Recently the Patrick Contreras Band played in a national band competition at the Hard Rock Cafe in Las Vegas. Bands were judged on: originality, stage presence, musicianship and crowd response.

Well, Fresno already knows PCB excels at all those things and the judges at the Hard Rock saw it too, because the band won the night. Which means they move on to the semifinals in August. They're looking to put together a party bus for it, we'll keep ya updated.

Speaking of party buses, Fresno Patrick Contreras fans might want to put together one for Visalia on Saturday because Patrick is playing two shows at The Cellar Door. First show is at 7 as Patrick plays with Omar Nare on piano and it will feature stuff on their new sideprojecty CD "The Castillo Sessions: Vol 1". The second show is at 9 and features the latest version of the Patrick Contreras band. The cost is $7 and that gets you into both shows.

Free bonus!: Patrick passed us a couple songs that we can pass on to you. The first is Patrick and Omar covering the Gary Jules song "Mad World" and the second is a PCB original that Patrick and Omar did acoustically called "Cotllion". Download them here:
>madworld.mp3
>cotllion.mp3

All this is leading up to the band's big CD release show in August: