Joe Popp returns to Tampa for a few shows this weekend.

In 2000, with the last embers of his namesake punk-rock band finally extinguished, Joe Popp left Tampa Bay for New York City’s greener creative pastures. Joe Popp, the band — which included bassist Martin Rice and late drummer Jeff Wood — was perhaps the last local rock group to pack ’em in at venues like the State Theatre.

Popp (his real name, he swears), who has maintained solid ties to Tampa Bay, returns for a couple of acoustic gigs this weekend.

He’s currently the technical director for the Sonic Arts Center program at City College of New York, where he designs studios, builds amplifiers and oversees the center’s facilities. He enjoys educational benefits, a light schedule and a one-year paid sabbatical coming up this fall. It is, he says, “a great job.” Popp has continued to make music on the side, be it a band gig with friends in New York or a rock musical, Maxwell, which he wrote and produced with Jobsite Theater in 2002.

This article appears in Mar 25-31, 2009.