The Band CAMINO’s is set to perform after the grand opening of Moody Coliseum on Saturday.
With their most popular song coming in at 70 million streams, The Band CAMINO was established in Memphis, Tennessee in 2015 and continues to be based in Nashville.
The band is the next band to perform in the ACU concert series following increasingly popular music artists. Previous concerts in the series include alumnus Aaron Watson and the band Surfaces.
Lucas Vogt, student engagement graduate intern and graduate student from Abilene was the one who had one of the main influences in deciding who was going to perform next.
“In terms of choosing bands, I had four or five in mind that I thought would be good. Band CAMINO was on that list,” Vogt said. “At that point, I started asking my friends, seeing what they like, what kind of music they’re interested in in terms of what would be popular on ACU’s Campus.”
Vogt also took a survey on social media asking the student body which band they would like to see on campus with The Band CAMINO getting the most votes.
PJ Martinez, associate dean of student engagement, said after they picked the band they filed a contract with the band’s agency.
“We submitted like a pre-contract that ACU does. That says these are the things we’re requesting. We would love to seek you being here to come to perform for us,” Martinez said. “It was up to the agency than to submit all the information to the band and the band agreed to do so. This contract includes no obscene language.”
The ACU community is encouraged to attend this event, Martinez said. However, the event is capped at 3,500 people and everyone must show an ACU student ID or approved lanyard.
“This is a big priority for Dr. Phil Schubert,” Martinez said. “I’ve been here since January and when I was in the whole interview process, one of the things that I heard all the time was we want to bring big bands to this campus. So it is a priority of mine and my office that we try our best to bring these big bands.”
In past years, the ACU concert series has collaborated with Wildcat Week to bring live music to the start of the semester. However, this year the concert series will help commemorate the grand opening of Moody Coliseum.
“This is something that may look different next year, but we’ll have one big concert every year,” Martinez said. “That’s a staple, and that’s a tradition that we’re always going to have at the beginning of the year.”
Despite the band’s newness to some students, Hailee Holtz, junior youth and family ministry major from Kaufman, said she has been a fan of the band for six months and attended a previous concert in April.
“When I heard they were coming to ACU, I was excited to get to see them again,” Holtz said. “The band had so much energy at the concert in Dallas… They interact amazingly with their audience and they are hilarious. “
The ACU concert series has gradually increased with each artist’s popularity, coming back from COVID-19 with Surfaces to now with The Band CAMINO.
Students like alumnus and graduate student Kelsea Abston from Lubbock have become gradually more excited about the concert series as the years went on.
“I’ve been able to watch the progress of the Wildcat Week concert – or I guess the ACU Concert series now – get bigger over the past four years with acts like Surfaces and Ben Rector, which has been really cool,” Abston said.
