Nov 29, 2023

Maker Park Radio's Battle of the Bands Finals at Flagship Brewing Company 11.24.23

Last Friday, the the third annual MPR Battle of the Bands crown of was back up for the taking. The Flagship Breweing Co. taproom was full of onlookers anxiously anticipating what type of crazy punk battle was about to go down.

The stakes are high. The winner of this contest gets a highly coveted $500 gift card donated by Staten Island's very own Rustic Music and a collaboration with Flagship to create their own beer based on their band! The two previous years of BOTB sported winners of King Like Mom who created a lavender type of beer and Gamma Ghouls who created a heavier IPA.

All proceeds from this year's competition benefited the Rise Up for Rose Gofundme. $2100 was able to be donated from the doors and there was an amazing amount of heartwarming support from our community for her. The bands know Rose and doing the battle and feeling like they’re contributing seemed really important everyone.

After three exilerating weekends, the three bands that made the finals were Woof Woof, Silkstone, and Grandma Drinks.

Woof Woof - Instagram

Starting off the show, Woof Woof killed it on stage. There were lots of fans in the audience and it made for a super lively atmosphere! Their guitarist had tons of energy and it really added to their performance. Their set definitly made a mark on the judges and I'd love to see another snow by them in the future.

Silkstone - Instagram

The middle child Silkstone brought the fire as well. They have a really cool style. Whenever I see them perform they remind me of the song Fat Lip by Sum41 where they're punk, but have some rap elements in their vocals. Pat Lagatta, their lead vocalist, spoke a little about his experience preparing for the compeition and about his love for the scene.

"Preparing for battle of the bands wasn’t too much different in preparing for our normal set. We just wanted to bring the same energy we always do. Performing was a ton of fun. We all had a great time performing as always. Lots of familiar faces and lots of new ones too! I think our favorite part of botb was just making people smile and feel when we were performing. It’s an amazing feeling. Also, it’s a beautiful thing to see so many people come out and support the scene. There’s so much talent on this island that I feel is so overlooked. It was a great showcase for a lot of talented people!"

Grandma Drinks - Linktr.ee

To finish off the trio, Grandma went on and played all original songs, something we haven't seen from them before Battle of the Bands. As a really powerful band playing covers of songs like Killling in the Name by Rage Against the Machine, it was really cool to see how they created their own sound while still keeping the same energy. It was also nice seeing the band's friends come out to support them. Milo Mayhem, a multimedia artist, showed up in full grandma attire and was breaking it down on the dance floor. With their last song they left everything out on the table. It was probably the most punk think I've seen on the island so far. I don't even know how to describe it, you just had to be there. In conclusion, Grandma destroyed their set, as well as a guitar.

The battle was judged by DJs from Maker Park Radio on various categories, one of which included fan vote by poll on Flagship Brewery's Instagram story. Kristin, a founder of MPR, said that this year's competition was so extremely close that the math came down to a tenth of a point.

And the winner is 🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁

Grandma Drinks!

This is what they said about their experience in the finals.

"Prepping for any Grandma show is always a bit chaotic, as we’re very much a “figure it out as we go” band. Preparing for this show a bit different because we debuted all new material which we have never done before, but we got it down despite the time crunch, put together a set, figured out the missing pieces, and put it all together. Performing was a rush. It’s always this insane adrenaline dump, and this time it was especially exhilarating. Playing all our own songs for the first time was terrifying but also thrilling. We went as hard as we could, and left everything up there on stage."

As for their custom beer, we got some insight in how that process will go. Flagship and Grandma informed us a little about that, "Soon we’ll set up a date to begin discussing the production of their collaboration beer. Our head brewer Doug and the Brew Team have killed it with the beers that they brewed for King Like Mom and Gamma Ghouls the past two years, and this will be more of the same."

Hopefully the new beer will be something everyone can enjoy, we will need to drink many beers in order to experiment (all in the name of science) we’ll also be experimenting with new labels and logos to try to make our beer match what we promote as a band, grandma drinking 🤟 - Grandma Drinks

Tom and Kristin from Maker Park Radio are the ones to select all of the bands that perform. And they always do an incredible job with the talent that comes to our stage. This year’s bands have been so talented, as well as respectful to our space. Its amazing seeing so many people come together to support the local music scene, especially since the bands are from such differing genres. It’s great having new faces in the taproom and we hope to see them back again soon. - Flagship Brewing Company

Thank you to all the DJ's who judged the battle and also to Rustic Music on Staten Island for donating a $500 gift card to the winner. And thank you to Kristin from MPR for the insight I needed to write this summary of such a fun event!