You've got to start your night off with the official WDEF News 12 house band, Static.

All the members work here, including news anchor John Mercer.

Our guys are playing at the Tennessee Valley Credit Union Stage at 5:30.

Since the last time you saw them, they've picked up a fifth member, Bryan Keene.

Here is their latest video.

Ana Popovich (7:45 Unum Stage)

When she titled her latest album "Still Making History," she knew what she was talking about.

When Popovich was born in Belgrade, Yugoslavia was still under Communism. Then the wall fell. Then the country fell apart under Milosovich.

While all of this was happening around her, Ana (like so many other Europeans) fell in love with the Blues.

She picked up her father's guitar, and it was her ticket out.

So with all that behind her, a little thing like being a girl in a guy's guitar world didn't phase her at all.

Now Popovich is a road warrior, both in the U-S and Europe (She speaks and sings English just fine).

Steel Mill (6:15 Bud Light Stage)

They're doing it the Jersey Way.

Back before Max Weinberg, the drummer for the E Street Band was none other than Vini "Maddog" Lopez.

He played for The Boss for three years in the early days, and that's the sound he's still playing in his current band, Steel Mill.

Here's a little bootleg nostalgia for you from 1971, when Bruce was the guitar player and singer for Steel Mill.

Not many Tennessee musicians have traveled the same road that Alex Chilton has.

During the sixties, Chilton was a Memphis teenager, singing in the Box Tops.

You would never tell it from the sound of his voice, but he was only 16 when "The Letter" hit number one.

The Box Tops had more hits with "Soul Deep" and "Cry Like A Baby."

During the seventies, he returned to Memphis to join Big Star.

The new group never was a commercial success.

But the critics loved them, and they inspired the next generation of indie rock acts.

REM called them a major influence, and The Replacements even wrote a song they named Alex Chilton.

By the eighties, Chilton was releasing quirky solo projects that the critics loved and the public ignored.

Here are some samples from a career in pop.

The Letter from the Box Tops.

Now here is Big Star on the Tonight Show.

And now the solo work.

Paul Thorn (9:00 Unum Stage)

I've raved about Paul Thorn before (notably before his Nightfall appearance last year)

I want repeat it all here, but suffice it to say that I think every southerner needs to see Paul's show at least once in your life.

It's a tent revival every time.

Here's the title song from his current album, A Long Way from Tupelo.

ZZ Top (9:30 Coca Cola Stage)

This is simply going to be one of the biggest nights ever at Riverbend.

Festival officials have been after them for a long time.

For the kids, here's a quick history lesson.

Before the Beards, ZZ Top was a Bluesy, rock band from Texas that scratched out some classic hits in the seventies (Tush, LaGrange, Cheap Sunglasses).

Then in the eighties, they grew the beards, tightened up the music, and joined the MTV generation.

Their videos were smashes, and set the image that they're still trading off of today.

Here's one of the early ones, Legs.

25 years later, they're still a top concert draw.

Here they are talking to the crowd last week in Knoxville.