Boots, Bass, and Biloxi Funk: Llamapalooza Gets Weird in the Best Way

First, picture the boots

A brewery parking lot in downtown Biloxi. Food trucks are parked nearby. Dogs are welcome. Then somebody starts an annual Boot Race, because apparently ordinary walking was never going to cut it.

That same Saturday afternoon ends with musicians tied to some serious New Orleans sounds. Llamapalooza is scheduled for October 24 at Fly Llama Brewing, and the contrast is perfect: goofy local chaos up front, deep funk muscle in the back.

The big band is a temporary beast

The free, all-ages festival runs from 1 p.m. to sundown at 186 Bohn Street. Karate Kids plays at 1 p.m., Leo Lovechild follows at 3, and Crescent City Heat takes the 5 p.m. slot.

Crescent City Heat is billed as a one-off lineup. The advertised players include Galactic bassist Robert Mercurio, Joe Ashlar with a Dr. John connection, drummer and composer Simon Lott, and Danny Abel of Tank and the Bangas.

That is a wild amount of musical history for a no-cover brewery event. It is not a claim that Crescent City Heat is a permanent band. It is a short-lived gathering, which can make a set feel like catching lightning in somebody’s cooler.

New Orleans does not stay put

Biloxi sits roughly 90 miles from New Orleans, close enough for the Gulf Coast to act like a long, messy musical hallway. Players, venues, food, gigs, and ideas move through it. A small festival can suddenly have a very big musical shadow.

Mercurio comes from Galactic, the New Orleans funk group formed in the 1990s. Galactic also operates Tipitina’s, the storied New Orleans venue, so its work stretches beyond touring and albums.

Lott brings another branch of that regional tree. The Louisiana-born drummer has worked across jazz, funk, hip-hop, electronic music, rock, and experimental performance. Improvising means creating music in the moment, rather than simply repeating a fixed part, and that spirit hangs around this whole lineup.

A Dr. John-sized echo

The Dr. John name on the bill carries real weight. Dr. John, born Malcolm John Rebennack Jr., blended R&B, funk, psychedelia, and theatrical New Orleans style into something nobody could mistake for background music.

He entered the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2011. Tank and the Bangas points toward a newer New Orleans groove world, too. Put those connections beside Galactic and Lott, and Llamapalooza starts looking less like a random fall market with speakers.

It looks like a casual Gulf Coast rendezvous. The kind where skilled working musicians land in the same place, play loud, and make a neighborhood afternoon feel briefly electric.

No prestige panic allowed

Fly Llama opened in downtown Biloxi in 2021, in the former Biloxi Brewing Company space. Its founders described it as a neighborhood taproom built for families, pets, local food trucks, and small-batch experiments.

That setting explains the festival’s charm. There will be crafts, vendors, special brewery releases, and local food, alongside the music. The Boot Race belongs there because it refuses to let the afternoon become too fancy for its own boots.

The festival’s own listing has a small identity crisis, calling itself both the second and fifth annual event in different spots. Fine. Let the number fight it out later. On October 24, Biloxi gets the bass, the brass-and-groove energy, and a reason to lace up something ridiculous.