Sam Hunt puts plenty of heart into his first Milwaukee concert in nearly a decade

Sam Hunt's return to Milwaukee Friday at Fiserv Forum was both way overdue and, apparently, ahead of schedule.

Nearly every arena-level country A-lister comes to Wisconsin's biggest city often. Oddly, Hunt hasn't been one of them, despite having one of the fastest sell-outs in the history of the Rave's Eagles Ballroom way back in 2015.

That was his last time in town here before Friday night, although an attempt to headline Summerfest 2020 didn't happen because of the pandemic.

That atypically long absence from a country star in the market ultimately may have hurt sales for Friday's show. The "cheap seats," which started at an economical $35.75 (before fees) when they went on sale in October, dropped down to $20.75 by Friday morning. There were still small pockets of empty seats in Fiserv Forum's upper bowl, with multiple sections curtained off.

But the patient (and certainly passionate) Hunt fans who came out to Fiserv Forum were treated to a sneak preview of sorts. Hunt revealed Friday that he's planning to release a new album next month, and he played a few new songs that should make the track list — like "Outskirts," a wholehearted, cinematic ode to small-town living, a recurring specialty of Hunt's songwriting.

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Typically, a performer's tour happens after a new album is out, not the other way around. But the 39-year-old Georgia native is one of the few Nashville stars willing to buck trends.

It's a reason he sold out the Eagles Ballroom so swiftly in 2015, in the wake of what would become an album that would change not only Hunt's career, but country music as we know it: "Montevallo."

At the time, bro country was living large, and the superstars of the subgenre were bluntly embracing hip-hop signifiers to signal some swagger. Hunt's infusion of hip-hop was much more nuanced, and ultimately more natural, with a novel, spoken-word cadence on songs like "Break Up In a Small Town" resembling Drake's fluid flow, with a touch of a tangy twang.

And Hunt wasn't only singing about partying with beer and trucks and women, but sharing his heartbreak with gripping, lived-in lyrical details, another area where Drake became a master.

That's how Drake helped change hip-hop, and in Hunt's wake, country bros were replaced by more sensitive and vulnerable male stars. The hip-hop and R&B that Hunt used so fluidly has become a crucial component of Morgan Wallen's superstardom.

Wallen has taken the hip-hop-in-country playbook to a new level, overstuffing his albums with tracks to rack up streaming numbers like many rap stars, and graduating to stadiums in the process. Hunt, on the contrary, has not been terribly prolific, and considering the soft sales in Milwaukee for Friday's concert, an argument might be made that his peak has passed.

And yet, on Friday Hunt demonstrated during his 88-minute set that he's a confident entertainer, even more assured than Wallen was at American Family Field last year.

"House Party," the second song of Friday's set, quickly got the crowd jumping, with Hunt's high-five-firing stroll among fans in Fiserv Forum adding fuel to the fire. But he was just as skilled with personable, poignant banter — like he was in a room with a few friends, not thousands of fans in a basketball arena — when he recalled the rebellious first date with his now-wife that landed them in cuffs, which in turn inspired "Cop Car." The story prefaced a solo acoustic performance Friday, making a song already filled with sweet and smart lyrical details and turns of phrases all the sweeter.

There's a tinge of nostalgia in "Cop Car" and other Hunt songs that showed up Friday, and nostalgia played a role in the crowd's enthusiasm for a setlist heavy on those earlier hits. But Hunt, who's made a habit of defying expectations, often doesn't go for the predictable payoff, like with a newer song "Walmart," about a chance encounter with an ex-lover's mom, and that ex-lover's young daughter, speaking to the bittersweetness of passing time.

And for anyone who assumed Hunt's hip-hop flavoring was a gimmick, a stirring performance Friday of "Montevallo" standout "Take Your Time" — like "Cop Car," performed just by Hunt on acoustic guitar, on a secondary stage on the back of the arena floor — made clear that it was exemplary songwriting, from moving melodies to the lyrics cathartic confessionals that made Hunt a sensation.

Ten years ago, that song felt ahead of its time. Friday, it felt timeless.

4 takeaways from Sam Hunt's Milwaukee concert, including openers Brett Young and Lily Rose

• Naturally, there was the expected cover Friday of "We Are Tonight," the 2013 Billy Currington hit that Hunt co-wrote. But the set also touched on Dua Lipa's "Don't Start Now" with a brief flash of Daft Punk's "Get Lucky," sung by Hunt's guitarist Tyrone Carreker, while "Ex to See" ended with a little instrumental nod to Lil Nas X's "Industry Baby." The cover of the night, though, was Hunt's short interpretation of John Denver's "Take Me Home, Country Roads," which showcased a piercing soulfulness in Hunt's vocals that even the country star's best songs have yet to fully demonstrate.

• Walking a fine line between aw-shucks and smolder, opener Brett Young embraced his gentlemanly persona, starting his set off with early career hits like “Sleep Without You” and “Like I Loved You” — the latter triggering the first big, primarily female-powered singalong of the night. Young sported a Bucks jersey to better ensure Hunt’s crowd would like him, but the crowd would have loved him even without the nod to the hometown heroes.

• Lily Rose was at this arena just four and a half months ago, warming up the crowd for Shania Twain. She traded a Giannis jersey for a Drink Wisconsibly shirt Friday, and maintained her eager-to-please, easy-to-like demeanor from last October in Milwaukee. She also used Friday’s set to show off some new tunes like the breezy “Running Out of Time,” which should maintain her forward momentum, and filled in for Ingrid Andress opposite Hunt on "Wishful Drinking" during Hunt's set (during which the Bucks jersey was back on).

• If you missed Hunt's Fiserv Forum concert, you'll have another chance to see him in the Dairy State. The tour, with both Young and Rose on the bill, comes to the Resch Center in Green Bay Thursday.

Sam Hunt's Fiserv Forum setlist

1. "Raised On It"

2. "House Party"

3. "Kinfolks"

4. "23"

5. "Water Under The Bridge"

6. "Outskirts"

7. "Start Somewhere"/"Take Me Home, Country Roads"

8. "Breaking Up Was Easy in the '90s"

9. "Hard to Forget"

10. "Make You Miss Me"

11. "Take Your Time"

12. "Cop Car"

13. "Wishful Drinking"

14. "Leave the Night On"

15. "We Are Tonight"/"Don't Start Now"/"Get Lucky"

16. "Let It Down"

17. "Walmart"

18. "Break Up in a Small Town"

19. "Ex to See"

20. "Body Like a Back Road"

Contact Piet at (414) 223-5162 or plevy@journalsentinel.com. Follow him on X at @pietlevy or Facebook at facebook.com/PietLevyMJS.

This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Sam Hunt's first Milwaukee concert since 2015 shows plenty of heart