Last Sunday, instead of pencils, papers and exams, White Hall
housed guitars, screaming vocals and body-shaking rhythms.

At WMRE’s Locals Fest, students saw this bastion of
scholarship transformed into a homey venue for a truly diverse
array of musical performances by bands from the nearby area.

The five-hour festival brought in six bands hailing from Atlanta
and surrounding areas, including two groups consisting entirely of
Emory students.

Playing on three stages set up in and around White Hall, the
groups put on energetic yet comfortable shows as the audience
wandered from stage to stage.

Elf Power, an Athens-based indie band often heard on 88.5 FM
that has gained a strong following in the past few years, was the
main course for musical appetites.

The group was introduced by a friend of the group,
“Heimlich,” a young man faking a German accent, who
said he hoped “zee music makes you happy in zee happy
region.”

Performing a lengthy set mostly from their album Walking with
the Beggar Boys, Elf Power played melodies driven by the deft
guitar work of Andrew Rieger and Jimmy Huges and sharp sounds of
John Fernandez’s violin and clarinet.

With multiple stages, the setting allowed students to wander in
and out of the festival as they pleased.

WMRE General Manager Spencer Koch said the open atmosphere was
one of the festival’s greatest successes.

“Music fans could go up and talk to the artists
themselves, and all the different acts watched each other,”
Koch said.

There were occasional pauses between the bands’
performances, but the multistage format allowed for an almost
continuous stream of music from start to finish.

Castle of Togetherness kicked off the event.

The group, a six-member, all-Emory student band, played heavy
rock with some experimental twists.

Following them was another Emory group, Suitcases, a
self-proclaimed noise band composed of College junior Chris
Darestra and College seniors Drew Haddon and Jonathan Quinn.

And just before Elf Power took the stage, Blame Game and
Untied States, both Atlanta-area bands that are relatively
well-known on the local scene, played hardcore and avant-garde
rock, respectively.

There were only five people present to watch the opening acts,
although about 80 people showed up through the course of the
festival.

The music could be heard throughout Emory’s campus and
attracted curious students and locals.

“I came because I was actually at Mass in [Cannon Chapel]
and we heard what sounded like heavy metal during the
service,” College sophomore Andrew Heymann said. “The
priest actually said ‘rock on.’”

Heymann said the sounds reaching his afternoon church service
were refreshing.

“I liked the fact that they didn’t sound exactly
like your usual nu-metal or pop-punk junk on the radio [or]
MTV,” Heymann said. “I would most definitely come to
one of these in the future.”

Koch and other WMRE organizers said they were also pleased with
the event.

“The bands were amazing,” Koch said.

But the small turnout did not go unnoticed.

“The Emory turnout was OK, but the local turnout was less
than we expected, especially for a locals show,” Koch said.
“We could’ve accommodated more
people.”

The low attendance may have been caused by the fact that
students were not aware the concert was happening, despite the
large amount of posters, LearnLink fliers and word-of-mouth
advertising for the show.

“I would have gone had I known about it,” College
freshman Mark Johnson said.