GROOVE: Canarchy

Student organizations that create their own material (videos, choreography, digital content,) perform it, and collect a wide fan base almost entirely own their own are sparse and a precious gem when discovered. It may be due to my relative newness on campus or general disconnect, but in the past month I’ve just discovered the high energy percussion group GROOVE. You may have heard of them as well, for they’ve been performing daily on the Diag in promotion for their recent and final performance of the year, Canarchy.

On a spur of the moment decision to attend with a friend on a Saturday night, I too strode into the Michigan theater and picked up a playbill from one of the parents of a GROOVE member, functioning as an usher. The moment I realized that this was so much cooler, respected, and worthy of my excitement came when the projector began playing a self-written, directed, edited and produced video on the screen to which the audience began to scream, hoot, clap, and cheer for. I turned in my seat to survey the audience and what I saw surprised me, the house was packed, floor and balcony.

This attendance, the amount of energy and excitement, the amount of support from students, parents, and apparent out-of-towners was justified in a two-part set in which digital shorts, live performances with collaborations from several dance groups, and audience-interaction pieces set the show on fire. The transitions between songs were seamless with an equally applauded jam-band filling with head-bob worthy improvisation.

Songs exploded in lasers, lights, STOMP-like trash can percussion, costumes, hilarious skits,  scaffolding climbing drummers, and of course smoke machines. Canarchy was exactly how GROOVE describes themselves: high-energy. The crowd screamed to the performers on stage with the same hysteric excitement of fans in the Big House. Gasps and hoots broke out when the performers crescendoed together to a roar or the lights surged to reveal flawless coordination or a flip to a set of black lights.

The group maintains a supportive alumni base that returns to Ann Arbor for shows, a dedicated group of parents that sell merchandise, and enough fans and friends to sell out the Michigan Theater. If this amount of backing isn’t enough proof of the phenomenal group, then one must simply read over the setlist as distributed in the playbill. Nearly every piece presented was arranged, selected, and performed by the student drummers exclusively. Not only must these percussionists perform with finesse and coordination on their instruments, they danced, acted, memorized lines, but they wrote the music themselves.

The final song performed included a pyramidal mountain of trash cans that were thrashed upon with passion. Every member of GROOVE was on stage, drumming with passion, sweat, and a fierce smile. The crowd screamed and clapped and gazed in awe of the lights, the smoke, the all-in-full-body sticking. The performers were entirely in sync with one another, listening to one another, feeling the rhythms, the pauses, the breaks. They beat their props in a frenzy and the song ended with a unified, coordinated boom on their instruments. The drummers raised their sticks over their heads in an “X” and grunted in unison. The stage lights were a fiery orange and the performers glistened with the pride of quite literally “leaving it all on the stage.”

What is incredible, what is laudable, what made my heart pound with excitement in the Michigan Theater Saturday night was the immediate jump to their feet the audience made in a standing ovation for GROOVE. We screamed, hollered, whistled, clapped, and stomped for these kids who had an outstanding show.

Whether you have heard of GROOVE or not, I cannot endorse them enough. The amount of musicianship, performance, and musical integrity executed in this group is exquisite. It was beautiful noise that flowed through, proving endless rehearsal. Canarchy blew me back in my folding seat and I cannot wait to be the first in line to buy a ticket to their next show.