Path points forward for Adelitas Way
In a few hours, he’ll be up onstage and then off it, an exclamation point incarnate, headbanging, lashing his mic cord like a bullwhip and crowd surfing halfway to the soundboard.
But for now, Adelitas Way singer Rick DeJesus is in his band’s dressing room at the Mandalay Bay Events Center, a small, narrow space that’s barren save for a long wooden bench and a table loaded with Rock Star energy drinks.
DeJesus definitely doesn’t need said beverages to get amped: He speaks in manic bursts, vibrating in his seat like a struck tuning fork.
For weeks now, Adelitas Way has been playing the main stage of the Uproar Tour, performing before crowds as large as 15,000 people a night in arenas and amphitheaters, opening for Staind, Godsmack and Shinedown (the tour came here as part of the first night of the Rock Vegas festival last Friday).
This is the biggest venue the Vegas band has played in its hometown.
“Check it off the list,” DeJesus smiles, eyes hiding behind a curtain of bangs. “I figured we were going to have to take a little more time to get here.”
Since the release of its sophomore disc, “Home School Valedictorian” in June 2011, the band has seen its profile gradually rise, scoring a pair of No. 1 songs on the active rock charts and releasing four singles so far from the record.
“It feels like everything is paying off,” DeJesus says. “We’re getting where we’ve got to go. It’s getting better for us.”
It’s been a tumultuous journey for DeJesus.
Eight years ago, when he first moved to town, he was living in his car.
“I remember sleeping in parking lots and trying to get shows at the Rainbow Bar and Grill,” he recalls, “just doing anything I could.”
And his band still has a way to go.
“You see all these empty seats?” DeJesus asked the audience toward the end of Adelitas Way’s set at Rock Vegas, scanning the half-full arena. “I want you to tell them what they missed.”
By the time the band finishes with “Sick,” the crowd is singing along.
DeJesus leaps offstage to join them, landing on outstretched arms.
He gets carried away, eventually landing on his feet.
It’s what DeJesus does.
“There are a lot of people walking into the arenas going, ‘Adelitas Way, who is that?’ ” he says of his band’s still-burgeoning status. “I want to go out there and show them all why we’re on the main stage and how we got there. And we’re doing it.”
Contact reporter Jason Bracelin at
jbracelin@reviewjournal.com
or 702-383-0476.