LAUREN CARR, VICTORIA HERNANDEZ AND DANIEL MOLINA
A&E EDITOR AND STAFF WRITERS
Their voices may have been the soundtrack of your summer or maybe even your ringtone in the late 2000’s. The punk rock band, Boys Like Girls, hit it big in 2007 and had songs that anyone from this generation can sing from memory. That was proven on Aug. 30th when the band headlined Quadstock and took to the steps of the quad to perform their biggest hits.
Martin Johnson, the lead singer, and Paul DiGiovanni, the lead guitarist, were the only two from the band that performed at the afternoon acoustic set. This was the second concert that the band has put on in the past year and a half.
“We’ve been just hanging and chilling in LA for the past few years,” Johnson said. “Everyone has been working on writing or producing and working with other artists. There really has not been a lot of touring the past few years so we are really excited to be playing here.”
While the band has been a part of big tours such as Warped Tour and have toured with artists such as Good Charlotte, Cobra Starship, Avril Lavigne and Metro Station, they are currently flying solo and taking new opportunities as they come.
Not touring and performing regularly showed during their set because in the middle of one of their songs Johnson forgot the words and had to ask the crowd to help him out. He then openly confessed that his memory is a little dim.
“I had three words to sing,” Johnson said during their set, “and I messed up two of them.”
That was not the only time he seemed to forget the words to songs that made them famous. Again in the middle of a song Johnson looked out to the crowd and confessed, “I forgot how to play this part, lets just skip it.”
The band seemed anything but completely polished and prepared, but that did not bother the crowd of students that have listened to them since their early days.
”Ive been a fan of Boys Like Girls since the 8th grade so I really enjoyed the concert,” senior Marco Zefi said.
“The show was really nice,” senior Marylise Uwabideli said. “It was a really relaxed vibe and it was so nice to be out with my friends. It was a lot better than Jasper Days.”
During their 11 song set, the two also played famous songs such as “The Great Escape,” “Love Drunk” and “Hero/Heroine.”
The band used the small venue to really talk and connect with the audience that had gathered on the quad. During one of their songs, “Two Is Better Than One,” Johnson called on a lucky freshmen named Antigone Thanasias to come up on stage and sing Taylor Swift’s part of the song after she was screaming to get their attention in the crowd.
“When I was younger that was one of my favorite songs,” Thanasias said. “So when I heard they were coming I knew that I just wanted to see them somehow. I just wanted a picture or something. I just had this impulse to scream out and it worked! The show was unreal.”
Student reactions showed just how successful this years Quadstock was. It allowed for them to have more interaction with the band and for the band to talk back to them as if they were a couple of friends hanging out on a sunny afternoon.
“The thing I love about college shows is that you get treated good,” Johnson said. “People are super psyched that you’re there and people put a lot of effort into your set. When it comes to a club or a venue you get some salty old dude rather than people who have a personality and have a passion for the projects that you put together.”
Fans of Boys Like Girls have nothing to look forward to in the future however. The band has no plans of a new album or going on tour. For now they will continue to, “hang” and “chill” in LA and hopefully brush up on some songs. Until further notice, you can listen to all of their songs on iTunes or Spotify to relive the glory days that were your youth.
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