Electro house musician Steve Aoki will take the main stage at the Recreation Center on Friday night. “It’s wild; he’s wild,” Collective Effort Events owner and partner Johnny Kenny said. “He has great music, great energy and the guy’s just literally a Tasmanian devil running around the stage.”
Brenna Swanston
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Steven Hiroyuki Aoki, aka Steve Aoki, will shake up the Recreation Center on Friday night, electrifying the main gym’s stage with electro house music, snow machines and an assortment of cakes.
Aoki is currently headlining the Winter White Tour, presented by Collective Effort Events and Otter Productions. The tour travels all over the East Coast and makes a few pit stops along the West, including Honolulu, San Jose State University and Cal Poly.
Collective Effort Events owner and partner Johnny Kenny said Aoki’s performance style has earned his position in the top five touring acts in the electronic scene.
“His concerts are unlike anyone else who’s out there today,” Kenny said. “He’s very active.”
Aoki has incurred a reputation for his audience interactions, Kenny said. For example, he keeps three inflatable rafts on stage with him during his performances. Toward the end of his set, he pulls members from the audience, sets them on the rafts and sends them crowd surfing throughout the venue.
“It’s wild; he’s wild,” Kenny said. “He has great music, great energy and the guy’s just literally a Tasmanian devil running around the stage.”
Another classic Aoki gimmick involves a widely loved but seemingly unrelated baked dessert: cake.
Aoki brings 10 cakes to each of his shows and, throughout the night, “cakes” audience members, Kenny said.
His fans often show up with shirts and signs reading “Cake me.”
“These kids are literally begging to be caked,” Kenny said.
However, only a handful are chosen — and they are a happy handful indeed.
“A lot of the time, they leave and they’re all caked up, and they don’t even wipe it off of themselves,” Kenny said. “They love it so much.”
Biological sciences junior Jeff Shen will see Aoki live for the first time on Friday.
“I heard he feeds people cake,” Shen said. “I hope he has chocolate cake. I’m expecting a sweaty good time.”
Kenny said a good time is exactly what the crowd will get.
“Just forget about the world for four hours and, as one, dance and experience the show that is Steve Aoki,” he said.
Electronic artists Dzeko and Torres, AutoErotique and Max Styler will join Aoki on the Winter White Tour, which is intended to create a winter atmosphere inside its concert venues.
“It’s more than just a straightforward concert,” Kenny said.
Those entering the venue will be greeted by people dressed as yetis, who will also pose in photo booths and dance on stage. The production will incorporate fake snow machines, confetti blasts, elaborate light shows, hundreds of large white balloons and an optional all-white dress code for its audience.
“We’re trying to bring the winter vibe inside,” Kenny said. “We have an endless summer here on the Central Coast, so we’re trying to bring a taste of that vibe to the event.”
Otter Productions President Bruce Howard said while tickets are available to the general public, college students comprise two-thirds of the show’s ticket buyers so far.
Aoki’s genre of music is what Cal Poly students have been waiting for, he said.
“The feedback that we get from students, overwhelming feedback, is that they liked alternative music but wanted more electronic dance,” Howard said.
Associated Students, Inc. (ASI) supervisor of musical entertainment and business administration senior Gage McGinnis agreed that Cal Poly students have demanded electronic dance music, he said. Until recently, ASI has struggled to meet that demand.
“You have to have the perfect venue and a perfect time to do something like that,” McGinnis said.
ASI tested the waters of on-campus electronic dance music on Jan. 10 with DJ XXYYXX.
“It was awesome,” McGinnis said. “Kids really really liked it. It got them warmed up for what’s going to happen this Friday.”
The XXYYXX concert yielded two arrests for public intoxication on campus. To prevent another such instance at Aoki’s show, the venue will have increased security, McGinnis said. However, there aren’t many more preventative measures Cal Poly can take.
“It’s not like you can necessarily prevent something like that,” McGinnis said. “We’re not going to breathalyze thousands of kids before going into the concert. But we’re scaling up security, and (University Police Department) will be there and they’re going to have their eye out for something like that.”
ASI expects the event to be a hit, McGinnis said.
“We expect it to be fun,” he said. “It’ll be wild. Loud music. Lots of lights. Kids dress pretty funky for stuff like this. We expect kids to be excited.”
The show should pave the way for more big-ticket concerts at the Recreation Center, McGinnis said.
The Recreation Center used to house large concerts on a regular basis, but that hasn’t been the case since its renovation. Now, however, it is back in action.
ASI suspects the show will sell out soon, so students hoping to attend should buy their tickets in advance, McGinnis said.
General tickets are $50 and $40 with a student ID. The doors will open at 6 p.m. and the show will begin at 7 p.m.