The recently concluded Power Cut reunion tour had more to recommend it than the phenomenon of its single show at North Lima’s Woodworth Park, though that was interesting.

For one thing, the crowd for a local band which hadn’t played together for about seven years was larger than might be expected, and included some old fans, some curious teens and lots of family. “Power Cut was always sort of a ‘family thing’,” said Jim Phillips, one of the acoustic rock quartet.

Three videographers and a complete sound system was unusual, but not as unusual as the 90 year old couple who got up to jitterbug in front of the band to one of their original numbers. The guy didn’t last long, but the rockin’ lady kept bopping and wagging her finger at her friends.

Phillips and his school chum Al Fiore, who had both been playing music since they were kids were in a wedding band while they were in school. Then Phillips joined former “Open Mike” talk show host Mike McKay and Denny Davis in the electric rock band Fair Warning in the 80s.

“In ‘91 MTV came out with “Unplugged” and that really appealed to us,” Phillips explained. “I called Al, and he really didn’t want to be in a band, but I convinced him to come to one of our practices, just for fun, and he loved it.”

Power Cut was a local fixture for the next 10 years, with regular gigs at Mr. P’s and a couple other area bars, “but then places closed and we ended up having to go farther and farther to get our gigs and it got to be a real hassle,” Phillips said. “To make it as a band, you have to get booked at the better bars, and we were doing pretty well,” he remembered, “but that also means leaving home about 6:00 p.m. to get ready and not getting back home until four in the morning. Al and I had little kids, and we just couldn’t keep doing it.”

Davis and McKay were also Boardman High School graduates 10 years earlier, and their kids had grown so they could keep playing, which they do quite regularly, as Davis & McKay, keeping the acoustic spirit alive.

All four guys have competent voices and blend well together for a repertoire which includes a lot of early 
Beatles and CSN and quite a few of their originals. They share guitars and bass for a full, harmonious sound.

“We still love doing this, and though we won’t be doing any four-hour shows,” Phillips said, “we’d be interested in performing special shorter shows like this.”

(photo by Greg Rhoton)

The 2008 version of RuKus Festival - The Sequel had everything you might look for in an outdoor music festival… except the fans.

The biggest crowd (of at most several hundred) came streaming in for Warren’s own band, The Kellys, and then left in a rush.

First, there was the ultimate altruistic motive: to raise funds for the Hattie Larlham Foundation which has been providing a wide variety of special services for disabled children and adults since 1961, including the innovative Hattie Larlham Creative ARTs program.

Second, was the area’s best venue for hearing live music, the Warren Community Amphitheater, on the river in downtown Warren; the setting and sound are beautiful.

And then the area’s top bands playing original music — The Kellys, Jones For Revival, The Zou, Reznik, (one-song wonder) ZR, Kent’s Winslow and regional bands Eclyptic and Jets to Red — and food and crafts and kids games, fire eaters and sword swallowers and a second stage managed by the Oakland Center for the Arts, all for free, and people stayed away in droves.

Some speculated that the threatening weather frightened folks off, and certainly, when a few sprinkles fell in the afternoon, some fans fled fearing erosion, but during the worst of it, Polly Punkneck, of the special guest performers Jason and the Punknecks, promenaded onto the proscenium and didn’t get her t-shirt wet.

RuKus Festival is produced by The Kellys, (bassist Moe Angelo came up with the idea last year when he was working for Hattie Larlham, and lead singer, Kelly McCracken’s mom did yeoman duty again) and Trevor Quillan of the recently launched RuKus radio, with it’s continuous internet broadcast of independent music. They are vowing to do it again next year.

JamBrain kudos to them for their hard work and fortitude creating an event which deserves much greater celebration.

Kansas was the major national act headlining the recent National Rib Cook-off at the Chevrolet Center in downtown Youngstown, but if they hadn’t shown for the show, the performance by the Sugarfuzz Orchestra, who opened for them, would have been worth the price of admission.

Though they play rock, Sugarfuzz is a real orchestra, with strings, woodwinds, brass, percussion… the whole works, just not a lot of each. Well, one of each, actually.

The Sugarfuzz Orchestra plays a lot of Chicago, and Chicago would be tickled by the tribute. They also do Tower of Power and Joe Cocker and they could probably do Beethoven (lead guitarist Rajma played violin with the Youngstown Symphony and each member of the band is a widely experienced professional), but the rib fest crowd might have lost some of its rocking roll.

In fact, the band’s musical skill is more extraordinary than the casual fan might know. “I’m always really worried before we go on,” said a relieved Rajma afterward, “because the stuff we play is pretty complex, and this band only plays three or four times a year and we never practice.” No worries that night; they were tight.

Rajma didn’t bring out his fiddle, but he did share the singing with bassist Rocco Criazzo and keyboard player John Rindy. They each have distinct, interesting voices and sound terrific together. Drummer Mark Tirabassi sat in with Donnie Iris at this summer’s rib fest in Niles, and the horn section is made up of Andy Erb on trumpet, Bill Forrester on trombone and Dan Carioti, sax.

The Sugarfuzz Orchestra doesn’t play often, so catch them when you can.

Vexfest 5 was concentric. It came full circle from its beginnings and expanded exponentially from there.

The idea for Vexfest was born over the bar at Barley’s in 2001 in a conversation between Fred Rafidi, who owned Barley’s then and members of local rock band Cyrus who hung out there. Their first attempt drew about 1,000 people downtown.

Vexfest is about music and it’s about Youngstown; organized by people who care about their community, who want to make it a more vibrant place to live, and who have the determination to make it work. JamBrain vigorously applauds their efforts.

Cyrus “fizzled” soon afterwards, but Rafidi kept Vexfest going for two more years, growing it by about 1,000 a year and bringing in national recording artists Mushroom Head in 2003, before other interests drew him out of town.

Fast forward to Barley’s bar talk 2007: Rafidi, who owns the building, met Jimmy DeCapua, the leader of local rock/jam band, Jones For Revival, and told him about Vexfest. DeCapua thought it was the nuts; so did Barley’s owner Dan Crump and John Jones who hung out there. They formed a corporation to do it again under the aegis of Youngstown Local Music, the name of the Myspace page DeCapua had started to promote his band.

The 2007 revival, with 40 bands on four stages was a hit, drawing nearly 6,000 people to downtown Youngstown. The recent 2008 version featured a reunion of Cyrus as headliners — as they were the first year — and an even bigger crowd (very conservatively) estimated at more than 7,000 festival fans. (Several hundred fans were there when the first bands opened before noon, and by 8 p.m., an early evening for many music fans and prior to the performances of some of Youngstown’s most popular bands, the street and bar were packed with people.)

One snag for the otherwise smoothly run festival was the closing of The Core, on West Federal Plaza, which had hosted a second indoor stage last year and was expected to do so this year, causing a shakeup of the scheduling, and a hectic pace at Barley’s.

“One thing we did differently this year,” said DeCapua, “was to hire a local company to come in and do the cleanup of the street. Last year we worried about that all day and then pushed brooms til 7:00 in the morning getting the street cleaned up. This year we were done by 4 a.m., and the cleaning crew finished up about 5.”

Another change was bringing in some of Youngstown’s talented hip-hop and rap artists, enhancing the diversity of the entertainment and the crowd, and making the event even more inclusive.

The Youngstown Police contingent covering the event, increased to handle the bigger crowd, seemed to be having as much fun as everyone else.

Youngstown Local Music is getting pretty good at this — having hosted two Vexfests and this spring’s JonesFest — and they have plans to grow, with possibly another event in the fall (next year) and an expanded Vexfest. “We know it’s not going to happen right away,” DeCapua explained, “but there’s no reason why this can’t eventually be a festival that covers all three city blocks, here, and draws 20,000 people to a fun day in downtown Youngstown.”

Youngstown’s three-piece rock band ProBono opened the west stage at VexFest 5, Sunday morning, and they brought out the faithful.

Pro bono publico, a Latin term meaning for the public good, is used most frequently to describe professional work done for free, and though it’s true that ProBono was playing for free, the early arrivals Sunday would shout “Amen” to the idea that their music was for the common good.

ProBono bills itself as a rock band, though they mix in a heavy dose of blues covers among their original music, and even have the audacity and skill to play Hendrix’s version of “Killing Floor.”

Kevin Glaz is the guitarist and lead singer and is very good at both. He makes frequent and effective use of bottleneck picking which works especially well with the strong and steady bass line provided by Kurt Anshutz (who also sings) and Dean Anshutz’s percussion mastery.

Dean played with three bands Sunday, opening with ProBono then staying on with Acoustic Juggernaut, which followed, and returning later in the evening for his new, regular gig with The Zou.

ProBono is not nearly as well known as their talent suggests they might be, but they have a loyal core of believers eager to testify for them.