Jeff's Illinois State Fair review

After the high of the Missouri state fair, would the Illinois state fair disappoint? Obviously not haha.

This is the furthest I have ever been seated at a carrie concert. Phil Vassar opened for almost an hour and he put on a great show. I do think he is one of the most under-rated male country artists today.

During the intermission while they were setting up the stage for carrie, one of the Djs from the local station came up and talked about carrie. It was announced that this was the largest crowd for this years fair.for those unaware, CURT (carrie underwood radio team) organizes weekly listening parties (usually on a Friday) and one was arranged the Friday before the concert. The vey DJ who hosted the party for CURT came up and gave a shout out to the carrie underwood listening party that he hosted and thanked all those who were listening in! how awesome is he!

I think after the Missouri state fair, carrie has reached another amazing new level in terms of her as a live concert performer. She was full of energy and moving around (and making it extrememly difficult to take pics of her lol). A few tidbits

- she was back to flirting with her band members during BHC. After the song she was like “I notice its normally the girls who sing along to this song, but tonight I notice a lot of guys singing along too! Whats up with that?” and then she laughed. She then went on and said she has been getting lots of bats in the mail and assured guys need not be afraid of her. At this moment, being the goon that I am, (despite being way back in the grandstand) I decided to shout out “we’ll never cheat on you carrie!”

- early on her set, she tried to reach out to touch the outstretched hands of fans, and after the song, she announced “I really wanna touch your hands, but… I have a phobia of fallin off the stage when I reach out! I really do have a phobia!!!”

- the crowd really sang along when she sang DFTRM. She was really touched and said it means a lot to her when the crowd sings along to her songs, since it shows her that her songs do matter to the fans.

- after IAICA, she went around the stage and bowed to each section of the audience (ala martina mcbride. I think she gave martina a call lol). However, she needs to bow to the crowd when she gets those standing ovations that shes getting on a really regular basis instead of cutting the ovation off! Lol. She bowed really gracefully and I got that on video.

Meet and greet
I was way back in the lineanyhow i am about to meet her and the cop there asks me to place my picture for her to sign on the table (to make things faster). the cop says "hey thats a great pic!" but i didnt respond cos i was too engrossed looking at carrie lol. she signed this one



I chose this pic (with advice from some of you, thanks!). she looked at it and was like "eek i look scary!" as you know i think she looks cute in the pic, but who am i to argue with carrie underwood, 3x platinum artist, the next megastar, and angel in my eyes??? As usual, I got her a present (I was visiting st louis the day before, so I got her a tshirt from the gateway arch), so i just chuckled and then handed her the present and mentioned i was in st louis the day before and got her something from there since its the city where everything began for her. she then said "thanks! its my lucky city!"