Ethnography Results, Week 8

For this week, we went to Schotzi's on Saturday, to see Strawberry Jam. We arrived around 10:00pm, when the Conglomerate, a jazzy band, was playing on the outside stage. For a few songs, they brought up Lindsay Harris to sing with them (we went to her concert for the first week of the project). Only 15 people showed up to watch them. This may have been partially due to the fact that Cartoon Network's Adult Swim had set up an event and concert across the street, which had attracted a lot of attention. After the Adult Swim event had ended, Schotzi's filled up. By the time Strawberry Jam came on at midnight, there were about 80 people in attendance. By the end of their performance, there were about 100 people there.

There were a wide variety of people in attendance at the concert. There were a few groups of sorority girls and fraternity boys, along with some groups that seemed to know the people in the bands. A few people in the crowd were shouting song suggestions, leading me to believe that they were familiar with the band and its songs.

The crowd watching Strawberry Jam was definitely the most active and involved audience yet. The band played a few songs at request, including an encore, that were popular songs. The crowd started dancing and singing along. People got right up next to the stage, jumping and dancing along to the music. In particular, the encore had people doing the "shout" dance, jumping and raising their hands while they sang along. The level of interaction that the band had with the audience was very interesting, as not many of the other bands we have seen have been able to attain it.