The Colorado staple Arise Music Festival isn’t your standard music fest. Since its inception, Arise has placed an importance on community involvement, local support and crowd participation. In line with their ongoing mission, Arise brought back the Rock the Fest contest — a fan-backed competition that gives up-and-coming acts the chance to play at this coveted festival. A few weeks ago, fans voted online for their favorite acts. The top 10 acts advanced to the final stage, where a panel of music industry professionals chose three winners. We chatted with the winners of the 2019 Arise Rock the Fest competition to learn more about their style and what we can expect to see at Arise. Arise Music Festival is an overnight camping event set to take place August 2 – 4, tickets are still available here.
Collidoscope
303 Magazine: What is your relationship with Colorado? What do you like about the state and music scene?
Collidoscope: We’ve lived here for over three years. This is definitely the right place for aspiring musicians. The scene is thriving — there is a ton of support for local music.
303: Why are you interested in playing Arise Music Festival?
C: We have heard amazing things about the festival. It has a reputation of being a beacon of artistic expression. We are looking forward to a break from city life. A refreshing vacation for the soul.
303: What is your style of music? What can people expect to hear or see at your show?
C: We all have various musical inspirations — but we all share a love of funk. Our style is a funky blend of electronic, jam, bass and funk. You can never have too much funk. We have a lot of original material as well as the occasional remix. We add jam sections in between songs to keep each live performance fresh. Ultimately, our goal is to have a great time sharing our love of music with everyone who attends our show. It’s about dancing and having fun.
303: What are you working on right now?
C: Our Got Filth EP is in the works right now. Two singles are already released with the rest of the EP on the way soon. We are really excited to be headlining Cervantes Other Side with Melody Lines on August 16. We are putting a lot of focus on the production for that show. It is going to pop off.
303: Where can people listen to your music and learn more about you?
C: At Cervantes Other Side August 16! Our music can be streamed on Spotify, SoundCloud, and all other major music platforms. Follow us on Facebook and Instagram. We love connecting with our fans.
Pamela Symphony
303: What is your relationship with Colorado? What do you like about the state and music scene?
Pamela Symphony: Colorado has something mystic. It is the kind of place I dream about before being there. That happened to me the first time I came last year. I started meeting more interesting people from this area. I also had a conversation with a much-appreciated buddy who is a Sound Healer from Colorado. She expressed to me that she dreamt about being at Lake Atitlán, my hometown in Guatemala. So, we realize (real eyes) that those places have a very special connection and we connected it with the story of Quetzalcoatl — who is a winged deity — the Feathered Serpent (as described by the Popol Vuh — the Sacred Book of the Maya). Quetzalcoatl crossed the north and center of what we call EEUU (in the Colorado area) until he reached Lake Atitlan where he took refuge and recovered his strength to continue his journey. The night before receiving the news that I won, I dreamt that I was there. In my dream, I visited a beautiful river, crystalline, with a kind of red ground with grass and other kinds of shrubbery. I’ve never been there before and I don’t know if that exists in Colorado, but we will see if I get to this place when I go. It was, is and will be a beautiful present.
303: Why are you interested in playing Arise Music Festival?
PS: I like the music scene at this festival because I find it with a purpose — the reason why I decided to keep sharing music — which is creating consciousness without evoking conflict. It involves the concept of what is art for me. Alternative festivals like Arise are a way to go back to the tribe and make us vibrate in positives frequencies and help us to know more about our powers, which is important for the human being to evolve towards a more sensitive state of consciousness. We can create awareness while we are partying and inspire ourselves.
303: What is your style of music? What can people expect to hear or see at your show?
PS: I am a Cello player and singer. I loop the Cello live and sing while I create layers of melody, harmony, percussions, bass and vocals. Basically, that’s why my project is called Symphony, because there is a bunch of sounds but all of them are produced by only one Cello at the same time. I play tribal songs that have ancestral lyrics and mantras in the line of what we could call mandalic and sometimes a little bit psychedelic. Along with this, I have had the influence of my background in Lake Atitlán, where I have been involved in Sound Healing journeys — mixing the Cacao with the experience of my music.
303: What are you working on right now?
PS: I just released an Album titled Tribal Cello which is a compilation of mantras and tribal songs which I recorded by looping. The lyrics are about Mother Earth and Mayan Astrology. I have been tuning and studying for years more about the Mayan Calendar and the Ancestral Wisdom contained there. So, in this album, you will find lyrics in Maya Tzutujil, Spanish, English, Japanese and Portuguese. I’m planning to start a little tour of this songs, wherever the doors open. My next step after Arise will be Burning Man at the Harmony Camp, where me and more Sound Healers will be sharing this music.
303: Where can people listen to your music or learn more about you?
PS: Tribal Cello can be found on YouTube and SoundCloud. And I publish what I do musically, mostly on Instagram.
Graham Good & The Painters
303: What is your relationship with Colorado? What do you like about the state and music scene?
Graham Good and the Painters: I have lived in Colorado since I was 12. I am now 25. It has been my home for over half of my life and I wouldn’t want to have grown up anywhere else! My favorite thing about the state is the ever-growing music scene. I have been able to connect with so many local musicians and learn how to climb the ladder. The most important thing about the music community in Colorado is that everyone is always trying to help each other’s bands elevate to the next level. It is a real community in the sense that we all wish the best for each and want to see each other’s dreams come true. It can get competitive at times, but I believe that support is a sport and the more love you give to others the better off we all will be.
303: Why are you interested in playing Arise?
GGATP: We are interested in playing the Arise Music Festival because we stand for everything that it does. We are a band that bestows blessings to our listeners by filling them up with hope, joy and confidence in their own powers to better the world and their own lives. Arise is a community of like-minded folks who consciously choose to look for the good in humanity and help shine a light on darkness. We wish to make the world a better place and we all live in our own little worlds so changing the world starts by making each and every individual’s world brighter in their own.
303: What is your style of music? What can people expect to hear or see at your show?
GGATP: Our style of music is feel-good funk-folk-rock. You can expect to see us smiling on stage and loving every second of it. We have a brilliant two-piece horn section, an awe-striking lead guitar player, a groove master bassist, a wizard of a keyboard player, a show-stealing drummer and myself — a singer/songwriter with too much joy to contain. We are fueled by the many fans who have already seen us time and time again. The love and encouragement have pushed us to new heights and we keep climbing knowing that the support is kind and genuine. Thank you to everyone who voted to get us to this spot, we wish you many miracles and can’t wait to keep making the world brighter together.
303: What are you working on right now?
GGATP: We are currently working on a new record so that we can continue to build and grow the following of our good vibe tribe and continually strive for greatness in the world around us.
303: Where can people listen to your music and learn more about you?
GGATP: People can hear our music on any major streaming services and can head to our website to learn more about us.