Apache Dropout performs at annual music festival

The sound of live music echoed throughout campus Saturday.

WIUX and Business Careers in Entertainment Club combined to host the annual Culture Shock Music Festival. 

Jen Samson is one of the student organizers of the festival. She was happy with this year’s turnout, she said, because usually a downpour of rain has stifled the event in the past.

“It’s been really great seeing everybody come out here,” she said. “It hasn’t been a more perfect day.”

Saturday, direct sunlight beamed onto the ground, and combined with the remnants of drifting cigarette smoke.

The combination created a luminous, hazy effect on all that could be seen in Dunn Meadow. This haze settled over the hundred-person crowd. There was not a drop of rain in sight.

At the mouth of the meadow facing Kirkwood stood the stage where most of the crowd was condensed. Many bands graced the stage Saturday, one of them being local group Apache Dropout.

Anu Nath, also known as Nathan, is a bassist and vocalist of the group.

Resting against the mossy surface of a tree after his performance, he described the beauty of playing his instrument.

“The bass sort of strips everything down into a really simple level,” he said.

The sound of this group is hard to describe because it is so intricate.
 
WIUX described the group as “psych-rock veterans who throw every decade into a blender and spit out the best Technicolor smoothie you could ask for.”

The group first got together five years ago, Nath said. While this was not his first time being at Culture Shock, he said that this was the first time Apache Dropout had played in the festival. 

“I love to play outside,” Nath said. “You get to play really loud, it’s really fun.”

In the five years they have worked together, he said that they have constantly grown in that time. 

“We’re creating art for the people,” he said. “We want everybody to get together and make something beautiful happen in the world.”