The annual January Jams concert will feature rock bands Secondhand Serenade, Cute Is What We Aim For, and Rookie of the Year.

Greg Balcom, Delta Chi member, said, “We will be bringing 3 bands this year which is a step up from the past few years we have hosted this. Also for the concert, concessions at the Wink Arena will be open so that guests can purchase food and drinks.”

January Jams hosted many famous bands since it began in 2000 with The Verve Pipe and recently hosting Bowling for Soup, Blue October, and Chevelle.

Teresa Fogel, Student Leadership and Activities Assistant, said nothing is new or surprising this year, just “good music for a cheap price and the only way we can bring shows this big for such a small price is Student Activity Fees as allocated by the Finance Division of Student Government. If it weren’t for that fund, our programming would be cut tremendously.”

Shanyn Lee, President of Entertainment Unlimited, said, “EU has done a co-sponsorship with Delta Chi for several years - we help them with hospitality for January Jams, and they help us set up the stage for Ferris Fest in April.”

Secondhand Serenade has been around since 2004. John Vesely, guitarist and vocalist of this one-person rock band, created the name when he decided to go solo. “The name allows him to be free to do whatever he feels like, from a solo performance to 10 musicians on stage at once,” as stated at his web site secondhandserenade.net.

Secondhand Serenade is considered more of an acoustic rock band with a hint of the Emo style to its music. Vesely plays an acoustic guitar and never has a set amount of people on stage to play the rest of the instruments.

Vesely, or Secondhand Serenade, has appeared on MTV, Yahoo! Music, AOL, Music Choice, in Rolling Stone, and many more as said on his myspace page, myspace.com/ secondhandserenade.

Many may recognize Secondhand Serenade from the pop/rock radio stations as well as the popular TV music stations like VH1 and MTV.

He’s played with the Plain White T’s, The All American Rejects, Hawthorne Heights, and Good Charlotte.

Vesely admits he’s a bit of a perfectionist when it comes to his albums. He produced all 10 tracks off his recently released CD, “A Twist in My Story,” himself.

He ventured into “crafting different styles of songs, but didn’t allow his surroundings change his artistry at its core.” Cute Is What We Aim For, second on the list playing at this year’s January Jams, was formed in 2005 in Buffalo, NY.

Shaant Hacikyan, vocalist, Dave Mellilo, bassist, and Jeff Czum, guitarist put together their band and created a major debut album “The Same Old Blood Rush with a New Touch,” which was released in 2006 and spent many months on the Billboard Top 200 charts.

Cute Is What We Aim For (CiWWAF), when recording, likes to experiment and is very open-minded, which helped them create their new album, “Rotation,” and make it sound good, new, and fresh.

“One lyrical theme on our new album, “Rotation,” would be ‘change…' Everything on this record has a message,” said Hacikyan.

Hacikyan understands “now there’s so much satisfaction in understanding life isn’t about the destination, it’s in the journey.”

Rookie of the Year is a fairly new band consisting of vocalist, Ryan, guitarist and vocalist, Mike, guitarist and vocalist, Brandon, bassist Pat, and drummer Mick.

Rookie of the Year has a much similar style to Secondhand Serenade with its acoustic rock/ pop music.

FSU freshman psychology major, Sasha Ashcraft, said, “I had a great time at the Secondhand Serenade concert [earlier this season]. The bands were all full of energy and it made for a great atmosphere. Rookie of the Year played really well, and Secondhand Serenade sounded amazing live. I would definitely go see them again.”

“Each year we try to bring a band that is popular throughout campus so that many students attend,” Balcom said. “The future will decide whether or not the rock genre says the main focus of January Jams.”

January Jams will take place in the Wink Arena on Jan. 29 from 7 to 10:30 p.m.

Tickets went on sale last Friday and will be on sale until Jan. 29 at the Ice Arena Box Office, Rankin Info Center, and at startickets.com.

Student ticket price is $8 with a valid student ID and general admission is $15. Startickets. com does not sell tickets at the student price.

Is your brain yearning for more than what you’re currently learning in your classes? You don’t have to look any further as one of Ferris’ professors has released a game of Da Vinci’s riddles for Ferris and the world to see.

Leonardo Da Vinci is most famous for his famous art works of “The Last Supper,” “the Vitruvian Man,” and the “Mona Lisa.” However, he didn’t just create some of the greatest works of art. Da Vinci was a great scientist and if his journals would have been translatable (he often worked in mirrored code), “they would have revolutionized the science of the 16th century,” according to MSN Encarta.

Dr. James “Ted” Walker is a humanities professor at Ferris who has found Da Vinci and his numerous works exciting. He combined the his love for puzzles and Da Vinci’s works to create this game.

The game starts with an introduction based on an offer. Da Vinci was dying and many people wanted access his personal journals, which held Da Vinci’s valuable studies. A man named Marcantino approaches Da Vinci, hoping to gain access to the journals.

Da Vinci tells Marcantino that if he can solve a set of puzzles he has written he will be able to have the journals. This is where the game actually starts.

There are 12 puzzles in the game that are longer than 10 lines in length. They are riddles that have a rhyme scheme, using language and patterns Da Vinci would have used, according to Walker, who wrote the riddles.

The answers to each puzzle combine to make the answer DaVinci is looking for, which will give Marcantino the journals he desires.

The offer featured in the beginning of the riddle never existed. It also was created by Walker himself, but he said that this offer is realistic and could have happened.

Many will find the puzzles difficult, but that’s exactly how they should be, according to Walker. “It shouldn’t be easy,” said Walker. “You shouldn’t be able to figure these out without a little thinking.”

The winner of the game will win a prize “from Da Vinci himself.”

“I had fun doing it. Nothing tickles me more than this,” said Walker.

Walker held another Da Vinci game two years ago. That game was a scavenger hunt with its participants going to different locations to locate items.

“It did pretty well. Over 300 people participated in that last game,” said Walker.

Like with this latest game, anyone could play the game. Not only did students, staff and community create teams, but people throughout the state attempted to complete the scavenger hunt.

Other people wanted to participate but were unable to complete the hunt because they were too far away from the Big Rapids area.

“People from Maryland were calling, wanting the answers,” said Dr. Walker.

Anyone wishing to play the game can do so for free.

The game will be located on the Ferris front page and runs from now until March.

“That should be all the time you need to figure out Da Vinci’s riddles.”

The 10th annual Bridal Show helped out a lot of brides-to-be in their search for the perfect wedding.

Last Sunday at the Holiday Inn ballroom, many brides-to-be and their bridesmaids looked at many different vendors for wedding ideas.

Diane Scarpelli, director of the Bridal Show with help from Ellory Daniels said, “We have all kinds of vendors coming here to show off their business. We usually have around 500 to 700 brides come and check out the vendors and fashion show we have here. Usually 230 to 250 brides use at least one of the vendors for their wedding, which is a high percentage for bridal shows.”

Brides could find vendors from catering to DJs, flowers to banks, hotels, and vacation ideas, hairstylists and make-up artists to dresses and tuxedos, and photographers to tent rentals.

Everything was there in one room. Caterers had samples of food, hairstylists did hair for some brides-to-be, florists had flowers and beautiful decorations, and photographers had sample albums.

Brides could win door prizes and cash. They could see the fashion show for dress ideas from the vendors at the show.

Scarpelli said most of these vendors are fairly local ones like Bridal Expressions, which sells dresses; Black Tie Tuxedo, which Scarpelli said has been coming to the show since it began; Sound Productions for DJs; The Gate for hosting wedding related events; and FSU catering for food.

Danielle, a bride-to-be, said “This is the only bridal show I’ve been to and it’s awesome. I actually went to this same one a couple of years ago too and it has been very helpful.”

This bridal show has been very popular and has always had many people come each year.

“It helps the brides make reservations for limos, catering, honeymoon places, anything they want for their wedding in advance,” Scarpelli said. “It gets really busy. Weddings are usually in June, July, and August and if one has a limo reserved for a date and another bride wants it for that same date, she won’t be able to get it, so going to [the Bridal Show] helps brides get what they want early.”

What is more horror cliché than invading insects, demonic children, late night exorcisms, and a pretty girl in distress?

If anything, “The Unborn” most likely got it covered. But, aside from a few tacky scares and expected jumps, the film introduced an unexpected scenario with some of history’s most gruesome events.

Odette Yustman plays the main character Casey, whose horror unfolds after having vivid night terrors and daily hauntings from the neighborhood boy. Soon after, the color in her eye starts changing and the doctor concludes it to be a genetic disorder shared between twins.

Of course the father confesses of an unborn twin brother and Yustman starts digging through her dead mother’s belongings to find answers. As usual, her findings lead her to the person who can tell her everything.

To cut to the chase, the unborn twin wants his chance at life now, or at least that’s what the movie tells you at first. Then the Holocaust angle comes into play and shakes things up.

The plot moves to the sadistic fascinations of the Holocaust’s infamous freak doctor Josef Mengele. The medical experiments he performed on twins and his curiosity with eugenics only explains part of her problems.

What she thought was her twin brother haunting her turns out to be the undead soul of something from another universe which they called a dybbuk. And if things couldn’t get any worse or predictable, the dybbuk moves from body to body.

After searching for answers, Yustman’s obvious option is an exorcism. Soon enough, the winds pick up, foreign languages are thrown around, and bodies get bent out of shape.

Along her journey to discovering the past, Yustman teams up with her witty best friend and loyal lover, played by Meagan Good and Cam Gigandet, respectively.

While the movie started with a bang, it finished like a bad rollercoaster. For every five minutes of intense action there were long drawn-out explanations. Then suddenly, it’s over. What happened? There has got to be a sequel.

Fortunately, an important aspect of “The Unborn” was its computer effects. In some cases, movies can be ruined by too many unrealistic horror images or characters, but this movie proved otherwise.

Dog-like creatures, twisting heads and not-so proportionate faces made for genuinely creepy moments and gave the movie that extra kick just as the actors started to get boring.

Overall, “The Unborn” was a semi-decent horror meant for the younger crowd, hence the PG-13 rating. I admit there were times where I was clutching the armrest and turning my head, but the most the movie received from me was a big yawn at the end.