University Union Concerts Board ended its year of programming on a high note with a nearly sold-out Snoop Dogg concert May 1.

With little more than one week to advertise the Block Party concert, UU sold about 5,000 of the 7,000 tickets. Though the crowd didn’t fill the house, UU Concerts co-chair Sherlen Archibald felt the concert was a success.

‘For a week, to have half the campus out is unbelievable,’ he said. Reviews have been positive, and the concert was the best he had ever been to, he added.

UU will absorb the costs of the unsold tickets, but the financial burden is minimal since 80 percent of the tickets were sold, Archibald said.

Snoop performed May 1 after Harvard University backed out of a concert for the same day, citing financial difficulties stemming from the need to increase security. Harvard students were concerned about protests over Snoop’s misogynistic lyrics.

No one protested Snoop’s SU performance, but the performer pulled girls from the audience to dance with him and played pornography on the big screen behind the stage – very ‘typical Snoop Dogg,’ Archibald said.

Archibald graduates Sunday with a major in music industry, leaving a solo Adam Gorode, the current concerts co-chair, to man the helm for next year.

Gorode is currently working on planning Juice Jam 2005. Seventy student organizations are signed up to participate in the festival. Despite interning at New York City’s Cornerstone Promotion and Sony BMG Music Entertainment, Gorode will spend his summer setting up the rest of the concert, and will begin sending bids out in the next two weeks.

This year, UU Concerts brought 30 artists to 14 concerts. Gorode’s plans for the next year of concerts include using the Dome on a regular basis and expanding into off-campus venues, such as the Landmark Theatre, he said.

In addition, Gorode will begin to look for and train the next students to run the board.

‘Sherlen (Archibald) and I kind of grew up with the program together,’ he said. The two, along with Josh Roth, founded Bandersnatch, which brings up-and-coming indie artists to campus, two years ago.

Freshmen Sterling Proffer and Andrew Harding and sophomores Emi Horikawa and Ryan Raichilson were chosen as co-chairs for Bandersnatch.

‘They’re going to be handed $20,000 to work with, and that’s a lot (of responsibility),’ Gorode said.

Now the four have the chance to shape Bandersnatch for years to come, said Proffer, who hopes to increase student involvement and awareness of the organization.

‘We want to bring bands that usually kids wouldn’t get to hear,’ Proffer said. ‘A forum for new emerging artists who can come as they’re developing and maybe one day they can return as UU artists.’

Proffer hopes to create a unique identity for Bandersnatch as the place where students can get a first look at next year’s The Strokes or My Chemical Romance.

‘We want to create the mentality of ‘come and see these artists in an intimate venue before you have to pay $40 to see them in some huge arena.”

Published on May 17, 2005 at 12:00 pm