ALLENTOWN, Pa. — The fact that country band Alabama has performed together for 57 years speaks volumes about the group knowing what its audience wants.
So does the fact that the band has had 32 No. 1 and two dozen more Top 10 country hits. It is the most successful band in country music history.
And so does the fact that the group on Thursday played a record 10th headlining show at Allentown Fair grandstand (it first played there 42 years ago).
What really made it appear that Alabama knows how to please its audience was the reaction of the fair crowd — likely less than 3,000, but constantly cheering and singing along to the group's show of 22 songs over two hours and five minutes.
That reaction came even though Alabama has lost a step or two since its 1980s heyday, when it had an astounding 27 chart-toppers out of 28 singles released.
All but six of Thursday's songs were No. 1 Country chart hits, and the group played all seven of its gold and platinum songs.
The concert started, appropriately, with the group's first No. 1 hit, 1980's "Tennessee River."
From the start, singer Randy Owen, now 75, performed in a broader voice, with far less subtlety and not always perfectly on key.
Throughout the night, he had the audience sing the chorus of at least six songs — they, of course, gleefully did — and had guitarist Jason Roller sing lead on "Love in the First Degree" and pianist Gordon Mote on "You Got the Touch."
But vocal precision never was the selling point for Alabama, which was a country-rock pioneer, and the band — now down to original members Owen and bassist Teddy Gentry (lead guitarist/fiddle player Jeff Cook died nearly three years ago) — has backed themselves with eight strong backing players.
That includes fiddle player Megan Mullins Owen, who showed on that first song's finishing breakdown that she was up to the task.
She did the same on the night's second song, "If You're Gonna Play in Texas (You Gotta Have a Fiddle in the Band)," which was Cook's centerpiece, and again halfway through the set, singing powerfully and playing on the classic country song "Orange Blossom Special."
Vulnerable voice and dedications
Gentry, 73, started the show seated, and with an injured left hand in a brace (he said he injured it in a fall in a farm field and has surgery scheduled next week), played bass on only four songs through the night.
He also took lead vocals on "Five O'Clock 500," which was dedicated to fellow county music titan Charlie Daniels, with whom Alabama frequently toured and who died five years ago.
The song had the band gather at the front of the stage to play together, as Alabama used to.
Gentry also took lead vocals on the 1982 No. 1 hit "Take Me Down."
The group also showed its knowledge of its audience by dedicating “Born Country” to “men and women in uniform serving all across the globe.”
During a six-minute version of the double-platinum 1988 hit "Song of the South," Owen had the crowd singing the “sweet potato pie and I shut my mouth” chorus, and polled the audience on how many drove pickup trucks, then on which make they drove.
And he dedicated "Angels Among Us" to the children helped by St. Jude's Children's Hospital. Owen's singing on that slower, more intricate song came up perhaps the most short, but the audience didn't seem to mind, as it waved its arms above its heads in unison.
There were other songs on which Owen's voice clearly was diminished — the slower "When We Make Love," for example — but on the slow 1991 chart-topper "Forever's as Far as I Go," he sang with intent, and his older, more vulnerable voice changed the meaning of the song, with "forever" seeming closer now.
And as if to prove he still had energy, Owen several times ran across the stage for emphasis.
Crowd connects with hits
But it was the hits with which Alabama connected most — and there were plenty.
"The Closer You Get" was offered early, and "Can't Keep a Good Man Down" seemed like a statement about Alabama's continuing.
"Fifty-seven years and we're still playing," Owen to the crowd afterward.
And the 1986 chart-topper "She and I" held up well.
Before "40 Hour Week (For a Livin')," Owen noted the coming Labor Day, and changed the song-closing callout to "Hello, Allentown, Pennsylvania" to big cheers.
Then Alabama followed with "Roll On (Eighteen Wheeler)," and those songs — now 40 years old — sounded strong and fresh.
Alabama closed the main set with a 12-minute mashup of "Dixieland Delight" and the gospel song "Will the Circle Be Unbroken" that turned the grandstand into a revival service.
The encore opened with the 1992 platinum hit "I'm in a Hurry (And I Don't Know Why)" and closed with the runaway crowd pleaser (the whole audience was on its feet) “Mountain Music,” amidst a blast of confetti.
Clearly the band still knows what its audience wants.
Opening act Montgomery Gentry — actually just Eddie Montgomery; Troy Gentry died in 2017 — performed an eight-song, 46-minute set of that duo's hits that also held up well and didn't disrespect them.
"Not a day goes by that we don't miss him," Montgomery said at one point.
Montgomery didn't sing a single chorus the whole set — turning that task to other members of his band — and turned over virtually the entire 2003 gold hit "Hell Yeah" to them.
But those songs still are catchy and entertaining. He played the duo's biggest hit, the 2005 platinum hit "Something to be Proud Of," mid-set, while waving an American flag.
And he closed with more the duo's top hits — the No. 1s "Lucky Man" and perhaps the set's best, 2009's "One in Every Crowd."
