Quick question: Did you know there was another concert besides Maroon 5 on Sunday night? To my surprise (and sadness, as I ripped up my A-Levine ticket), there was! In the quiet neighborhood that is College Ave., house number 106 held what turned out to be three incredible and fresh bands. The Fanclub concert’s headliner was Real Estate, a band from New Jersey, preceded by two opening bands: the awesomeAWESOMES and Madres de Juarez.

The show was set in the typical college house. The audience was in the living room — giving off the vibe of just hanging out, listening to your friends sing karaoke. The stage, a long dining room, was equipped with Baldwin Kruegan amps and Yamaha speakers with a tie-dye sheet acting as the backdrop.

This Ain't Maroon 5: Real Estate Performs

“You know you’re in competition with Maroon 5, right?” I asked Benj Gilman ’10 and Sebastian Helipern ’10 of Madres de Juarez as they were warming up. “Yeah, well people who listen to our stuff wouldn’t listen to their stuff anyways,” they responded. That statement couldn’t have been more true, except in the case of the few who had more heterogeneous tastes. While Maroon 5 had Barton Hall and $20 tickets, this show had kazoos and $1 beers for sale that no one was really keeping track of. And the aweomeAWESOMES made stickers.

For those of you who are freshmen, or at least freshmen to the underground world of music, Fanclub Collective is a group at Cornell that “puts on dance/folk/experimental/punk type shows,” according to their own description. They were praised by Jenny Eliscu in “Schools that Rock: The Rolling Stone College Guide” as “encouraging the development of a stronger indie rock scene in Ithaca … working to bring more obscure acts, and has succeeded in booking bands including Interpol & the Arcade Fire.” They are so indie-chill, that they describe themselves as being “kinda lax, but [they] aren’t the Cornell Concert Commission bringing things in for 200 people to vote on. [They] get things done … put on a lot of shows with not a lot of money.”

The fifty plus people that ended up coming to this show earned their indie stripes, all decked out in their flannel shirts, square glasses, skinny jeans and beards for the guys. One concert-goer even ironically remarked on how to dance in a typical indie fashion: “You stand still and kind of rock back and forth.” And like that, we were true hipsters.

First up on the bill was Fanclub Collective’s own Madres de Juarez, playing their first ever show. As their first of two songs began, they experienced some technical difficulties. After five minutes of getting things back on track, they thanked the audience for “sticking with us.” The audience, in a catatonic / indie trance, was ultimately too busy being mesmerized by their enchanting melodic sound.

After another break in the show it was the awesomeAWESOME’s turn to take the stage — comprised of Samuel Sveen ’10, Chris Bentley ’10 and Lauren Barbato ’10. The awesomeAWESOMES, who described themselves as the “next step of the Elsa and the awesomeAWESOMES empire,” continued the psychedelic trend of the evening with catchy chants and rhythmic beats. But just as the audience started to sway slightly, their short set was over.

Finally, Real Estate took the stage. The band, although fresh off a stint at CMJ and currently touring with The Girls every night until December 3rd, couldn’t seem more relaxed. Their personalities reflect exactly the type of music they produce.

Members of Real Estate include Martin Courtney (lead vocals), guitarist Matt Mondanile, Etienne Pierre Dugay (on the drums) and Alex Bleeker (bass player). For this show, they were promoting their newest release Underwater Peoples, which resonates with their “beach” vibe. While it’s laughable that they list “New Jersey” as an influence on their Myspace page, it just goes to show the power of any beach, even if it isn’t the exactly the Caribbean.

Instead of that typical whiny, emo “Why me?” sound, listeners were treated to a fresher, more enjoyable anthem. There is something incredibly powerful in a band’s ability to transcend the audience’s current location and transport them to a faraway (and warmer) place. Real Estate did just that for the packed audience.

As the audience walked into out of the College Ave. house and into the dark streets of Ithaca, everyone was in an almost peaceful state of mind, reminiscing on the eclectic, yet contrastive sound from one another. Perhaps even giving way to a stronger indie culture here at Cornell.