Last Saturday was Lathrop’s Love Hurts event, as previewed in the last issue of the Miscellany News by Esther Clowney (“Love Hurts band expo to address Valentine’s Day woes“). Held in the high-ceilinged Lathrop MPR, students brought new use to the space, while setting precedent for what could become a great new tradition of musical performances.

Vassar students and members of The Facts and Figures Ben Conant and Ricky Goldman were both pleased with the turn out of the event, “It was great, we had about one hundred and fifty people in there at one point,” Conant revealed.

Ricky Goldman and Ben Conant of The Facts and Figures.

The event brought in student bands from outside of campus, which were also a huge success. Lead singer of Mother Courage Oliver Kalb played to the audiences affection, pleading once the band had finished, “I’m not gonna tell you to go to our Myspace. I’m not gonna tell you to buy our C.D. But if you liked our music tonight, I am gonna ask you to march down to the Admissions office and request for Oliver Kalb, class of 2014.”

Oliver Kalb, lead singer of Brooklyn band, Mother Courage.

For Ben, the event was “exactly what the music scene at Vassar needs.” While he finds that the Mug can be too cramped and sweaty, and a large space like the Villard room or UpC can be awkward with too small a crowd, the Lathrop MPR was an ideal setting for a show of this size. Lathrop’s collaboration with Vassar bands The Facts and Figures and The Bathtub Sailors was what allowed this to happen.

Josslyn House seems to be following suit with their upcoming Joss Band Showcase. The showcase will feature Vassar bands The Seasons, Giant Man Band and Sir Saturn and the Neptones. Upon learning about the Joss event, Ricky says that he wished that all of the bands could be more unified. This is the purpose of Ben Conant and The Bathtub Sailors’ member Sam Carvaglia’s recent petition for a student band organization called the Vassar Student Bands Union. The purpose of which would be to “create more school unity, leading to better artistic endeavors,” as Ricky put it. “People don’t know what types of artists are out there, maybe we could all work together.”

Sam Carvaglia of The Bathtub Sailors.

Simply looking for ways to enhance the music scene at Vassar, Ben says that “creative thinking and innovation” is all that’s needed. It seems that in order to achieve goals of better performance and practice spaces, exposure to other student bands outside the “Vassar bubble” and integration of students from all different dorms, all that’s needed is a little more communication. As Ricky says, “ I’m all about collaboration, and it helps to be well-informed.” Conant and Carvaglia’s Vassar Student Bands Union would do just this.

Love Hurts and Joss’s Band Showcase are first but important steps in this process of collaboration, and Vassar students and music lovers will only continue to benefit from it.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, February 17th, 2010 at 9:52 pm and is filed under Events. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.