Brewers and bands talk beer and punk rock at Punk ‘N Brew in Huntington Beach

Brewers and punk rock fans turned out in droves for a day at the beach filled with beer, live music and good times at Punk ‘N Brew at SeaLegs Live at Bolsa Chica State Beach in Huntington Beach on Saturday.

The expanded grounds, which took over parking lots on either side of SeaLegs at the Beach, as well as a good fenced off portion of the sand immediately in front of the venue, sold out with around 10,000 patrons who had a chance to indulge in over 200 craft beer tastings from over 50 breweries. They caught sets by punk rock bands NOFX, Bad Religion, Goldfinger, Strung Out, Ignite and more.

The six-city touring festival, curated by NOFX frontman Fat Mike and produced by Orange County-based companies Brew Ha Ha Productions and Synergy Global Entertainment (SGE), also included a special beer collaboration with Stone Brewing, Punk in Drublic, a lager-style beer that got its name from the band’s fifth studio album, released in 1994.

“Stone Brewing has always had a history with music, we’re inspired by music and our founders are musicians,” Ethan Anderson, vice president of marketing at Stone Brewing said. Earlier this year members of NOFX showed up at the brewery, which has locations in San Diego and Escondido, to help create the specialty brew.

“Fat Mike came and helped us brew the beer – well, actually we like to say he just kind of got in the way,” Anderson said with a laugh. “It was just a great collaboration because of the alignment of the two philosophies, that anti corporate, stick-it-to-the-man type of mentality, all those things Fat Mike stands for, Stone stands for as well. We’re furiously independent and into doing things the right way, with the utmost integrity and perpetuating this idea of really upending the status quo and challenging convention and Fat Mike and NOFX is the epitome of all of that.”

Though Fat Mike is mostly a vodka drinker and he’ll occasionally grab a Stella he thinks his Punk in Drublic beer is “quite good.” As he sampled a little backstage in his best pink and black horizontal stripped dress he said that while out on the Punk in Drublic/Punk ‘N Brew tour he has “tried new things.”

“I had a PBR,” he said. “But it was a big one. The worst part was it was from the night before and there was only about a third of it left.”

He was probably serious.

SGE’s John Reese said, joking aside, that working with Fat Mike on the tour has been a great experience.

“What I appreciate about him more than anything else is that he’s just like ‘let’s go, let’s do this’,” he said. “He’s an idea machine and he always executes.”

For Brew Ha Ha Productions’ Cameron Collins, who has been producing local, regional and now national beer tasting events since 2010, pairing up with SGE and bringing a bigger concert element into his business model has changed his company for the better.

“We’re hiring staff and we’re expanding and next year, we’re already slated to double the number of festivals from what we did this year,” he said. Even at this point, between Punk ‘N Brew in Huntington Beach and until the annual Brew Ho Ho at the Phoenix Club in Anaheim on Saturday, Dec. 9, Collins said he still has six more festivals. Though he says he’s a bit tired, he’s quickly re-energized by a few sips of beer and watching the crowd enjoying tastings.

“We build these events for beer enthusiasts,” he said. “We celebrate the fact that other people that are not enthusiasts come and have the opportunity to become enthusiasts. That’s really what’s happening here. It’s a cool deal because I want craft beer to continue to grow and flourish in the market and take more of that market share and the only way we’re going to do that is by converting beer drinkers into craft beer drinkers and they only way to do that is by doing events like this.”

Several brewers onsite, including Jarrod Larsen of Tustin Brewing Company, Deven Dufresne of Four Sons Brewing in Huntington Beach and Nicholas Cordato of Artifex Brewing Company in San Clemente, said they love it when people they meet face-to-face at one of the Brew Ha Ha events turn up at  their breweries with friends for a tasting or to purchase growlers.

“It’s nice when you’re here and people come back over and they say they want another tasting because it was so good,” Larsen said of meeting beer drinkers at events. For Punk ‘N Brew he brought out a limited run dry stout, the seasonal Oktoberfest and two flagships, the Old Towne IPA and the Red Hill Red.

“It helps me validate what I’m doing because being a brewer isn’t really that glamorous. It’s a lot of work and when you hear people say that they appreciate the product and enjoy drinking it or that they’re coming by the pub next week to grab a growler, that makes it worth it.”

Cordato said they always bring one of Artifex’s most popular beers, Unicorn Juice, to every event, but they like to switch it up. On Saturday they brought out Trigger Finger, a popular IPA and the Burlington Bandwagon, a smooth, hazy double IPA. They also brought the honey blonde, which Artifex brew’s exclusively for the Broad & Brew eateries, one of which just opened in Huntington Beach.

Dufresne was quite busy at his Four Sons Brewing booth, but handed out samples of some smaller batch brews including the Pucker Up Buttercup lemon sour and The Subtle One, a pineapple IPA with a kick of habanero. The sour was subtle, and very drinkable, while the habanero crept up after each swallow. Dufrense said over 80 peppers were added into the batch. He knows the exact number because he had to cut them up himself. It was a learning experience, he said, and he now knows he needs to wear gloves and protective eye wear when dealing with fiery chili pepper.

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After his group performed, guitarist Kevin Kilkenny of the O.C.-based hardcore band Ignite sat down for a few beers. The band has been out on tour in support of its album, “A War Against You,” which came out on Century Media Records last year. Though he tours the world and has sampled all kinds of beer, Kilkenny said he goes back to the basics with either a Pacifico or a Sam Adams. Some of the best beer he’s had, he said, is the Kölsch-style brews in Cologne, Germany.

First, we sampled the Stone Brewing Punk in Drublic Beer.

“That’s a good beer, Fat Mike had a hand in this?,” he said. “For me it tastes more like an IPA than a lager. But I like it because it’s a little less hoppy. I could see drinking this all day. I’d say Fat Mike did a good job here.”

Sometimes you discover crazy things about people over a beer. We found out that Kilkenny actually broke and set a new world land speed record with the American Motorcycle Association by racing his 500cc Kawasaki motorcycle 131.431 mph.

“I don’t put that on my resume,” he said, grabbing a taste of Anaheim brewery Towne Park’s Blonde.

“It’s a little heavier than other blondes and I think this one might get me drunk,” he commented. “I like it though. It’s not as easy drinking as most blondes I’ve had but it has good flavor.”

Next up was Knee Deep Brewing Company’s Breaking Bud IPA.

“Does this have weed in it? It smells like weed,” he said. “It’s so hoppy. It’s a real IPA. I don’t necessarily like IPA’s. This has too many flavors going on and I’m not sure I could get behind this one. I admire the effort because it was probably difficult to make, but it’s not for me.”

And finally, we tried Los Angeles’ Concrete Jungle Project’s unfiltered German lager.

“What do they leave in when its unfiltered?” Kilkenny asked. “It’s actually really crisp. Wow, that’s good. This is a tasty beer and really refreshing. I think this could be a new beer for me. Think this one is the winner of our tasting.”

Punk ‘N Brew

With: NOFX, Bad Religion, Goldfinger, Strung Out, Ignite, the Dickies, D.I. and more

When: Saturday, Oct. 28

Where: SeaLegs Live at Bolsa Chica State Beach, Huntington Beach