Eclectic Collective threw 8-hour Picnic Day music marathon

BY JULIE HUANG and MIRIAM RAMAKRISHNAN — arts@theaggie.org

On April 18, Eclectic Collective threw their annual Picnic Day house show, which ran from noon to 8 p.m. and featured nine bands. 

The show is a collaboration between Grace Lawlor, UC Davis alumna, founder and sole official member of Eclectic Collective, and Katya Jane Fomin, a master’s student at the UC Davis Graduate School of Management and founder of Velvet Red Productions. 

“Katya and I are good friends,” Lawlor said. “We've known each other since undergrad at Davis, and we both started separate event groups and have thrown various kinds of music shows.” 

Fomin and Lawlor have hosted other shows together but first began holding the Picnic Day event together in an official capacity two years ago. 

“We had 10 or 11 bands, and we had music from like 10 a.m. to 10 p.m.,” Lawlor said. It was really nuts. It's a really fun time. I love it.” 

The show originally started as a way to fill the demand for a music show that lasted all day, after the closure of the co-operative living space Turtle House left a vacuum in the music scene on Picnic Day. 

“There was always a big music show on Picnic Day,” Lawlor said. “It’s one of the best parts of the day. When Turtle House changed directions and wasn't a co-op anymore, we were like, okay, we still need this show to happen. It’s the best part of the year.” 

There have been complications before. The gun violence that occurred at Community Park on Picnic Day in 2025 caused Lawlor and Fomin to close their show early in order to protect the safety of all attendees. 

Though saddening, the difficult event did not permanently damage the spirit of the Davis live music community — this year alone, Eclectic Collective sold 1000 presale tickets for the highly anticipated Picnic Day show. The event also generated a high output of digital buzz prior to the event, amassing over a thousand likes on Instagram for the flyer, which all nine bands reposted.

“We sometimes get nervous about how large the show can get, but we’re going to be really calm and collected at the door, monitor the crowd and make sure that we get people out,” Lawlor said.  

Though Fomin and Lawlor are the principal organizers of the show, the musical event is made possible thanks to the help and support of volunteers, including their close friends and those who are interested in keeping live music accessible to the wider Davis community.  

“It’s super helpful having a team of people alongside us throughout the whole day,” Fomin said. “We have friends who want to volunteer, open the door and help with crowd control, which is so important. We're all together in this.” 

This was the first year that the Eclectic Collective show featured an elevated stage in the front yard. In the past, Lawlor and Fomin worked with a makeshift stage out of pallets, but they knew that they could improve upon the visual presentation and showgoing experience for both the bands and audience members. 

“Every year we learn more and more about how to hold a better show,” Lawlor said. 

Kian Abulhosn, a fourth-year music major and drummer for local Sacramento-based rock band First Name Basis, experienced feelings of excitement and anticipation about performing.

“It’ll probably be our most attended show,” Abulhosn said. “It’s a little stressful with all the organizational stuff, but we’re glad to be here. We want to play as much as we can and share music with as many people as possible.”

The show lasted from noon to a little after 8 p.m. as attendees mingled, wandering in and out of the area. However, the crowd maintained its large size throughout the day, and Fomin and Lawlor experienced no anxiety about keeping the atmosphere energetic and enthusiastic. 

“It's on Picnic Day, which is a well-established day in Davis, obviously,” Lawlor said. “Everyone wants to have a lot of fun and we know that there's going to be a crowd.”
In the middle of the second set, an hour into the show, police officers arrived to shut the event down. In response, Lawlor got on stage and asked audience members to applaud for bands that had flown in from New York and those who didn’t get the opportunity to play at all. Simultaneously, at the front gate, Fomin had managed to convince the sheriff to allow the show to continue, and the music kept going until its scheduled end. 

Fomin and Lawlor handpick the musical lineup themselves but expressed they understand that the music scene in Davis and surrounding areas is vast and varied. While the selection of music on Picnic Day does not encompass the entirety of local performers, their ultimate goal is to platform a diverse range of musicians while keeping audiences engaged. 

“We tried to tell ourselves we were going to have a smaller show, and then it turned out to be nine bands again,” Fomin said. “One year, we had eleven. So many amazing groups want to come here, and we want to showcase as many as we can.”

After the logistics are handled, what remains at the core of Eclectic Collective’s Picnic Day show, and each of their shows in general, is a deep-rooted love for Davis and the local music community, especially those who make it possible to continue holding such events.

“We're always so excited, and the past few years have been so big and grand,” Fomin said. “It's always so exciting to be around friends in our community on the biggest day in town.” 

Ultimately, the audience, the bands and the organizers are all crucial elements of the Picnic Day music show. Each person who comes through the Eclectic Collective space becomes a part of the process, making clear that events like these truly are a collective experience.

 “We come together every Picnic Day,” Lawlor said. “It's really fun. We're just here for the community.”

As always, this is not the last house show to be thrown in Davis, though those shows might be a little shorter than their Picnic Day extravaganza. Stay tuned for more Eclectic Collective events on their Instagram @eclecticcollective_, and those hosted by their collaborator, Velvet Red Productions, via their account @velvetredproductions.

Written by: Julie Huang and Miriam Ramakrishnan — arts@theaggie.org