Author: Jill Marucut|Jill Marucut
Last Friday, Ra Ra Riot took to the stage at Sycamore Glen as part of Oxy’s Labor Day weekend celebration. Sponsored by the Office of Student Life (OSL), the Dean of Students Office and the Programming Board, the concert was indie, affordable and highly regarded – Ra Ra Riot was a huge success.
Programming Board manager Daniel Perez (junior) thought that choosing Ra Ra Riot was a practical solution to finding a band that would excite the crowd without exhausting funding. “Ra Ra Riot just happened to be available on Labor Day weekend, which benefited us because we wanted to get a big event rolling as soon as the school year started,” said Perez.
Small-scale acts such as Ra Ra Riot also allow the Programming Board to preserve funds that can then be directed towards a more recognizable artist for the Springfest concert.
Upon hearing about the arrival of Ra Ra Riot, Amie Kashon (sophomore) said, “I freaked out, I was so excited, and told one of my friends that I danced around in my room.”
Overall, while Ra Ra Riot was a good choice that got the stamp of approval by music lovers who take pride in knowing underground bands, Ra Ra Riot’s crowd became out of control, and it was difficult for even die-hard fans like Kashon to fully enjoy the music. After seeing the concert, Kashon had a bittersweet message: “Sadly, I feel like a lot of the moshing was out of boredom.”
The Ra Ra Riot concert has inspired many Oxy students to look more into the band’s music. Ra Ra Riot’s set was extremely well-received by the students. “It was really good. I heard about them before, looked them up, and they sounded the same live,” said Katie Sims (first-year).
However, while the performance was top-notch, many have expressed that the chaos was unwelcome and unexpected. “I was surprised to see a mosh pit, it didn’t seem fitting for the atmosphere,” said Sims.
“I thought [the moshing] was really inappropriate … it’s frustrating when it’s a band you really enjoy and you’re there to actually see the concert and not hit all the people around you,” Kashon said.
Considering their genre of music as falling under “healing and easy listening,” as expressed on their Myspace page, it seemed less than fitting for unruly behavior to occur.
Some people embraced Ra Ra Riot, many thrashed their heads against the stage, some rocked from side to side and others just sat down on benches ready to kick back. It didn’t matter whether the mood was low-key or high-key, Ra Ra Riot inspired others to enjoy the beats.
For Etri Ajbour (sophomore), who beatboxed spontaneously on the stage, the concert became participatory. “I was just being impatient and asked one of the band members if I could do a little impromptu beatboxing to rally the crowd. He kindly directed me to his manager who said that they would be starting shortly, and that was the extent of the convo. After the concert, I was still feeling very uninhibited so I got up there on the stage and did my stuff,” said Ajbour.
Unfortunately, this was done without the permission of the tech staff and Ajbour’s microphone was turned off.
In addition to being the perfect solution to the OSL’s plan to conserve the concert budget for a more mainstream act for next semester, Ra Ra Riot satisfied the indie junkie’s dissatisfaction with Oxy’s history of hip-hop acts.
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