COUNTRY music.
That’s the easiest way to explain what transpired on the Whitewater Ampitheater in New Bruanfels on a sweltering Saturday night time in Central Texas, August sixteenth. Some people with rattling good style slotted Hannah Juanita, Jesse Daniel, and Braxton Keith to all take the stage on the identical invoice. It was scorching. For a second, it was moist as a deluge swept by way of the realm. It was every thing that a night in central Texas is about. And for those who made it out, it was a reminiscence they gained’t lengthy overlook.
It was three performers with six first names, and Braxton Keith together with his Rollie Fingers mustache capped all of it off making a robust case for why he’s the following scorching factor in nation music.
Hannah Juanita and her kick ass band from Nashville blew into to carry out a rousing set of precise nation music to open the night. The don’t name Hannah Juanita “The Hardliner” for nothing. That is one Tennessee Songbird you don’t have to fret about fluttering away to the world of electronica pop. Together with her beau Mose Wilson bending the strings of that scorching Telecaster, they’re drawing a tough line between what’s nation, and what’s not.
A couple of songs into Hannah’s set, it began raining as exhausting because it ever does. They didn’t skip a beat, and no person within the entrance row was leaving. She featured songs from her 2024 album Tennessee Songbird, together with her signature music “Hardliner Blues,” and the very enjoyable “Granny’s Cutlass Supreme.”
Juanita additionally featured a model new music she simply launched known as “Tears and Tequila,” and performed “Georgia on a Quick Practice” by Billy Joe Shaver to mark the Texas legend’s Heavenly birthday. And talking of recent music, Hannah’s guitarist Mose Wilson additionally simply launched a brand new Louisiana-inspired album known as That’s Love.
Additionally talking of recent music, Jesse Daniel had a few of his personal to showcase from his 2025 launch Son of the San Lorenzo. It was picks from the album, and fan favorites like “Delicate Spot (For The Laborious Stuff)” and “Suppose I’ll Keep” that ingratiated Daniel to these unfamiliar to his music within the large crowd. Jesse Daniel doesn’t sing nation music. He bleeds it, sweats it, lives it. Then once they permit him up on stage, it comes out like an enormous exhalation.
Jesse Daniel has been breaking in some new gamers within the band just lately, together with an previous, acquainted face. After metal guitar participant Zachary Moulton left Silverada, he performed with The Vandoliers and a few others, however has formally discovered a everlasting dwelling in Jesse Daniel’s band. In line with Jesse, they couldn’t be extra thrilled to have him, and as anybody who is aware of about metal gamers, Moulton is without doubt one of the greatest. Lead guitarist Matthew Lee from Nashville additionally made an enormous impression.
And people who fell in love with metal participant Caleb Melo after seeing him in Jesse Daniel’s band, don’t fret at his departure. In line with everybody, issues are nonetheless cool. Caleb simply wished a change of surroundings, and is now taking part in with Ben Haggard. And after residing in Texas for a spell, Jesse Daniel has relocated again to the West Coast for the second, and might be touring the West Coast as his subsequent junket.
However in the end, the throngs that assembled on the Whitewater Amphitheater Saturday night time have been there to see the person of the hour: Braxton Keith. In reality, many people on the Whitewater Amphitheater remarked how they’d by no means seen the GA part replenish so rapidly after the gates opened. This was partially to the standard number of openers. Nevertheless it additionally speaks to the meteoric rise of attraction in Braxton.
Braxton Keith is a phenomenon all his personal. However not dissimilar to Zach Prime, Braxton is creating cross-generation attraction in true nation music, with the overwhelming majority of the entrance rows full of teen and 20-something followers, all singing each phrase to each music, whether or not it was one in all Braxton’s originals, or one of many many traditional covers he featured throughout the set.
A Keith Whitley music, George Strait’s “The Chair,” Johnny Paycheck’s “Slide Off Your Satin Sheets,” Eddie Rabbitt’s “Drivin’ My Life Away,” all of them made appearances throughout Braxton’s efficiency, and not one of the youthful crowd was making prune faces at their fathers and grandfather’s music … that is what they’d come for, together with Braxton’s authentic songs, together with his large hit “Cozy.”
Braxton Keith sings nation music just like the clouds rain, the solar shines, the river flows, and the birds fly. It’s such a pure, easy, and flawless enterprise, you’ll be able to’t assist however be mesmerized, because the 1000’s on the Whitewater Amphitheater have been.
It’s honest to say that Braxton’s music has a smart method, making an attempt to solid a large web, specializing in mid tempo love tunes sort of like a Randy Rogers Band expertise, although positively signature to Braxton Keith. Initially from Midland, he’s now made a house in San Antonio when he’s not in Nashville, and has discovered an extremely appreciative base of supporters there.
Not solely does Braxton’s viewers veer youthful, in addition they veer extra Hispanic, which means he’s bridging cultures and generations. He’s making nation music cool to an enormous cohort of individuals in Texas and past who reduce their tooth on George Strait, however now have a rustic music hero from their very own time and technology to have a good time.
Alex Torrez of the Torrez Music Group helped curate the night at Whitewater, and has been constructing one thing actually particular with Braxton. As Keith shouted out his openers Hannah Juanita and Jesse Daniel, he adopted it up with “That’s nation music proper there.”
And that’s what it’s all about. As the dimensions of the gang assembled on the Whitewater Saturday night time attests, nation music is the most popular factor in nation music in the intervening time, and these three performers represented the resurgence in Nashville, on the West Coast, and deep within the coronary heart of Texas.
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