Poland’s Underground Pete ready for Rock Off

By JOHN BENSON

vindicator correspondent

A learning experience is ultimately what most participants of the Tri-C High School Rock Off take away from the House of Blues’ annual battle of the bands competition. For Poland Seminary High School senior and two-year Rock Off veteran Steven Wright, the current event, which takes place weekends now through Feb. 6 at the downtown Cleveland venue, is more like grad school with his new band Underground Pete.

“We’ve been together since the summer, and we pretty much formed with the Rock Off in mind,” said singer-guitarist and Poland resident Wright, who appeared at past Rock Offs with groups Radio Backup and Adam’s Taxidermy. “My other bands didn’t make it past the semifinals, so with that in mind, we kind of have more of an upbeat sound and more of a classic-rock thing going. That just seems like what the judges were looking for in the past. Underground Pete is influenced by Pink Floyd, Radiohead and U2. It’s prog-rock without getting too complicated.”

Underground Pete is scheduled to play during Saturday’s round of the Rock Off, along with 10 other bands. The competition begins at 4 p.m. Tickets are $8 at the door.

Among Underground Pete’s original tunes are the upbeat “Off The Edge” and the Kings of Leon-meets-Pink Floyd-sounding “John Wilkes Booth.” There’s also talk of a Led Zeppelin cover by the threesome — Wright, bassist Chase Blisard, 18, and drummer Chris Bzinak, 17. Wright is confident in his trio’s abilities, which leads him to believe a shot at the finals isn’t out of the question.

“That would be great,” Wright said. “I really think we have the potential, but we’ll see. It’s just really a great time, playing a great venue and meeting new people. I think we’ll have a good time. [If we got to the finals], it would be another weekend to play at the House of Blues, so that would be cool.”

Also cool would be placing in “Final Exam,” which takes place Feb. 6 at the House of Blues. The winning band of the 14th Annual Tri-C High School Rock Off will receive $500, a $500 gift card from Sam Ash Music and a total of 24 hours of recording time at Ante Up Audio, in addition to appearing on Tri-C’s cable-television programs “Crooked River Groove” and “Words & Music.” The winning band also will have the opportunity to open for a national act, and their high school band fund will receive a $200 donation.

Second place receives $200, a $100 donation to their high school band fund and 12 hours’ recording time at Ante Up Audio. Third place will receive $100 and 12 hours of recording time at Ante Up Audio. All finalists receive a $25 gift certificate to Sam Ash Music and will record a song for this year’s High School Rock Off CD at Ante Up Audio. Also, all 18 finalists will record one original song, which will be available as a free download on Cleveland.com.

Though Wright doesn’t rule out Underground Pete’s playing out in its future, he stressed the threesome is actually part of larger Poland band The Kulaks, which not only has performed locally at Indie Wax Records and Bill’s Place but includes members too old to play the Rock Off. Hence the side-project Underground Pete.

Finally, with the name Steven Wright, we have to ask whether his parents ever heard of the dry comedian of the same name?

“Yeah, they have,” Wright said. “We’re all actually really big fans of him, but I wasn’t named after him.”

So that means no funny stuff during Underground Pete’s set?

“I might throw a few jokes in there,” Wright said with a laugh. “We’ll see.”