Divide the Day performs at Ace’s Lounge in Austin, Texas on March 16, 2010. (Vanessa Franko)
This story originally appeared on A1 of The Press-Enterprise on May 13, 2010.
BY VANESSA FRANKO
STAFF WRITER
Chris Allen and Tyler Glenn spent hours composing songs in the bedroom of Allen’s childhood home in Murrieta, honing the pop rock sound that would propel them to stardom.
Their band, Neon Trees, now has a major-label recording contract and has appeared on “Jimmy Kimmel Live.” On Saturday, the band makes its debut at Los Angeles’ famed Greek Theatre.
Neon Trees tops a bumper crop of professional musicians who started in the bedrooms and garages of southwest Riverside County.
More than a half-dozen bands with ties to the area have toured nationally, netting attention from major record labels, and dozens of others have released original music and have played concerts regionally.
Why the sudden bounty of bands?
Musicians and promoters said the need for activity, the affluence of the area, music programs in schools and places to perform have been factors in building the burgeoning scene.
“When we were all growing up in this town there was nothing to do,” said Paul Bahou, bassist for the Temecula-based band Inverse. He said the options for kids included skateboarding and sports or music. “Everyone knew each other and everyone had time to practice,” he said.
They also had gear – and garages. Southwest Riverside County’s upper-middle class demographic allowed young musicians to find the money for instruments, said Ivan McClain, a local promoter who books shows at The Vault.
The median family income is $88,302 in Murrieta and $84,979 in Temecula, compared with $65,104 in Riverside County as a whole, according to the U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey of 2008.
Inverse performs at the Texas Rockfest in Austin, Texas on March 19, 2010. (Vanessa Franko)
MUSIC RISING
The region first started gaining attention in 2002 as the Temecula rock band Finch toured the world and found moderate U.S. radio success with a couple of singles.
Two years later, Yesterday’s Rising, a band out of Murrieta, landed its first gig on Warped Tour, where the band would become a perennial favorite. The band broke up last year but singer Brandon Bolmer is now the front man for the chart-topping hard-edged rock band Chiodos.
Bill Gould, organizer of the Temecula Music Fest and a local promoter, said the highly regarded music programs in the schools in Temecula and Murrieta have helped fuel musical aspirations.
“Those kids are in the jazz band at school and they have a metal band,” Gould said.
High schools in the Temecula Valley Unified School District and Murrieta Valley Unified School District offer guitar as a class as well.
Music in school also helped plant the seed of music for Allen, albeit in a less traditional way.
Watching his friends’ bands play at school during lunch period in seventh grade inspired him to make music, he said during an interview in Austin, Texas, where Neon Trees, who have a sound akin to a modern and more rock-driven Eurythmics, performed at the prominent music conference South By Southwest in March.
“I think we’ve all experienced that ridiculous jealousy where it’s, ‘I want to be in that band. I want to be in that place,'” his bandmate Glenn said.
The problem that faced musicians for years was the lack of venues in southwest Riverside County. As bands grew, they had to travel to LA, San Diego and Orange County for shows.
Temecula offered options for jazz lovers, with the Temecula Valley International Jazz Festival and the concerts at the area’s vineyards, and the successful Temecula Valley Balloon and Wine Festival brought in former chart-topping acts, but other musicians didn’t have local venues and were relegated to parties and a carousel of coffee shops that would shut down every month or two.
“For people into rock n’ roll or hip-hop or experimental music – there was nothing,” Gould said.
Now the area cultivates local talent with the all-ages concert venues The Vault in Temecula, which has attracted national touring bands and local opening acts; and Live at the Merc at the Old Town Temecula Community Theater complex, a spot for local musicians to perfect their chops; and the Temecula Music Fest, which Gould started to celebrate homegrown music in 2005.
“The venues are the backbone of the scene,” McClain said.
Gould launched the Temecula Music Fest as a place for local bands to have an outlet at least once a year. It’s set for Aug. 13-15 this year.
The Vault will celebrate its first birthday this summer. In the past year, the venue has brought national acts such as punk band Strung Out and rap group D-12. Local bands open every show as well.
McClain noted that churches in Southwest Riverside County also hold concerts from time to time, and have high-end equipment, providing opportunities for young parishioners.
COMING UP
While they still play hometown shows, a number of local acts are stretching beyond the confines of Inland Southern California.
“Now that there are more options, we’re getting residencies in different places and making money,” Bahou said.
Inverse regularly performs in Los Angeles as well as Temecula. The band is working with Mark Needham, who produced The Killers and also worked with Neon Trees, and has piqued the interest of major record labels.
Divide the Day, whose guitarist Adrian Maude is from Menifee, is signed to Universal Republic Records and is the band behind the theme song for “WWE Smackdown.”
Another act from the area, Murrieta’s On Being Human, recently released its debut album and has started to build buzz. Temecula’s progressive metal band Souljourners is booked to play the large Christian music festival Cornerstone this summer.
As for Neon Trees, the band is now based in Utah. The group released a major label album, “Habits,” in March, and the single “Animal” has been getting radio airplay around the country. The band was recently announced as part of the Lollapalooza festival lineup.
That’s only the beginning, Glenn said, “We want to be that bigger-than-life thing.”