A pair of major, local-music festivals are descending upon Denver the weekend of July 24-26, a mere four miles apart and each featuring hundreds of local bands.
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But you can only go to one of them.
That’s not just because music fans may only be able to afford one or the other. Rather, one is already sold out, and the other is counting on last-minute ticket sales to shore up its revenue. Each includes a dozen or so official venues, in a walkable neighborhood format, and are expecting thousands of attendees.
But music fans would be forgiven for wondering why the festivals are taking place on the exact same weekend.
“A year ago we thought The Underground Music Showcase was going away forever,” said Mike Young, co-lead organizer of the new Blucifer’s First Rodeo festival.
He’s talking about The UMS’s formerly uncertain fate after its owners said they were pausing the festival, leading many to believe The UMS had shuttered permanently. “It was a sad day, and it was disappointing,” said Young. “But it’s this summer music holiday people have gotten used to, and it’s too important for the scene, so it felt like the decision of when to do it was out of our hands.”
Instead, the UMS, which has run on South Broadway for the last 20 years, was revived and will take place this year in the River North Art District. Organizers expect about 10,000 people per day to crawl the district’s venues, boutiques, craft breweries, and restaurants. And that’s entirely to the benefit of music fans, said Kerry Madeksza, executive director of the RiNo Business Improvement District, which spent $250,000 to buy a 50% stake in The UMS.
“We have 60, 70 businesses asking to be a part of this and investing in it, and that’s meaningful,” she said. “It says a lot for how far this district has come.”
Back on South Broadway, however, the upstart Blucifer’s First Rodeo (which begins Thursday, July 23) has already sold out its full-fest and day passes — about 2,200 in individual tickets, and another 800 complementary passes for artists.
The narrative that the two events are competing is false and unhelpful, organizers from both said, especially given the slight overlap of performers. With about 20 Denver acts playing both, thanks to the lack of contracts that guarantee exclusive performances (also known as radius clauses) and valuable, grassroots community programming at both, the weekend may be an unfortunate, zero-sum game for two otherwise worthy events, said UMS co-founder John Moore.
“It’s just inconsiderate to core local music fans who might naturally want to attend both,” he said. “Blucifer’s really seems to be tapping into the spirit of the original UMS. But I do think strategically they’re making a mistake. Why wouldn’t you want everybody at your festival, and what’s the point of sticking it to The UMS? Nothing good can come out of them happening at the same time.”
Is competition good?
Multi-stage music fests often produce feelings of FOMO (fear of missing out), as music fans rush from one stage to the next so as not to miss their favorite or want-to-see acts. But it’s hard to fault a band for playing both events, since they need to get paid, and community-centric organizers and bookers are hoping the fests will be complementary.
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“The UMS has been a part of my professional life for a decade. Let’s see what this next iteration looks like,” said Alicia “Bruce” Trujillo, a talent buyer for The UMS for the last four years, in describing her thought process for returning to the rebooted event. “I myself had reservations after seeing the Westword Music Showcase and others flicker out in (RiNo) because it’s so sprawling, but I do think that the festival map will keep things tight.”
Trujillo programmed showcases and parties for both festivals, in fact, featuring women and queer artists. That includes UMS events and a Blucifer’s kickoff promoted by her own Manos Sagrados nonprofit in Aurora. Having a hand in both supports her mission, which extends to an all-women UMS show that will feature the Girls Rock Denver and Book More Women nonprofits.
“I really like the (UMS) lineup for the Babes at Beacon (Saturday, July 25), which has a lot of different genres represented,” she said. “Both organizations (Girls Rock Denver and Book More Women) emphasize that creation from women, femmes, trans and non-binary music isn’t contained to one musical type, even if Girls Rock sprouted out of the Riot Grrrl movement, their Camp explores a lot of sounds,” she said.
The UMS has gotten far more diverse over the years from its dude-rock-heavy lineups, but adding some sense of accountability in the booking process helps local music fests in general, said Heather Goodrich, Girls Rock Denver storytelling and engagement director.
“Combining at this event with Book More Women is a huge moment for us,” Goodrich said. “That’s because Girls Rock Denver’s mission is to turn up the volume on confidence to empower girls and trans kids and gender expansive youth with the tools to make friends — and lots and lots of noise.”
“You can’t always quantify the impact of being part of these events,” added Book More Women founder Abbey Carbonneau. “Partnering with Girls Rock Denver is important for us because we need these smaller festival spaces, and they’ve been leading that work.”
Uneasy bedfellows with the same mission
Blucifer’s also has grassroots, nonprofit partners and a diverse lineup. But because it’s artist- and volunteer-run, and not reliant on profit, attendees and musicians get to feel like they’re part of a big, collective art project, said Gillian Pasley, co-lead organizer of Blucifer’s.
“I’m surprised by the bravery of hundreds of people being willing to step up and try something new,” she said.
Whatever the result, a post-mortem may discover that the best thing for both fests is to take place on separate weekends, provided they both survive.
“This is about music discovery and supporting local artists and exploring neighborhoods,” UMS director Stoner said. “After the dust settles, I’d like to talk to the Blucifer’s folks and see how we all did. It may be that we move weekends. But I can’t deny that I wish it was on a different weekend.”
