Manning Laundry (Sweater Weather)

I know what you're thinking -- who in their right mind would play live music in a laundry room? As it turns out, I know someone who did. My cousin played a live concert with his band in a laundromat on campus during college, just because they wanted to preform somewhere they wouldn't normally get to. Remembering that story, I thought I'd test it out here, and I can say that I'd host a concert here too. My voice bounced off the concrete on all sides, creating an almost ethereal reverb. It seemed to amplify my baritone ukulele and bring out the softness I was trying to emulate with my cover of the song I chose ("Sweater Weather," by the Neighborhood).

I picked that song partially because of the mention of clothing (low hanging fruit, I know), but partially because I had listened to it going back and forth from my dorm to this room to do my laundry. There's a playlist on my phone that I listen to whenever I do laundry, and that song seems to play almost every time I'm in here. As you can hear, I mess up quite a bit, but I was having so much fun with it that I didn't want to stop the recording to do it over again.

Socially, I'm not sure it would go over terribly well to preform a concert in the laundry room. It was awfully quiet when I went to sing there, most likely because it was a Saturday night. Still, aside from the sounds of the pipes overhead and the machines themselves, it seems to be a quiet space on campus, and I felt I was breaking some sort of unspoken rule by playing music there. I could hear people coming down the hall at times too, and afraid of what they'd think of me playing Sweater Weather at 10pm in a laundry room, I'd quiet down. However, I do think if it were planned, the space would make an excellent concert venue. The acoustics are unique, and since the space is so small, any performances there are bound to be rather personal. In theory, I'd come back and play here again, but in practice, and the context of people trying to sleep, I'm not so sure.