By John Boggess, Music Director
Welcome to the first edition of Cutting-Edge Encore! A new blog series by WMUL-FM 88.1 recapping concerts a member of our Music Staff attended. First up I, WMUL-FM Music Director John Boggess, will recap the first ever concert held at Joan C. Edwards Stadium. This concert was headlined by Grammy Award winning artist Zach Bryan with opening acts from TikTok personality turned artist, Petey USA, and bluegrass folk band, Trampled by Turtles.
The city of Huntington prepared for days for this concert. Areas of the road on 3rd Avenue were shut down outside of Joan C. Edwards stadium for a little bit as they prepped the stage and street sweepers, a sight I have never seen in Huntington, were cleaning the roads late at night all around town. It is safe to say Huntington was aiming to impress Zach Bryan and the nearly 40,000 fans for the Joan’s first concert.
Fans began lining up outside of Joan C. Edwards stadium from the time I woke up the morning of the concert. Many were willing to sacrifice their time leading up to the concert to ensure a great view while others set up and tailgated in the parking lot as if it were a Marshall football gameday. Meanwhile, I waited to walk over at about 6:30 p.m. because no matter what time I showed up, my seat was still going to be Section 117, Row 21, seat 102 along with WMUL-FM Executive Director Emma Johnson who sat in seat 101.
Even though gates had opened at 5:30 p.m., lines still wrapped around Joan C. Edwards stadium leading up to the 7:00 p.m. start time. Once we made it in, lines to the concession stands, merch store, and even the bathroom were pretty much the same. It was no doubt that the event had sold out.
Emma and I made it to our seats just in time for the start of Petey USA’s opening performance. While Zach Bryan and Trampled by Turtles music is often roped into the country genre, the Royal Oak, Michigan native is more of a rock artist with notes of indie, emo, and pop.
Petey USA performed plenty of tracks from his most recent studio album, The Yips, including the title track and “Model Train Town”. He closed his 30-minute set with his most popular song, “DON’T TELL THE BOYS”, which was released in 2022. I was not too familiar with Petey USA’s music before this concert, but I was a big fan of his comedy skits he would post to TikTok. Overall, I enjoyed his performance and hope he has a successful upcoming music career. There was only one time during the whole concert that the speaker pointed directly towards me vibrated my whole body and that was a Petey USA song that did it.
At about 8:00 p.m., Trampled by Turtles took the stage for their performance. Dave Simonett provides the lead vocals for the band that originated in Duluth, Minnesota whilst also playing guitar and harmonica. Along with Simonett was Tim Saxhaug (bass), Dave Carroll (banjo), Erik Berry, (mandolin), Ryan Young (fiddle) and Eamonn McLain (cello).
I was a bit more familiar with Trampled by Turtles, especially since WMUL-FM was recently sent a CD of their album with Alan Sparhawk. None of these songs were performed, most likely because the project was headlined by Sparhawk. However, these tracks can be heard during WMUL’s alternative hours!
Trampled by Turtles played several songs they have written over the years, with many of them being from their 2010 album, Palomino such as “Bloodshot Eyes” and “Victory”. My favorite overall was their cover of Pixies song “Where Is My Mind?”. Their bluegrass takes on the alternative rock hit was phenomenal, and I am glad I heard it for the first time live. Trampled by Turtles finished just before 9:00 p.m. with one more hit from the Palomino album, “Wait so Long.” The band was a great edition to the evening, and I hope that they will perform somewhere close again.
At about 9:30 p.m., the wait was finally over as John Denver’s “Country Roads” played and Oklahoma’s own Zach Bryan and his band began to take the stage. Bryan tends to take the stage to songs legendary to the state he performs in, such as how he did so with Bruce Springsteen songs at his MetLife Stadium shows in New Jersey.
Bryan played a total of 22 original songs over the course of 2 hours. It all began with “Overtime,” a song from his self-titled album released in 2023. At least one song from all of Bryan’s studio albums was performed such as “28” (The Great American Bar Scene), “East Side of Sorrow” (Zach Bryan), “Something in the Orange” (American Heartbreak), “Heading South” (Elisabeth), and “God Speed” (DeAnn). EPs such as Boys of Faith was represented too with “Nine Ball” and Summertime Blues with “Oklahoma Smoke Show” and “Quittin’ Time.” Newer released singles such as “Bowery” and “Madeline” also made the concerts setlist.
Perhaps the coolest part of the Bryan’s entire set was his encore. He performed fan favorite and former Marshall baseball player, Owen Ayers, walkup song, “Revival”. Bryan and his band moved to a much smaller stage on the opposite side of the stadium to give the fans in the nosebleeds one song up close. The song’s typical length is 3 minutes and 41 seconds, however Bryan extended it at least 15 minutes as he gave every member of his band the chance to have a solo on their instrument and performed the chorus again after every single solo. It truly did seem like we were going to have an “all night revival,” as Bryan’s band has a lot of members compared to most. Strings, brass, drums, bass, banjo and many more were all represented.
Overall, I would say Joan C. Edwards first concert was a huge success! The city did a good job of keeping the evening safe and in order and the performers really brought their all. I am excited to see who they might bring next!
One critique I would give is that Joan C. Edwards Stadium is in dire need of an upgrade to their seating number displays. Sitting in seat 101 and 102, Emma and I were asked at least 20 times what row number we were because it was too dark to see the “21” engraving on the concreate step beside of us. I did not mind helping folks at all, but the consistency in the number of times we were asked shows improvements could be made.
Stay on the lookout for the next Cutting-Edge Encore as there are plenty of music related events, I plan on attending soon. Any of the members of the WMUL-FM 88.1 Music Staff could have a new story from anywhere at any time!