I don’t remember the first time I went to a music concert. Maybe it wasn’t really a concert at all. Maybe it was when I was in the 7th grade and my family took a trip to Nashville to see The Johnny Cash Show. I remember that clearly. My daddy had tickets, maybe someone had given them to him. Johnny Cash had a variety show that we were glued to on a weekly basis. I got to get out of school early. We stayed in a hotel. Johnny Cash was larger than life. This was at the time when he wore a tuxedo shirt with his black suit. It was so cool. We were so special.
I went to concerts throughout high school. I think every time John Denver came to Freedom Hall I would go. I didn’t care where the seats were. I couldn’t afford front row seats so anything further back it didn’t matter because you could hear him. This was back before they had the automatrons. Those big screens allow you to watch every pick of a guitar, every facial expression the artist even thinks about making. So back then, you wanted to sit close. And if you didn’t have good seats you would try to sneak past security and get as close to the stage as possible so that you could stand up and watch every move the artist would make. Of course security would track you down and kick you out of the best section of the auditorium. And I was afraid of getting in trouble so when I found out it wasn’t allowed you couldn’t talk me into trying to get closer.
As I’ve gotten older I came to realize that concerts weren’t necessarily worth the effort. They became expensive, there were so many people there, it just seemed easier to go out and spend the money to buy the artist’s music. I never got to see Garth Brooks in concert. But I think I have every CD he ever put out. Now, I’ve made some exceptions. I have seen Hank Williams Jr. many times. But he puts on a show. I have seen Loretta Lynn because everyone should see Loretta live at least once. Man can she sing. I got to see Bonnie Raidt, but that one was free, and a small venue. Oh, my sister took me to see Emmy Lou Harris. Man can she sing. A couple of years ago Alabama came to the Kentucky State Fair and I got to go see them too. I had seen them several times back in the 1980’s and oh, I could listen to Randy Owen sing just to me for the rest of my life. Someone I had always wanted to see in concert was Alan Jackson. I had always taken the notion to spend money on his music rather than go to a concert but for years I had known a friend of mine, my Alan Jackson soulmate, and we decided to go to Nashville to see him in concert. It was going to be at an amphitheater in downtown Nashville and I just knew it would be a concert worth remembering.
We headed out to Nashville early. The concert didn’t start until 7:30 but we both took off work for the day so we left town about 10. We knew we would want to find the venue, go somewhere nice to eat and maybe walk around downtown. But first we did a little shopping. That was fun. We went to Opry Mills and mainly walked around but did manage to buy a few things. We decided to eat at the Mall and then headed downtown for the concert. We found out that the gates didn’t open until 6PM so we still had 2 or 3 hours to kill. We talked about going to the Country Music Hall of Fame. My family did that when we went to see Johnny Cash back in the 1970’s. I knew that it had changed quite a bit since then. But we didn’t think we had the time to give it the time it needed for us to go through. So we decided to walk Broadway.
I don’t know what was going on in town but oh my gosh there were people everywhere. We had parked at a lot across from the venue and we were good there until the next morning. It wasn’t cheap but it was close and the older I get the more I appreciate close. But back to these people. There were couples, there were small groups, there were large groups. I swear there was a class field trip. I don’t know if that was true but there was a very large group of teenagers that were all together. There were a whole lot of cowboy hats and cowboy boots. There were those in matching t-shirts. And they weren’t just walking Broadway. They were standing in line to get into bars and restaurants. They were overtaking the souvenir places. The weather had called for rain by this time of the day but the sun was out with a vengeance and I knew all of those people had to be getting hot. I certainly was.
We stepped into the Ernest Tubbs Record Shop. It was cool in there, and not overly crowded. We started going through the music. It was amazing to me how much my friend and I agreed on music. It seems that we were raised on the same country stars. Her tastes were more traditional. Mine had a little bit of outlaw in them. But at the core we are both traditional country music fans. We stayed there for awhile and then headed further down the street. And who should we run into but Alan Jackson! Okay, not really Alan Jackson but an life-sized Alan Jackson cut-out. He was located outside of the AJ Goodtime Bar. We were so excited. When we walked in they asked if we were there for an event. I wish we had said yes. But the answer was no, we just wanted to sit down and have something to drink. You could tell this place wasn’t finished but it didn’t matter, there were people everywhere. They told us that the only floors open to the public were the first and fourth floor. So we walked through the first floor and decided to walk up to the fourth floor. Oh my goodness. One, we’re old. We made it almost to the third floor and decided we weren’t that interested in walking to the fourth floor. When we turned around we found that there was a VIP event on the second floor. If we had just splurged for those VIP tickets then we too could have been included in this event. That was okay. Think of the money we could spend on his music for the value of the VIP experience. When we got back to the first floor we headed back out and finally came to rest at the George Jones restaurant and bar. This place was huge, and not crowded. We sat there and cooled off and had a drink. The music was good, the seats felt good and even though they had the doors open you could tell that the air was on. So we were happy.
When we left George’s place (I should have bought a t-shirt) we decided to head to the venue. We stopped at the car and got our new chairs that we had bought for the event. We were about a quarter mile to the car from the venue. When we got up there it was obvious that they hadn’t started letting people in. A woman stopped us and told us that our chairs were too big. We told her that they were just the folding chairs that you use for soccer games and such. She told us that they don’t allow anything larger than a beach chair. We were free to store our chairs at the entrance but we wouldn’t be checking them. I offered to take them back to the car and get a blanket. And that’s what I did. I got back about the time they were beginning to let everyone into the venue.
We had tickets for the lawn. I had taken my daughters to see the Jonas Brothers on the lawn up in St. Louis so I had an idea of what we were getting ourselves in for. But we were there early so we got pretty good seats. It didn’t take long to realize that most of the people were going to rent those beach lawn chairs. We decided to stick it out on the blanket. We didn’t know whether or not we would be able to get up out of those chairs, they were pretty low. The problem with getting there early though was that as the venue started filling up, people started crowding around us. A couple of times the people around us scooted up some so that no one could sit in front of them. We decided to scoot with them. The other problem with getting there early was that everyone was drinking, a lot. They had they huge beers they were selling and people weren’t shy about drinking them. I was really glad we had made up our minds not to drink. It was too hot, plus we had to drive home. I didn’t want to be sleepy all of the way home. So we settled in for the concert.
There were two opening acts for Alan. His nephew, who has written a couple of songs for him, opened the show but only sang for about 15 minutes. You could tell he didn’t feel very comfortable. But he had a good voice and his music was good. Then LeeAnn Womack took the stage. She’s a tiny little thing. I have always liked her but didn’t really own any of her music so I couldn’t sing along. I had made up my mind that I was going to sing along, some, but only to myself. I came to hear the artists, not myself. If I wanted to sing I could have stayed in my car and listened to the music. I will tell you this though, by the time LeeAnn was about half through her set this group of party girls moved in right behind us. Remember, we had scooted up. Well, the people behind us didn’t scoot up. That left a nice place for these six to eight young women to come in at the last minute and take up residence. And they knew her songs. There were a couple of them who chose to sing her work to the top of their lungs. Being the older, hateful, woman that I am, I turned around with a nasty look on my face and said “Really?” That’s all I said and I turned back around. It didn’t phase them.
I don’t know if they started out drunk, which I think they did, or if they just were doing a lot of drinking but these girls were there to party. If I wasn’t interested in hearing an idol of mine singing my favorite songs to me, they wouldn’t have bothered me, except for the fact that they thought they were in a bar and we were obviously at a concert. I know that this is Alan Jackson’s Honky Tonk Highway Tour but this was not a honky tonk. And I’ve never paid as much for a cover as I did for my tickets to this event. In fact, one of the girls, the one who was really drunk and obnoxious, kept saying that she really hated country music and she didn’t know why they were there. I kept wondering the same thing.
But this was the Alan Jackson concert. I was mesmerized. I made up my mind that they could set off a bomb next to me and I wouldn’t mind. I was getting to hear Alan Jackson sing my favorite songs just to me. Forget everybody else. Honestly, I really felt sorry for the people behind them. Because these girls made up their mind that they were going to stand up throughout the entire concert. You know, people who want to do that shouldn’t be up front. That’s what the rear of the auditorium, or lawn in this case, was for. And we should have gone to get security. Because it wasn’t long before these girls were smoking pot too. I didn’t have a problem with the pot but this was a no smoking venue. They should have gone over to where everyone was smoking if they insisted. But I didn’t go get security. I decided to just ignore them. I had had a wonderful day. I certainly wasn’t going to let them ruin my night.
I don’t remember exactly when it was but my friend, who was usually very patient with people, and sweeter than sweet, turned around and screamed “will you all just shut up?” I looked at her in shock. I didn’t turn around. I didn’t want to see the ugly looks. That quieted them down for a few minutes. But then Ms. Loud and Obnoxious got worse. Finally, she turned around again and said “WILL YOU ALL PLEASE SHUT UP AND SIT DOWN!” (Notice the caps lock). That’s when Ms. L&O got in her face and started cussing her. Of course by this time I had to throw a few things back, like “do you talk to your Mama with that mouth?” (I know, not original. She didn’t hear me anyway she was too busy telling us who to go *#^$%%.). We told them to just go find somewhere else to sit, that we were there first. They wouldn’t stop. And then Alan started singing “Remember When” and Ms. L&O was screaming that at the top of her lungs. I wanted to remind her that she hated country music and didn’t know why they were there. As much as I wanted to tune them out I couldn’t. And that ruined that song for me. Which put a big dent in my night.
As the concert came to a close they finally started to leave. We decided to stay until the crowd had thinned out a bit. A gentleman came up to us and asked if we were all right. We said that we were fine. He said that he was watching them and if they did anything to us he was going to go get security. I told him “thank you very much but we’re mothers”, indicating that we could handle kids like that. In fact, I wish I had been given a chance to talk with their mothers. He just nodded and said “yes, I had a mother too”. My friend said that was a weird comment. I told her he was expressing his respect to us. That smoothed the dent out of my night a little bit.
The ride home was long but still good. We had to stop in Clarksville and get some gas. The clerk asked if we had been out bar hopping. That struck me as very funny. It’s been a long time since I’ve bar hopped.
I probably won’t go back to a concert, at least not at a venue like that. I mentioned this to my sister, that I should stick with smaller venues. She said that she had gone to see Loretta recently at a small venue, had 3rd row seats and the woman in front of her turned around and said “I’m going to stand up for the entire concert”. My sister told her that she hadn’t spent all of that money to look at her bootie. She told her she could stand up for one song. She got to choose the song. The woman said “okay” and that’s what she did. Another friend told me that she had a group of girls stand up in front of her throughout the last concert she went to. She wondered where they got that. I told her that everybody thinks their in a bar.
I came home and started downloading Alan’s music that I didn’t have. I think I’ll go back to that. Maybe one day though I’ll be able to see somebody like him and get the VIP experience. I could buy a lot of music for that though.