“No regret, no pitying parties.” Denver’s Underground Music Showcase is closed

The long -term underground music showcase of Denver will be closed after the 2025 event amid an alarming loss of national music festivals in the US.

Even with sold-out tickets and capacity, mathematics simply is not logical, said non-profit producer Youth on record, who has run the festival with co-owner since 2022 two parts.

“If you have a cultural inheritance such as the UMS, people deserve a ceremony of farewell,” said Jami Duffy, executive director of Youth On Record, which is long mentioned in the UMS – as the South Broadway event is long mentioned.

“We didn’t want to tear anything away from people and then send a sheepish e -mail about it in September,” she said. “We wanted to give them time to celebrate and remember.”

The 25th UMS, planned for Friday, July 25, Sunday 27 July, at locations, clubs and shops along South Broadway in the Baker Neighborhood, will contain more than 200 local and national independent acts with different backgrounds and genres. That includes all those witches, Flyna Boss, Devotchka, La Luz, El ten Eleven, The Velveteres and dozens more.

The event has organized more than 10,000 performances over the years and had millions of dollars in economic impact along the business course, Duffy said, introducing countless thousands into local and national bands.

She noted that the event only ends ‘in its current form’, which means that it is open to another organization that starts a version of it again. However, the $ 1.4 million budget of the UMS is still too much for young people to support, since the entire organization has only a budget of $ 2.2 million for next year, Duffy said.

“We are a small independent company, just like all on South Broadway,” said Duffy. “But the bigger question is: how much of the economic development in a neighborhood should be on the shoulders of a cultural festival? What is the role of city and state subsidies? We don’t want to curb our mission to support emerging artists. Mission costs money.”

With increasing costs for security and public safety; Artist Poes (the UMS is proud of his high artist wages, Duffy said); Pricey permits and weather insurance as a result of climate change; And other new urgent issues, it’s just not sustainable, she said. She pointed to a sharp fall in music festivals in the US last year – NPR called 2024 “The year The Music Festival died” – and noted that 40 festivals have been canceled since the beginning of 2025.

Events organizers mentioned similar reasons such as Duffy, such as new high production costs, as well as safety and security problems. But competition from a few concerts, falling ticket sales and other logistical challenges weighing at events, ranging from Bonnaroo, which this year was partially canceled to Coachella and Burning Man, both who were not sold out.

“We have poured our love, sweat and tears into this festival. Year after year, everything we have given,” said Casey Berry, co-owner of the UMS, in a statement. “The 25 -year anniversary will not be different. No regret, no compassionate parties – only a feast for the centuries!”

Duffy hopes that important conversations about music, sustainability and cultural support will continue on this year’s UMS, both during the festival and his Get loud music topAn industrial and artist-oriented event that takes place from 25-26 July. The music scene of Denver has always evolved together with the UMS, she said, and she doesn’t want to slow anything.

World touring, Grammy-nominated Act Devotchka, one of this year’s UMS headliners, played the second UMS and took advantage of Denver’s DIY, underground scene from the early 21st century-from which the UMS was exemplary, said singer Nick Urata.

“I like the full circular feeling and symmetry of playing the early and now the latter,” he said. “We have beaten and drag a lot and have received many rejections in the early days, and I remember that feeling of playing the EMs and at the same time super excited and super nervous.” This is it! This is our Make or Break Moment! ” “

Former Denver Post Reporter and critic John Moore founded the UMS in 2001 With a quartet bands on a one -day showcase in the Bluebird Theater. Denver Post Pop-Music Criticus and editor Ricardo Baca In 2006 it grew in a southwestern festival in the southwest, where a wristband granted access to several locations. (Full disclosure: I helped that first year on South Broadway.)

“I sympathize because I can’t really know the full weight of economic problems that is needed to achieve a feast of this size,” said Moore. “But I do know that we have set up a domino and have tipped it purely to increase the profile of local bands in Denver. If you think of all the beautiful memories and performances that have happened as a result of that one Domino, it is really overwhelming. I am grateful to everyone who had something to do with it.”

Over the years, the UMS has evolved among different managers, where the event changed from a Choestring Denver Post Production to a non -profit event of the Denver Post Community Foundation, then a single production of two parts (from 2018), and recently a youth on record/two parts event.

Directors and managers of Executive Festival and managers such as Moore, Baca, Kendall Smith, Will Dupree and two parts have all left their mark on the UMS, with the youth on record in the emphasis on making artist care, sober and all-year options, an accessibility guide and other progressive guide.

Just like South by Southwest, the UMS also dismissed unofficial day festivals that helped at the birth of Major Denver Acts such as Nathaniel Ratliff and the Night Heats (Rateliff was a regular solo artist at the Fest), while borrowing credibility to new faces and voting.