Last week I went to see Robert Plant and Alison Krauss. The "Raising Sand" tour resulted from the collaborative album of the same name materfully orchestrated by T. Bone Burnett.

T (my T, not the Bone Burnett one) had called me from the store a few months back with some concerts he wanted to see and I went right away to TicketMaster.

The show had sold out but there was this Hot Seat Package available for American Express customers, so I clicked and up came what I thought was a 7 seat group of tickets down front! I quickly, turns out too quickly, clicked BUY!

I was so stoked that I was going to be able to take T, ChandaBear, BuffaloRob, some employees from the store and I thought it was genius to have an odd number of seats, so that the single person or person that had a disinterested partner would fit right in.

Lo and behold (my bank account "lo" and them "behold"ing my money,) I had just purchased, and "just" is quite the operative word here, ONE seat, seat "7" in row "C" for megabucks. The exact amount shall never be spoken.

My personality allows me to, and sometimes dictates that I do things on my own and so there I was, backstage pass around my neck and a laptop bag with the tour logo embroidered with what I hope is 24k gold thread sitting at home, empty still.

Plant & Krauss descended to the stage at about 8:45 and summarily taught everyone in attendance a lesson in music, the kind of fun lesson you got from your favorite substitute teacher. It was so other-worldly that I firmly believe that once the show was over, they stepped backstage and rose to the heavens. Not to be seen again until the curtain rose in Poughkeepsie.

Some samples of the show from YouTube:

At the very end of this first one, Plant could hardly contain his Zeppelinesqueness...that beast reared its wondrous head many times during the show to the delight of the hardcore Zep fans; 40-50 year old dudes that would scream wildly every time Plant twirled that mic stand and let out the blood-curdling scream that used to blare from the 8-Tracks in the Pintos, Vegas and the AMC Pacers as we took our "smoke" breaks in the parking lot.

Please Read the Letter



Krauss playing the Jimmy Page part on her violin was awesome on Black Country Woman: (This was the exact spot/view from my seat although this wasn't the Atlanta show.)



And speaking of "other-worldly:"



The Everly Brothers "Gone Gone Gone" was the rousing encore.



"Raising Sand" means to go a bit too deep into the well and bring up water that has some impurities, or "sand." These icons of music dug deep into the well of music's past and brought to the surface some tunes that bear the true grit of life.