FLORENCE — Blake Shelton might have set a Country Thunder attendance record Saturday night — 27,500.
That beat the 26,200 people who showed up on the Saturday night of last year's festival — headlined by Shelton's wife Miranda Lambert.
Ah, to be a fly on the wall when Blake gets home and tells her the news.
The count is unofficial, and frankly seemed a little low. There were people packed shoulder to shoulder from the stage to the midway point of the sprawling festival grounds. And from that midway point to the Electric Thunder after-party tent at the back of the grounds there were even more people. They weren't as tightly packed but there were enough of them that it made getting through the throng a task.
Shelton, not surprisingly, made it well worth their while. The man is a party animal, fueled by a bottomless black Solo cup that surely was not filled with water, and an almost preternatural desire to have fun.
"Hello everybody, my name is Blake Shelton and I love Arizona," he said to kick things off. "Let's raise some hell!"
His idea of raising hell was to raise his glass and sing his greatest hits: "Boys Round Here," "Neon Light," "The More I Drink," "Ol' Red," "Austin," "She Wouldn't Be Gone," "Hillbilly Bone" and "Footloose" among the dozen plus.
His show also included a duet with his Season 2 "The Voice" contestant Gwen Sebastian on "My Eyes." Sebastian has been working with Shelton and Lambert since being eliminated from "The Voice" during the 2012 season.
Several times Saturday night Shelton looked out into the crowd with disbelief.
"Son of a (expletive) there are a lot of people out there," he said. "This calls for a drink!"
