Plain White Ts and Parachute Coming to SAU


10/22/2013

As a pivotal player in the Campus Activities Board's efforts to bring the two-time Grammy nominated Plain White T's and the equally popular band Parachute to St. Ambrose on Nov. 17, Lindsey Gibney has become a campus celebrity.

"I am definitely making new friends everywhere I go," said the senior nursing major from Cedar Rapids, Iowa. "People are trying to get tickets out of me that I unfortunately don't have."

In fact, she doesn't even have a ticket herself for the concert that will be conducted in the ballroom of the Rogalski Center. Gibney was not among the hundreds who made their way to Galvin Fine Arts Center box office on Oct. 17 to grab tickets made available for free to St. Ambrose students.

There had been plans to put some tickets on sale to the public later in the month, but when all 800 of the available tickets were claimed by students in just four hours, the "Rock Show at Rogo" became an all-Ambrosian affair.

"I was shocked and kind of in denial," said Gibney, who has served on the CAB events committee the past two years. "When we heard it was sold out, we thought, ‘Oh, they just didn't print all 800 tickets.' I didn't even get a chance to get a ticket, so I was definitely surprised."

Plain White T's is described a power-pop band that formed in suburban Chicago in 1997, but waited a decade to become a national hit. Their song Hey There Delilah was a Grammy nominee for Song of the Year and for Best Pop Performance by a Duo or Group in 2008. It won the 2007 Teen Choice Award for Choice Summer Song. The band recently released its sixth EP, Should've Gone to Bed, and its seventh studio album will follow next year.

Parachute formed while the members were students at the University of Virginia. Their newest single, She is Love, debuted in the Billboard Hot 100 and rose to No. 14 in the on Adult Pop Songs chart.

"I think there are more students coming to see Parachute," said Eileen Eitrheim, marketing manager for the Galvin Fine Arts Center. "They are all pumped. It is truly going to be a St. Ambrose event."

Director of Student Activities Jason Richter said CAB had been targeting this year for an on-campus event ever since the band Time Flies performed on campus in 2011, shortly before they became popular enough to fill large venues.

Previous CAB-sponsored concerts have starred the Ben Folds Five, which played at the Adler Theater in downtown Davenport, and Train, which performed at the Mississippi Valley Fairgrounds.

"The board has been saving up its money and this is the year to do it because I have a lot of seniors on CAB and they know how to run things," Richter said, specifically crediting Night Life committee chairpersons Gibney, Ben Buhlman and Molly Conrad, along with CAB president Brittany Bersano.

Gibney got a line on the Plain White T's when she joined the email list of the band's manager and promoter while attending a national campus activities convention a year ago.

When the Plain White T's-Parachute Tour was announced, the price was right and CAB applied to host a show. Lo and behold, St. Ambrose was one of two college campuses included on an 11-city tour by the two popular bands.

"That is super exciting for us," Gibney said. "It's going to be great."

Now, if she could only find a ticket.

news

News


News
news

Addy Nelson ’23 was born with an entrepreneur’s spirit. With her parents owning the bowling alley in her hometown of Gregory, South Dakota—the same place she perfected her game to earn a scholarship to St. Ambrose University—she learned early to be innovative, customer-focused and business-minded.

Read More About Innovative App-lication...

News
Maggie (Verdun) Bohnert '15, '16 MOT
News
news

At SAU, hard work = recognition. Here is a list of full-time students who were named to the St. Ambrose University Dean's List for the Fall 2023 term. These students earned a GPA of 3.5 or higher (on a 4.0 scale).

Read More About Fall 2023...

So, what's next?

Are you ready to take the next step? Click on the visit button below to learn more about our virtual and in-person visit options.