Do not forget that the Spring Concert is tonight at 9pm in Roone with Grizzly Bear and The National. And according to some guy with a microphone at last night’s Planet Earth screening, there are still tickets available!
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Bwog Staff on
Apr 21, 2008 
35 Comments
Do not forget that the Spring Concert is tonight at 9pm in Roone with Grizzly Bear and The National. And according to some guy with a microphone at last night’s Planet Earth screening, there are still tickets available!
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35 Comments
@i think that the low attendance and sold out tickets situ was due to the fact that the show was held on a Monday night and people with tickets went to Butler instead . Can’t you just see this scenario happen in Butler:
Student 1: I have SO much work that I can’t even go to the spring concert.
Student 2: Really? Man that sucks
As student 1 works “so hard” on facebook.
You missed a solid set by Grizzly Bear and while I’m not a fan, The National was good.
@stubhub “Student 1” is what happened with at least five people I know. If those kids with “SO much work” would rather spend another two hours checking facebook at Butler versus getting out and having fun with friends without even having to leave campus at the only spring show the university puts on each year, well, good for them.
I’ll never understand why it’s like pulling teeth to get people to do anything at this place. I first had the “oh no, papers!” thought too, but then realized I could just put in an extra hour or two today if I need to. Not that hard.
@lila ps. The whole turn out thing doesn’t make sense to me since the national easily sell out Terminal 5 (capacity 3K for 2 nights) or 5 nights at the bowery.
Seems a show at Columbia with them headlining would have drawn more?
Were people told it was sold out when it wasn’t? Was this just truly unpublicized?
Or do columbia kids really just not care about this music and miss the heydey of Wyclef Jean
(I certainly hope not)
@ugh I hate it when people throw around the whole “people don’t care about music” when they’re not interested in the indie band of the moment. Honestly, I thought the National were ok, but Grizzly Bear were boring as fuck.
@lila I thought both bands were pretty great. Having not heard of grizzly bear I actually came away liking them more than the national, although I liked the national.
FYI: that space sucks. The sound is not so hot. However, it only looked empty b/c they capped it off so early.
I had friends that wanted to come but were told couldn’t!?!?
That I don’t understand. I would guess 600 people, about same as BOWERY
As for nobody having “heard” of those bands, I later saw Grizzly Bear on conan and found out they were touring with radiohead.
Seems pretty well “known” to me.
Thanks to whomever put on the show, although I think that space should be avoided at all costs in the future.
@stubhub That’s fair. I don’t think most of the people at tonight’s show have bene to the Bowery either, let alone a concert, so it’s, so it’s nice to see kids exposed to new things. Since it looked 20% full, I’ll go so far as to suggest that maybe 200 people showed up. That’s still pretty bad.
What’s the booking agency that Columbia uses? I still find 20k on the very high for at least the first band that played a standard 40 minute opening set. I don’t know what The National are getting (and I really doubt “most people” have heard of them).
Nobody’s saying anything wrong with “local” being a bad thing. New York has a really vibrant scene right now, especially in Brooklyn. Where a band resides really doesn’t say anything about what they can charge.
@stubhub If the bands, both local, got roughly $20,000 each, Columbia got ripped off like never before. These bands, especially Grizzly Bear, aren’t close to pulling in anywhere near that.
Yes, I was there. For the sake of argument, the Bowery Ballroom fits 600 people. This showing wouldn’t have filled even half the floor of that venue. There were maybe ten rows of students toward the middle, a buffer, then chairs that they didn’t even bother to pull. The room fits far more than what turned out. If you looked at the balcony, also technically sold out, at least 80% of the seats were empty. I’m going to assume the percentages were similar for the floor. Seriously, it was a really bad showing. It’s what happens when you open a registration system to students only and let it fill up with the vast majority of students having no interest in coming to the event. That’s what happened here.
Again, why couldn’t this have been held outdoors at the steps on a nice Monday night?
@Sigh I’ve never been to Bowery Ballroom, but there were definitely more than 100 people there tonight. Also, why would the registration fill up if students were uninterested? In any case, it maxed out at 1000 registrations, which is more people than usually come to the Steps anyway.
The reason it was not held on the Steps this year was because holding it indoors saved $10,000 in staging costs.
And considering that Columbia uses one of the main booking agencies and always shops around for the best prices on any major purchasing agreement, I think you may not realize just how much a well-known artist costs. 20k is nothing for an event like this, as exorbitant as that may seem. For a band “most people” have heard of, you’re looking at six figures.
Also, you forget that “local” when you’re in New York City is not exactly a bad thing, either.
And #26, while it’s debatable whether having a concert is worth the money, the hundreds of people there would probably disagree with you. We all pay into the student life fees so that there will be events on campus, yet no one goes to all of them. Would you make the same argument about all the different culture shows?
@Nobody pays $40,000 for a culture show. Yet their attendance is much larger relative to the cost of staging such a show.
@Still in the know Were you actually there? The crowd may not have been full capacity, but it was pretty close. I’d say at least 600. And the bands got roughly 20k each, fyi.
@stubhub Right, but there’s no way that those bands tonight are bringing in $40,000, or anywhere close to it, especially for a 40 and 60 minute set.
[yes, i decided to go at the last minute — we’ll talk about how columbia concerts botched this royally in time, i’m sure — like how maybe 100 people showed up]
@Ffs Those bastards get $50,000 in student life fees and the best they can do is fucking grizzly bear. How many people on campus even know who that is? I defy you to find me the equivalent of $50,000 in SL fees in # of students. Incompetence.
@In the know After staging fees and various other expenses, there’s $40,000 tops for the artist. These two bands were not bad at all, considering that amount of money.
The concert budget works out to about $7 out of every undergraduate student’s annual student life fee. That’s not very much, less than 1% of what you pay. So, um, suck it?
@So, if 100 people showed up, those 100 people paid the equivalent of $400 in ticket prices, or – by your estimation of $7 per person – that $39,300 was paid by a disinterested student body for an event that did jack shit for the Columbia community. So, um, suck it?
@The Dink Some guy with a microphone??? THAT HERO WAS JEZZONIOUS REX, THE MAN WHO IS BACCHANAL AND MADE ALL OF THIS HAPPEN.
@Emcee THE DINK TELLS NO FIB
@stubhub i still have an extra if anyone’s stuck. i’m just north of campus if anyone wants it. looks like i’m going to have some friends with extras too.
@timing? show starts at 9 — I assume Grizzly Bear is opening? The National then goes on at what, 9:45, 10? Anyone have any insight?
@no... the reason there are tickets still available is because the main section sold out and the balcony was opened at the last minute
@random The reason there are still tickets available is because these bands aren’t of interest to the majority of the school.
@boo hoo it’s going to be a good show people should have an open mind
@nope doors open at 8, concert starts at 9
@dear bwog it’s at 8, not 9.
@pedant These formulations … they’re intolerable!
@where's where’s your phd.
@THE MIND DOCTOR Someone give this child some ritalin. Or quaaludes.
@please please don’t interrupt me. now where was i.
aaoiwro23u823yur9r823yuraiwefjalkafjsfasdf bllalrlgh.
@stubhub i have one floor ticket available to the show tonight. i’m willing to just give it away if anyone’s stuck (papers, papers, papers), but has anything been said about checking ids at the door since our names are on the tickets?
@lean to the right side the opposite way can work t oo.
@zoom into these give us enough time. world’s worst ever. lollercats stuff.
@danger danger awaits those who wait. lollercats LOLLLLLERCATS AND STUFF YAYYYY A LOT OF OVERLAPPING GRASS TO DOT ATH YOU JUST MAYA SUICIDE MAYA MODEL WON’T BEA BEL TO RENDER.
@a power ranger a power ranger is huge and sweet
@godzilla is huge and pretty sweet.
@godzilla, godzilla > grizzly bear
@YEAHHHH SO PSYCHED.
KREBS LEARN TO LOSE! ADAMES IS THE PRESIDENT OF CCSC. GIVE UP THE LIES, KREBS AND DIAMOND! RETURN…