A Black Eye But Does Anyone Really Care?

Jimmy Carter in his homebase Nashville.

It was the rowdiest and nastiest crowd the ever attend an event at Heinz Field in Pittsburgh. Over 100 arrested ... 150 treated by medics ...40 taken to the hospital. Ten large fights. Public urination. Disorderly conduct, assault, ticket scalping and ... oh yeah, a Country music show was the purpose of this all-day affair. Hurricane Kenny, it was called ... 60,000 pounds of trash left behind that included homemade toilets ... poop in a box.

The aftermath got a lot of attention in Pittsburgh. Of course, most of the 50,000 or so were normal, sober Kenny fans, but the percentage of Neanderthals was high and visible. The large fights even made YouTube.

These large tailgate drunkfests have turned bad on more than one occasion. Shall we forget the young girl killed after Kenny tailgating at Gillette Stadium? Hard to believe the MADD folks or someone hasn't said something about all this. Maybe this time they will. If you are a non-drunk, why do you want to be around this? A dial back of a few watts would be at the minimum called for.

Waiting for someone to get killed? A cop to get hurt? What will be the strong that breaks the back?

Five percent of the audience in the venue to see the opening act -- even though the audience was mostly there by 3p!

Alison at CMT wrote about the "den on iniquity" situations at many Midwest and NE amphitheaters .

Sex, drugs, Country music. No cops, no arrest, no problem. Sex on the grass, dope heads ... at Country shows. Still no one does or says anything. Has greed just won? Money ahead of what is right. Didn't think that was the theme of this genre of music. Some trade group better get it together and soon ...This drunken ride is moments away from the front page ... and not in a good way.

Didn't see a lot of Country music support for Paula Deen this week. She was surely involved with many artists and guested at the CMT Awards a few years back. She was lynched this week. She deserved some form of public punishment, but while the stores throw out Paula they keep all the Rap CDs filled with all kinds of racist material and, of course, plentiful N word usage. Hypocrites abound.

Trying to predict a year in advance what's going to be popular and make a million-dollar-plus bet on your decision is how veteran concert bookers roll. Luke Bryan and Gary Allan booked as headliners at 2014 Country USA in Wisconsin ... Lady A and Jake Owen at another festival ... Brad Paisley at Hunter's Mtn., NY ... Safe bets all.

Sure hot this weekend at that festival in Kansas ... 100? Whew ... 117 Saturday in Vegas ... Taylor Swift has the right idea ... ARENAS in summer!

Big water cooler talk about Forbes and the Toby Keith: 500 Million Dollar Man story ... Long career,smart decisions, stable home life. Dependable hit music and show. Toby is a great star. Wish there could be some sort of peace treaty with Toby and the powers-that-be. His music is solid as King George. Never really changed. Dependable is good.

Rolling Stone did a list of the best amphitheaters in the USA ... If you ever get to see a show at The Greek Theater or Hollywood Bowl in L.A., DO IT .. Red Rocks, Colorado - oh, yeah ... I'm going to the Gorge next month in Washington, and Jones Beach is a nice setting. Wish Nashville had an amphitheater; hard to believe they closed Starwood and replaced it with NOTHING.