Clapping hands, dancing feet and live music filled the Missouri Theatre Sunday night as Buskers Last Stand closed out the 2026 True/False Film Fest. As people trickled out of the fest’s final film showing, they were submerged in music that echoed through the theater lobby.
Three artists — Anthony Wilkerson, Jason Shapiro and Pasha Raghu — alternated performances, blending honky-tonk, underground rock and modern indie into the fest’s closing soundtrack.
Ash Parker-Smith, a T/F assistant venue captain, said the lineup was designed to reflect the range of music genres T/F showcases.
“Everybody is so different that comes to the festival,” Parker-Smith said. “So when you get different artists like this, you capture everybody’s tastes, and I think that really works for an event where you’re trying to bring everybody together one last time.”
Wilkerson kicked off the show alongside drummer Spenser Rook and bassist Marielle Carlos. The trio masterfully encapsulated the traditional country style in a rousing set that blended heartfelt vocals with a twangy guitar and soft drums.
Next, Shapiro, a Chicago native, took the stage. He immediately called on the audience to clap and dance along to his music, a request they eagerly fulfilled.
Several of Shapiro’s songs were filled with sarcastic, comedic lines. In “My Daughter,” which is told through the lens of a father who believes college brainwashed his daughter, he sang, “Moved to the city and dyed her hair green / Her gender study teacher filled her head with beans,” which garnered laughs from attendees.
One of the night’s biggest highlights came when Shapiro invited Wilkerson back onstage to sing a duet of Shapiro’s, “You Kiss Like A Fish,” a song told from the perspective of a man who has some suggestions for his partner.
“I wrote it on the train to Missouri last year to True/False, and then pretty much the first thing I did when I arrived at the place I was staying, I showed it to Anthony,” Shapiro said. “I had a recording of it, and I was like, ‘Well, it’d be cool if next year, we practice it a little bit and actually do it.’”
Raghu, a student at Hickman High School, was given the honor — and potentially intimidating task— of capping off the night and T/F as a whole. What followed was a powerful set that resonated deeply with both the audience and performer.
For several years, Raghu has shared the T/F stage with her older brothers, Arjuna and Surya, under the band name drona.
Recently, however, Raghu has stepped into her own as a solo artist. Using a batch of unreleased songs, she created “heliophilia (garden of earthly delights).” This project and the songs within masterfully pair soft vocals with guitar melodies, creating a soft indie rock sound best described.
“I was really looking forward to seeing how everyone reacted to it,” Raghu said. “I had very positive feedback, and everyone was cheering, and I got to smile a lot and see what people thought of it while they were dancing.”
As the event wound down, so did the 2026 True/False Film Fest, which had filled downtown Columbia with filmgoers and filmmakers alike for four straight days. Over 35 feature documentaries and 25 short films were screened throughout the festival, including 20 world premieres.
You can look back on The Maneater’s 2026 True/False Film Fest coverage here.
