Okay, it’s time for a personal confession: I have no idea who Jason Derülo is.

Okay, it’s time for a personal correction: I had no idea who Jason Derülo was. Up until last week, if someone would have mentioned the name “Jason Derülo,” I would have just as easily assumed he was a 16-year-old Scandinavian secret agent as a famous American hip-hop artist (who secretly moonlights as a secret agent).

That was strike one.

The most shocking factoid that I learned about Jason Derülo is the fact that he is apparently performing at Grand Valley State University. Very soon.

Strike two.

I happened to make the mistake of attempting to pass through Kirkhof on the particular day that tickets to this particular show were going on sale. It was really eye-opening to see what appeared to be half of the student population lined up to get tickets. I was tempted to ask some cute girls if this was the line for tickets to the “gun” show, but my nerves got the best of me after catching sight of the glocks peeking out of their purses.

Jason Derülo fans don’t screw around when it comes to purchasing tickets.

One of the reasons I bring up this forthcoming concert at GVSU is to also comment on the recent cancellation of a concert at the proximal Calvin College, who decided to terminate an upcoming show by the indie pop band The New Pornographers. According to various reports about the incident, Calvin College cancelled the concert due to the band’s name, claiming that they were not comfortable associating themselves with anything that reminds people of pornography.

Also, Calvin College hates being associated with “new.”

Before anyone gets too upset about the ridiculousness behind this reasoning, let me say that I am in total concurrence with Calvin, and his College. In fact, I have recently ceased playing the basketball game Horse for similar reasons:

1) I do not wish to be associated with the words “ho,” “hor” and “hors.”

2) I am really bad at basketball.

As a digression, I have to ask why the game is called “Horse” in the first place. Did the creators not realize that small children would be spelling out inappropriate words until they lost the game? Heck, “Skankmonster” would have been a better name!

Either way, I applaud GVSU for choosing artists and bands whose name do not provoke any controversy. I mean, as long as we ignore the fact that the name “Jason” often evokes the image of a serial killer who murders teenagers at sleepaway camp, the name is completely harmless.

And despite the goofy umlaut in his name, Jason Derülo is way more successful and respected than I was at his age (which is strike three for me, meaning if we were playing basketball, I would be a “hor”).

So, in that esteem, I respect him and his ability to sell out the Fieldhouse. It takes some major illustriousness to outsell the gun show.

[email protected]