Political awareness? Music? Movement? What is this, the 60’s? Apparently the UT College Democrats think so and they are making an effort to bring somewhat of a political generation back to the mainstream with their last weeks “Rock the Vote” concert.

The concert was thrown in Vaughn Courtyard in order to “raise political awareness” all while providing a politically musical environment.

The event had an arrangement of political booths where you could register to vote while being informed of democratic candidates and amendments that were going to affect our country. “Rock the Vote” featured four bands performing roughly 30 to 45 minute sets with guest speakers in between sets.

The concert kicked of with folk solo singer/songwriter senior Noah Woods. I must say I was pretty impressed with the way he carried himself onstage. He had an arrangement of instruments that he played for the crowd all while keeping that warm folk rock sound.

After Noah Woods left the stage the next band that came on was a band by the name of greX. I was impressed by greX’s sound, but even more impressed by their violinist Brittany Friesen, fellow UT student. I was amazed to see the violin brought to the front of the band as if it were the lead guitar itself. greX showed us that punk rock does have a place at UT with their comical rap song about Mr. Barack Obama.

As their set ended we were greeted by an intermission of various people talking about registering to vote and certain political candidates. Various attempts at getting the few students out late on a Thursday to vote were made with free Obama t-shirts thrown into the crowd and stating facts about the importance of young adult voters. And then the third band approached, which was a rap artist by the name of Shane Ali. Interestingly enough he is the youth coordinator for the Tampa Barack Obama campaign. It was quite amusing to see him preach about Obama after a guest speaker tried to just sway us in Ms. Clinton favor and preaching as if she were some God.

Shane Ali turned some heads with his explicit and often comical lyrics, such as, “I’m over the beef, so pass the cheeba.” That line amused me quite a bit, you go from supporting Obama to smoking the cheeba, but hey, more power to you. As the night began to unwind and Shane Ali made his exit we we were still in store for one more act, Ryan Joy, the female singer accompanied by her band.

Ryan Joy strutted around the stage with her vocals and her swagger was matched by none the whole night. Many times throughout the night I was amazed at how much Ryan Joy reminded me of Paramore’s lead singer Hayley Williams.

They were almost absolutely identical in every aspect possible

As soon as the concert started it just as quickly ended. I was very impressed to see an event on campus with such a strong cause, all I really hope now is that they motivated some people to get out there and vote.