Vexfest 5 was concentric. It came full circle from its beginnings and expanded exponentially from there.

The idea for Vexfest was born over the bar at Barley’s in 2001 in a conversation between Fred Rafidi, who owned Barley’s then and members of local rock band Cyrus who hung out there. Their first attempt drew about 1,000 people downtown.

Vexfest is about music and it’s about Youngstown; organized by people who care about their community, who want to make it a more vibrant place to live, and who have the determination to make it work. JamBrain vigorously applauds their efforts.

Cyrus “fizzled” soon afterwards, but Rafidi kept Vexfest going for two more years, growing it by about 1,000 a year and bringing in national recording artists Mushroom Head in 2003, before other interests drew him out of town.

Fast forward to Barley’s bar talk 2007: Rafidi, who owns the building, met Jimmy DeCapua, the leader of local rock/jam band, Jones For Revival, and told him about Vexfest. DeCapua thought it was the nuts; so did Barley’s owner Dan Crump and John Jones who hung out there. They formed a corporation to do it again under the aegis of Youngstown Local Music, the name of the Myspace page DeCapua had started to promote his band.

The 2007 revival, with 40 bands on four stages was a hit, drawing nearly 6,000 people to downtown Youngstown. The recent 2008 version featured a reunion of Cyrus as headliners — as they were the first year — and an even bigger crowd (very conservatively) estimated at more than 7,000 festival fans. (Several hundred fans were there when the first bands opened before noon, and by 8 p.m., an early evening for many music fans and prior to the performances of some of Youngstown’s most popular bands, the street and bar were packed with people.)

One snag for the otherwise smoothly run festival was the closing of The Core, on West Federal Plaza, which had hosted a second indoor stage last year and was expected to do so this year, causing a shakeup of the scheduling, and a hectic pace at Barley’s.

“One thing we did differently this year,” said DeCapua, “was to hire a local company to come in and do the cleanup of the street. Last year we worried about that all day and then pushed brooms til 7:00 in the morning getting the street cleaned up. This year we were done by 4 a.m., and the cleaning crew finished up about 5.”

Another change was bringing in some of Youngstown’s talented hip-hop and rap artists, enhancing the diversity of the entertainment and the crowd, and making the event even more inclusive.

The Youngstown Police contingent covering the event, increased to handle the bigger crowd, seemed to be having as much fun as everyone else.

Youngstown Local Music is getting pretty good at this — having hosted two Vexfests and this spring’s JonesFest — and they have plans to grow, with possibly another event in the fall (next year) and an expanded Vexfest. “We know it’s not going to happen right away,” DeCapua explained, “but there’s no reason why this can’t eventually be a festival that covers all three city blocks, here, and draws 20,000 people to a fun day in downtown Youngstown.”

Youngstown’s three-piece rock band ProBono opened the west stage at VexFest 5, Sunday morning, and they brought out the faithful.

Pro bono publico, a Latin term meaning for the public good, is used most frequently to describe professional work done for free, and though it’s true that ProBono was playing for free, the early arrivals Sunday would shout “Amen” to the idea that their music was for the common good.

ProBono bills itself as a rock band, though they mix in a heavy dose of blues covers among their original music, and even have the audacity and skill to play Hendrix’s version of “Killing Floor.”

Kevin Glaz is the guitarist and lead singer and is very good at both. He makes frequent and effective use of bottleneck picking which works especially well with the strong and steady bass line provided by Kurt Anshutz (who also sings) and Dean Anshutz’s percussion mastery.

Dean played with three bands Sunday, opening with ProBono then staying on with Acoustic Juggernaut, which followed, and returning later in the evening for his new, regular gig with The Zou.

ProBono is not nearly as well known as their talent suggests they might be, but they have a loyal core of believers eager to testify for them.

(Warning: First names only)

Wayne offers NoXcuse for his band’s name. (Er, wait, that’s a little obscure.) Wayne’s band’s name is NoXcuse. (Yeah, that’s better.)

Wayne played in other people’s bands until 1988, and he wasn’t happy about it. He’s a particular guy, and it bothered him when things weren’t done right, so he started his own band.

He formed NoXcuse nine years ago. The current group has been together for a little more than a year. Wayne plays rhythm guitar and sings; Jack plays bass; Ron is the lead guitarist; and Carl does drums.

Wayne (who introduces himself as Wayne) is particular about every phase of the band’s operation. He sets up the equipment; he checks the sound himself; he conducts a warm-up session and team meeting before the performance.

When the clock strikes “time to start”, the band is playing. When the band takes a 15 minute break, they are playing again in 15 minutes, not ‘about’ 15 minutes. “And we play 18-song sets,” he states proudly, with little or no break between songs. That is quite a lot to get right.

NoXcuse plays a very wide range of covers and they play them right. Singing and instrumentation are right on. “We’ll probably sound crappy,” Wayne said just before they started, “because we haven’t played for a month. I just got burned out.” Big surprise, Wayne; take a deep breath. They sounded fine.

“We worked really hard for a while writing our own music — we were really into it,” he says to that question, “but people only wanted to hear covers, so that’s what we play. It’s hard enough to get people out even then.”

NoXcuse packed Tangiers for a recent Saturday night gig and none of their fans seemed to notice the rust.

William Vaughan and his partner, John Pasquale bought Crickets, a neighborhood bar at 1733 E. Midlothian Blvd., in March and they are aggressively turning it into … a neighborhood bar.

Vaughan was telling his glass plant boss, Pasquale about his passion for food and beer and his dream of having his own place (and that Crickets was on the market), and Pasquale said, Let’s go for it, I’ll back you (or words to that effect).

Crickets has been serving the blue collar neighborhood just east of 680 since it was converted from a church decades ago, and has been called Crickets for the past 15-16 years. It has a seating capacity of almost 100 (about 20 at the u-shaped bar on the east side of the single room), a full kitchen and a spacious parking lot surrounding the building.

There’s nothing snooty about Vaughan’s passion for food (”I do all the cooking at home”). It is family fare at ‘fair’ (an understatement) family prices (nothing on the menu over $10). Saturday’s special is $.50 hot dogs; he makes pulled pork sandwiches with his own barbecue sauce ($4.25) every Wednesday.

His flair for beers is a little more exotic. “The domestic beer market has gone flat,” he explains, “while the craft beer market has taken off the last several years. We will be putting in a whole new tap system and we’ll have 10 beers on tap and 70 beer selections.” He already offers a beer menu.

He is “experimenting” with music, he says. The place was filling up when Steve Vuich started his first set on a recent Saturday, but Vaughan said the crowd has varied from a packed house one night to only the regular bar patrons another. A corner bandstand opens onto the main room and the sound carries well.

Vaughan is bringing in new (and old) decorations to maintain and enhance the atmosphere and he has the dream and drive to make Crickets THE bar for a greatly expanded neighborhood.

Stan Drogowski is well aware that he sometimes “goes on” as they say, and one time, when he was getting ‘that look’ he asked his companion, “Am I bugging you?” He was; and is, though in honor or his roots, he uses the ebonics spelling: Bugingu for his stage name. The UFOs are a little more illusory.

Drogowski also has a sense of humor. For instance, he claims Bugingu is “in the personal noun sense.” (Good one there). And when he calls his music ‘death metal’ and ’soul’ he’s joking. Sightings of the UFOs are unconfirmed.

His roots are actually in folk rock, especially Dylan, whom he channels when he’s standing and strumming, and he likes Rush a lot. His solo ballads fit nicely into  ”evolutionary blues” wrapping.

Bugingu and the UFOs is the title of his second CD, and on it, his original pieces benefit greatly from the back-up instrumentation he added; they are thoughtful and complex, musically and literately.

But one wonders, Are fans going to flock to hear someone who’s Bugingu, with or without the UFOs?