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Brad Paisley played at the Las Vegas Hilton on December 13th. This was the second time I'd seen his show. I saw him in at the Splitfire Grill in Vacaville, CA in 2000, and the show was just as great

Chely Wright opened for Brad, and she played for about 40 minutes. After about a 5 minute break, the curtains parted and Brad arrived on stage. He was wearing a deep red jacket and jeans with a white shirt underneath.

He opened the show with "Long Sermon" off his debut album, Who Needs Pictures, then played "Two People Fell In Love," from his latest album, Part II. Another song from the same album was third; "All You Really Need Is Love."

Brad welcomed the crowd and thanked everyone for coming. He said that if people had been

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Brad Paisley Review
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to shows of his before, they know he likes to tease his fiddle player, Justin. He then told a story about Justin at a recent party. He said that Justin is a real ladies man... if there is a lady that is stationary, he thinks she's his. He told how Justin met a girl at the party named Wendy, and he asked her out to dinner. He waited at home for her to arrive, and the time for her to get to his house came and went, and she never did show up. He was sad about this. Brad kidded... "well, you know you have to wait til they say yes before you assume you're going out."

Then, he said that Wendy works on a corner in Nashville, and the audience all made an "oooh" sound. Brad said, "Wait a minute, she sells flowers... Vegas people," and he shook his head. And he asked her how her date with Justin went, and she said "what date?" That was when he found out she's married. And not *just* married, but married to one of the band. Then the bandmember said he could forgive Justin, cuz he didn't know any better, but it better never happen again. Brad said that this was how Justin's love life usually went, and he referred to him as the band's "Little Harry Potter," as he's the youngest one in the group. He dedicated the next song to him, which was "Two Feet of Top Soil."

Next Brad played his second #1 song, "We Danced." Next came one of my favorite parts of the show, when Brad plays one of his awesome instrumentals. He played one called "Munster Rag." In the song, all the band members get a solo. It's awesome!

Then Brad played his latest single, which is currently in the Top 10, "Wrapped Around." After the song was over someone yelled at him to take off his jacket, which he did. This lead into his first single, and the title track of his debut album, "Who Needs Pictures." He started to play it, then stopped and said, "Should we do this?" Then everyone yelled that he should, so he continued. After it was over he thanked everyone for making that his first hit record.

Brad got a stool out and sat down while the band left the stage. He started playing "Battle Hymn of the Republic" acoustically, and it sounded so good! He played one verse and the chorus, then he lead into "America the Beautiful." The audience got on their feet and you could hear soft singing from everyone as he played. Very cool moment. From this, Brad lead into "How Great Thou Art," which he sang as well as played, and the audience sat back down for the duration of the song. When he was done, everyone got right back up and gave him a standing ovation for such a beautiful medley.

Next Brad said, "Wanna hear a new song? Do ya know any?" Then someone shouted out for him to sing the cigar song. He said, "Oh... that's the one I was thinking of doing, anyway." And he sang it. It's not on either of his albums, but it's really funny. The story is about a guy that buys these Cuban cigars, then insures them against theft, fire, etc. Then, he says he smoked them one by one, and when he was done, he took his claim to the insurance company and said that they went up in a series of "small fires." He got paid for the damages, and with his payment he went to buy another box of cigars. But, the insurance caught on and he got thrown in jail where he now smokes 10 cent cigars.

The band returned to the stage and Brad played another humorous song, from his latest album. It's called "I'm Gonna Miss Her."

After this, the band returned and Brad played "Me Neither," and tossed out some guitar picks with the help of an adorable little boy. He dedicated it to all the women, cuz he says they are the ones that really rule the world.


Brad ended the show with his first No. 1 song, "He Didn't Have To Be." Like I mentioned in the Chely review, I was disappointed that they didn't sing their duets together. Brad and Chely have "Hard To Be a Husband, Hard To Be a Wife," which was nominated for a CMA Collaboration award this year, and "One Night in Las Vegas," which is on Chely's Never Love You Enough album. Maybe they did end up singing together during the other two shows, but they didn't during the night I went.




[ Back to Vegas - Country Style (Part Two) ]

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