A beginner’s guide to the UP Fair.
Rockin’ the night away. For six nights in February
each year, the Sunken Garden becomes a deep
valley of rakistas, punkistas, rockers, head-bangers
and the likes as various homegrown talents, name
bands and artists rock the night away at the UP Fair.
February, the “love month” is much awaited at UPD. Aside from the yearly exposure of the members of the UP community to the love bug, February marks the celebration of the Diliman Month and the time of the UP Fair!
UP Fair is a week-long music feast at the Sunken Garden packed with concerts, shows, fair booths, bazaars and a lot of other gimmicks sponsored by different UPD organizations, as organized by the University Student Council (USC). This year, the event titled No Fairmit No Rally! started on February 14 and ended on February 18.
I am among the people who yearly anticipate the UP Fair concerts. This year, I attended SchizoFairnia II, a bigger, better and bolder concert that featured performers from the mainstream rock genre covering pop rock and alternative rock and sponsored by the EMC2 Fraternity and the Circle of Entrepreneurs on February 17. The concert was a tribute to one of my favorite pop rock bands in the Philippines, the phenomenal (defunct) Eraserheads (E-heads). Kamikaze, Brownman Revival, Imago, Cambio, Sugarfree, Sessionroad and Kikomachine were among the bands that paid tribute to the E-heads that night. Each band rendered their own version of one E-heads song and performed two of their original songs. Francis Magalona was also there and performed the E-heads’ “Superproxy.”
As expected, the concert was a blast! To blend in with the crowd, a friend and I dressed like the typical Peyups stude: t-shirt, matching blue jeans and rubber shoes. Both of us partied until the break of dawn along with our fellow rakistas (rock concertgoer)—mindless of all the shoving, and the unruly, dandruff/lice-transmitting-head-bangers in the crowd.
Normally, the “uniform” of rakistas, me included, is a black shirt. It is a cool thing because you can wear it with a skirt, faded jeans, rugged pants or whatever suits your fancy. Some even put on Goth make up, black nail polish with matching beaded bracelets, bangles and assorted bling-blings, while some experiment with their hairstyle—a complete get up silently screaming “Punks are not dead!” at UPD, at least. Of course, the attire is not strictly applicable to all rock concertgoers: it really depends on what you feel like wearing on that special day.
At the nightly concerts, majority of the crowd wore a black shirt, like me. But, it is important to note that a rakista is different from a punkista (poser, rockstar wannabe or hardcore rakista—depending on how you would want to classify them) even though they are both wearing the prescribed “uniform.” A punkista has an exaggerated fashion sense. Some are covered with tattoos, wear multiple earrings or nose rings, or tattered jeans. Some have shocking hair colors like fuschia pink á la Chester of the foreign band Linkin Park or dreadlocks á la Bob Marley. The UP Fair crowd was fairly divided into rakistas and punkistas.
Moreover, a veteran concertgoer like me could easily identify the UP crowd and ordinary concertgoers from the dreaded “black shirt gangs.”
Who are these “black shirt gangs” anyway?
Some are notorious gatecrashers who refuse to pay the entrance fee in any rock concert, pick up a fight with the venue’s security, or literally destroy the barricades just to get in (explaining the chaos that happens yearly at the UP Fair concerts). On the other hand, some “black shirt gangs” pay the entrance fee and peacefully join the crowd. However, when their favorite band performs, they would immediately converge in the center to form what is called a moshpit, where they remove their shirts and do body slamming. Sometimes, amidst the body slamming, they would lift a lightly-built male over their heads and pass him among the people in the moshpit, much like a sacrificial lamb in a pagan ritual. At the UP Fair, a “black shirt gang” disguised themselves as ordinary students by wearing printed white shirts. When the band Kamikaze started playing their hit song Narda, they removed their white shirts (some changed into black shirts) and formed a moshpit. Then the crowd became unruly.
This occurrence is inevitable in any UP Fair concert since these events are open to the public. Although the entrance fee costs P75, which was slightly higher than last year, still, the Sunken Garden was jam-packed with people. It was a good thing the organizers and the UPD administration anticipated and prepared for the appearance of the “black shirt gangs.” In fact, the Office of the Vice Chancellor for Community Affairs deployed some members of the Special Services Brigade (SSB), some of whom I saw pacifying a large group of unruly “black shirt gangs” trying to break down the barricades.
Other than the commotion caused by “black shirt gangs,” the concert was super!
The UP Fair’s first night featured performers who have campaigned against political repression, sponsored by the Tau Alpha Fraternity. Other events include the following: Love is in the Fair, a concert of UP-based and popular artists sponsored by UP Gagayyem (February 14); Pop Fiesta, which featured artists from different genres, sponsored by the UP Alpha Sigma Fraternity (February 15); SISFIRE 4: Rebuilding Lives, Rebuilding the Nation, a night of reggae, alternative rock, R&B and pop featured top-billed and multi-awarded artists sponsored by the UP Sigma Beta Sorority (February 16); and Calibrated Pinoy Rock, the culminating night for this year’s Fair, which featured both UPD-based and popular artists, as sponsored by the University Student Council (February 18).
— Haidee C. Pineda