News
March 31
There are only a few Tufts traditions that bring thousands of Jumbos together to simply have a good time. There's that one in the fall with the football game. There's that one in the winter with the running and the nakedness. And then perhaps, the most highly attended of them all, is that Fling thing in the spring.This Saturday, a number of attractions - the music, the food, the camaraderie of one's peers, and the opportunity for daytime public drunkenness - will draw students, many desperate for stress-relief, to the President's lawn. Spring Fling happens every year, and inevitably the throngs arrive, most eager, many inebriated. Will they leave in such good spirits? The answer seems unclear with the event yet to occur. But many - the Daily included - have elected over past weeks to offer a prediction. Some foresee the greatest Fling ever, others fear disaster, and most are unsure. Mobb Deep, Toots and the Maytals, and moe. have their work cut out for them. Every year the skepticism and questioning encouraged and fostered as a positive approach to education in such enlightened institutions of higher learning as Tufts, works its way into our extra-curricular evaluation of Concert Board. But isn't that the way it should be? Concert Board, the student organization that plans and produces this and most other campus concerts, has not only the third largest individual budget among TCU funded student organizations, but also the implied obligation to produce a successful one-day music festival attended by a majority of the undergraduate student body, each member of which demands an entertaining show and a memorable experience .But few outside the organization know exactly how the bands were chosen and signed to perform. Two chairpersons, seniors Aaron Wright and Christian Trentacosta, have led the organization this year, with an executive board that includes a handful of Board veterans. Between 15 and 30 Concert Board members attend weekly meetings to plan the shows, organize publicity, and choose the performers. So how did it work this year...? The Daily sat down last week to chat with chairmen Wright and Trentacosta.According to Wright, prior to one of the last meetings of the fall semester and over the New Year break, the executive board researched available bands on the website of their agent Howie Cusack and a number of his competitors. They brought a number of options to the entire Board. Why didn't they start earlier? According to Wright and Trentacosta, few bands are willing to book that far in advance. Train and the Goo Goo Dolls were evidently the only ones available, each asking $50,000 - a price tag too dear for Concert Board's budget.Come January, Gangstar, moe., Bruce Hornsby, and Less Than Jake were among the performers that made the first cut. Then just before they settled on a band on which to bid, Wright discovered that the Strokes, a quickly rising New York rock and roll outfit, were available and originally quoted at $30,000 dollars, a reasonable price for Fling standards. The group plans on spending approximately $65,000 overall for talent each year. But upon placing that bid, they were surprised to realize the asking price had suddenly jumped to $60,000, eliciting an immediate rejection from a Board charged with hiring three bands with an already strained budget.Based on votes from all of the Board's members, they went with moe. and got the often lengthy bid and signing process rolling: Both Wright and Student Activities Assistant Director Ed Cabellon placed a request for a bid with Cusack, the man behind Pretty Polly Productions, the Univeristy's agent for over two decades. Cusack communicates with the band's agent and negotiates a contract that includes everything from payment to the number of fruit platters in the dressing room. Not until the contract is signed by both the performer and the university is it official.With moe. in the works, it was time to fill out the rest of the show's play card. They set off with two caveats in mind: a hip hop act is almost always present at Fling, and this year Board members wanted to bring a heavier harder rocking band, a sort of reaction to the lighter fare of the fall show, Billy Joel, and the fact that a jam band was almost set to open. And with the realization that the more expensive big name bands were failing to come through, a proposed four-band set came to the front. "We started tooling around with the four band idea." Wright said, "Our ideal was Gang Starr slash moe. as sort of joint headliners. Then Less Than Jake or maybe Buck Cherry, Goldfinger or another punk or hard rock band... that was our vision.""We were excited because 4 bands had never been done before," Trentacosta said.So they set off to make it happen. At the same time Cusack informed the Board that Wyclef Jean may have become available at the last minute because Middlebury College, which had originally set the high bid for that artist, had failed to make the proper preparations and lost him. According to Wright, Cusack, who also represents Middlebury, seemingly put other Tufts bidding activity on hold while trying to iron out the Wyclef situation. When the opportunity to bring Wyclef Jean was broached to the entire Board, they ultimately vetoed it in a close vote, favoring other options that promised in Board members eyes better music and a better show. Shortly thereafter, Talib Kweli and Gang Starr were selected by the Board as preferred rap options. But when Wright went to Cusack to request they place a bid, he learned the bands were no longer available."Howie said 'they're all taken'" Wright continued, "And I said, 'Oh...you should have told me that last week.' That should have been brought to our attention." With that, the Board learned of a huge rap summit in California that had been set to take place that weekend, suddenly limiting Tufts' options. They returned to the group members with a weaker set of options and settled ultimately on Mobb Deep.At the same time the Board decided to go ahead with ska-punksters Goldfinger. Wright told Cusack and Cabellon to go for it and Cabellon sent in the fax. But confusion arose and Cusack said he never received the bid. "I thought it was clear, but the way it went was a miscommunication," Wright said. "If only we had all voted on Tantric," Trenatcosta added with a laugh, citing the hardcore act as the ideal solution to problem.Was this just an isolated incident, a one-time mishap?Those who have been around for some time cite Cusack's reliability and positive work with the University for nearly two decades. Some find it difficult to hold one quasi-error in judgement against him. Still, others refuse to even call it that. Cabellon offered another interpretation:"I don't know if I agree with that. Howie has to deal with 20 schools, he's given Tufts twenty years of service," Cabellon suggested adding that if things didn't work out as well this semester as they did say last semester or in past years it was due in fact to a convergence of factors and not one single mistake. "It was off-timing and we missed out. Do the students have a legitimate gripe? Absolutely," Cabellon said. "But everyone did the best possible job they could with what they had," he continued, considering not what the Board missed, but what they hit. "There's such potential. This show's going to touch a lot of different types of people. It's going to draw a diverse crowd."With spring break quickly approaching and the third band far from decided, Concert Board had little choice but to return to the traditional three-band set up and find the final act as soon as possible. With time quickly running out, the exec board brought a final list of options to the group which included the Samples, Wilco, and the reggae forefathers Toots and the Maytals, who were eventually chosen and in due time signed to perform.The final lineup - moe., Mob Deep, and Toots - left Wright and Trentacosta initially disenchanted. "I am disappointed," Wright said. "I was not happy with past Spring Flings and looking back on past years it seemed like some of the leaders didn't know at all what they wanted. Christian and I had the vision and the ideas and it still didn't work out. We did our best."Trentacosta agreed. "You just have to expect things to wrong sometimes. That's normal. But it doesn't get me depressed. It's gonna be fun. We're gonna have cool T-shirts," he said, alluding to the sea camouflage-colored tops all Board members will wear Saturday.Wright, who works primarily on the logistics of signing bands, turned with an apologetic glance to Trentacosta, who coordinates the production aspects of the concerts: "I feel bad," he said. "I committed to Christian. I promised him we'd have a hard rock act and it didn't happen. I didn't deliver. I'm really sorry.""I thoroughly forgive Aaron," Trentacosta announced aloud to the large empty room in which the three of us sat, as if proclaiming it to the world. With this, their comments volley back and forth. They play off each other, kidding and teasing, as if they were brothers."I'm looking forward to the concert, to seeing moe. I know in my heart they're not a headlining band but I'm excited to see them," Wright said. "You're too hard on yourself Aaron. You really are. You're too damned hard on yourself."Trentacosta shook his head."I can't help it that's what pushes me to the next level," Wright answered smirking, half-serious, half in jest."Aaron doesn't sleep either. That's another thing."Wright brings us back to a discussion of the bands: "But really, it's the first time we've had a jam band.""And the first reggae act ever in Fling history," Trenatcosta added.Just days before the big fest, the focus of six months work, both Wright and Trentacosta remain optimistic, and continue to lead both Board meetings and this chat with nervous smiling cheer. "And I have one thing to say," Trentacosta offered as both an apparent response to critics and a reassurance to himself, "to anybody who has a problem. If your tastes aren't represented by Concert Board, here's an idea: join Concert Board."
