For the opportunity to be crowned “Best in Bellingham,” six bands are competing at AMP’s Battle of the Bands. Each group will go head-to-head against another at the Viking Union Underground Coffeehouse.
Competitions take place on February 11, 18 and 25. The three surviving bands will perform at the grand finale on March 4, with one band awarded the victory.
Grover, a Bellingham band consisting of four Western students, is preparing for their first duel on Feb. 25. The band, including Laila White, Bubba Mack, Max Fenger and Cade Sweeney, met for an interview to discuss their upcoming performance.
Q: What are each of your positions?
Sweeney: I’m the drummer.
White: I play bass and sing.
Mack: I sing and play guitar.
Fenger: I play guitar and sing.
Q: How did you become a band?
Mack: Max and I were in the audio program, and for a while, Max would walk to my house after class on Garden Street, and we’d just play some tunes. We recorded a few of them that were really awesome, and then we were like, “Let’s do this for real.”
White: And then he showed those songs to me and Cade and we were like, “Sure!”
Q: Where did your band name come from?
Mack: It’s from our good buddy, Milo. His dad’s name is Grover, and it sounds baller.
Q: How long have you been in a band?
Mack: Just about a year now!
Q: What style of music do you guys do?
Mack: Garage rock, rock and roll.
Q: Do you write your own music or do you do covers?
Mack: We all work together on writing.
Q: Is that hard?
Mack: I think lyrics are the hardest part. Me and Laila do a lot of the lyrics, and then we just figure out songs all together. Max is dabbling in his songwriting journey, too.
Fenger: A lot of the time, we’ll find a cool chord or something, like we’ll get inspired from a song or a band we listen to and bring it, and someone will write lyrics for it, and we’ll just kind of jam until it sounds good. I think everybody plays a pretty equal part in providing feedback to that. Everyone’s a big part of that process.
Q: What’s your game plan going into the battle? How are you preparing?
White: Be good, be the best ever.
Mack: Plan to win. Play louder and faster, and scream more than every other band.
Q: What are you most excited about for the battle?
White: Winning.
Sweeney: It’s fun to play on campus. The coffee house is a fun spot.
Students and the community are invited to gather to support the bands, their votes helping decide who will be named “Best in Bellingham.”
All four Battle of the Bands events are free to attend and run from 7-9 p.m.
The bands competing alongside Grover are Blair.wav, Third Space, Surreal and Made Up Worlds.
More information about the event is available on the Western Involvement Network.
Mackenzie Rankin (she/her) is a reporter on The Front’s campus life beat. She is a third-year public relations journalism major. Aside from finding new stories to write, she can be found doing art or on walks with her friends. You can reach her at mackenzierankin.thefront@gmail.com
