Hoboken has a rich music history, from its favorite Frank Sinatra to the iconic underground venue Maxwell’s, and in modern days Stevens students have become a unique subset of the Hoboken music scene. There are a variety of clubs and extracurricular activities where students can express their own creative talents or take in the Stevens’ music scene. The Stute spoke to Chloe Brenna (she/her), affiliated with Stevens Underground Music Appreciation Committee (SUMAC) and campus radio WCPR, and Shelly Ferina (she/they), President of the Audio Engineering Club (AEC) about the current state of local music.
Both Brenna and Ferina commented on the niche that Stevens’ musicians find themselves in; while live music is still present in Hoboken, it’s more subdued since the closing of Maxwell’s in the 2010s. Young performers can still find gigs at a select few bars: Willie McBride’s, 8th Street Tavern, and Farside Tavern, though these are limiting because the under-21 crowd can’t support all of their friends. “For being such a cool, vibrant, young city, Hoboken is seriously lacking young music… there is no sense of scene, if there is, Stevens is not connected to it,” Brenna comments. Current Hoboken nightlife is much more receptive to 80s rock cover bands, and is less so a place for young people to try out their own sound. Student performers instead find gigs in New York City, or at on-campus events, making Stevens a diverse and vibrant place for Hoboken music culture to develop.
AEC hosts open-mic nights frequently throughout the semester, giving any student who wants to perform the time and space to do so. Ferina reports that most acts perform with a full-band setup, though others use backing tracks. Many performers are rock artists, fitting with their Hoboken ties, though the proximity to New York and the fact that Stevens students are often not native to the area allows for a wide variety of influences. Open mics on Babbio Patio allow for any student or Hoboken resident to stop and enjoy the music, and the view cannot be oversold. “There is nothing quite like playing a show in front of the NYC skyline; Hoboken has a magical feel to it,” says Ferina.
While many of the performers are students in the Music and Technology program, SUMAC, AEC, and WCPR provide a place for interested students to create and enjoy music separate from their studies. Ferina describes how the lessons she learns in class “have become increasingly relevant to the ways that I approach music.” The curriculum offers extremely practical lessons for aspiring musicians, with classes in music theory, recording, private lessons, and extracurricular performances that allow students to independently manage their equipment and set up for a show. The scene remains accessible to those outside of the program: Brenna is an Engineering Management major and attributes the passion for creating music of many Stevens students as a means of coping with rigorous academic demands. The people who make up the community are fundamental to the overall experience of the scene, according to Ferina: “This community is a special bubble that feels fairly separate from the rest of campus culture, as we all know each other and work together. I believe that students who walk by and unexpectedly hear live music are naturally drawn to our events. The music and the free pizza are then an incentive to stay. The consistent people who run the events or play at them, however, come for the community.”
Brenna said that, in choosing bands to perform on campus through SUMAC, she chooses ones that people “need to hear, I wish more people knew about them,” many of the artists being LGBTQ. These acts fall under the broad spectrum of alternative, from bubble-grunge, indie-alt, and shoegaze, to hardcore metal. Because underground music, by nature, features lesser-known bands, Brenna’s objective when choosing acts is to introduce listeners to their potential new favorite band. She suggests students who attend local concerts scout out bands that might be interested in performing and refer them to SUMAC, describing how speaking to Hotline TNT after a show she attended led to them performing last semester. She hopes that Stevens can foster the music scene by making these shows more open, as it was pre-pandemic. The Stute reported in March 2003 that a five-hour SUMAC show in the Bissinger room hosted 300 people, an estimated 50 of those being Stevens students.
Stevens is an integral part of the evolving Hoboken music scene, especially as a place for the under-21 crowd. Organizations like AEC and SUMAC have been contributing to the scene for decades, building a lively, eclectic community for music culture and young talent to thrive.
