Brad Paisley uttered words from the BeachLife Ranch stage on Sunday night that were music to founder Allen Sanford’s ears:
“This is the most beautiful festival I’ve ever seen, I think,” Paisley said.
The superstar, while blowing away attendees with a highly produced, gangbusters show, was himself, blown away by the atmosphere.
“Look at this spot,” Paisley said from the stage. “It seems like you don’t need me at all. Like you’d be coming down here anyway.”
A charismatic Paisley closed out the three-day country/Americana festival on the sand at Redondo Beach’s Seaside Lagoon.
The show was dynamic, complete with stunning coordinated videos, a life-sized lookalike Paisley puppet, a tribute to the U.S. military, a guitar giveaway to a little girl wearing a fuscia cowboy hat — and even a marriage proposal.
BeachLife Ranch made the big leagues Sunday night.
Sanford, by phone Monday morning, was still riding that tall wave.
“Brad is electric,” Sanford said. “And so is that production.”
Sanford said production value just hasn’t been there for the South Bay shows — until this year.
The same feeling of indescribable energy from a performer, he said, also happened at the May BeachLife festival with Gwen Stefani’s performance.
“To see all of that together, in perfect synchronicity, that was the intended effect,” Sanford said. “The sound is coming through your chest and you’re seeing the vibrant colors. It was incredible.”
It was a dynamic end to three days of country music that had more than 26,000 attendees, about a 25% increase over last year’s inaugural BeachLife Ranch, according to Sanford.
There were a lot of highlights during the weekend that included performances by surfer-turned-star Jack Johnson, Wynonna Judd, The Doobie Brothers, Cody Jinks, The Marshall Tucker Band and Chris Isaak.
But what stood out the most for Sanford, he said, was moments on stage when the performers broke out of their rehearsed set…
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