I Just Read About That…

[ATTENDED: December 14, 2024] Pat Finnerty

Pat Finnerty opened for Strand of Oaks for the last three Winter Classics. And these three are the ones that I missed.

And now that I’ve seen him I’m even more bummed that I missed those three shows.  Because he was funny and he and his band were super talented.

Pat told us that he and his band (which was all of Strand of Oaks and his cousin Mike) were there to warm up Strand of Oaks and that this show was going to be all covers.

The house music was ZZ Top’s Legs and he said that they had to play the whole song if they had started it.  He won me over immediately by saying imagine going to your bandmates and saying hey, I’ve got a new song, it’s called Legs.  Band: What’s it about?

He then asked the keyboard player to learn the keyboard part so they could play Legs at the end of the set.

He also told us that he had cash and would give cash to anyone who earned it.  Last time, he saw some woman really dancing when he played a blues riff, she got $4.  At our show, a guy received $2.

First he told us about his hat which said Bald As Shit and they were for sale in his car.  And then he said that the The Strokes would never have succeeded if the singer was bald, and they played a great cover of it.

He took requests and someone said Live Forever, and they played it with Pat singing in a n exaggerated accent.  When he said that he was going back to the feud and was going to play the opposite of Oasis, someone shouted Bob Seger, and he laughed so hard he gave the guy $2.

They played Ramblin’ Gamblin’ Man and then he said he was going to play the same song in a different key, which was Taking Care of Business.  He admitted that he didn’t want to play the song, but then he was getting into it.  So they played it through.

He called out Madalean Gauze from Depression, Mom to sing Tom Petty’s I Need to Know (she was great).

Then he played a couple of his own songs.  I forget the first one and the second was a country parody called Hog Ride which he admitted was practically not parody anymore because real country songs are more stupid than his (cue Jason Aldean).

The keyboardist admitted that it trying to find the right sound for Legs, he blew out his whole system, so instead they played Bohemian Rhapsody.  Someone from the audience sang a part of it and mid song they broke into the intro to Smells Like Teen Spirit.  Then Pat admitted they were way over times, so they rushed through the end.

It was without a doubt the most fun opening act I’ve ever seen and I will definitely look for Pat playing shows in the future.