7/14/17

John Lygate, the English poet, penned the phrase, “You can please some of the people all of the time, you can please all of the people some of the time, but you can’t please all of the people all of the time.”.  Despite the obviousness of this quote, people continue to test the veracity of it, and they continue to find out just how true it is, even applied to small, reasonably homogenous groups, like concert goers.

Why bring this up?  Because Pam bought us tickets to see the Soul2Soul tour with Tim McGraw and Faith Hill, each a luminary in country music in their own right.  It has been over a decade since they toured together.  We saw them in August of 2006, one month shy of 11 years ago.  At the time, I liked country music, but Pam had little or no interest in it, and she humored me by going to the show, which we were invited to by a business contact.

This time around, Pam wanted to go more than me.  I am somewhat of a Faith Hill fan.  I love listening to her sing live, as she has a tremendous voice, even though I am not a huge fan of many of her songs.  I have always tolerated Tim McGraw songs, as I find them a little too produced, synthetic and sappy for my tastes.  But turnaround is fair play, so I readily agreed to go to the show.

The show itself was fun.  The opening act, Rachel Platten, was really a bit out there for a country show.  She performed like a teeny bopper, despite the fact that she is in her mid 30s.  Her songs were a mix of pop and indie pop genres, and I am not a fan of either.  Unfortunately for me, she truly loves her bass.  I, however, do not.  I usually gripe about the bass rattling through my torso and up into my head.  For some reason, it lodged in my right shin at the show.  That did not make it any better, and I swear I had a shin splint in my right leg the next day.  Having said that, she is a good entertainer with an excellent voice.  She put on a good show and finished it with Fight Song, which is a great underdog anthem and is near and dear to Pam.  Pretty soon it was Tim and Faith time.  They came out together.  Sang songs together.  Sang songs separately.  Sang songs together.  Left the stage together, we think, because we snuck out just as the encore started.  Each song was good, but something was amiss.  Something was a little off.  Maybe it was crowd energy.  Maybe it was chemistry on stage.  Maybe it was genre conflict.

As Pam and I drove home we discussed the show.  We both liked it, but neither of us loved. it.  We weren’t sure why.  Faith just nailed it.  All her songs were delivered perfectly.  Tim sort of nailed it, sometimes sounding really pinched as he drawled out some of his less gritty material.  At times he was amazing, especially when he sang Live Like You Were Dying, a song I love.  I got the sense that he was performing more for himself than for the audience.  This came as no surprise, as I felt that way I when I saw him perform last time.  So that did not explain what was amiss.

Pam likes to listen to KKGO, the only country station on the radio in LA.  She follows their Go Girls on social media, and when we got home she began reading some of the posts.  No doubt that many people loved the show; however, many were nonplussed.  At first, Pam and I were sort of surprised about how many less than stellar comments were posted.  Most of the people who were not overwhelmed with the show complained that there was not enough Tim in it.  Very few complained that there was not enough Faith in it.  As they were playing two successive days in Staples, Pam checked out more of the Go Girls posts the next day.  She noted that the same comments were made about the second show.

One of the millennials at work went to the second show.  Her feelings about the show echoed the ones we had read.  She liked it, but did not love it.  She wanted more Tim, especially his older songs.  She was surprised, though, at how good a singer Faith Hill was.

I kept replaying the show in my head.  As I did, I realized that when Tim and Faith sing a duet, Faith’s voice, which is so strong, just overpowers Tim’s.  As a result, the show comes off as more of a Faith Hill show than a Tim McGraw show, despite the fact that Tim McGraw was, and still is, a bigger star with a bigger fan base.  This seems to account for lots of the lukewarm comments.  My suspicion is that if it was either a Tim or a Faith show, the comments would have been spectacular.  Instead, it sort of fell flat, proving just how astute John Lygate was.