May 104 min read

Tailgate Tour Party on Cinco De Mayo 2024

Updated: May 11

Tailgate Tour

On Cinco De Mayo night Lincoln hosted a Tailgate Tour full of good hard rock bands, that started off with a Mr Tim Montana. They are a band of four, two with beards and two without. Tim is well known by the Boston Red Sox team for his beard and a song he wrote about his beard called “This Beard Came Here to Party”

Tim told many personal stories Sunday night at the Pinnacle Bank Arena that were backed up in the songs he sang about growing up so below the poverty line it was practically non-existent. When I heard Get Em Up I heard the anthem he belts to everyone who’s ever been down, ever been out, ever worked hard, Tim wanted you to throw your hands up and be proud. A great message.

Mary J clouds billowed from the crowd as he began the song…Well as he began just about every song to be honest. Tim Montana is a country singer with a hard rocker’s attitude and it suits him perfectly. To hear more please check out his website or youtube: https://timmontana.com/

Saint Asonia? What do I see here? I do believe I see a supergroup. Mike Mushok performs with Staind on this night but he is actually the lead guitarist in Saint Asonia. Adam Gontier was the lead vocals for Three Days Grace. Mike Mushok is an original Staind (also on this amazing Tallgate Tour) band member, plays as a Staind band member and is on the their latest Staind album released in 2023.

Cale Gontier, a cousin to Adam Gontier, took over the job duties from Corey Lowery who now plays for Seether, uh... did I mention Seether is also on the Tailgate Tour and I will be discussing them in a moment? Cody Watkins replaced Sal Giancarelli, who used to drum for Staind. Confused? I still am and it's been a few days! Does it really matter? No, because Saint Asonia has a fine catalog of music, and started the set with a great song “Devastate” Adam with his mohawk and warpainted cheeks got the audience bouncing with devil horns when he sang a couple old Three Days Grace song “I Hate Everything About You” and “Riot” Good times!

Saint Asonia is an outstanding, kick ass set of musicians! Besides, when I think of supergroups my brain still jumps to Ginger Baker, Eric Clapton and Jack Bruce!

Let’s talk Seether! Sometimes getting a photograph of Shaun Morgan can be challenging. I have seen the band four times and I have had good luck only once because it was an outdoor venue. Their stage lighting is quite dark and foggy. Cool as it might sound, it’s very difficult to capture at times.

So, my gift of gab is going to set the stage for me. Seether is a simple stage really. Blood red letters high above a drum riser, fog machine that saturates the stage and gives a swamp style feel (think Halloween) to everything. Lights of red, blue, orange and purple seem muddy as Dale Stewart strutted across the stage breaking through the muddy colored fog and begins riffs and licks that make the audience remember better days.

Shaun Morgan is an amazing artist. Prolific, writes about what he knows, feels, experiences, some angry, brooding, moody, emotional and everything in between. I own many Seether albums and consider myself a good fan. At the Pinnacle Bank Arena, the other fans went crazy over old favorites “Save Me” “Fake It” and “Broken” This band has been around awhile and shows no signs of slowing down, an album release in 2020 may seem like a while ago but every time I turn around they are on another tour either with festivals or smaller.

Staind! Staind “told me it was ok” to listen to music outside my genre. Some of you will get this, some won’t. I was the mother of a teenage daughter whose friend had left a cd at our house. I picked it up and well, one thing led to another and I was hooked. “Right Here” was my intro and after that I owned everything they had out up to that point. The way Aaron Lewis recited my feelings back to me in a way, made me feel like I wasn’t alone. Every time someone pointed out I was just another than a Gen X mom from the Classic Rock era, I would smile and know that I had a fucking Staind cd in my car (several of them) and I wasn’t afraid to listen to it! Most of the original members including Mike Mushok rocked out some of the classic songs that night. Aaron Lewis hung on to his mike like a lounge singer, cigarette in hand and “Lowest In Me” began its descent into the night’s performance. Playing all the favorites, asking us to hold up our phones when he played “Outside” a song that still reaches my soul on a bad day, he would pause for us to sing the song in his place. “It’s Been Awhile" was just as emotional hearing Lewis sing it in concert as it was the day I heard it on the CD. If you are familiar with the song “Been Awhile” you know his last line is “since I said I’m sorry”, but he changes it abruptly and says “fuck you I am not sorry!” This gets uproarious laughter and howls of agreement from the fans in the audience. Staind put on a stellar performance and I was excited to have been there, been able to see them first hand. With a simple stage, they had a large screen behind them played past video content of the younger Staind band singing and performing the same songs in unison to the now version. It was really quite cool.