OneRepublic stepped onto the stage at 8 p.m. sharp Monday night, ready to give their best to a nearly full Mini-Dome of ETSU students. They primed the crowd before Maroon 5 stepped out about an hour later.

Ry Cuming didn’ t show up, but the crowd’s spirit still seemed relatively high despite this.

It was a miracle of sorts that the show was even going on after the events of the school-wide power outage that had hit that morning, forcing ETSU to cancel day classes.

“For those of you who don’t know, we’re OneRepublic,” said front man Ryan Tedder.

And even though a few shouts went up and some eager fans clapped their hands, it seemed that a lot of people didn’ t know this – or at least the majority of them weren’t too excited about it.

Though an anxious crowd had assembled around the front of the stage, not even these students seemed to be picking up what OneRepublic was laying down.

As I heard one gentleman behind me put it, ” This [was] pretty anti-climatic.”

“All the Right Moves” was definitely the high point to OneRepublic’s performance, but even that song went over a little dully.

Tedder’s splicing of The White Stripes’ “Seven Nation Army” and Justin Timberlake’s “Sexyback” certainly didn’t seem to knock many socks off.

Then Tedder and the boys said goodnight and Maroon 5 stepped into the spotlight.

“Wow, these guys are a lot better than OneRepublic,” I heard from another critic behind me.

He was right, too.

Lead singer Adam Levine sensed that something wasn’t right.

He called out to the students in the floor section. “Get out of your seats,” he said. They got out of their seats. “You, too – in the stands.” They did too.

“Now this feels like a concert,” Levine proclaimed after the orderly rows of chairs in front of the stage had been swallowed up in a sea of students who had found their feet.

I’ll admit it: I’m biased. I don’t consider myself a Maroon 5 fan.

But I’ ll say it didn’t take too many of the guitarist’s killer solos or too much of Levine’s well-delivered lines to get me into what was now going down.

Maybe it’s because the latter group treated the audience more like a living, breathing thing than the first group did by involving them in the concert, urging them to sing along.

Maybe it’s because they just had a better set list put together.

Regardless, I feel Maroon 5 saved this concert – not to say OneRepublic put on a bad show.

Something was just amiss, but Maroon 5 made all things good when they picked up their instruments and poured out their hearts for ETSU.

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