Corefest helps New Brunswick-based bands get noticed

Corefest, the annual music festival hosted by 90.3 The Core, transformed the Cook Campus Center’s multipurpose room into every independent basement show-playing band in New Brunswick’s dream venue. Like Cinderella’s Ball, Corefest is an opportunity for bands that typically only play intimate shows in basements around Rutgers, to get on a real stage and play for a large audience.

Any given weekend in New Brunswick, there are students who morph into our favorite local musicians — playing rock or jazz or pop-punk shows, and once every year we get to cheer for them above ground thanks to 90.3 The Core.

“New Brunswick has a very vibrant local music scene, especially in terms of indie music, and indie-rock,” Business Director and DJ Matt Tomasello said. “(And) that is a lot of the music that The Core plays, so every year we bring some of the bands that are the most popular amongst our listeners and among our DJs together to have a big live performance.”

Corefest also boosts a diverse lineup every year, DJ Marcus Pescinski, a Rutgers Business School junior, said, who has worked with The Core and been part of Corefest since his freshman year.

And for the first time, Corefest hosted a nationally recognized band — A Great Big Pile of Leaves, who headlined the event.

“Lots of our friends are playing today so we’re really excited to see them play with A Great Big Pile of Leaves," Jenna Murphy, a Rutgers University Class of 2015 alumna said. “It’s a really big, fun show for everyone.”

Murphy and Lindsey Kelman, also a 2015 graduate, became friends through the underground music scene at Rutgers. They returned to Cook Campus to see some of their old favorites, which is Corefest’s real focus — to bring everyone’s favorite basement bands onto the main stage.

“We always went to shows in the basement community at Rutgers, so we wanted to come back and see our friends and other great bands like Dollys and Modern Chemistry,” Kelman said.

The day-long event also featured Puddle Splasher, Rita Fishbone and Milkmen.

The latter two bands won their spots at two separate Battle of the Bands events, that were hosted by popular New Brunswick basements Nowhere, USA and the Candy Barrel.

“The basement scene in New Brunswick as a whole is a really big piece of the city and a really unique part of the city,” Pescinski said. “You can go all over the country and you’ll find people who have heard about the underground scene at Rutgers.”

Bands come internationally and across the country to play in New Brunswick basements, Pescinski said, but he was even more excited to share his pride about the bands that come from the New Brunswick basement scene.

Being the bridge between Rutgers and the basement scene is a key part of The Core’s mission statement, Tomasello said. Part of working at 90.3 is representing the entire New Brunswick community’s music interests, and providing a main stage for the listeners and musicians alike is a large part of that.

“It was one of our favorite things to do here — it’s a great community, and it’s a really nice, safe, open space for everyone,” Kelman said. “And it’s really welcoming, it’s just a lot of fun — for us, it was the most fun thing to do at Rutgers.”