24 Jan 5th–Jan 11th, 2023 phoenixnewtimes.com phoenix new Times | music | cafe | film | culTuRe | NighT+Day | feaTuRe | NeWs | OPiNiON | feeDBacK | cONTeNTs | Music Man How the life of Tempe bassist Paul ‘PC’ Cardone will be celebrated with a monumental one-night concert. BY JENNIFER GOLDBERG I n 2014, a who’s-who of local music participated in a three-night series of shows in honor of longtime Tempe bassist Paul “PC” Cardone. The occa- sion was his 50th birthday. On Friday, January 6, many of those same bandmates and friends will come together again, in joy and sorrow, for a Celebration of Life concert at Yucca Tap Room. Cardone, 58, died in his sleep at his home on November 10. With his death, the Phoenix music community lost a friend. A mentor. A figure of unfailing kindness and encouragement. And in the words of his friend and roommate, Ryan Probst, “a fucking badass musician.” Word spread quickly the Thursday that Cardone had passed. The following week, when an impromptu Jam for PC event preempted Yucca’s normal Monday night open mic, his friends gathered and began discussing how to honor Cardone. “It was a no-brainer that the best way to do that, since he had such a heavy influ- ence on the music scene, was to throw him as big of a concert and a party as we possibly could,” says Brannon Kleinlein, owner of central Phoenix music venue Last Exit Live and co-organizer with Cardone of the Apache Lake Music Festival. The event will be one of the biggest, most significant concerts in Tempe music history. The bill includes dozens of musi- cians from 30 years of the Tempe scene, all of whom are bands Cardone played in and/ or artists he befriended and appreciated: Banana Gun, Banshee Bones, The Black Moods, C3, Chocolate Fountain, Dead Hot Workshop, Dry River Yacht Club, Future Exes, Ghetto Cowgirl, Greyhound Soul, Haley Green Band, Jason Devore of Authority Zero, Jim Beach, Liz Rose, Los Guys, Robin Wilson of the Gin Blossoms, Satellite, The Slims, Strange Young Things, The Sugar Thieves, Wyves, Walt Richardson, and more. Roni Helinski — lead singer of Future Exes, one of the show’s organizers, and one of Cardone’s closest friends — says that all of the artists immediately signed on to the concert. “I think that nobody would rather be doing anything else that day. Nobody wants to miss this. People are coming from different countries. People are canceling surgeries and trips to be here because we all need to be together,” Helinski says. Probst will play that night with Dry River Yacht Club, who have come back together after about a decade for Cardone’s show. “People have been trying to get the orig- inal band to come back together for a long time,” Probst says. “[Kleinlein] reached out to me saying he wanted us to play the show. I said ‘absolutely.’ Instantly, every single person said yes right away.” It’s been amazing, he adds: “Not only the personal aspect of hanging around friends, but revisiting all these songs and hearing them come to life again. It’s been beautiful.” Dry River Yacht Club isn’t the only band that’s putting an immense amount of time and effort into getting ready for the concert, he adds. “Everybody’s practicing and motivated and wants to play the best they can. This is the most important show I’ll ever play, and it’s the most important show most of these people will ever play. So everyone is treating it as such,” Probst says. The event will start at 2 p.m. and encompass two stages: Yucca’s indoor performance space, plus an 8,500-square- foot stage outdoors. There will be an outdoor bar and restrooms as well to accommodate the crowd. At 8 p.m., the show will briefly stop for a tribute; a number of people will speak, artists will play special music in honor of Cardone, and the crowd will see some video tributes. The outdoor music will end at midnight, but inside, the show will run until closing. Kleinlein ran Apache Lake Music Festival for 10 years, and says that planning an event of this magnitude would usually take three to six months. The organizers are doing it in less than two. But Kleinlein says the city of Tempe has been incredibly cooperative in getting things squared away quickly and helping with permits, liquor licenses, and other details. “They know PC, they know what we’re trying to do, and they’ve been super- helpful,” he says. The ticket price of $25 in advance, $30 at the door, is significantly higher than usual for shows at Yucca Tap Room. But Helinski explains that the show will prob- ably eat up $5,000 to $10,000 in produc- tion costs. None of the musicians are taking a fee to perform, “but we have overhead that has to be covered,” she says. Any funds that are left after taking care of production costs are being used to kick- start a new charitable foundation under the umbrella of Unity Through Community, a Tempe nonprofit. The goal of What Would PC Do is to keep doing what Cardone would do if he were still alive, Helinski says. WWPD will operate “in the ways he taught us to be, which is sharing your gear, your equipment, your money, your talent, your time, the shirt off your back,” she says. “So if you think about the things that he would do, and how a foundation might accomplish that, it’s hosting jam sessions with seasoned musicians and inviting any talent level to come and learn and play together and hone your skills and friendships.” Other initiatives the foundation The one, the only, Paul ‘PC’ Cardone. Jeff Newton >> p 26 ▼ Music Cardone performs at an event for the closing of Long Wong’s on Mill Avenue in 2004. David Rhodes
