Brad Paisley Concert

Last night was my big night at a country music concert--Brad Paisley's concert to be exact. And even though I am not a huge country music fan, it was a lot of fun and absolutely worth the money I spent. The concert started off with someone by the name of Chuck Wicks (Sorry, had never heard of him) but worth checking out--if for nothing else than for checking him out, though he has a nice voice too. Did I ever tell you how I got these tickets? Back in August I won a 6 month membership to the Brad Paisley fan club. Then right before tickets went on sale for the concert here in SLC I got an email from them offering me a chance to buy tickets before they went on sale. I figured that might be fun, talked to my sister who is a country music fan and a Brad Paisley fan, and we bought a couple of tickets. The one catch to the tickets was that we had to pick them up the night of the concert at will call (not a problem) and it wouldn't be until we picked them up that we would find out where our seats actually were. As it turns out we were on row 10 on the floor and since part of the stage jutted out into the audience, sometimes we were on row 4. Hence the pretty close shots I was able to get of the performers.

So anyway, back to the concert. After Chuck Wicks (who I accidental kept calling Chick--but obviously I knew that was wrong when I would say it) a man by the name of Rodney Atkins took the stage. I recognised one of his songs (the going through hell song--we sometimes spin to that song in spinning which I think is quite appropriate and fun) which was good. I did however mistake his fiddle player for him at the very beginning and was about to be very impressed that a fiddle player was making it big, but then I realised everyone else was looking in a different direction than me--how was I supposed to know? I just looked for the guy in the center. Anyway, Rodney is incredibly talented and the chatting he did between songs was very entertaining--even more so than Brad's commentary later on that night.

And to top it off I came home with my own Rodney Atkins guitar pick given especially to me by him.

Okay, so actually he just threw it into the crowd and it landed on the floor where no one noticed it until the concert was over and the lights come on--maybe I should take up the guitar now that I have some equipment.

So next up was Mr. Brad Paisley himself. This part of the concert seems part country and part special effects rock show. It was a lot of fun--especially being so close to the action--and I even recognized like 3 of the songs. I wished he had talked a little more about the songs, but he packed a lot into his show which went by way too quickly. Like I said, there were a lot of special effects that really added a nice to touch, especially during the "Where I Get Where I'm Going" video tribute to some famous people who have died--even included Heath Ledger (Two people sitting near me only found out that he had died when they flashed his picture up on the screen--where have they been for the last couple of days?). The special effects went on to include video footage of local SLC bars (including one drawn into the background for a shot of The Simpsons) for the song about Alcohol. It was a bit loud (I guess I'm getting old) and I could have done without the screaming girl standing next to me (tune in tomorrow for my commentary on the drunks in the audience), but like I've already said, I thoroughly enjoyed it and who go again in a heartbeat.

Brad looks down a lot when he is playing so it was hard to get a good picture of him.

Then again, my camera isn't that great and really needs to be replaced so maybe my inability to get a really great shot was do more to my camera (or me) than being Brad's fault. If the latest economic stimulus package goes through I am going to by myself a new camera. Any suggestions on which one to buy?

p.s. I'm putting a few of the songs on my jukebox for your listening pleasure for the next few days--sorry no Chuck Wicks was available.