As students streamed through checkpoints and ticket gates at a parking lot on 13th Street and Fee Lane at 6:45 p.m. Saturday, the skies above IU’s second Welcome Week Block Party were holding clear.
“We’ve got a lot better weather, knock on wood,” IU junior Tom Kondash said. “Last year, we had torrential downpours, which I was driving through picking up food.”
Last year, Kondash was a runner for the Block Party, running errands like picking up chicken Caesar salads for B.o.B, the Atlanta rapper who replaced original headliner Chance the Rapper after he dropped out. This year, Kondash is the Union Board’s head of hospitality. He said the event was running much more smoothly with no inclement weather or lineup changes.
“I think we have an awesome lineup,” he said. “Plus, the different genres and different types of music, it attracts everyone.”
Inside the venue area, a crowd gathered while rap and electronic dance music blared from the stage speakers. The students wore summer music festival attire: tank tops, jean shorts, colorful sunglasses, a plethora of retro basketball jerseys.
Around 7 p.m., Rob Sherrell, IU’s first stand-up comedy major and the evening’s emcee, took to the stage, telling a story about a Union Board-presented show that “changed everything” for him.
“It was in that moment I realized college is the time to chase your dream, the time to step outside your comfort zone,” he said.
After a few minutes of stories, jokes and encouragements for students to tweet about the Block Party, Sherrell ceded the stage to Phoebe Ryan, an electro-pop singer-songwriter who released her debut EP in June after finding some internet-bred success with a mashup-cover of R. Kelly’s “Ignition” and Miguel’s “Do You ... ” and an original single called “Mine.”
Backed by a live drummer and synth player, plus green lights that matched her dyed-green hair, Ryan played a short opening set, closing with “Mine.”
After the set, Sherrell returned to the stage, reading tweets he deemed the best with the #iubp15 hashtag. A few tweets, such as one making fun of Sherrell’s camouflage pants, elicited some crowd feedback.
A few minutes later, Action Bronson, a rapper from Queens, New York, emerged to the opening strains of Led Zeppelin’s “Whole Lotta Love” and ordered students to put their middle fingers in the air. He launched into a set filled with cuts from “Mr. Wonderful,” his major-label debut, which was released earlier this year, as well as an unreleased track.
While the weather stayed clear all night, some audience members were still rained on: halfway through Bronson’s set, someone threw a still-full water bottle, and others followed suit, resulting in a hail of water bottles that arced, grenade-like, over the crowd for 2 1/2 songs, soaking some of them.
Once Bronson finished, the packed crowd momentarily loosened up as students jockeyed for position for the final two acts. On one edge of the audience, near a line of yellow Porta-Potties, a circle formed and people took turns dancing in the center — except for one participant, who instead lead a “fuck Purdue” chant.
In the grass near the portable toilets, freshman Kirsten Hartman searched for a pair of misplaced Ray-Bans. Despite the missing sunglasses, she said she thought the Block Party was a good way to end Welcome Week.
“It’s kind of a way for me to meet people and then hang out after,” she said.
At the end of the between-set break, Sherrell announced Capital Cities would go on next, surprising some audience members who expected the headliners to close the show.
Flashing, colorful lights accompanied the Los Angeles-based synth-pop duo, which appeared Saturday with a bass player and trumpet player in tow.
In 2013, the group released its debut album, “In a Tidal Wave of Mystery,” and scored a top-ten hit on the Billboard Hot 100 with the single “Safe and Sound.”
It opened with a cover of Pink Floyd’s “Breathe” and saved “Safe and Sound” until near the end of its set. When it did play the song, the bulk of the audience jumped collectively, singing along and waving their hands while people on the fringes danced with more space.
After another song, the band put down its instruments and stayed on the stage as a remix of “Safe and Sound” blared over the speakers.
“Here’s one last dance,” frontman Ryan Merchant said before urging crowd members to take off their shirts and jackets and wave them in the air. The crowd obliged, clothing of all colors spinning in the air as white beams of light shot from the stage above.
After Capital Cities exited the stage, much of the crowd exited the venue, leaving the parking lot covered in crushed water bottles, broken sunglasses and torn-off wristbands.
Sherrell returned to the stage, with the remaining crowd — now only waiting for Adventure Club — still packed together for about 50 feet in front of the stage.
“The night is not over,” Sherrell said. “This is IU — do we turn down for anything?”
The response from the crowd: an emphatic “no.”
The crowd buzzed as it waited for Adventure Club to arrive. When the Canadian electronic dance music duo took the stage, they set off a dubstep build-up, lasting only a short time before a sampled voice signaled the drop.
“Everybody fuckin’ jump,” the voice said.
And everybody jumped.
