As we head into our third trip to Summer Camp Music Festival, I’m feeling better about this year than I have before.

2018: Went in completely unprepared.
Heard some amazing bands I’d never heard before, but missed a lot more.

2019: Tried to cram all my prep into a few weeks before the festival.
Sat down with Sean Kenny (Appreciated that SO MUCH!) and went through the entire list and talked about who I should tell people not to miss (and who not to miss for myself)… and then ran out of time to write a post about it for you.

2020: Starting early and already excited
about the bands who will be there… and decided to find a way to help those of you who are not familiar with every band on the list get excited about who we are going to see too!

We have a Spotify playlist that will include every artist that has been announced in the lineup. They are mostly in order of how they were announced and I’ll continue to add newly announced bands to the end of the list.

I realized that if I add each section of the lineup to the playlist when announcements are made, we’ll all have plenty of time to listen to the bands and get acquainted with their music. I have a few bands I’m really looking forward to seeing already!

In fact, just hours after I heard them for the first time while adding them to this playlist, Fletcher’s Grove played at Kenny’s Westside Pub on Saturday. Imagine my excitement when they started a new song and I realized, “Hey! I know that one! It’s on the playlist I made for PML!”

Here they are performing it at Kenny’s… Note: If you can’t watch the video for some reason, the point of sharing the video is: Don’t miss these guys at Summer Camp this year! I listened to their CD all the way home that night!

Out of curiosity this weekend, I posted a poll asking people if they were lyrics-driven listeners or musicianship-driven listeners when it came to music. The fact that my husband and I are opposites on this made me wonder where other music lovers fell as well.

According to my unscientific polls, Peoria Music Live followers are generally musicianship-driven at a rate 64% over 36% who consider themselves more lyric-driven.

In a similar poll in a Facebook group dedicated to all things Summer Camp, the percentage was even higher at closer to 84% who prefer to focus on musicianship over lyrics.

So, what have I proven? What everyone already knows… Not everyone loves all the same kinds of music for all the same reason. In fact, the way polls are structured allowed people in the Summer Camp group to add other options for consideration and “Entertainment-driven” was one someone added, which can turn into a whole different discussion.

My point is, since SCAMP20 (thus this playlist) will have a wide variety of genres, it makes sense that few will want to listen to the #SCAMP20 playlist in its entirety more than once… but that’s where I’m encouraging you to start.

Listen to each song. There are two by each scheduled SCAMP20 artist who had two available on Spotify. Even if you don’t believe jam bands are your cup of tea, and you’ve heard this is a jam band festival… listen to the playlist. There are bands on there you are going to be glad you heard about.

Then use the playlist to help you with this:

1. Decide who you love and go to their artist page and click “follow” so that you can get more of their music into your regular mix.

2. Use our playlist to create your own personal SCAMP20 Playlist. As more bands are announced and added to the original playlist, you can create your own and add the songs from bands you want to see to that playlist.

3. When the Summer Camp App is updated with new artists you can go straight to the bands that are on your playlist and add them as “favorites” and put them on your schedule when times and stages are available.

Note that for the first round of lineup announcements, there are two bands on that list who are not on Spotify. Brainchild and Sun Stereo. Just put them on your Summer Camp Schedule. If you don’t know them yet, you can just take my word for it. You’re welcome.

(You can also find them on Facebook… click BRAINCHILD or SUN STEREO.)

One last thing before you take off to check out that playlist… remember that a live performance at Summer Camp Music Festival is going to be 100 times more entertaining than what you hear on Spotify. So, if you even like the music a little bit, add them to your schedule anyway!

Too Many Zooz was one of my favorites in 2019, which might seem odd since I’ve clearly said I love great lyrics and this band doesn’t have any… but they were so entertaining to see live, I’ll definitely be back if they have a set again this year. (At this time they are not on the lineup... but I’ll update this if that changes.)

So, here is your link to the PML #Scamp20 Playlist: bit.ly/scamp20

You can also open Spotify and scan this QR Code:

Interested in checking out tickets and getting more information for this year’s 20th Anniversary Summer Camp Music Festival? You can do it all here: Summercampfestival.com