For anyone attending the KAABOO Discovery Tour in Downtown San Diego, it was a very unusual experience. The venue was an urban park known as the Quartyard. It features a patch of faux grass, a wide range of alcohol, a place that serves flatbread pizza and burgers where the food is brought to you, and dogs.

The event was the third and final part of a series of concerts held by KAABOO. From what was announced during the event, they each consisted of several local artists and bands competing to perform as part of KAABOO over at Del Mar. For this final event, it was a chance to perform on the same day as artists such as Katy Perry and Wiz Khalifa.

It was hosted by Terry King of iHeartRadio, and while he said that the company was presenting alongside KAABOO, their brand was nowhere to be seen at the event. The only sponsor with a table of their own besides KAABOO was RADD, reminding concertgoers to not drink and drive.

Four different artists and bands performed several songs to convince concertgoers to vote in their favor, although the two solo artists each performed with their own supporting bands. All of the performers were based in some form of rock, although they each differed by fusing rock with different genres and instruments.

Nick Crook of Burleson, Texas, kicked off the night with a mixture of rock and organ. He has a good singingvoice and bit of a drawl. His type of music was a weird fusion of Paul Shaffer, country music, and early Maroon 5. It sounded like something that would not feel out of place at a Starbucks while someone waited for their Venti Iced Skinny Flavored Latte. At one point, he let one of his bandmates Stefan Hollis sing a song that was radically different from the rest of the set. Hollis sounded a lot like a surfer dude and was very talented with the guitar. Throughout the performance, Crook stated that most of the songs were from his latest album Sunday Drive. He ended his set by plugging his website Nicholascrook.com, explaining that NickCrook.com was already taken.

The event’s second act was the band Sweet Tooth, and it was also the noisiest part of the night. Right after they finished their first song, the crowd suddenly got closer to the stage, beach balls were suddenly being passed around, and supporters of the band began throwing out t-shirts. The band stood out among the other performers by how they were all wearing plain white shirts, pants, and shoes. They managed to quickly win over the crowd by sounding like an underground version of Radiohead. The crowd liked them so much that they demanded the band perform one more song after finishing their original set. They may have heavily been in the band’s favor because they were the only local performers in the event. The band had so much confidence in themselves that they announced, in the middle of the event, their next performance would be at KAABOO. They did not plug a website and simply told the crowd to look them up on YouTube and Instagram.

The third act of the night was Sophia Dion of Utah who stated that she had recently moved to Los Angeles. Her set consisted of both covers and originals, which showed that she has the range to perform pop, rock, and country. Sophia’s original songs leaned more on country than rock. Of her covers, the most distinct one was of “Finesse” by Bruno Mars; she converted the 90s throwback hip-hop single into a laidback country song. She ended her performance by wishing well the next act and plugging her website Sophiadion.com.

The fourth and final act was the band Desert Rhythm Project from Joshua Tree, California. The band had the most unoriginal sound of the night, sounding more like a bizarre experimental version of Magic! They also had some cringeworthy rapping that sounded out of place with their Reggae beat. Despite all of that, the band was clearly having fun with their performance.

At the end of the night, and after a prolonged reveal by King, Sweet Tooth was declared the winner. They thanked the crowd, applauded the other performers, and promoted their next concert at The Belly Up.

The concert’s only problem was that the event planners decided to schedule it at the same time as a Padres baseball game being played less than half a mile away over at Petco Park. Since both events started and ended at around the same time, it created a traffic nightmare for those who wanted to get out of Downtown. This event would have been much more enjoyable had it taken place at a proper concert venue far away from Downtown where traffic could not have been such a problem. Alternatively, if they really wanted to host it in Downtown, they should have done it on a night where the Padres were playing either an afternoon or away game.

Despite the unusual concert venue, the KAABOO Discovery Tour was clearly a really fun time for both the musicians and concertgoers. Sweet Tooth deserved the victory by having the most distinct sound of the night. They will now perform on the third and final day of the Del Mar event, September 16th, alongside superstars Katy Perry and Wiz Khalifa.

As of this writing, tickets are still available for the three-day event.

Review by Joel Garcia