UNM Communication and Journalism 271: Local Music & Amped Performance Center

Local Music & Amped Performance Center

William Aranda

12/9/2012

Writing & Editing 278

MW 12:30-2:00

What are some places that people think of when their favorite band or singer is coming to their town? Some concert halls that come to mind are The Pavilion, Tingley Coliseum, the El Rey Theatre, Launchpad and Sunshine Theatre. All of these places have catered to famous artists in one way or another. And no matter if they play to thousands at the Pavilion or Tingley or if they are playing to only hundreds at Sunshine Theatre, everyone knows where to go when they want to see their favorite artist.

But what about local bands, where can they play at? Where can they go to get their music heard? One of the places where local groups can perform at is the Amped Performance Center, a new venue located at Central near 5th Street next-door to the Kimo Theatre, where both local bands and unknown touring bands come to play their music at.

The venue promotes itself as an all ages, alcohol free, drug free venue that provides professional lighting and sound to any bands that want to get their music out to the public, no matter what genre or style of music your band plays.

This venue is family staffed and features volunteers who want to do nothing more than support local bands that they love.

“I feel like the Amped family and a lot of the bands that come out of Amped, like that was their first venue, have a huge impact on the people that they come in contact with”, says Mike Walling, bassist for SubVert ,“once you start networking with other people everything becomes easier and tight nit.”

“I’d say that giving bands the opportunity to play because that’s every bands goal in the run is to play shows, have people come to them and have a good time”, says SubVert drummer Casey Frew, who also admires the Amped Performance Center for helping out the local music scene.

One of the volunteers at Amped is Adam Smith, who is also one of two guitarists for Belen based band Crushed!?. “It’s a great thing to be a part of something so massive that it affects so much peoples’ lives in a positive way,” says Adam, “and it’s very nice being a part of something, the whole unity of people working together.”

For anybody that says that there is no music scene in Albuquerque would be wrong. There IS definitely a strong music scene in Albuquerque, one would just have to look up any local bands that sounds good to them and see where they would be performing.

On the night of December 7th, there was a performance at the Amped Performance Center where Throw the Temple would be headlining. Other bands on the bill included Vertigo Venus, Crushed!?, The Greylist, Bright Night Lights and SubVert. This would be SubVerts second to last show before their final performance at the Wagon Wheel on December 12th.

Just after 7 p.m., SubVert showed their presence by dressing in casual attire and donning black ski masks, partly in support of jailed members of all female Russian punk group Pussy Riot. They started out with the folk inspired “Communist Cowboy” and then blistered into a 20 minute set that featured songs “Pink House White”, “Fuckansas” and a cover of “Rather Be Dead”, originally by Refused. Despite some problems, such as Zack Luten’s guitar strap break mid-way through their set, the audience gave them the recognition they deserve.

Following SubVerts set were Bright Night Lights and The Greylist, both bands based here in Albuquerque. Bright Night Lights pleasured the crowd with a cover of the Foo Fighters song “My Hero” while The Greylist played what they call thrash indie, a mixture of thrash metal and indie rock. Both were given a fair round of applause.

Crushed!? played next afterward and featured Smith on guitar. Two things that stuck out for me about this group was the insane energy of Smith as he ran around onstage and whipped his hair around like a whip. The second were all the members switching instruments half way through their set and played just as good as they had on their original weapons of choice.

Vertigo Venus, billing themselves as goth industrial punk on their Facebook, came on at 10:00 p.m. This group was unlike any of the other bands that had performed that night for a couple reasons. The first was that they had used a drum machine for their performance. And while the other bands music had the crowd moshing, this music was more mellow and had the audience slow dancing. But their music held up to the crowd and the latter responded with roaring applause at the end of their set.

And then we were treated to the headliners of the night - Throw the Temple. Earlier this year, Throw the Temple was one of six bands selected by radio station 104.1 The Edge to play EdgeFest concert and became the first band to win 104.1’s Edgy Award for “Best Local Band” in Albuquerque. One highlight for me was guitarist Matt Garcia playing a solo with his guitar behind his head.

“No Way but Down” was among the several songs that they played for the hundred fans that showed up to see them at Amped on Friday night, with crowd response being outstanding.

For anyone who says that there is no music scene in Albuquerque or that there is a lack of one, then they are lying to you. There is definitely a thriving scene going on here in the Duke City and it is growing stronger every year. So if you've got nothing to do on the weekend, look for any bands that are playing then, especially at the Amped Performance Center.