Music

Phil Vassar Is A State Fair Legend And I Hereby Demand His Induction Into The Nashville Songwriters Hall Of Fame

'Thanks again for having us to the state fair,' Vassar purrs into the microphone. 'We appreciate this.'

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Phil Vassar Photo 1

Phil Vassar (Courtesy photo)

It’s the record-setting first day of a Minnesota State Fair that will see many attendance records toppled. Based on the size of the crowd already gathered an hour before his show, Phil Vassar had a little something to do with that.

Fairgoers were lucky. Substitute a few moments of hesitation for decisive action under pressure, and Vassar would not have been there to headline these first two nights.

“Touring means more to me now than ever, honestly,” says Vassar, 62. “I don’t know if you know, but I had a heart attack last year. I’m the guy who never drank. All my buddies, ha, they pounded it hard, they’re still rocking. And I’m the one who just drops dead.”

It took 10 shocks from an AED to restart Vassar’s failing heart. On his tour bus — once owned by country music legend George Jones — I speak to the woman who found him, ashen, unconscious, as he succumbed to his cardiac event. She performed CPR, did it the right way: with multiple ribs fractured. She saved Vassar’s life. She is shy, and I don’t think would want to be named in print.

“It was very humbling,” says Vassar. “You think you’re bulletproof, but you’re not. I’m very blessed. Very, very thankful.”

The heat of the day has dissipated. A cool breeze wafts in the scent of damp wood chips from the nearby car dealership booths where shredded trees protect the earth from the weight of multi-ton SUVs. To the south, the capsule atop the Space Tower ride spins lazily. Onstage, Vassar’s piano awaits.

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Vassar is a Virginia native and Nashville transplant, but he practices “Minnesota nice” as though born to it. Friends and well-wishers stream in and out of the green room before the show. One of them, a former math teacher from Eau Claire named Mr. Kent, met Vassar at one of his concerts 20 years prior. Mr. Kent has been welcomed backstage warmly ever since. Tonight, he bears a gift: a brand-new Eau Claire Bears baseball cap.

With 10 minutes ’til showtime, Vassar steps out to change. His bandmate David Black cranks up the music and begins assaulting an easy chair with a pair of drumsticks.

Five minutes to showtime. “Time to make the donuts!” Black shouts, before the thwacking stops abruptly and he sprints out of the room. “Break a leg!” I call after him. “I’ll certainly try,” comes echoing back down the hallway.

Outside, a slash of crimson paints the horizon. Right on time at 8:30, the band takes the stage. The crowd erupts, and the first notes of “That’s When I Love You” drown out the cheers. Then comes “Carlene.” “C’mon!” Vassar cries into the microphone after the first verse of “Bye Bye.” The crowd howls.

By the time they launch into “In a Real Love” the sky looks like a week-old bruise. Vassar asks the crowd to sing along to “My Next 30 Years” — which you might know as a Tim McGraw song, though Tim McGraw knows it as a Phil Vassar song. On Vassar’s 30th birthday, the song came tumbling out of him in 10 or 20 minutes, “as fast as [he] could write it.”

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“Love Is a Beautiful Thing” follows, and “Six-Pack Summer.” People shout out requests. Vassar banters with the crowd, tells them how he wrote this song after his kitchen flooded, and pounds out the unmistakable opening notes of “Just Another Day in Paradise.”

“Thanks again for having us to the state fair,” Vassar purrs into the microphone. “We appreciate this.” I try to keep track of how many times he says “thank you” or otherwise expresses gratitude. I lose count somewhere into the second dozen.

More music pours from the keys. It’s hit after hit from Vassar’s storied career, along with a few carefully selected covers. On the final lyrics of “American Child,” fireworks go off, literally. Boom, crack, pop! Reds, blues, greens, and yellows light the sky overhead. Each explosion accentuates a line of “For a Little While.”

A security guard who I’d been chatting with earlier saunters up and pulls out her earplugs. “The fireworks mean the concert’s over,” she yells directly into my ear. Nope.

More old favorites reverberate into the fairgrounds. Nearly unique in country music of his era, Vassar’s lyrics tackle complex topics — aging, introspection, maintaining long-term friendships, even LGBTQ+ tolerance — not just partying, falling in love, and heartbreak (of course, there are a few excellent examples of those ones too). Despite occasionally heavy subject matter, the energy never ebbs. “It’s fun, and it’s supposed to be fun,” Vassar had said earlier of his music. “People take everything so seriously.” At the end of “I’m Alright” there’s a big drum solo. Had he been playing it back in the green room, Black would have reduced that easy chair to splinters.

“Scream for the band up here too!” says Vassar. They scream.

It’s pitch black now, and this time the end really is near. They close out the show with a cover of “Piano Man.” The crowd sways, the crowd sings, all of them entranced.

Vassar addresses everyone one last time. “Thank you all so much, God bless you guys!” One row stands up, then another, then another, in a rapidly swelling wave. I peer at my watch and see the second hand make a couple loops. Eventually the standing ovation subsides. He’s barely offstage before he’s inviting me onto the tour bus.

“I feel great now,” says Vassar. “I’ve never felt this good.”

In trying to describe what took place on the first night of the fair, the word “triumph” comes to mind. A year prior Vassar was a tenth shock away from never making it to this time, this place. Three years before that, the Minnesota State Fair itself fell to the coronavirus. Yet, here we all are: the first day of the fair finally recovered to surpass its prepandemic glory; Phil Vassar, risen from the dead, never missing a beat as its opening late-night act. It’s an unarticulated celebration of the joy in everything that might not have been, but is.

Vassar is being considered for the ASCAP Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame, and I truly hope he’s inducted. No one deserves it more. Whatever happens, though, whatever life has in store for Phil Vassar’s second act, one aspect of his legacy is now written in stone: Phil Vassar is a state fair legend.

Jonathan Wolf is a civil litigator and author of Your Debt-Free JD (affiliate link). He has taught legal writing, written for a wide variety of publications, and made it both his business and his pleasure to be financially and scientifically literate. Any views he expresses are probably pure gold, but are nonetheless solely his own and should not be attributed to any organization with which he is affiliated. He wouldn’t want to share the credit anyway. He can be reached at [email protected].

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