Hometown boy Jesse Dayton served as the opening act for Ness, and it was nice to see him tear through his outlaw country stylings again -- I hadn't caught Dayton since the last time he opened up for the Supersuckers. The boy's still got it, and to make my music and movie worlds collide, he even played "Home Getting Hammered (When I Should Be Getting Nailed)," from the Devils Rejects soundtrack.

After Dayton's energetic set, Ness took the stage with a band that was damn near Social Distortion, member-wise -- just with a different drummer and a pedal steel guitarist. They played a most of the material from Ness's two solo albums, Cheating at Solitare and Under the Influence, including "Devil In Miss Jones," "Dope Fiend Blues," "Ballad of a Lonely Man," and the cover of "I Fought The Law." The energy level was no different from a Social D show, only more "cow" and less "punk." Sadly, there were no barfights, but there was a hell of a lot of dancing, hootin' and hollerin'. Both the audience and the band seemed like they were having the time of their life, and it showed that Ness can definitely bring it outside of the "punk" genre. At times, he actually comes dangerously close to crooner-dom...except that this crooner can kick your ass and/or help you soup up your engine.

I never thought I would enjoy a solo Mike Ness show as much as a straight-up Social D show, but I did. Of course, it might have helped that Ness closed out with the "honky-tonk" version of "Ball and Chain," but even without that little bonus, I would have walked out of the show happy. The only thing that could have made the experience better is if the show had happened at Gilley's. END