Starfields... flogging a dead horse?

[RedCelt69]

As the header says; new term, new sinner. Hoping for a fresh influx of new people to dilute the stale pools of piss represented by the likes of you.

[limejellyfish]

I don't care about Starfields, I don't like that kind of music, but I have really enjoyed reading this thread. Laugh out loud stuff, honestly. I can only hope somebody uses the quote function to have a go at me.

[Delts]

As the header says; new term, new sinner. Hoping for a fresh influx of new people to dilute the stale pools of piss represented by the likes of you.

Shows how much attention you pay, that's been up for a year now.

[Frank]

As the header says; new term, new sinner. Hoping for a fresh influx of new people to dilute the stale pools of piss represented by the likes of you.

Shows how much attention you pay, that's been up for a year now.

He didn't claim it was new, pillock. Simply that that is what it said.

I don't care about Starfields, I don't like that kind of music, but I have really enjoyed reading this thread. Laugh out loud stuff, honestly. I can only hope somebody uses the quote function to have a go at me.

Oh shut up you silly bugger. (Better?)

[limejellyfish]

I don't care about Starfields, I don't like that kind of music, but I have really enjoyed reading this thread. Laugh out loud stuff, honestly. I can only hope somebody uses the quote function to have a go at me.

Oh shut up you silly bugger. (Better?)

Yes oh yes oh yes

[schmod]

Need I say more?

[Rob2]

Ok so maybe the price for a ticket this year is slightly over the top in regards to the popularity of the acts, but it will still sell out. I've happily paid for a ticket. Why... you may ask? Because Starfields has that certain student vibe about it that the union lost ages ago. Firstly, the crowd is awesome, and the girls are hot. Secondly, Starfields may book C-list acts but at least its taking a risk - when I saw this year's freshers week line up it reminded me why I didn't vote for Phil Pass in the elections. Tonight was ok, but in comparison to previous years the lineup is a load of shite. Of course half of the people on here are union hacks, who will defend the pile'o'wank lineup til the death, but c'mon people. I can't wait until Saturday night, even though I am mostly a band music fan over electronic music, Starfields won the common sense decision outright. Saying this I'll probably pop into the union just to film thirty seconds in venue one and post it to failblog as Event Fail.

Rob

[Delts]

Sell out? From what I heard it was going to be lucky to make much of a profit!

And taking risks is all fine and well, unless they are stupid risks when there is already a winning formula there. Stacy Lee moved away from the more traditional line up for freshers week last year and the amount of people buying tickets took a big hit. From what I gather, the only event so far that hasn't been sold out this year has been the first hypnotist showing. So whilst the acts may be a "load of shit" in the union, they are proving popular, which means the union makes more money, which means more money to spend on societies and trying to keep things like bar prices low.

[Hennessy]

[donpablo]

Starfields vs The Union... a more objective look

Entertainment: Starfields only just win on a technicality by being less bad.
Hot Girls: Starfields becos im thinking more effort will be put in by the girls over all.
Price: Union wins hands down.
Location: Union wins again by a long way.

Draw

While Starfields does seem like an obvious choice it's up against pretty weak competition. Would be nice to just have the same general Starfields idea but in Venue 1. Surely it would save a lot of planning hassle and they could just focus on getting the acts and I guess the sound n light systems etc. Certainly a lot of risk eliminated on the surface of it too, everyone seems to benefit.

I've lost faith entirely for any decent entertainment this year. You can't really call a busy union in freshers week a success, that's just normal. Let's see how dead it is in the weeks after though. If we can't get any decent entertainment during freshers there's little hope of getting it during the year. As for Starfields maybe it will go away if it doesn't make a profit. Neither seem able to get the basics right. F*ck it, I got my GK tickets anyway now.

[Les_Paul]

To be perfectly honest whilst I can follow the premise of the argument here regarding the quality of acts, my disappointment is to be found not with the said acts, but in the genre.

It has become apparent to me that there is a bias towards what I, as a relative 'oldy' term 'Dance Music', and not nearly enough good old 'Band' type music.

Does anyone else feel like this? I should stress before anyone books the roady from Wayne's World and buys him some M&Ms to colour separate pre-performance, I am perfectly happy to listen to all generations of music, from 60's through to the 00's It's just the genre I am struggling to get excited about.

[Delts]

I personally prefer watching bands as well, however it's the sad state of St Andrews since most band events aren't well attended. Even free ones like the battle of the bands are rarely the size of crowd I'd expect.

[Jono]

Not that I want to reinforce the view that this board is full of union hacks or anything, but...

Isn't Starfields still a union event? Last I checked, it was a sub-group within St Andrews Radio which existed to organise and promote those sorts of things. The whole, Starfields, vs Union mentality is false. They're essentially the same thing. Don't forget, last year the Saturday of Starfields only went ahead because it was able to relocate to the union building at the last minute.

I see what you're saying about the union being a tarnished brand. That's been the case since before I was a student. Of course the organisation is beholden to licensing laws, charity legislation, PLI, PPL, and all that other muck. In my experience, it wears those commitments a bit too openly. Keep that shit in the committee room. In the public areas of the building, only fun and enjoyment should be allowed; not concerns about OSCR or the Licensing Board smashing in the front door. Stacy Lee tried to allay this problem last year with his re-branding (Vanquish, multicolour. STARfields should probably be seen in that context too). Although I suspect that applying fresh coats of paint to a structure fundamentally made of rust and bureaucracy won't sort out the core problems in the long-term.

when I saw this year's freshers week line up it reminded me why I didn't vote for Phil Pass in the elections.

Ah, hack baiting, and announcements of how shit freshers week was. The old traditions never die! I've no idea how bad the lineup was this year (or indeed, how good). As for the elections, seeing as he’s been active in many parts of student life for years, including the ents crew, and ran against a manifesto of promises that couldn't be kept (and a person making those promises, presumably), I still say the Meerkat was the better bet!

[Jono]

To be perfectly honest whilst I can follow the premise of the argument here regarding the quality of acts, my disappointment is to be found not with the said acts, but in the genre.

It has become apparent to me that there is a bias towards what I, as a relative 'oldy' term 'Dance Music', and not nearly enough good old 'Band' type music.

Does anyone else feel like this? I should stress before anyone books the roady from Wayne's World and buys him some M&Ms to colour separate pre-performance, I am perfectly happy to listen to all generations of music, from 60's through to the 00's It's just the genre I am struggling to get excited about.

This is a problem which has blighted St Andrews, or more properly, the St Andrews student community, for ages.

With its tight budget and outdated facilities, the Union gets a lot of not entirely fair stick for this. It puts on big, homogenous, inoffensive events like the bop which reliably make money, while keeping a lot of low key events run by quasi-independent societies and subcommittees. It takes flack for falling into routine, not catering for enough tastes, and all generally being shit. It decides to take a risk and put on something headline, big, and flashy which caters for a more limited crowd. Then, when one thousand rock snobs or whatever fail to attend and the event loses money (or even if it doesn’t, it loses the potential for revenue that could be generated by something reliable), the Financial Executive have a heart attack, and the Union takes flack for poor management. So they revert back to ‘ol faithful.

The real tragedy is that this ain’t the Union’s fault. Well, not entirely. We have a tiny student population compared to Edinburgh, or even Dundee. We’re never going to be able to stage Rock headliners like they sometimes can. That said, there could be improvement, with improved facilities and more investment in student organization. The Union was built to house about 3,000. There are over twice that number of students. There is a plan to renovate and rebuild, if only the university would stump up the cash. It’s made vague promises for years, and it’s time for them to act!

When an event is shit, whinge energy could be better channeled into action. The student body needs to raise hell with the university as to why they pay money for pointless levels of administration (The student experience office being a blatant example (http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/administrat ... xperience/)) rather than actually investing in the student experience. For the Union’s part, there should be more transparency with the overall budget, and there need to be tough questions about what money is being spent on. (To take my old job) Why should the Union giving £30,000 in grant money to societies (a tiresome number of which are incapable of tying their own shoe laces without the Union being on hand to explain the process)? Why are plays that fill half of the salad bowl being staged in venue 1? And of course, the old chestnut; why is STAR getting… oh you all know the rest! I’m citing examples of various legitimacy. The point I want to make is that the only way to improve this is to do something about it.

Demand change you can believe in!

[Les_Paul]

To be perfectly honest whilst I can follow the premise of the argument here regarding the quality of acts, my disappointment is to be found not with the said acts, but in the genre.

It has become apparent to me that there is a bias towards what I, as a relative 'oldy' term 'Dance Music', and not nearly enough good old 'Band' type music.

Does anyone else feel like this? I should stress before anyone books the roady from Wayne's World and buys him some M&Ms to colour separate pre-performance, I am perfectly happy to listen to all generations of music, from 60's through to the 00's It's just the genre I am struggling to get excited about.

This is a problem which has blighted St Andrews, or more properly, the St Andrews student community, for ages.

With its tight budget and outdated facilities, the Union gets a lot of not entirely fair stick for this. It puts on big, homogenous, inoffensive events like the bop which reliably make money, while keeping a lot of low key events run by quasi-independent societies and subcommittees. It takes flack for falling into routine, not catering for enough tastes, and all generally being shit. It decides to take a risk and put on something headline, big, and flashy which caters for a more limited crowd. Then, when one thousand rock snobs or whatever fail to attend and the event loses money (or even if it doesn’t, it loses the potential for revenue that could be generated by something reliable), the Financial Executive have a heart attack, and the Union takes flack for poor management. So they revert back to ‘ol faithful.

The real tragedy is that this ain’t the Union’s fault. Well, not entirely. We have a tiny student population compared to Edinburgh, or even Dundee. We’re never going to be able to stage Rock headliners like they sometimes can. That said, there could be improvement, with improved facilities and more investment in student organization. The Union was built to house about 3,000. There are over twice that number of students. There is a plan to renovate and rebuild, if only the university would stump up the cash. It’s made vague promises for years, and it’s time for them to act!

When an event is shit, whinge energy could be better channeled into action. The student body needs to raise hell with the university as to why they pay money for pointless levels of administration (The student experience office being a blatant example (http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/administrat ... xperience/)) rather than actually investing in the student experience. For the Union’s part, there should be more transparency with the overall budget, and there need to be tough questions about what money is being spent on. (To take my old job) Why should the Union giving £30,000 in grant money to societies (a tiresome number of which are incapable of tying their own shoe laces without the Union being on hand to explain the process)? Why are plays that fill half of the salad bowl being staged in venue 1? And of course, the old chestnut; why is STAR getting… oh you all know the rest! I’m citing examples of various legitimacy. The point I want to make is that the only way to improve this is to do something about it.

Demand change you can believe in!

I take your point to a certain degree. I have seen this sort of pattern in other organisations, clubs etc where you have a mode of operation that works, becomes old faithful and keeps things ticking along. Then people, such as myself moan and request something different such as a headline band. The obvious happens and it is not well attended and the cycle starts again.

However my point is this, Starfields was marketed to me as a 'music festival' not a 'dance music festival' What about tagging two events together? Book an act to appear at one of the 'reliable' events and it should attract both crowds. I think the other point to consider is that most people would be happy with live music period, it does not have to be a major name headlining.

All that said I struggle to fathom out some some things here at St Andrews. I have asked a few times if there are any musicians willing to get together for a jam or just a chat and it seems most are happy playing away alone and in their room. Friends do not believe me that I cannot find people to perform and socialize with. With that in mind it is clear that music as whole has some deeper routed problems at St Andrews.

[Jono]

I take your point to a certain degree. I have seen this sort of pattern in other organisations, clubs etc where you have a mode of operation that works, becomes old faithful and keeps things ticking along. Then people, such as myself moan and request something different such as a headline band. The obvious happens and it is not well attended and the cycle starts again.

However my point is this, Starfields was marketed to me as a 'music festival' not a 'dance music festival' What about tagging two events together? Book an act to appear at one of the 'reliable' events and it should attract both crowds. I think the other point to consider is that most people would be happy with live music period, it does not have to be a major name headlining.

All that said I struggle to fathom out some some things here at St Andrews. I have asked a few times if there are any musicians willing to get together for a jam or just a chat and it seems most are happy playing away alone and in their room. Friends do not believe me that I cannot find people to perform and socialize with. With that in mind it is clear that music as whole has some deeper routed problems at St Andrews.

With regards to STARfields, I think you're confusing 'ought' and 'is'. The event has always pretty much been allowed to do its own thing without too much debate about the direction or genre makeup. The problem with forcing the event to hold a live set is that there has been no evidence that they are capable of pulling in the bop-sized crowds on their own account (even Idlewild wasn't all that full). Even if you ignore that and run with it on the basis of musical diversity (which, arguably, the union is obliged to accommodate) you set a precedent, that any musical genre- regardless of popularity gets a fair hearing. That risks turning the whole event into a homogenised mess, and doing for one of the Union's only real crowd pullers outside of the Bop.

I would argue that live guitar band music has been massively over-represented in the past; with time money and resources dedicated to it beyond the scope of its popular appeal within the student community. whether that's still the case, I don't know. You've still got Musfund and all that jazz. If people can't be arsed leaving their bedroom's, that's hardly the Union's fault.