Boise flooded the grandstands for country hits and baby-boomer nostalgia at last week’s Western Idaho Fair.
Singer Josh Turner and ’60s icons the Beach Boys drew massive crowds at the fair, which ended Sunday. Average concert attendance for the five shows was 9,860 — up from last year’s nightly average of 8,825.
Known for chart-toppers such as “Why Don’t We Just Dance” and “Your Man,” Turner was the big winner. He pulled in the third-largest attendance number ever at a fair concert: 16,200 fans on Friday.
The Beach Boys weren’t far behind Thursday with 13,400. That’s impressive — especially for octogenarians still out there harmonizing.
The other performers pulled in four-digit numbers: 7,400 for classic-rock act Kansas on Monday, 4,500 for country singer Nate Smith on Tuesday and 7,800 for rapper Yung Gravy on Wednesday.
Wait — country music drew the biggest crowd and the smallest one? Yep. Smith’s show was the least-attended since 2018, when Bret Michaels drummed up a somewhat “Poison-ous” number of 3,900. Of course, Smith only became well-known in recent years. He rose to fame after a breakout TikTok song, “Wildfire,” in 2020.