By Scott Roos
photos by Scott and Deanna Roos
This past Friday, February 25th, country music fans of Prince Albert and surrounding area were treated to a rocking good time at the EA Rawlinson Centre for the Arts. Kicking off the festivities were the girls in Nice Horse who cycled through roughly 30 mins of rollicking, toe tapping, and melodically diverse songs.They had last been here in 2018 opening for The Washboard Union and were phenomenal then but have obviously improved tenfold since last being in front of a Prince Albert crowd. They were immediately engaging, musically as tight as a drum, and their songs were catchy as hell with one enamoured fan even shouting out loudly "That's bullsh*t" when learning that the band's set was coming to a conclusion.
"I've missed live shows for sure - playing in front of a large audience and getting to actually really express ourselves as a live band. I love a live audience because you can actually see people reacting physically to what you are bringing to them and it's indescribable," remarked guitarist Tara McLeod in a brief interview with NSMZ prior to the show.
Nice Horse is continuing on an upward trajectory and now that COVID rules are subsiding again hopefully they can get back to some semblance of "business as usual".
Tebey was up next and definitely proved, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that when it comes to delivering a crowd pleasing series of radio friendly, hook laden, medium tempo stompers that he has the proverbial "skills to pay the bills". He is a first rate entertainer and performer. He interacted with the audience members several times throughout his set and eventually the majority were on their feet singing and dancing along. To his credit, Tebey, who grew up in Ontario, but has been a resident of Nashville since he was in his teens, mixed up his set with songs that he wrote with other artists, cover tunes, and also a double portion of his own solo material. This strategy kept the interest level up throughout.
At the end of the day, it's shows like this that make us all remember what life was like before the pandemic and also raises a hope for the future at the same time. A great show is one where you leave all your stress, troubles and worries at the door and go into the venue and just have a good time. This past Friday, Nice Horse and Tebey delivered the goods and right now, politics aside, that's all we can hope and ask for.
*It was a bit more rowdy of a crowd at the Rawlinson than normal but that suited everyone just fine. Tebey and band were on point and the energy from the crowd was palpable. The crowd loved both acts!
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