feel like bad value for money.
January 22, 2025 @ 6:03 pm
Bingham and Stoney LaRue are on my bucket list. I’ve seen darn near everyone else I care to. Unless you’re in TX or OK those two are tough to catch.
January 23, 2025 @ 3:37 am
i saw Bingham 3 times in Rome(Italy) back in the days.
January 22, 2025 @ 11:08 am
I wonder whether they may be trying to re-orient this to be like Stagecoach, with a pop-country stage and a “Palomino” stage. It will be interesting to see if there are changes to the set up, especially as this festival reported sound problems last year.
If thats the plan they should make it clear as soon as possible because the Strong undercard is a great festival so long as you get Headlining length sets out of RCS/Sierra Ferrell/Jinks/Bingham. If they are limited to 45min sets, independent country fans are going to be seriously short changed.
January 22, 2025 @ 11:22 am
On a much smaller scale, Roostertail Music Festival in Madison, Indiana had been building a nice, small two day festival since 2018. They took a hit with covid, but last year they had an excellent lineup top to bottom for a small town music festival that’s 40 miles from an interstate. Then they got someone new running it this year instead of the guy that built it, and it’s being headlined by Randy Houser (okay fine) and Dustin Lynch. I tried to see the lineup for reference, but they blocked me on facebook for commenting that they were going away from what built the festival
January 22, 2025 @ 2:00 pm
Probably going to have a whole thing on Roostertail and the new Unbroken Circle Festival once they both announce their full lineups.
January 24, 2025 @ 1:29 pm
Roostertail seems more like the canary in the coal mine for authentic festivals than Railbird. If Railbird has a few poison pills, then Roostertail is a leaky bag of arsenic. To me, this is the death rattle for the whole festival industry, at least as it relates to authentic country and Americana acts. Hats off to smaller ones like Laurel Cove that have figured out how to stay viable without gutting the quality.
January 22, 2025 @ 11:27 am
I live in Lexington and have been every year — one year it had pretty much a dream lineup. But we’ll probably skip this year.
There are several acts I’d like to see (Jinks, Bingham, Ferrell, although we saw her last year there), but the problem I have is the crowd it’s going to bring in for Jelly Roll and Zimmerman is not the festival crowd I want to be around. I’m a Zach Bryan fan, but the crowd for his Railbird headlining set was one of the more obnoxious festival crowds I’ve been around.
It’s hard to justify the price when I’d leave before the Sunday headliner.
January 23, 2025 @ 5:01 am
If you live in Lexington, you can see half these people at the Burl headling for half the price over the next year or two
January 22, 2025 @ 11:40 am
Great line ups. More than enough to keep most people happy. One is not going to like everyone at an event like this.
January 22, 2025 @ 12:14 pm
The Smoke will be there. That alone makes this worth it.
January 22, 2025 @ 9:56 pm
Holy shit…. Fatass Jelly Roll, special ed Zimmerman, fake teeth Green, and Shitboozey all in one festival. What an embarrassment such good artists have to share the same stage as these clowns.
On a side not, I’ve grown to really like Max McNown. Glad to see his name on there.
January 23, 2025 @ 8:16 am
Aside from Blackberry Smoke, there’s no one on the list that I care to see, haven’t seen, and/or can’t see in a smaller venue for a fraction of the cost.
Add the fact that BBS is underbilled, and it’s an easy pass.
Jelly Roll just played an Arena show in Lexington two months ago. Just bizarre booking decisions.
January 23, 2025 @ 8:39 am
Shabloozey and Jelly Donut? HA, ok. good way to kill what should otherwise be a really good line up.
January 23, 2025 @ 7:36 pm
What about Green and Zimmerman? Equally as bad.
January 23, 2025 @ 4:59 pm
“That’s one way to make sure the fest isn’t oversold!”
Or it’s forward thinking and a good way to make sure the Festival will be sold out for years to come. So many festivals vying for limit dollars these days. While I’m not a fan of Jelly Roll or these other so-called “poison pills,” wouldn’t it be great if their fans came and ended up discovering all of these other cool artists they might never have heard before?
Music snobbery and elitism is so played at this point.
January 26, 2025 @ 1:35 pm
I disagree, there’s other festivals that cater to that crowd. Look at Railbird previous headliners and then look at this year. I like Zach Bryan music but when head headlined Railbird there was a big bro crowd that came with it. This year will have that 10 fold of carolina squat drivers who try to fight after 3 bud lights