At long last, the Student Association has announced the lineup for Spring Fling, and it’s eclectic as usual.
Bad Rabbits, a funky rock band from Boston, will open the concert, followed by rising-star rapper Sage the Gemini, who’s best known for his singles “Gas Pedal” and “Red Nose.” Mashup duo The White Panda will close the show.
Since the Student Association Programming Board (SAPB) started booking multiple artists for Spring Fling a few years ago, they’ve traditionally had one headliner who followed two smaller acts. This year, they’re presenting three acts of similar stature as co-headliners. Late Nite will also host a Battle of the Bands over several weeks, with the winner opening the concert at 7:30 p.m.
Vice President for Programming Stephanie Zagreda said the SAPB spent less on Spring Fling artists this year, but still remained within the range of what they’d typically spend on each act.
“We had a huge cutback this year, in artist costs in general — what we were going to spend on every artist for Spring Fling — just because we do want to work towards getting rid of our deficit,” Zagreda said. “That was one of the prime areas that’s easy to cut back for Spring Fling. It’s harder to cut for costs that you have to use the University, for using the fields and everything. But we still felt that the artists that we got were still going to bring the stage presence we wanted.”
If the Constitution that the Student Congress proposed Monday night is passed by a referendum, an additional $1.50 from each student will be allocated to the SAPB, which may be used to bid more competitively against other venues for the artists that the SAPB wants as its first choices.
“We get outbid by other schools,” Zagreda said. “Like, destroyed. There was a school in the south that outbid us by 30 grand.”
Because of construction by the Student Wing and Lecture Hall, the SAPB will hold the concert elsewhere. They haven’t settled on a location yet, but they’re considering two potential ones. One possibility is on the Peace Quad. The other is in front of the Old University Union — the band would be on the sidewalk, close to the building, and the audience on the hill leading up to College-in-the-Woods. Zagreda found the location feasible because there was already an established plan from previous years to provide accessibility for emergency personnel as well as reroute buses around the location. The SAPB also had to consider other factors, like the concert’s proximity to the festival, making sure not to pollute Vestal neighborhoods with noise and avoiding conflict with other events scheduled for May 2.
“When Spring Fling was founded, it started on the road,” Zagreda said. “It would be different, for sure. But it’s been done many times before, so we’re not logistically worried about anything.”
White Panda was one of the top choices in the electronic genre on the Spring Fling survey released earlier this year. Sage the Gemini wasn’t on the survey, but “he was one of the most recommended artists for this year, both in the fall survey and the spring survey,” Zagreda said.
Unlike last year, International Fest will not be held simultaneously with Spring Fling — it’s scheduled for April 19. Rides and carnival food stations will be set up by the Harpur Quad fountain, and student groups will table along the Spine, as usual.
Correction 4/14: A previous version of the article incorrectly stated that the SAPB would be hosting a Battle of the Bands event at Late Nite. Late Nite is hosting the event, which is not connected with the SAPB