The 69th Semiannual Orgo Night
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| - An eager crowd awaits the band’s entrance |
If you missed Orgo Night, fret not – the show was recorded and will be available tomorrow on CUMB’s blog. Now, the Bwog review:
After entering to the usual “Roar Lion Roar,” the Columbia University Marching Band noted that, due to the recession, this year’s show would be sponsored by the Columbia University Show. “We also thank the Varsity Show,” a band member opined, “for lowering expectations for the past 35 years.” As the Hillel-distributed stress balls flew in the air over the spectators (one eventually landing in a tuba sousaphone), many were still looking for seats, but the band told them not to worry: “if you can’t hear the jokes, there’ll be plenty seats open by intermission.”
Thus began one of the best Orgo Nights in recent memory, though, in typical marching band fashion, some of the jokes skirted the edge of tastefulness. Surprisingly, the end of the election and the departure did not dampen the band’s taste for political humor- the first two segments focused on Ann Coulter (simply described as “fucking crazy” and Fox News respectively (with “Beat It” and “More Than A Feeling” mixed in), and mostly had fun at “Coultergeist’s” expense, including asking “If she thinks kindergartners are being taught fisting in kindergarten, what are they being taught in high school?
But the satire soon returned home, with bits on the “fun recession,” new Dean Moody-Adams’s secret plan to make Columbia more like Cornell, and a well-received, epic narrative of the band being dragged home by “The Diana.” Jokes included Dean Cristen Scully-Kromm and her “eight hairy legs,” a scuffle at the Winter Formal coat check over people attempting to “smuggle out fun in their pockets,” and “The Diana” being described as “every Barnard girl: she was tall and short, slutty and a lesbian, fat and anorexic.” Appropriately the tale of hooking up with the Diana ended with a spirited rendition of “Love Shack.” The Cornell segment was perhaps the edgiest section, though, as jokes included “Columbia’s new mascot – the Suicide Lion,” and the building of a gorge on 116th Street where students can express their frustration and despair “the Cornell war: headfirst.”
The performance closed with a combination of the political and educational spheres, as the Marching Band took on Hillary Clinton, Barack Hussein Obama, and Eric Holder. Holder got the lightest treatment, his experience in Columbia College, Columbia Law, and the Board of Trustees making him “the only person Bollinger follows on Twitter.” Clinton became fodder for another Barnard joke, as the band expressed surprise that Clinton would return twice in a year when “Barnard girls don’t know how to make a relationship last more than three months.”
It was Obama, though, that led to a surprise, as the band announced that “Barack Hussein Obama, honorary member of the marching band, will be delivering the commencement address…in your fucking dreams.” Continuing to draw inspiration from that beloved alum, the band continued “we are not a liberal Columbia, we are not a conservative Columba, we’re just a mostly liberal Columbia” and, to even more applause, “we are not a white Columbia, a black Columbia, a Hispanic Columbia, or an Asian Columbia – we’re a mostly Jewish Columbia!”
With that, and a playing of “Jerk It Out,” the band departed, but not before one final Orgo-inspired shot: “a long chain of molecules is called a polymer, and a long chain of the same joke over and over again is the Varsity Show.” A final ovation followed, and, in Bwog’s opinion, the band deserved it all.
- JCD
Tags: ann coulter, barack obama, barnard jokes, fox news, hillary clinton, hillel, mma, orgo night, the diana, things that rock, we're still calling it the vag
7 May 2009 @ 10:42 PM · 31 comments
bravo cumb bravo
best one yet!
will graduate with cumb laude
If can’t think of the answer to a multiple choice question, just go with C. And if you can’t think of the punchline to an Orgo Night joke, just go with Barnard.
an amazing Orgo Night.
I wasn’t there, and I don’t think I get the Varsity Show joke… sorry to be obtuse but can someone explain it?
The Varsity Show was like one clown getting out of a gigantic limousine. Too long and totally the opposite of what’s funny.
last semester’s. i actually felt bored at some points.
i thought the very best i had seen was spring 07, though.
This one was MUCH better, minus the suicide jokes which were a bit untasteful given this semester’s events.
No matter where you sit, you won’t hear ANY jokes…
The Varsity Show had six months. The Band had…three weeks?
And yet Orgo Night was better. Way to win, Band, way to win.
easily the best one i’ve been too in 3 years at columbia. great job everybody! also, some props to hillel for bringing the stress balls, which added some amusement
The ball landed in a sousaphone, not a tuba.
Those were tubas. A sousaphone is a type of tuba. Next time you try to be an ass, try to get your facts right.
whatever, fucker.
Random ass people just came around. And essentially told me to go to bed. And gave away Jolly Ranchers. As if I’m not delirious enough already?
Orgo was a blast, last semester was better.
anyone know if the KFC on 109th is honoring the Oprah Winfrey coupons?
and not as of yesterday (they’re a ‘franchised’ location)
INTERVIEW WITH DR. ZIZMOR!!!
http://gothamist.com/2009/05/08/dr_z.php
doc is a total quack?
Dr. Zits-more!
Any video?
band didn’t say ‘Hispanic,’ said ‘Latino’
and typo up top– the cornell way–not the cornell war: headfirst…
which I thought was the only really tasteless comment.
otherwise, job well done.
I think I was there at the first…or it might have been the zeroth.
The idea that it has become an event worthy of a Wikipedia entry is pretty amazing! Long live intelligent, abjectly sophmoric, patently offensive humor!!!!
G(TB ** 2)!
orgo nite last nite was OK, agreed that last semester’s was better. i just listened to it and while the subjects of the jokes-basically barnard, recession, obama-were the same, the ones in the fall were much better. guess it was a quiet semester here at CU.
i hope those CUMB freshmen and sophomores failed their lit hum and cc exams for how bad they sing
theres a reason theyre in a band and not a choir
but just watched it online http://vimeo.com/album/90634/page:2 (nicely broken down by jokes & songs so those who are cramming can skip easily)
very funny and relevant. watching this and the camaraderie in Butler makes me proud to go to this school, even with all its craziness.
congratulations to everyone in the band – you guys are fucking awesome.
We’re glad you liked it! Here’s a better way to watch it, though: http://blog.cumb.org/post/105146542.
thanks for posting the video…couldn’t make it to orgo night but it was hillarious. the description of the barnard girl as a “fat but anorexic, jap from nj and long island…etc” was dead on. and the fox news bit was hilarious, the glen beck remakrs and saying columbia’s colors suggesting “that we are pussies”…haha well done cumb.
CUMB all the way
was so freaking awesome. i just watched the whole thing again on blog.cumb.org and oh man im so proud to be a columbian.
I’m watching the videos now and totally regretting not having gone. ORGO NIGHT WAS AMAZING. great jokes, fucking beautiful.