Neon Bloom Shows, Isla, and Getting Local Youth Involved In The Scene

 By Chelsea Jones

Editor's Note: The main KRL website is temporarily down so this week's issue is up here on KRL News and Reviews. Hopefully the main website will be up in time for the next issue. 

This article was supposed to be about a band. Or, two bands. It was supposed to be about a local musician who played in two bands, and then I was going to say: “Go listen to the two bands!” But once I got talking to Isla (the local musician in question), it became clear to me that while this article would in fact contain information about two bands, bands that you should go listen to, this story was not about bands, but about the direction of our music scene here in the Central Valley.

Isla performing with Go In Grace

KRL readers know that Central California has a *lot* going on creatively. Whether you’re interested in open studio showcases or belly dancing or musical theater, there is always something to choose from. However, over the years I have had many conversations with folk who have been around longer than me (I’ve heard that young people call them “old heads” now…?) about the struggle to get young people interested and involved with the arts. It has especially been a challenge to connect artists in different age groups, instead of each generation having their own very separate scenes doing their own very separate things. Enter Neon Bloom Shows, an event organizing collective whose mission is to get youth involved in our local music scene.

I sat down with Isla, a volunteer in the collective, to talk about Neon Bloom and her own personal music projects. For the past decade, Isla (Eye-luh) has been a fixture in Fresno’s DIY (or “do-it-yourself”) music scene. She is currently in two bands, Go In Grace and In Amber Clad. More recently, she has also become a solid presence in the promoter scene––she is the volunteer coordinator for Neon Bloom, a music booking collective that organizes shows all over town, and has its home base at The Great Room at the University Presbyterian Church in Central Fresno. “I've been associated with The Great Room and Neon Bloom Shows for about a year now,” said Isla. “I really appreciate what Shua and Neon Bloom are trying to do for the scene—providing all-ages, DIY sober spaces where people can feel safe letting their kids go to shows, knowing there are people around looking out for everyone. I've seen so many kids come through those doors for their first-ever show, or even playing their first show on a stage with good sound equipment. More spaces like that could really help, I think.”

Some may recall seeing events promoted with the name Great Room Shows—Neon Bloom decided to change their name from ‘Great Room Shows’ to ‘Neon Bloom Shows’ in order to clarify the difference between the event collective, and the physical The Great Room venue space. “[The name] Neon Bloom is a tribute to Eric Estrada of Neon Pineapple Entertainment, a friend of Neon Bloom’s who did shows and embodied a lot of the DIY ethics and ethos that we value so much, but he unfortunately passed away of cancer.” While Shua started the group, Isla made it clear that Neon Bloom is a collective where everyone’s voice matters. “[Neon Bloom] is just a group of people who want to make shows happen in the DIY sphere, so we pool our resources and ideas.”

Isla grew up in Hanford. “A lot of my uncles played guitar and wrote songs,” she recalled. “My mom played guitar almost every day, so it was a very normal thing in my household.” While she had this access to music at home, there weren’t a lot of opportunities in Hanford for youth interested in music. In high school, her friends would sometimes make the 45 minute drive to Fresno to attend local shows in places like the back room of Dynamite Vinyl, or cramped word-of-mouth DIY shows in someone’s living room or backyard. “I thought it was the coolest thing ever. I was like, 'I can do this? This is an option? These guys with very little experience can make this happen--so can I.’”

Isla's musical influences reflect that DIY ethos: Charmer, Modern Baseball, Title Fight, Jeff Rosenstock, “those tiny, teeny bands who are just making music because they love doing it—I feel like there's artistic merit there that isn't there in these larger acts.”

Isla’s long running band Go In Grace is a gripping screamo triad including Isla on vocals and guitar, Ryan of the group dontcryformeimalreadydead on bass, and multi-instrumentalist Paris on drums. They’ve been playing together since 2022. Isla writes the lyrics, which cover topics ranging from politics to personal emotions to the transgender experience. “Go In Grace was kind of like a passion project of mine. I just started writing this heavier, kind of screamy music”.

In Amber Clad is Isla’s newest project, which involves screamo-style vocals over metalcore instrumentation. The band has only been together a few months but has already played several shows and gained a local following. In Amber Clad was “trying to bring back the mid-2000s vibe of emotional hardcore and metalcore,”’ she related. “We can have some emotional moments in our song instead of just songs to beat your friends up to.” While the music is loud, intense, and distorted, it also has a sense of humor: currently, all their song titles are references to the video game Halo and the band’s self-given genre is “nostalgic tranny-core.” Band members include Brandon on bass, Ron on drums, Paris (also in Go In Grace), Gerry, and Jose on guitars, and Isla on vocals.

The desire to write songs and perform are inherently rooted in the local scene for Isla. She pointed to a specific Mom Jeans show she attended at Dynamite Vinyl as particularly influential on her decision to pursue music. “Getting access to a DIY sober venue like that is what inspired me to start writing my own music, is what inspired me to start actually playing in front of people. I don’t think I would be here today as a musician if it weren’t for that show. So, I hope to God that we are able to provide spaces for those things to happen, for kids to have these formative memories of, ‘Oh shit, music is cool! I can do this!’”

“And that's kind of the whole idea of The Great Room—is that we want to provide a space for DIY shows to happen. We've had a lot of kids come and play their first shows there and they're just blown away with the sound and everything because we have a bunch of fancy audio equipment and you can actually hear yourself on stage. Just to see their faces light up as they realize like, ‘This is something I can do and we're actually doing pretty good at it,’ is such a beautiful thing.”

But getting kids to come out to shows has not been easy. Multiple factors, including social media, parent safety concerns, and shows with age limits keep kids away from events. “We’ve been struggling to get those kids off of TikTok and into the DIY-sphere,” Isla lamented. “We're starting to see kind of the uptick again in people who want to come out in the last year or two. Screamo in particular has gotten really popular on TikTok.”

She emphasized that all-ages shows were not just important for the safety of minors who want to enjoy live music, but for keeping the music scene alive. “All-ages venues and minors feeling included and feeling welcome in the scene is just so important to the longevity of the scene. Post-COVID a lot of shows went 21-plus and I think we're still feeling the repercussions of that. If kids aren't going to shows, they're not going to know that they can make their own bands and do their own things. And local scenes specifically, we need new bands all the time. We need new people playing to keep things interesting, and I've found the best way to do that as a scene is if we provide spaces for kids to express themselves.”

Isla encouraged people who are interested in volunteering with Neon Bloom or playing a show at The Great Room to get in touch via Instagram. “Message Neon Bloom on Instagram or myself personally, @isla_domain. Come and help. You want to run door for a show? Come run door. You get to see free music, get to hang out with some cool people, make some lasting memories and friendships. A lot of my closest friends are people I volunteered with through Neon Bloom. And we always need new people. We don’t expect anything of you, just come work a show if you want to work a show, if that sounds fun. Nourish your community in a way that matters.”

Isla has a show coming up soon: The second show is on Friday February 13 at the Vista Theatre at the Fresno Music Academy & Arts in the Tower District, directly across the street from Goldstein’s. This is a free show as part of the monthly Tower Live series, a monthly free arts, literature, and music performance sponsored with a Measure P grant. This month’s show also features former Fresno Poet Laureate Bryan Medina, poet Wade Pierson, and the legendary Warr-guitar-playing songwriting master Brian Kenney Fresno. The show will also be live broadcast on KFCF 88.1FM if you are unable to make it in person.

Isla has a message for people interested in starting bands. “Music isn’t just about singing or screaming into a microphone and playing guitars and looking cool and getting your mosh clips to post on Instagram. It’s a community. It’s, in my opinion, the most important space for people to be able to express themselves artistically, politically, and just be true, authentic versions of themselves. It’s about building community [and] using that community for productive things like benefit shows. A couple months ago, I got to organize a benefit show to raise money for folk who can’t afford gender-affirming care. Finding ways to use that community to better everyone’s life I think is our responsibility as artists, right? There’s not money in music, but there can be money for important efforts like gender-affirming care or providing toys for children who can’t afford them.

“Go into music because you want to express yourself, you want to provide spaces for people to express themselves, and because you want to raise awareness and money for things that you think matter. There’s just something so beautiful about everyone coming together and making these things happen despite overwhelming adversity … it’s just so beautiful, there’s just so many people who want to express themselves and make these things happen and that’s what we should be focusing on.”

You can find more information about Isla’s bands on Instagram at @inamberclad.mc and @go_in_grace and can listen to her music at goingrace.bandcamp.com. If you’re interested in Neon Bloom events or volunteer opportunities, contact their Instagram at @neonbloom_shows. For information on upcoming shows at The Great Room, check out the Instagram @greatroom_fresno.

Chelsea Jones is a multimedia artist and musician from Kingsburg, CA. They have an MFA in Digital Arts and New Media from UC Santa Cruz. Chelsea has been published in Noctua Review, Anti-Heroin Chic Magazine, Abridged Magazine, and others. More of their work can be found at chelseaevangelinej.wixsite.com/chelsea and chelseajones.bandcamp.com.