Tuesday, May 26, 2015

PunkFest 7!

All the years I spent in Atlanta always caused me to miss the big summer event in Maine, PunkFest.  My good friend JoAnne throws a massive all day punk/hardcore/metal fest in northern Maine on Memorial Day weekend.  This past weekend was PunkFest 7, my first PunkFest!

Not only was the event amazing but she also allowed Squashed to serve food at the event!  The day prior I spend all day in the kitchen with Ashley.  We made over 100 cupcakes, chopped veggies and made enough sandwiches for 80 wrap servings (hummus, falafel, chick-un), made several dressings, made salads, and roasted cauliflower for sides.

We brought the cauliflower in the slow cooker but brought the table top deep fryer and made sandwiches to order all day and night.  It was quite an experience.  We sold out of falafel by about 6pm which was a little sad because folks kept asking for it.  Apparently, word had spread all the way to Lowell Mass that we were serving amazing falafel!  We sold out of the cauliflower around 8pm and the cupcakes were going like crazy!

We can home with about 2 dozen cupcakes, lots of chopped veggies (we went over board with those it seems) some hummus and only a few sandwiches worth of chick-un remaining.  We did quite  decent job and were invited back next year.  We are super excited and learned a lot from this event.  We will be even more prepared next year (and won't run out of falafel!).

I was so focused on the service and setting up that I forgot to take any pictures of the food or station until late into the evening.  It was quite an little operation we were running, both Ashley and Kaleigh did an amazing job too.  I could not have done it without them.


As for the Fest, it was a lot of fun.  Fortunately, there were very few orders while bands were playing so I was able to see most of the bands.

Pink Sock was a band I had heard about since moving back to Maine.  They played early and were pretty fun.  Silly dudes that played some catchy punchy SoCal punk rock.

Pink Sock

Pink Sock

Another band that caught my eye was War Cross.  They were billed as a hardcore band which I generally avoid.  However, these dudes were much more aggressive and late 80's style then most.  While they had some monster hardcore breakdowns that had the kids doing gymnastics, most of their songs sounded much more like Agnostic Front or even Coke Bust.  I was glad I got to see them!

War Cross

Uncle Spudd and the Skowhegan crew played as well.  I did not bother to photograph any of their set because I see them often and have plenty of pictures to go around of these dudes.  They were really good and I was happy they played their most aggressive stuff instead of the more melodic songs you occasionally hear with these boys.

More Beer Please came from Boston to play, they are somewhere between street punk and the mind 90's British drunk punk stuff.  They were a lot of fun to watch and put on a great set.

More Beer Please
USA Waste & Tuesday Morning Wrestling also played but I was serving food and missed most of their sets.  USA Waste is always a lot of fun as one of the longest running punk bands in Maine.

Hashgrinder was a brutal three piece from PA.  I think most of the crowd was sleeping on them to be honest.  I think they may have been overlooked as they were not quite hardcore enough for the hardcore kids and not quite punky enough for the punk kids.  I really enjoyed them though.  They were really harsh and relentless, simply sick grindcore.

Hashgrinder

I got to see most of the 88 Rangers set.  It was the 2nd time I have seen them.  I really enjoy the punk-abilly sound but for whatever reason it seems like they play for a long time.  They are realy good and hit their style perfectly.  PunkFest was no exception.

88 Rangers
Compassion Fatigue was a band I was really looking forward to seeing. They are also from Boston but play more so a crustier thrashy sound.  They played a very short set and I would have loved to see a few more songs.  They were good though, and I enjoyed what I saw.  Raw, fueled, angry, and full of energy.

Compassion Fatigue

Jim Dandy is a Maine favorite.  These Belfast Mane punks have been making noise for awhile but I had missed all of their shows until PunkFest.  It was great to finally see them.  They were super nice folks and play some really fun music.  Punk rock that defines most traditional genres as some tunes are fast while others mix more melody and some are just for funnzies.

Jim Dandy


No comments: