The Boys From Oklahoma Concert Series Is Breaking Records

We're one day into the Boys From Oklahoma concert series in Stillwater, featuring all of the original Red Dirt county/rock bands from the Sooner State, and it's already projected to break every concert record in the state.

It's even bigger than any single Rocklahoma or the country Born & Raised Festival.

It seems to be a testament to the old "If you build it, they will come" mentality of throwing massive events in Oklahoma.

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A short history of Red Dirt.

You can't call it rock or country. It's not blues or soul. It may have a hint of bluegrass and more folk than anything, but Red Dirt is all of the above. A hodge-podge of genres all crammed together.

While it first came to be a term in the 1970s and 80s when Red Dirt founding fathers like Bob Childers and The Red Dirt Rangers first started playing parties at OSU's Farm House, it didn't move towards mainstream until the early 90s when a band called The Great Divide exploded out of Stillwater.

While The Great Divide carved out a name and a loyal following for themselves, it wasn't until the turn of the century that Red Dirt made a big run at the mainstream with other acts like Cross Canadian Ragweed, Jason Boland & the Stragglers, and Stoney LaRue.

More bands followed.

The scene was eventually claimed by Texas - as Texas Country - but only because the bulk of touring in the genre was across the Lone Star State. This is likely why things felt like the whole Red Dirt music scene fell off as we aged and matured. We also discovered new things, our tastes changed, and as bands broke up and went on hiatus, we naturally moved on... until this reunion of sorts.

Since Cross Canadian Ragweed could legitimately make the claim of being the 'biggest" Red Dirt band, they started to tease fans on social media late last year. After a few weeks of everyone guessing, they announced two shows in Stillwater alongside The Great Divide, Jason Boland & the Stragglers, the Turnpike Troubadours, and Stoney LaRue.

Both shows at Boone Pickens Stadium in Stilly quickly sold out. 80,000 tickets snatched up a pair at a time. The response was so far beyond what the bands expected, they added two more dates to make a four-day weekend.

180,000 tickets to four back-to-back sold-out shows.

Even in its biggest year, Rocklahoma only had a draw of 77,000 people.

By Sunday night, The Boys From Oklahoma will have set a new state record for the largest concert ever, more than double second place.

If anything, this proves that there's nothing like home-grown Sooner State originals.

Nashville may have passed on these bands when they didn't like the sound. LA refused to touch it, but Oklahoma will always welcome its own.