Railbird is a country music festival held on June 1st and 2nd every summer in Lexington, Kentucky. The 2025 performers are Bailey Zimmerman, Shaboozey, Riley Green, and The Red Clay Strays. The 2025 headliners are Laniey Wilson and Jelly Roll. Majority of country music fans are disappointed with this setlist.
In 2024, the headliners were Noah Kahan, Turnpike Troubadours, Chris Stapelton, and Hozier. Having four well known headliners brings in more fans because they have popular music. This year, having only two, semi-popular headliners will not bring in as many fans. I can name multiple songs from each of last year’s headliners, but I can’t name one of Lainey Wilson’s or Jelly Roll’s songs.
Some may disagree with this opinion and argue that in 2023 they only had Zach Bryan and Tyler Childers as headliners however, Zach Bryan is ranked second best country artist on Spotify and Tyler Childers is ranked 15th. Childers playing in his hometown proves him to be more popular and bring in more fans than Jelly Roll and Lainey Wilson who are not natives.
In 2024, Sam Barber was listed 10th out of 16 on the railbird setlist. Sam Barber is listed 12th on the best country singers on spotify, which is higher than one of the 2025 headliners, Lainey Wilson. The more popular you are, the higher you are listed on the setlist. How does the 10th person on a 2024 setlist beat the first person on the 2025 setlist? It shows how unpopular this year’s setlist is.
The Red Clay Strays was on last year’s setlist and are on this year’s setlist. The Red Clay Strays did get more popular after Railbird, but people want to see new artists perform, not the same as last year.
Many people out of Kentucky travel to go to Railbird because of how popular it is. That makes it way more expensive because of tickets, hotel, gas money, or even plane tickets. With this setlist, there will not be as many out-of-state people there because they will not want to spend all that money to see these artists.
Overall, I’m not saying that Railbird won’t sell out as usual, just that many fans were overall disappointed.
