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The concept for Nerdapalooza was born from the mind of super-nerd, John T. Carter (aka hexwarrior), who loved video-game-inspired-parody music so much he wished for a nerd music festival. Six months later his wish is starting for come into focus.
Over 30 nerdy bands from three continents have expressed interest in playing in Eureka. Headliners include the artist who popularized the underground genre of Nerd-core rap/hip-hop MCFrontalot and post-punk laptop rap artist MC Lars (Hot Topic is Not Punk rock was his single and played on the radio for a short time last year).Pixelh 8 is a chip-tunes artist who is coming all the way from England to play, and Category, a nerd-core hip-hop artist, is using Nerdapalooza as his CD release party. In fact so many artists and bands want to play that Carter has to turn away some very good acts. The whole line up is on Nerdapalooza.org, along with message boards. There's also a fantastic wiki-post about Nerdapalooza at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nerdapalooza.
The original plan was for Nerdapalooza to take place on the weekend of Sept. 22 and 23, however due to a lack of funds, Carter has pushed back the date to June with hopes of more bands and better publicizing. "I have people foaming at the mouth for tickets," said Carter. "That makes me hopeful." While Carter's dream is ambitious and a bit of a gamble, failing is not an option. "I would sell a kidney before that happens."
Marty Allen, frontman for the geeky multimedia extravaganza known as Uncle Monsterface, is planning on traveling out from New York City, and was not surprised when Carter chose to move the date back. "I wasn't totally surprised, I was disappointed," said Allen, "It's a big project to undertake, it seems like a good idea to postpone it and make it better."
Carter anticipates three stages with constantly revolving artists. One stage a band will be setting up, one stage a band will be playing, and one stage a band will be tearing down. So hopefully keeping the festival accessible and fun for everyone involved.
Carter got into nerdy music without even knowing it. "I always liked the music in video games," explained the six-year HSU computer student, "I've always listened to Weird Al."
From there he got into harder nerd-core rap and chip-tunes (8-bit rap), and it's been a long lasting love affair ever since. Carter is doubtful if he will ever graduate now that he's found Nerdapalooza, "You don't really need a degree to do Nerdapalooza, just a quick wit and determination." While Nerdapalooza has gotten lots of local support in the way of partnerships with local non-profits who will help organize the event, Carter hasn't gotten an financial support or sponsorship as of yet.
The Ink People, a local non-profit organization specializing in the arts, has helped get Nerdapalooza non-profit status. Also many nerd music websites have thrown in support in the way of advertising and creating that oh so important Internet buzz. Websites like 8bit-peoples andnerdcorehiphop.org, gamemusic4all, thefump.com (funny music project) have been helping in different ways. For instance, if you want to sample some of the music that will be showcased in September you could visitnerdcorehiphop.org and download compilations of various nerd-core artists.
One of the founders of gamemusic4all.com and major nerd music fan Anthony Ruybalid is planning a trip to Humboldt for Nerdapalooza when it happens, as well has supporting it on his website. There's a post on gamemusic4all explaining the financial trouble Nerdapalooza is in.
Carter is even listed under the contact info as Hex Warrior, explaining his involvement in Nerdapalooza, as well as his radio show of nerd music. Ruybalid, the Los Angeles native, said, "I'm excited about [Nerdapalooza] since it'll be one of the first large scale music events geared towards the artists who perform music based on subjects like video games, cartoons, and computers, as well as the people who are fans of that music of course." Ruybalid looks forward to meeting Carter in person and is most looking forward to seeing Temp Sound Solutions perform live on the big weekend.
A website called digg.com posted a forum urging kids to help save nerdapalooza, although the comment count was high the event has yet to conjure up the money to fund it. If you want to check out the forum go to http://digg.com/music/Help_Save_Nerdapalooza.
Other ways Carter is looking for support is through http://nerdapaloozers.blogspot.com/, the Nerdapalooza street team.
Nerd culture has been the topic of a few major articles in the Washington Post and The New York Times and Nerdapalooza has been featured in each article, as well as a mention in an Italian paper called theCorriere. So while the buzz spreads and the date gets closer nerdy artists around the world are gearing up to rock Nerd-dom.
"All these artists have such interesting things about them," said Carter. "It could be the way they make their music, or how they got their name... every single one of them is ripe with character and story.
Melody Stone can be reached at forevermelody@gmail.com
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