-Jeff Dykhuis, Fan Reporter #001
Feb. 13, 2009 - Joe's Bar - Chicago, IL
The ACM nominated Randy Rogers Band played a great show in a venue that is also currently nominated for an ACM award: Joe's Bar. Darren Kozelsky opened the Friday The 13th show. I was at the Randy Rogers concert two days earlier at The Intersection in Grand Rapids, Michigan too. Both shows were highly entertaining and sounded great. If you appreciate a band that can sound as good live as they sound on studio recordings then you would like The Randy Rogers Band and Darren Kozelsky both.
Darren is releasing his second CD soon, called Arrivals & Departures. He kicked the show into high gear with his new single Good Day to Get Gone which was just released to radio a few days ago. The show remained in high gear with guitarist Chris Claridy's energetic solos and a well rehearsed band. Darren counts George Strait as a major influence and even has George's keyboard player Ron Huckaby on tour with him. Darren's obvious passion for what he does shows through on and off the stage and he had no problem adding another signature to my hat and talking with fans.
Randy and the band came out full-steam-ahead with fiddle and harmony vocalist Brady Black's attention-keeping-style of fiddle playing, and interaction with the enthusiastic crowd. To quote the song When The Circus Leaves Town on Randy's latest self-titled release: "For the next ninety minutes we'll be having the time of our lives." The Randy Rogers Band put what they had into that ninety minutes and the circus left town to set up to entertain somewhere else.
-Jeff
[Update: We did some digging and found video of this show on YouTube. It's posted below. We have no idea who recorded this but you can click here to see their YouTube channel. -Ben Krech]