FLORENCE — It started as spittle really, an annoying drizzle that arrived just as Old Dominion was singing about rain at Country Thunder Thursday night.
The drizzle graduated from annoyance to bothersome, accompanied by a breeze that quickly turned into something more gusty. Gusty enough to cause concern among those stage hands responsible for keeping the Country Thunder stage and all its parts in place.
So they delayed headliner Kip Moore's 10 p.m. show about 30 minutes — enough time that a couple hundred people headed to the exits. But when you have 27,000 or so people packed into the Country Thunder West festival grounds, missing a couple hundred didn't really make a difference.
Moore, dressed in tight jeans with strategic rips, a tank top and a backwards snapback, bounded atop a stage speaker and thanked the crowd that stuck out the rain.
"Y'all give us all you got and we'll give y'all all we got, I promise," he said a few songs into a 90-minute show that had flashes of Springsteen — a little rough-hewn with a genuine working man's authenticity.
Moore sings about life in a world that most of his fans can probably relate: first-time love in the backseat of car on an unlit street; scraping together just enough "Beer Money" for a Friday night out; and "Something 'Bout a Truck" and the pretty girl that came with it.
Moore's show was rocking from start to finish, with a few sobering moments when he promised he'd come "Running for You" if "the rain starts fallin, fallin' on you / And your heart starts breakin', breakin' in two." The irony of those words wasn't lost on the audience, may hiding beneath plastic ponchos or hoodies.
This was Moore's second Country Thunder appearance; he debuted at the festival in 2013 as a deep-in-the-lineup opener.
The festival picks up Friday with Tucker Beathard at 2:30 p.m. Florida Georgia Line is the headliner.
