Students rock out at Battle of the Bands
Participants rocked out on guitar hero and bands rocked out for students.
April 8, 2008
Hardore rock band Let Lions performs their set at Mizzou After Dark’s Battle of the Bands on Friday in Memorial Union. The band, which is well known around Columbia and will be playing at The Blue Note later this month, won second place.
Senior Anthony 'Boston' Geary performs solo on the acoustic guitar and harmonica at Mizzou After Dark’s Battle of the Bands competition. Geary, who played his first-ever gig, won third place in the contest.
Wayfare closes out Mizzou After Dark’s Battle of the Bands with an eclectic and diverse set, using several unconventional instruments such as the accordion, ukulele, lute, trumpet and stand-up bass. The band won first place in the competition.
Memorial Union was transformed Friday night into a place of music madness. People scrambled around to eat pizza, got temporary airbrush tattoos, pretended to be rock stars, jammed out on Guitar Hero and Rock Band and made music videos in front of a green screen to some of their favorite songs. But all of these music-themed activities were just back up acts to the main event: a battle of the bands.
Five groups of students came together, including competition winner Way Fare, to show off their musical chops and whipped out their instruments and stage charm to battle it onstage at Mizzou After Dark and the College Music Committee’s Battle of the Bands.
Some of the bands were typical pop-punk while others were just a guy with his guitar and harmonica. Some were the screaming type that sounded as though some vocal chords had to have been torn to produce such angsty roars, and a set of strings and trumpets accompanied one group.
With such a variety of music, everyone in the bands seemed to have a fun time being in the limelight, and the audience members, which included everyone from the acoustic singer/songwriter type to others with dark side-swept bangs, tight pants and real tattoos, seemed to enjoy a night of free music and fun.
The first band to take the stage in the room that had been decorated to look like a real concert venue was Breakdown. Perhaps the most surprising part about this group was that the bassist was a blonde, flirtatious female holding her own among the rest of her male band.
“It was awesome to see a girl up there,” senior Amie Norton said. “That doesn’t happen a lot.”
The girl rocker, Becky Keller, who graduated from MU last year and is getting ready to take the MCAT, isn’t intimidated by being the only member without a Y-chromosome.
“It’s cool, and the guys take good care of me,” Keller said. “Being a girl in the band is something we need more of. Girls are just as talented as guys and I’d love to see more of us out there.”
Keller loves being onstage and has been performing with her brother, who is the band’s lead singer, ever since she was little.
“But now we’re getting serious,” she said. “We have shows in St. Louis and are serious about performing every weekend, instead of making this just a hobby.”
It seems that the audience was able to pick up on their love of music, too.
“I thought they were good, not my style, but I thought they were good musicians,” said freshman John Hash, who listened while waiting for his friend’s band to take the stage. “They won me over.”
The next band to take the stage was The Carrington Year. The singer was dressed very casually in a pair of green gym shorts and a thin white t-shirt.
The band’s bassist, freshman Jason Koch, enjoyed being on stage and said it wasn’t a new experience for the band.
“I’ve been in a band since I was 13, so being onstage feels like being home,” Koch said. “It’s very comfortable. Seeing people groove to your music is wonderful.”
He said that he used to get nervous when he was in front of a crowd, but not anymore.
“Now it’s pretty exciting,” Koch said. “I hope that people like it. We play and write music that we enjoy.”
Despite dropping his pick and having his hand cramp up, he feels that they put on a great show. They wouldn’t have even been able to be in the battle had one of the members not seen a random flier for the event.
“It’s nice to get music on campus,” Koch said. “We play St. Louis shows, so it’s nice to get our vibes around college.”
The next act to show off his skills was senior Anthony Geary, who goes by the name Boston Geary. He sat all by his lonesome on the stage with nothing but his guitar in his hands, a harmonica in his teeth and a bottle of water at his feet. He played mellow songs with lines such as “’Love me tender’ Elvis said, but you can kiss me hard and put me to bed,” that entranced the sitting crowd. He seemed to enjoy interacting with the crowd and would segue from tune to tune by providing little one-liners such as one about a certain mythical creature.
“This song’s about a dragon,” Geary said. “He’s kind of like Puff the Magic Dragon, except he doesn’t get high all the time.”
Geary said the inspiration for his music style is Bob Dylan (though he feels that he’s nothing compared to the legend), but he felt his performance wasn’t bad.
“I thought it went well,” Geary said. “I did the best I could. Sometimes the crowd likes it and sometimes it doesn’t. Music is relative.”
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