Herded through a meandering labyrinth on our trek towards Sculpture Park we soon found ourselves passing signage for a black-tie wedding while masked and muscular guards stood sentry, suspiciously eyeing the sea of neon liberty spikes, hands clasped in front of their protruding stomachs; the required stance for all security guards. We joke that we will crash the wedding on the way out and maybe slam dance with the bride.
Brew Ha Ha Productions, a craft beer-centric event producer, brought the Punk in the Park Festival to Sculpture Park in Denver on August 7th. BHHP promotes local craft beers at their events and offered almost as many Colorado breweries in attendance as the band FEAR has songs about beer. Breweries sampled regional favorites and seasonal beers from the time the gates opened until 3 o’clock when the music started.
Kicking off Saturday’s lineup was Denver based Younger than Neil, an 8 piece band that combines 3rd-wave ska and 00’s post-hardcore. “YTN” has a loyal local following with a guaranteed kickass set and Saturday’s performance proved the rule with several new songs added to the set list. The band did the 303 proud.
Next up was the Punk rock band named after the Likety Lix Bombpop. Like the ice cream treat, the female co-fronted band The Bombpops out of SoCal always satisfies.
With a luchador masked front man, sped up walking bass lines accented with rhythm on the off beat and a horn section, the Voodoo Glow Skulls kicked the afternoon into high gear.
Replacing the band H2O who had to drop out of the lineup last minute was the seminal hardcore band FEAR out of LA. Led by 71 year old singer Lee Ving, the only original member, I did not think I would personally ever see the band play live again. Thankfully for all of us, like many of Lee’s blues music heroes, he will probably continue to play music live until he dies.
Supporting the feature act Saturday was The Vandals. The band has been together for over 40 years and was probably single-handedly responsible for the resurgence of punk music in the 90’s as they saved us all from Hair-Metal bands. The band’s choice of Covering Queen’s, “Don’t Stop Me Now” for their encore could not have been more perfect, as I hope The Vandals never stop playing.
Headlining the one-day festival was Pennywise, and the Punk scene showed up en force to support one of the genre’s better-known acts. A whirlwind of dust complemented by droplets of craft beer and sweat undulated above the packed grassy terrain. The crowd had no qualms about breaking the cardinal rule of sporting band shirts at the show, as Pennywise merch was prevalent among the attendees. Brightly colored beach balls and a guy in a banana costume bounced along with patrons of all ages and demographics, lending a youthful atmosphere to the mostly aging Denver Punk rock community.
Things have changed a lot since Punk began; instead of clubs with a capacity of under 200 people, long established bands share lineups that fill venues like Sculpture Park; which offers a capacity of more than 5,000. Gone are the stinky, graffiti covered bathrooms with floors so soft you feel like you might fall through when you use the urinals, replaced by a long line of porta-potties. Ok I guess not everything is necessarily better, but I think most people (those who weren’t preoccupied with proving they they’re punker than thou) both young and old enjoyed being brought together by music and good beer to hang out with the dancing sculptures for a day.
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