Joe Walsh, shown at a VetsAid concert in 2023, is bringing his benefit performance for military veterans and their families to Intrust Bank Arena on Saturday.
Courtesy photo
Joe Walsh said the previous eight VetsAid concerts – benefit performances for military veterans and their families – were just a warmup for the ninth edition, in his hometown of Wichita.
“I don’t know. We probably should have done it sooner,” the guitar great said in a phone interview with The Eagle from his Los Angeles home. “We were visiting venues we thought were important vet-wise and making the rounds. Wichita was always on the bucket list to play, but this is our ninth one and it’s time to come home.
“We probably should have done it before, but it’s kinda sweet that we know what we’re doing now,” he added. “The first dates, we didn’t have a clue, but we pulled it off.”
VetsAid 2025 takes the stage at Intrust Bank Arena on Saturday night, Nov. 15, five days before Walsh’s 78th birthday.
Walsh headlines the bill with Country Music Association Hall of Famer Vince Gill – Walsh’s bandmate in The Eagles after the death of Glenn Frey – and Ryan Bingham & The Texas Gentlemen. Each performs a complete set with their own bands.
Joining Walsh on his set are Nathaniel Rateliff and married blues-rockers Susan Tedeschi and Derek Trucks.
When asked if the concert was well-structured or improvised, Walsh answers: “Both.”
His stepson, Christian Quillici, expands.
“It’s pretty well formatted,” said Quillici, co-founder of VetsAid. “It runs along like a pretty well-oiled machine, but Joe takes care of the improvisational stuff. Each of the sets will bring their own surprises within, and there’s plenty of moments for improv.”
“Each of the people who are coming in this year I have the highest respect for, and I don’t have any rules for them,” Walsh said. “I turn them loose – whatever they want to do, whatever they want to say, whatever they want to play. And they’re so happy to be there. It amazes me that some pretty significant people have said, ‘Sure, I’ll come,’ and this year also.”
At previous VetsAid concerts in places such as Fairfax, Va., Tacoma, Wash., Columbus, Ohio, Houston and San Diego – as well as two livestreamed concerts during the COVID years – guests have included Ringo Starr, Don Henley, James Taylor, the Zac Brown Band, Keith Urban, Chris Stapleton, The Black Keys, Eddie Vedder, James Hetfield and Gwen Stefani.
“It’s amazing the people who show up, and it’s amazing the musicians who care about vets,” Walsh said. “They don’t know how to help, really, and so they jump on this.”
The audience, Walsh said, misses out on what might be the best show.
“I tell you, backstage is really funny, when all these acts are there and we start giving each other a hard time. It’s like a gang of thugs, a gang of musical thugs,” he said with a laugh. “We never get to hang out anymore. It’s amazing that we get a chance to.”
It’s Walsh who makes the literal and figurative call on who will be part of the VetsAid concerts.
“The problem is early in the year you’ve got to start on everybody, because the time Vet comes around, everybody’s in the middle of a tour or some part of the country that makes it impossible to come,” he said. “I’ve got to jump on people really early in the year, and everybody has to check their schedule. I’m pretty nervous for about three months, until everybody confirms.
“One of the things you’ve got to be careful of when you do a benefit show is that if everybody says yes, you’re in big trouble,” Walsh added. “I figure I’ll get 30% of who I ask for.”
“It’s a big ask, it’s a heavy lift, but it’s a big show,” Quillins added.
Like most previous performances, a “super set” closes out the night.
“We’ll have to see how it goes. By the end of the evening, everybody who said they weren’t going to stick around wants to,” Walsh said. “If there is some jamming at the end of the show, it’s going to be profound.”
Grants to Kansas veterans, organizations
In between the sets are public introductions of the recipients of VetsAid grants. Applications were open when the concert was announced Aug. 1, and all of the grants will be going to Kansas veterans and state organizations.
“Every year we pick a city, and all the money’s going to that city, or in this case to Kansas,” Quillins said. “We want to make an impact on Kansas, because that’s where Joe’s from. And that’s the kind of impact we want to make in 2025.”
Walsh said VetsAid purposely avoided any bureaucracy in its organization.
“We’re not like a corporation. We don’t have an office in Washington, D.C., to lobby,” he said. “We go to places that have vets organizations that aren’t funded, and we help them. We go through each individual community and find the best way to keep people and those organizations going and see where money’s needed.”
Entering his late 70s, Walsh is doing anything but slowing down. He’s a “mega-mentor” on this season of NBC’s “The Voice,” and is spending most of his weekends with The Eagles, headlining at The Sphere in Las Vegas.
“I never thought I’d be a headliner in Las Vegas,” he said. “I remember when I was starting out as a young kid, that was a big deal – if you were in the lights in Las Vegas. I never thought that would happen. It’s a trip to see your name on the Strip!”
Walsh also has projects he’s not sure he’s going to finish by the end of the year.
“I can fit these things in from time to time,” he said. “I have a lot of stuff I said I was going to do, maybe later in the year, and now all that stuff has come back to haunt me.”
Joe Walsh’s Wichita connections
Besides the local veterans’ organizations, the concert will also pay tribute to both sides of Walsh’s family in Wichita.
“We’re going to tell some of the story of Joe’s family during the show,” Quillins said. “Wichita will definitely be a part of the show.”
“It’s really, really special to be going back to where I’m from,” Walsh said, who returned to the city this summer and discovered, “Wichita’s happening, it really is. I was amazed.”
In the 1990s, Walsh bought his maternal grandparents’ home on the 1600 block of Fairmount Street and donated it for use as a shelter for battered women.
“I wanted to buy it immediately,” he said.
Supporting veterans literally hits home for Walsh. His father, Lt. Robert Fidler, a pilot for the U.S. Air Force, died in a mid-air collision while flying a Lockheed F-80 Shooting Star during maneuvers over Okinawa in 1949.
His son – who was adopted by his stepfather and renamed Walsh after the family moved to Columbus, New York and New Jersey – was just 20 months old.
“In those days, if you lose your parents in the military, it was just ‘too bad,’” he said. “There were no support groups, there was no Gold Star designation. It was rough, everybody had a dad and I didn’t, and I never really got to know him. I almost remember him, but my whole life the important thing to me was that I wanted him to be proud of me.
“Part of this VetsAid thing I’m doing now is that I’ve been-there-done-that, have someone not come home from a war. I’m resonant to the pain of these Gold Star kids and Gold Star families,” Walsh added. “I want to pay attention to them.”
Walsh insists on a room in the venue reserved for Gold Star families, and a room where the Gold Star children can meet each other.
“I’m glad to be able to do that,” he said.
VETSAID 2025: A CONCERT FOR OUR VETERANS
When: 6 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 15
Where: Intrust Bank Arena
Tickets: $52-$619, from selectaseat.com or 316-755-07328; The concert can also be streamed at veeps.com, for a cost of $14.99 for a one-time viewing or $19.99 for an all-access subscription
