The people that select the artists (students) will get the best that they can. Just like anything else they have to budget. We’d all love to drive the best, fastest, and fanciest cars but our paycheck just won’t allow it. Asking for someone like the Dave Matthews or have Dane Cook come would be great but that is like asking your wife to go in with you on a Ferrari or Bently. Not gonna happen.

So you have the budgetary side to deal with but guess what? If a band IS within your schedule and DOES have an open date during OP they have to be somewhere near the area (which generally means they are going to play in a major metropolitan area in Texas) and they have to be willing to play a small college town at an event that is hosted OUTDOORS in a state where it can go from “Finger of God making a smiley face in a field tornado” to “Bake the highlights right out of your hair hot” at a concert where they aren’t the biggest draw (because we have comedians too) and students will be running the whole thing so the best perk you can hope for is a bitch’n after-concert party and maybe a drunken hookup with some co-ed that was puking behind a bush just a few minutes before because she drank half a fifth of Evan Williams and OMG she just loves your song that she heard on the radio but she can only hum a few bars because she’s about to hork up some of the cheese fries she ate at Joe’s earlier and what’s that? Oh, Stillwater Police. Everybody run!

So speculating, whining, and pleading with the execs on campus, on message boards, and at the water cooler at work doesn’t make a bit of difference. These are hard working kids trying to balance school, work, OP, and the other basic human functions of life and they last thing they want to deal with is some Freshman writing in his blog about how he “Would have been so stoked if Fallout Boy and AFI could have made it but the OP execs are jerks and got country!!!1!!!@” Guess what fancy pants, it is freaking OKLAHOMA. Home of Garth, Reba, and Vince. Songs about tractors, pickup trucks, and losing both while your wife drives off in them are popular here. Buck up.

My suggestion is to go to OP and enjoy it for what it is, a pep rally. A time for OSU students to enjoy the camaraderie and fun that is the start of a new season of Cowboy football even if they had to move it two weeks back because the headlining band got arrested for pot possession in Arizona. I love seeing alumni, my parents, coming back and trying to act like they enjoy Hero Factor but we all knew they were just there to be on campus. Some of the best times of my life occurred while I was on the Marketing Committee and helping to put the show on. I made some great friends, enjoyed some great late nights, and I’ll never bitch about the headlining band at OP ever again.
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