WRMC’s annual fall SOS (start of school) Fest brought neighs, ribbets, and everything in between on Sept. 13. The show was headlined by bands Frog and Horse Jumper of Love.
The opener, Shaggo, hails from Brooklyn, NY. The feminist punk band is led by Middlebury alum Lucy Rinzler-Day ’21, who described her experience playing on campus as “surreal.”
When WRMC reached out to her, she was filled with excitement at the idea of playing at her alma mater.
“I was like absolutely, anything to give back to the WRMC community. Being back here has been a dream, honestly,” Rinzler-Day said in an interview with The Campus.
During her time at Middlebury, Rinzler-Day studied sociology and film. She was a part of social spaces and extracurriculars like The Mill, the Mischords, WOMP and WRMC’s executive board. She spoke about how her time as a student heavily influenced her music journey, citing how some of her academic readings influenced her lyrics.
“I really believe in college radio,” Rinzler-Day said. “I had such a positive experience with WRMC and I feel like my friends there and upperclassmen really influenced my music taste, and overall Shaggo inspiration.”
The first headliner, Frog, was an indie rock band from New Rochelle, NY. Their sound can be described as a unique alternative spin on indie folk rock; their performance was a blend of piano solos and naked, twangy vocals that bled through with emotional lyrics.
“I love his voice, it was froggy but in the best way possible, it broke at the perfect moments. They are a very talented band,” audience member Kana DeCoste ’27 said.
The band’s upcoming project “The Count” will be released on Sept. 19, marking their seventh album since their self-titled debut back in 2013.
The second headliner, Horse Jumper of Love, or Horse Jumper, hails from Boston, MA. They took to the stage bathed in blue and purple light. Their heavy shoegaze noise rang out in waves over the crowd, some were even moved to tears by the mellow lyrics and intimate atmosphere.
“I love Horse Jumper, the best part was the last song. I cried!” audience member Devin Santikarma ’25.5 said.
The artists balanced each other out: Frog erring on the side of upbeat meshed well with Horse Jumper’s low and slow sound following beautifully behind.
Violet Gordon ’26 is the Co-Concert manager of WRMC this year, along with Ellie Trinkle ’26.
The two are in charge of allocating funds from their budget to the multiple events WRMC sponsors throughout the year, as well as determining which artists meld well with Middlebury's music sphere and coordinating performances.
“Ellie and I are two of the biggest concert fanatics on radio, we love going to shows together so we are so excited to do this at Middlebury and bring artists that we want to see to school, ” Gordon said in an interview with The Campus.
“Planning a one day concert like SOS Fest can take several months and lots of communication between agents, artists, and companies,” Gordon said. “It’s a lot of long email chains between us and the artist's agents. For this concert, we started reaching out to artists back in May and early June.”
College shows may not always have the biggest names in music, but they still provide some of the best social spaces throughout the year, WRMC Co-Presidents Neel Shah ’26 and Matthew Held ’26 said.
“My personal ideas around college show booking is that [the artist] should be someone that we are excited to see at Middlebury first, not to worry too much about name recognition or how big the artist is, as long as it's someone we are excited to see,” Shah said.
Held agreed. “I’m grateful that there’s an understanding in the Middlebury community that even though we may not have the biggest budget or the biggest artists, people trust that it will still be a good show,” he said.
Since the shows put on by WRMC have no profit incentive, there’s less stress about the number of people that show up. “We can just all enjoy music together,” Shah said.
“It would be really cool to see people be a lot more open to going out and seeing the show, even if you only know one song,” Shad said. “One of my favorite things is going to concerts where I have never heard of the artist before and being absolutely blown away by them.”
Both Shah and Held have been involved with WRMC since their first years on campus. They hope to keep the organization as welcoming for others as it has been for them.
“We want to keep WRMC a warm and accepting environment. Everybody has a space at WRMC, regardless of what you are into. Weirdos are welcome, freaks are welcome, in the most loving way. College radio is all about having a space for different lifestyles and different people,” Held said.
Editor's Note: Ellie Trinkle is the Senior Arts & Culture Editor. She had no involvement in editing this story.
Norah Khan '27 (she/her) is an News Editor.
Norah has previously served as a Arts & Culture Editor. She is majoring in Political Science and English, with minor in Spanish. Outside of The Campus, she is involved with Matriculate as an Advising Fellow and the Conflict Transformation Collaborative as a Conflict Coaching Peer Facilitator.
