Last week, the Univerisity Programming Board (UPB) announced its selection of mtvU’s Campus Invasion Tour as the free musical performance to be featured at this year’s Spring Fling.

A day of rides, free food and games will be topped off by a performance by three up-and-coming rock bands: Straylight Run, Hellogoodbye and Motion City Soundtrack. On Saturday, April 29, from 12 p.m. to 5 p.m., students will be able to come out and enjoy the mtvU Village, as well as other festivities running from the Engineering Building down to the Student Wing.

“This is going to be even bigger than any Spring Flings before,” said Pat Craig, the Student Association’s vice president for University Programming.

MtvU will be bringing its Village to hype up the concert by handing out free things and providing entertainment throughout the day.

“Spring Fling is expected to draw an even larger crowd this year and so what we are probably going to do is extend it down and set up the main stage down by Student Wing,” Craig said.

Craig said UPB chose the mtvU tour because it was a good package, offering more than just music at a reasonable price.

“They’re providing us with advertising, great bands and the Village, and it’s also great publicity for the school,” he said

The tour is also being documented by mtvU, which means Binghamton University’s Spring Fling could end up on television because it is one of the larger schools on the tour, according to Craig.

“They film the tour, so if we could have a nice day, we’d have rides in the back and a good turnout, it’s very possible we could be on TV,” he said.

If it rains, however, the festivities will be relocated to the East Gym.

The cost of putting on the large-scale show will be covered by the Student Association’s budget, the student activity fee, UPB and Campus Life.

Initially, Spring Fling was scheduled for May 6, but the tour would be unavailable for that date because the Bamboozle Festival, in which the mtvU bands are also participating, falls on the same weekend.

“We moved it up so that we can have the mtvU tour,” Craig said.

BU has been an mtvU campus for the past two years, meaning that has mtvU installed flat-screen televisions in the Old and New University Union buildings that continuously play mtvU, and dorms also recieve the mtvU channel free of charge. Craig said that being an mtvU campus gave BU preferential status when tour locations were being selected.

MTV’s Campus Invasion Tour came to Binghamton in 2000, with the bands Nickelback, Default and Injected. “They do a good job, a lot of people come out,” Craig said.