The Inter-Residence Hall Association has scheduled a benefit on Saturday, and with not one, but three concerts going on at once, it will make for one loud night at Iowa State.

The idea for the IRHA Make-A-Wish benefit concert stemmed from a similar concert held last year that benefited children affected by the Sept. 11 attacks. That show drew about 150 people, but Carlyn Goebel, IRHA director of special events, would like to see even more people this year.

“I was hoping we could get about 200 or so people to come,” says Goebel, sophomore in political science. “I guess that is the only real goal I have.”

This year’s benefit concert will follow about the same format as last year’s, with Maple-Willow-Larch, Knapp/Storm and Friley Halls all hosting bands. Two dollars gets your hand stamped and access to all three venues, which will each be hosting four bands. Goebel and company at IRHA even have transportation taken care of. A bus will be running to and from each venue as well as from the commuter lot.

And of course, the rock is all for a good cause. Once the idea for the benefit was approved, it wasn’t hard for Goebel to choose the Iowa Make-A-Wish Foundation as a beneficiary. The Make-A-Wish Foundation, with 78 U.S. chapters and 25 international affiliates, grants wishes to children under the age of 18 who have life-threatening illnesses. All money raised by the concert will go directly to the Urbandale chapter of the foundation.

“We decided that maybe we could pick a charity that definitely needed help all the time and I personally know people who have had wishes granted through the foundation. So I asked around to get a feel if people were willing to donate time and everyone was into raising the money,” Goebel says.

Choosing the bands that would play the benefit was a tougher decision, though. She contacted Ames Music Live, who in turn let local bands know about the benefit. Goebel received responses from more than 20 local bands willing to play the benefit show for free. Originally IRHA thought maybe it could use all of the bands and hold an all-day event, but due to regulations regarding Dead Week, the show could only be held during the planned four-hour time slot — meaning the list of bands had to be narrowed down to 12.

The indie

The Envy Corps is one of the bands that did get chosen to play and will be sharing the Friley Terrace Room with Frankenixon, Poison Control Center and Des Moines’ Little Mojo. There has been a lot of activity in The Envy Corps camp lately: The band is still working on its new record, recently it lost half of its members and even changed its name for about two months.

“There has always been a problem with the pronunciation and spelling of The Envy Corps and one day we got fed up and made a rash decision to change the name,” says singer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Luke Pettipoole. “It was The Eaves for two months or so, but somehow a Scottish band of the same name caught wind of it and sent me a nasty e-mail. At that point, we were fed up of the Hives, Vines, Strokes anyway, so back the name went.”

But out went the rock-pop group’s drummer and bassist, leaving Pettipoole and guitarist David Yoshimura to finish the record by themselves.

“There is a progression to the discs, but each one stands on its own and could be listened to individually. I have been doing this for so long I can’t even tell if it’s going to be good or not, to tell the truth,” Pettipoole says about the new record. “As far as a date, we are recording it ourselves, which takes a long time, plus the amount of material we have is enormous. Hopefully we’re looking at a spring release.”

The punk

Eight Miles Out, who will play the Maple-Willow-Larch commons along with the Glass Rodgers, Driving While Stupid and Road to Ruin, just finished up its new record. In fact, the three-piece pop/punk band will be hosting its record release party the night before the benefit.

The record, “T.C.I.F,” is the result of nine months of work and guitarist and vocalist Pat Boberg says the album is a big step above the group’s last release.

“We put out an EP that we recorded during high school called ‘First’ and it sounded pretty bad,” Boberg explains.

“It was pretty bad pop punk. We’re really pleased with where we have gone now.”

Boberg says that although the band still listens to bands like MxPx and Blink-182, it has tried to focus its attention to other types of music and write punk music that is beyond the scope of the simple pop punk melody.

Eight Miles Out was slated to play last year’s IRHA benefit, but due to conflicts with the group’s other members, drummer Alex Miller and bassist Chris Saldanha, Boberg instead played what he calls a “pretty bad” solo show. Nonetheless, he is excited about playing this weekend and helping out the cause.

“I think Make-A-Wish Foundation is a very cool thing, even though it is also a very sad thing, I think it’s a cool thing to do and we are definitely looking forward to it,” Boberg says.

The rock

Alternative metal band Lesser Known Saint will be one of the newer bands trying to make an impression this weekend. Although the band has only been together a few months, you might recognize its members from other local projects. Vocalist Jim Schloemer and guitarist Mike Britson played quite a few shows in Ames as part of dead by Wednesday and bassist Ron Sidhartha played with Far Cry and now handles bass duties for Mechanistry. Drummer Sam Wong rounds out the line-up.

Schloemer says the band has the usual influences you would expect from a metal band but is also inspired by the likes of jazz, funk and techno. He hopes the band will eventually be able to offer something different than what is found in today’s rock music.

“I get so sick of music that’s been done to death — the commercial rock formula. We’ve been stuck in that rut before. We’re beyond that now — never again,” Schloemer explains. “I’m not going to pretend that we’re doing anything completely original. We’re simply not mature enough for that yet.”

Saturday’s benefit show will mark the fourth time that Lesser Known Saint will take the stage, but Schloemer says response has been good so far and he believes it has something worthwhile to offer show patrons.

“I think we’re all amazed at how overwhelmingly positive the response has been thus far. The first few shows are always rough for a band, no matter the collective experience among the members. Things can only improve from here, and the new material we’re working on far transcends anything up to this point,” Schloemer says.