Taylor Swift opens up tour in Omaha

Seems lately that artists are starting their tours in Omaha.  Last year I saw Tim McGraw open up his Southern Voice tour here, and this weekend Taylor Swift started off the North American leg of her Speak Now tour.  I wasn't at the first show on Friday night, but I was at the Saturday night show. 
I have to say that I am a bit more disappointed in the opening acts compared to her previous Fearless tour.  Last time she had new group Gloriana with her, who had a huge hit single, Wild At Heart, out at the time and when the show came to Omaha, their debut CD had just been released.  And Kelli Pickler was the 2nd opener, who is also fairly well known & I have both of her albums and was familiar with all of her songs.  On this tour Taylor has multiple acts filling in the first slot.  In Omaha, that slot was filled with Frankie Ballard.  He put on a solid, but very short (5 songs) set.  The 2nd opener, Need To Breathe, is somewhat of a rock group.  They were good, but I'm not sure if anyone there had ever heard of them.  Their set was also fairly short for a 2nd opening act.
Taylor came out just before 8:30pm (concert started at 7pm) and played for 2 hours.  The best way to describe it would be "it's the Fearless tour but bigger." She wore 9 different dresses that I counted from the pictures I took and there were many moving parts for the stage setup. 
The show started out with her coming up from the bottom of the stage with a bunch of smoke.  Of course that was after a big red curtain that was surrounding the stage was pulled back.  She started it off with her song Sparks Fly while wearing a shimmering gold dress.

The first set change came before the songs Our Song and Mean.  If you've seen the video for Mean or perhaps her performance of it on the ACM's then you knew that the song was coming shortly.  A front porch looking set up was brought in on the main stage and Taylor and her band & dancers were dressed in old style country clothes.

Another one of the moving stage parts that was used was a large bridge that was brought down from the ceiling for the song Back To December.

Taylor came up from underneath the stage with a piano to play the song.  The bridge was lined with people with violins.  I'm not sure if they were actually being played or if they were some of her backup dancers pretending to play.

Perhaps the most theatrical song performed was Speak Now.  The song is about speaking up at somebody's wedding that the guy shouldn't marry the girl, but instead run off with her.  The song played out almost like a music video on stage with a minister, groom, a girl in a wedding dress with a couple bridesmaids and even church pews with "guests" in them, all played by her band and backup dancers. 

When the groom runs away with her at the end of Speak Now, Taylor actually walks to the back of the arena to a small stage where there is a tree she sits at the base of.  While Taylor sings a few songs, the first one of which she is playing a ukulele, the tree rotates around.

Another very visual pleasing song was Haunted.  Large bells were dropped from the ceiling.  Taylor and a couple others acted like they were hitting the large bells at the beginning of the song.  Later the bells were raised up and a person dropped out of each one of them on a bungee type cord doing all sorts of acrobatic tricks!

For the encore, she played Fifteen and Love Story.  For the song Fifteen a couch came up from under the stage.  She started out on it by herself, with her band joining her during the song.

The most exciting part of the show for most people sitting up in the upper sections of the arena came during the closing song, Love Story.  Taylor got on a small platform that looked like a balcony and made a large circle around the arena up in the air.  She went directly above where I was sitting.

It was an amazing show.  Even those who don't like Taylor's music have to acknowledge the fact that she knows how to put on a very entertaining event.  If you have the chance to go see the tour, I strongly recommend it.  Her shows are the kind that in the years to come you will tell your kids and grand-kids about!
Here is the set list from the show (taken from the review at Omaha.com)
“Sparks Fly”
“Mine”
“The Story Of Us”
“Our Song”
“Mean”
“Back To December”
“Better Than Revenge”
“Speak Now”
“Fearless”
“Last Kiss”
“You Belong With Me”
“Dear John”
“Enchanted”
“Haunted”
“Long Live”
Encore:
“Fifteen”
“Love Story”

And finally, to close out the blog, here are a few more pictures!

Close Encounters of the Country Kind

I had the opportunity today to do something I haven't done before.  And that is to see an intimate acoustic performance in a small room with about a dozen other people.  I signed up online to get the chance to see David Nail at the KAT103 listener lounge a couple weeks ago and found out a week ago that I would get to go today when he was there.  I've seen David a couple other times in concert.  The first was last year at CMA Fest in Nashville and then again this past fall when he opened up for Lady Antebellum when they were in Omaha.  He has an amazing voice so I was looking forward to getting to hear it in such a small setting. 
After eating some food in another room we were ushered into another room where David, along with a drummer and keyboardist, were waiting for us.  Since I was the 3rd one in, I picked my spot out in the front row, center, right in front of David.  And it was his birthday!  Kinda wish we would've sang happy birthday to him.  He performed a total of 6 songs, mixed in with lots of storytelling and interaction with the crowd, some of which was with me since I was right in front of him, I did get picked on a bit.  But that just made it an even better experience!  Of the 6 songs he did, he performed his 3 singles, Red Light, Turning Home and his current single, Let It Rain.  He did a couple other songs off of his first CD as well as a brand new song that will be on his new CD called How I Remember You. The song was amazing and I hope that it will be a single for him someday. 
Afterwords they passed out some glossy 8x10 pics of David for him to sign and he did pictures with everyone.  It was a great experience and I hope that I can be lucky enough to get into the KAT103 listener lounge again someday.

Tim McGraw, Luke Bryan & The Band Perry Concert Review

Last night I got to see 3 great acts in Sioux City at the Tyson Events Center.   I had only seen The Band Perry once, last year on the Riverfront Stage at CMA fest in about 90 degree heat at 10am.  I hadn't ever seen Luke Bryan, but have wanted to for a long time (was hoping to catch him at CMA Fest last summer but didn't) and I had seen Tim 4 times, but none of the times I had heard the song Don't Take The Girl, so I was really hoping to get to hear that song this time.  Of course I won't reveal if he did till later.......
First up was The Band Perry.  I had the privilege to meet the sibling trio before the concert in their meet and greet.  Very friendly people, but like other meet and greets I've been to for artists, I get a tad nervous and can't think of what I actually wanted to say to them when I met them.  This happened 2 times since I got to meet them again after the show in an autograph/photo line that they did.

meet & greet before the show

 

 

post concert autograph line

Although their set was short (20-25 minutes and 6 songs) they packed in a lot of energy.  They came out singing the song Double Heart.  It's a very up-tempo song, and my favorite on their album as I mentioned in the blog post about the CD when it came out.  They did 2 other un-released songs from their debut album as well as the 3 singles they've had so far from it.  They had a unique intro into their current top 10 hit, You Lie.  They used the refrain of the song 'I Love The Way You Lie' by Rhianna & Eminem.  I was very impressed with their stage presence.  Most times, the first opening act isn't allowed to use much, if any, of the catwalks that the main act may have in their stage set up.  They were able to use all of the catwalk that was attached to the main stage.  And they used it a lot.  In fact, they kinda had to since their equipment on stage was so close to the edge that there wasn't much room for them on there!

Luke Bryan was up next after a short intermission.  He put on another energy packed set that was about 45 minutes long.  And like The Band Perry, he came out singing what is probably my favorite song of his, Country Man.  Also like TBP, he used the catwalks most of the time.  I actually feel kind bad for the people that had front row seats for the concert, because the best seats were probably more towards the middle on the floor level.  Luke played all of his hits and a couple new ones from his next CD which will be out later this summer.  The thing that caught my eye the most was how much he fiddled around with his ball cap that he was wearing.  He came out with it on right, then later he turned it backwards and then shortly after that it would be forwards again.  This happened the whole set.  I wouldn't say it was distracting, I found it more amusing than anything!  The most distracting part of his set was the drunk people sitting by me, but that's another story.......

 And then it was time for the main attraction, Tim McGraw!  Tim kept the energy going that the opening acts created and put on an almost 2 hour long show.  He started out singing at a stage that was set up around the front of house area in the back.  And he returned to it another time or two throughout his set.  Tim played a broad range of his hits with some of his early stuff, new songs and a few in-between.  He even brought out the opening acts for a couple of his songs.  The Band Perry came out and joined him on 'She Can't Be Really Gone'.  And then a couple songs later Luke Bryan joined with him on 'Back When'.  And although he performed many of my favorites, there is one that he still managed to leave out: Don't Take The Girl.  I don't know how in the all of the times I've seen him in the last 5 or so years that he hasn't done his first number one song!  Hopefully if I get the chance to see him again he will do it then. 

The Band Perry joining Tim onstage

Luke Bryan with Tim