One of the Valley's most prominent food and bar groups is taking a different turn with its latest venture. Pretty Decent Concepts, the team behind spots such as Wren & Wolf and Filthy Animal, has partnered with Relentless Beats to bring their cocktail expertise to music festivals.
The new concept, called Only Sometimes, will bring creative collaborations to special events, festivals and concerts.
Pretty Decent Concepts founders Teddy Myers, Thor Nguyen and Kaitlin Myers are no strangers to working with large events. Their collective experience serving at the Super Bowl with Guy Fieri, producing large-scale tailgates and other events bolstered the group’s decision to set out on their own.
This weekend, Only Sometimes will debut its first pop-up at the Goldrush Music Festival, called Samurai Saloon.
The new concept, called Only Sometimes, will bring creative collaborations to special events, festivals and concerts.
Pretty Decent Concepts founders Teddy Myers, Thor Nguyen and Kaitlin Myers are no strangers to working with large events. Their collective experience serving at the Super Bowl with Guy Fieri, producing large-scale tailgates and other events bolstered the group’s decision to set out on their own.
This weekend, Only Sometimes will debut its first pop-up at the Goldrush Music Festival, called Samurai Saloon.
The mashup was first announced on Instagram five days before the music festival in a short cinematic showdown set in one of the old Western-style buildings at Rawhide Western Town.
“Seeing people supportive of a collaborative event like this was really fun and exciting,” Myers said. “Now the next bit of excitement will be seeing the first guest come through and getting their initial reactions of what we've created for them.”
The team carefully curated the Samurai Saloon’s vibe for the almost sold-out weekend-long desert EDM festival. The event will take place on Friday and Saturday in Chandler.
Drawing on the crossover between Pretty Decent Concepts and Arizona’s longest-running event provider for electric dance music, the hospitality group created the Southwestern outpost with East Asian touches that reflect the fusion that can be expected from the menu.
“We knew from the very beginning that we wanted to do an East-meets-West concept, where two worlds collide,” Myers said. “It's representative of the Pretty Decent Concepts and Relentless Beats two worlds colliding.”
The Samurai Saloon is intended to be a place to explore in between sets, or when you need to take a beat away from the thumping bass and strobing lights. Myers and his team know the star attractions are the artists on stage, and don’t anticipate guests spending more than 15 to 45 minutes at the saloon.
“We're just hoping to add a little bit of our magic to their experience in the evening,” Myers said.
Filthy Animal, the newest restaurant by Wren & Wolf creator Pretty Decent Concepts, debuted in April.
Courtesy of Pretty Decent Concepts
In addition to bringing over 30 staff to the outpost, the Pretty Decent Concepts team will also organize bites for festival attendees with platinum tickets from two of their other kitchens. In the platinum lounge, there will be a Filthy Animal food spread on Friday evening, and on Saturday, a spread from Wren & Wolf will be offered.
In downtime between opening new places, the local restaurant group crafted the inaugural pop-up event, setting out to offer something that Arizona festivals don’t typically have. Despite the Samurai Saloon’s casual origin, it's a heavy lift to get a high-profile gig like this together.
“I think just the amount of effort that we've ended up putting into this has been a little bit more than we thought it would've been when we came up with the concept, ” Myers said. “But it’s going to be completely worth it by the time it's Sunday morning and we've gotten through it.”
The Only Sometimes series will act as an incubator for new ideas and an avenue for Myers and his team to stretch their creativity and limits. Another pop-up is confirmed for February 2026, although the location has yet to be disclosed. The team hopes to expand to four events a year and extend its locations out of state and potentially out of the country for an international destination partnership with the company's airplane-themed bar, Carry On.
“Like writing an album, you know you write 50 songs to go on an album but only 10 make the cut,” Myers said. “But some of the ideas from those other 50 songs might go into your best singles. That's the mentality that we're talking with, Only Sometimes.”
Goldrush Music Festival
Sept. 12 and 13 Rawhide Western Town
5244 S. 48th St., Chandler
