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On Friday, six student bands—Protein Shake, Obasi-Shaw, Foxpack, Shitzu-Jujitsu, the Lighthouse Keepers, and Catch of the Day—drummed, strummed, and sang it out in the Queen’s Head Pub for the opportunity to open for Yardfest. After a night of music ranging from sultry jazz to spirited alternative rock, the crowd voted The Lighthouse Keepers and Protein Shake as Yardfest 2016’s student openers. The Roving Reporter caught up with a few of the bands after the show.

Cole D. Toner ’16 (drummer, Protein Shake)

Roving Reporter: How do you balance football and music?

Cole Toner: It’s tough. We’ve played with each other since we got to the Quad—there’s a recording studio in the SOCH, so we started jamming there. We loved doing that, and we decided sophomore year, “Hey, we’re going to play Yardfest senior year, we’re going to try it.” We have less of a time commitment for football now, since we’re seniors. Two of us are done, and two of us are just doing the NFL workouts in the morning. It’s a lot of fun.

RR: What kind of music do you like to play most?

CT: We’re mostly just a rock band—a little indie—but we haven’t jammed together for that long. We’ve practiced probably 10 songs and played five here. But we like all types of music; a lot of us are very musically smart guys. I want to say a special shoutout to Scott Peters [’16], our guitarist, who broke a string in the first song and transposed down a key the whole time. Still played every note right. If he wasn’t a genius, we wouldn’t have had a show.

RR: If you could have any professional football player in your band, who would it be?

CT: Andrew Luck. He’s a smart guy [who] appreciates music too. I don’t know if he plays any instruments, but I’m sure he can learn. His personality seems a lot like ours—a little goofy, smart, has a lot of fun.

Daniel L. Winshall (Boston Arts Academy; bassist, Foxpack), Jas H.E. Kayser (Berklee College of Music; drummer, Foxpack)

RR: How did you first meet as a band?
Daniel Winshall: Claire Dickson [’19], the lead singer, brought us all together. I met her at summer camp.

Jas Kayser: I did too. The same summer camp, in 2013.

RR: How long have you been playing together?

DW: About a week.

RR: Where do you guys see yourselves going in the future?