Garth Brooks Brings His Epic Stadium Tour to Eugene, Oregon

Garth Brooks has been a household name for decades, touring the world, and his legacy is growing bigger and better each year. Brooks held a press conference at The Country Music Hall of Fame earlier last year to announce that over the next three years he will embark on a stadium tour, hitting 30 cities. The first set of cities have really blown Brooks’ fan base away. The latest city to experience the World Tour, Eugene, OR.

Opening up the show was Brooke Eden a Nashville based artist and BMI songwriter. Making a name for herself with her self-released single “American Dreamin,” and EP Welcome to the Weekend, the crowd was very impressed with her ability to capture an audience of 60,000+. With her songs including “Act Like You Don’t,” “Honey,” and “Honky Tonks In Heaven,” Eden gained many more fans last Friday night.

This tour was epic before the show even started, the 360-degree stage commanded such a presence among the large stadium. Autzen is known for loud crowds during football games and Brooks was up for the challenge. Dressed in his signature Wranglers, a red shirt and of course a cowboy hat, the highest selling solo artist of all time started the party with “All Day Long”. Instantly he felt the energy from the crowd so he paused and said “I see why everybody calls this the loudest place on Earth! If you are going to raise hell, you picked the right guy on the right night tonight!”

You hear that Brooks is famous for his live show and you can tell after just a few songs why he has been named Entertainer of the Year. Throughout roughly two and a half hours of hits –“Rodeo,” “Friends in Low Places,” and “Thunder Rolls” were in the set list among new songs. Brooks also included a few covers as well, starting with the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band’s “Fishin’ in the Dark.” What fans may not know is that two of his popular hits are two songs he turned into songs of his own, the Oak Ridge Boys’ “Callin’ Baton Rouge” and Billy Joel’s “Shameless” which both came later in the set.

He paused many times throughout the concert to take in the awe of the crowd but possibly the most emotional for Brooks was after “The River.” When the crowd takes over songs like “The River” and “Unanswered Prayers” it is one of the coolest feelings in the world to stand amongst so many singing along. To be in sync with that many people, singing the songs you grew up on, back to the artist themselves, there is nothing like it. You can tell by the emotion in Brooks’ eyes that these are the moments he dreamed of when he first got to Music Row.

While moments like the one above made the whole world stop for a second, Brooks still ran across the stage throughout the duration of his set, giving fans throughout the stadium plenty of opportunities to see him. You could tell that he was just as excited to be there as the fans were. Throughout the evening he told the crowd how great of an audience they were and how excited he was to be there with them for a night of music. Inviting the Oregon Ducks Cheer team and the Duck mascot himself on stage during “Friends in Low Places” was one of the highlights of the night. Brooks also brought a choir with him that filled the stadium stairs during “We Shall Be Free” wearing beautiful colorful robes.

20 years later and Garth Brooks is still selling out 50,000+ shows all across the country. With his unbelievable energy and charismatic personality, he shows no signs of slowing down. Continuing to announce dates throughout the next three years, as well as new music, there are plenty of opportunities to catch the man in action.