The Campus Activities Board’s effort to bring bigger acts and new excitement to the campus is still undergoing intense investigation.

“We had a list of four primary bands to look at, in rank order from the student’s voting last spring,” said Rich Ramos, assistant dean of students and CAB supervisor. After the four bands were chosen, the next step was to find dates that worked for both the band and openings in the field house on campus.

“Due to the large amount of athletes and the fact that we would need the entire building for a whole day, the field house openings and band dates just didn’t coordinate,” said Ramos.

Jimmy Eat World proved a student favorite and received inquiry from Simpson. According to Ramos, they sat on the offer and dates for a couple months before finding out that the band was busy during the time Simpson offered them a show.

“We weren’t able to get anyone due to their tour dates and our Homecoming weekend like we wanted,” said former CAB president Kim Lamon.

Next, CAB looked at other options: New Found Glory, Hoobastank, MXPX, American Hi-Fi, Default and Good Charlotte, to name a few. These bands either played at very few colleges, if any, or their tours were already sold out.

“Good Charlotte had some dates that could work, but Saturday of Simpson’s homecoming didn’t work for them, since they are in Idaho the night before,” said Ramos. “We’d have to fly them here that night and that’s just another time and cost issue.”

Ramos stresses money as a big issue with a band of this magnitude coming. “Given the price of the bands, I don’t think it makes sense for us to do it right now,” he said. “We have no funds set aside and ticket sales is all we can do to make money.”

Even though most students are ecstatic about the big band idea, some bands may sell and others just won’t. The big question of the ticket sales being enough to pay for the cost is a major issue right now.

“The last major show Simpson had here was Fiona Apple, and we took a $10,000 loss on that show,” said Ramos. “We just can’t handle that happening again.”

The exciting idea of a chief band coming to Simpson has proven to be quite a time-consuming process. According to Ramos, CAB is working on the issues that have arose, along with still looking at times next spring to host a big band on campus.

“We have to be patient with this process; it isn’t easy,” said Ramos. “Sometimes no matter how hard we try to make this possible, it just might not work out.”