Listen to article \u2022\u00a00:00 min<\/p>\n
Music triggers memory. So, the long gone Philly venue that inevitably came to my mind during Kacey Musgraves\u2019 \u201cMiddle of Nowhere\u201d tour stop at Xfinity Mobile Arena in South Philly on Friday was the Valley Forge Music Fair. <\/a><\/p>\n My head is spinning just thinking about it. <\/p>\n Why? Because just as was the case at the Devon<\/a> venue where I saw legends like George Jones, Merle Haggard, and Ray Charles, Musgraves staged her show in support of a superb new return-to-country album giving her tour its name in the round.<\/p>\n And not only in the round, but also \u2014 just as at the Music Fair, which closed in 1996 and was located on a site where home improvement retailer Floor & Decor now stands \u2014 with a spinning stage. <\/p>\n Listening to Musgraves\u2019 music can be mildly trippy . Going back to \u201cFollow Your Arrow,\u201d from her 2013 debut Same Trailer, Different Park, the East Texas native who uses @SpaceyKacey<\/a> as a social media handle has espoused a you-do-you philosophy.<\/p>\n That song is the foundation of Musgraves\u2019 arena-sized following, and her significant role in making country cool for younger audiences who might be turned off by too much twang or homilies about small towns, pickup trucks, and beer.<\/p>\n Instead, Musgraves opened the door wide to the LGBTQ community on \u201cFollow Your Arrow,\u201d which was the penultimate song in a sparkling, consistently pleasing set. The song suggests fans \u201ckiss lots of boys, or kiss lots of girls, if that\u2019s something you\u2019re into\u201d and advises taking a toke or two \u201cwhen the straight and narrow gets a little too straight.\u201d<\/p>\n No weed smoke was sniffable from where I sat. But the sense of strange things happening was nonetheless in the air; with the stage and video screen above encircling it moving clockwise, then abruptly moving in the opposite direction. <\/p>\n Also notably odd was the faux roadhouse building constructed behind the stage from which Musgraves made her initial entrance, walking through the crowd over a floor strewn with hay. It remained otherwise unused. <\/p>\n More memorable was how Musgraves chose to present \u201cRhinestoned,\u201d a terrific tune about stepping out behind the roadhouse for a smoke in hopes of taking the sting out of a breakup. <\/p>\n \u201cIs every one having a good time?\u201d she asked, adding coyly: \u201cWould you go so far to say you are having a ball?\u201d With that, a double disco ball appeared over in the anatomically correct shape of a pair of testicles. <\/p>\n Conveniently, the mirrored object was built with space for Musgraves to take a seat within it as she was lifted above the stage. \u201cThe is my grandma\u2019s favorite part of the show,\u201d she quipped, then rather remarkably managed to maintain the emotional thrust of the song, singing \u201cOoh, let\u2019s put a little sparkle on \/ Ooh, until the heartache and sadness is gone.\u201d <\/p>\n The moving stage and aerial scrotum made for clever \u2014 dare I say ballsy? \u2014 strategy by an artist who is more mellowed out than dynamic in performance.<\/p>\n \u201cThunderstruck\u201d by AC\/DC \u2014 the Australian hard rock vets who will be across the street at the Linc on Sept. 29<\/a> \u2014 played during the entrance countdown. <\/p>\n Nothing nearly so raucous followed in the 22-song set to come, as Musgraves was backed by a subtle and understated band that included steel guitar and accordion, spicing up a Tex-Mex vibe in songs like \u201cUncertain, Texas\u201d and the Texas Tornados cover \u201c(Hey Baby) \u00bfQue Pas\u00f3?\u201d <\/p>\n But if Musgraves is somewhat of a static performer \u2014 she moved with such deliberation that her hair never seemed to move beneath her black cowboy hat \u2014 that\u2019s OK, because her fans aren\u2019t coming to see the sort of aerobic display expected at most outsized pop concerts. <\/p>\n Instead \u2014 and refreshingly \u2014 it\u2019s all about the songs. Musgraves\u2019 strength is in her writing, which is sharply focused in Middle of Nowhere tunes like \u201cHorses and Divorces\u201d and \u201cLoneliest Girl\u201d that settle contentedly into mid-30s singledom and convey the satisfaction of making peace with oneself as middle age approaches.<\/p>\n Musgraves\u2019 crossover from country to pop was highly successful \u2014 2018\u2019s Golden Hour was named Grammy album of the year.<\/a> But Middle of Nowhere is as satisfying as it is in part because after wandering away from the music she grew up on, it feels like a homecoming. <\/p>\n \u201cThe bones of country music are really in my heart,\u201d she said, while thanking her fans for a decade plus of loyalty. \u201cWhenever you strip it down to its beautiful basic form, it\u2019s a genre that is built on stories about real people, and just real hearts, real life stuff. And that\u2019s what inspires me the most.\u201d <\/p>\n Two unexpected things happened \u2014 or didn\u2019t \u2014 over the course of the evening. <\/p>\n First, after singing a spooky \u201cI Believe In Ghosts\u201d \u2014 about cowardly guys and Irish goodbyes \u2014 Musgraves broke out in a snippet of \u201cHere Comes the Sixers,\u201d the snappy theme song of the team for whom LeBron James<\/a> will soon be dribbling on the very spot she was standing. <\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t know why I know this song,\u201d she said, before leading the crowd in a \u201c10, 9, 8 \u2026 76ers,\u201d singalong, confessing that \u201cI don\u2019t know [much] about sports.\u201d (Turns out, she has a history with the song \u2014 though why is a mystery \u2014 as my colleague Emily Bloch explained in 2024<\/a>.) <\/p>\n