From conception to execution, UC Davis community members share the immense effort that goes into creating a successful show

By EMME DUNNING — features@theaggie.org

Live music is a vital part of the social lives of many UC Davis students. A hub for backyard concerts, underground raves and local community music events, the Davis music scene has long been celebrated as a cornerstone of student culture. However, while many students and community members attend these events, far fewer truly understand the full extent of what it takes to put a show together.

Caden Velasquez, a UC Davis alumnus with a Bachelor of Art (B.A.) in international relations and the founder of the local music collective DRC Creatives, previously known as Davis Rave Company, is acutely aware of just how much is required to create a memorable show. He also understands that this hard work is often unnoticed by the average attendee.

“[Attendees] buy their ticket, they show up, they have fun and then they leave,” Velasquez said. “You’re maybe seeing 5% of the entire show.”

So what accounts for the other 95%? Velasquez asserts that the entirety of a show is a major production that can take weeks, if not months, to coordinate.

“It takes a lot of people and time to put on a show,” Velasquez said. “The first step of the timeline is the concept. What you want to do, what kind of vibe you’re going for, who you want to attract and what kind of product you’re trying to create for people.”

This stage of planning is crucial, Velasquez asserted, as all elements of a show must work together cohesively to be successful.

“It has to mesh very well, and a lot of that goes into comprehensive planning,” Velasquez said. “You just want to make sure everything is compatible, comprehensive and complementary because, in the end, that’s what’s going to make a really good show.”

After a general vision is established, organizers start coordinating more granular logistics.

“Once you have a location and a date and an artist and really a concept, you can start to reach out and get other third parties involved — like vendors,” Velasquez said. “A few days before the event you start getting more into meticulous itinerary planning and who’s gonna be doing what, at what time and where, with who — so you want to make sure that you’re orchestrating a team really well.”

Velasquez said that although this planning is essential to the success of a show, the most successful shows never let on to this massive effort.

“If you’re at a really good show, you should feel very immersed in the experience,” Velasquez said. “Never should you feel like you’re anywhere but that show.”

For Katya Jane, a UC Davis alumna with a Bachelor of Science (B.S.) in neurobiology, physiology and behavior, this behind-the-scenes work is a personal passion.

Jane is a former member of the locally renowned band Cowboys After Dark, her involvement in which propelled her into her current career as the founder and lead show producer for Velvet Red Productions. In this role, Jane is responsible for much of the logistics that go into creating a successful music event and is all too familiar with the sometimes lengthy planning process it brings.

“There are so many layers that go into it,” Jane said. “I personally like to have about a month in advance to plan all the gear, make all the arrangements and get a really good flyer that’s engaging and easy to follow.”

During this month, Jane also takes time to introduce performers to their potential audience through social media.

“On Instagram, I like to do spotlight posts,” Jane said. “I like to highlight every band and kind of talk about them individually before the show so that people know who they’re going to see.”

As the show gets closer, pressure to perform well can mount for both musicians and crew members. To combat the expected stress from this, Jane noted that having a solid and compatible team is essential.

“It’s a lot of people working on one thing so it’s really important to have camaraderie with the people that you’re working with,” Jane said. “There are so many moving parts, and it can get very chaotic. You have to make sure you’re able to communicate things efficiently and get a lot of people on board to do one big event. That’s how these events become big and awesome and so much fun is when everyone comes together and does their part.”

Nola Zimdars, a fourth-year design major, has taken a particular interest in creative marketing and poster design for local music events, particularly with ASUCD’s Whole Earth Festival. Zimdars asserted the importance of design in shaping the underlying message of a show and attracting a key player — the audience.

“Design is so important,” Zimdars said. “A good design catches people’s eyes. If you don’t have a good poster, who’s going to come to your event?”

Being part of the music scene through designing flyers and other promotional content allows Zimdars to engage with the creative community, despite not being a musician herself.

“I get to be creative,” Zimdars said. “I’m not musically inclined, but I get to participate in the process and then I still get to just be in the crowd and also feel like I’m involved in the creation. It’s super rewarding to work hard and see your efforts come to fruition.”

For Zimdars, a major goal of promotional design is to expand the reach of the show beyond those who might typically attend.

“We’ve been trying to make a much bigger effort to diversify where we put posters up because the music scene is for everyone, and everyone deserves to participate,” Zimdars said. “It shouldn’t just be the group that’s involved going and we’re trying really hard to make a broader range of people feel included and welcome in the space and just give more exposure to groups that might not normally have wanted to come.”

Once a show has been planned, booked and effectively advertised, the focus shifts to the performance itself and how to effectively capture the hard work of organizers and performers on and off the stage.

During the show, photographers and videographers play a vital role in ensuring the show is documented thoroughly and professionally, providing future promotional materials for artists and immortalizing memories for attendees.

Nik Wylie, a UC Davis alumnus with a B.A. in history, and JJ Noel, a former UC Davis student and Davis resident, work together to capture the unique energy of local shows. The pair work as full-time UC Davis staff members, shooting marketing content as a videographer and photographer respectively, but also hold a strong passion for the local music scene. Like many other players, they have a primary goal of contributing to the overall success of the show for both the artists and the audience members.

“Especially here in Davis, we’ve been pretty blessed with a lot of really good local bands who can play a really good show and a really fun show,” Wylie said. “Being able to take videos of those shows and how fun they can be — it’s really cool being able to share that kind of stuff.”

As a musician himself, Wylie hopes to accurately portray the atmosphere of a show through his videos to truly capture the experience as if it were live.

“I want to make it as representative as possible of what it’s actually like playing onstage,” Wylie said. “I’ve been in the crowd and I’ve been onstage, and the nice thing about video is being able to capture what it’s like being on stage and then representing that on social media. I think it’s very special to be able to do that.”

Noel echoed these statements and emphasized the importance of photography in capturing the true essence of a show.

“My motivation for doing photos of the local scene is really to shine a spotlight on them and show people how exciting these shows are,” Noel said. “Being able to do that for people who are students and just doing it for the passion of it […] is a really special thing.”

Noel asserted that the right visuals go a long way in making a show look professional and, in turn, elevating the perception of local shows and artists.

“[We want to] take something that [is] super grassroots and elevate it to a level of, ‘This could have been Green Day back in the day,’” Noel said. “It could’ve been anyone. It could’ve been a national act, and making it look and feel that way is our goal as marketing photographers and videographers.”

While Davis continues to be a hub for local artists and creatives to thrive, Noel fears that fourth-year planning members graduating and a recent loss of long-standing venues could pose a threat to the future of the local music scene.

“We’re losing houses that are willing to put on shows, and we’re losing music venues in Davis,” Noel said. “A lot of the people who made these incredible memories for us graduated and moved on.”

Although this shift presents undeniable challenges to the beloved music scene, Noel remains hopeful about the future. To keep this special scene alive for future generations of Aggies, he said that it will take initiative from everyone.

“This is something that anyone can do,” Noel said. “If everyone contributes to the community and everyone puts in a little bit of effort and believes in it, really amazing things can happen.”

Written by: Emme Dunning — features@theaggie.org

Involved parties discuss the success and scope of small-scale dating services on college campuses

By NOAH HARRIS — features@theaggie.org

At UC Davis, there is a relatively unknown and unconventional method for students to find love: Datamatch, a website initially started at Harvard University in 1994. Unlike Hinge or Tinder, which are mobile apps, Datamatch is a dating website unaffiliated with UC Davis where students can sign up, answer survey questions and be matched with other UC Davis students.

This year, 331 students, around 1.1% of UC Davis’ undergraduate population, used the website. Students log in using their university email, ensuring that only fellow students are permitted to use the website. Each year on Valentine’s Day, 10 potential matches will be presented to users, after which they can decide to “like” as many of them as they want. If both people “like” each other, they will be matched and have the chance to fall in love or, at the very least, have an awkward interaction via the site’s direct messaging feature.

Since its inception in 1994, the site has expanded to include 47 universities. This year, over 16,500 people signed up in total across the nation. In the recent past, Datamatch has experienced privacy issues, such as when a Harvard student released the Rice Purity Scores of Datamatch users and when UC Los Angeles students accessed the profiles of over 16,000 students.

While Datamatch has existed for three decades, it was introduced to UC Davis in 2021 from Nina Steinkemper, a 2022 UC Davis alum with Bachelor of Arts degrees in design and communications.

Steinkemper had friends that attended East Coast schools and who commented on their experiences with university-specific dating platforms.

“I was like, this sounds so cool,” Steinkemper said. “But I was also thinking, maybe UC Davis is just too big and it’s not gonna happen.”

Steinkemper submitted a request to Datamatch to add UC Davis, which was approved.

“I was reading more into this, and I slowly just started to realize that I’m the one who has to do all the work,” Steinkemper said.

After creating survey questions, Datamatch already had a system in place to gather student emails, which left most of the work in advertising.

“Basically, what they do is they write a code so they can get every single email from their student directory and they encourage every single university to do that,” Steinkemper said. “Just because you literally get your hands on thousands of emails.”

Steinkemper, with help from a Harvard student, attempted to find an easy way to email en masse.

“It wasn’t possible because our university is a public university, so the database is just way more protected,” Steinkemper said. “But then again, our university still has a directory where you can find [any] student. I have access to all this information, but now I’m realizing I’m gonna have to copy and paste. I did this for like three months while I watched lectures [and] watched TV.”

There were roadblocks that arose for Steinkemper with emailing thousands in the school directory, including only being able to use an email account affiliated with UC Davis.

“I was using just a generic Gmail [account],” Steinkemper said. “A lot of things would land in spam. So I think ultimately, it was really hard to not get the scammer vibe [from me]. That year, we had 790 students sign up.”

Steinkemper described different methods she used at the beginning of the Datamatch process.

“I went to this one thing that was just such a mistake,” Steinkemper said. “I went to a discussion [on Zoom] and I put the survey [in the Zoom chat] so people could do it immediately. After, I saw I got kicked out of the class. Then, I [got] an email from UC Davis administration saying that I have one strike on my admission. If I do it one more time, I’m gonna get kicked out of UC Davis.”

Through Steinkemper’s efforts, which included making a UC Davis Datamatch Instagram page, the following year, which was the second of the site’s existence, they were able to reach 1,504 student users, nearly four percent of the UC Davis undergraduate population. However, a few months later, Steinkemper graduated.

“I didn’t have anyone to pass it down to,” Steinkemper said. “I assumed that it just went away.”

The Instagram account became inactive and students no longer received emails from the Datamatch account. However, the entity itself stayed alive.

This year, one individual responsible for Datamatch’s advertising, who wishes to remain anonymous, explained their reasons for promoting Datamatch.

“I want to help out my fellow Aggies [and] some friends of mine,” the anonymous source said. “There’s all sorts of clubs at UC Davis, but it can be kind of hard for people to try to connect with somebody, and I’m not talking about a hookup or a one-night thing.”

Unlike Steinkemper, the anonymous source did not contact Datamatch or create the survey.

“I had no affiliation, I had no access,” the anonymous source said. “All I did was help with just advertising. I was trying to put the word out on YikYak.”

Chris Whites, a fourth-year art history major, joined Datamatch in 2024.

“I heard about Datamatch from a flyer on campus that had a QR code on it,” Whites said via email. “I signed up because I thought that it would be a fun way to meet new friends. I filled out the survey and got a few matches with some people but I never actually met up with anyone.”

However, the results of 2024’s Datamatch was not as successful as what was hoped for, according to the anonymous source.

“Unfortunately, the payoff wasn’t quite what I was hoping,” the anonymous source said. “It didn’t work. One of my friends was turned off by all the advertising. So they weren’t even interested and then other people said they didn’t like their matches. Only 331 people signed up to do this. There’s not going to be a lot [of options].”

While the future of Datamatch at UC Davis is unclear, there is a path for university-specific dating sites, with 38% of Harvard students using Datamatch and 25% of Cornell University’s student body using a site called Perfect Match.

The anonymous source was skeptical about the future of Datamatch, citing the lack of awareness and limited timeframe of the site.

“It’s not really that well known,” the anonymous source said. “The problem is, while I think it’s a really cool service, it’s only open one week of the year for Valentine’s Day, which is problematic.”

In the future, Datamatch could end up being a popular form of online dating at UC Davis. However, while Datamatch holds a presence on other university campuses, the percentage of users at UC Davis have been decreasing over the last few years. Whatever happens, Datamatch and similar small-scale dating services prove an interesting method of finding love in college.

Written by: Noah Harris — features@theaggie.org

The entirely volunteer-based event offers various crafts, vintage clothes and jewelry to community members at Central Park 

By RACHEL GAUER — features@theaggie.org

On two Sundays of every month, the fresh produce, bread and cheese booths that typically populate the Davis Farmers Market in Central Park are replaced by an array of handmade goods, vintage clothing and jewelry.

The Davis Craft and Vintage Fair has become Davis shopping staple, allowing local businesses and vendors to collectively sell their specialized goods in a prime location downtown. Items that are frequently on sale at the event range from handcrafted journals and notebooks to carefully curated vintage clothing pieces. Accompanied by alternating local bands and a food truck, the craft fair offers a unique market for any shopper looking for a Sunday stroll.

Debra Ariola is the director of the Davis Craft and Vintage Fair and the owner of  Recollections Vintage & Pre-Loved Items, a business reselling vintage jewelry at the fair. Ariola, who has lived in town since the 1970s and is a UC Davis alumna, highlighted the appeal of Davis that draws vendors to participate in the fair.

“We have amazing volunteers that come from as far as Auburn and they are committed to our community,” Ariola said. “It’s amazing how charmed people are by Davis and how much we are a great community that people want to be a part of.”

The events originally began in 2012 as Square Tomatoes Craft Fair and offered exclusively crafted goods. Though the quirky name was certainly memorable, Ariola said it brought both some confusion and limited the offerings to only handmade goods.

“Many people came looking for tomatoes: We thought we either would have to start crafting tomatoes -– square ones — so we can say, ‘There they are,’ or we could change the name,” Ariola said. “We decided to change it to Davis Craft and Vintage Fair to be very clear about what we are and who we are.”

Ariola highlighted that the event is organized entirely by volunteers — vendors who choose to volunteer have greater priority in securing a competitive spot for a booth.

“As a director who is also a vendor it has been very important to me to have this group of volunteers,” Ariola said. “It has made the fair and grown the fair so much from what I can do just by myself — I have a great group of people who are totally committed to keeping this fair going.”

The fair’s team of about 30 volunteers do everything from local advertising to running their various social media pages. Emily Avalos and her husband are part of the team, installing lawn signs to advertise the event around town.

Avalos is the owner of Emily’s Crochet Corner and began selling her handmade crocheted plushies at the Craft and Vintage Fair in 2023. She said that the fair has offered her a sense of belonging and community unique to Davis.

“I knew that Davis was a community-based town, but once we started doing the craft fair, I found that not only are all of the people who are part of putting on the event are extremely kind and welcoming, but also the community has been really great, especially all of the college students,” Avalos said. “It’s always lots of fun to see people come in and get excited about the things in my booth and I start recognizing regular customers and build a rapport with them.”

The fair also partners with local non-profit Couleurs Vives Art Studio & Gallery, a Davis organization that offers art classes to neurodivergent adults at their downtown studio. In addition to being a key sponsor, Couleurs Vives also offers a booth at the fair to allow the artists to sell their work.

Kim Nguyen, the director of Couleurs Vives, explained the intention behind this unique experience for the artists.

“It’s an opportunity for them to be a part of their community and not feel a stigma,” Nguyen said. “My goal is for these artists to come and showcase their talent and learn to communicate with the people in the community.”

Nguyen, who began partnering with the fair in 2018, emphasized that the work sold at the booth and any donations made go directly to studio space.

“The proceeds go to the artists themselves, and the money we raise covers the expenses that go into the studio –– the supplies, the rent, everything,” Nguyen said. “The [artists] come to work at the studio and it is all free for them.”

Outside of the Sunday events, Nguyen explained that Couleurs Vives and the Craft and Vintage Fair work to mutually benefit each other: The organization assists financially to host the fairs and vendors volunteer to teach classes at the studio.

“The vendors teach at our studio and encourage the artists to be touched on their creative side,” Nguyen said. “It’s good for the vendors to have an understanding of these special artists and how they think and that they are capable of being creative and successful at doing what they do — they learn about people who are neurodivergent and the neurodivergent learn from them.”

The Davis Craft and Vintage Fair hosts the event twice a month on Sundays from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. at Central Park in Downtown Davis. For more information on regular vendors and the fair’s history, visit the Craft and Vintage Fair’s website.

Written by: Rachel Gauer — features@theaggie.org

UC Davis students discuss what image of UC Davis best represents the school and its history

By AMBER WARNKE — features@theaggie.org

The debate over whether or not the cow should replace Gunrock as the UC Davis mascot has been going on for years. In 2022, 73% of students voted to change the mascot to a cow in the spring elections for the ASUCD. However, concerns over how difficult re-branding would be, as well as what alumni would think, led to the choice to institute the cow as the ASUCD mascot, rather than as the UC Davis mascot. Nevertheless, the debate about which mascot would better represent the UC Davis community has lasted since this decision over two years ago. 

Diego Tolliver, a third-year materials science and engineering major, weighed in. 

“I think the cow is just a better representative of the spirit of the school in general,” Tolliver said. “Everything is cow-themed already. And the mustang is kind of a thing of the past.” 

Tolliver proposed “Bucket” as a name for the potential cow mascot, and suggested that another reason the cow is the right mascot choice lies in how people often perceive UC Davis. 

“I’ve heard of people kind of using ‘Davis as a cow school’ as a little bit of a derogatory thing,” Tolliver said. “But if we were to change our mascot to a cow, it would be kind of reclaiming that.”

Tolliver also pointed out that the cow mascot would suit Davis’ agriculture-heavy culture. 

“I think it would be better to have a cow,” Tolliver said. “[Horses] are not as much of an agricultural thing as cows are, so that fits that a lot better.”

Jack Manly, a fourth-year history major, takes a very different approach to the issue. 

“There is no such thing more agricultural than a horse,” Manly said. “It was horses that were used historically to till the fields, pull the plows, take farmers from one place to another. Horses have been an integral part of agriculture since we tamed them. I see no reason why we should switch to a cow.” 

Manly went on to clarify the reasons behind his opinion. 

“I think [Gunrock] then and still now represents the ideas of Davis as a campus and as a community,” Manly said. “I think it’s important also that we honor our history, which I feel strongly about as a history major.” 

The real-life Gunrock was actually named Gun Rock and was a Thoroughbred, not a Mustang as the current mascot is. Gun Rock was born in 1914 to Rock Sand, the British Triple Crown Winner in 1903. He lived at UC Davis from 1921 to 1931, and while he did compete in races, Gun Rock did not land any significant wins. Instead, he was mainly considered valuable as a breeding horse. During his time at UC Davis, Gun Rock was bred with a whopping 476 mares, siring many notable racing horses.

Manly considered Gunrock a valuable symbol that represents UC Davis students. 

“I think Gunrock represents the hardworking and motivated drive that all Aggies possess when it comes to academics,” Manly said. “Speaking from my personal opinion, I view horses as animals that have that drive, that motivation. Cows don’t evoke the same image. They evoke a wandering laziness, which is not what I believe that Davis currently represents, has represented in the past or will represent in the future.”

Manly also reflected on his experience as the Gunrock mascot at the 2024 Big West Conference basketball game. 

“It’s hard to not feel connected when you are the embodiment of something, even if for a short period of time,” Manly said. “Being inside the Gunrock costume has only amplified that connection and passion I feel for it as a mascot.”

Grace Zuroff, a first-year graduate student at the School of Education, said she considers Gunrock to be unique from other university mascots. 

“What other school has an anthropomorphic blue horse as their mascot who’s ripped AF?” Zuroff said.

She believes that Gunrock, standing apart from any other mascot, captures the spirit of UC Davis in a special way. 

“It plays into the beauty of Davis in that we may not be like the biggest UC, but it’s still something that makes us fun and quirky,” Zuroff said.

Zuroff also acknowledged that having Gunrock represent UC Davis in athletics was more fitting than a cow, since cows don’t “really strike fear into other schools.” 

However, one hangup she had about Gunrock was his representation in the infamous “Daddy Gunrock Senpai” fanfiction, which has been widely circulated on Instagram since 2021. 

“The fan fiction and the fan art did not make me proud to be an Aggie,” Zuroff said. [That’s] one thing I want to be remembered by.”

Benton Buecker, a second-year environmental policy and planning major, also spoke to the way the mascot should represent UC Davis culture. However, he feels that cows better capture this spirit. 

“Davis for the most part is this chill little college town where we have tons of access to nature,” Buecker said. “And I think that if we want to attract new students, I think that we should lean into the cow messaging.”

Buecker continued to describe the lack of connection between the student body and the current UC Davis mascot.  

“I don’t think many people have any sort of emotional connection to Gunrock,” Buecker said. 

Buecker believes that the merchandise already being more cow-focused points to the existing affection students have for cows over Gunrock and pointed out how other schools’ mascots represent their cultures more closely. 

“You think of UC Santa Cruz, they’ve got the banana slugs, which I think is hilarious because it totally fits with their Redwood, laid-back vibe,” Beucker said. “And I think for Davis, we should have a mascot that represents our vibe and our campus, which I don’t think a blue horse does very well.” 

He also criticized the need for mascots to be “hyper-masculine predator-type things,” believing that a cow might change that stereotype.

“The mascot should be a cow because, sorry, Gunrock, you’ve been dead for a hundred years,” Buecker said. 

Manly stands in opposition to this viewpoint and wanted to make something clear.

“There is a room in the heart of the Aggies for both Gunrock and the cow,” Manly said.

“There is room for both in this ecosystem.”

Written by: Amber Warnke — features@theaggie.org