Tucson’s teen rock stars to battle it out in band contest

“So, I heard about it from my mom.”

And just like that, the word is out and applications are coming in for the 2023 High School Battle of the Bands.

The first-ever Tucson Parks and Recreation-sponsored High School Battle of the Bands will take place on March 26 at the DeMeester Outdoor Performance Center. The event will start at noon and will be free to the public. Bands with members between the ages of 13 and 18 can apply for the battle at tucne.ws/1mjb. The cutoff date is Feb. 15.

The winning band will receive an allotted amount of studio time at Luna Recording Studios and an additional show after the battle sponsored by local live event coordinators, Best Life Presents, according to the City of Tucson website. The event will also feature a “People’s Choice Award” that will be presented by Cloud Microphones, an American microphone company.

“We have some really good local sponsors,” said Tucson Parks and Rec special events coordinator, Michael Hayes.

The event was curated by Hayes and Best Life Presents, who collaborated to achieve a shared interest in supporting youth art outlets in Tucson.

“I started working for the city about a month and a half ago with the mission of bolstering teen programming,” Hayes said.

Hayes said that part of his primary effort to reinvigorate teen programming was to focus on utilizing underutilized Tucson event spaces like the Kennedy Park Fiesta Area or the now newly appointed High School Battle of the Bands arena: DeMeester Outdoor Performance Center.

Hayes cited the Arizona Daily Star’s Battle of the Bands as his main inspiration for bringing the event back to a new generation of young musicians.

“The battle of the bands was one of those events that had been missed, I think, by a lot of folks and it was a pretty formative and important event for me growing up,” Hayes said.

The Daily Star-hosted Battle of the Bands was a yearly event that ran for several years in the early 2000s. This upcoming Battle of the Bands will have the Daily Star as a sponsor.

Hayes said he has already received “a handful of” band applications after reaching out to “about 60 music educators” at multiple Tucson high schools to inform them and their students about the event.

“So, I heard about it from my mom,” said 15-year-old, Griffin Birkinbine, lead singer of the University High School indie rock band, Public Freakout.

“My mom sent me this thing for it and a bunch of other people I knew forwarded it to me on Instagram that same day, so I just decided to sign us up for it,” said Birkinbine.

The indie-alt band, consisting of six members ranging in age from 14 to 18, has already sent in an application for the event.

“For battle of the bands, I’d say we’re pretty excited,” said Birkinbine.

Public Freakout has been regularly playing shows around town for about a year and recently competed in a separate battle of the bands hosted by Dusk Music Festival in November.

“I think that was one of our best shows that we’ve played. The energy was really good,” said Birkinbine.

Birkinbine said the recording studio time prize at Luna Recording Studio sounded “like a really good opportunity” for the band.

The city will narrow down applicants to a group of six to 12 bands who will perform at the DeMeester Outdoor Performance Center, 800 S. Concert Place at Reid Park.

It’s free to enter the contest and attend the event. All genres are welcome. Bands must have two or more members. For more rules and information, go to tucne.ws/tbbhs.