Blind Melon at Harrah’s VooDoo Lounge, with Jimmy Peck, The Stacys, and Beyond The Grey opening

It is a sizzling Saturday, about a month before the official Summer Solstice, but it already feels like summer. My mouth tastes like clove cigarettes and anticipation; I am wearing flannel, jorts and platform combat boots, as I await for Blind Melon to step on stage. Is it 2025 or 1995? . . .

The paper ticket in my pocket said it was May 10, 2025. Harrah’s VooDoo Lounge in Kansas City, Missouri hosted a show promoted by Cory O’Meara of the concert promotion/media company Stratgazer Entertainment: Blind Melon with locals opening in traditional Stratgazer fashion. 

First up was Jimmy Peck, a solo musician from Kansas City. He stepped on stage wearing a backwards baseball cap, a Blind Melon “Soup” shirt, ripped jeans and sneakers. 

Peck has been a fan of Blind Melon since he was 12 and heard them on VH1’s Behind the Music.

“That was probably the first time I had heard of the band, and I just really got enamored with their music,” Peck would later tell me.

Peck opened his set with his debut solo single “Society” (released in February 2025). One man with one acoustic guitar and a few guitar pedals, Peck’s music is hauntingly honest. His set was composed of entirely original music - no covers tonight here, folks!

Peck used a few guitar pedals during his set - including a Tech 21 Acoustic Fly Rig Multi-FX Pedal and a Fender Smolder Acoustic Overdrive Pedal.

A particularly emotionally touching moment occurred before his song “Scatter My Ashes”:

“I know everybody is subject to life, and life means that we lose people that are close to us,” Peck said as he started strumming the first few chords. “So I want you if you would - if you’ve got a drink in your hand, raise it up. And if you don’t drink, that’s fine, just put your hand up in the air. This next song is called ‘Scatter My Ashes,’ and I want to dedicate it to all the people that are close to us that we’ve lost and we miss dearly.”

Peck walked off stage with a glowing smile to a flourish of applause - and the night was just beginning.

Up next was The Stacys, a Kansas City-based rock band blending blues, grunge and psychedelic-rock.

The band is composed of two brothers - Chris (lead vocals and guitar) and Alex Roach (drums), alongside their cousin Neal Roach, and bassist Kyle Sargent.

The Stacys played at VooDoo Lounge two months prior in March at their self-titled EP release show. Their set included songs from the EP alongside new, yet-to-be-released songs. 

Something I have personally always admired about The Stacys throughout the times I have seen them live is their duality; while Chris is 85% of the time the lead singer of the band, Neal will also sing lead on several of their songs.

“3 Cheers” is one of those songs. Neal started off the song before he and Chris took turns singing lead. 

The Stacys’ entire set was full of energy, grooves, and good times.

Beyond The Grey was the last local band before Blind Melon stepped onto the stage. . .Like Jimmy Peck and The Stacys, Beyond The Grey also hails from the Kansas City area. 

Beyond The Grey is composed of: David Lingenfelter on vocals, Jim McNeil on bass, Scott David Cameron on guitar, Matt Richards on guitar, and Eric Nissen on drums.

Prior to the show, I had checked out Beyond The Grey’s music; they were the only local band on the bill whose show I had not yet seen.

Their studio material evokes a magnetic effect: pulling the listener in with hypnotic riffs amidst a hard rock/pure rock’n’roll background. 

These elements carried their way into the band’s live shows, too. 

“We didn’t know how the crowd was going to react to us because our music is a little different than Blind Melon - but, overall, it looks like people were reacting positively,” Beyond The Grey told me after their set.

And the positive vibes kept flourishing by the time Blind Melon stepped on stage at 9:30. 

A word that kept popping up that night at the show and in subsequent social media posts is ‘beautiful.’ People around me in the crowd wore smiles to match their high-energy dancing. 

Blind Melon’s set included “I Wonder,” “2x4,” “Change,” and, of course, “No Rain.” 

The crowd cheered almost louder than the band when they heard the cheerfully-melancholic riff and fingersnaps of “No Rain.” There was a beautiful, freefalling energy in the air, where nothing else mattered but Music and Music Itself.

2025 - what a time to be alive and hear good music and have some good times! While summer is just beginning, it is off to a wonderful, beautiful start, thirty-some years after the door on the decade of 1990 closed, and the everlasting magical force that is Music continues to connect souls and open doors of opportunity. . .