You can hear the beat of drums, the bass reverberates in your heart, and the guitars scream in your ears as the music fills you with energy. And you feel the beads of sweat form you and others fall onto your arm as everyone jumps around the microphone with the vocalist.

This is what it is like to be at one of the shows organized by Grandaire Booking, a company started by former students of HHS that has been part of the local music scene for many years. Their motto? “Good vibes=Good times.”

The men behind it all are Michael Pezzuto and Jose Martinez. Both of these men have been part of the local scene for many years and originally started off by organizing shows at “The Shed”. I remember being younger and hearing about this amazing place where on Friday nights near the Hammonton Train Station local bands would literally be playing in someones shed in their backyard. Now the bands and community that was involved in that has moved from backyards to organized events at Veteran’s Halls, clubs, and coffee shops. They have become a stop for bands on tour from surrounding states and the community has grown immensely.

Thanks to Grandaire Booking and the local musicians, Hammonton’s music scene and the areas around it have been getting a lot more attention and it’s most likely due to the work of Grandaire. With bands coming in from the shore and out of state, Hammonton being in the middle is almost becoming a hub for local punk, hardcore, and alternative bands.

Some of the bigger groups to come out of Grandaire Booking are Your Persona, Teeth for Teeth, and Me Versus I. These three bands are all currently on tour and have gotten to where they are today thanks to the music scene here in Hammonton.

Senior Jimmy Austin has been attending shows organized by Grandaire for about four years now and had this to say about the company, “It is one chill family, we just sit around and listen to music.” He stated that it sometimes is more than the music, the same people attend each show, the people attending have become a family over the years and with it growing, there is always new people.

Student Nick Palumbo said that he started going to the shows this summer and that there is “A lot of energy”, and “there’s great heavy music, there is a great community that attends, it’s almost family like.”

Brandon Beckley and Nick Moretti of HHS have both been apart of the community for about four years. And both were in the band Verity and now Parkwood which have been playing with Grandaire Booking for some time. They stated that it’s great being apart of the local “scene”. Moretti said for the bands its like a symbiotic relationship “It’s given us a place to play, we support them [Grandaire Booking], they support us”. Moretti and Beckley both agree the greatest impact the booking company has had on the local community is that it has inspired many people over the past few years to start making music of their own, to express themselves, and sometimes they perform with Grandaire Booking.

Now go out and support the local scene, go write some music or attend one of Grandaire Booking’s shows. So go check them out on Facebook, Tumblr, or Twitter.