We the Kings shoot DVD at Wednesday’s free hometown show

Fans started lining up outside The Hall in Palmetto at 7 a.m. Wednesday. It would be almost 11 hours before they could get inside.

The event was the annual hometown show from We the Kings, the band of middle school friends from Bradenton who went on to create such national hits as “Check Yes, Juliet” and “We’ll Be a Dream.”

It was the 10th annual holiday hometown show for We the Kings. The band wanted to make it special. “Magical,” in fact, to use front man Travis Clark’s word.

A video crew was on hand to shoot the event. The video will feature the band’s performance, which included its entire first album played from beginning to end. But the video will be more than just a concert movie. The crew also interviewed We the Kings fans, both inside and outside The Hall.

“We’ve always been a band that’s very proud of our hometown,” Clark said. “The video is going to be a tribute to our 941 family.”

After the video is edited in a month or so, Clark said, the band plans to release the DVD in segments, and ultimately make it available for free on Youtube.

Besides that first album, the show’s set list included several We the Kings hits, plus some new songs from an upcoming album. The band has released a couple of singles (“Festival Music” and “Planes, Trains & Cars”) from that album, and will release others soon. The entire album should be out in the next three or four months, Clark said.

The new album has a title, but the band is raising money for the album through a pledge drive, and people who pledge get to know the title before the rest of the world. So the band is keeping the title a semi-secret.

Sam Woolf, who became a local superstar when he made it to the top five on “American Idol” a few years back, was scheduled to be one of the opening acts for Wednesday’s concert, but he bowed out.

“He’s actually in Boston,” Clark said shortly before the show. “He couldn’t make it. He had to cancel.”

The band Brightside was the only opening act.

“They’re from Tallahassee,” Clark said. “They were with us on our 10th anniversary tour so we invited them to do this show with us.”

This story was originally published December 27, 2017 at 3:21 PM with the headline "We the Kings shoot DVD at Wednesday’s free hometown show."