Featuring a whole lot of music superstars, exciting events, and many things to do and see, the 2010 Central States Fair is where the stars and buckles shine!
Back by popular demand is the Supercross Races and other fan favorites like the Demolition Derby and three nights of PRCA Rodeo. The grandstands will be rockin' and shinin' with Stars Clay Walker and The Band Perry; Uncle Kracker and Little River Band; Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, Western Underground and 32 Below; with a final night of Gary Allan and Bomshel. It's where the stars and buckles shine at the 2010 Central States Fair!
Saturday, August 21 - 7pm
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Sunday, August 22 - 7pm
Clay Walker is one of those artists who just seem to have an innate sense of what it takes to please an audience. Whether on stage or in the recording studio, Walker never gives less than a hundred percent, and it's that kind of dedicated work ethic combined with extraordinary talent that have made him one of the most successful country acts of the past decade.
He first topped the Billboard country singles chart in 1993 with "What's It to You" and followed with his second consecutive No. 1 hit, "Live Until I Die." Since then he's placed 31 titles on Billboard's singles chart including such additional chart toppers as "Dreaming with my Eyes Open," "If I Could Make Living," "This Woman and This Man," and "Rumor Has It." He has consistently been one of the busiest artists on the road.
Inheriting a cross-pollinated love of country and rock & roll from their parents, The Band Perry - siblings Kimberly, Reid, and Neil Perry - say that they bleed the bright red blood of American music. The three have always felt the drive to perform and create music, sweating out the summers in Mobile, Alabama playing in any dusty roadhouse or church that would have them. "We always knew we'd take the stage together - all we were waiting on was the right moment”, says Kimberly.
That moment came in July of 2005, when -after years of writing together - the siblings decided to join forces as one band. "There's a tightness between the three of us that goes way beyond even best friends," Neil adds. "Family vocal harmonies can't be fabricated. And, besides - the three of us know that through the thick and thin of life and the music business, we're watching after each other."
Monday, August 23 - 7pm
Though many know him from his early years as the DJ in Kid Rock's Twisted Brown Trucker Band, Uncle Kracker (whose real name is Matt Shafer) has had impressive success as a songwriter.
On Happy Hour, Uncle Kracker's soulful drawl unspools over massively hooky choruses on feel-good songs like the buoyant first single "Smile," the hilarious SoCal-skewering "I Hate California," and the freewheeling "Good To Be Me," in which he sings about riding with the T-Top down in his Cutlass Supreme. The songs may go down easy, but that doesn't mean they were easy to write. Happy Hour is Uncle Kracker's first album in five years because after he finished two years of touring behind his previous release, 2004's Seventy Two & Sunny, he wrote and recorded an entire album that he wound up scrapping. "I just decided it wasn't the right record," Uncle Kracker says.
"I think Matt really stepped it up by bringing in someone like Rob to help him with the production end of things," says Kid Rock. "Happy Hour is his best record sonically. I also think it's his best-written record.”
Little River Band was formed in Melbourne, Australia in 1975. The original members came from other successful Australian acts from the '60s and '70s.
Little River Band is considered to be among Australia's most significant bands. In May 2001 the Australasian Performing Right Association (APRA), as part of its 75th Anniversary celebrations, named "Cool Change" as one of the Top 30 Australian songs of all time. According to BMI, Reminiscing has achieved 5 million airplay status on America radio, and Lady is close behind with over 4 million airplays. LRB was inducted into the Australian Recording Industry Association (ARIA) Hall of Fame at the 18th Annual ARIA Music Awards of 2004.
The current lineup blends new energy and arrangements to the classic hits, making new memories for the audience out of each live performance. It's always fun to watch as people are swept up by the show's vitality and the volume of hits from LRB's history. You'll see plenty of people mouthing the words..."I love this song...I forgot it was one of Little River Band's hits!"
Tuesday, August 24 - 7pm
The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band formed in Southern California during the spring of 1966 as a scruffy, young jug-band. Forty-two years later, the quartet (Jeff Hanna, Jimmie Fadden, Bob Carpenter and John McEuen) is still going strong.
It was their 5th record, 1970's Uncle Charlie and His Dog Teddy, which would become the band's breakthrough project, yielding 3 pop hits including their version of Jerry Jeff Walker's “Mr. Bojangles.”
With a career that spans five decades, the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band has gone from a hippie jug-band to pioneers of country rock, and their influence is still being felt today.
In the late 1980s, former world champion bareback rider, turned country singer, Chris LeDoux, was preparing to throw everything into a music career, which had long played a distant second to his love of rodeo, and those bareback horses. His search for a full time touring band that could help to create his new musical vision, produced a unique group of talented musicians, which he named WESTERN UNDERGROUND.
Over the next 16 years they became the sound, and the drive, behind Chris's famed rodeo rock and roll, and they remained with him until his death in March 2005. After countless conversations, e-mails, and phone calls from fans across the country, the band decided to put together a show that would carry on the musical spirit of their mentor, and friend, and honor a great American icon. The members of WESTERN UNDERGROUND are Ned Ledoux, and KW Turnbow on drums, Bobby Jensen, keyboards, Mark Sissel, guitar, and Lyle (Pops) Evans on bass. There is one new addition to the band. Dustin Evans joins WESTERN UNDERGROUND to cover the majority of vocals. A long time friend, and frequent opening act for Chris, and the band, Dustin brings his own energy into the mix, and adds some great songs also.
It’s been nearly 8 years since country-rockers 32 Below released their debut album. Now, 4 albums later and with over 20,000 CD’s sold, 32 Below is currently writing for their fifth album in their studio in West Fargo, ND. In early 2009, 32 Below landed a sponsorship deal with Jim Beam, as well as a guitar string endorsement from GHS strings. With multiple songs in rotation on radio stations in major markets across the U.S. as well as playing 150-200 shows a year, 32 Below is turning heads the way they always have, one at a time.
Wednesday, August 25 - 7pm
PEOPLE Country named Gary Allan one of Country’s Hottest Guy’s, 25 sexy men who make fans swoon. This latest newsstand–only issue, dedicated to the country music scene and country lifestyle, went on sale June 18th and is the third of six PEOPLE Country issues published in 2010.
Gary Allan’s hit “Get Off on the Pain,” is the down-home masterstroke that begins and provides the name for his new MCA Nashville collection. Unhesitatingly frank, mercilessly guitar-crazed, it’s the rocked-out country confession of a smart guy drawn to what the rest of the world calls wrong roads and long shots, or complains of as aching bones and stubbornness, or — as Allan sings in a spectacular stretch of drawn-out soulful vowels — underestimates as dark horses. And as the California-born superstar releases his eighth studio album, it’s about the most Gary Allan piece anyone could imagine.
Few young women are equally at ease penning a poignant hit about a friend battling cancer or simply knocking back tequila with Kix Brooks, but then again you can always count on Bomshel to embrace the extremes and---like their name implies---deliver the unexpected.
Well known for their vivacious personalities and sense of musical adventure, the duo displays their more pensive side on the hit “Fight Like a Girl.” The song engaged country radio and served to whet appetites for Kristy and Kelley’s new project, a well-crafted collection that finds the talented twosome hitting their stride as songwriters and vocalists. Several years of touring have given them an extra measure of confidence in what they wanted to say and how best to say it.
