CMT Blog: Archive

All I really went for was Colt Ford. I wanted to hear how this "Cold Beer" and "Chicken & Biscuits" guy sounded in a live show at Joe's Bar in Chicago. But I got so much more. Keith Anderson was there, too, headlining and then six of the Stanley Cup-winning Chicago Blackhawks were there, doing some very mediocre background vocals on Anderson's "Wrap Around" at the end of his set.

But even with all that going on at the close of the show, Ford was the one who really got things off to a raucous start. All 300 lbs. of him. Going in, I wasn't so sure if Ford's kind of country -- spoken-word country vocals are his specialty -- would be my thing. But when he opened his show with "Mr. Goodtime," I figured out why his unique rap style works so well. It's his band. All seven of them were part of every song. Like when his fiddle player Suzanne Rohrer did a back bend while fiddling during their cover of the Charlie Daniels Band's "The Devil Went Down to Georgia," Ford held her waist so she wouldn't fall. And the harmony singing made the group's hip-hop sound, well, sound all right. He did a handful of his own stuff off his Chicken & Biscuits album, plus older ones like "Cold Beer," a song I didn't love at first. But after seeing and hearing it performed live, I've completely changed my mind.

Someone standing next to me said, "These guys are entertaining the (expletive) out of this crowd." That pretty much sums up the show for me in one nice little sentence.

After Ford's set, Anderson kept the place alive for his spirited set of hits. And even though they were not so good as singers, having Blackhawks stars Jonathan Toews, Kris Versteeg, Andrew Ladd, Patrick Kane, Adam Burish and Ben Eager up on that country stage just a week after their Stanley Cup win gave all the fans there something new to tweet about.