Near-capacity crowd packs Colisee

LEWISTON – Country singer Trace Adkins climbed the Colisee stage Friday night amid a flood of lights and smoke.

His too-deep-to-be-allowed voice rumbled through the Lewiston arena, bringing the near-capacity crowd to its feet with his hit, “I Got My Game On.” Behind him, a giant screen displayed magazine covers from his 11-year recording career.

“How y’all doin’?” asked Adkins, wearing a black cowboy hat and a knee-length black coat.

More than 3,000 people attended the concert, Androscoggin Bank Colisee spokeswoman Kellie Morris said. However, that number might swell to 4,000 or more when all the tickets are counted. The arena parking lot was filled to capacity half an hour before the first opening act, young Arkansas singer Justin Moore, took the stage.

Moore ended his country-rock set with a challenge song, “I Can Kick Your Ass.”

“It’s a song that’s probably going to get me in trouble,” Moore said.

Later, during his own set, the 6-feet, 6-inch Adkins praised the song but chuckled at the shorter singer’s cockiness.

“I was like, ‘That’s pretty funny,'” Adkins said.

Luke Bryan, the son of a Georgia peanut farmer, followed Moore with songs from his first major-label album, titled “I’ll Stay Me.”

By the time his set ended with his first hit, “All My Friends Say,” many at the Colisee were on their feet, charmed by Bryan’s compositions and his “aw, shucks” delivery.

At the back of the arena, Janis Terison of Otisfield, said she was surprised by the rock influence at her first country music concert.

“It’s not as twangy as old country,” she said.

It was that rock and country mix that led her to Adkins, who is also appearing on TV’s “Celebrity Apprentice.”

Adkins was the draw, though.

Teresa Hatfield, a nurse at Stephens Memorial Hospital in Norway, scoffed when asked what makes Adkins so special.

“Besides being tall and gorgeous?” she asked. She loves songs like “Hard Working Man” and “Honky Tonk Badonkadonk.”

“It’s his voice and the stuff that he sings,” she said. “And he looks good doing it.”

Hatfield, a Tennessee native, once treated Adkins in an emergency room back home. (She refused to describe Adkins’ problem.)

They never spoke.

“I was too nervous,” she said.