Last Friday, hip hop producer J. Cole, along with his opening act, Bas, kicked off the University’s Spring Fair festival weekend with a concert in the Ralph S. O’Connor Recreation Center. The concert was co-sponsored by the Hopkins Organization for Programing (the HOP) and the 2014 Spring Fair Music Committee.
Born Jermaine Cole, the rapper got his start in North Carolina, releasing his first mixtapes The Warm Up (2009) and Friday Night Lights (2010) on Jay Z’s record label, Roc Nation. His debut album, Cole World: The Sideline Story, was released on Sept. 27, 2011 and debuted at number one on the U.S. Billboard 200 Top R&B and Top Rap Albums charts. In February 2012, Cole was nominated for Best New Artist at the 54th Grammy Awards.
Gaining popularity as a rap lyricist, Cole has collaborated with notable artists like Wale, Miguel, Beyoncé, Jay Z and Kanye West. He released his sophomore album, Born Sinner, on June 14, 2013, which rose to number two on the Billboard 200 chart.
Tickets for Cole’s concert cost $18 for Hopkins students, and doors opened at 7 p.m. Thanks to Cole’s expansive fan-base, the event drew a large crowd, and the show was sold out.
“Over the past two years, the HOP and Spring Fair concert has tended towards the alternative genre, so we aimed to vary the performer genre so that we could attract a wider interest among the student population, and it definitely worked!” Co-Chair of the HOP senior Jon Hunt wrote in an email to The News-Letter. “We sold out all 1,550 tickets available, so obviously we did something right with the artist this year.”
In previous concerts, the HOP and Spring Fair have brought Passion Pit (2012) and Grouplove (2013) to the Hopkins campus.
Starting at 8 p.m. on Friday, the entertainment began as Bas, whose hometown is Jamaica Queens, N.Y., took the stage. Bas released his new album, Last Winter, on Tuesday, and it is now available on iTunes.
Since Bas’s performance included unreleased songs, the crowd reacted with limited enthusiasm, as they were hearing some of his music for the first time.
Although Bas successfully pumped up the crowd with his rhythmic raps and attempts to teach the crowd lyrics to sing along, there were a few cheers from students requesting Cole to take the stage.
After much anticipation from the audience, Cole finally made his appearance on stage at around 9 p.m. He began the show by connecting with the crowd.
“JHU, man. First and foremost I appreciate all of y’all for coming out tonight,” Cole said. “I love doing this s***, and I especially like it when it’s intimate like this. We’re so used to doing these big-a** shows that sometimes when I come and I do this then I can see everybody’s face.”
During his set, Cole also introduced his band members and continued to promote Bas’s upcoming album release. He jokingly encouraged the audience not to clap for Bas but to still purchase his album.
“I thought Bas did a great job of pumping up the crowd, but the real performance started when J. Cole came out,” freshman Erika Rivera said. “He really knows how to work the audience. I love how he not only sang but also talked to us — it made the whole experience just feel really intimate and personal.”
In an energetic performance, Cole sang hits like “Work Out,” his catchy, popular single from his first album. Cole mostly stuck to songs from Born Sinner. “Power trip,” which features Miguel, and “She Knows” received strong responses from the audience.
“I though that J. Cole was a really exciting concert and the entire environment was very upbeat. Everybody was having a really fun time, and it was very well organized by the HOP,” freshman Shaun Verma said.
For most students, the concert was a welcomed break from academics and a chance to let loose.
“The concert was great. It was Hopkins like I’ve never seen before. Definitely one of the best experiences of freshman year!” said freshman Saakshi Suri.
Leading up to the show, the HOP and Spring Fair managed to keep the concert performer a secret from students.
“This year, the announcement was made over the course of a week with one of the Spring Fair members releasing a YouTube mix with multiple different artists at the beginning of the week and narrowing down the number of the artists in the mix throughout the week until we concluded on Friday with the announcement video featuring J. Cole,” Hunt wrote.
Since Spring Fair is a very large student-run festival, the Spring Fair team of 45 Hopkins undergraduates and the 25 undergraduate members of the HOP collaborated to prepare for the festival’s first concert.
“Preparing for the event, we have been working since the artist contract has been finalized to ensure that the concert will run as smoothly as possible, having HOP committees focus on logistics, production, marketing and many other essential focuses to running a concert,” Hunt wrote.
Overall, the HOP maintained organization during the performance and cleanup afterwards.
“Physical set-up ran for the entirety of Thursday afternoon and Friday morning with the help of HOP members and the paid aid of members of the Sigma Phi Epsilon Fraternity, and cleanup ran immediately after the concert with the help of HOP members and the paid aid of members of the Phi Delta Theta Fraternity,” Hunt wrote.
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