Star-Spangled Bad Boy

Next stop Mayberry: Windall Armour, Jake Schroeder, Scott Davis and Randy Chavez make good as Opie Gone Bad

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With 3rd Degree, 8:30 p.m. Saturday, March 18, Gothic Theatre, 3263 South Broadway, $7, 303-380-2333

Virgin Megastore, 500 16th Street, Free 303-534-1199, 1 p.m. Friday, March 1

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More About

• Jake Schroeder
• NHL Western Conference
• NHL Northwest Division
• Professional Hockey
• Hockey

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Of course, having close to 20,000 hand-over-their-hearts people root for you more than forty nights a year can't hurt Schroeder and his band's own run at the major leagues. "It's a brutal song to sing, man," Schroeder says of the anthem. "I try to keep it pretty straight when I sing it. I mean, it's not about me, and it's not my song. I'm singing it for the guys that fought in WWII and Vietnam." Guys like his father, who served in southeast Asia and heard the anthem every time the body bags were laid out on the air-base tarmacs of Vietnam before being shipped home for burial. "I'd go to games with my dad when I was a kid," Schroeder recalls, "and they'd do the national anthem, and he'd get all choked up. I'd sit there and think, 'What's with that?'" Before he died, the elder Schroeder told his son about his in-country experiences and why the tune brought on tears. "I guess that's kind of a shlocky story," Schroeder says, "but it's one of the reasons I love singing the national anthem. I'm a patriotic guy."

Leaving the arena following the conclusion of the Avalanche game, Schroeder acknowledges that his anthem gig has helped him and his mates build a larger following. But he's careful about not making too much of the job. Opie Gone Bad passed on performing live at the Pepsi Center this year, he notes, in part because the new facility had no stage area for it to perform on and because the band wanted to avoid possible saturation among hockey fans. (The band's tune, "Let's Go Avalanche," and an accompanying music video, are still broadcast on the scoreboard at each game.) "I don't want to wear out our welcome here and have people get sick of us," he says. Such concerns might be unwarranted. As Schroeder walks up a LoDo street alongside a stream of departing post-hockey game cars, a young woman's cheer-ravaged voice roars out a passing car. "Opie rocks!" she screams.