As October draws to a close, Canes After Dark Halloween is bringing pumpkins, candy apples and a haunted house to campus Friday.
The SAC, UC and UC Patio will be packed with activities including a psychic, henna tattoos, mask decorating, and roaming performances by UProv, UM’s improvisation group.
Quantum Entertainment will present “The Rocky Horror Picture Show” at midnight, when all the other events wrap up, at the Cosford Cinema.
But the act to see this Friday will be on the Patio from 9 to 11 p.m. when two local bands, Nag Champayons and the Patacon Conspiracy, unite. Both bands have performed on the Patio stage this semester as part of the Thursday “Patio Jams” afternoon concert series. For this event, they will be doing a longer set and merging forces to feature artists and music from both bands.
Nag Champayons is a 10-year-old project that has been the dream of bassist Ed Cardona, guitarist Jose Elias and keyboardist Ryan Cacolici.
Cardona and Cacolici worked together at a record distribution center where they would get samples of world music that would not sell.
“Nobody wanted to hear, like, the cool Afro-beat stuff, but we would,” Cardona said.
With these albums as inspiration, they brought on Elias, who had Afro-Cuban roots, and started a “world-garage” band.
The band picked up speed, attention and new members. Champayons is constantly evolving and acquiring new musicians, instruments and members.
One of the latest additions to the band is Colombian rapper, producer and conga drummer Ephniko Dialecto. After jamming with the Champayons for about a year, he has become a regular part of their show.
He also has his own band called the Patacon Conspiracy, which draws its name from the traditional Caribbean dish – that’s their flavor.
Nag Champayons categorize themselves as “afrogalactic tropidelic,” and there is no better way to describe them. The members are multicultural, drawing musical roots from Afro-Cuban, psychedelic rock, rap, jazz, folk and just about any other genre that can be named.
Ephniko and the Patacon Conspiracy are more world-beat hip-hop. Again, the diversity of Patacon is its draw with the Latin as well as hip-hop beats and bilingualism.
Both bands are strong believers in improvisation as one of the most righteous forms of expression because, at that moment, the music is “the most modern art [being] made” Cacolici said.