The Rolling Stones Wrapped U.S. Tour in Beautiful Ozarks with Once-In-A-Lifetime Show

by Julian Spivey

Julian Spivey Photo

The Rolling Stones wrapped up their 2024 Hackney Diamonds U.S. tour on Sunday, July 21, at the Thunder Ridge Nature Arena in the remote Ridgedale, Mo. amphitheater just outside Branson.

Seeing The Rolling Stones, considered by many to be the greatest rock & roll band ever, in the middle of nowhere in southern Missouri, just a few miles north of my home state of Arkansas, is something I’d never thought I’d experience.

The venue opened in 2022 and is centered in the Ozark Mountains, with views of Table Rock Lake in the middle of a 1,200-acre nature preserve. It was one of the dreams of Bass Pro Shops CEO Johnny Morris, who, adding The Rolling Stones to his little piece of paradise, proved that maybe some people can always get what they want.  

Thunder Ridge Nature Arena reportedly seats about 18,000, but with its large grassy areas can accommodate as many as 80,000 people for shows.

The Rolling Stones opened up their set at 9:45 p.m. Sunday with “Start Me Up,” of course, the No. 2 hit from their 1981 album Tattoo You, which has probably led off nearly every show the band has done since it was released. It’s a quintessential rock show opener.

The Stones mixed hits, new songs, and some deep cuts into their two-hour set, which also saw many hits fail to make the cut, but that’s always going to happen when you have a 60-year-old band with the number of massive hits as this one.

Throughout the night, the Stones featured four songs off their latest album, Hackney Diamonds, which is their prerogative. Still, I found myself having that “play the hits” mentality that so many concertgoers seem to have, which I know firsthand can annoy folks who genuinely want to hear the latest from artists. These are essentially “bathroom songs,” the songs folks choose to head to the venue’s restrooms during, which I must admit I did during “Whole Wide World” and “Mess It Up,” played back-to-back from the new album.

There were plenty of hits, however, during the 20-song set that lasted close to two hours, including some favorites of mine like “Get Off of My Cloud,” from their early years, and “Tumbling Dice,” off 1972’s Exile on Main St., when they were the biggest group in the world.

The Rolling Stones album that saw the most songs played during the show was 1969’s Let It Bleed, which included the title track as the fan-voted song of the night. Before each stop on their Hackney Diamonds Tour, the band would place four songs on its website for the fans to vote on, and “Let It Bleed” was the winner for the Missouri stop, despite my hope that “Dead Flowers,” my selection, would win out.

Sticky Fingers, which featured “Dead Flowers,” is probably my favorite Stones album. Surprisingly, not a single song from it was performed on Sunday night, despite hits like “Wild Horses” and “Brown Sugar,” which the band likely doesn’t play due to obvious content-related reasons.

Speaking of content-related reasons, when the band performed 1968’s “Sympathy for the Devil,” one of the show’s highlights, vocalist Mick Jagger omitted the line, “I shouted out who killed the Kennedys,” which has been the case since one of the candidates for President of the United States was recently involved in an assassination attempt.

Among my other favorite performances of the evening were “You Can’t Always Get What You Want,” “Honky Tonk Women” and “Gimme Shelter,” which featured amazing vocals from backup vocalist Chanel Haynes, whose previous career was as a Tina Turner impersonator, and I can certainly see why.
My favorite performance of the evening was definitely “Paint It Black,” the band’s No. 1 hit from 1966, which has always been my favorite song of theirs.

About midway through the show, Jagger took a much-needed break and let guitarist Keith Richards, one of the most legendary figures in rock history, take the forefront to perform a few of the songs he did lead vocals on over the years: “You Got the Silver,” “Little T&A” and “Before They Make Me Run.”

When it comes to seeing The Stones live in concert, it’s more about just being there and living in the moment and seeing legends kick ass in their early ‘80s. It’s seeing Jagger strut down the extended center stage like a Prima donna – it’s wild he can still do it at nearly 81 and still belt out the songs. It’s seeing the dual guitar legends of Keith Richards and Ronnie Wood hit their classic licks that are among the most legendary in the history of rock music, like the opening riffs of “Jumpin’ Jack Flash” and “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction.” And I still can’t get over this happening in the middle of a forest in the Ozarks.

The Rolling Stones finished off their terrific set with a little bit of new and a little bit of old, beginning with “Sweet Sounds of Heaven” off Hackney Diamonds, before ending with the song that kick-started their ascent to rock music icons “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction.” Seeing ‘Satisfaction’ live is going to be one of those “I can’t believe I saw that” moments when I get older, like having previously seen Paul McCartney perform “Yesterday” or all the times I’ve seen Bruce Springsteen do “Born to Run” in person.

Blues-rocker Samantha Fish opened the show on Sunday night and put on a guitar hero clinic for the audience. Due to epically long guitar solos and jam sessions with her talented band, she probably only performed four or five songs during the set, including outstanding covers of Screamin’ Jay Hawkins/Creedence Clearwater Revival’s “I Put a Spell on You” and MC5’s “Kick Out the Jams,” but it was a pleasure to watch. Opening for The Stones was a bucket list moment for her. She even said it was bigger than being nominated for her first Grammy Award earlier this year.

Despite the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity of seeing The Rolling Stones on Sunday, it wasn’t without its headaches. Usually, I wouldn’t put this kind of stuff in a concert review, but I must warn any future Thunder Ridge Nature Arena attendees. If you want to attend a concert at this venue, as beautiful as it is, you had better be prepared for a parking nightmare. The venue being in the middle of nowhere means the parking situation can be a nightmare. It took us two hours, the same length as The Stones’ set, to leave the parking lot once we trekked back to our cars (they do have a tram service if you don’t feel you can walk from the lots to the venue). I’ve never been to a concert venue with a parking situation as atrocious as this one. Morris should throw some of his billions of dollars into correcting this issue because I can see it being a reason for a lack of return customers to his venue.