I know a lot of you played, but I haven't heard a peep about it. How was HyperFest? I missed the whole thing since I was out of town camping at a mini-fest in the middle of nowhere.

I thought it was pretty cool. The LB team went out on thurs, fri, and sat. Basically all of the bands involved with this were really good at their styles.

I think the general flavor of things was rock/indie, but it was diverse. Not a lot of hard bands. I saw some pretty glam looking cats, but I didnt let it phase me.

Black Lamb, Broken Teeth, The Fred Green Band stand out in my mind.

This festival was very intelligently organized.

it was overall pretty good. i didn't make it down on friday night, but saturday was okay. we had a lot of fun with our set and had a pretty good turnout considering the dude from primus's new band was playing next door at the same time. overall though it didn't really seem like there was that big a turnout. i heard colourmusic was pretty awesome too.

We were out on friday and had a great time.
Attended the conferance itself on Saturday afternoon and was surprised how very few bands took advantage of the resources given to them.

We spent about 4 hours in the mentoring sessions bouncing from person to person. It was a very eye opening experience in terms of how "they" view bands.

Still, they had some pretty heavy hitters there. We met with the VP of SESAC which was interesting and revealing. Met some useful contacts and got more info on the music biz than we could ever possibly use.

All in all I think it was 100 times better this year than it was last year.
-Zac

I think it ran rather smoothly, with the exception of maybe one venue--but that was the fault of the venue, not of Hyperfest. They had no idea how to run sound for anything other than club/dance music. Lame.

On Thursday night, at the VIP party, I saw Zack Freeman, Colourmusic, and The Attorneys. I really enjoyed Zack's performance.

I can't even remember Friday night. I think I saw a band at Ralli's that I remember not liking. Ralli's also had a band of young'uns and they were pretty tight--the guitarist had an Orange stack on top of a Mesa 2x10. It was ridiculous. But they sounded good....I think... I caught a couple songs by this one Hawaiian ska band at the District. I wonder where that night went?

Then Saturday, we played at Club 7, which was cool because a lot of our friends were there, which made us feel better because Jon broke a string and the backup guitar wasn't working either. I spent the whole night there working as a stage manager. I saw a band called Drew Grow, and they were pretty cool: mellow, harmonious, wierd...kinda like Ben Kweller-style stuff. I liked it. At El Rey, I got to see The Attorneys play their cover of The Reaper by Blue Oyster Cult with Marsh from Soular taking the honor of smacking the cow bell. They sounded really really good. I also caught Fight The Quiet at the District. Their new music sounds great. I was completely exhausted when I went to sleep Saturday night.

quote:

Originally posted by Zac:
Attended the conferance itself on Saturday afternoon and was surprised how very few bands took advantage of the resources given to them.
-Zac

That's because so few bands actually have a chance of making anything of themselves...mine included. No, all kidding aside it was cool. I went to some panels and got some good info. Saw the cool Cherry Tempo fog/flashlight show, and had a good time.

Man, you can tell from the birth of the festival that everyone involved put everything they had into making it different than last year. And it was! From the VIP party, this ended up in some drunken good times, to the very informative conferences then down to the solid selection of bands. This thing has a lot of potential to be bigger and bigger each year.

We made friends with Tim Alexander (Primus) and his band(s). Helped them move their equipment and sent them home with some “stuff” for the road. Black Lamb, from Denver, (They Fucking Rock!) used our drum kit due to the back line kit getting destroyed. Saw some amazing bands represent and enjoyed socializing with all the “important” music cats and musicians.

There was a fight at our venue, The District, Friday Night and the Texas spokesperson for the “TexasRockFest” got 86’d for drunken disorderly conduct. Our singer got into it with the bassist from one of the Texas bands while we were playing to give you an idea of what the belligerent tension was like in that place. Beer, Metal, Texas Rock makes for a great fucking mix.. hah!

I look forward to next year.

I did the stage manager thing at Atomic on Saturday, and have some good stories that I'll have to get into later, but real quick:

Oktober people were dark, tense, epic. They all said they sucked after the set, and maybe it's because my taste runs more to the raw side but I was really into it. In the top 5 times I've seen them for sure.

I guess some audience jerk messed with the sound board during Unit 7 Drain's set? I was helping Standing Ground load out, Matt was in the can, and it took Len and Matt a bit to figure out why they just suddendly sounded shitty. otherwise great though, as always.

I was the only guy watching Yellow Delicious at the end of the night. I guess the crowd was totally partied out. I thought they were good, Cheap-Tricky power pop, but they were so non-rock star looking I had to squint to really enjoy them. I got their disc but it had a bunch of slow, ballad-y songs they didn't play.

Mostly I was unneccessary, since Atomic and the bands and Hyperfest had their shit together. I did a lot of hovering and asking if people needed help, and mostly just hauling shit and pointing out outlets/restrooms/soundguy.

I had a great time, but I was only out because I played. I was around Saturday night between burt's and the atomic. After I heard Tim Alexander was going to be there I became giddy, but was mildly disappointed that he wasn't playing drums. I didn't do any of the conferences or parties (I'm horrible at parties), but I'm glad this is happening in our city and so many people get to benefit from, and enjoy, this festival. The Giranimals sounded great with the addition of Bud Melvin on keys. John of LB mentioned the potential of this thing, and that's the overall feeling I got; hope this continues.

quote:

Originally posted by The Musk:
I had a great time, but I was only out because I played. I was around Saturday night between burt's and the atomic. After I heard Tim Alexander was going to be there I became giddy, but was mildly disappointed that he wasn't playing drums. I didn't do any of the conferences or parties (I'm horrible at parties), but I'm glad this is happening in our city and so many people get to benefit from, and enjoy, this festival. The Giranimals sounded great with the addition of Bud Melvin on keys. John of LB mentioned the potential of this thing, and that's the overall feeling I got; hope this continues.

wait a second... are you sure tim alexander wasn't playing drums for fata morgana? what would he be playing? of course i couldn't tell b/c of the silly masks, and i only heard half a song, but it sounded to me like him playing the drums.

He was playing guitar.

gio is right. guitar and singing.

Totally nice guy by the way: pro, laid back, respectful, etc

3 words :

giant squid
friday at AC

period

.