People at Dartmouth talk about bands as if they're as easy to find as a Good Sam call on Webster. Well, Programming Board simply doesn't have the power to choose a band at will and have them show up at Dartmouth for a concert. I wish it were that easy, but unfortunately it isn't.
In case you're not already aware, Third Eye Blind is coming to perform in Leverone Field House on May 6. And apparently, some members of the Dartmouth population aren't too happy about it. "you guys suck. do you have any taste in music? f*** PB. there's no way in hell I'm buying tickets to your god-awful concert," read a recent blitz that we received in the PB account. It's disappointing to see posters specifically aimed at criticizing the Programming Board and encouraging people to boycott the concert.
I think the student body needs to understand how the Programming Board works, so that maybe everyone will have a little more of an idea as to what goes into planning one of our concerts.
For starters, Programming Board is limited to bands that fall within our budget range -- approximately $40,000 for each of our two concerts. Our apologies if you'd love to see Dave Matthews come to Dartmouth, but chances are he's not even considering the college scene, and if he were, he would charge a few hundred thousand, minimum. I don't think people would be too thrilled about paying $100+ for a concert ticket.
Furthermore, the band has to be on tour. Prefer Weezer over Third Eye Blind? Sorry, Weezer isn't touring right now. And even if a group is on tour, they're not going to travel to Hanover unless they happen to be in the New England area -- yet again restricting our options.
And to make things even more difficult, Dartmouth has not been blessed with its own concert arena. If anyone would like to pony up the donation for it, let us know -- we'd be thrilled to have one. Therefore, we are at the mercy of the Athletics Department to give us one date -- scheduled around the numerous athletic demands on the facility -- for Leverone. And in this case, we didn't even receive our Leverone date until the last day of winter term, hardly giving us a great deal of time to book a band. The University of Vermont is having Ok Go come for a concert; some people said they'd rather have them instead of Third Eye Blind. But Ok Go wasn't available on May 6 -- they were already booked at UMass-Amherst by the time we knew our schedule.
Fortunately, even with all of these extenuating circumstances, PB was still presented with a list of possible concert options. The board itself or even just the six PB execs could have made a band choice on our own. But instead, we offered a survey via blitz to the entire undergraduate population to rank their band preferences, from 8 (highest preference) to 1 (lowest preference). PB doesn't operate in a bubble. It's our job to offer events that reflect the desires of the student body, and in this case, Dartmouth decided that they wanted Third Eye Blind, winning with 5646 points -- 639 points ahead of the runner up, Hot Hot Heat. Dartmouth spoke and PB listened -- so we booked Third Eye Blind.
Unfortunately, given that Dartmouth has 4400 undergraduates, we'll never be able to make everyone happy, but we do the best we can. Given that we had a rock/hip-hop concert in the fall with The Roots, we welcome the change in genre and think it will be appreciated by many students. And if you don't agree, PB is always open and willing to have new members and new opinions. Come to one of our meetings -- every Monday at 3 p.m. in Collis 101. We'd be thrilled to hear your input. Really. And you'll even get a nice snack to boot.
And finally, contrary to what the recent article in the D may have reported, we have already sold over 1300 tickets -- spot on for our expected target at this point. So stop by the Collis Info Desk, buy a ticket to the concert, and come join us on May 6. We'd love to have you. Seriously, what else are you going to do on a Sunday night?
