I went to see Brad Paisley at the Allentown Fair Saturday night. I felt a little out of place without a cowboy hat or boots on, but was entertained non-the-less.
First off, I grew up on country music as well as rock and roll. My father owned a bar in the 70's out in Claussville, PA... a small "local yocal" type of place that had Hank Williams and Patsy Cline on the juke box as well as live bands on weekends like "Whiskey River." When the guy would change the 45's in the juke box he would leave the old ones in a box behind the bar, and we would take them home and put them on our own juke box (A Sebring 100 exactly like the one on the sleeve of record 2 of the Rolling Stone's "Exile on Main St." LP, which I still think is really cool. It still works and is sitting in my father's basement.) So I grew up a huge Willie Nelson fan and fan of the old "classic" country songs, but not a huge fan of modern country. (My wife Celeste astutely pointed out that our rock and roll is today's country.) My wife will ONLY listen to country stations in the car, so I've become familiar with a few current songs and artists, but could not name a Brad Paisley song. My wife's sister, brother-in-law and nephew just moved here from Norman, OK (where Toby Keith lives nearby) and are fans, so we took them to see Brad Paisley, Dierks Bentley and Jimmy Wayne.
I must admit I was pretty impressed. Paisley is quite the showman, and played for 1 hour and 40 minutes, performing 20 songs. He knows how to connect to his audience, constantly slapping hands and throwing guitar picks to the predominately female audience. There were many shrieks from said audience, many from my wife and sister-in-law (who boldly yelled out "Brad please come home with me" as her husband stood close by. I imagine he shrugged his shoulders and thought "can't really argue with her there." My own wife proclaimed "He's SO cute" as I stood next to her. I shrugged my shoulders and thought "can't really argue with her there..) What I really liked about Paisley's stage show was the fact that he sang from everywhere possible on the stage: center, stage left, stage right and about 20 rows deep at the end of a stage extension. He had a multitude of video screens which showed videos, a short animation film which he himself did the animation, and various video backdrops which complimented the songs. The coolest part was when he played along to his newest video: "Welcome to the Future" where he customized it to include 5 local children who had won a contest through radio station Cat Country 96. Unfortunately, from our General Admission seats on the side of the stage I was the only one who could see 1 of the 3 screens mounted directly above the band. Actually, they weren't seats at all...the uncomfortable folding wooden chairs we sat on at the very back of the side of the stage for Dierks Bentley transformed into my own tired feet and bad knees for BP so everybody else could get closer to Brad. My mates often mistook the pained look on my face as my not enjoying the music rather than the pain of standing on the gravel infield for an hour and 40 minutes. While Brad was singing about fishing I was praying the boat would come by so I could sit down for a couple of minutes and rest.
As for the music itself, I really liked the song he opened with: "American Saturday Night" which is the name of the new single, new cd and the name of the tour. He played all of his hits including "Celebrity," "Alcohol" and "Mud on the Tires." (Thanks to my brother-in-law Jay for the titles.)
He's a pretty good lead guitar player and played each song from beginning to end. I say this because a lot of artists pick up a guitar for one or two songs for the phony "Hey I play rhythm guitar on 2 songs, I'm not just the singer! Or Keith Richards who lately will strum a few chords and take the rest of the song off since he apparently no longer has the strength or desire to do more. But then again, that's what makes Keith so cool!! Paisley sat on a stool and played solo for one song, often playing ballads from the same spot at the end of the center stage extension to be closer to his audience. He talked about how Billy Joel made Allentown famous and sang a few lines form the infamous song, as well as a few bars of "Pennsylvania Polka" a little later. He closed the show with a version of Don Henley's "Boys of Summer" while the video screen rolled the closing credits movie-style to give props to everyone from the stage riggers to the tour bus drivers.... a great idea for an artist to show appreciation for the hard work the people behind the scenes do, and usually never get any credit for. We even learned who made the grilled cheese sandwiches! I used to complain in my tv news days that I would bust my butt to shoot video at a news story, edit it in the truck, run a cable, lights and microphone out barely making our time slot, and at the end of the report the anchor would say to the reporter "thanks for that report Biff! HEY, YOU'RE WELCOME!! I'd shout long after we were off the air as Biff walked back to sit in the van and call his wife to complain about how exhausted he was while I had to pack up all the gear.
I can't say I'll run out and buy any Brad Paisley cd's, but I won't ignore his songs the next time they come on the radio station my wife insists we listen to when she's in the car either. I CAN say Brad Paisley's show was worth the price of admission, although my feet and knees may say something different.
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