Oakland Music Festival Unifies Music Scene and is Awesome!

Photo by Sierra Young

The Oakland Music Festival celebrated its third birthday this year. Opting to veer away from the traditional festival lay out, the OMF events happened over the course of ten days at a wide variety of Oakland venues.

I went to West Oakland’s Eli’s Mile High Club on Saturday night to check out the Fool’s Gold Records co-founder Nick Catchdubs and Another Party Fam’s Trackademicks and L-Deez DJ a hot dance party. Was it good? Well, the house was packed, the music was slick and everyone looked great – so yeah, it was the shit. In recent times, Eli’s has served mainly as a punk-rock-metal venue, but it has a long and storied place in Oakland’s musical history

I took a few minutes out from boogying down to talk with one of Eli’s owners Matt Patane,  about the Oakland Music Festival and the rich culture of Oakland’s music scene.

Photo by Sierra Young

How do you feel about Eli’s being involved in the Oakland Music Festival?

I think it’s great to be part of the music festival. For a lot of reasons. First, we are really into music and the history of Oakland and this being a historical venue it’s really great to bring new stuff her. Especially music that hasn’t been performed here in the past 10 years. It’s nice to introduce the public to a new spot they might not have been to yet.

I would say that Eli’s is usually a punk bar, so it was cool to walk in and see a different group of people here tonight.

That’s one of the nice things opening this venue up like this is we are bringing in different genres of music. We are trying to keep this very urban Oakland scene in our backyard, where it’s still a little rough around the edges, but it’s still a fun space to be in. I think that when a bar opens itself up to other types of music, people become fans of the bar too, and then hopefully they get exposed to music they like that they might not otherwise.

Photo by Sierra Young

What did you guys want to achieve in participating with Oakland Music Festival this year?

We are trying to create a space where it’s really fun. Where the people coming have a good time, where the bands have a good time and not necessarily adhering to one thing. We want you to be surprised when you walk in.

What has your experience been hosting both a daytime show and a night time DJ party for Oakland Music Festival this year?

The managers were great to work with. The band this afternoon from LA was fantastic. This party tonight is awesome. The really great thing about the people organizing the event and the people participating in it came in with all smiles and were really great to work with and it was great to provide a great venue for them. We were really happy to participate.

What do you think about the Oakland Music Festival is achieving?

I think this festival is really bringing together different aspects of the music scene. Or, at least I hope for that. They are doing a great job of doing things around the city and it’s great they have made their way around to us. Oakland is a small city and a big town. There is so much condensed in Downtown and so it’s really nice to see the festival reach into some of the other neighborhoods.