Dierks Bentley plays hits, preserves country's expansive traditions at Bridgestone Arena

Watching Dierks Bentley in concert allows a study of his three decades of excellence as a straightforward, party-rocking country artist. Moreover, it is an undeniably entertaining way to dive headlong into the cultural and sonic borrowing and appreciation upon which the genre's century-long history is founded.

Bentley played three dozen songs at Bridgestone Arena on Friday in just over two hours. Three in every five were his original material. However, when he deviated, he did so in ways that were as educational as they were captivating.

Three songs into his set, Bentley launched into a powerful rendition of his decade-old single "I Hold On." Anthemic, arena rock energy filled the track's vocal performance. Lovelorn yearning is underpinned by a booming drumline and power guitar chords as a percolating banjo informs the song with very country-specific vibes.

Note that the banjo in question was being played by Charlie Worsham, the Academy of Country Music's 2022 Acoustic Musician of the Year. The vaunted artist and in-demand session musician has joined Bentley's band for summer dates. His addition joyously added another virtuoso player to a top-tier unit.

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Country music's eldest offshoot roots are in bluegrass, a jazzy, banjo-driven sound tinged with folk, gospel, and what historians of the sound highlight as rapid tempos, instrumental dexterity, and complex chord change was also Bentley's bread and butter when he arrived in Nashville in 1993. At this point, the genre was five decades old, thus making an 18-year-old interested in the genre something of a prodigal artist.

Bentley worked as a researcher for CMT's sister station The Nashville Network when he arrived in Nashville. So naturally, a Dierks Bentley concert is the one pop-country leaning place in town where fans can expect to hear the names J.D. Crowe, Dr. Ralph Stanley and Earl Scruggs name-dropped as essential industry pillars.

Regarding bluegrass, the fiddle player in Bentley's band, Dan Hochhalter, was spotlighted via a cover of the Charlie Daniels Band's 1979 bluegrass-laden classic "The Devil Went Down To Georgia." The performance brought the capacity crowd to its feet for a stomping, kicking and screaming celebration.

Rampant jubilation was a cornerstone of the evening.

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Aside from being a virtuoso creator and stylist within country music's traditions, Bentley's greatest strength as a live artist is that he's mastered the art of distilling those traditions' well-worn tropes to their core essence. He then delivers those distilled concepts couched in modern swagger.

His 2022 single "Gold" is as much an earnest study in gratitude buoyed by tight steel guitars as it is driven by a fast, chugging rhythm reminiscent of Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers' 1989 classic "I Won't Back Down." In the song, Bentley describes wanting to find the gold at the end of a metaphorical rainbow. This tie ultimately connects the two songs.

Moreover, connect the vocal delivery and alternative power-pop-style composition of Bentley's show-closing country rocker "Drunk on a Plane" (which the three-time Country Music Association Award-winner delivered with his son, Knox, decked out in a combat-style flight suit — and whom he referred to as his co-pilot) to the New Radicals 1998 "one-hit wonder" single "You Get What You Give," and something fascinating occurs.

Typically, sonic analogs like these bedevil a performance and deny them appreciation. However, here, they create cross-genre, cross-cultural comfort because of how well Bentley's mastery of country music's aesthetics are folded into the tracks.

Similarly, the same goes for 2016's "Somewhere on a Beach." For any other artist, a lovelorn, R&B-inspired ballad that rhymes "body" and "naughty" in a clear homage to any great number of Dirty South or midwestern rappers of the early 2000s would be either a cause for charges of cultural appropriation or receive a generous eye roll. For Bentley, it was a raucous singalong moment and the penultimate song of his live set.

Comparatively, earlier in the evening, Dustin Lynch (who opened, as well as 2022 Grand Ole Opry NextStage member and "My Boy" vocalist Elvie Shane) closed his set by inviting fans onstage to challenge each other in a game of beer pong.

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The soundtrack? With the aid of an onstage DJ, Lynch bridged his own "Good Girl" into Outkast's beloved late 90s hip-hop B-side "SpottieOttieDopaliscious," followed by Miley Cyrus' "Party in the USA," Alan Jackson's "It's Five O'Clock Somewhere" and his own single "Party Mode."

Lynch's stylings were well received and showed that if he more significantly mirrors Bentley's formula, the answer for what could be an unprecedented triple-platinum and tenth No. 1 single on country radio could lie in understanding what exists squarely between so many disparate, yet still very engaging, influences.

Notable, as well, were two other occurrences. Foremost, Bentley, whose current singles include chart-topping collaboration "Beers on Me" with BRELAND and HARDY, plus "Worth a Shot" with Elle King, lamented the trio of stars were on the road and would be unable to join him. Thus, he joked, "when in doubt, bring the kids out," and his daughters Evalyn and Jordan joined their father for a show-stopping collaboration on P!nk's 202 single "All I Know So Far."

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As Bentley's shows often do on the "Beers on Me" tour, he closed the event with a dozen-song, fifteen-minute performance by "Hot Country Knights," the five-year-old 90s country lampooning alter-ego cover band he and his bandmates have put together.

Watching men wearing mullet wigs perform Eddie Van Halen-style jumping scissor kicks, carrying keytars and throwing out roses to the crowd while singing Garth Brooks' "The Dance" wasn't necessarily the most expected close. Still, it was appreciated for a night that honored the depth and scope of country music's explorations and evolution of sonic conventions.

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Dierks Bentley Set List

This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Dierks Bentley plays hits, honors country tradition at Bridgestone Arena