The HomeGrown Music Festival — Bend’s showcase of local and, increasingly, regional bands, just keeps on growing.
Forty bands — 24 of which are local — will play across five stages at its new host venue, Century Center on Bend’s west side. The Volcanic Theatre Pub, GoodLife Brewing Company and The Commonwealth Pub will open their stages, allowing for a walkable, enclosed festival vibe that will preclude the Frogger experience of rushing across NW Greenwood Avenue between HomeGrown stages during previous iteration in downtown Bend.
Hosted by Spencer Marlyn Band and presented by Volcanic Theatre Pub, HomeGrown is hosting a hot wing-eating contest at Fire on the Mountain on May 2. The winners in a race put down nine hot wings will win festival tickets. Along with a raffle, Call Down Thunder (Bend’s celebrated Grateful Dead tribute band) will bolster the fun with a trio performance.
Reached by phone, festival organizer and local percussionist Scottie McClelland says he’s stoked about HomeGrown’s maturation since its 2023 debut.
“I’m very excited about the new location,” he said. “I think it’ll be better localized and more accessible than when it was downtown.”
Co-producing the HomeGrown VTP events is festival partner 1988 Entertainment.
While HomeGrown began with a near-exclusive emphasis on the local scene, McClelland has been widening the festival’s reach, bit by bit each year, to regional talent. This year, greater Pacific Northwest acts are swooping in from various national tours to respectively headline HomeGrown’s three nightly bills. These high rollers are Seattle funksters Polyrythmics, dreamy Glitterfox and the brass-heavy jammers MarchFourth — the latter two of which are from Portland.
“This year is a regional showcase, which is how I’ve been trying to build this event,” McClelland says.
While McClelland plays percussion in two local acts — Billy and the Box Kid and Spencer Marlyn Band — both performing on HomeGrown stages, he’s quick to tell the Source about all the other local bands he’s proud to put on — folkies Quattlebaum, bluegrass players Skillethead and chanteuse-led melody rockers Chiggi Momo. McClelland is particularly keen to highlight mamasboy, a high-energy local dance funk group heading HomeGrown’s kickoff party at VTP on May 7.
Reached by phone, mamasboy frontman Hudson “Huddy” Mickel spoke about the R&B, hip hop, funk and rock that rubbed off on his group’s ‘90s-tinged songs. Mickel’s group likes to intersperse party-rocking dance grooves with ballads and acoustic numbers and even heavy-ass songs, such as “Man?” which sounds straight out of System of a Down’s catalog.
“I just thought we should just have a whole different genre with one of our songs,” Mickel said. “I love so many different styles of music that I want our shows to be dynamic — a wide range of what you can experience. I’m gonna play like 20 genres — everyone is going to like at least one part of the show.”
Folks who attended HomeGrown last year may have caught the now-seven-piece at the Silver Moon Brewing backyard stage. What they mightn’t’ve noticed was that mamasboy was recording its debut album live. The band had taken up sound engineer Jonathan Tyson on his offer to record (and later master) mamasboy’s eponymous debut “(Live from HomeGrown).” Despite the stage’s proximity to the Bend Parkway, the album’s sound quality is superb.
Oh — about the band name?
“Oh, I’m a momma’s boy,” Mickel said with a chuckle. “My mom knows how to be judge-free and love people better than most. So ‘mamasboy’ is very true to the name.”
HomeGrown Hot Wing-Eating Contest
May 2, 5pm registration; 6-7pm contest
Fire on the Mountain
637 NE 3rd St., Bend
$15 to enter (winners receive festival entries)
HomeGrown Music Festival
May 7-9
Century Center
70 SW Century Dr.
www.homegrownfest.com
Tickets: 05/07, $20; 05/08, $40; 05/09: $50
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