Festivals at their best

CLOVIS - Two years ago, the organizers of Draggin' Main and the organizers of the Clovis Music Festival decided to hold their events on the same weekend. Last year, they decided to be one committee. This year, both facets of the weekend proved to be their best editions yet.

Organizers were ecstatic in the days following the week of celebrating car culture and the Clovis Sound, between three well-attended concerts, three Saturday parades and a hot rod show that filled up Hillcrest Park.

"It was easily the best one we've ever had," said Gene Porter, one of the original Draggin' Main organizers. "The new venue at Hillcrest Park and the old municipal golf course was outstanding. We exceeded our best car count by over 100 cars. We'll have to do a drone count, but we estimate somewhere around 350 cars."

A drone count, Draggin' Main Committee Chair Derek Cockrell said, was still to be done on the crowd as well, but there were estimates of 8,000 to 10,000 people attending the car events at Hillcrest.

Cockrell said 2017 was a trial run with two separate committees to make sure if the two events could function at the same time. The committees merged into one last year, and there were enough Draggin' Main and music festival people to make sure one event didn't overshadow another.

"When we first did that, nobody knew what everybody else was doing," Cockrell said. "Now, everybody knows what they need to do so the team works really well.

"We look it as, 'This is our week of events,' instead of, 'This is the thing I care about.' There wasn't much of that before, but it's all been washed away."

The music featured a Wednesday faith and family night with Josh Wilson headlining. Cockrell thought the local openers of the Praise Quartet and Aundrea Dawson were also great, and helped give the Wednesday night crowd three different takes on Christian music.

Thursday saw Lance Lipinsky and the Lovers as an ode to the Buddy Holly era sounds of Clovis. It's always a goal for the music festival to have one show dedicated to the Clovis sound, and Cockrell said he's not against having Lipinsky back in future festivals.

Friday brought the family band Liliac to open for headliner Loverboy. Liliac, which plays most of its shows in New York and California, drew fans from Texas and Colorado

"We knew internally they were going to be a big show, but we thought we'd have to do some selling on those guys, Porter said. "Everybody knows Loverboy. To our surprise, 80 percent of the comments on our social media were about Liliac, so it was exciting. We feel now they could be a headliner for Clovis at this point."

The committee budgeted $30,000 for ticket sales, Cockrell said, but ended up pulling in $48,000. That, plus an influx of sponsors means organizers expect this year's Draggin' Main to be a bigger financial success than last year's.

Saturday saw three parades on Main Street - one for the American Legion's 100th birthday, another for Clovis being named a Great American Defense Community and the third the classic hot rod parade.

The main plans for next year include lining up different musical guests, and getting with the Clovis Softball Association so the Custom Classic and Draggin' Main events are on different weekends in June.

"It benefits both of us if we're not on the same weekend," Porter said.

Clovis Police Capt. Roman Romero said there were no major issues during any of the activities, including the late-night Main Street cruise that included hundreds of cars, classic or not.