In 2019, Texas Tech announced enhancements to the football fan experience on gamedays, as they do nearly every year.
However, the biggest focus of the 2019 announcement was the complete revamping of Raider Alley. It was moved to the engineering key and the biggest addition was a stage for pre-game concerts. The first season was strictly Texas Country artists with Hogg Maulies, William Clark Green, Grant Gilbert, and Kyle Park among those who played free pregame shows.
In 2020, the festivities were obviously put on pause but in 2021, the shows returned in full force with a Shaq DJ Set kicking the season off as well as performances from Waka Flocka Flame, George Clinton & Parliament Funk, Josh Abbott Band, and Bowling For Soup. Last year was another great and varied run of shows with performances from Grouplove, 24kGoldn, Jon Wolfe, NGHTMRE, Tone Loc, Gin Blossoms, and Paul Wall.
So, hot off the heels of two solid years of shows and heading into my last year of undergrad at this great university, I decided to finally do something I’d been wanting to do for a long time. Go to every show and rank them from worst to best. I tried doing it last year but ended up not being able to make it to a handful of shows for a variety of reasons. This year I was fully committed, and it was a rough year to do so.
Look, I won’t beat around the bush. The Raider Alley bookings this year weren’t amazing. The hit-to-miss ratio is the worst I think it’s ever been in the three years it’s been around since I’ve been in Lubbock but look, it’s free live music, it was a ten-minute walk from my apartment, how was I gonna say no?
I had two rules for myself for the entire season: first, stay for at least 30 minutes of the band or artist’s show. Second, stand as close as you can to the soundboard for all the shows for the best view of the stage and the best sound.
Before I begin this list and with those rules in mind, it is with great sadness that I report that Smash Mouth will not be included in this list as I got to Raider Alley with barely enough time to see them play the end of their cover of Rick Astley’s Never Gonna Give You Up and their hallmark, All Star. I will say though, those two songs were a blast.
Without further ado, here is every Raider Alley show I saw in 2023, with the exception of Smash Mouth, ranked in order from worst to best:
5: Lit
When Lit was announced as the opening performance for Raider Alley in 2023, I knew it was gonna be rough but I had no clue just how bad it was actually going to be. I am not exaggerating, Lit is one of the worst concerts I have ever seen in my life. I’ve been to funerals that I enjoyed more than I enjoyed seeing Lit. I would rather forcefully give myself papercuts in between all of my fingers than see Lit perform live again. Lead singer A. Jay Popoff was about as on-tune as I am trying to sing in the shower and his brother, lead guitarist Jeremy Popoff was the cheesiest guitar player I’ve ever watched play, leaning back and staring at the sky with his guitar pointed towards the sky too for every. single. solo. of which there were many. Lit was so bad it was almost sort of commendable, but if Lit is ever in your city, please don’t go. Save yourself.
4: Louie TheSinger
Louie TheSinger is an absolutely hilarious on-stage presence. If his entire show was just stand-up comedy, I would be snatching tickets anytime he was anywhere near me. Unfortunately, the majority of his set is his music which isn’t great live. Louie is branding himself as a country singer, even signing with UMG Nashville a little over a month ago. I have no issue with that as his music was at least pretty unique and interesting, with country roots with a Mexican and Spanglish flair. My issue with it is that if he wants to continue making country music, I hope he’s in a spot soon where he can have a full band behind him. This is just me personally but I got absolutely nothing out of him singing his songs with a DJ behind him playing mp3s of the exact same songs. The music wasn’t bad, the banter was incredible, but he still left a lot to be desired.
3: Vanilla Ice
Playing the most crowded Raider Alley show I’ve attended since Shaq’s DJ Diesel show, I wanted to hate Vanilla Ice and part of me still doesn’t look back at the set fondly, mainly because of how uncomfortably loud it was. So loud that I could hear his set from my apartment as I walked over. But man, the more I look back, the more I wish I could’ve seen more. While I was at his set, I only saw Vanilla Ice perform the end of Ninja Rap then got full performances of Play That Funky Music and Ice Ice Baby before he spent the rest of his hour-long slot DJing, dancing, and keeping the energy high. I originally complained about that in the show’s immediate aftermath but he did a damn good job of that. While I did only get to hear him play two and a half of his own songs, the DJing portion of the set was an absolute blast as he still had his full band playing behind him. Would I ever pay to see Vanilla Ice again? Probably not. But I cannot lie to you guys and say I didn’t have a good time.
(I will add though, 56-year-old Vanilla Ice grinding in the middle of a bunch of college girls on stage is probably the first thing you see when you get to Hell.)
2: Cory Morrow
Mere hours after Lit stepped off stage, it was announced inside Jones AT&T Stadium that Cory Morrow would be performing at Raider Alley the following week. I was thrilled as Morrow is someone that I’ve been a fan of for a long time and at that point it had been eight years since I had seen him last. I was very biased going into this, all Morrow had to do was walk on stage and sing his songs and it was gonna rank pretty high on this list.
Morrow is always such a blast to see. He’s always extremely enthusiastic and energetic and he exudes such great positive energy from the stage. Getting to hear Lonesome and 21 Days live is always such a treat and this is the only show where I was truly bummed I didn’t get to see the entire thing (following a huge fiasco getting into the Oregon game, I didn’t want to take any chances). It was made even worse by the fact that I couldn’t make it to his Cactus Theater show in November, even if it was an acoustic set. I hope it doesn’t take another eight years of waiting before I can see Morrow again because he brings the heat every time.
1: Slim Thug and Mike Jones (WHO!?)
Yeah, there was no other option. The second this show got announced I knew it was gonna be in the top spot and it did not let me down at all. No other Raider Alley show this fall came anywhere close, even with the last 15 minutes of Mike Jones’ set being all new material that did not connect with the crowd at all. The pacing was a little odd too with Slim Thug starting with a 30-minute solo set, then Mike Jones entered the stage as the two performed Still Tippin, then Mike Jones took the rest of the time left for his own solo set. While I wish the two could’ve performed together the whole time, I was still extremely pleased with the end result.
In a weird situation where we played a nationally televised game on a Thursday, I don’t think anyone got me more hyped for a game all season than this set did. The two understood the assignment to a T. Slim Thug opened with Thug and ran through bangers like Welcome 2 Houston, I Run The Streets, and Like A Boss. He also was sure to include I Love This Game which features a sample of Fight Raiders, Fight from the Texas Tech Goin’ Band. The performance of Still Tippin right in the middle of the set was the perfect segue for Jones to enter and it kept the energy level high as he ran through his own gamut of bangers: Mr. Jones, Flossin, Next to You, and of course, Back Then. All of them rapped word for word with a ton of enthusiasm. Along with that, the energy that Jones performed with was second to none. While his set did lose a bit of steam at the end, it was still fantastic.
I’m not sure what the future of Raider Alley looks like. While I am graduating in May, I still anticipate I’ll keep tabs on it and pray that it can bounce back after a pretty “meh” year of bookings across the board. While I can only say I had a bad time at one show, the Raider Alley experience is still always fun and while some of the artists may not have been for me, there are definitely students or even Lubbock locals who never thought they would get the chance to see a band like Lit or Smash Mouth in this city, much less on Texas Tech’s campus. I look forward to seeing who they can grab in future years and maybe I’ll be able to catch another show or two in the future on return visits to the city. I look forward to the day that happens.
All photos by Andrew Watters except for this one right below.
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