Camp Spectacles DIY Music Festival Returns to Copperhead Island

You know what’s cooler than a DIY house party? A DIY house party that lasts three days. But what happens when you want to go even bigger? Why not rent out an island and hold a whole DIY music festival?

That is the basic line of thought behind the creation of Camp Spectacles, a three-day festival of music, culture and camping that’s set to return to Copperhead Island on Lake Wylie for its second year in August.

It was just four years ago that Abdul Smith started hosting small shows at his apartment in Charlotte. What began as casual gatherings with friends led to him meeting and building a network of artists, musicians and creatives through the city’s DIY scene.

That momentum eventually sparked a bigger idea. After hosting a birthday celebration on Copperhead Island, Smith got the idea for Camp Spectacles, a free, three-day DIY music festival that came to fruition with the inaugural celebration in 2024.

“It was sort of a random moment of inspiration,” Smith said. “I had my 22nd birthday on Copperhead Island and then I started that same year doing the house shows, so I just married those two things together.”

This year’s Camp Spectacles is set to take place on Aug. 29–31 and will feature acoustic performances, volleyball, face painting, vendors, tattoo artists, overnight camping and more.

Entry is free, with free food also available for attendees throughout the weekend.

Live music and a sense of community

While the full lineup for this year’s Camp Spectacles has not yet been released, there will be some returning acts including Charlotte rockers StraightJacket, which closed the first night of performances in 2024.

“These shows always stuck out to me for the sense of community they bring,” said Mason Cutshall, the 19-year-old frontman of the band. “It was always more than a music show and more of a big hangout with really cool people and really cool bands.

“These shows allow people to be surrounded by like-minded creative people and experience art in a really fun and eventful way,” he continued. “Not only does Abdul bring the music but also the community.”

It’s that sense of community that Smith and his co-organizers have striven for in creating Camp Spectacles.

Smith told us that the free entry, free food and other experiences are designed to relax the mind in an age when anxiety and tension is at an all-time high.

“If everything is taken care of, I don’t have to worry, and then that sort of lowers my guard to where I’m able to better connect and build bonds with other people,” Smith told Queen CIty Nerve. “I want people to feel taken care of and feel empowered to take care of other people after they leave the event.”

Smith said he has drawn inspiration from footage of Woodstock and other events during the 1960s, an era that he believes has parallels to the current climate with the way young people are stepping up to protest against war and government overreach.

He isn’t doing it alone, however. Smith’s co-organizers, fellow Gen Z Charlotteans Brennan Wooden and Sonnie Zayzay, have helped shape this year’s event, bringing experience and their own ideas to the planning process.

Wooden is working as the event curator while Zayzay has booked DJs and worked on designing the festival ground.

Wooden said she would like the event to serve as a unifying experience in a city where creatives and others are too often siloed in their own circles.

“It really all comes down to community,” she explained. “Seeing all kinds of people enjoy a common thing and enjoy each other, get out of their comfort zone, listen to new kinds of music, meet new people and see you can have fun without being put into a box of what you should be doing.”

“I hope people take from their experience at the festival a sense of hope in community and the strength in numbers,” added Zayzay.

Last year’s Camp Spectacles came together in just two months, an experience that Smith described as chaotic and stressful but fulfilling.

This year, the team started planning just after Halloween, coming off a sprawling Spooky Spectacles party that comprised three parties in one at the former Area 15 campus off East 15th Street.

With increased planning time this year, the team has made several improvements to the Camp Spectacles itinerary, scheduling the event later in the summer to reduce heat, setting up water misting lines for attendees to cool off and

“Keeping people cool last year was a really big challenge,” Smith said. “We had water and soda and other drinks on ice for people, but still, when you’re out in the heat for hours, it can wear.

“The main thing that’s always a challenge is organizing gear and understanding what gear people need,” he continued, “what people are able to bring and what we’ll need to source from a third party or something.”

He’s also aiming to make the festival more environmentally sustainable, utilizing eco-friendly materials to print promotional fliers and other literature that can then be folded into planters and sowed into the land with seedlings of one’s choice.

As for the entertainment, this year’s biggest addition is a two-night rave held at a lakeside property near Copperhead Island.

The makings of a DIY music festival

For Smith, the creation of Camp Spectacles is one more example of how creatives in the city who insist there’s nothing fun to do should be stepping up to organize events themselves.

“I feel like the city would be boring without the DIY scene,” he said. “It can be very stale and overly polished and I think that the DIY scene adds, you know, substance and it adds depth and it gives it texture.”

Kenyon Irvin is a guitarist and singer for Charlotte-based alt-rock band Beauty, another returning act from last year’s festival.

He agrees that DIY is what keeps Charlotte’s cultural scene thriving, which may be why he refers to last year’s festival as the coolest show he’s played in his musical career thus far.

“Shows like this one are only possible through lots of people coming through and spending their time or money, if not both,” Irvin said. “Independent events are so important for the community and us artists because it puts us much closer to you. Local places can feel like a middleman sometimes and they don’t provide anywhere near the amount of fun or whimsy.

“For the community, it’s great because it’s inexpensive, everyone is welcomed, and you’re usually going to find more entertaining shows than you would going to the usual live music spots,” he continued.

Amplified music isn’t allowed on Copperhead Island, a 14-acre piece of land located in the McDowell Nature Preserve just east of the South Carolina border.

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Smith said has worked with the park ranger to ensure that everything is in compliance. As someone who got his start as an event organizer hosting shows in his Charlotte apartment, he’s no stranger to cultivating a stripped down sound from the acts he’s booked.

“This year we’re expecting more people, so we’ll see, but we’re encouraging everyone to be on their best behavior,” he said.

Smith says the most rewarding part of organizing shows is giving creatives a chance to flourish. He’s a music fan after all, so putting on shows is one way to create the scene he wants to live in.

“Anyone who does music and performs and puts out music, I have an immense respect and admiration for because music is something that I’ve always been a fan of and enjoyed,” he said.

While this year’s Camp Spectacles event is expected to see growth, its future is uncertain at the moment. Smith is planning to leave Charlotte at the end of this year.

He said that, even when he’s living elsewhere, he hopes to support the DIY scene from afar.

“One thing that I want to do after I leave is to see if I can do some type of fund or sponsorship or something where it’s like, ‘Okay, I’m not here, but I still have a connection to this city and so here’s sort of just, a fund [with] money or gear or whatever for the people here who want to continue stuff on in the DIY scene.”

For those who may be interested in picking up the torch to keep Camp Spectacles going or organize a similar event, Smith has some advice.

“Try not to be afraid, but even if you are scared of doing a show, still do it scared,” he said. “I think a personal thing that I’ve found to help me navigate through things is to try to find a love for the work of it and not necessarily the outcome of it. Find what act of service you enjoy doing for others and really just go hard at that and the rest of it will sort of just work itself out.”

Camp Spectacles will take place on Copperhead Island, located at 15200 Soldier Road on the banks of Lake Wylie, from Aug. 29–31. Follow Abdul Smith on Instagram at @_abdulsmith_ for updates as the festival nears.