Courtesy of Alec Guan
Growing up, I always wanted to play the guitar and join a rock band like the ones I saw on TV. Even though I picked up the guitar in seventh grade, the dream of being in my very own band seemed so far away. I never expected to be given that very opportunity just a few years later.
Having moved here from outside the district before freshman year, I found myself unfamiliar with the new environment. At the first school event I attended, the 2022 Food Truck Fest, I saw a group of students, whom I later found out were a student band called Peach Fuzz. They were performing Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit” as a small crowd cheered them on. At that moment, I realized that, maybe, that rock musician dream from years earlier could be a reality.
One of the first people I met was Alex Ge in Ms. Wu’s Chinese class, another freshman who had transferred from a different school district. We quickly bonded over our shared affinity for “osu!,” a rhythm video game. I found out that Alex played the drums. He learned that I played the guitar. Somehow, luck had brought two strangers who shared the same goal together to become friends and future bandmates.
Along the way, we picked up a bassist, junior Mason Cheng, and a singer, junior Victor Wu.
It happens that we all suffer from strong spring allergies, so we named our group Pollen Prone.
The first few practices were rough.
Said Alex: “Initially, I tried to emulate what Peach Fuzz did, since I also wanted to do cool stuff like them. However, during the first few practices, we weren’t used to playing in rhythm with each other, and it didn’t feel like we were playing together.”
Fortunately for us, since the members of Peach Fuzz all graduated after our freshman year, we had an opportunity to fill their spot in the school’s rock band pecking order. After reaching out to the ASB and assistant principal Matt Torrens, we were scheduled to perform at the very event that showed us that forming a band was something that we could actually accomplish: Food Truck Fest.
Performing in front of an audience for the first time at Food Truck Fest 2023, we definitely felt the nerves. On my part, I really appreciated the fact that all of our friends came to support us and cheered us on.
Alex added: “To me, our first performance was a bit rocky, since I had to deal with a bit of stage fright. After more practice, though, it cleared out.”
Our Food Truck Fest performance also helped us establish ourselves at school. Subsequently, we were invited to perform at the 2024 Music and Good In Concert (MAGIC) Club charity concert to support victims of the Maui fires.
Not only was this event a huge step above all the previous rallies and other events that we had performed at, but it was also for a cause that was greater than ourselves. Performing in the McAfee Center in front of over 300 attendees, in collaboration with many other Saratoga musicians, I couldn’t help but be proud that our music was uniting a community to help others.
“[From our practice sessions and performance], we definitely grew to understand each other better and how to support each other while playing music,” Alex said.
Throughout the years, we performed at many rallies and other events, but the annual Food Truck Fests remained our favorite events to perform at. Since Peach Fuzz was such an inspiration to us as freshmen, we elected to perform Green Day’s “Welcome to Paradise” at each year’s Food Truck Fest as a cheesy welcome to freshmen who might have been feeling lost.
“I thought that Food Truck 2025 was pretty much the peak of our band’s run,” Alex said. “On one hand, we definitely played the best, and I feel like that for the first time, I truly had full confidence; we also played a lot more fluidly than previous performances.”.
For me personally, performing at the 2025 Food Truck Fest was also something very gratifying. From watching Peach Fuzz play as a starry-eyed freshman to starting my own band with people that would become my closest friends and being able to perform is something that I feel very fortunate for having experienced. As for the future of our group, Alex and I are passing the torch to the two juniors, Mason and Victor, and we’re confident that they’ll find budding rock band talent to replace us and carry on what we started four years ago.
