Oldies tunes, hip-hop tracks and other serenading sounds filled the Otter Student Union (OSU) Thursday night at the annual Cal State Monterey Bay (CSUMB) music festival, Otterlands. Attendees gathered in the student union ballroom and quad, ready for a night of live music, crafts and community. The festival’s lineup highlighted three student artists who warmed up the OSU audience leading up to the R&B headliner, Jordan Ward.
Both a play on words and an ode to the famous San Francisco music festival “Outside Lands,” Otterlands is CSUMB’s own spring music festival that brings together music loving students from all across campus. The event is a collaborative effort between Associated Students, Otter Media and Student Housing and Residential life. Although the event’s main attraction is the live music, the student union quad was filled with art stations and other stands that allowed students to partake in vinyl record painting, T-shirt stamping and tie-dying, caricature art and more, all working together to keep the good vibes going even outside of the ballroom.
Second-year environmental science major and Otter Media member Patrick Schmitt spoke on the importance of the pre-show artists being CSUMB students.
“A lot of bands play off campus, or like a lot of these bands, their only chances to play are here, which is really really cool. So it kind of brings them into the light, you know, in our kind of fast moving campus,” said Schmitt.
Once attendees stocked up on snacks and made their crafts, concert-goers made their way inside the OSU ballroom.
Each artist had about an hour’s worth of stage time to perform, with student artist Miss Fortune taking the stage first. No stranger to CSUMB stages, Miss Fortune serenaded the crowd with her witty lyricism and passionate vocal performance.
The next performers were The Mystic Souls, a Chicano-rock band and familiar face to the 831 music scene, led by frontman and CSUMB hospitality student Bryan Gutierrez. Their Otterlands performance skillfully handled genres the same way Gutierrez juggled instruments, as he handed off his guitar for a flute and trumpet throughout their performance.
The third and final opening act was Devere, who returned to the Otterlands stage after performing at last year’s festival. Devere’s raps and rhymes warmed up the crowd for the artist that the crowd was buzzing to see: Jordan Ward.
Ward had the audience crowding the stage’s barricade and dancing to his versatile songs and catchy beats. Ward danced up and down the stage, referring back to his days as a backup dancer for artists like Beyonce and Justin Bieber.
Fourth-year kinesiology major Andrew Ylanan said that his takeaway from Otterlands wasn’t just the music, but the community and togetherness present at the event. “I’d recommend it to all years, you know, it’s not just like [for] certain grades or something like that, like everyone should go to it”
“It’s definitely a good way to make new friends and just have fun in general. Like just let loose.”
