Open Mic at Red Lion Café give students opportunities to express themselves

Deep in the underground of the College Avenue Student Center is the ever-famous Red Lion Café, most known for holding live shows of all kinds. The Association of Punjabi Students at Rutgers University (APRU) hosted its very first open mic last Thursday night.

“Mostly what we bring in is a Punjabi crowd but this time what we wanted to do was bring in an entirely diverse crowd and just give local talents a platform and an audience to let their name out and let them be known, said Krunal Patel, a School of Arts and Sciences junior and the president of APRU. “We wanted to try something different, (something) more community-service oriented.”

It was an awesome show with a wide variety of acts ranging from rap battles to one girl performing Bollywood and Bhangra dances, right down to the good old traditional acoustic guitar sets. There was something for everybody.

“I think the performances were great,” Patel said. “It wasn’t really an open mic night, it was more like a talent show … We just showed all the diverse talent that Rutgers has to offer.”

The hype was definitely there and the event ending up holding a full house, which was a much bigger turnout than the club had anticipated.

“We only thought like 25-30 people would be coming but … the crowd was even bigger than that,” Patel said.

People will always come out and enjoy open mic nights.

Everyone seemed to enjoy every minute. Feeling the rappers hot beats, watching the dances in awe and singing along to acoustic renditions of hit songs, including a few open mic must-dos such as “Riptide” and “Feeling Good." You could feel the love with the thunderous applause after every set.

Patel stated that APRU has a pretty big fanbase and usually hosts more formal events but is looking into hosting more community-service oriented events with the open mic being one of the first.