Staff Reports
One might muse that a band that launched a career decades ago would really have to sweat to connect with today’s younger set.
But Grammy-winning Western and comedy act Riders In the Sky, slated for a 7:30 p.m. concert Friday at Brown County Playhouse, hardly fiddles around with such talk, pardner.
Consider the foursome’s following entry on the website ridersinthesky.com after an appearance at the popular 2018 Bonnaroo Music & Arts Festival in Manchester, Tennessee.
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“We found out the huge audience of mud-caked millennials knew the chorus to ‘Ghost Riders,’ which they sang along with at top volume. We found out they really liked songs from ‘Toy Story 2,’ which they were raised on.
“And they really really really liked Too Slim’s ‘Eminem Rap,’ apparently still cheesed at the legendary rapper for his Saturday night concert featuring pre-recorded gunshots which had folks freaking and diving for cover.”
The group, which is amid its 40th anniversary tour, still brings enough ammunition to shows to shoot full of holes any idea that it might ride off into the sunset anytime soon. So, when people say the band continues to stand hats and shoulders above other veteran performers while listeners embrace them as “America’s Favorite Cowboys,” they mean it.
The band that boasts more than 6,000 performances — including a 1993 show at the original Commons in Columbus — is the only Western group in history to win not just one Grammy, but two. And besides the group’s music being a part of “Toy Story 2,” it also landed in the Pixar short film, “For the Birds.”
The quartet has performed on the nation’s most prestigious stages, from the Grand Ole Opry to Carnegie Hall to the Hollywood Bowl. Plus, members have hosted their own weekly show on TNN, as well as a Saturday morning series on CBS.
Besides being inducted into the Grand Ole Opry, Riders are in the Western Music Association’s Hall of Fame, the Country Music Foundation’s Walkway of Stars and the Walk of Western Stars, along with Gene Autry, Roy Rogers, John Wayne and other cowboy legends.
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Who: Grammy-winning Western and comedy act Riders in the Sky on a 40th anniversary tour.
When: 7:30 p.m. Friday.
Where: Brown County Playhouse, 70 S. Van Buren St. in Nashville.
Tickets: $39.50 to $42.50.
Information: 812-988-6555 or browncountyplayhouse.org.
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