Student bands battle it out at the Street

The Street was overtaken by an assortment of live music Saturday night, not just the typical DJ Bob variety, as seven student bands took to the clubs. While the Holy Smokes jammed at Charter most notably with a floor-rocking rendition of Bon Jovi's "Livin' on a Prayer," Tower was co-host along with the Alcohol Initiative to the other six for its Battle of the Bands event.

Tower went off-tap in order to host the event, in accordance with the Alcohol Initiative regulations. To attract students to the event, the club served pizza, soda and cookies throughout the night.

"It was great for local artists to come together and support each other as well as support the alcohol initiative," said Matt Nickoloff '04, lead singer of Fabled and Tower's Vice President.

The first shots of the Battle were fired by Fabled, who played a short set of acoustic songs before their headlining show at the Cottage Club for the rest of the night. They played five songs, employing acoustic guitars, bass, a mandolin, a djembe drum and a full drum set. For the Battle of the Bands, they played only original music, but their performance at Cottage consisted of a mix of their own songs and covers. Even though Fabled started playing at ten o'clock, a substantial crowd attended their performance.

Fabled was followed by the two bands, Unsent Letters and Theory of Raquetball, which both consist of students from the Princeton Theological Seminary. "I think it was really cool that there were other bands there from the community at large," Nickoloff said. "It's good to showcase a diversity of talent that might not otherwise be shown on this campus."

Corporate Hangover and Topshelf, two University bands, followed suit. Though by the time Topshelf played — past two a.m. — fans were still excited to dance and sing along. Matt Losch '05 was impressed with the crowd's support. "There were a lot of people out listening," he said. "The event was really great."

Concluding the event was Dan Semaya '04, who played guitar and sang. "It was a great idea for Tower to involve the Alcohol Initiative so that they could afford to bring in great professional equipment allowing all of the bands performing to perform at their best," Semaya said.

The bands covered a wide variety of popular songs over the course of the night, ranging from Jimi Hendrix to Maroon 5 to the Beastie Boys.

Cullen Newton '04, the President of Tower, said, "It was a lot of different music, a very diverse group. Good times all around." Connor Allman '04, the club's Social Chair, agreed that "the club was really excited to host the event, and we hope that it continues next year."

In the end, the Battle produced no official winner. Allman explained, "it was too hard to work out the logistics of voting, with people coming and leaving all night. It ended up being more of a showcase."

The Battle of the Bands event competed for students' time with Fabled's following show at Cottage, and the Holy Smokes' well-publicized performance at Charter.

"The Battle of the Bands was a great opportunity to show the range of our music, and we really enjoyed that," Dan Siegfried '05, the drummer for Fabled, said. "At the same time, our set there wasn't as exciting as our show at Cottage later on that night."

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He attributed the difference to the two different crowds, saying "much more energy came through at Cottage when we played electric. It was sweet to get the two extremes in the same night. Both shows were fun, but in different ways."

The Holy Smokes have consistently filled eating clubs with students eager for their performances, which consist of covers of well-known songs. "They were great. They always put on a good show — everyone loves their music, Lauren Nichols '04 said. "The crowd was into it."

"The best was when they played Rage Against the Machine's 'Killing in the Name of,'" Josh Huang '04 added, "because my swimmer buddies were there and we were jumping up and down like crazy. It was packed and I think people were even bodysurfing."