Lopiez Celebrating Two-Year Anniversary With Alternating Currents Party This Weekend
The following article is part of QuadCities.com’s partnership with local music website The Echo. For more, check out theechoqc.com!
Andrew Lopez recently attended Lollapalooza in Chicago, and as part of Alternating Currents in downtown Davenport, he’s celebrating his family business Aug. 20-21 on a smaller scale, in what could be called “Lopiez-a-palooza.”
Starting 5 p.m. Friday and Saturday (free admission), in the lot next to Lopiez Pizza (429 E. 3rd St.), the Lopez bros (Andrew, Peter and 
Mike) are having a second-anniversary party. Live entertainment Friday night includes the bands Road Soda, Druids, Pit Lord, plus sideshow antics by Matt Nicke and a drag show, with Saturday night bands Radkey, In the Whale and Horseburner, plus SCW Pro Wrestling.
Food trucks at the event will include Smash Truck, La Flama, Stevie’s Eatz, Cavort and Oh so Sweet. Vendors on-site will be Abernathy’s, Allied Barber, Brick & Motor Boutique, Monster Fest, Cloud 9, Gnar City and Ragged Records. Beer will be available for purchase from Rock Island’s Wake Brewing and SingleSpeed Brewing of Waterloo. In the restaurant, they always feature local beers on tap and other craft beers.
Lopiez is in the mood to celebrate after surviving the 2019 flood and 2020 pandemic, says Andrew, a 36-year-old alum of Davenport Central who opened Lopiez in June 2019, pushed back from the historic flooding that spring. He organized the punk rockers Radkey for Alternating Currents in August 2019 in a vacant space on East 2nd Street. “We knew right when we started this place, we wanted to be involved in music as much as possible,” Andrew said recently. “I’ve always been in a band since I was 15, 16 years old.”
He played guitar and started touring when he was 18. “I was drawn to music for some reason,” Andrew said. He moved to Denver when he was 21 to try something new when one of his friends moved there.
“I started seeking out bands, wanting to help with whatever I could do,” Andrew said. “I was also a tour manager for a lot of bands.”
He traveled a lot on tour, saying it was a crazy, humbling experience. “As a touring band, you don’t get much out there,” Andrew said. “Sometimes, you don’t even get paid for some of the shows you play and have to stay in the van. That’s kind of where my head was when I started the ALTA program.”
To read the rest of this article, check it out on The Echo HERE.
