Faceman Is Throwing the Festival of the Century With 100 Bands in Two Days

“Everyone always thinks I’m the one that did this, but I’m not,” Steve “Faceman” says about his latest mastermind, “Faceman’s 100 Year Storm,” a two-day festival taking place this weekend at the Oriental Theater during which 100 bands will perform twenty-minute sets. “Everyone can come up with an idea, but if other people don’t put their hearts in it as well, nothing comes of it. I’m always fearful that it’s a selfish endeavor.”

Hopefully Faceman realizes that booking 100 of your friends' and peers' bands is far from a selfish endeavor. Those who know him are fully aware that his ideas come from a place of creativity, collaboration and community.

An undertaking like this is massive, but for Faceman, it's the next in a long line of his off-the-cuff musical festivals and brilliantly harebrained ideas. These ideas include playing inside of a giant shark; a series of “Faceman’s Waltzes,” where bands learn to play and perform each other's songs; and last year's “Journey to the Sun” at Ophelia's Electric Soapbox, which showcased 44 bands. Yes, he wore a spacesuit for that one.

FaceMan [the band], which just released the excellent new album Wild and Hunting, is always at the center of these performances: playing host, performing and making sure everyone is welcomed and taken care of. For the "100 Year Storm," the band collaborated with longtime partners Incite Productions, along with local musicians Tyler Breuer, Scott McCormick and a host of others.

We caught up with Faceman and asked him why he always feels the need to take things to the next level — and the process behind doing so.

Westword: What were the thoughts behind "Faceman's’100 Year Storm"?

Faceman: FaceMan [the band] has been hard for me to understand. It has never been a specific goal. It’s not like I have this master plan for this Death Star. What I've learned from being around creative people and the creative process is that the more you keep it going, your radar for open doors is more refined. You start to see routes where you can go. It's like going through a door that expands your mind.

This festival was just basically one of those doors that came about through all the other projects we were doing. I was like, ‘We know everyone at this point, so why not just host a festival?' It’s as simple as that. I don't know what it is yet.


Why has putting on shows  always been something that requires so much thought? A lot of people are comfortable just playing. Why does it always have to be so grand?

To be honest, the first projects we did were to be different and to stand out in a town where there’s hundreds of bands. We asked, 'What could we do that no one else was doing that could drive us some more interest?' It was very calculated and gimmicky at first, but it expanded [to] where we have legit artists involved, like Incite.  Now they are way less about getting people to the show and more about trying a project and [seeing] if we can pull it off.

The lead-up to it is what it's about. When I wake up and we have thirty days before the festival, that's all I'm thinking about, and there’s a beauty to having focus on something. We set this goal and we’re gonna try to get there. I’m realizing art and music is about putting something out there and chasing it. The process of chasing it is when you get better and learn about what you’re doing. There’s an amazing richness of that process, and I think that’s where this project is at this point. Most bands you are in have a set of rules,  but FaceMan doesn't have those.

This all started with the shark  Incite built you for your Megalodon show. Did you know them before and wanted to utilize them, or did you have this idea and you sought them out?

The shark is what broke it. How it happened was, Scott McCormick was really the matchmaker; he was the one that figured out and told us we needed some people who knew what the fuck they were doing [laughs]. We needed to have a professional approach to our ideas, so he put me in touch with Justin Hicks. I wanted to do these themed shows at different bars in town that would promote the venue as well. I was watching TV, and it was "Shark Week," and I saw a thing about the Megalodon, and I could not stop watching that. So I wanted to find Megalodon in a lake that was hard to find, so we did it at Lost Lake.

Why 100 bands? Any significance to that number?

We did 44 bands at Ophelia's for "Journey to the Sun." I knew I wanted to do another festival, and in this process, you have to keep outdoing yourself. One way to do that was to do more bands, so we picked a hundred!

A "hundred-year storm" is something you’ll never see again in your lifetime. Our messaging is, "This collection of artists is something you’ll never see again in your lifetime!"

Faceman's 100 Year Storm
Friday, November 18, and Saturday, November 19, Oriental Theater, 4335 West 44th Avenue, 720-420-0030.

Full Schedule:

Friday, November 18

Disaster Zone Stage:
7 p.m. – SOLOHAWK
7:20 – Bark Wilson
7:40 – Grayson County Burn Ban
8 p.m. – Bottle Rocket Science
8:20 – Bib Tucker & the Liars Club
8:40 – Chris McGarry
9 p.m. – Anthony Ruptak & the Midnight Friends
9:20 – Evan Holm
9:40 – Same Sex Mary
10 p.m. – FaceMan
10:20 – Safe Boating Is No Accident
10:40 – Bud Bronson & the Good Timers
11 p.m. – BLEAK PLAZA
11:20 – Orbit Service
11:40 – High Plains Honky
12 a.m. – Roka Hueka
12:20 – Hang Rounders
12:40 – West Side Saints
1 a.m. – The Lollygags

Disaster Relief Stage:
7:15 p.m. – Oscar Ross
7:45 – Avourneen
8:15 – Til Willis (solo)
8:45 – Jessica Mays
9:15 – Mace Windu
9:45 – Card Catalog
10:15 – Cawhause (Colin Bricker and Janet Feder)
10:45 – Babah Fly
11:15 – Blanket Empire
11:45 – Lords of Fuzz
12:15 – Ralph Lazo
12:45 –Teacup Gorilla


Saturday November 19

Disaster Zone Stage:
1:40 p.m. – SOLOHAWK
2 p.m. – The Foothills
2:20 – The Green Typewriters
2:40 – Coal Town Reunion
3 p.m. – Five Mile Woods
3:20 – Matt Skellenger
3:40 – The West Colfax 4
4 p.m. – The Grown A$$ Man Band
4:20 – L.O.R.
4:40 – @Bonnie and the Clydes (Bonnie Elizabeth Sims)
5 p.m. – New Ben Franklins
5:20 – Til Willis & Erratic Cowboy
5:40 – Heira Nova
6 p.m. – Automatic Iris
6:20 – Greasy Species
6:40 – Bison Bone
7 p.m. – Indigenous Rowbot
7:20 – Tomahawk Fox
7:40 – Poet's Row
8 p.m. – M.Florea
8:20 – Bear Antler
8:40 – Open to the Hound
9 p.m. – Lost Dog Ensemble
9:20 – Jack Evan Johnson
9:40 – Kissing Party
10 p.m. – Gun Street Ghost
10:20 – The Outfit
10:40 – Strange Americans
11 p.m. – Molina Speaks
11:20 – Bianca Mikahn
11:40 – Church Fire
12 a.m. – SUPERCOLLIDER
12:20 – Altas
12:40 – Chicharon
1 a.m. – Los Mochetes

Disaster Relief Stage
1:15 p.m. – Bonnie Weimer
1:45 – Sputnik Slovenia
2:15 – BOX
2:45 – The Maykit
3:15 – Joshua Trinidad Trio
3:45 – Chella Negro
4:15 – The Grand Tour
4:45 – Slam Nuba
5:15 – The Far Stairs
5:45 – B.L. Reed
6:15 – Malamadre
6:45 – Boat Drinks
7:15 – Rowboat
7:45 – Montropo
8:15 – wrtch
8:45 – Yardsss
9:15 – Andy Palmer
9:45 – FaceMan
10:15 – Ol’ Hickory
10:45 – Hot Apostles
11:15 – Vox de Ville
11:45 – Ned Garthe Explosion
12:15 a.m. – Claudzilla
12:45 – Filthy Casuals
1:15 – Smokestack Relics