Colin James wraps up his Open Road Tour in Grand style in Kingston

Fall is here but the temperature was far from cold at the Grand Theatre in Kingston last night. Colin James and company were in town on the final stop of their Open Road Tour.

Texas based Ally Venable kicked off the night with an impressive set of blues rock. The 23 year old from Kilgore, Texas has already seen a fair amount of success so far in her career winning the 2014, 2015 ETX Music awards female guitar player of the year, plus she and her band were the ETX Music Awards 2015, 2016 blues band of the year. Her 2018 album, Puppet Show, debuted at number 7 on the Billboard Blues Albums Chart. This tour with Colin James was Ally’s Canadian debut and let me tell you it was one heck of an entrance. If Ally continues to rock the way she does right now she’s going to become a force to be reckoned with on the International Blues Scene.

What can I say about Colin James that I didn’t already say in July when he performed at RBC Bluesfest? With 20 albums under his belt and an obvious love for entertaining no Colin James show is the same. Just look at the set lists from the last few nights of the Open Road Tour. Not one night is the same and I love that about these shows. You could see multiple shows and get a different experience every time.

It seemed that the common thread on the Open Road tour was that the show kicked off with “Voodoo Thing” and wrapped up with an encore featuring “Into The Mystic” and “Johnny Cool Man” featuring Ally Venable. In the middle was pure Colin James’ blues rock goodness. For about 2 hours Colin had the crowd singing along and dancing in the aisles, at several points Colin himself went into the crowd with his guitar, much to the delight of the fans.

It was a bit of a special occasion for me as 16 years ago this February my wife and I were engaged at a Colin James concert I was helping promote in Pembroke. 6 years later we were married meaning that this February we’ll be celebrating our 10th wedding anniversary…couldn’t think of a better, pre-anniversary, celebration than bringing her along to the show. (special thanks to Eric Alper and Live Nation for making it happen for us last night).

If you’ve never seen Colin James live before it’s a must, I promise you won’t leave disappointed and if you happen to see the name Ally Venable on a bill do yourself a favour and go and check her out. Look at it this way. Colin James turned 58 in August, Ally turned 23 in April…if she’s this good now imagine what another 35 years of her honing her craft and working with artists like Colin James will do for her.

To stay up to date on what Colin James has coming up, including future shows, be sure to visit www.colinjames.com

To keep up with Ally Venable checkout allyvenableband.com.