Students wondering when the next big rock, rap or hip-hop concert will be held on the Cal State Long Beach campus may have to wait a while.
After the last big-name concert sponsored by Associated Students, Inc., the organization decided not to host any similar events unless it was fiscally responsible to do so.
Rapper Ludacris headlined the last concert in 2008. The event filled less than half of the seats in the Walter Pyramid and charged up to $45 for tickets. It also drew protesters offended by some of the rapper’s lyrics.
“There was a fairly good turnout, but it was not what the students were expecting or fully wanted in the sense that it was not sold-out,” said Associated Students, Inc. President James Ahumada. “Any concert we do should have the students’ backing and be worth the students’ money.”
Other major area universities routinely hosted big-name musicians. For example, University of California Irvine hosted Weezer this year at its Bren Events Center, while artists from Ella Fitzgerald to They Might Be Giants have performed over the years at University of California Los Angeles’s Royce Hall.
“Comparably, if you look at a school like UCI, they’re able to bring bigger artists in but don’t charge students [for tickets] because they have a larger fee that goes towards that,” Ahumada said. “We try to use our fees for services like childcare and recycling. That does kind of divert funds from a big concert, but in the end it’s better for students.”
CSULB students pay a $168 University Student Union fee and a $44 ASI fee per semester, totaling about $425 per academic year. According to the UCI web site, students there pay separate Associate Students, Bren Events Center, Student Center, Recreation Center and Campus Spirit Fees, totaling more than $600 per academic year.
ASI’s Chief Programming Officer Kimberly Helm said a big concert would not be the best use of student revenue, because ASI must balance a desire for students to have fun events on-campus with a need to provide student services that are more practical.
“Hopefully when we get more students on campus and more fees we can have that type of concert,” Helm said. “We’re trying to allocate our funds to things that are more connected.”
Helm said plans for the current semester include having a battle-of-the-bands contest, which will be open to student and local bands. the winner will play at the homecoming rally on Nov 10.
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