When you are in downtown Nashville on a Friday night, it is usually anything goes as far as music is concerned. With a slew of clubs to choose from on Broadway you can find a classic more traditional based band at one, or a modern, rockin’ country act another, but at the Wildhorse Saloon on this night it was Matt Stillwell’s chance to shine and capture the crowd.
With his already growing, grassroots, fan base the Wildhorse was up on their feet and dancing pretty quickly as he blasted into his set with the boot stomping “Whiskey Well” and that was all he needed to light up the crowd. Stillwell commanded the large stage with relative ease igniting the crowd that was clearly on hand to have a good time and sing-a-long with him, as he played songs from his debut album including “Dirt Road Dancing,” “Damn This Rain,” “Somewhere Between Me & You,” etc… However, it was when he played his current single, coincidently the #3 video on CMT Pure 12 Pack, “Shine” that the crowd was in the palm of his hand. They screamed along with the catchy chorus of the song and didn’t hesitate to hand Matt a mason jar full of Moonshine to sip from which he proudly did.
But it wasn’t just the originals that had the crowd singing along with him. He mixed in a few covers throughout his two hour set including the popular Fishin’ In The Dark, during which he insisted the crowd sing back to him and they gladly met his request, and “Dixieland Delight,” that had the crowd dancing and singing along some more. However, it was when he was draped in only his acoustic guitar and offered up the Tennessee State song “Rocky Top” that the Wildhorse crowd got that much more enthusiastic about his set than they already had been thus far.
Stillwell’s band, most notably his fiddle/mandolin player commanded the right side of the stage displaying a tremendous ability to rock a crowd simply by pulling the bow across the strings of his fiddle. However, the rest of his band certainly held their own and swapped guitar licks and bass lines with each other throughout the set allowing the crowd to bounce around more often then not.
Though he may not be a household name just yet, Stillwell is well on his way to becoming one if this show was any indication as to what can be expected from him going forward. He did everything right on this night. The crowd danced to the upbeat tunes, couples slow danced with each other during the slower ones, everyone sang along with the familiar ones, and some even seemed to know all of the words to Matt’s originals as well. The band was solid, Stillwell engaged the crowd in between songs leading them in many holler and swaller’s throughout the set, and all in all his fun songs and laid back energy gave the show a small honky-tonk feel even though it took place in one of the bigger clubs in Nashville.
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