I don’t love country music, but I don’t mind it. I used to live in Elma which is definitely out in the country compared to other burbs of Buffalo, and I spent a lot of time at a bar named the Clonmel. My buddy lived next door to it so we would just get wrecked then go bother his parents. That bar is now called Kodiak Jack’s. I heard a lot of country music in that bar, and as Toby Keith once said..  I love this (that) bar…

Speaking of Toby Keith, this past weekend was Jam in the Valley – and Toby was headlining! Little known fact, but I actually work with the guy who has MC’d that event for 20+ years – Mark J – better known as DJ ICE! So once I found that out, I started doing a little pestering, to see if he could get some hookups for this year’s Jam in the Valley! Somehow, (with the generosity of my business partner), I wound up with VIP tickets, and boy was I in trouble.

I had heard Toby Keith before, but I wasn’t 100% familiar with his discography – and once I heard I would be seeing him, I started doing my research. for 2 solid months, I did ‘Toby Tuesdays’ as I called them, where I played Toby all day! Probably irritated my co-workers, but by the time this past Saturday rolled around – I was ready! VIP too! how exciting!

Jam in the Valley is a 3-day camping event that features live music on 2 stages, out in the middle of nowhere (Varysburg NY)

Basically, you keep driving down 20a until you hit a farm that is blown the F up with traffic, then turn onto the ‘field’ parking ($10)

Now you can camp there and attend all 3 days of the intense debauchery, but my liver is only good for one day of that nowadays. Any more than that, and I need to sleep for about 2 full days for every day that I go over 1 day. We got there mid-afternoon (3:30) and there were campers and tents set up all over the damn place. It was a shanty town that wreaked of BBQ and stale beer – it was awesome!

Eventually, we found the front door and after a few setbacks, managed to gain entry.

The VIP tent was a double decker tent like nothing I had ever seen before –

It was hooked up with a buffet line, bars on both levels, couches, luxurious private bathrooms, and primo views of the entire area!

I’m not sure why, but when they started listing off the available beers, there was just something right about going with Genesee beer at an event like this..  needless to say, I had so many Genny’s that the girl serving them started calling me Forrest!

Food was great, and the access to our seating was great too! this was the view from our seats”

And this was the view behind our seats!

here’s the view from the back!

america fountain!

My homey Jason!

My Genny!

How to koozie hack a 22oz beer:

And well hey! look who it is! DJ ICE!

Took me back stage! it appears I didn’t take any good pictures of that though, so I apologize.

Here’s the man on stage!

Music started happening! and my recollection of the evening’s events started to go downhill!

Look at that bathroom!

Toby!

It was a great show! whether you liked country or not!

Red solo cuuuup!

He started pulling veterans up on stage!

again, recollection was rough at this point. I vaguely remember screaming Toby like a stupid school girl when he was in earshot… as well as co-starting the USA chant to get him back on stage for his encore.

Then there was an INSANE fireworks display – I didn’t take tons of pictures, I sang drunkenly along with Neal Diamond’s ‘America’ and various other America ballads.

borderline blacked out in this shot, Mom..  I’m sorry – I had too much fun!