Cage Rage sees popular headliner, lower ticket sales

The fifth annual Cage Rage concert, featuring headliner MS MR and openers STRFKR and Gentlemen Hall, was held at Carzo Cage in Cousens Gymnasiumthis Saturday evening.

According to Concert Board Co-Chairs Matthew Marber and Kathryn Gibb, about 1,100 tickets were sold, as opposed to 1,350 tickets sold at last year's event. Gibb, a junior, attributed the lower ticket sales to the time conflict with many other events happening that night, including the sQ! show, the Tufts Symphony Orchestra concert and the Sarabande performance.

“Considering how busy the day was for the rest of the Tufts population, I think that the amount of tickets we sold was pretty impressive,” Marber, a junior, said.

Boston-area indie-pop band Gentlemen Hall opened the show. Even though there were fewer students at that point given the show's early start time, the students who were there really enjoyed the band, according to Gibb.

“[The band] loved Tufts too,” she added. “Afterwards they were hanging out in the crowd during MS MR’s set, and it was really awesome.”

Marber noted that Gentlemen Hall had a flute player who started the show with a two-minute flute solo.

“It was the coolest thing I’ve ever heard,” he said.

The second opener, STRFKR, had a DJ set to do mash-ups of its own music and others' music because some of the band members were not able to make it to the concert, according to Gibb. She noted that she heard both positive and negative reviews of the performance, although she believed that overall the set did get better and still went well.

Annie Gill, a sophomore who attended the concert, said that she thought STRFKR was a little disappointing and that she wished they had played their own songs.

Sophomore Miranda Willson said she had bought tickets for herself and her brother, who was visiting over the weekend, especially to see STRFKR. They were both extremely disappointed by the set and left before it was over.

“There were just so many unfortunate things about this year’s [concert],” she said, adding that the security measures at the entrance were excessive and annoying.

MS MR, which Marber described as an “indie-pop-rock boom explosion,” was very well received.

“The crowd responded really positively to them, and we confirmed this by talking to the artists after the show,” he said.

Gibb added that the audience was singing along and clapping at the right times, showing that some of the students knew the songs well.

“MS MR did a great job,” Gill said. “Their energy on stage was a lot of fun, and their performance was impressive.”

According to Gibb, MS MR had just finished a tour, and Cage Rage was its last show of the year

“They were really excited to close it out with a college show,” she said.

Marber explained that the duo had met each other in college, and he noted that the group was used to performing in a college setting.

“The artists were all really cool," he said. "They were all really willing to talk to the student workers.”

Marber and Gibb estimated that there were about 40 student volunteers at the event. They helped with setting up the stage the night before and on the day itself, loading in sound equipment and lights, setting up pipe, drape, bike racks and dressing rooms and getting things that the artists needed, according to Gibb.

Gibb and Marber said that the day of the concert went smoothly. Everyone behind the scenes, including student volunteers, event staff and administrators from the Office for Campus Life, worked together fluidly without major issues.

Gill agreed, saying that the event ran smoothly, it was easy to enter and exit and most people enjoyed themselves.

“I definitely had a rage in the cage," Marber said. "My mind was blown.”

Gibb added that both she and Marber have been on Concert Board since their first year at Tufts, but this is their first semester as co-chairs.

“I think it was an awesome experience to see what it’s like having more responsibilities,” she said.