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Lisa has done shows with us before. And when it comes to running? She’s locked in. Calm. Efficient. Protective. Until the Taco Bell incident. Post-show food run after a Diamond night. The drive-through scam was in motion. “Printer’s broken.” Cash only. No receipt. Wrong answer. She went off. Hard. Employees in tears. Manager apologizing. “We’ll give you the food for free.” “I don’t want the food f...

Spring 2003 was a blur. One night you’re at the Diamond with The Cramps. The same night you’re across town at The Other Side going full Texas with Pissing Razors, 40 Grit, and Society 1. Back-to-back shows. Highway miles stacking up. The road felt like home. Three days later, April 29, Evanescence hits the Bricktown Event Center with Revis, Die Trying, and more. Momentum building. Alternative brea...

It’s the Beatles birthday.  Happy 64th. The fans are rolling in. Balloons. Confetti. Hip hop air horn on standby. Maybe even a circus clown before it’s over. And then the special guest to the right. Deana Baker. Max’s sister. The one who lived through the Baker household years. Growing up with him? “It was crazy. He kind of did his own thing. He was the one who always got in trouble… so we just wa...

April 2003 was stacked. April 8 brought Chevelle, Disturbed, Taproot, and Un Loco to what had just transitioned from the Myriad to the Cox Convention Center. Heavy lineup. National names. That era when nu-metal and hard rock were packing rooms. Three days later, April 11, another one. Atreyu. 18 Visions. Fail Safe. Ground Zero. Special Edgar. Atreyu was on fire at that time. 18 Visions had a serio...

The Buffalo Bike Run wasn’t a small-town gathering. It was Cross Canadian Ragweed. It was Foghat. It was over-the-top production. And it was Evel Knievel. Dennis Rodman. Brian Bosworth. For anyone outside Oklahoma, that lineup sounds unreal. Rodman made sense in the biker world. Bosworth showing up before being fully embraced again by the Sooner crowd? That raised eyebrows. But he was still part o...

It wasn’t a small event. It was the Buffalo Bike Run. Marketed as the largest payout in Oklahoma bike run history. Over $100,000 paid out. Vendors. Music. A full production. Even a circus element. Max and his partner at CEU, Brad White, built it big. And then it got bigger. The response was overwhelming. Riders. Participants. Moving parts everywhere. At some point, it wasn’t about pride. It was ab...

March 26, 2003. Mudvayne. In Flames. Grade 8. A heavy lineup at the Bricktown Event Center during a time when alternative and metal were surging in Oklahoma. This was one of those days where everything clicked. When Jeff and the crew worked those Event Center shows, they were dialed in. Sean McGillikelly was in the mix. Choice Music had skin in the game. It wasn’t just attendance. It was partnersh...

Max and Brad are yelling. Bumping bellies. About ready to throw down. And Deana walks into the middle of it. “They look at me and say, ‘Who are you?’  I said, ‘I’m Deana Baker. I’m Max’s sister. I’m here to help.’” They ask what she’s going to do. “Uh… whatever. I don’t know.” Then comes the assignment. A box. Full of pre-registration paperwork. Hundreds of packets that people are supposed to pick...

You want to be a tour manager? A promoter rep? Here’s the test. It’s almost 1:00 AM. Bus call is set. The band wants six pizzas. You’re in a town where everything shuts down by 11. You forgot to place the order. Money won’t fix it. They want pizza. What do you do? There’s always a solution. You go to 7-Eleven. You buy frozen cheese pizzas. You heat them up. You slide them into pizza boxes. That’s...

June 3, 1994. Lynyrd Skynyrd, Ted Nugent, and Ian Moore at the Zoo Amphitheatre. Big summer show. Big production. Tight camps. And then the mistake. Before the show, stagehands went into Nugent’s dressing room and smoked weed. The tour manager walked in, caught the smell, and lost it. Ted is famously anti-weed. It wasn’t just a bad look. It was disrespectful. They almost got fired. Different dress...

July 2nd at the Bricktown Brewery brought The Romantics and The Dirt Poets together for a $3 ticket night. The show did around 300 people. At three bucks a head, that’s not bad for a club show in the mid-90s. Everyone knows The Romantics . Solid catalog. Radio songs. Name recognition. But the band worth spotlighting that night was The Dirt Poets . If you were around the Oklahoma scene in the 90s,...

Three days. Three cities. One crash course in show business.  February 28 at the Diamond Ballroom.  March 1 at Cain's Ballroom.  March 3 at The Cotillion. That run wasn’t just about ticket sales. It was about learning how Psychopathic Records operated. ICP’s show was precision chaos. Around 100 liters of Faygo per night. When the soda ran out, the show was done. That’s how rehearsed it was. 9...

While the world was watching Woodstock ’94 on a massive stage, Oklahoma did it our way. August 14, 1994. Eight local bands. Eight dollars at the door. Six bucks in advance. That  was the deal. This was for everyone who couldn’t afford to fly out to the real Woodstock chaos. No Netflix  documentary. No mud-covered headlines. Just a stacked local lineup and a crowd ready to  show up. Bands like Slic...

When Carcass and Life of Agony hit The Roxy, it changed the temperature in the room. Life of Agony already had a strong following here. That show packed the place out and brought real energy back into the building. For the first time, there were cars filling the parking lot, a circle pit on the floor, and stage diving off the front. It was chaos in the best way. Security had to work that night. Ke...

March 8 and 9, 2003. Two nights. Two cities. Both sold out. First at the Bricktown Event Center in Oklahoma City. Then at Cain's Ballroom in Tulsa. In OKC, he was Jeff’s assistant. In Tulsa, he was the runner. One of those Tulsa runs meant driving the band to Jamil's Steakhouse for dinner. If you’re a runner, you know the rules. You don’t invite yourself in. You don’t insert yourself int...

June 12th marked our first and possibly only show at Cowboys before it transformed into The Roxy . The lineup featured Forte and Pitch Black , and it turned into a turning point for that building. Long before it was Cowboys, the place was called The Beaver Pond . In the 70s, it was a strip club where dancers floated on lily pads in a real swimming pool. That pool never left. The stage at Cowboys w...

“Rollin’ in my sweet baby’s arms.” When Leon stepped into his Hank Wilson persona, he wasn’t just covering country standards. He was honoring them. Recording under the name Hank Wilson, cutting classic covers, bringing that Oklahoma edge to traditional songs. And when you really dig into the catalog, it’s not even close. Leon was prolific. Across genres. Across decades. Studio work. Producing. Wri...

It wasn’t a no-security tour. This was the Bigger Bang era with The Rolling Stones — and the backstage setup was on another level. Snooker tables. Game areas. Full liquor bar. Food everywhere. The most elaborate backstage environment he’d ever seen. And then the seat assignment. At Keith Richards’ table. Keith comes out with his buddy, same scarf, same energy. Quiet moment. Timing something. Synch...

Some moments don’t feel big when they’re happening, but time turns them into milestones. July 14, 1994 was one of those nights when Collective Soul played Bricktown Brewery and quietly checked a major box in their career.  It was their first sell-out show , and tickets were just $8 . Same artwork. Same early-era vibe. No hype machine yet. Just a band catching fire at exactly the right moment.  #Co...

When the Bridges to Babylon tour rolled into Owen Field, it wasn’t just a concert. It was a  construction project. Promoter TNA International invited media to preview the massive stage at the south end of  the stadium. Production holds were released once sightlines were confirmed, turning  previously held seats into some of the best in the house. $65.25 tickets went on sale at the  Lloyd Noble Cen...

The feud was real. If you met Joe Cocker first and got his autograph, then walked over to Leon with the same  item, Leon wouldn’t sign it. “No way.” Not that day. Not under those circumstances. And this wasn’t normal behavior. Leon would usually sign anything for anyone. But that day,  he wasn’t doing it. Joe Cocker went on to become a Rock & Roll Hall of Famer. Globally recognized. Massive  c...

At the Diamond Ballroom, Lisa built a reputation that was equal parts fear and respect. They even kept a running joke scorecard of how many people she made cry, and most of them were grown men.  If something went off the rails, one phone call and she’d show up in ten minutes ready to handle it. She didn’t tolerate excuses, and she didn’t back down.  Years later, when it truly mattered, she was sti...

There are rules when you’re a runner. You don’t turn the radio on.  You don’t start conversations.  You don’t insert yourself into the moment. You wait. You answer questions. You drive. Now imagine your all-time idol getting into the van. The job was simple: take the band from the top of the Bricktown Ballpark down to the stage. Engine running. Band waiting. Thirty minutes later, he appears. He ch...

It started at 15 years old at the Cotton Bowl. The Rolling Stones with Eagles and Trapeze opening the show. Then came 1978.  Then 1981 — six shows in one year. Houston. Dallas. Kansas City. New Orleans. That “first farewell tour.” Through the years it kept going. The Myriad in ’99. The Ford Center in 2002. Watching the stages get bigger. Watching the production get wilder. Different cities. Same b...

“Despite earlier reports that The Rolling Stones wouldn’t stay in Oklahoma City… they arrived late Sunday night.” They kept a low profile before taking the stage at Owen Field, with Sheryl Crow opening the show. There was even talk about skipping sound check. “They don’t do one every day.”  “If it doesn’t need fixing, why fix it?” They had tried to book Norman before during the 1994 Voodoo Lounge...