It’s official, ladies and gentlemen: Miguel is your headliner for Dillo Day 2015.
Although he has only released two studio albums, the 29-year-old R&B singer has accomplished quite a bit in his young career. While his debut All I Need Is You originally performed poorly upon its release, it later experienced a chart resurgence and spent 45 weeks on the Billboard 200 chart. Miguel’s second album, Kaleidoscope Dream, received critical acclaim, and netted the singer four Grammy nominations in 2013 and one win in the Best R&B Song category (for the track “Adorn”). He has also collaborated with several hip-hop artists, including Wale and J. Cole, and experienced a bout of infamy after a head-kicking accident at the 2013 Billboard Music Awards.
After releasing Kaleidoscope Dream, Miguel went on a three-year hiatus, where he released no music and performed very little. However, he released a 3-song EP in December of 2014, and announced that his third album, Wild Heart, would be released on June 30, 2015 – about a month after Dillo Day. He is also featured on A$AP Rocky’s newest single, “Everyday,” and he is certainly doing his part to step back into the spotlight.
“Timing is everything for us,” said Michael Bass, director of concerts for Mayfest. “We want relevant artists, we want cool artists, we want hot artists, we want artists making music within the year or two years. And that is Miguel.”
“His mysticism has risen a lot,” added Steven Goldstein, co-chair of promotions for Mayfest.
As the Dillo Day headliner, Miguel is certainly a departure from acts that have previously capped off the festival. Of the last five headliners, four have been rappers (2 Chainz, Wiz Khalifa, B.O.B., Nelly) and the fifth was an electronic artist (Steve Aoki). This year, however, Mayfest chose to head in a different direction from rap and EDM.
Much of this was due to an overall level of dissatisfaction from last year’s headliner, 2 Chainz, that Mayfest saw on their campus-wide Dillo Day poll (which a majority of campus responded to, according to Bass). Students were unhappy that he consistently played only one verse of several of his songs, and many felt that the show was “choppy.” The show was also problematic for other reasons.
“We did have an unprecedented amount of complaints last year from the Evanston community in regards to our sound levels with a hip-hop artist, but not only that but also the language from a hip-hop artist,” said Mayfest co-chair Justin Wolf. “So that was heavily taken into consideration.”
Miguel’s language isn’t exactly G-rated – his newest single “Coffee (F**king)” features the lyric “Pillow talk turns into sweet dreams / Sweet dreams turns into fucking in the morning” - but musically, Miguel’s act should be a big change from past headliners. His live act features a full band, and his performances have been lauded by critics and fans alike. He may not be as big of a name as Wiz Khalifa or 2 Chainz, but his show ought to be one of the more engaging and energetic sets Dillo Day has seen.
“A lot of his singles have been serviced to the radio, just maybe not at the prevalence and frequency of something like 2 Chainz,” Goldstein said. “Once it’s re-interpreted with the live band, and once it’s all put together for an hour and a half, people will realize how many amazing and critically acclaimed Miguel songs they know.”
“One of the things we didn’t love about 2 Chainz and [Steve] Aoki was that it was a guy and a stage,” Bass added. “We wanted a big experience, because whether fans know it or not, having a big band on stage changes everything. [Miguel] has a huge band, and it’s electric and it’s awesome.”
Tuesday night will also mark the launch of Mayfest’s official merchandise store, which can be found on the Dillo Day website. Mayfest also wanted to remind students to register for their student wristband, which students can do up until May 29. Finally, Mayfest’s official Dillo Day app is currently live, and there might be “a little surprise” in the future for those who download it.