Not all of Bingham's music is sad, though. Although most of it is riddled with unfortunate circumstances and bad luck, plenty of his songs are upbeat - jovial, even. And when they're fun, you can't help but feel like dancing. And Saturday, the audience did plenty of that.

But no matter what kind of songs he writes, they always come across as authentic. And that, in our humble opinion, is what's missing in so much music these days. Authenticity is appreciated; authenticity is admired; and authenticity can sell-out the best-sounding venue in Houston.

Ryan Bingham and The Dead Horses are proof of as much.

Personal Bias: We were forced to listen to country music growing up. Because of that, we developed something of an aversion for it for years and years... until we heard "The Weary Kind." It struck a chord, and we decided to give the genre another chance. We ain't turned back since, y'all.

The Crowd: We saw a lot of pearl-snap shirts and plenty of cowboy hats, but we couldn't discern who were "real" cowboys and who were hipsters, just wearing cowboy hats ironically. Are you confused? So were we. Oh, and have you ever been stuck behind a tall cowboy at a concert? It sucks. You can peer around most people, but it's a bit harder to do so when he is wearing a big cowboy hat. No disrespect, though. We love all cowboy paraphernalia; it just so happens that it inconvenienced us a bit on Saturday.

Overheard In the Crowd: "Take your shirt off, you sexy sonuvabitch!!"

Random Notebook Dump: Unfortunately, we missed The Silent Comedy, who were onstage before Bingham. It's not because we weren't on site; there was confusion with regard to our tickets at will-call, for which a faulty printer was to blame, and we weren't allowed inside in time to see them perform.

We did, however, hear from plenty of people that they put on an amazing show, so we bought a CD to substantiate the claims. And yes, they are very, very good.