BANDS OF SUMMER

E ach summer, countless solo artists and bands of musicians make their way to Ocean City, hoping for a chance to entertain the immeasurable number of people visiting the area — either for the season or for the week. And most of them, it seems, spend the duration of their gigs working off a set list that consists primarily of cover songs, but with a handful of originals mixed in for good measure.

There are a few acts, however, that prefer to dedicate their time on stage to songs they created — the ones they believe best show their talent as musicians.

Unfortunately, the people footing the entertainment bill don’t often agree. That, in a nutshell, has been the primary obstacle for Delmarva Nightlife, a Baltimore-based entertainment company that strives to introduce music fans to original artists from around the region.

“In 2005, DNL Entertainment sprang up as one of the driving forces behind the development of an original music scene in the Ocean City and Delmarva region. Until that time, original music was relegated to a kind of once-in-a-while novelty act that was sprinkled on top of all the cover bands and deejays that flood the beach region every summer,” said DNL cofounder Robert Bryan.

FICTION 20 DOWN OF BALTIMORE “Skip Dixxon of Ocean 98 was one person [who] was always trying to help out the original artists by hosting large original band showcases in an attempt to bring attention to the local musicians.

“When [DNL] first got started, we … learned a lot from Skip’s effort and continued to work off his design,” he said.

Bryan and partner Winn Johnston helped book original bands (Pasadena, Bond and Bentley, Hotbox, Grilled Lincolns and 86 the Effort, to name a few) at various spots in Ocean City and at larger venues in the Baltimore area for several years, but it wasn’t until 2009 that DNL was offered significant club space in Ocean City.

JADE FOX OF BALTIMORE “After 25 years of its existence, the Party Block … became the first large-scale club in Ocean City to give original artists a shot on a real party stage,” Bryan said of the resort hot spot, best known for housing “three clubs in one.”

“With events like Bands of Summer III, the Thursday Night Original Music Concert Series and Blockstock (an all-day festival held in August), the Party Block really helped plant some of these very talented bands firmly onto many of locals’ playlists.”

On Saturday, DNL will take its fourth annual Bands of Summer event to the Party Block on 17th Street, where the evening music festival will not only introduce a long list of original bands scheduled to perform throughout the summer, but also the club’s Thursday Night Original Music series and theme parties.

KALEB BROWN OF OCEAN CITY “The idea for the Bands of Summer shows sprang up in 2007, as way for DNL to showcase some of the all-original musical talent that will be performing at the beach that summer … Due to the transient population of Ocean City, we decided to continue the Bands of Summer series each of the following years, as a way to re-introduce all the bands to the town in one fell swoop,” Bryan said.

Sponsored by Delmarvanightlife.com, DNLdc.com, DNLbaltimore.com, Ocean City Today, FREEstate Workshop, Good Clean Fun Life, Suicide Skateboards and www.clarksmithphotographs. com, Bands of Summer IV will feature Fiction 20 Down (Baltimore), Bumpin Uglies (Annapolis), The Permilla Project (Salisbury), Sweet Leda (Annapolis), Pasadena (Pasadena) and Bond and Bentley (Baltimore) on the Big Kahuna stage; Tommy McGee (Glen Burnie), Broken Coast (Baltimore), Ground Score (Washington, D.C.), Fresh Competition (Baltimore), Jade Fox (Baltimore), Minlus and McCracken (Baltimore), Cool Kid Collective (Wilmington, N.C.) and Kaleb Brown (Ocean City) in Rush; and Coastal Vibrations (Baltimore), The New Kings of Rhythm (Philadelphia), The Bullbuckers (Philadelphia), Phantom Limbs (Ocean City), BOB (Washington, D.C.) and Hardsell (Salisbury) In the Paddock.

BOND AND BENTLEY OF BALTIMORE The first performances of the night will begin at 7 p.m., when Fiction 20 Down takes the Big Kahuna stage, Alternate Seduction (Dutch Apples and Trisha Benton) introduce Tommy McGee on the Rush stage and Coastal Vibrations entertains the Paddock.

“It’s a great night for locals and business owners to come out and catch all great talent that will be hitting the beach all summer,” Bryan said.

PASADENA The Thursday Night Original Music series will kick off June 3 with Ballyhoo! (Aberdeen, Md.), and the first theme party of the season will be June 17, when the Grilled Lincolns and Fat Daddy Has Been (Wilmington, Del.) host a St. Patrick’s Day celebration.

“By combining the Party Block’s tradition of off-the-hook Thursday night theme parties with some of the best original talent in the region, Party Block and DNL worked closely together to finally give original music the regular weekly spot on Coastal Highway that the musicians and fans so richly deserved,” Bryan said.

For additional information about the Party Block’s Thursday Night Original Music series and theme parties, visit www.partyblock.com.

n SEE ’EM: Saturday, May 1, beginning at 7 p.m. and continuing until 2 a.m., at the Party Block on 17th Street in Ocean City

PHANTOM LIMBS OF OCEAN CITY n CHECK ’EM: delmarvanightlife.com // DNLBaltimore.com // DNLDC.com
SWEET LEDA OF ANNAPOLIS