Eric Church raised the roof off the TD Garden on Thursday, April 30th bringing to Boston the Outsiders Tour. With his multi-million dollar, 360-degree view stage, that allows for interaction with all the fans, equipped with in-stage pits, flashing swaying lights, the raised drummers platform, and the giant multi-story inflatable devil that blows up and towers over the crowd, Eric broke his previous record of most songs played at a concert and set a new one at thirty one songs. Not only did Church break his record for most played songs but he broke the TD Gardens’ 11:00 pm curfew and played until 11:30 pm to the delight of the fans in attendance.
Opening up and getting the crowd ready for an amazing night of music, and proclaiming that it was his first time in Boston, was singer/songwriter Chris Stapleton. Stapleton gave a powerful performance during his forty minute, nine song set. Stapleton, an up and coming artist with the old 1970’s sound of country, shared several songs off his album, ‘Traveller,’ which was released on May 4th. Stapleton, known best in Nashville for his amazing songwriting abilities, has penned songs for artists such as Kenny Chesney, George Strait, Luke Bryan, Darius Rucker and Tim McGraw.
As the audience soon found out, writing songs is not all Stapleton can do. He performs them as well and does a pretty good job at doing so. Stapleton shared with us several songs from his debut album including his opening song ‘Nobody to Blame.’ Stapleton’s wife joined him onstage singing the harmonies on several of the songs. Included in his set were the songs, ‘Fire Away,’ and the title track, ‘Traveller.’ Before singing ‘Tennessee Whiskey,’ Stapleton asked the crowd, “Where are my George Jones fans out there. Sing this song for GJ.”
Stapleton also performed, ‘Drinkin’ Dark Whiskey,’ originally sung by Gary Allan and the Tom Petty song, ‘You Don’t Know How It Feels.’ But, the most memorable song of his set was ‘Sometimes I Cry.’ The last track on the album, Stapleton captivated the audience with his raw tone and glass-breaking notes. His voice went so high, that even if you were not paying attention to his performance, you would stop what you were doing and turn your eyes towards the stage.
Stapleton ended his set with the song ‘Outlaws Like Me,’ but not before adding, “There’s an outlaw state of mind right here in Boston tonight!” This was an appropriate segway to the main act of the night Mr. Outlaw himself, Eric Church.
The lights went out, and the crowd screamed. Amid the darkness and cheering, Eric appeared on the stage singing, ‘The Outsiders.’ The song, a prime example of Church’s rebel like reputation, includes the following lyrics.
“We’re the bad news
We’re the young guns
We’re the ones that they told you to run from
Yeah, the player’s gonna play, and a haters gonna hate
And a regulators born to regulate
When it hits the fan, and it all goes down
And the gloves come off
You’re gonna find out just
Who we are, the outsiders.”
The audience, a nearly sold-out crowd of almost twenty thousand Eric Church fans, never once sat down for the next few hours. Church’s stage presence, and extreme passion for what he does, did not allow for resting. His fans cheered, sang, lit up the venue with their cell phone “lighters” and absorbed Church’s high energy and evident love of music and performing. The set list a record breaking thirty one songs stemmed back to 2006. He included songs from his first album, ‘Sinners Like Me,’ all the way to his current album, and the name of his tour, ‘The Outsiders.’
After his opening song Eric performed, ‘Creepin’ and ‘Guy’s Like Me.’ ‘Carolina,’ a crowd favorite, came next followed by ‘You Can’t Take It With You When You Go.’ Before Eric performed his next song, ‘Pledge Allegiance to the Hag’ from his ‘Sinners Like Me,’ album, he shared with his audience his love and appreciation for the city of Boston, the radio stations and the fans. “This city has been my favorite city. I remember Showcase Live, I remember Hard Rock Cafe, I remember House of Blues. I remember the Paradise.” The band started the intro for ‘Pledge Allegiance,’ while Eric said to the crowd,
“This is the part of the show where I have a pretty damn good idea about this audience and where this show is going. I’ll tell you this, I don’t know where we are going tomorrow and I really don’t give a shit, tonight I’m at the Garden.”
After performing ‘Livin Part of Life’ and ‘Jack Daniels,’ he sang ‘Drink In My Hand.’ This song is always popular with the crowd, because it becomes a competition among the different sections of the auditorium.
Getting the crowd riled up for this friendly competition, Eric had this to say, “This is the part of the show where you get to show off and kick the other side’s ass, that’s what this is! Running from left of the stage to the back of the stage saying, “I feel good I feel good about this side over here. What about my people back here?!” Then returning to the front of the stage he proclaimed,
“MY PEOPLE. I want hear now from everyone so everyone can hear the sound from here to Manchester!”
The crowd of twenty thousand, not wanting to let Eric down, certainly sang loud enough to be heard as far as Manchester.
“All I want to do is put a drink in my hand!”
With lights going low, Eric with just his guitar and singing smooth, performed his current single on the radio, ‘Wrecking Ball.’ The song may make some people uncomfortable as the lyrics insinuate a purely animalistic theme but the chorus says it all. “I’m gonna find out what that house is made of. Been too many nights since its felt us make love. Love you baby, like a wrecking ball.” But no one in the crowd seemed to object as there was a bit of a hush in the venue during the performance. Eric followed it up with ‘Cold One,’ ‘That’s Damn Rock And Roll,’ ‘Give Me Back My Hometown’ and ‘Homeboy.’
Before singing ‘Dark Side,’ and then ‘Devil Devil,’ Eric shared with us a conversation he had with his son while they were traveling to Boston.
“I had THE best conversation today. I was talking to my 3 year old, and I was talking about the Garden and I was talking about guys, like Robert Parish, Dennis Johnson and Larry Bird, Kevin McHale. We were talking about what I grew up on, what this place, what this CITY, means to me and there’s a song on ‘The Outsiders’ album, anybody who’s a parent out there, anybody whose got kids, you would do anything in the world to protect your kids, anything, and I swear to God anybody who tries to hurt your kids, you will do anything to them I mean anything. This songs gonna tell them so.”
Other songs from the extra-long set list were, ‘Longer Gone,’ and ‘Smoke A Little Smoke’ from his album ‘Carolina.’ From the ‘Chief’ album were the songs, ‘Over When It’s Over,’ ‘Loves Me Like Jesus Does,’ ‘Country Music Jesus,’ and ‘Keep On Looking At Me.’ From the ‘Sinners Like Me’ album, he performed ‘Before She Does,’ ‘Sinners Like Me,’ ’How About You,’ ‘Almost Was’ and of course ‘These Boots,’ a very popular song with the crowd. Church always takes one or two boots from someone in the audience and while singing the song he holds them up high for the crowd. He then autographs the boots and tosses them back to their owners. He also performed ‘The Ballard of Curtis Loew,’ a cover song originally sung by Lynyrd Skynyrd, and a song that Eric rarely ever performs live.
Church never even left the stage for an encore but continued singing and playing his hits. But, like all good things, Eric Church’s concert had to come to an end. Singing the song ‘Raise Em Up,’ which was recorded as a duet with Keith Urban, Eric transitioned smoothly into his last song of the evening, ‘Springsteen.’ Taking a break in the middle of the song, Eric shared his thoughts and the meaning behind the song.
“There’s a line in the song that talks about a melody and a memory bump into each other and as a kid who grew up as a Celtics fan this is a big deal for me tonight. I can remember being 16 years old, and having music change my life forever. I heard this song which changed my entire course which caused me to pick up a guitar for the first time.”
“Here’s the great thing about music. To this day when I hear that song, I’m 16 years old again. I’m right back there. When I talk about melodies and memories I’m freezing the moment of time. That’s what happened to me at a young age and that’s what happened tonight when I hit the Garden in Boston so, I’ll never be able to thank you enough my band, we’ll never be able to thank you enough.”
“I’m not done just yet, so I’m gonna keep on going. Loud! Now you do it! One more time Boston. Then changing the next line of the song he sang, “Funny how a melody sounds like a memory like a soundtrack to an April Thursday night, Springsteen, I remember Springsteen, Now take us home!!”
Stomping, screaming, cheering, and whistling followed Eric Church as he exited the stage for the evening. It was an absolutely amazing night full of music, stories and of course memories. The bar was raised high and it will be tough to beat for all of those who will come after. It was a concert that I am sure will forever be one of the best and entertaining shows that has ever taken place at the TD Garden. The Garden that brings to the surface the memories of a sixteen year old boys’ love for the Boston Celtics.
Concert review conducted by Lorraine Frigoletto, contributing writer for New England Country Music. You can follow me on Twitter.
More photos from this show can be found here.
