Before Kenny Chesney took the stage at the Joint for a two and a half hour country music marathon, red-hot up-and-comers Lady Antebellum and Miranda Lambert opened the evening with some surprises of their own.
The Nashville-based three-piece started things off backed by a band of the same size with lead singers Charles Kelley and Hillary Scott taking turns shaking hands and signing autographs as they traded off on vocals.
After a 10-minute break, 25-year-old Miranda Lambert burst onto the stage with a cover of Beyoncé Knowles’ “Ring the Alarm.”
Dressed in tight, distressed blue jeans, an animal print tank top and a hooded black leather vest, Lambert took no prisoners. She rocked out, got plenty sweaty and messed up her already-messy long blonde hair.
She made two things clear: One, she’s no Taylor Swift, and two, hers ain’t your momma’s country.
OK, she made three things clear: She also can – and, if challenged, probably will – drink you under the table.
“I really like beer,” she confessed before proudly stating how she knows exactly how many miles it is from her front door to the nearest beer store.
“The ride to the beer store's not nearly as fun as the ride from the beer store,” she noted.
Again: She’s no Taylor Swift. The Texan is far more "Gunpowder & Lead" than “Forever and Always.”
What’s more, Lambert’s bassist has a Mohawk and the guy who played slide guitar on Saturday wore a Beatles T-shirt under his stylish sport coat.
Again: Hers ain’t your momma’s country.
Lambert had to interrupt herself at one point when horrified fans in the front row kept telling her that she was bleeding through her $240 William Rast jeans.
She just shrugged and laughed it off.
“Last weekend I was hog hunting and I cut my leg,” she said, unconcerned about the growing puddle of blood on her lower thigh, or the fact that she had actually gone hog hunting.
“Really, it was no big deal,” she said. “I was drinkin' beer and I fell in the creek bed and cut my leg.”
She did note, however, that they weren’t just any jeans that she was bleeding through. William Rast is Justin Timberlake’s label, so JT, if you’re reading, you should really send her another pair.
And with that, Lambert picked up where she left off and continued her set.
The rough-around-the-edges Nashville Star alum briefly showed her softer side when she sat on the side of the stage to sing, “More Like Her.”
But that moment was short lived and Lambert soon resumed the role as country’s raucous wild child.
Lambert covered Joan Jett’s "I Love Rock n’ Roll,” in what appeared to be a salute to fellow girl gone wild and Jett cover-singer, Britney Spears.
Indeed, the Lambert-Spears comparisons abound – they’re both young, hard-partying, tattooed blondes from the South.
But, for the record, fellow country star Blake Shelton serves as Lambert’s version of Kevin Federline (point: Lambert), and she has yet to check into rehab, get married/divorced or give herself an early-morning buzz cut.
Oh, and Lambert writes her own songs, plays her own (very pink) guitar and so far, has yet to hit bottom.
There was only one K-Fed/rehab/lip-synching gong show in town on Saturday, and it was over at the MGM Grand.
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