Well, the results are in. Spring Fling’s May 7 musical lineup has been announced, to the usual chorus of disappointed moans and excited exclamations of glee. This year, we have a tri-genre ensemble of clashing but potentially fun sounds. We have a few suggestions for the show but first, of course, the acts.
Super Mash Bros. tests the boundaries of intellectual copyright laws from its very name down to the music it plays. Seemingly an homage to last year’s Spring Fling headliner’s success, the act is in the same musical family as Girl Talk — they mix and mash other artists’ tracks in a similar fashion. If the Super Mash Bros. manage to be half as fun as last year — and we enthusiastically endorse an encore of the toilet paper cannon things — then we think they were a good booking (See Page 1).
Far East Movement, of “Like A G6” ubiquitous fame, is a somewhat riskier play. Sure “G6” will be five minutes of lyric-screaming excess, but this Movement is still essentially a one-trick pony. To the masses anyway. For those who are part of the “movement,” we’re sure this is a big deal.
Taking Back Sunday, despite its Christian Rock-edged band name, is an emo band you may remember from middle school. One of its albums apparently peaked at the No. 2 spot on the Billboard Top 100 back in 2006.
Our thoughts? This year’s lineup starts with the same foundation as last year — again, Super Mash Bros. and Girl Talk are more or less interchangeable — but has one-hit wonder and punk rock multipliers. So, if done right, this is certainly an improvement. And remember, we already saw Drake this year.
We know it’s tough to convince anybody to come to Binghamton, we know the Student Association Programming Board loses years of their lives booking Spring Fling and we know it’s obviously impossible to make everybody happy.
So all things considered, we can’t complain. (Lifehouse is not coming. Repeat: Lifehouse is not coming.)
Interestingly, the order of the acts has not been finalized. This pending decision is absolutely critical — because of the jarringly eclectic nature of this odd trio, the order will make or break this year’s concert.
Taking Back Sunday needs to go first, plain and simple. It plays to a much more niche market than its Spring Fling musicians-in-arms, and it’s better to get nostalgia (even if it’s fast-paced, potentially head-banging nostalgia) out of the way from the start.
It would be a serious mistake to put Taking Back Sunday between the other two acts, who both have similarly clubby sounds. And to put the emo, pre-teen melodrama at the tail end of an electronically infused, thousands-strong dance party would be simply strange.
Next, we’d go with Far East Movement. Ideally, they would warm up the shifting crowd, as Taking Back Sunday’s moshing masses make way for a more mainstream — and apparently Asian — mix of concert-goers. Hopefully, Far East Movement would have a surprising number of great songs we had not previously heard of, but “G6” would be an appropriately climactic serving of icing on an electro-pop cake.
Super Mash Bros. would then follow and anchor the show, ideally entering as it live-mixes Far East Movement’s trump song into its own set.
It’s still no Jay-Z, but for a free concert we’ll certainly take it.