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00:00Hey, what's up, Kix Country? It's Dub. As you can see, it is early. It's before 5.30.
00:08Just getting ready to go on here in just a little bit. I'm in the Soundproof booth.
00:13Just want to show you that the Soundproof booth is real in case any of y'all thought that, you know, Cody...
00:19In case you're wondering where she went during Camp Beat Cody, the Soundproof booth is 100% real.
00:24So, we're just a little over two weeks away. Two weeks from tomorrow is the 2023 Kix 99 Guitar Pool.
00:31And so, this is going to be my 21st Guitar Pool. My first one was in 2002.
00:37And I just want to kind of go back and tell you a little bit about how my experience was.
00:42The first time I got to experience the Kix 99 Guitar Pool.
00:46Fun fact, it was actually the first concert I ever went to when I was a kid.
00:49I just never really, like, did the whole concert thing.
00:52So, the 2002 Guitar Pool was my first concert or concert experience.
00:59It'll always be special for a couple of reasons, but one of them is the fact that it was actually the first concert that I'd ever been to.
01:0716 years old. I've been working here officially for a few weeks.
01:13And I thought I was just, man, they actually gave me, like, a backstage pass.
01:19And it had my name on it. It said WrestleBoy on it.
01:22If you guys don't know the whole WrestleBoy WB Dub story, don't worry.
01:26Ask me in person. It'll be a whole lot faster than telling you here.
01:29So, I had a backstage pass. It had my name on it.
01:32And, man, I thought that was hot stuff.
01:35Let me tell you, one of the biggest differences between the 2002 Guitar Pool and the 2023 Guitar Pool
01:42is in 2002, it was general admission.
01:46What that means is you would have a ticket to the show, but you didn't have a seat.
01:52You didn't have an assigned seat.
01:54So, people would get to the building.
01:56It was at the Bell Auditorium. It was totally sold out.
01:59People would get to the Bell at, like, 6, 7 in the morning to have their seat,
02:04to get their spot in line so they could get the best seat in the house.
02:08There's no way that we could do that anymore.
02:10In fact, 2002 was the last year we did that because it was insane.
02:14As soon as doors opened, I mean, people were running through there.
02:17It sounded like a stampede, but it was kind of cool.
02:20But, again, couldn't do that these days as big as Guitar Pool has gotten.
02:24The lineup that year was Lone Star, Trace Adkins, Mark Chestnut, Blake Shelton,
02:29Carolyn Dawn Johnson, and Cindy Thompson.
02:32One of the cool moments that I'll remember from that show is
02:37I had gone to the back area, and at the Bell, when you go behind the stage,
02:43there's, like, a little walkway, or there was.
02:46It's, you know, under construction now.
02:48But I would walk down there, and they had, like, catering set up,
02:52so I was going to go get, like, a little snack.
02:54And as I walked down the stairs, there's this tall fellow with long hair named Blake Shelton,
03:00and he's making himself a plate.
03:02And he actually came over and introduced himself to me.
03:04And this guy had had, you know, two number ones at the time with Austin and Ol' Red.
03:08And I'm like, man, he didn't need to introduce himself to me.
03:10I know who he is.
03:11But that's the kind of guy Blake Shelton was.
03:15Just a super nice, super down-to-earth guy.
03:18Another cool story is at intermission, I was standing backstage kind of talking to Mark Chestnut a little bit,
03:25and he was trying to figure out what song to sing on the next round after we came back from intermission.
03:31And I was like, why don't you do Bubba Shot the Jukebox?
03:33The next song that he sang when it was his turn, Bubba Shot the Jukebox.
03:37I looked at somebody and said, I made that happen.
03:39That was me.
03:41There would be no Bubba Shot the Jukebox without me.
03:44Just kidding.
03:44There totally would.
03:45But I was like, it was really cool that he took my suggestion and sang Bubba Shot the Jukebox.
03:49It was a really fun, fun night.
03:53It's so cool to see how far we've come from a sold-out Bell Auditorium to a sold-out James Brown Arena.
04:01Just how big this show has gotten over the last 21 years.
04:05For me, yeah, it's just, it's insane.
04:10I can't wait to do it again.
04:11And thank you for watching this and letting me share some of the memories about my first guitar pull with you.
04:16I appreciate it, and we look forward to seeing you in two weeks.