Downtown Nashville went OFF this weekend.
With the nice weather (and by that I mean it was hot as hell and the humidity was so high that it was like walking into a sauna), no more COVID restrictions, and people taking their summer vacations, Broadway is as busy as it’s ever been.
Add to that a rodeo taking place at Bridgestone Arena and the Nashville Opera hosting a performance of “Cinderella” at Ascend Amphitheater (because hey, we’re cultured here), and you’ve got a recipe for shit to pop off.
I even ventured down there myself for a couple of hours this weekend with some friends and man, it was as crazy as I’ve seen it in my 5 years in Nashville.
From fights to people passed out in bushes to 911 calls about cyber attacks, the police scanner was buzzing all weekend.
A few weeks ago we recapped the best of the scanner traffic from the first weekend that Nashville fully reopened, but it seems like the action isn’t slowing down so I figured, why not make this a recurring series.
With that, let’s get into the wild weekend.
Friday Night
People seemed to be on their best behavior heading into the weekend as things got off to a slow start on Friday. Until…
Once people start passing out in the bathroom of the bar, it’s on.
Miranda Lambert’s new bar, Casa Rosa, quickly got in on the action with a fight that resulted in an arrest – and we were quickly marking off squares on the Broadway Bingo card.
And this guy must have been fired up, because officers requested even more backup once they got him to down to the jail.
What are they putting in those margs at Casa Rosa?
Then we got one of the more interesting calls of the weekend: A woman calling police and rambling about cyber attacks in nearby Clarksville.
Police were never able to locate the caller – but with all the cyber attacks going on lately, maybe she knew something we don’t?
Next we ventured a little off Broadway to the Hampton Social, a restaurant downtown popular with bachelorette parties for its giant “Rosé all day” sign in the lobby that’s a popular spot for group Instagram pics.
But apparently somebody had a little TOO much rosé…
The next offender on our Broadway Bingo card came from a frequent source of action: Kid Rock’s.
Vomiting in the streets at 9 PM? Bob Ritchie would be disappointed.
Oh, and while somebody was losing their hot chicken out front on the sidewalk, the fire alarm was also going off at Kid Rock’s.
A little while later we had somebody make a decision that usually doesn’t end well: Fighting with the police.
Spoiler alert: It didn’t end well.
And what’s almost as stupid as fighting with the police? Fighting with a paramedic who’s trying to give you medical attention.
Meanwhile, the party on Broadway was so big that the sidewalks almost couldn’t handle the crowd.
As if things weren’t already wild enough, next up was a fight at Tootsie’s that broke a window out of the front of the bar.
People were getting feisty as the night wore on: At one point there were five active calls for fights in the downtown area.
We ended Friday night with one last call to Jason Aldean’s – for a hole outside that people kept falling in.
And that was just Friday.
Saturday Night
The first call of the evening on Saturday came from FGL House.
Sounds like somebody’s been listening to FGL’s music.
There was a wreck on Broadway when a jacked up truck with a tour group full of tourists took out the front end of a car.
And a guy who got his foot run over by a car.
Would now be a good time to say that maybe the city should think about just closing Broadway to vehicles on weekends?
Once again on Saturday, we had people passing out in the bathrooms of bars.
And…this.
But the biggest scene of the weekend came when Metro Nashville Police encountered a guy walking around with a knife.
And tazed his ass.
The horse units got involved.
Save a horse, take a ride to jail.
Same.
Honky Tonk Central seemed to see a lot of action this weekend, because a little while later we had a medical call from their stairwell.
Then Luke Bryan’s 32 Bridge and Dierks Bentley’s Whiskey Row both wanted to get in on the action too.
There were even calls from the boot stores. Somebody who just got a brand new pair of cowboy boots and then quickly realized they couldn’t walk in them when they were shitfaced?
There was a big scuffle in the intersection outside of Dierks Bentley’s and Margaritaville.
And with traffic backing up on Broadway as the opera and the rodeo let out, one officer was asking the important questions:
(Turns out they were leaving Ascend Amphitheater and didn’t have any other way to get out. What a terrible time to have to try to drive a big rig down Broadway).
There was also this exchange about the traffic, from what was definitely an officer working his first weekend shift on Broadway.
There was a fight at the usually-well-behaved Alan Jackson’s Good Time Bar.
But the party wasn’t just heating up on Broadway. The Wild Beaver Saloon, located one street over, also got in on the action.
If I could sum up Nashville in one tweet, it would be that one.
We then got our second knife call of the evening.
And yet another fight and arrest, this time at Tin Roof.
And an unspecified arrest in the alley behind the Valentine.
By this point it was after midnight, and people just started passing out wherever they could find a soft place to lay.
Like the bushes.
Police also finally decided to shut down Broadway to vehicle traffic around midnight. Probably a good idea at this point.
Because people were getting rowdy up and down the sidewalks.
Just a ton of fights.
There was also a poor pizza delivery driver who had his car stolen from the Hampton Inn downtown.
As if having to deliver pizzas in all this mess isn’t bad enough…
And we ended the night (and one wild weekend) with a burglary alarm going off at either Jack’s BBQ or Robert’s Western World.
Jeez. What was the deal this weekend, Nashville?
Maybe it’s because it was hot as balls and everybody was just sweaty and fired up. Or maybe it’s still the high of finally going out for the first time post-COVID.
Whatever it was, visitors to Music City had themselves one hell of a weekend.
It’s gonna be a long summer.
