The day was hot and then came the rain (which only made it hotter) and by the time Flogging Molly got to the stage the crowd was in full party mode. Without the O-Train this year my usual method of Bluesfest transit needed to be changed. I thought about perhaps finding a lot a bit closer and then bussing it from there but after driving around for about 45 minutes I ended up back at my faithful Greenboro Park & Ride to catch the 107 downtown, of course I didn’t have correct change and with the O-Train not running the change machine was also out of order so I had to rush over to Bulk Barn to make change so that my wife and I could make the next bus. Luckily once we arrived on-site the Bluesfest team was organized like clockwork, as they always are, and a quick check with a blue shirt (volunteer) confirmed that media passes were being handed out in the War Museum as they had been last year. I was able to get in, get my pass and make it onto the grounds to hear the last half of Flogging Molly’s set in seemingly record time. A bit disappointed that I didn’t catch more of the opening acts but glad we were finally there.
Zac Brown Band delivers!!
The crowd was surprisingly massive last night (downside to the large crowd was that it killed off the signals of both my 3G & 4G devices which made live tweeting impossible). So large I have a hard time recalling a single night last year that quite rivalled that, perhaps the night that Iron Maiden and Alice Cooper headlined but I’m thinking this was even bigger than that, perhaps closer to that of KISS a few years ago. Clearly most were there to welcome the Zac Brown Band for their first ever show in Ottawa.
Click to view slideshow.Zac Brown and his band didn’t waste any time getting down to business and jumped right into their show with…well “Jump Right In”. It went on and on with massive hit after massive hit, to be honest I have a hard time recalling any other country act that doesn’t have a story to tell at some point in their show…not Zac and the boys they just kept cranking out the tunes one after the other until they threw us curveball. I don’t know if the heat got to them or if one of them got stung by a possessed mosquito but what ever happened the show was about to take an incredible turn as suddenly they tore into an eerily accurate rendition of Metallica’s “Enter Sandman”. As if the crowd didn’t need to be pumped up any more than they already were, this put them over the top. As most of you know I started my blogging career as a country music blogger so I’ve seen many country concerts, even Carrie Underwood doing Aerosmith. But I’ve never, ever seen anything as incredibly awesome as what I witnessed last night, perhaps not even by Metallica themselves who I saw the last time they were in Ottawa. The crowd was fired up and for a moment I actually got a feeling from Zac Brown that he was a bit overwhelmed by the whole thing as well. As they wrapped up their set he told the crowd that they would be in Canada a lot in the coming months and I think one thing is for certain the, so called, city that fun forgot blew Zac Brown’s toque off last night with one heck of a welcome. It goes without saying that you can count on seeing them in Ottawa again very soon!
Tonight
Dixie Chicks, Neko Case, Fitz and the Tantrums, Belle & Sebastian and more…
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Related articles
- Time to get Chicken Fried with a cold beer on a Friday night at Bluesfest (blogs.ottawacitizen.com)
