By Jacob Mathias

Metalheads will unite for the third year as Jam’n’July hits the Pfiffner Park band shell on July 15.

Jam’n’July, Stevens Point’s newest annual music festival will once again return to the Pfiffner Park band shell on July 15 at 11 AM. The festival will feature 11 local bands, and new this year are two featured national act headliners Pangaea and Terraform.

Ben Kollock, founder and organizer of the festival, envisioned the festival three years ago as a way to feature local music talent and bands. He hopes the performances will inspire community members in the way he was inspired as a young teenager.

“There’s a pretty big gap in Stevens Point for local musicians to get a venue to perform and have people actually watch them perform,” said Kollock. “I was for one day out of the year trying to fill that void.”

The majority of the bands are local to Central Wisconsin. New this year is an added time slot, giving festival goers 13 total bands, one more than the first two years. Also new this year is the addition of headliners Pangaea and Terraform, national acts originating from Wisconsin.

Most of the bands are of the heavy metal genre, a group of musicians that Kollock says are under represented in the music festival world. He said the metal fans are die hard and act as a family.

“Without a doubt, it’s definitely a family,” he said. “In my mind, when I think about Stevens Point or Wausau, I have brothers. They may not be blood related but they’re people I’ve been playing in bands with since I was 16 years old.”

Admission to the festival is $10 for all day admittance. A $25 ticket is also available that includes all-you-can-drink beer from Central Waters and O’so Brewing Companies. Soda and water will also be available to drink. Pizza will be sold by Jam’n’July sponsor Polito’s Pizza, and sweet treats will also be available.

Kollock made admission free for festival attendees 15 years old and under. As a young teenager, Kollock said he’d bike to the Mission Coffee House in downtown Stevens Point to see the band that would perform there every weekend.

“That just lit such a big fire in me to want to be part of that,” he said. “Then I got a drum set and it changed my life forever.”

He wants to bring that same experience to the children of Stevens Point.

“Come to Jam’n’July and have that same experience that I had when I was a little kid for free. Come hang out and see what music can do and light that same fire in kids that I had inside me.”

2017 Lineup

All Day DJ – Mike Hoerter
12:30 – 1:00 PM Michael Strike and The God Damn Band
1:15  – 1:45 Scarlet Curve
2:00 – 2:30 Among Them In Trenches
2:45 – 3:15 Rosa Parkinsons
3:30 – 4:00 Searchlights
4:15 – 4:45 Indonesian Junk
5:00 – 5:30 Constance
5:45 – 6:15 2nd and Archer
6:30 – 7:00 Beyond Atlas
7:15 – 7:45 RIG TIME
8:00 – 8:30 All Out Mutiny
8:45 – 9:15 Terraform
9:30 – 10:00 Pangaea

Pfiffner Park is located at 1100 Crosby Ave. in Stevens Point along the Wisconsin River.