Another awesome review! Looks like the tour is going great so far:

A big show came to town Saturday night. Big as in the most elaborate staging that Pershing Center has seen for a good while. Big as in the sellout crowd that packed the old building. Big as in a star hitting a peak.

That star is Blake Shelton, who wouldn’t have been called a star or packed Pershing or carried such a large show a year ago.

Then he became a coach on The Voice, married Miranda Lambert and “crossed over,” if not beyond country, to its upper echelon.

But he hasn’t been there long. Last summer, he opened for Brad Paisley. Now, he’s a headliner.

Emerging from the center of three “corrugated metal” silos, Shelton kicked the 7-piece band into “Footloose,” then hit his swinging “It’s All About Tonight” and a pair of ballads before taking a drink, walking back to the microphone and saying:

“I was nervous as crap coming in here tonight. This is my first headlining tour and my first weekend.”

Shelton didn’t appear anywhere near nervous from the third row. He was, instead, relaxed, assured and ready to carry an arena show.

Playing the majority of his radio songs — a couple of which are covers — Shelton has a an arena-worthy catalog that draws on all contemporary country veins. For example, the Jimmy Buffett-like “One Beach” and the Charlie Daniels-like “Kiss My Country Ass.”

That number is part of Shelton’s redneck persona, which he displayed to great audience enjoyment, embracing drinking and deer hunting and Twitter.

“The Nashville people don’t like me talking about crap like that,” he said. “I’m a country artist. I’m supposed to drink milk.”

Shelton paid some homage to “The Voice” in the show. His talent show discovery, Dia Frampton, opened the show and joined him for a song, and the night’s cleverest cover came from Cee Lo Green, the smash “Forget You.”

With the audience singing along to his oldest songs and screaming for every tune, it was obvious that Shelton has made the jump to a new level.

At 8 p.m., the Pershing hallways were jammed by late-arriving crowd and beer and restroom lines. The sell-out crowd was in the 6,200 range, a number that reflects the staging that extended about 20 yards into the center of the auditorium.

Staging and lights came in the half-dozen semis that, along with a handful of busses, blocked N street Saturday. There was a big show in town.

The next time Shelton comes back, the show will even bigger. And in a new bigger arena.

- Source