MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. — Outside of Bay Area fans of Rage Against the Machine or My Chemical Romance, few have had to wait for a pandemic-delayed concert as long as fans of country artist Chris Stapleton, whose Saturday concert at Shoreline Amphitheatre was two years in the making.

Stapleton packed the place to the gills (it was a sellout) and exceeded expectations in a two-hour performance that was just as much Southern rock and blues as it was country, even showing off his not as well known talents as a soul or R&B crooner. The bit of “Freebird” that he and his talented seven-member band performed as a lead-in to “The Devil Named Music” about two-third of the way in—which got some of the loudest whoops and hollers of the night—drove the point home that Chris Stapleton is more than a country artist.

Performing in front of a wall of spotlights, below a wide video screen, the band kicked off with mid-tempo thumper “Nobody to Blame,” off 2015 album Traveller. Stapleton, who remained roughly in the same place on stage for most of the show, began on a Fender Jaguar guitar but switched among several throughout the night, including a blues standard Gibson semi-hollow-body and an acoustic.

“Parachute” featured a galloping beat and a harder edge to it. “Second One to Know” was funky and sticky, transitioning to a bluesier chorus before ending in a storm of speed-strumming by Stapleton. At this point, he introduced the title track to his latest album, 2020’s Starting Over. The rest of the band took a backseat and he switched to the acoustic for the first time on this folkier, more traditional ballad, singing a duet with his wife and bandmate, Morgane Stapleton. The two kept the pace slower on another duet, “Millionaire.”

On “Hard Livin’,” a return to twangy rock and roll, Stapleton held the opening vocal note for a good 20 seconds. This led to a blues rock cover of Guy Clark’s “Worry B Gone” that sounded a heck of a lot like ZZ Top.

After this blip, Stapleton returned to acoustic balladry for a triptych of “What Are You Listening To?,” “Traveller” and “Whiskey and You.” He took it a step further, having the band leave the stage, leaving just him. Introducing the middle song, he told a story of having a bad week and his wife buying an old Jeep Cherokee and taking him out west to Arizona and New Mexico. At one point during the song, he commanded the crowd to sing one chorus, which fans did dutifully with little direction.

Stapleton remarked at one point that he still gets nervous fans that won’t sing along, but that it used to be a bigger concern.

“It wasn’t a long time ago when it was quiet not because there were crickets but because there was no one in the room,” he said.

The latter song of the three was the quietest of the bunch, and while part of the crowd was heard passionately singing along, others were talking over the performance.

The band returned for the rocking and rollicking “Arkansas,” fan favorite “You Should Probably Leave” and a return to blues rock with a cover of the SteelDrivers’ “Midnight Train to Memphis.”

The downtempo “Might as Well Get Stoned” was punctuated by a pedal steel solo, while the moody “Cold,” which was one of Stapleton’s many vocal highlights, included his powerful, gravelly vocals. It was paired with noir-ish slow-panning camera work on the video screen.

For “I Was Wrong,” Chris Stapleton and co. left country behind completely. On the long (10 minutes, give or take) blues tune, he delivered plenty of swoon worthy guitar licks, full-on crooning and an extended jam session where it looked like he was improvising some of the parts.

The latter half of the performance included rootsy country tune “Joy of My Life” and hit “Tennessee Whiskey.”

The evening’s openers included singer-songwriter Margo Price, as well as Tom Petty’s guitarist Mike Campbell with his band the Dirty Knobs—both acts originally scheduled to perform at this show in 2020. And both were terrific, given the short time they had on stage.

Margo Price opened with “Letting Me Down,” off her latest album, 2020’s That’s How Rumors Get Started. It was uptempo, melodic and tinged with keyboard lines that got the blood pumping. Price and her six-member band then went into “Four Years of Chances,” from her 2016 debut solo album, Midwest Farmer’s Daughter. Here the band broke loose, with Price walking among her bandmates to check in on everyone. The song was carried by the fun, disco-y bass line. “Tennessee Song,” also from the debut album, was percussion-led and driving.

On 2021 single “Light Me Up,” Price was backed by a guitarist and keyboardist before the song broke out into a rumpus with her banging away at a tambourine. The song changed pace twice more, with Price, at one point, breathingly heaving; as if she was about to unleash a blood-curdling metal scream. She didn’t, and instead, the band regrouped, turning it into a powerful Southern rock gem.

With Mike Campbell playing lead guitar, her band rolled through the uptempo “Ways to Be Wicked.” The transitions between songs were also masterful. Instead of ending one and starting another, or fading out at the end, several times Price’s band found ways to connect tunes together. “Twinkle Twinkle” segued right into rocker “Don’t Say It,” for example. She rounded out the performance with another 2016 tune “Hurtin’ (On the Bottle),” after which she was handed a cigarette, took a drag, exhaled, tossed out some red roses and raised her arms over her head as if to say her job was done.

Mike Campbell and the Dirty Knobs had just five songs to work with, but still turned in a statement with “Runnin’ Down a Dream” and original tracks “Dirty Job,” “State of Mind” (as a duet with Price) and more.

“It’s a good thing I brought my sunglasses because it’s so bright,” Campbell said when the sun was at its brightest. “I can’t really see you, but I can feel you.”

Campbell and co concluded with a slowed-down version of “Refugee,” which he cowrote with Petty and said was once again relevant to the world. Drawing out the verses and enunciating all the lyrics, Campbell effectively turned it into a slow dance—except for the one normal-speed breakdown. The audience in the lawn finished the final refrain on its own.

Follow editor Roman Gokhman at Twitter.com/RomiTheWriter. Follow photographer Sean Liming at Instagram.com/S.Liming.