The thunder rolling over the Delta Center didn't just bring the short squall that drizzled on more than 18,000 concertgoers spewing out of the arena late Saturday night (as if a June rain could dampen the enthusiasm of a Garth Brooks crowd).
The big noise was inside the center, where Brooks validated his super-star status to the sound of man-made thunder: tumultuous applause. The Salt Lake stop marked the fourth date on a scheduled six-month, 77-city tour, and the rowdy Utah crowd was ready to whoop it up all night long.Following a 30-minute opening segment by up-and-coming country performer Martina McBride and a short intermission to rearrange the stage, Brooks and his band made their anxiously anticipated appearance. It was an entrance that could've been staged by illusionist David Copperfield.
The lights went up and the platform was bare - then, slowly, the center section of the stage began to elevate and the members of Brooks' band rose into place. The musicians stepped off the cylindrical hoist, which then slowly descended back to stage level - first revealing the top of a cowboy hat, then those impish blue eyes and then the face of the world's hottest country singer.
Garth Brooks got right down to business with one of his biggest hits,"Rodeo" (and, please, can someone tell me what "latigo" means?).
Off stage, Brooks may be laid-back and quiet, but put him on stage with a band behind him and a big crowd in front, and well, the adrenalin gets pumping and the energy level soars.
He told the crowd he wasn't just going to sing his hit singles, he was also going to perform some of his personal favorites that never made it to single status. There was also some fresh material fans can look forward to on upcoming albums.
One tune that deserves to be released ASAP is one he just recently wrote after witnessing the Los Angeles riots.
Appropriately rooted in a solid gospel beat, "We Shall Be Free" sends a strong, positive message:
"When the last thing we notice is the color of skin,
"When the first thing we notice is the beauty within,
"We shall be free."
Brooks said the lyrics were the thoughts of merely "an ordinary man" - but I doubt that record-sellers and fans would ever label Brooks "ordinary."
It was probably a toss-up who was enjoying the show more - the stomping, yelling, screaming fans, or this big, fun-loving teddy bear of a guy from Oklahoma.
The biggest response of the night had to be for "The Thunder Rolls," which ignited nearly five minutes of deafening applause.
The reaction to "The Dance," Brooks' poignant look at the loss of a love, was more visually profound. One barometer of how much a concert audience appreciates a song is the number of cigarette lighters held aloft. The expression "a thousand points of light" came to mind as the arena - from the floor all the way to the upper reaches of the topmost level - glowed with thousands of quietly flickering lighters.
One after another, Brooks performed a constant stream of familiar tunes - "Friends in Low Places," "Shameless," "Wild Horses," "Two of a Kind" and "If Tomorrow Never Comes."
One moment he could be reclining on one of the slanted platforms flanking the band, and the next he would be running amok, dashing to the rear of the stage (so the folks at the rear of the arena could get a closer glimpse), and even clamoring over the drums - breaking one of them off in the process, then handing it to a cluster of fans in the front rows.
If Saturday night's concert was any indication, it appears that the current King of Country has settled in for a long, long reign.
- MARTINA McBRIDE, a beautiful and exceptionally talented young singer with a crystaline voice, is making her national tour debut as Brooks' opening act.
She used her brief, 30-minute segment to good advantage, performing mostly music from her first album ("The Time Has Come"): the upbeat "Walk That Line," the soulful "Cheap Whiskey," the insightful "A Woman Knows," "True Blue Fool," "That's Me," the moving "When You Are Old" and the album's title cut.
She also paid tribute to the week's newest crop of high school graduates with a Gospel-like tune entitled "The Rope."
I'm no country music prophet, but I have a strong hunch Martina McBride will be headlining her own tours before too long.
- BECAUSE OF AN ERROR somewhere in the printing process for Sunday's Deseret News, photographer Tom Smart failed to receive the well deserved credit for the front-page photograph he shot during the opening moments of Garth Brooks' concert. It's not often one of our photographers gets a chance to shoot a superstar in action, and Tom's name should've been on the picture.
- MY DATE FOR THE EVENING, my 19-year-old daughter Blythe, helped me out by taking notes when I left the arena for about 10 minutes to phone in a few comments for Sunday's front-page story about Brooks' press conference. She had seriously hoped I would mention how good-looking the guys in his band were and that she'd be more than willing to offer her services as a nanny after Taylor Mayne Pearl Brooks makes her appearance next month.
After I had explained what the real purpose of a review was, Blythe offered this in-depth comment: "It was good."
That's it? Just "It was good?"
"OK," she said (after some prodding), "It was really good."