Forty years before the rapper Drake told a raucous Binghamton University crowd last week that he’d ‘better find your lovin,’ Jerry Garcia and the Grateful Dead wished a campus concert here ‘goodnight, goodnight, goodnight.’

Much has changed in the 40 years since May 2, 1970, when thousands of Deadheads watched one of the highlights of the university’s rich entertainment history.

David Hagerbaumer, BU’s director of campus life, has watched the transformation.

‘The best shows and concerts on campus? It depends on who you’re talking to,’ he said in a recent interview. ‘Any alum will tell you the best show was the best show during their four years.’

But since the opening of the $33.1 million Events Center in 2004, few could debate the improved quality of acts that have made the familiar road trip down Route 17 or up Route 81 to perform on the

Vestal campus.

The facility has housed a variety of different activities: Southern Tier Athletic Conference cheerleading championships, the NYPENN Franklin Graham Festival in 2007, BU’s annual Relay For Life cancer fundraiser, opening ceremonies of the Empire State Games, the state’s Special Olympics and several America East championship basketball tournaments ‘ to name just a few.

In addition to the basketball teams, the Events Center houses practices and competitions for varied sports, including tennis and track and field.

The versatile building, which encompasses 165,000 square feet of floor space, can be configured for different capacities for the multitude of events it can accommodate. About 5,500 people can fit in the arena for the school’s basketball games; with the seats expanded, as is done at commencement, it can pack in up to 8,000. The maximum capacity for concerts is around 7,500.

‘When you go from a max of 3,000 to people to an audience of 7,500 ‘ we have a whole new world of possibilities,’ Hagerbaumer said.

Concert planning did not always go smoothly. For many years, the university’s entertainment budget was handled by ‘Fly By Night,’ a group whose leadership was not elected by the student body but rather, Hagerbaumer said, run by Greek Life.

‘Fly By Night was pretty much being operated by a fraternity,’ Hagerbaumer said. ‘And the brothers were only electing their own brothers.’

Hagerbaumer wouldn’t name the fraternity.

As the group’s budget grew, Hagerbaumer said, the decision was made to incorporate Fly By Night into the Student Association, and have the top concerts official ‘ called the vice president for university programming, shortened to ‘VPUP’ ‘ become a student-body elected position.

Michelle Adams ’94, now managing director of public affairs at real estate firm Tishman Speyer in New York City, was one of the first VPUPs after the transition, and she coordinated the show in 1994 featuring Cypress Hill and House of Pain.

‘I will never forget going outside right before we opened the doors and seeing the line all the way back to the guards station as you enter campus ‘ and I was so proud!’ she said recently via e-mail.

That’s not to say every show since Fly By Night dissolved has been a hit: Hagerbaumer recalls rapper 50 Cent’s appearance in 2003 as a memorable flop.

‘When we had 50 Cent ‘ he was hot,’ he said. ‘We didn’t sell it out, believe it or not.’

Of course, sales languished after the ticket price ballooned: The BU administration said the rapper had a reputation for sowing violence among the audience and forced concert organizers to limit ticket sales to BU students and their friends, install metal detectors and deploy an army of extra security guards and moonlighting cops.

In the end, the concert filled less than one-third of the West Gym. Organizers accused the the administration of racism against 50 Cent, who is black, which they said influenced the decision to impose the security measures.

The administration rebuffed the racism allegations, citing violence at previous 50 Cent concerts and pointing to other shows at BU featuring minority artists where there had been no such security. Student leaders estimated at the time that the student government lost at least $60,000 on the show.

Compare that flop to April 27, 2005, when an estimated crowd of 7,400 jammed the Events Center to croon along with one of the hottest acts in the world: Green Day.

‘It was pretty amazing how all the pieces fell together,’ said then-VPUP Jason Kupperman, who held the concerts post as a student leader from 2003 to 2005.

The timing of the show couldn’t have been better, Kupperman said, as ‘American Idiot’ was ubiquitous at the top of popular charts and on radio stations around the world.

‘When we put the show on sale, the pieces just fell into place so well,’ Kupperman said recently from the New York City offices of Paradigm, the talent agency where he now works. ‘The day we put the show on sale was a Monday. The night before was the Grammys, where they won Rock Album of the Year.’