This year’s Munch and Music at Drake Park in Bend kicks off its 24th year on Thursday, July 10, 5:30-9:30pm. The series continues for six consecutive weeks every Thursday through August 14. This weekly series continues to be a summertime favorite and provides the community of Central Oregon a great chance to strengthen their bond while enjoying the arts, outstanding food and free music.
2014 Line Up
July 10: Fruition
July 17: Too Slim and the Taildraggers
July 24: Nahko and Medicine For the People
July 31: Cash’d Out
August 7: Shook Twins
August 14: Cooper and The Jam
The Details
Thursdays, July 10–August 14 at 5:30pm in Drake Park. The evening will include an opening band and headlining band. Many local food vendors, a Deschutes Brewery Libation Station with beer, wine and specialty cocktails, as well as great kids activities in the Family Fun Zone!
This year there will be a walk-around alcohol policy. You cannot bring your own alcoholic beverages into the event, but you can roam the area freely inside with your purchased beverages!
BAND BIOS
Fruition: One of the North West’s hottest emerging acts in the nuegrass/pop genre. Sharing a common love of music, whiskey and life on the road, Fruition were originally brought together by the lure of adventure. For the last five years, the Portland, string infused quintet has racked up the miles playing sold out shows in their adopted hometown and garnering new fans across the country. This summer, Fruition will release Just One of Them Nights, an album that finds the band tackling the many struggles and successes that come along with living a vagabond lifestyle and the search for artistic clarity.
Jay Cobb Anderson (lead guitar/vocals) and Keith Simon (bass) moved from Idaho to the Pacific Northwest with nothing but their instruments and some drinking money. They spent their days busking the streets and their nights exploring Portland’s rich music scene. In 2008, the duo met fellow street performers Kellen Asebroek (guitar) and Georgia-born Mimi Naja (mandolin/vocals). Feeling an instant connection, the foursome decided to embark on a new collaboration. Just a few short weeks later, the like-minded new friends found themselves in a living room crowded around a microphone and recording Hawthorne Hoedown – an album that took one day to record but forged a lasting connection.
Too Slim and the Taildraggers: An iconic, national, band that has been tearing it up across the country for years, performing their own signature blues/rock sound. The band currently consists of Tim “Too Slim” Langford (lead vocals, guitar), Polly O’Keary (bass, vocals) and Tommy Cook (drums). Tom Brimm (bass) and John Cage (drums) were both early members of the group.
To date, Too Slim and the Taildraggers have released 11 studio albums and four live albums. The Fortune Teller (2007), Free Your Mind (2009) and Shiver (2011) all charted in the Top 10 of the Billboard Top Blues Albums, peaking at numbers 9, 8 and 9 respectively.
The Inland Empire Blues Society named the band “Best Blues Band” in four consecutive years, from 1995-1998, while the albums Swamp Opera and Blues for EB were also named Best Albums. The Cascade Blues Association named them “Best Regional Band” for five consecutive years, 1995-1999.
Nahko & Medicine for the People
This band has been billed as the next Michael Franti and Spearhead, being groomed by his former talent agency, and exploding into headlining roles at festivals across the country. A perfect, hope inspiring, uplifting, Munch and Music act. Munch and Music will debut this emerging act for Bend.
From his hometown of Portland to the shores of Hawaii or Bali, wherever he has traveled, Nahko is joined by a tribe of culturally alienated truth seekers for whom Nahko’s story resonates with their own, and who find redemption in his voice, guitar, flute and drum. Whether solo or with the dynamic group of musical troubadours known as “Medicine for the People,” Nahko delivers a soulful dose of curative vibrations that moves audiences to dance, laugh and cry. His ‘spirited redemption music’ lays bear the scars of cultural wounds, environmental wrongs and social injustices. His lyrics bear the burden of heavy messages, but the load is lightened by agile melodies and driving rhythms that coerce all who bear witness into spirited, purifying, movement. His humor disarms, and his lyrical stories open listeners to the power of “Real Talk Music”—songs that reveal an honesty and depth so raw, it inspires an internal revival that echoes out into the world. Sometimes exuberant, sometimes savage, but always transformational, Nahko makes the movement move.
Cash’d Out
A johnny cash tribute band who has developed an enormous following in Central Oregon, with repeat sold out performances at The Midtown Ballroom.
Over the past couple of decades, tribute bands have become big business in the world of concert promotion. And, not surprisingly, the more popular ones are the acts that are most authentic. Such is the case with Cash’d Out, a San Diego based band, that channels Johnny Cash in about as close a manner to the real thing as it gets. How can you tell?
Well, beyond critics having anointed Cash’d Out (Douglas Benson on vocals, Kevin Manuel on guitar, Ryan Thomas on bass and George Bernardo on drums) the “next best thing to Johnny Cash,” and the group having won four San Diego Music Awards for Best Tribute Band, the real proof lies in what members of Cash’s inner circle have said.
“Cindy Cash came to a show, we made her cry and she gave me a necklace with Johnny’s hair in a glass locket,” explains front man and Cash impersonator Douglas Benson. Benson added that Cash producer Lou Robin has also been to several Cash’d Out shows, and claimed that if he closed it eyes it was like “going back in time.”
Shook Twins
Recently featured in USA Today’s newspaper as one of the top 10 band’s to emerge– continuing our theme of selecting indie bands who are breaking in a big way.
Born and raised in Sandpoint Idaho, Shook Twins are an Indie folk-pop band now hailing from coniferous forested Portland. Identical twins, Katelyn and Laurie Shook, Kyle Volkman and Niko Daoussis form the core quartet. Central elements of the Shook Twins’ sound are a wide range of instrumentation, including banjo, guitar, electric and upright bass, mandolin, electric guitar, electronic drums, face drum (beatbox), glockenspiel, ukulele, banjo drumming and their signature golden EGG. Beautiful twin harmonies, layered upon acoustic and electric instrumentation coupled with Laurie’s inventive use of percussive and ambient vocal loops, and Katelyn’s repurposed telephone microphone, set their sound apart, creating a unique and eccentric blend of folk, roots, groove and soul.
Cooper and the Jam Fresh on the scene, Cooper brings a fiery spirit and a massive voice to the turn table. She performs with a power and tenacity that is difficult for most young women to muster. Just named one of Nashville’s top 5 artists on the rise for 2014 by Nashville Lifestyles Magazine, Cooper and her extraordinary band have been kicking ass in Music City and stealing hearts across the country. Music City Roots journalist Craig Havighurst calls Cooper “delightful, twinkly, impassioned, and on the make.”
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