GLENDALE, AZ | Zach Bryan and The Burn, Burn, Burn Tour made its 25th stop in Glendale, Arizona at the Desert Diamond Arena. The arena can hold 20,000 people, and that night it welcomed just that and then some.
One of the most attended events in Arena history, it was abundantly clear Glendale, AZ was ready for Zach Bryan. As luck would have it, Zach Bryan was extra ready for AZ. What made this stop different from the prior 24 is that Bryan dropped a new album the day of the show. The fourth album in Bryan’s discography, the release came at the perfect time for the Glendale fans.
It has been a banner year for Bryan, selling out every leg of his stadium tour. Perfecting the art of performing in the round, Bryan makes sure he plays to everyone in the room. The gravity is not lost on him though—he let everyone know how much his life has changed this year and how grateful he is. Zach was immensely appreciative all night, thanking the crowd for coming out multiple times and the audience showed their love right back by singing along to all 22 songs.
The night kicked off with Charles Wesley Godwin and his band The Allegheny High. The West Virginia native and crew got the ball rolling quickly. The band has been playing together for quite some time, and it is entirely evident the amount of energy they perform with. Not only do they play great music, it’s clear how much they love what they do. Desert Diamond Arena is a pretty large space, but everyone in that building could feel the spirit of the opening set. In the theme of evolving genres, CWG plays Country with influences of Americana and folk. A perfect intro to Zach Bryans set, CWG delivers a powerful opening set.
Up until this point the setlist on the tour has been primarily American Heartbreak songs, but there is Bryan’s entire discography sprinkled in there. A fitting title, the set kicked off with “Open the Gate” followed by “God Speed,” a throwback feature from Bryan’s first album, followed by “Fifth of May”—one of the nearly 50 songs Bryan released in 2022.
The show features slower, hard hitting songs as well, such as “Oklahoma Smoke Show,” “The Good I’ll Do,” rock songs like “Heavy Eyes,” and all the way to songs where the fans sing every word for Zach. The crowd seemed to be completely proficient for “Heading South,” “Something in the Orange,” and “Condemned.” After the 12th song, the band exited the stage and Zach let the crowd know all he wanted to do was just sit, play the guitar and sing. The audience was then given five straight, very new songs released that day.
The show provides quite a bit of emotion, and raw sentiment too. The vulnerability rings clear: “You can tell me that you love me, ‘Til your little lungs turn blue, But I’m always alone when I fall asleep” in “Condemned,” and “I’m damned if I do and I’m damned if I don’t, ’cause if I say I miss you I know that you won’t,” featured in “Something in the Orange—a song Zach offered as a sad one. Zach pulls from a range of influences though, as “Open the Gate” includes “I ain’t never feared nothing that was four legged and buckin’, Throw me on a hurricane and I’ll ride it to the coast” and “Whiskey Fever” mentions “High waisted Rockies and their sailor’s mouths, And the boys in the back of the bar screamin’ loud” as a nod to the time Zach enjoys with his friends.
Speaking of revival, as kind as he is, Zach offered quite the encore to his fans. Welcoming his opening act back onto the stage, Charles Wesley Godwin, Zach put on an absolute masterpiece with his song “Revival,” including one of the more catchy choruses out there as the fans screamed the lyrics, “Baptize me in a bottle of ‘beam, and put Johnny on the vinyl” as loud as humanly possible.
As Zach walked back onto the stage for the encore, he let everyone in the building know we were about to get going. In between choruses Zach introduced all of the band members and let them each play a solo, every member bringing more energy than the next, and the song ended with who Zach described as “the last great American cowboy,” Noah Le Gros shredding his guitar.
As mentioned, the tour setlist has mostly been songs off the album American Heartbreak, released in May of 2022. In an interview with Amplify, Zach explained the album by saying, “I would say true love of anything is supposed to rip your heart out and put it back together all in the same go ’round. This album to me is all the trials we face day-in and day out.” The album broke the record for most global streams of a country album in a 24-hour period.
Albeit a country album, the LP also topped the charts in folk and rock solidifying the diversity of Bryan’s range. He said it himself in an Instagram post prior to the release of American Heartbreak, “At the risk of sounding pretentious; I don’t want a genre, I don’t want a scene, I don’t want a title, I just want to make music.” Running at the speed of light, Bryan released a 9 track EP “Summertime Blues” two months after American Heartbreak, followed shortly by Burn, Burn, Burn and thus the title of the 2023 blockbuster tour. Grammy.com put it perfectly: “Male vulnerability in country music often falls within narrow lines—heartbreak and anger—but Bryan allows himself and his songs to be sensitive outside those boundaries, displaying a raw honesty.”
A US Navy veteran turned industry changing musician, Zach Bryan deserves all the love he has received over the past year and a half. We are unfortunately to the end of the Burn, Burn, Burn tour, but what a run it was—one of the more engaging and diverse shows I have ever been to, there is something to offer for everyone. In incredibly exciting news, Zach has just announced his 2024 tour Quittin’ Time so it won’t be too long until he is on the road again. Grab your cowboy hat, and head to Zachbryan.com for more information.
CHARLES WESLEY GODWIN
