String lights lined the brick road as concertgoers poured in for Cottonseed Live: Drew Holcomb and The Neighbors with special guests Penny and Sparrow on Aug. 28.
Vendors from the local area set up for the street party outside of the John Emerald Distilling Company and Red Clay Brewing Company. Spray paint artists added to the murals on the brick around the stage before the performances.
Rachel Morrell, junior in social work, said she loved the street party.
“I love supporting local businesses, and I think it’s a really cool way of displaying what Opelika has,” said Morrell. “It’s a great way of combining the two communities.”
Andy Baxter of Penny and Sparrow said Opelika is similar to Florence, the town he and Kyle Jahnke live in.
“(Opelika) feels small town, but there’s still really great home restaurants and entrepreneurs around,” Baxter said. “There just seems like a lot of young businesses, young restaurants, and young distilleries, and that’s exactly how it feels in our town.”
Robyn Walker, freshman in kinesiology, said she has met Penny and Sparrow twice.
“They told me for the song ‘Fantine,’ it’s all about how everyone has a checkered past,” Walker said. “They’re really real.”
One surprise guest that made a few appearances throughout both performers’ songs was a train. Penny and Sparrow paused as the train blared its horn, then picked back up where they left off.
“Sometimes it happens,” Baxter said. “You just got to roll with it and try to be the same person up there as you are over here.”
The train reappeared during Drew Holcomb and The Neighbors’ performance, which made them switch immediately from their song “American Beauty” to Johnny Cash’s “Folsom Prison Blues."
“We knew the train was going to come,” Holcomb said. “We just didn’t know which song it was going to come.”
Tim Lyons, merchandise manager for Drew Holcomb and The Neighbors, said this is the third tour the band has teamed up with World Vision, a child sponsorship organization.
“About two years ago, his brother was a chicken farmer in Rwanda,” said Lyons. “While he was there, he was asking his brother, ‘Hey, are there any organizations over here helping out the kids?’ His brother said ‘Oh my gosh, World Vision, they are helping out over here, doing great works.'”
World Vision, according to Lyons, helps provide food, health care, education and clean water to children in Rwanda and allows sponsors to write letters to the children.
Drew Holcomb and The Neighbors just started their Fall Medicine Tour the previous day. They will be heading to Liberty University in Virginia next.
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