Another Concert Gig Review: Sheryl Crow at the Beacon Theater

Enjoy my GIGSoup review of Sheryl Crow's tour stop at the Beacon Theater in New York City. Here are some of my concert pictures! Visit TheLiveMusicGirl for concert videos.

(C) PipPepPop

(c) PipPepPop

(c) PipPepPop

My Gig Reviews in New Places: Dierks Bentley Concert

Pardi, Bentley, and a plane. (c)PipPepPop

Bentley (c)PipPepPop

If you're a live music fan like me, I have a great website for you to check out. GIGSoup is a music website devoted to live event reports, album reviews, artist interviews and music news. I recently wrote my first piece here about seeing Dierks Bentley's 'What the Hell' tour. Opening acts featured on the tour included Jon Pardi and Cole Swindell.  Enjoy!

During the song '5150' (c)PipPepPop

Bentley sitting on the 'Riser.' (c) PipPepPop

The ACM Awards: Like the High School of Country Music

Imgur GIF from "Not Another Teen Movie" 

   Sometimes the adult world feels a lot like high school. Award shows are no exception to this rule. Tonight we're exploring the stars of the Academy of Country Music Awards (ACMs) and comparing them to characters from teen shows and movies. Get those tropes ready, we're going to see them in full force. Consult the below dictionary for you favorite country star. * These titles are all bestowed with Love!


Brett Eldredge
A true showman who, will run rhoguh the audience and serenade showgirls during his song.  Brett has the soulful eyes of a heart breaker and the deep emotions of a guy that will do anything for love. Character: Patrick  (Heath Ledger) from 10 Things I Hate About You

Brothers Osborne
I love brothers Osborne. They have a great album of songs that are great for chilling, like Rum. They have a great band energy as well because they're brothers. I'm bestowing on them a double teen movie honor: best bad comprised of the same guys in multiple movies. In Can't Hardly Wait, both Breckin Meyer and Donald Faison are in the band playing at the big party. In Josie and the Pussycats, the same two are in the boy band DuJour, along with CHW cast member Seth Green. I love that there is an unofficial band reunion for these guys in multiple movies!

Carrie Underwood
Carrie is one of America's literal idols. She sings sweetly, but if you get on her bad side, she's going to bash in your car (Before He Cheats) or possible murder you with poison (Church Bells). Part of me really wanted to bring Carrie together with vengeance demon Anya (Emma Caufield) from Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I considered it again, and Anya starts out as a villain and becomes endearing to the audience (fear of bunnies and all). But Carrie is on another level, so I have selected Rebecca Bunch from Crazy Ex-Girlfriend. Rachel Bloom's Rebecca charms us with every song she sings, even if she's plotting unspeakable revenge. She says, "She's just a girl in love and can't be held responsible for her actions, (faking a pregnancy, faking a break-in, faking a relationship)  and the creepy Josh drawer that played The Entertainer.

Darius Rucker
I feel like Darius Rucker is the cool teacher in this scenario for a variety of reasons. He already had his first career as a touring pop band vocalist, then reinvented himself as a country star. Since then, he has won Grammys and become one of the most active members of the Grand Old Opry. His teacher spirit would be like Mr. Turner (Anthony Tyler Quinn) on Boy Meets World.

Dierks Bentley
He's always up for helping out a buddy. Dierks performed his own song, sang with Cole Swindell and co-hosted the show with Luke Bryan. When does this guy sleep? When he's not getting Drunk on a Plane, Bentley is serenading his wife Katie in the sultry song Black. Dierks is a lot like Lucas Scott in One Tree Hill, a jack of all trades. Chad Michael Murray's Lucas plays varsity basketball, writes a novel, helps his mom run a cafe and later also a music venue, and manages to be everyone's best friend before gradating Tree Hill High.

Faith Hill and Tim McGraw
They just put a new duet out this week, and they've been been married for 21 years. The McGraw-Hill group's (publishing joke) idea of a good family adventure is going out on tour for a year together. These two are just like Ferris Bueller (Matthew Broderick) and Sloane Peterson (Mia Sara) from Ferris Bueller's Day Off.

Kelsea Ballerini
The girl next door that's starting to show her true feelings. Ballerini is the female vocalist of the year! Her cute and flirty songs like Dibs and  Yeah Boy reminds me of  Joey Potter ( Katie Holmes) singing All By Myself, knowing that she has feelings for Pacey on Dawson's Creek.

Jason Aldean
He's quite the opposite on stage from the persona in his party anthems. Aldean is a sensitive soul buried under a scowl and a wounded soul. He is the essence of the Friday Night Lights troubled footballer Tim Riggins (Taylor Kitsch), who falls in love with his paralyzed best friend's girlfriend.

Keith Urban 
As an Aussie, I would love to put Urban in the "cool foreign guy" category, but I would probably have to go back to Saved by the Bell to find a cool foreign guy. Scratch that, Screech once pretended to be a Russian chess player, so this category is not going to work. I think Urban is best suited as the cool actor guy, like Josh Duhmael's Tad in Win a Date with Tad Hamilton. As soon as he shows up in a small town, all the girls are falling over him.

Kacey Musgraves
Mentioned for her nomination, but not shown during the show, Kacey is no stranger to being an outcast. She last won an ACM in 2014 for best album, The also nabbed countless wards and a Best New artist Grammy. Musgraves has lost a lot of radio support for just being herself. I love her desire not to be part of The Old Boy's Club and she has earned the title of Veronica Mars. Kristen Bell's likable loner was misunderstood by her peers, but she solved more mysteries than the town sheriff's department and she always got the last laugh.

Florida Georgia Line
FGL 's Tyler and Brian represent the bro-iest bros around. But they're definitely the little brother  in this situation looking for some camaraderie with their older brothers. FGL and the Backstreet Boys united together for their new single God, Your Mama and Me, then brought down the house with Backstreet's Back. Stay tuned this week for my review of #BSBVegas, because it was epic. I'm going to honor this southern brotherhood with the Brothers of Kappa Tau (honorable mention to Scott Michael Foster as leader Cappie) on the show Greek.

Little Big Town
This band represents the  rock-solid couple from freshman year. They are as sweet to each other as they are to everyone around them. They even show up in coordinated outfits, which looks great in their Group of the Year winner photo. I'm going to give them Murray (Donald Faison) and Dionne (Stacey Dash) from Clueless, minus the fighting.

Luke Bryan
Bryan is the All-American boy. He can sing, dance, host, cry, laugh, and pose with a Chippendale dancer all in the same night. Luke is well liked, but she is completely approachable. He has a huge heart, looking after his orphaned nieces and nephew. Luke is like Freddie Prinze Jr.'s Zack in She's All That. Everyone loves Zack as the soccer team captain, head of the class and student body president. He can look past the shy girl and see the hotness beneath. As a bonus, Zack's hackey sac performance art reminds me of Bryan's recent soul-bearing Tonight Show song about how to pronounce  the Greek delicacy Gyro.

Maren Morris
This girl's got edge, and I'm not just talking about her Joan Jett-inspired wavy bob and nose ring. He breakout single last year My Church likened Johnny Cash to a spiritual awakening. Her most recent hit 80's Merdeces is light and breezy. I think Morris is best repented by Oscar Winner Emma Stone's Olive in Easy A. She may seem pretty tough on the outside, but she's just a bit misunderstood and she runs with it.

Miranda Lambert
This album of the year winner wrote a double album about her divorce, titled "The Heart" and "The Nerve." She's no stranger to falling apart (Mama's Broken Heart, Vice), and she's trying to dig herself our of a hole from a very messy public divorce from Blake Shelton. She's a dark horse, a Blair Waldorf (Leighton Meester) in Gossip Girl. Stay on her good side, or you might find your house doused in Kerosene.

Old Dominion
Their addictive hit from last spring Break Up with Him was Back to the Future themed! This is just another teen drama fact. I'm going to classify these guys as Josie and the Pussycats (movie version) because they are always checking pop culture and other music in their songs, like in Song for Another Time.

Reba
Reba is the fairy godmother of country music. She looks down on everyone offering motherly advice, and now she sings gospel songs. I'm going to credit Reba as the wise Iona, played by Annie Potts in Pretty in Pink. Iona offered Andie guidance while she tried to work out her feelings for Blaine, although she should have stepped in when Andie created that monstrous pink prom dress.

Sam Hunt
Mr. Hunt has become well known for his sexy sing/talk mix, called "sam hunting" by some radio DJ's. He wrote an album of  breakup songs about a girl, and now they're engaged. Tonight during his Body Like a Back Road, Hunt sat in the audience with his arm around Hanna Lee, serenading her as he described how well he knew her curves. Hunt is totally Dan Humphrey (Penn Bagley, aka Gossip Girl), who pines after Serena van der Woodsen for years. While publicly pursing Serena, Dan  almost destroys the lives of all their friends and family on their way to eventual marriage.

Taylor Swift
She's not at the awards in person tonight, but it's like she almost was there. She's like that girl that moved away to another school that you still think about. Even though she's off in a new scene, she's still sending songs like "Better Man" to Little Big Town, cinching their Group of the Year award win. I would say she is similar to Amy Jo Johnson's character Julie on Felicity. She became friends with Felicity, made the Felicity-Ben-Noel triangle into a rhombus, wrote some songs, and then split before college was over.

Thomas Rhett
This guy doesn't do anything halfway. He set the world record for largest twister game for the release of his 2015 Tangled Up album.  He sings that he would die a happy man just holding his wife Lauren's hand, then he announces his wife is having a baby and they're adopting a child from Africa. This family has been taken to another level! Rhett is the ultimate romantic, which is why he is the boombox guy,  Lloyd Dobbler (John Cusack) from Say Anything.

Sometimes You Must Shake It Off: The Taylor Swift Experience

Lyrics for Welcome to New York
(c) PipPepPop

Swift's guitar and MTV award
(c) PipPepPop

     Last November, I learned that a Taylor Swift-themed exhibit was Welcome to New York, and I freaked out like a tween. The Taylor Swift Experience came to Fulton Street and it was good, campy fun! I went with my 'squad' a few weeks ago to check out the multimedia travelling show, which began at The Grammy Museum in Los Angeles. After the New York turn, the exhibit is on the way to the Mississippi Grammy Museum. The price tag couldn't be beat, for 11 dollars we got more entertainment than a typical exhibit.

Red dress
(c) PipPepPop

     The first floor had a gift shop full of Swift swag and the singer's memorabilia. There were more recent stage costumes (see the RED dress below) and the very cute and sparkly ringmaster suit from the Red Tour. There were lyrics (see left) for the song Welcome to New York. Swift penned other tracks for the Red album with Ryan Tedder. Read more about Tedder's collaboration in my past post. Swift's famous glitter guitar was included in the exhibit. I have been coveting this beautiful 6-string since I saw it at the Country Music Hall of Fame in 2013. Swift has contributed a beautiful educational wing to the CMHOF. Childhood items were also on display for the singer.  There was a saddle from Swift's early horseback riding days, report cards, and a baby baby blanket. There were media pieces in the display area including early home movies from the Swift family.  The walls of the area were covered with listings of each tour and venue locations, with total number of fans attended.

Promo card (c) PipPepPop

   The second floor of the exhibit was interactive and our favorite part. The feature attraction was a multi-colored tile dance floor. The tiles changed color in time to the pulsing music. As swift hits played on the screen, the lit-up dance floor changed as you stepped on each tile. We waited each time times until  Shake it Off cycled through, then busted out our best moves while singing along. It was very therapeutic and it may become part of my new stress-reduction routine. The media floor also had a recording studio where we recorded We Are Never Getting Back Together and played it back with the music video. Outside the studio, there were screens with headphones that let you playback Swift's country-tinged Mean, with individual voice and audio tracks that you could control. The Grammy winner has taken a 21st century take on a museum, making the most of audio and video to engage fans. The second floor auditorium was playing past Swift's past performances performances and concerts. I recommend this to anyone who is a dreamer or who is looking to inspire the next generation of dreamers!

Shake it Off on the video dance floor
(c) PipPepPop

Mr. Misunderstood Live: All Hail Chief Church

The "Chief" backed by a choir. (c) PipPepPop

     Most artists do not play a double set on their tour. Eric Church is not like most artists and Holdin' My Own is not like most tours. Church is a tough guy and a gracious performer. He invites the audience in for a party, even taking a camera under the stage to pour shots of Jack Daniels for the crew when singing an ode to the famous whiskey. My only complaint about the show up front is that time is "just a suggestion" as my mom once remarked about a late-starting event. Church was once thrown off the Rascal Flatts tour for playing a too-long opening set. They gave the spot to Taylor Swift and the rest is history. The show was scheduled to start at 8 P.M. at The Barclays Center in Brooklyn, the world's most inconvenient arena.  At about 8:30 P.M., Church came to the stage. He still beat some of my friends to the show. (They appeared a few songs in, apparently held up on a long beer line.) The show ended after 11:30 P.M., and for those who know the NYC subway late night schedule, it took me a long time to get to the train station and catch the last train home of the night.

(c) PipPepPop

As a performer, Eric Church is not much of a talker. He hides behind a pair of defining aviator sunglasses,his expression always looking tough. When he does talk, he makes it count. He spoke of travelling and life on the road like he was talking to a friend. I felt like we were in an intimate venue a she casually walked the stage, singing into a microphone with a guitar dangling down his back. He played hits from his 2015 album Mr. Misunderstood with it's blusey radio hits Kill a Word and Record Year, and the title track, a rocking  tune about making dreams and finding his place in the world.

 When you think about me, do you think about seventeen?

Do you think about my old jeep, and about the stars in the sky?

It's funny how a memory sounds like a melody;

Like a soundtrack to a July Saturday night... 

Springsteen. 

     My favorite part of the concert was when Church began his 2012 stadium anthem, Springsteen.  This song is a tribute to the great king of Jersey rock and songs about dreamers. Church goes into the traditional Bruce Springsteen-like "Oh" chanting during the song. In this live version, he also went into a verse of Born to Run, forever enmeshing the two songs in my brain. It's a nostalgia tune for an old flame, and it has the heart of the Boss. As the stadium swelled, I cheered, I sang, and near-wept at the perfection of the performance. 

Are You Busy One Year From Now?

   
     I am the first of all my friends to get excited about a concert announcement. If I really want to go to an event, the furious link sharing, venue debates, and messages that begin. The hype lasts about 2-3 days between the tour announcement and the pre-sale date with comments like "Does your sister want to go so we can get the 4-pack seats?" or "Are we all agreeing that we will stick with this unless the seats are over $70.00?" * If we strike out during the pre-sale it is not guaranteed there will be any trinkets left for general on sale, although I do fondly remember the Maroon 5 ticket miracle in the Fall of 2014.
   

McGraw at the 2014 "Sundown Heaventown"
tour (c)PipPepPop

    With all of this background knowledge, one might ask why I even bother seeing live music. Some people are addicted to drugs or gambling or drinking, but I am addicted to live music!  I am delighted to hear Tim McGraw and Faith Hill's announcement they are re-booting their 2006 Soul2Soul tour for 2017. On top of that, the country power couple is celebrating 20 years of  a as co-parents and marriage champions. What could be better than that news?  Tickets begin going on sale this Friday for concert dates. Yes, this Friday the 20th!

     When I looked to see where my local shows would be, I discovered the last stop on the tour is at Brooklyn's Barclays Center (sigh). (For various reasons, I have had bad associations with attending events at the center, but that is a story for another time). The date of that tour-ending show? It's October 27th of next year! Let me remind you, we haven't even passed this October 27th yet.  I'm a bit shocked the tour would announce dates over a year into the future. While I can't see this show going in sale yet, I have reached the point in my life where I like making plans, but I don't like paying for tickets and arranging my entire October a year from now around this date.  I enjoyed seeing Tim (or Timmy McGee as my friends lovingly call him) in 2014, and I committed to that show 2 months out, which is more than reasonable. I'm certainly not going to "Live Like You Were Dying" and commit to pricey concert tickets a year in advance.


* I wish I was joking about the prices. The cheapest concert tickets I purchased this year were $20.00 lawn seats for Daruis Rucker (during a ticket discount sale) and it rained on our uncovered lawn seats. See my recent piece on the difficulty to even procure concert tickets and the accompanying skyrocketing prices.

A Little Twangy Song About A Pub, or Country Music Outside of America

     First of all, there was another country awards show this past week. My brother asked me to specifically describe the ACCA Awards and explain how they are different from the early April ACM awards and the November CMA (Country Music Association) awards. I didn't dare mention the CMT (Country Music Television) awards. Let's break it down here. The ACCA stands for The American Country Countdown. It's a weekly radio show created by the late great Casey Kasem and presided over by 1/2 of Brooks and Dunn, Mr. Kix Brooks. This is different from the Luke Bryan & Dierks Bentley hosted The Academy of Country Music Awards, which is awards given from the country music industry. The ACCM winners are a strict, most spins, highest-charting each week, fan-voted type of award show. It's basically the country radio equivalent of the long-lost TRL Awards, which were different than the MTV Movie Awards and the MTV Video Music Awards (VMAs).

Photo Courtesy of Taste of Country

     One can unarguably say that Taylor Swift has changed the face of country music. She took it to the country, and around the world like the first great worldwide country star, Garth Brooks. But let's be real, even artists like ACCA Artist of the Year Luke Bryan do not have a large international following because country music has not take over markets in Europe. People don't drive out into the woods and dance on truck beds like they do here in 'Merica. During last month's promotion for the ACM awards, the English-born Late Late Show host James Corden jammed with Bryan and Bentley (dressed up as a King, a Queen's guard, and Sherlock Holmes). The trio sang a song about going to the corner pub in "Jolly Good Pub," or as country crooners call it, a honky-tonk. It's one small step toward country music taking over other continents, and possibly, a future ECCM award show.

2016: The "In Memoriam Section" is Going to Be Long

"A legend has died," is a phrase that has been uttered way too many times for only being 4 months through 2016. At an alarming rate, music greats have been dying, leading to what many have called "the end of a generation of music." They come from different walks of life and died for a variety of reasons, but we all remember where we were the first time we heard them... and the last. I attribute today's blog title to my friend Teresa. She eloquently summed up the fan response to the growing number of music legends dying this year. 

Merle Haggard (I looked, but there are no GIFS for him)
Haggard eerily died on his 79th birthday (April 6th) this year. I didn't know too much about him because his era of country was well before my time. Most of my knowledge comes from seeing an exhibit about him at the Country Music Hall of Fame in Nashville a few years ago titled, "The Bakersfield Sound." Haggard was a man of the people, taking on the persona of the "Okie from Muskogee."

GIF from Gfycat.com

 Prince
 For Prince (or The Artist Formerly Known As) as he was called when I was kid, the 57 year old man seemed to die gradually. I was scrolling through some music to listen to at work the morning of his death, hearing he was found unresponsive in his elevator by lunchtime, and pronounced dead by the evening. It was a bone chilling moment when I heard the news. While I enjoyed "Kiss" and "Little Red Corvette", police were responding to a 911 call at his Minneapolis compound, where Prince would later be pronounced dead. Stadiums were lit up purple and people held all night dance parties to celebrate his passing. Prince was not just a fashion icon, but an ambassador of a way of life. My favorite moment of the artist is not one of his well known ones. It's a clip from Muppets Tonight (the 1997 show on the Disney Channel) and "the artist formerly known as" Prince is writing songs about cafeteria food. Rizzo the Rat keeps addressing "the artist" by turning around and showing the symbol on the back of his jacket. 

GIF from Tumblr. 

David Bowie
In January, another 80's legend, David Bowie, passed away quietly. Unbeknownst to fans and the public, the singer succumbed to liver cancer days two days after his new album Blackstar was released. My most memorable Bowie moment is from the 1980's (also Muppets) movie, Labriynth. I thank my parents every day that I never saw this movie as a child, because I had enough things to be creeped out about (mostly the song "Season of the Witch" by the band Donovan). While there was talk of  the movie being re-booted after Bowie's death, that got shut down quickly.
     This movie would have also made me afraid of baby napping, David Bowie, mazes, and cats. Just look at the guy, he's a spandex-wearing man cat! I first saw the movie at the beginning of college, where I was able to laugh at the 80's graphics and strange songs, like Bowie's "You remind me of the babe" song and dance with the kidnapped baby Toby. 

The Eagles (Frey on left) from GIPHY

Glenn Frey
The legendary Eagles guitarist passed away in January from multiple issues, including pneumonia, rheumatoid arthritis, colitis and inflammatory bowel disease. He was 67 at the time and had retired from touring with the band about a year before being hospitalized for the above issues. My favorite Frey moment has got to be his music video for "You Belong to the City." There is some beautiful acting going on and some "Baker Street" style saxophone solos. The song was written for the show Miami Vice, but oddly the promotional music video features Frey clearly in New York.  

Natalie Cole
This charming jazz singer passed away at age 65 on new year's eve. If that wasn't bad enough, she suffered from heart failure as a result of lung disease. While I'm torn to choose a favorite Natalie Cole moment, I have to go with her 1992 Grammy Awards duet with her dead father (jazz singer Nat King Cole) in 1992. With the magic of video screens and good audio quality, both Coles were able to sing "Unforgettable."

A Crazy Town Full of Neon Dreams

     Wednesday night marked the long-coming wedding between Nashville's Deacon and Rayna. As the two country superstars united in a 20-plus years coming marriage, they struggled to keep their privacy. As a cool publicity move, ABC created a page on The Knot in honor of the couple's wedding. The page was filled with photos of the couple (played by Connie Britton and Charles Esten) a link to their favorite songs, and information about the places in Nashville that meant the most to them. It's an odd sort of ploy, but the show ties so heavily into town tourism, I can see why they went this way. I happen to be on my way to Nashville this weeks o I will keep my eyes peeled for any juicy gossip!

Image from Pintrest

     The wedding itself was one for the record books. The groom almost ran away, the brides's kids put up a fight about coming, and her sister said something to the effect of "Are you sure you really want to do this?" But Rayna and Deacon said "I Do," while all of the guests struggled with the last-minute change in venues and imploding personal lives.  Avery Barkley (Jonathan Jackson) is still married to superstar Juliet Barnes (Hayden Panettiere) and he has reached his breaking point about lying to the press about where Juliet is (as she sought treatment on the show and in real life for post-partum depression.) Scarlett (Clare Bowen) attended her uncle's wedding solo and pal Gunnar (Sam Palladio) tried to set her up with a ton of weird guys, only proving that they really belong with each other if they could only admit it. Rayna's ex Luke is still losing all of his money and his miserable son Colt finally starts telling people that Juliet was trying to jump off a hotel roof when slimy record executive Jeff Fordham (Oliver Hudson) accidentally fell to his death. This whole situation is not going to end well, but maybe this will finally give bring wannabe Layla (Audrey Peeples) an exit. Also Chris Carmack's Will Lexington is still a gay country singer. He declined to attend the wedding to avoid the press asking him the same questions over and over... so really nothing has changed among these background characters. If something doesn't change up soon, the show's chances of renewal are slim.

The Coat of Many Colors

  I wasn't sure what to think of Dolly Parton's NBC movie, The Coat of Many Colors. The song is not my favorite one (I love 9 to 5 and Islands in the Stream) I also sat through their recent production of The Wiz and was a lot more interested than I was in some of their other live musicals, so I kept an open mind. I was pleasant delighted by the tale of a strong Southern family who rely on each other  and their values to get through hard times (drought, infant mortality, a bully family).

Courtesy of NBC

    Little Dolly was played by the delightful Alyvia Alyn Lind, who sticks to her principles when people make fun of her coat of little rags. Country singing darling Jennifer Nettles of Sugarland was truly delightful and honest as Dolly's mother Avie Lee, vocalizing with her children and teaching them how to love their neighbor and themselves. Her counterpart is the NYPD's finest, Ricky Schroeder, whose Robert Lee Parton could not find the faith to join his family in church until he thought about the afterlife and the possibility of being alone after his family moved on. It's worth a watch on demand if you haven't seen it yet, and it's based on a true story. 

The Time I Saw Ol' Bocephus

USA's Playing House:
The Bocephus Disguise

     According to Urban Dictionary: Bocephus is a common nickname for Hank Williams Jr. Hank got the nickname from his famous father, who looked in the cradle and just called him "Bocephus." Bocephus is a common phrase airbrushed on 1984 Ford F-150s.

     I won tickets to attend the third day of a three-day country music festival in upstate New York. It happened to be on Father's day, so I got my trusty pop to be my plus one. We were hoping to arrive early afternoon after a family lunch and we would catch acts like Thompson Square and Thomas Rhett. The first two days of the festival had amazing headliner acts like Brad Paisley, Dierks Bentley, and our Sunday night juggernaut, ol' Bochphus.

View from the top of the ski slope.

     A long story short, we ended op getting very lost. My GPS on the phone was picking up signals beyond 1x data,  I think guidance was likely from spaceships. When we arrived, we were able to park nearby the camping area, outside of the ski resort t for no additional fee. Other told us they had paid $30.00-$50.00 to park their cars there. The staff managed to find two more bracelets to admit us in, and into the breach we went. Thank god for real bathrooms! We were also relieved to find there was still some beer.

Ol' Junior. 

     Just in time for the last set, we struggled to make a list of songs we knew from Hank Jr. We came up with the Monday Night Football Theme and the original version of "I Fought the Law." We were treated to renditions of songs by his father and Jerry Lee Lewis, we we were very much out of sync with the rest of the crowd. There were so many mud-stricken people there, dirty and drunk from three long days of partying, and covered in terrible sunburn. Halfway into the set, dad asked I wanted to head home, and I couldn't have been happier to head back to civilization.  I can safely say I would never have enjoyed Woodstock.

A Love Note: Dear Luke Bryan

 

Dear Luke,

You are the best country music man out there!  Enough said. I am a total fan girl.

Love, PPP

In closing and in defense, he is the one in the baseball cap and leather jacket. !In true country boy style, he has a loving wife and two adorable sons, and he sings like an angel. Sigh! Plus, check out the second video from the Grammy nomination concert where he shows some moves like Jagger.

A Note: No More Banjoes

   I know Mumford and Sons is very popular right now. It's so popular, I've seen about 7 guys that look like Marcus Mumford in a simple supermarket trip, and they're all looking for artisanal pickles.

   All of a sudden, it seems that the radio has learned about this newfangled instrument called the banjo, the 5-stringed cousin of the mighty guitar that ruled rock radio for so many years. But I have a little known fact to the major radio stations, the banjo has been around for a while. If you've ever flipped on a country station for an hour, you;re guaranteed to hear several banjo songs. In fact, Rascal Flatts put out a song earlier this year, and it's called simply "Banjo."Like many other country song,s this song is about getting off the beaten path and getting down with nature, possibly with some moonshine and a creek that you can stop by and take a dip.

   So back to the popular music DJ's, who are claiming this is "revolutionary" or Dylan-esque", don't forget, banjos have been jamming on the radio for a good long time. #country