Catch Bahamas at StanFest this weekend

Bahamas at StanFest mainstage
Sunday, July 2, 10pm
$50 day pass/$140 weekend pass


“In some ways I’m grateful people still want to come see us play after three years of no new music, which is really nice,” says Afie Jurvanen, the laconic guitar wizard better known as Bahamas. “And also playing in the summertime in general is so different for me—everyone’s outside so they’re already in a good mood, you know?”

It’s a Sunday morning in Kennebunkport, Maine and Jurvanen is emptying the dishwasher, relishing in a day off from his American tour of amphitheatres and stadiums with Jack Johnson. (“I don’t know if I’ve ever been a part of a tour where the vibe was—I thought I was pretty chill,” he says of the Hawaiian folk star. “His world is next-level.”) His last album, Bahamas is Afie, was released in 2014. There’s a new one waiting to go, but he’s keeping mum on the details until a plan is set, though he does reveal he did not record the whole thing himself, as with Afie.

“I wrote those songs a long time ago, and I had a lot of time back then,” he says. “I have two young daughters now, and my whole process for writing songs is just different—I just don’t have any time to sit there and analyze myself to such a degree.”

New songs are seeping into the current set, so you can expect to hear a few this weekend at StanFest, along with select tracks from his previous three full-lengths. “They’re willing to go to a lot of places, and that’s a luxurious place to be as a performer,” says Jurvanen of his dedicated audience. “I can play more music, different types of music, as opposed to a rock set where you just have to plow through, you know?”