This concert has got to be one of, if not THEE best that I've seen all year. It was so good in fact, I don't even know where to begin. I traveled the whole 12 minutes to a great dance hall called The Dusty Armadillo where once again, my favorite country radio station K-105 had managed to book yet another great artist, Eric Church for a Friday night show. Dave Steele, the stations late afternoon DJ had been talking this show up for what seemed to be forever before the date finally came. At just about 9:15 pm, Dave took the stage at the Dusty and asked this sold-out crowd to give a big, warm welcome to Country Music's next superstar, Eric Church. With the Dusty being a dance hall, there's a huge dance floor in front of the stage and it sure seemed like most of the 600+ crowd already knew they were about to see the next big thing currently hitting the country music airwaves. The well behaved crowd packed itself in as close to the stage as possible and erupted into a mighty fine Northeastern Ohio roar of applause and foot stompin' when Eric took the stage. I don't know who was louder, the audience's welcome or the incredibly talented musicians Eric has assembled for his touring band. Opening up with "Before She Does" a perfect choice for this rowdy crowd, waiting with baited breath for some hard hitting, rockin' country licks.
I had first heard of Eric in February of this year during the Country Radio Broadcaster's Seminar held in Nashville. Playing only four songs during Capitol Music's Luncheon Showcase, I was incredibly impressed then. I saw Eric again in July in Mentor, Ohio and also reviewed that show. I thought he was awesome both shows and someone definitely to watch, but I can't tell you how much this artist has grown in these past few months. He said he was there to play loud and long and that's exactly what he and his band did. What he didn't say was that he was gonna knock the cowboy boots off every single person lucky enough to be there.
After initially setting this crowd on fire right from the git-go, Eric mellowed out just a tad to perform a couple of songs from his first and current CD, Sinner's Like Me. "What I Almost Was" and "Guys Like Me" were up next before Eric began talking about being "let go" from a band he had been touring with recently for being too loud. When Eric said that, I personally thought maybe those "Me and My Gang" guys didn't know how to handle an artist that was too talented to be a 20 minute opening act. But honestly, their answer was to fire him? What were they thinking? Eric told us he has gone on now to tour with Bob Segar and will be opening up for Bob at the "Q" arena in Cleveland on December 16th. Rumor has it, Eric's set is about double the length of time it was before.
Keep in mind, every song on Sinner's Like Me was written or co-written by Eric. With that being said, also keep in mind that a song isn't really a song to Eric, it's more of a story, one based on either his own experience or one that he has witnessed. Eric said that himself during a meet and greet held on his bus after the show. Oh yeah, I forgot to mention being one of the five extremely lucky fans that were chosen to go party on his bus with the man himself after the show, but I'll get back to that later in the review.
"Pledge Allegiance To The Hag" is a brilliantly written song and instead of taking place somewhere called The Cross-Eyed Cricket Waterin' Hole, with all the toasting going on at and on the stage to Eric, the fans, the music and anything else they happened to be pleased with at the time, Eric could have changed the words to The Crossed-Eyed Armadillo Waterin' Hole. Okay, it doesn't flow quite as well as The Cross-Eyed Cricket but you get what I'm saying. The crowd loved the song and Eric loved how they loved it.
After performing "These Boots," and a song I'm not too sure if I got the title right, "Take It Out On Me," next up was Eric's current single, "Two Pink Lines." Eric has only had two singles released from his current CD with "Two Pink Lines" being the current. The most amazing thing to me was this crowd knew the words to EVERY song Eric played from the CD. I have never witnessed anything like that. This artist released his first CD a mere four months ago and I'm talking about a crowd of 600+. Now I can understand everyone knowing the words to "Tulsa Time," the legendary hit from Don Williams which Eric performed, and another special treat of "Rolling Stone," although I do think someday Eric will be buying five copies for his mother, but these people knew and sang every song on the album.
When it came time for a very special version of "How Bout You," the first single, you almost couldn't hear Eric over the crowd. Eric and the band add a little taste of Ram Jam, Ozzy and few other very famous song rifts to the middle of the song making it one very long but very impressive song.
