Country 2 Country

After a day of rest on Saturday and watching the Rugby and Grand Prix qualifying we set about our big day for Sunday..
We left Derwent6 at 8.30am and headed to the train station.. here we got the fast train down to London and then got the tube over to the O2 Millennium Dome where the Country 2 Country festival was going on..

We had got tickets for our Anniversary which is coming up on Wednesday and there was one guy performing that we had always promised to go and see if he came over.. We were starving so we first found a nice cafe where we could have a whole hearty breakfast which would do us for the rest of the day..

Afterwards we then had to do some planning as there were a few country music acts performing around the outside of the O2 Arena..

The music started at 12.00pm and we first went to see a band called Hometown Show and they kicked us off to a good start with some old hillbilly stuff. From there we walked over and saw a guy Stevie Agnew who sang with a girl and they were brilliant and we could have watched them all afternoon, but we had so much to see.

We then walked round to another stage and saw Tom Wright with some great guitar work.

We then saw a guy who had sounded good on iTunes.. His name was Alan West and  he wrote stuff with an old looking boater guy called Steve Black....well these songs just sounded fantastic live and a great acoustic sound.. 

It was then back to the Brooklin Bowl stage and another group were on called Raintown. 

We just had time to grab a beer and get a good spot before they came on. This was a couple who were engaged to be married and she had a brilliant voice. It was starting to get packed at this stage. When they had finished, we went round all the stalls and merchandise before heading into the main arena.

We had only been seated for ten minutes when Bob Harris from Radio 2 came on to introduce Chris Young, one of our few big Country singers in the states..

He has a fantastic Country voice and got the crowd going.. We then had two bands, (who we've got to say we were a bit disappointed with), one was The Band Perry who were very rocky but the girl singer seemed to be shouting over the band. They were a family group and full of energy but it just didn't suit this type of venue. We then had Rascal Flats who were well known in the crowd and had a good following, but the lead singer had a really high pitched voice and it wasn't our cup of tea. They also had a hour and a half set and came off after 55 minutes...... hmmmm
Still we had the main man to look forward to...

Brad Paisley is a singer we have been following since we went over to the USA in the 80's and we love his voice..

Del's Dad also loved him and one of his favourite tracks was "Who needs Pictures" which was played at his funeral. Del wore his old Bootlace he used to wear at all the Country functions he used to go to and it felt we had a little piece of him there, he would have loved to see Brad perform.

He was just brilliant and even though our expectations were high he exceeded them.. Not only can he sing but boy can he play the guitar...Wow!  He didn't play Who needs Pictures, but did play our favourite, "Mud on the Tyres" He played for two hours non stop and it was a great show..

We hit the crowds as we left and found a short cut to the tube and managed to get back to Euston just in time to grab something to eat and get on the last train. We didn't want to pay the food prices inside the arena at the O2, with £5.00 a pint and £4.00 for a bottle of diet coke, and also £12.00 for a burger and chips and £7.00 for a hotdog........they are having a laugh!
We arrived back on Derwent6 at 1.15am and just flopped into bad with our ears still humming!!!!