A place of family fun, pizza and pinball by day, laser tag dance raves by night, South Burlington’s Pizza Putt was host to the sold-out Bass Invaderz on Oct. 15. With more than 270 confirmed guests, taking place from 10 p.m. to 4 a.m., Burlington-based music production company 2k Deep and Who Do You Know Productions hosted this year’s dub and house inspired event. Think 2009’s Rollin’ Balls but upgraded: three rooms of DJs, a sound system to impress, laser tag, mini golf and pizza, all doused in a psychedelic-inspired light show. Adrian Sakgrime, an organizer behind Bass Invaderz, has been targeting UVM students since his pre-club, basement party days. Sakgrime is arguably better known in Burlington for his heavy, underground-inspired DEM as DJ Haitian than his UVM degree in Biochemistry. 2K Deep was founded in April of 2006 by Sakgrime, Dave Leikin (Sleezy D) and Mike Hambrecht (Hambone), and has gone on to include others like Logo, Sharkat and SMD, all of whom mixed and mashed beats at Friday’s event. “Bass Invaderz and Rollin’ Balls are the works of myself and Scott Cohen and Will Tatro of Who Do You Known Productions,” Sakgrime said. “[We] frequently team up for the big parties because it’s … a complex undertaking.” Putting on such an extensive event requires many people. “It is a massive team effort and we are very lucky to be backed by such amazing, hard working people,” Sakgrime said. In the restaurant portion of the venue, students crowded around the stage, unaware of how big the party really was. The music was primarily bass-y dubstep, house and electronic. 2K Deep has no doubt profited from the popularity of electronic dance music (EDM) among college students for its deviation from mainstream, and accessibility. “On one hand you have people completely rejecting mainstream, top 40 music and listening to underground music and subscribing to the culture and then on the other you have mainstream kids crossing over because the music in fact has mainstream appeal,” Sakgrime said. A shuttle ran from Patrick Gym to Pizza Putt, packed with loud and neon-spandex-clad students ready to dance, as well as play laser tag. For sophomore Kat Raynor, the diversity in activities Pizza Putt allowed as a venue did not go unnoticed. “The venue was really cool because you could wander around the mini golf course … it was like a maze filled with awesome music and glow sticks,” she said. It also allowed for a larger capacity than Rollin’ Balls. Sakgrime’s main intention to blow faces off, without much regard to profit margins, was a success. Inspired by early ‘90s DJ Tricky Pat’s Lucky Strife bowling alley parties, Sakgrime understands the frustrations of underage students who don’t necessarily want to drink, but still go to great shows. “It’s an under-21 rite of passage, events for everyone to get down,” he said. “Younger kids rage here.” As for the future of 2K Deep’s shows, their next club event is Thursday, Dec. 19 at Club Metronome, while the Pizza Putt might very well be glow stick-infested again next.
