Posted on April 25, 2010 - by Editor

Punk Rock Bowling: Sinners, No Saints

Stern Brothers -BYO/Youth Brigade PRB winners

Punk rock and bowling seem to go hand in hand stateside and the BYO Records founded event Punk Rock Bowling (PRB) is hitting its 12th year in 2010. Some have disregarded the event as a gimmick, but the event has grown year by year which includes a stellar band line-up for the Las Vegas weekend in May 6-9th which includes a mixture of industry folk and the public. BYO Records co owner and member of Youth Brigade, Shawn Stern who helped initiate Punk Rock Bowling with his brother Mark gave us his view on the weekend of festivities and undoubted debauchery for what is dubbed the “best punk party of the year.”

Steve: What inspired the first punk rock bowling tournament and what were the biggest issues you faced in organising the first one?

Shawn: We first started a bowling league with other labels Epitaph, Hopeless, Fearless and some bands and fanzines at Bayshore lanes in Santa Monica after hearing that Fat Wreckords had a league in San Francisco. After that was successful, my brother Mark and I thought we should make a tournament and since we love going to Vegas we decided that was a great place to have it. We did the first one on Presidents day weekend in February ’99 and we had 27 teams. We’ve sold out all 70 lanes at the gold coast the next couple of years, moved it to the Castaways and sold out there 105 lanes. Moved to Sam’s town and increased to three squads the past several years for a total of 168 teams. Surprisingly we’ve had few problems, we believe it’s mostly because it’s all friends that come and everyone is there to have a good time and they do. We don’t call it the best punk rock party of the year for nothing!

Steve: How have things changed over the years, this being the 12th edition?

Shawn: This will be our biggest PRB ever because we’ve moved to Sunset Station which has 70 lanes so there will be 210 teams between the three squads. We’ve sold out the 400 rooms at the casino in a record three weeks and have sold over 150 more rooms at nearby hotels. However PRB is now becoming a music festival with bowling instead of a bowling tournament with music.

Steve: The band line-up is a strong one, like you said it seems like the music festival is no longer a sideshow but a main attraction. Who are you most looking forward to?

Shawn: I’ve seen all the bands and I like all the bands cause we play with most of them and have for many years. Mark & I picked the bands because they are our friends and we like their music. We believe lots of other people feel the same which is why we seem to throw a pretty good party! I’m looking forward to all of it!

Steve: You mentioned the event used to take place in Sam’s Town Casino, but this year is different, what was the reason for the change and what improvements are there?

Shawn: Well, we were very happy at Sam’s Town but we’ve always wanted to find a casino that had a good concert venue on premises. Sunset Station approached us after the PRB and asked us to come check the place out. The bowling alley is bigger, the casino is bigger, it has more bars and we told them everything we wanted and they said yes! Lower room prices, bands in the lounge, take over about 90% of the hotel rooms and the outdoor amphitheatre pretty much decided it all for us. We changed the timing from January to May because it will be warm but not unbearably hot and now we have a pool party!

Steve: So having said that what is the biggest improvement at this year’s event in particular?

Shawn: The outdoor Amphitheatre at Sunset Station, which holds 4,000. We will have a show each night and they’ve let us put bands inside the casino at the Club Madrid lounge late night from 11pm till 3am.  We’ve already sold out the Sunday night lounge show with Me First and The Gimme Gimmes, Cute Lepers and St. Alvia and the Saturday night with the Revival Tour featuring Chuck Ragan (Hot Water Music), Kevin Seconds (7 Seconds), Steve Soto (Adolescents), Nathan Maxwell (Flogging Molly) and some surprise guests is almost sold out.

Steve: The main features you are bowling, the live bands and the Texas Hold Em’. What is your preferred poison on the weekend and why do you look forward to this weekend in particular?

Shawn: Hot Punk Rock Girls! Umm, drinking, music, gambling and bowling are fun too!

Steve: Good priorities! The event is open to the public, even though it seems to have a “private” party/industry insider tag. Can you explain how it all works and how people can get involved this year or in future years?

Shawn: It’s always been “open” to the public in that anyone could come and watch bowling and buy tickets to the shows. We’ve just never advertised it because we didn’t need to. It sold out every year and there were very few open lanes cause if you were there last year you get your lane back each year. When someone dropped out, we’d open it up to the wait list, but we were pretty strict that you had to be from a label, band, zine, agent, etc. So in that sense if wasn’t really open to just anyone.

Steve: The event does seem very American, How would you feel about attracting more European bands or from elsewhere and have an intercontinental bowling challenge in future years?

Shawn: We contacted quite a few UK punk bands but sadly it did not work out. We’re hoping that the success of this year will help us bring out bands from all over the world for next year.  And we’ve got the winner of a Vancouver bowling tournament coming down this year and would love to see more people coming out next year. We do have people coming from Europe, Japan, Canada and Mexico so far. We hope to see that increase next year!

Steve: Have you been surprised by the growth and growing support for Punk Rock Bowling?

Shawn: Not really because no one does what we do. This was really just a big party for all our friends. Now it will be a music festival as

Stern Brothers © Lyndsay Hutchens

well. The challenge will be to see if we can maintain that fun party atmosphere at the same time that we more the double the amount of people coming each day compared to what we’ve had the past several years. I believe we will and that everyone will want to come back next year.

Steve: Does BYO have any teams involved? Any grudges from previous years and scores to settle?

Shawn: Of course, BYO won the first year and the 6th year. Epitaph has won four years, they beat us one year and we beat them one year, so that is probably the biggest rivalry and it’s usually really close. Neither of us has made it to the quarters the past couple of years, but that’s ok cause new teams are winning and spreading it around.

Steve: Are there any “what happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas” stories you are allowed to break code on for us?

Shawn: That’s just a bad ad campaign. There lot’s of crazy stories from bands that happen all over the world. PRB just happens to be in Vegas. And there just happens to be a lot of craziness going on that weekend in the punk rock world.  I’ve seen a lot of crazy things in my life as a musician, but repeating those things would go against all that I believe in! And then someone would have to die and it ain’t gonna be me!