0

By Tesha Ballard

“I feel good about being here in Lincoln. Never been out here, it’s my first time,” Ben J of New Boyz said in an interview with me after their show at Bourbon Street on Friday, Oct. 19th. “I like the people here, everyone’s chill.”

Although I was really excited to see them and get the chance to meet Ben J, I was disappointed with the concert overall. For one thing, The New Boyz only performed for an hour, disappointing many of their fans.

“I expected a lot more,” senior Sydney Claypool said. They were supposed to come out on stage around 10 p.m.  but didn’t walk on until 11:27 p.m. A lot of the crowd gave up and left before they came out – thinking that they were a ‘no show’.

The doors didn’t open until 7 p.m. so Sydney and I waited outside in the cold for about half an hour. Actually  we got a chance to meet the New Boyz as they came through the front doors, and got a hug and pictures from them.

After talking with their manager, he agreed that they would do the interview when they were “comfortable.” So after the doors opened Sydney and I waited inside and watched the opening acts, Young D Boy, and B.O.S.S. perform.

The opening acts didn’t really move a lot of people, almost everyone stayed in their seats, making the room feel a bit awkward. The crowd was shockingly small, mainly because the concert wasn’t as promoted as most other concerts. One of the workers informed us that they sold over 300 tickets but only 75-80 people showed.

Even as they came out on the stage both members didn’t seem as enthusiastic to perform as expected. The first few songs they performed were ‘Crickets’, ‘Crush on You’, and ended with their most well known songs “Backseat, and Better  with the Lights Off” Ben J, one of the group members interacted with the crowd most of the time, slapping hands, and singing towards the crowd and looking them into the eyes trying to get the few crowd they had pumped up. While Legacy, on the other hand was to himself and barely sang when he had to. Only towards the end of the show he began to interact with the crowd as Ben J did.

At the end they had planned to have an after party at Bourbon but admitted that they expected to have more people and were disappointed that they decided to move the party to another location. Back stage the New Boyz were squished inside a dimly lighted hallways to chat with fans. I managed to get through the crowd of girls that were taking pictures and taking shots with them to get an interview with one of the New Boyz, Ben J. Unfortunately with Ben J, it was hard to comprehend what he was saying after he answered her questions, with the fans trying to talk to them, and the DJ still playing. Only a couple of questions in, when asking about other artist he wants to work with Ben J gave conflicted answers, “Man I want to work with everybody, everyone out is good… I mainly want to work with Wiz (Wiz Khalifa)” Unfortuntely the New Boyz were getting bombed with fans trying to meet them, pushing me out of the way, so I didn’t even get the chance to interview Legacy with all the fans surrounding him.

Both of us were disappointed how things turned out for the New Boyz concert, but we’re looking on the bright side for up and coming concerts in the near future. Despite all the waiting, we had fun and enjoyed ourselves as we danced to the music of the DJ, meeting some new people, and getting the opportunity to meet such celebrities even if it was just a short amount of time.

We’re looking forward to some upcoming concerts like Boy II Men in November 9th and the Trey Songz concert November 30th, in Kansas City.