Students Brave Rain for Third Eye Blind Concert

As the occasional beach ball, water balloon, and crowd-surfer passed overhead, undergrads in plastic ponchoes sang and danced Saturday in a muddy Tercentenary Theater to ’90s hits such as “Semi-Charmed Life” and “How’s It Going to Be.”

The College’s second annual Yardfest—featuring tire swings, game rings, and headline band Third Eye Blind—drew 1,500 to 2,000 students, according to organizers, a far cry from last year’s estimate of 7,000.

According to S. Adam Goldenberg ’08, chair of the College Events Board (CEB), the decreased attendance from last year could be attributed in large part to the weather.

“Plain and simple, last year was a beautiful sunny day,” said Goldenberg, who is also a Crimson editorial editor. “We still had almost 2,000 people at Yardfest [this year], which we’re thrilled with.”

To prepare for the rain, the event coordinators moved the cookout food to dining halls and provided students ponchos. Students who attended the event had mixed feelings about the weather.

“It would have been nice if it hadn’t been wet, but the mud was fun,” Michael B. Kaehler ’10 said.

Lead singer Stephan Jenkins joked with the crowd about the weather as well as his not getting into Harvard in the ’80s.

While some of the jokes and songs received a lukewarm reception, the audience erupted with enthusiasm when the band started to play their final song, “Semi-Charmed Life,” prompting the band to return for a three-song encore.

“It seemed like a small crowd, but it didn’t seem to bother the band,” Steve J. Fiascone ’08 said.

Fiascone said that he spent all day Saturday listening to Third Eye Blind albums on repeat and calling all his friends from high school to tell them about the performance.

“They’re all really jealous,” he said.

But not all students shared Fiascone’s enthusiasm. “It was decent,” Ashley M. Grand ’10 said. “It wasn’t necessarily to my taste.”

The event was organized through a combined effort of the newly created CEB and the Harvard Concert Commission (HCC).

CEB took care of the games and food, while HCC was in charge of all things related to the concert and its production, said HCC Director D. Zak Tanjeloff ’08. Funding for the event came from $200,000 allocated for student life by Dean of the College Benedict H. Gross ’71.

To raise spirit prior to the event, the CEB-sponsored “Pimp your Stein Club” events in each of the Houses since spring break, where students were able to win passes to meet Third Eye Blind band members after the show, said CEB Yardfest Coordinator Neesha M. Rao ’08.

Third Eye Blind is performing at three other Ivy League schools this spring: Dartmouth, the University of Pennsylvania, and Princeton. Only Harvard’s event is free for all undergraduates.

In a pre-show interview, Jenkins said he enjoyed playing at colleges because the age group understands the band’s lyrics.

Jenkins mused about everything from the state of his band to American politics, his speech peppered with profanity and words like “dude,” “rad,” and “lame,” belying his longtime California residence.

“We’re a kind of quirky, lyrics-based band...that happens to have catchy tunes,” Jenkins said.

Fiddling with the sports-cap of his Poland Springs water bottle, Jenkins added that he never expected “Semi-Charmed Life” to be played on the radio, considering that it talked “about methamphetamine and fellatio.”

“Our lyrics aren’t any more racy than your average Kurt Vonnegut novel,” he offered.

As for the band’s lack of activity since the release of its third album in 2003, Jenkins explained that he had felt unable to produce anything for awhile.

“I felt lyrically blocked,” he said. “I think there are times in your life when you’re taking in, times when you’re putting out, and I’ve been in listening mode.”

—Staff writer Aditi Balakrishna can be reached at balakris@fas.harvard.edu.