Iyaz gets students pressing ‘Replay’
Before he left the stage after his performance Tuesday, singer Iyaz had a message for everyone who attended:
“What did I tell you guys about music man?” he told the Minnesota State students in attendance. “We don’t even know the words but we still having fun with it.”
Iyaz was the headliner in the Student Events Team’s annual Spring Concert Tuesday night in the CSU Ballroom featuring Iyaz and Nur-D.
“College is so stressful, and people pay a lot to be here. The whole purpose of the Student Events Team is to just provide students with free or low-cost events where they can relax and have fun,” said Student Events Team Head of Concert Productions Maggie Driemeyer. “It felt full in there tonight, so I feel like we did our job.”
When it came time, Nur-D was ready. He came through with an energetic performance, getting the crowd involved on nearly every song. He just released his newest album “Crush,” and performed songs from said album, like “Big Boi,” “All My Friends Are So Hot” and the title track.
“We had Nur-D open for T-Pain a few years back,” said Driemeyer. “The crowd loved his performance and so it just worked out to have him back for the spring concert.”
Following Nur-D was 15 minutes of downtime before Iyaz took the stage by storm, coming out to one of his biggest hits, “Solo.” Along with “Solo,” he performed his song “Gonna Get This,” which features Miley Cyrus. The song was released in 2010 on the “Hannah Montana” soundtrack and peaked at no. 66 on the Billboard Top 100.
Iyaz also took another approach to performing Tuesday night. He called upon artists like the aforementioned Miley Cyrus, Bob Marley and Rema to show different parts of his life or beliefs. The Caribbean-born artist played the song “Three Little Birds” as an homage to Bob Marley and his birthplace in the Virgin Islands.
Along with that, he played Cyrus’ “Party in the USA” and “Calm Down” by Rema to emphasize the impact those artists had on his life.
Everyone knows his hit song “Replay,” and everyone knew it was coming. But Iyaz teased the hit song all night before ultimately letting the crowd hear what they came out for. Replay spent 34 weeks charting on the Billboard Top 100, peaking on January 9, 2010. The song also has over 700 million streams on Spotify alone.
Following the Spring Concert, the Student Events Team has two more events to look out for. The first is Second Chance Prom, going on in the CSU Ballroom this Saturday. The other is 1000 Ways to Win happening on April 26.
Header Photo: Internationally acclaimed singer Iyaz, pictured above, came to Minnesota State this week, dazzling singers with his renditions of party hits like “Replay” and “Gonna Get This.” (Dylan Long/The Reporter)
Write to Hayden Lee at hayden.lee@my.smsu.edu