Techno Guy settles with SUB over music dispute

Techno Guy and the SUB have worked out a deal, but it won’t necessarily bring peace and quiet to campus.

English Professor James Burbank led a complaint against the loud music played by Josh “Techno Guy” Arellano outside the north end of the SUB last month.

Since then, Arellano met with Ryan Lindquist, associate director of the Student Activities Center, to determine an appropriate volume level to play his boom box.

“We had three meetings with Josh to work on his volume out there,” Lindquist said. “We wanted to make sure that it was at a level that was more in accordance with what other people do on campus.” Per the meetings, Lindquist and
Arellano agreed upon a maximum volume level for the music, which Arellano said is signi cantly lower than past levels.

“I’m trying to stay optimistic because I can still bring my boom box here, but the volume level has been pushed down 60 percent, and I feel like it’s a slap in the face,” he said. “Honestly, my laptop is louder than what the boom box is allowed to be at. It’s kind of a joke. It’s not even worth my time or e ort at this level.”

Burbank, who led the complaint to the Dean of Students about Arellano’s music being disruptive, said he was satis ed with the new restrictions.

“I feel like Joshua is trying to work with the Student Activities Center,” Burbank said. “I was up there today and it seems like his music is at a reasonable volume, so he is complying with the restrictions.”

Burbank said he received threats and other fallout after ling the complaint.“People want to silence me. They have threatened me personally and I nd that despicable, frankly,” Burbank said. “Everybody has a right to free speech,
and you can’t suppress other people just because you don’t like what they are saying anymore than I would want to suppress Joshua.” e purpose of playing the music outside the SUB is to expose students to a different type of music,
Arellano said, and the new volume level makes that di cult. “If I wanted to be listening to my music by myself in my own surroundings, then I would have just brought head phones and there would be no reason to bring a boom box,” he said.

“If I wasn’t trying to a ect other people’s realities then I wouldn’t have brought a boom box in the first place.”

What happens now that they have pushed me down, if something else comes up I might be used as a precedent as to how to act when someone wants to express themselves.”

Should Arellano turn up the volume again, Burbank said he won’t hesitate to le another complaint. “the more people say I should shut up, the more I feel I should speak out. I guess that’s just how we are as human beings,” he said. “People can say what they want, but free speech is free speech and that’s what I advocate for.”