Comedy duo Dakaboom inspired laughter between serenades at yearly CPB talent show

By Sara Jane Sheehan
Transcript Correspondent

Performers and an audience members filled the Milligan Hub for Campus Programming Board’s (CPB) annual OWU’s Got Talent on March 2.

The CPB provided free food and glow stickers for students to enjoy as they watched their peers perform.

CPB brought in a music comedy duo called Dakaboom, made up of Paul Peglar and Ben McLain to host the event. According to the Dakaboom website, each has respectively performed on “Glee” and “The Sing-Off.”

Their act featured popular songs with different comedic twists. At one point McLain took a member from the audience and serenaded her to the song “Maria” from the musical “West Side Story.” There was much laughter from the audience during their performances.

Sophomore Marta Del Cid said that she thought Dakaboom were funny and were not what she was expecting.

“I definitely thought that they added excitement and comedy throughout the show,” she said.

The stage lighting was also unique to the show—different colored lights were used throughout.

“We got a lighting company to light up the stage specifically for this event,” said sophomore Kelly Rand, vice president of CPB. “We wanted to give Dakaboom and the performers a really nice stage.”

Members of CPB said that they were happy about the turnout. They said they know that they were competing with the basketball game, but they were still happy with the amount of people who showed up.

Before the show started, members of the audience and performers were asked to be a part of a “Harlem Shake” video with CPB’s mascot, the Pink Gorilla. Those who participated gathered on stage and danced to the music as the video was filmed.

Eight acts performed a variety of music styles in the talent show.

The Jaywalkers, OWU’s all-male a cappella group, were the first to perform. They sang three songs: “Starships” by Nicki Minjai, the “Pokemon” theme song and “The Kids Aren’t Alright” by The Offspring.

Senior Angel Spencer sang “The Story” by Brandi Carlile after the Jaywalkers. Freshman Nicholas Fonseca rapped “The Recipe” by Kendrick Lamar; then Junior Eddy Zhao played the guitar and sang Queen’s “A Crazy Little Thing Called Love.”

The second half of the show started with The Sig Experience, a band composed of sophomore Austin Daniels on guitar and vocals and sophomore Patrick Zmina on drums. They performed Staind’s “It’s Been Awhile”.

Freshman Alexander Paquet performed next. He played guitar and sang an original song of his album called “Winter Bus”.

Juniors Kati Sweigard and Cara Slotkin, performing as Kati and Cara, followed Paquet. They sang “You’re Gonna Miss Me When I’m Gone” by Lulu and the Lampshades, and “Just Give Me a Reason” by Pink.

The show ended with a performance from OWU’s women’s a cappella group, Pitch Black.

They sang three songs: a mash-up of “I Wanna Dance with Somebody” and “Dancing on my Own,” a medley of different songs and Gloria Gaynor’s “I Will Survive.”

Voting began after the last performance—members of CPB handed out two slips of paper for people to write down their two favorite performances of the night.

Dakaboom entertained some more before they announced the winner of the talent show.

The Sig Experience came in third place, the Jaywalkers got second and Pitch Black placed first.