ParachuteUniversity of Alabama at Birmingham students will celebrate the start of a new school year with a free welcome-back concert featuring DeQn Sue and Parachute on Sunday, Aug. 24, on the Campus Green.
The concert is co-sponsored by the UAB Office of Student Life, University Programs Board and the Undergraduate Student Government Association. Gates will open at 6 p.m., with opening artist DeQn Sue at 7 and headliner Parachute at 8. The UAB Campus Green is located between 14th and 16th streets South on University Boulevard. The concert is free and open to the public. Call 205-934-8225 for more information.
Parachute is Will Anderson, lead vocals, guitars, piano; Kit French, saxophone, keyboards, vocals; Alex Hargrave, bass; Johnny Stubblefield, drums; and Nate McFarland, lead guitar and vocals. The name of their third album, “Overnight,” could be a sly commentary on the hard work and commitment it has taken for them to experience the success that has built over the last four years. 
DeQn Sue Their 2009 debut, “Losing Sleep,” featured the Top 15 Adult Pop Songs single “She is Love,” the video for which boasts more than 6.5 million views. “The Way It Was” in 2011 included the No. 1 iTunes Rock Song “Kiss Me Slowly” (co-written with Lady Antebellum) and the Top 15 hit “Something to Believe In.”
Alternative pop artist DeQn Sue counts Chaka Khan, Blondie and David Bowie as musical influences. Released in 2012, her EP “Idiosyncratic” vividly and sonically introduces listeners to DeQn Sue’s quirks and charm, featuring songs that range from funk to pop. Her songwriting continues to shine on her full-length album, “Zeitgeist,” released in July 2014 and produced by Alabama-based and Grammy Award-nominated producer Kelvin Wooten (Kelis, Anthony Hamilton, Raphael Saadiq and Jill Scott). That album’s first single, “Magenta,” pulls off a catchy balancing act, with just enough songwriting quirk to tug against the glossy pop production and pull the track pleasantly off-kilter in the process. Matt Wake with Al.com dubs “Zeitgeist” “nerd-chic, FM sticky, sepia arcane, robot futuristic, detached and personal – often within one, four-minute track