The Country on Campus tour performed a concert Thursday, Oct. 27, in Watkins Auditorium at UT Martin, including up-and-coming artists Thomas Mac, Alana Springsteen and Patrick Murphy.
Beginning at 7 p.m., and free to the public, the event was hosted by Assistant Vice Chancellor of Student Affairs John Abel as emcee and sponsored by Roku, JLab and Clif. Throughout the show, sponsors provided giveaways including 4K streaming sticks, wireless earphones and headphones, and Clif Bar snacks. With two ways of obtaining these prizes, a QR code was provided upon entry to scan from a mobile phone for a digital raffle. Other winners simply got lucky and were given items between acts by the artists performing.
Thomas Mac was the headline act and had the longest performance. With nearly half a million YouTube subscribers, Mac played his hit single “Beer vs Women” along with other songs from his most recent album. Alana Springsteen holds nearly 16,000 YouTube subscribers, as she played her greatest hit to date, “Me Myself and Why” followed by other songs that she related to Taylor Swift’s music. Patrick Murphy was the opening act and played many popular songs of other artists’ and hits from his latest EP, “Half the Story.”
Between acts, all three artists took a short break to allow Abel time to provide prizes to the winners of the sponsored giveaways. Throughout the show, Abel provided an interesting invitation of entering a Student Affairs raffle, as he mentioned “stay tuned to the Flight Crew Instagram to find out what and when we give away our prizes.” Providing multiple giveaways from both parties at no cost was definitely attention-grabbing.
