Secret Stages returns, makes the Loft District an indie musical haven

The Secret Stages Music Discovery Festival, which features up-and-coming acts from Birmingham, the South and across the United States, returned to the Loft District downtown on Friday, Aug. 4, and Saturday, Aug, 5.

The event featured about 60 bands from more than 30 cities — including a dozen acts from Birmingham, Bessemer, Tuscaloosa and Decatur.

Despite a hard rain in Birmingham Friday afternoon and some cloudy skies on Saturday, event organizers were happy with the turnout, according to event director Jon Poor.

“We’re lucky to have a core group that always supports us, and we got even more fans this year, I think," Poor said while taking a short break at Rogue Tavern — a festival venue on Second Avenue North — on Saturday night.

The other event venues were Pale Eddie’s, Urban Standard and Jazzy’s on First. There were also two outdoor stages.

Secret Stages, now in its seventh year, is continuing to grow its audience through positive word of mouth, according to Poor.

“It takes people hearing from other people that this is cool, because they don’t necessarily know the bands,” he said. “But if someone says, ‘It doesn’t matter. You’ll have a good time,’ they listen. Year by year, we can tell by the numbers that this happens.”

Among the first-time Secret Stages visitors on Saturday were Heather and Bob from Shelby County, who declined to give their last names.

“I’ve heard about [Secret Stages] for several years,” Heather said. “Several of our friends have gone and they’ve talked about it.

“We don’t even know any of the bands,” she said as she and Bob checked out their copies of the festival schedule.

“My understanding is that [Secret Stages] is kind of the cream of the crop of the secret bands, ones you’ve never heard, but it said on the website they’re hand-picked, and that sounded good to me,” Bob said.

And Bob had another good reason to attend. “Any excuse to get out and drink beer and listen to music,” he said, laughing.

Most attendees seemed to buy into the festival’s mission of giving audiences a chance to discover new acts and new sounds.

“The idea of discovering artists through live performance — I like that a lot,” first-time attendee Joe McKenzie said in the VIP lounge on Saturday.

McKenzie was in VIP with friend Lee Sheffield. Both men had volunteered as bartenders in the lounge on Friday night.

McKenzie said he was looking forward to seeing the band Nossiens, from Hattiesburg, Mississippi, and the Atlanta rapper Cuz Light Year.

Sheffield said that he liked the concept behind Secret Stages and also saw another good reason for people attend — the offerings in the VIP section.

“For the price, you get awesome food and bottomless drinks,” Sheffield said. “Even if you don’t like any of the music, you can have a pretty good weekend. And when we’re here, we see people we know from all over town.”

Jake Easter, a UAB student, said in the VIP area on Saturday that he liked the “really fresh” idea behind Secret Stages of discovering new bands.

And Easter made a couple of discoveries Friday night.

He raved about Omni, a lo-fi pop band from Atlanta that played at Pale Eddies. “They were crazy good,” and “insanely talented,” he said.

Easter finished the night Friday by catching the horn-driven free-jazz band Wolfpack ATL at Rogue Tavern. “They blew me away,” he said.

The event could not happen without scores of volunteers, one of them being William Delhomme, who was manning the front table at Jazzy’s on First Saturday night.

He said that volunteering at Secret Stages was useful for him as an aspiring musician. “Seeing how these [musicians] work gives me insight into how to distribute my sounds to the people,” Delhomme said.

He said that Secret Stages, with its focus on novelty, is part of a new wave in the world of creativity. “That’s what the 21st century is about — discovering independent artists,” he said.