Rodeo Roundup

Trevor Brazile, defending champion of the National Finals Rodeo, was only 16 years old when Brooks & Dunn first staked their claim to the rodeo's entertainment arena in 1992.

The duo are still at the top of the game in a Nashville where stars don't age as gracefully as they once did. With 15 years of the NFR under their belts, Kix Brooks figures it's "a genuine tie-in" to have the duo's label license the title song of the new Brooks & Dunn album, "Cowboy Town," for the NFR's arena anthem.

"It's something we've been tied to, or at least feel like we've been a part of," says Brooks, who sings with partner Ronnie Dunn today and Saturday at the Las Vegas Hilton. The song has been played nightly during the rodeo's grand entry, and the duo were scheduled to perform it live at the NFR Thursday night.

"It's no secret that Vegas is one of our favorite places to perform. We like the city in general but when you bring all the cowboys in, it just gets extra special," Brooks says.

Raunchy country comic Rodney Carrington didn't crack Las Vegas for NFR week until 2000. But he has something in common with Brooks & Dunn: They both played here in July, and rodeo week is no longer their lone shot at the Strip.

"We seem to do just as well whether we're here during the rodeo or not," says Carrington, who does his song parodies and stand-up at the MGM Grand today and Saturday. "I guess it's just a testament to hard work."

Carrington broadened his fan base through the ABC sitcom "Rodney," which ran from 2004 through 2006. While his stand-up is not unlike a redneck Andrew Dice Clay, the TV show "came from another side," the Tulsa, Okla.-based comedian says.

"It came from a lot of what my life was. It was actually about the struggle in the early days of what I went through pursuing stand-up comedy. It was rooted in my family and my experiences. What I got out of that was a whole other group of fans."

With the Strip now a year-round "Cowboy Town," some of the top-shelf arena draws are waiting out the rodeo: Brad Paisley plays the Mandalay Bay Events Center Jan. 26 and George Strait chose Super Bowl weekend for an MGM Grand Garden concert on Feb. 2.

NFR fans still have an arena date with Larry the Cable Guy on Saturday at the Orleans Arena, and the chance to see rodeo perennial Clay Walker today in the Golden Nugget's theater and a cowboy-favorite show band, Ricky and the Redstreaks, in the Nugget's new 11,000-square-foot events center.

And if Kenny Chesney owes a country-rock debt to Brooks & Dunn, their door was in turn opened by Lynyrd Skynrd, who play the Hard Rock Hotel today and Saturday.

"We've seen the crowds in Vegas change dramatically over the 15 years we've been playing there," Brooks notes. In the old days, the midweek nights of a Vegas gig would be "at that time what was a typical Vegas crowd and was, for lack of any other way to put it, pretty dang polite.

"You'd come out of a big outdoor arena where people were swingin' from the rafters and you're used to everybody screaming," he recalls. And the contrast would be like, "Is there anybody here?"

Now, Brooks says, "It's just a great party-fun atmosphere year-round. It's fun to see just how people have taken on the whole attitude of Vegas."

Fans will find out if the duo will risk a buzz-kill by performing their current single, "God Must Be Busy." It's a somber, topical anthem about the state of the world that their RCA label "really wanted to release" to country radio ahead of "Cowboy Town," Brooks says.

The song backs up Brooks' contention that "our whole ambition and focus is to matter. If we're not making current music we feel makes a difference and we're excited about, it's time to hang up the spurs."

Back in 1992, when the duo were riding the momentum of their breakout hit, "Boot Scootin' Boogie," Dunn told the Review-Journal, "Longevity is the goal of this organization."

Now, says Brooks, "It's every bit as exciting for us as it ever has been. ... I'd like to think we're still current. Our music is still being played on the radio, we're still having hits and still digging what we're doing."

Contact reporter Mike Weatherford at mweatherford@reviewjournal.com or (702) 383-0288.