Throwback Thursday: ‘River Stages’ in Nashville, 2004

Stoney Keeley relives a helluva concert series from the early 2000s in Nashville.

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Let’s take a stroll down Memory Lane on this fine Thursday morning here in Mount Juliet, Tennessee. It’s early May. The summer concerts are starting to fire up around town, and it had me thinking about some of my favorite summer concert memories. Old heads in Nashville will remember an old tradition from the late 90s and early 2000s – River Stages. The last one I attended was as a senior in high school back in 2004. After doing some research, I realize that was the last one they ever did.

The concept isn’t too different from what you see at CMA Fest these days. They’d just build a stage right there on the Cumberland River at Riverfront Park. Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, bands from various eras and genres would take the stage and we’d all gather and celebrate accordingly. It was during a time when you could still navigate downtown relatively easily. I can remember in 2004, driving down on Friday night…April 30th, 2004 according to Setlist…we were stoked to see Fuel, and hung around for the Foo Fighters too. If memory serves me correct, it began to rain and instead of toughing it out, we decided to leave early. I can only venture a guess to say Brandon was with us, and I know he hates getting rained on.

Nonetheless, that Saturday’s show didn’t feature a lot of bands I was really into. We caught some Styx, but that really didn’t move the needle for me until they played the Mr. Roboto song. Nay, Sunday had the lineup that I wanted to see more than anyone else – Story of the Year, Smile Empty Soul, Puddle of Mudd, Finger Eleven, Fountains of Wayne, Trapt, and it was all topped off with a performance by The Strokes. To this day, it’s one of my favorite festivals I’ve ever been to.

I can remember Brandon getting smushed around in the mosh pit at Story of the Year, while I watched from the pedestrian bridge above because I saw that shit happening and didn’t want to get caught up in it. I also distinctly remember yelling “SMILE EMPTY SOUL” at Smile Empty Soul as they exited the stage after their set. I was alone, mind you…all of my friends were still down in the pit getting trampled on. So, I can only imagine how strange it looked, but their bass player looked up and waved with a smile and I always hoped that maybe that made their day being recognized by some lunatic waving from the bridge above. I don’t remember much of Puddle of Mudd, which is weird because I was a stupid big Puddle of Mudd fan when I was a kid. All I remember from The Strokes’ set was their lead singer, presumably fucked up of some variety, looking up and noticing “the Batman building” for the first time. That’s a shame because I wasn’t a big Strokes fan back then, but I sure am now.

Wouldn’t it be nice if we could have something like that in Nashville again without 100,000 people joining us downtown? Does everything need to be so grandiose? I don’t know – I realize I’m asking an entire city to go back in time. And, hell…maybe there are venue options outside of the city that offer that same sort of appeal that I just haven’t been to yet. But, there was a charm to that era of Nashville that the noobs just won’t get. It felt like the city was crawling out of its 90s era crime vibes, but it was years before the flood and subsequent rebuild. We used to play freeze tag in Riverfront Park on Friday nights back in those days. We had Starwood. We had the motherfucking Gerst Haus. We spent weekend nights in Centennial Park (where we definitely noticed the hammocks in the trees) after meeting up with friends at Cafe Coco. Nashville was smaller, and it felt like it was ours. I’d like to feel that again about this city one of these days.

If you remember River Stages and have a special memory of it, drop it in those comments. Let’s reminisce together.

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Stoney Keeley is the Editor in Chief of The SoBros Network, and a Dogs Playing Poker on velvet connoisseur. He is a strong supporter of Team GSD, #BeBetter, and ‘Minds right, asses tight.’ “Big Natural” covers the Tennessee Titans, Nashville, Yankee Candle, and a whole wealth of nonsense. Follow on Twitter @StoneyKeeley

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