Many bands plug away for years, playing house parties, clubs and smaller halls before they ever reach a stage inside an arena, assuming they even reach such a stage at all. But the South Bay-bred indie-blues-rock group Fritz Montana were fortunate enough to play at Oracle Arena in Oakland—on their fourth show.

This isn’t to say the members of Fritz Montana haven’t earned their success. The group went up against a slew of great local bands in Live 105’s local band contest before pulling in the most votes and nabbing the coveted opening slot for the radio station’s annual Not So Silent Night concert last December.

“It was beyond a dream,” says Fritz Montana bassist Kevin Logan, who recalls how the gravity of the accomplishment didn’t totally sink in until the group showed up at Oracle the day of the show. “The second we stepped into that arena, we started seeing all the techs, the roadies, the sound guy—it was really overwhelming.”

Since last year’s NSSN, Aaron Axelsen, Live 105’s music director, has continued to play Fritz Montana’s tunes on his weekly local and new music show, Soundcheck. When the group recorded some new tracks earlier this year, he put those into regular rotation on his program as well.

The group’s infectious mix of heavy, blues-tinged alt-rock and high-energy pop—a la The Arctic Monkeys and The Black Keys—has been earning the band a following, at home and around the country. According to Logan, the NSSN gig served as a springboard to bigger local shows and a seven-show run at this year’s South By Southwest.

For a band that is hardly 2 years old, Fritz Montana are certainly making big waves. That doesn’t come as a surprise to San Jose promoter Barbara Wahli, who caught the group’s very first show at San Jose State University.

“I loved the songs and knew they would resonate well with a large audience,” says Wahli, now Fritz Montana’s manager. “They have so much potential and everyone I contact responds positively to their music. My gut tells me big things will happen for the band.”

So far, Wahli’s predictions appear to be on point. Fritz Montana saw a large turnout at the July 26 release party for their new EP, Scaredy Cat, held at the Rickshaw Stop in San Francisco. And in addition to regular spins from Axelsen, they’ve garnered some positive press. The music blog, Infectious Magazine put Fritz Montana on its “best unsigned bands to watch in 2013,” while another music blog, Lucy Out Loud, featured the band on one of its new music compilations.

“Every show I feel like, we build up a little more momentum,” Logan says. “When we started we did not have a game plan. The experience of playing in front of several thousand people, that got us hungry for bigger shows.”

Fritz Montana play The Blank Club on Oct. 24 at 8pm. More info.

With the instant availability of studio manipulation and infinite overdubbing possibilities, a lot of the current indie bands have lost the rawness that was standard in the late 80s/early 90s lo-fi era. Froadz continues that tradition with all the elements of an experimental guitar-driven post-rock outfit, while still maintaining that raw underground sound.

Formed last year in San Francisco, Froadz sticks closely to the rules of the power-rock-trio format with some nice subtleties. The guitarist plays soft arpeggios and quiet strumming while the bassist and drummer give the songs a steady driving rock beat—but never overpowering the guitar’s sparkling notes. Froadz are deconstructing post-rock, stripping away the excessive texturing and reformulating it into the simplest terms possible, but their rawness comes not just through simplicity, but from bringing back a sense of jamming and organic dynamics to the indie-rock sound.

Froadz play at the Blank Club on October 3 at 9pm. Admission is free. Dream House and Breathing open the show.

After making it’s debut last year, the Think and Die Thinking music festival returns this weekend with two days of punk and indie music performed by bands with women, people of color and members of the queer and transgender communities.

Last year, Rich Gutierrez and Christine Tupou introduced the idea to San Jose with two days of music at the Billy DeFrank Center and one day of music Streetlight Records.

“It was a trial thing (last year),” Tupou says. “We didn’t quite know how it was going to go. We had never booked a fest before. It went better than we expected.”

This year, the focus remains the same, but they’ve made a few changes, like hosting all three days at the Billy DeFrank Center.

Though, last year wasn’t without its problems. They were faced with some last-minute band cancellations, plus several local bands got upset that they weren’t allowed to play, not fully understanding the mission of the festival. According to Tupou, women, people of color and members of the queer and transgender communities are underrepresented at punk and indie shows and therefore don’t always feel comfortable there. They wanted to do their part to help to change that.

“There’s always going to be those few people that are mad because they can’t play a fest,” Tupou says. I felt personally responsible for telling each and every one of those people why we were doing this. At the end of the day it’s a pride thing. I think it was good to have full disclosure and be really transparent of what our intentions were. The mission statement still rings true because we’re still making space for people in San Jose that don’t really feel comfortable at shows and don’t get to see people like themselves on stage playing music.”

This year the organizers decided, while still staying steadfast to their original mission statement, to book a broader range of artists including non-punk bands, performance artists and comedians.

“I want to expand the fest as much as possible,” Tupou says. “I want to keep the theme punk and indie, but I want to show people you don’t have to limit yourselves to one form of art. You don’t have to play punk. You can get a drum machine and play that kind of music and still hang out with punks. It’s making room for anything that you don’t usually see and sometimes you don’t even know you want to see, other than when you see it it’s completely insightful and inspiring.”

Think and Die Thinking is August 24 to August 26 at the Billy DeFrank Center. Tickets are $7-$10. More info.