Garth Brooks Fuses Humor And Honky-Tonk
Friday, August 09, 1991. Boston Globe
Steve Morse

At: Great Woods Center for the Performing Arts, last night

MANSFIELD -- Country star Garth Brooks is one wild 'n' crazy guy. His albums are fairly tame affairs, accenting classic country and traditional honky-tonk music. But his concerts are another story. How many country singers stress strobe lights, smoke bombs and rock-concert volume? How many duckwalk across stage, playing air guitar? How many climb a rope ladder and hang out over the crowd, wailing Billy Joel's "You May Be Right, I May Be Crazy"?


Brooks, the award-winning wunderkind of country's new wave, did all this and more during last night's local headlining debut at Great Woods. Only 4,000 fans showed up, but their leather-lung loyalty made them sound like 12,000, as they cheered Brooks' curious, but likably zany, antics.
"I see a lot of empty seats, but you guys are louder than hell!" said a surprised Brooks. His summer tour has sold out virtually everywhere, but not in this area, which currently lacks a country radio station. "I was worried that we'd be dejected out there," Brooks said later backstage. "But this ended up being one of the five or six most fun shows of the year."

Fun is the word. While respectful of country's roots, he's not afraid to warp them. He came out dressed incongruously in a psychedelic-colored shirt, sporting the same high-tech headset microphone favored by futuristic rockers like Peter Gabriel. Four members of his crack six-piece band had similar headset mikes (allowing them to scamper around stage almost as much as Brooks), while playing in front of a fake marble staircase stage that looked out of a Nashville version of "Spinal Tap."

In between the laughs, the music was seamlessly played. The 90-minute show contained many of his hits, from the barroom-primed "Friends in Low Places," to the warmly intoned, silky baritone ballads "The Dance" and "If Tomorrow Never Comes." His knack for country hooks seemed effortless, as on "Two of a Kind" (about an "easy-lovin' woman" and her "hard-workin' man"), and the rib-tickling "We Bury the Hatchet (But Leave the Handle Sticking Out)."

Brooks also showed uncanny marketing savvy. He pleased the oldsters with George Jones' "The Race Is On." And he hit younger fans with the above-named Billy Joel song, plus the Georgia Satellites' rocking "Keep Your Hands to Yourself." No, this was not your typical country show. It was a unique fusion that only Brooks could devise.