Musicians will show their stuff Saturday at Battle of the Bands for a chance to be the opening act at Groovin’ on the Grounds in the spring.
Students on Target, a department of Student Government, is hosting the event, which will take place from 1 to 3 p.m. at Free Speech Circle.
Pushing Pandas will perform first, followed by The Broken Rubber Band and Winbourne. Stone Rabbits will close the competition.
Beverly Suffern, SG director of programming, said the bands will be judged in five categories. The judges will rank the bands on a scale from one to five on stage performance, crowd reaction, musicality, originality and overall score.
Suffern said Nick Boudreau, KLSU station manager, Johnny Palazzotto, producer of Baton Rouge Blues Week and a member of the Louisiana Music Commission, Bill Kelley, recording engineer at the School of Music and Jonas Spira, night disc jockey for 104.9 The X, will be judges at the competition.
Cullen Davezac, The Broken Rubber Band’s lead singer and rhythm guitar player, said the group’s style of music is what will set it apart from the other bands. The band’s music contains jazz, blues and classical influences.
“The big umbrella we are under is rock, but we have no limits,” Davezac said.
While most of the bands competing fall into the rock genre, Dane Monic, guitarist and vocalist of Pushing Pandas, said all the groups have a different sound.
Monic said Pushing Pandas’ rock sound covers both the heavier and lighter sides of melody and groove.
Khristen Jones, assistant director of programming, said 20 bands applied for Battle for the Bands. Students on Target judged the bands at a listening party, and the top four highest-scoring bands were selected to perform at the competition.
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Contact Celeste Ansley at [email protected]