Kenny Chesney’s Goin Coastal Tour in Philadelphia

Long before I had known what was in store at this concert, I was never one to include country music as one of the genres that I would listen to on a regular basis or at all, aside from the bar anthems Garth Brooks made famous years before my time at a watering hole was established.  When the time came to decide whether to attended this beer drinking, cowboy hat wearing, all day in the sun part y as it was described to me, the answer was simple, Yes.  I enjoyed the time when one could day drink for hours and then go out and continue the party until the waning hours of the following morning, and this was my chance to relive those days, if only for a day.  The group of people (my cousin, his lady friend, a buddy of my cousin who I have known since I could remember, and another friend) that I would partake in this adventure made the experience worth more than the price of admission, and I hadn’t even seen a second of the show.  Fast Forward to the day of the show and that is where the story of how this concert would begin.  Within moments of arriving to Lincoln Financial Field, there were copious amounts of beer flowing and scantly clad women as far as the eye could see.  Upon arriving at the tail gait of choice, a beer can was popped open and the debauchery began.  The hot dogs and hamburgers were grilled and the experience of what was happening was dawning on me as the influx of concert go-ers and those who came strictly to partake in tailgainting activities.

By the time our livers had decided that the tailgaiting should end, the journey to the concert truly began.  The amount of people that were looking for their seats and waited hours to make their way to the standing room only areas was something that was out of a movie.  Thousands of people singing along with the Zac Brown Band, who opened for Kenny Chesney, including myself for a few tunes that I had recently learned, strictly because, well to be cliche, When in Rome… you know the rest.  By the time Cheseny had taken the stage I was well on my way to a great hangover but wanted to see the show that I had heard so much about.  What I saw was something unlike anything that I had seen in all my years of seeing concerts.  There were people smitten for Cheseny and his stage presence fed right into the show and his passion for playing music, a word that I used very loosely when it came to country sounds before this concert.  Yes, I am sure the songs prior to the finale were great, if had known them it may have stuck with me a little better, but the encore to his show was something I had not thought about, let alone experienced.  For about 30 minutes, he and his tour mates played an amalgamation of music that had little to do with what I considered country, and focused more on the music.  I wish I could describe the imagry of the experience in better detail, but the best way to desribe it would be to say that from an outsider to the music, the country music scene has earned my respect and those who caste judgement before giving this type of music a chance, do not deserve to put forth and opinion upon which they know nothing about.  Maybe it was the alcohol from the day, maybe it was the music, but what I really believe made the experience, for lack of a better word,  one of my most memorable was the company I was with in addition to the afore mentioned factors.