Kenny Chesney Poets and Pirates Tour 2008

Last Saturday my son took me out; we went to see the Kenny Chesney Poets and Pirates Tour 2008. This is a stadium tour and much unlike the other concerts that I have been too. Most of the concerts that I have attended have either been indoors or if I was attending an outdoor concert I was seated in the Pavilion area. This concert however was totally outdoors at the Raven Stadium in Baltimore, MD

We left our home around 11:30 a.m., my son and his friends were going to do some tailgating, me I have never done tailgating in my life, so Rob being the good son that he is started to provide me with instructions the night before what I would need to pack, so that HE could tailgate. I had to make a special trip to the grocery store, I bought all the things that one would take to a picnic, hot dogs, rolls, hamburgers, potato salad, macaroni salad, coleslaw, paper plates, cups, ketchup, mustard, dressing for the salad that he wanted, I got a salad from the salad bar, snacks, chips, pretzels, sodas, beer, it was like I was packing to go to the shore. But Rob assured me that by tailgating we would be saving money and he assured me that his friends were going to chip in, when it snows I will probably see that money.

I bought charcoal, and dug out the hibachi, lawn chairs, coolers ice and paper plates, trash bags, napkins, plastic forks, cups and a small table to put in the back of my SUV. Now understand I was not supposed to be doing anything, this was my day out to enjoy for Mother's Day. Yeah....

They drove up to Raven Stadium and pulled into the parking area, no one had change on them so I had to dig out the thirty dollars to park the car, again this van full of people all told me that they were going to pitch in and pay for their portion of the parking.

The young men in our group did unload the back of the SUV, they did take out the table and hibachi and they did light the grill up, then they disappeared with beer in their hands to play ball in the parking lot. I set up the table, put the food out, set the plates on the table with the wind blowing hoping that it would not rain on me, and put the food on to cook. It was amazing how quickly they all returned when the food was done. Anyway enough complaining about them; we all had something to eat, they did help with a little assistance on my end to pack up the leftovers and dump the coal, they finished off the rest of the beer and at least no one got ill.

It was close to two o'clock and the concert was to start at two thirty so we started to walk around toward the stadium. It was gray and looked like it would pour on us at any moment. The stadium personnel do not allow a number of items into the stadium including an umbrella, so I had assured that I had taken a poncho for myself. The group of us separated within the stadium itself, because we all were sitting in separate sections. My son and I headed toward the end zone where our seats were. We were sitting in the first row above the floor seating, so our seats were fairly decent. At the beginning of the concert the stadium may have had around 10000 people in it, yet it was still early.

Kenny Chesney is sponsoring a new idea for all of his stops on the tour, he is requesting that the local radio station that is promoting his concert run a contest, and through that concert the winner among the local bands is his opening act. This is a great opportunity for the locals to become involved and the band that was presented to us was not bad at all. The stadium was full of a very diverse section of people, they started to drink a lot, talk alot, were friendly and there must have been over a hundred beach balls being tossed around the stadium.

The line up for music included Leann Rimes, Big and Little, Gary Allen, Brooks and Dunn and then Kenny Chesney. During Brooks and Dunn's performance, the have a large hot air balloon that floats over the stadium crowd. They did an awesome rendition of "Only in America" honoring our service personnel from the Army, Navy, Marines, Air Force and Coast Guard, each with a member coming on stage to a standing ovation.

Kenny came on afterwards and he made is entrance through a hidden stage in the middle of the stadium, he rose up singing his song then ran down the runway clasping hands with various fans along the way. His performance was good and entertaining. I was not very impressed with the sound system, however I had to keep reminding myself that I was in an open air arena and should not expect the sound system that I was used to. Kenny did an encore performance which was really nice. The whole concert was a party atmosphere, plenty of entertainment and in the stands; some people just do not know how to handle their liquor,

When we were leaving the stadium, as you can imagine with 40,000 people trying to leave, yes the stadium started to fill up as the day wore on. We were stuck in traffic. I happened to pull out after this big black bus pulled out of the stadium gates, the tags on the bus were from Tennessee the windows were all blacked out so you could not see who was in there, we followed him up to the BWI turnoff, I had heard earlier in the day that Kenny was flying home directly after the concert so that he could visit his Mom on Mother's Day and we could not help but wonder if the bus we were following, which made a path for us through the traffic was that of Kenny, wouldn't that have been wild?

Any way we had a good time and Rob took a lot of pictures and we both had a few strawberry daiquiris while in the stadium, Had a good time and I would defiantly recommend this as an entertaining day.