It looks like this year’s Pandamonium has finally broken Carleton’s musical curse.
k-os hardly “rocked the vote” when only a hundred or so turned out for his DJ set in October. Down With Webster’s concert faired a bit better but it still wasn’t up to par with previous frosh week concerts. And last year’s Pandamonium headliner, Travie McCoy, dropped out of the show and tickets were given out for free.
Thankfully, this year’s Pandamonium was a complete 180. As an official Juno event, nominees the Arkells, Classified and Lights played the year-end concert. Each of them could have headlined their respective concerts.
So, how did the Carleton University Students’ Association (CUSA) manage to secure all these artists? Perhaps because it was done in partnership with not only the University of Ottawa and Algonquin College, but also the Junos.
Partnerships seem to force the CUSA to be more organized which allows them to secure better artists. Pandamonium became a Juno event accidentally. Vice president (student life) David Tapiero said he didn’t even know the Junos were happening in Ottawa until he was approached to host a student event in collaboration.
Opportunities like these won’t always fall into organizers’ laps. CUSA should look at forging more partnerships with organizations for all major events. This year, advertising was done well in advance, ticket prices were reasonable and Tapiero secured a great venue and headliners.
No matter which way students look at it, it took a lot more than luck for this to happen. Incoming vice-president (student life) Tomisin Olawale should make sure he learns from his predecessors’ mistakes so he can keep the curse at bay.
