Tim Hicks Blows Roof Off 2023 Boots and Hearts Kickoff Party

On Thursday night Boots and Hearts kicked off it’s 2023 edition of the festival with the emerging artist contest, Owen Reigling, Josh Ross and Tim Hicks.

They started with the emerging artists all getting a short 15 minute set for all 8 artists and then Mildmay native Owen Reigling took the stage while the crowd was still somewhat smaller than normal due to most of the campers with trailers stuck along the side of the highway waiting to get through the security checkpoint with the change to open only Thursday at 10am instead of the traditional Wednesday opening day. But regardless of the size of the crowd Reigling put on one hell of a performance, the highlight of his set for me was when Owen said that the main reason he got into music was by hearing Eric Church’s song Springsteen on the radio during a family back in 2007 I believe he said. He said how Church pays omage to Bruce Springsteen in the song he wanted to do something similar so he wrote a song dedicated to Eric Church with the song appropriately titled “Church” he also went into a Mashup of other Chief hits like “Desperate man” and “Talladega” near the end of the song he challenged the crowd saying there was nobody in the crowd that was a bigger church fan than him… well he’s lucky I wasn’t closer to the stage cause I would’ve took him up on the challenge.

Next up was Josh Ross and he dazzled the crowd with all his hits from “First Taste of Gone” “On A Different Night” and “Trouble” which he had the crowd singing along quite loud word for word as he just soaked in the moment.

Then it was time for Mr. Boots and Hearts to take the stage Tim Hicks he was making his 6th appearance at Boots and Hearts and while celebrating his 10 year anniversary of his throw down album he was also back at Boots and Hearts 10 years to the day of his 1st performance which was August 10th 2013. I got to interview Tim before he took the stage and I could tell how emotional he got when I asked him how it felt going from opening up on the Thursday to now being the Thursday night headliner.

He definitely gave the crowd a “Hell Raisin’ Good Time” and the Boots and Hearts crowd returned the favor by being very “Loud” Towards the end of his set Tim told the crowd they were going to record a music video during the next song which was his newer song “Yee To The Haw” which saw a drone buzzing just 10 feet above the crowd capturing some amazing footage. He closed the night with everyone’s favorite “Stronger Beer” and then said ah let’s do 1 more song which was “Here’s To You” and that wrapped up the Thursday night and leaving everyone pumped up and excited about the rest of the weekend.