Once again it’s been a while since I’ve posted anything…well, anything about music. It is actually quite surprising considering the 2011 I had, musically speaking of course. It was a year filled with crazy adventures, great music, not so great music, amazing friends and a wonderful return to my favorite venue, The Hollywood Bowl.
But I digress, as I sit and write my thoughts continue to stray back to the first live show I can remember. Do you remember yours? Did it have a lasting impact? I can undeniably claim that my first memory of a live musical performance (that I wasn’t in, of course…but that story is for another time) begins in the summer time. But it did not have a lasting impact, other than to say that I remember it. It was mid-nineteen eighties, though I don’t recall the exact year. Lasting impact, ha! I was but a lad, and visiting my cousin Kim who lived at the time in Bloomington, Illinois. Ahhh, yes. Illinois.
In my youth I spent two weeks every summer visiting family in Illinois. One week with my maternal grandmother in Galesburg, and one week with my cousin Kim in Bloomington. Kim is a year or so older than I, but growing up we were very close even though we lived twelve hundred miles apart. I have many, many fond memories of my time in Illinois as a young boy, but alas I digress yet again.
The first live performance? Yes, yes…I remember. Klymaxx, that soulful eighties all girl band. At the Illinois State Fair in Springfield. What can I say? I’m not their demographic. It was summer, the air was warm, the sweet smell of something gooey and fried hung on the air. I was at a state fair, of all places. Not exactly sneaking over the wall as a teenager to catch a Led Zeppelin show my parents forbade me to see. Nope, no such adventurous tales for me…
And so, my journey to the ultimate rock concert took the better part of thirty years. A journey that led me down the road of some amazing shows with incredible stories and lasting memories. Years of reggae concerts; of seeing legends a little past their prime; of seeing legends considerably past their prime. A pop/rock concert or two. I was asked recently if I’ve seen a lot of shows, and the answer is yes. But that ultimate rock concert had eluded me until only recently. And I waded my way through a spring of country music to get there…
Here in California, we have a number of festivals that offer an aficionado’s ear a delectable variety of music. Which is to say there is something for everyone. In 2011, that something for my wife was the Stagecoach country music festival in Indio. A two day, artist packed weekend that would be sure to delight the big hat, pointy boot wearing fan for miles and miles. I was a little skeptical.
I grew up on Merle Haggard, Kenny Rogers and Barbara Mandrel. My first guitar was black because I’m a huge Johnny Cash fan. I can sing along with Alabama, and The Oak Ridge Boys or Ronnie Milsap. But to say that I’m a country fan would be misleading. I’m not. Being stuck in the back seat while your parents tuned the radio to Dolly Parton doesn’t qualify me as a fan. It is a part of me, but I’m a little bit rock and roll…
But the times they are a changin’. Partly due to Kenny Chesney, if I’m being honest. That man has a pretty darn good thing going, and if you need a soundtrack for your summer he’s got it. I’m only a mild fan of Jimmy Buffet, but I’m becoming a huge fan of Kenny Chesney. Sometimes he’s a little on the rowdy side, but I sure do love his music. Tap your feet, crack a cold one, head down to the beach and put your toes in the sand. Yeah, I’m there…
So when he was listed as one of the headliners for the festival, I eagerly agreed to go. Joining us would be our dear friends Matt and Ky. Now, along with my wife, Matt and Ky are huge country music fans. Big hats, big buckles, those pointy shoes again…
I arranged a hotel for the four of us (dudes in one room, chicks in another…like camp all over again) and I drove us all down Friday night, getting a little lost on the way but finding the hotel after I finally admitted that everyone in the car but me knew where they were going. We settled, had dinner and went lights out only after a great night of hanging out and talking.
Stagecoach is a festival. On a huge field. In the desert of California. What you are reading right now (though the words may look a little different) is huge crowds, traffic, lots of waiting, hot, windy, blah blah, huge crowds. Welcome to a two-day hee-haw!
Everyone was dressed so much alike that I had a little trouble distinguishing the crowd. Even I got into the spirit of the event and bought a big hat (though I stuck to my guns and wore my usual uniform of t-shirt, shorts and flip-flops). To be honest, with so much western wear I was a little disappointed to not see any cattle. And then we were let into the gates, and my desire to see cattle emerged before my very eyes. Can you say cut-off denim and bikini tops? I knew that you could…
Modesty has its place in the world, but apparently not at Stagecoach.
They did have music, though, and plenty of it. From Saturday, my favorites were The Cleverly Trio. They may have been my favorites from the entire weekend. From the very beginning you know these guys have shaken something loose just by the name. The Cleverly Trio. There’s five of them. And they are HILARIOUS. They covered Cee-Lo Green’s “Forget You”, Beyonce’s “Single Ladies (Put a Ring On It)” among other current hits. In their twangy bluegrass, they were a definite highlight for me. They had the crowd hollerin’ and clapping and laughing. Absolutely good stuff.
Now, Saturday had Steel Magnolia and Chris Young on the main stage as well. I enjoyed both shows. Recognized a tune or two. We watched from within the mob. A lot of sun burns and red solo cups. As the day wore on, our tolerance for the mob became less and less. It seemed to many that the music was secondary for their reason for being there. A shame, too.
But, we managed. Darius Rucker played just as the sun was setting and the night began to cool what had been a weather beaten day. He sounded incredible, had a great rapport with the audience, and of course had more than a few hits to entertain the crowd with. We enjoyed every minute and sang along with every song. The Hootie hits included.
- Great Friends & Big Hats
But the day had been long, and the crowd (most notably the group directly in front of us) was growing increasingly rowdy. Sitting on a lawn in the middle of the mob isn’t my idea of a good time. Our energy and enthusiasm began to wane. We stayed put for the beginning of Kenny Chesney’s set, but a song or two in we made for the exit. It took some time, and we stopped more than once to hear a favorite song and sing along. An hour or so into his set we had positioned ourselves close to the exit and after agreeing we had heard nearly every song we had wished to, we bid the legions adieu and retired to our hotel. I will say this about Kenny Chesney, he sounded amazing. But I will also say that he did not live up to the hype from those I’ve heard speak of his shows, and coupled with our disdain for the crowd I would have to say his time on stage was a bit disappointing. I will leave total judgment open for an opportunity to see him again.
Day two? Sure, much of the same. A lot of photographs of, well…I’ll be kind. Let’s just say we took a lot of photographs and were quite entertained and amused. We watched Josh Turner and Easton Corbin on the main stage and a few bands on the side stages that were…eh. It was clear the festival crowd was not for us. We aren’t big drinkers and that seems to be the pre-requisite for such an event.
Carrie Underwood was the highlight of Sunday. She looked amazing (from nearly the back row where we chose to sit and avoid the mob), and she sounded incredible as well. A little love, a little tenderness, a little rock and roll. Walk This Way? Uh-huh…she did. I’m not afraid to say that I think this girl is something special anyway and her time on stage only affirmed that notion.
By the time Rascal Flatts came out on stage, our weekend was over. Sun dried, wind blown, a little too much of the hedonistic party crowd. Yeah, I’m not a prude but sheesh…leave SOMETHING to the imagination. If only a little something…
So based on my experience with the rowdy country crowd at a two day festival, you can imagine my reluctance to get too excited about our tickets to see the Zac Brown Band two weeks later. Was I to expect a repeat of the wily ways of the big hats? A little liquid courage, a Saturday night, an oversized buckle or two? What was I to expect?
Well, the venue held me in check and the memories of Stagecoach soon became short and faded, much like the itty-bitty shorn blue jeans of many a dude or two.
Hold him closer, tiny Wranglers…
I think these were the athletic fit...
The venue for Zac Brown Band? The Hollywood Bowl. Probably my favorite place to see a concert. And yet, I’ve only seen two artists there. John Mayer (twice), and now Zac Brown. But the venue is something special for sure. We take a bus from close to home so there’s no dealing with parking, the seats are great for the price (though I think most concerts are too spendy) and the atmosphere really puts you in a mood to enjoy whatever show you’re there to enjoy.
World Famous Hollywood Bowl
The Zac Brown Band did not disappoint. I put his music on par with Kenny Chesney as my favorite in country music. Probably even a little better than that. It has legs and depth. The music takes you places. And for me, anyone who sings about the Stars and Stripes and freedom in a song and visits the troops as he has done is aces in my book. He’d have to do an awful lot for me to turn my back on him now…
His band is a no frills kind of band, in the sense that he just wants to entertain you. No high drama, no flashy light show. Zac and the band just walked out on stage and started playing. Good, good music. All of the hits, a bunch of the new stuff. He weaved a tale from here to there by mixing a melody of Where the Boat Leaves From with Van Morrison’s Crazy Love to Kenny Rogers’ Islands in the Stream and back to Where the Boat Leaves From. It was the first of two samples of Van Morrison, as the encore included a melody of Free with VM’s Into the Mystic. Have I ever told you that Van Morrison’s Moondance album is in my top five of all time? Another day then…
He gave us a little bit of everything. The Devil Went Down to Georgia? Sure, why not? A little Tom Petty’s Won’t Back Down during the encore? Uh, huh…it was there. My absolute favorite of the night? A full version of America the Beautiful before beautifully bridging his way into Chicken Fried. I get goose bumps even now as I write this. I’m a sucker for baseball, apple pie and America the Beautiful…
May be one of the best shows I’ve ever seen. The crowd was awesome, the music was engaging and fun and incredible. My favorite venue. Sharing the whole experience with my beautiful bride made the night perfect and an experience I’ll never forget.
And yet, just days after the show I already had my heart set on a day five months to the day in the distance. At another venue I’ve been before. To see another show. Another concert. Anticipation grew as the country spring I was experiencing became a warm and lazy summer. That elusive ticket was nearly in my grasp…
My brother was heavy metal growing up. Long hair, puffy shirts, tight pants. THE LOOK. But to some degree he lived the life, too. Nights on Sunset in the clubs seeing the bands. Going to the stadiums to see the shows. My brother was that guy out there doing it. It wasn’t until years later that I wished that I had done it too.
I’ve run into people who tell me the stories of their first show. Teenagers hopping fences. Friends piled into cars and going on road trips. I met a kid who spent a summer following the Grateful Dead! Not someone who grew up with the band, but someone who wanted the experience…I’ve been in awe of many of these stories. Sometimes I feel my musical journey has been less than exciting or adventurous.
Until October 14th. The Foo Fighters @ The Great Western Forum. Home of the Showtime Lakers. Now a church and concert venue. A concert venue for one of the greatest rock bands of this generation. Of all time? You could argue that. Some might disagree. Hey, you might disagree. But this is my story…
Sometimes you're having too good a time to take a really good picture...
Just me, my best friend and eighteen thousand of our closest friends. It was hot, the crowd was a mix of young and old. Mostly young. Long hair, short hair, no hair. Rockers and Dockers. But the energy was electric! You could just feel that we were all here for one purpose. It was a following…
Cage the Elephant opened. They played one song, and the reverb coming off of the walls was so loud that you really could only get sense of the beat and rhythm and not really of the words being sung. Or in the case of lead singer Matthew Schultz, you couldn’t really tell what he was screaming. Did I care? Uh…not one bit. My ears were ringing, the music was super loud, everyone was shaking like Edison had plugged us in. The song was over, and Shultz begins telling a story of how their regular drummer had to have an emergency appendectomy, and they would like to bring out a guest drummer if that was ok. Was it ok? Sure, what do I care what you….huh? Is that? It is! It is! The crowd goes BEZERK!
Dave Grohl steps to the stage, gives Shultz a hug, waves to the crowd and takes his place behind the kit. At forty-something, Grohl hasn’t missed a step. It was like watching old video of Nirvana being replayed to different music. The hair flew, the kit shook, the arms rose and fell with speed and fury. The beat coursed through us like a blacksmiths’ hammer. I didn’t know the songs well, but I soaked in everything. It was one hell of way to begin the show…
The Foo Fighters. Their most recent album, Wasting Light was recorded live on tape, in Dave Grohl’s garage. Old school style. You can tell it’s something special. You can sense this band remembers the days when the vinyl used to crackle when you’d spin the latest from Jimi, Plant and Paige or Mick and the boys. You can tell.
I stood the entire night. Grohl announced that we had better settle ourselves in because this wasn’t going to be an ordinary show. And it wasn’t. They played for three hours. Every hit. Every riff. The screaming, the pointing to the crowd. The jumping up and down. For three hours it was musical nirvana, the enlightenment of releasing anything you had in your thoughts and letting the music transport you. And in the end, you feel alive and new…
The stage had a runway and Grohl used it with aplomb. The entire set felt interactive. We were a part of the show. A part of the music. A part of the journey. This only became more so when the band disappeared and Grohl appeared alone, on a rising cone with his acoustic guitar and a microphone. In the middle of the floor crowd. He rocked every song he played. One man giving everything he had, heart and soul, to every chord and every word. Eighteen thousand fans rapt. It was a following…
I could probably write for days. Of the energy, of Grohl’s weird Prince story, of the Tom Petty cover Breakdown, the encore. I could sit here and press play on my iTunes and relive each moment. But I think I’ve done enough for one day. Maybe too much. It’s worth every moment to get out there. If only once. Hopefully more. Much more. But still, you have to get out there. What was that dream you were telling me about? Yeah…go do it. Find a way.
Just because life got in the way doesn’t mean that dream moved on. It’s still there. Waiting for you. What are you afraid of? That it actually is still there? That it will happen? Me too, once. Until that one night, nearly my fourth decade in life, when I became that teenager who hopped the fence and went to see that show my parents forbade me to see.
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