There’s no better way to spend a beautiful, sunny Saturday afternoon than with good friends, fun fall activities and lively music. Quinnipiac University’s Student Programming Board and WQAQ 98.1 FM hosted the annual Fall Fest concert on the Quad on Oct. 12.
Students were greeted with merchandise, snacks and drinks, food trucks, inflatable activities, a pumpkin patch and a free concert by The 502s.
BEHIND THE SCENES
Emma Dinnan, a senior journalism major and mainstage chair for SPB, explained that planning started in the summer and picked up steam once the semester started.
“Once you hit July we started getting ‘Okay let’s lockdown merch, let’s lockdown vendors that we have and everything,’” Dinnan said. “The past month has just been planning the activities and smaller stuff.”
Similar to last year’s Fall Fest, Nicole Healy, assistant director for student engagement, said that they wanted to keep the music happy and upbeat.
“Because it’s an outdoor event and people could be walking by, we stay away a little bit from heavy rap. Stuff you’d hear on casual radio is kind of the energy,” Healy said. “(The 502s) are good and interactive with students, they’re respectful and they enjoy the college environment.”
Even though Fall Fest usually hosts a lesser-known band, that doesn’t stop students from enjoying the music.
“I saw them live last year at Toad’s in New Haven and I love their music so I was really happy,” Dinnan said. “(The band) has been nothing but nice to all of us so we’re super happy with the vibe of everything.”
And the vibe of everything screamed “fall.” From exclusive quarter-zips and long sleeve shirts with pumpkins on them, to a pumpkin patch, pumpkin painting and a mechanical pumpkin inflatable, SPB and WQAQ truly put the “fall” in Fall Fest.
This year, the announcement of the artist came only a few days before the festival, released on Oct. 9. Healy said it was a mixture of how many departments at Quinnipiac have to process the contract and the band’s legal team.
“That was hard to navigate the last couple of weeks but we wanted to get it out as soon as we could,” Healy said.
That’s also why SPB heavily advertised the other aspects of the event.
“We know not everyone comes because they love The 502s, but they may really want the food and the photos and the environment by the music,” Healy said. “There’s something here for everybody.”
SPB and WQAQ had to keep in mind the issues that may arise when hosting the festival on a long holiday weekend.
“We were kind of downplaying it because people went home this weekend because of the long weekend, so we were like ‘Maybe not a lot of people will show up’ but honestly there’s so many people here which is super cool,” Riley Moger, a sophomore advertising major, social media manager of WQAQ and co-director of activities for Fall Fest said.
GETTING TO KNOW ‘THE HAPPIEST BAND ON EARTH’
Originally from Florida, The 502s have garnered over 1.4 million monthly listeners on Spotify. The band consists of six members: Ed Isola, Matthew Tonner, Graci Phillips, Nicholas Dallas, Joe Capati and Sean Froelich.
The band’s name comes from a success story.
“Our lead singer Ed started the band with his cousin back in 2016,” the band wrote in an email to The Chronicle. “Growing up they lived on the same street and 502 was Ed’s house number. They quickly had to choose a name for an upcoming battle of the band contest to play a major music festival, which they won and so the name stuck.”
Their most popular song, “Just A Little While,” has over 100 million streams. Much of that was due to the song blowing up on TikTok, which is where a lot of students heard of the band.
“The experience of ‘Just A Little While’ becoming a TikTok trend was a totally surreal whirlwind of excitement that has ultimately changed all of our lives (for the better),” the band wrote. “Social media has always been a huge part of our life as a band.”
Long before TikTok success, The 502s first spark of internet fame was six years ago.
“Our very first tour back in 2018 got booked off of a viral Facebook video of us playing in a laundry room at Ed’s grandpa’s house,” the band wrote.
Amid their international tour, “The 502s Great Road Trip,” they still love performing for colleges and universities.
“It is definitely a bit of a different vibe than our typical concerts,” the band wrote. “When we’re playing at a school it’s typical to have a lot of people there who don’t know who we are or know our songs well, but there’s a sort of fun challenge to us in that environment to make sure we are providing a show that everybody can get into, not just The 502s diehards.”
While The 502s have a wide discography, there is one song that the band considers their anthem.
“One that stands out from the early days is ‘Enjoy the Ride’ off of our first album,” the band wrote. “It’s a story song about a group of friends on a road tripping adventure, which is what we were dreaming of at the start of the band and it sounds a lot like our lives now.”
But the song also has a deeper connection with fans.
“The song is really about how every day has its good and bad moments and nothing is going to turn out exactly how you planned, so the most important thing is to experience everything to the fullest and get all that you can out of it,” the band wrote.
‘STORIES TO TELL’
Many students were impressed with the event, whether they’ve attended Fall Fest before or not.
“I’m enjoying it more than I did last year,” Ali Sargent, a sophomore nursing major said. “I just think that there’s a lot more energy and more things to do.”
“I didn’t think it would be as organized and interactive as it is,” Noah Sussal, a first-year finance and accounting major said. “I think it’s great, the punch cards, the food, it’s very cool.”
Despite most students not knowing of The 502s before Fall Fest, many came for the festivities and ended up staying because of the music.
“I love live music of any kind, so I’m really enjoying (The 502s),” Sargent said. “I don’t know them but their music is good. It’s a little bit more upbeat than what I usually listen to but I think that’s good for Fall Fest. You want something really exciting and fun like this.”
However, some students were familiar with The 502s and their music.
“Well, we had actually been talking about Fall Fest and I was like, ‘Oh it’s probably going to be like The 502s or something similar to them’ a couple of weeks ago,” Sussal said. And then I saw it was The 502s and thought that’s cool.”
Sussal had the opportunity to engage in various activities with his friends and enjoy the warm weather.
“After we checked in, we got pumpkins, we painted pumpkins, went to the tea light, got food and we’re going to do more activities later,” Sussal said. “It’s just a beautiful day. We wanted to spend some time together and have fun and this seemed like a really good opportunity.”
Many students just stumbled upon the event but decided to stay and enjoy the festivities.
“I like the open flow and how you can do what you want, you can just walk around and enjoy the day,” Richard Lebrun, a junior law and society major said.
Students also like the idea of being given options and the opportunity to vote for who they’d like to see perform at Fall Fest.
“Oh I think that would be awesome,” Sargent said. “I think if you could get (musicians) that students really want to be here and really want to see, that’d be awesome.”
Even though midterm season can be a stressful time, there’s nothing like kicking back and relaxing, looking at the colorful leaves on Sleeping Giant State Park and listening to live music.
