{"id":1315058,"date":"2019-09-27T08:04:15","date_gmt":"2019-09-27T14:04:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.cmt.com\/news\/?p=1812041"},"modified":"2019-09-27T08:04:15","modified_gmt":"2019-09-27T14:04:15","slug":"luke-bryan-the-farm-tour-qa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/music-news\/luke-bryan-the-farm-tour-qa\/","title":{"rendered":"Luke Bryan: The Farm Tour Q&A"},"content":{"rendered":"
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by Alison Bonaguro<\/a><\/span> 6m ago<\/span><\/span> <\/p>\n

Wes Statz, one of the family farmers who runs the Statz Bros. Dairy Farm in Marshall, Wisconsin was up until 1:00 am on Thursday (Sept. 26), harvesting 250 acres of sorghum for the 8,000 cows on his dairy farm. It was a job the farmers had to get done before 20,000 Luke Bryan fans descended on their land for the Farm Tour. And it\u2019s a lot of land. The Statz\u2019 farm is as big as the town is tiny.<\/p>\n

All that late-night harvesting sounds like a lot of effort. Like back-breaking labor. But when I asked Statz how much work goes into taking care of 10,000 acres of crops and all the Holsteins and Jerseys, he said, \u201cIt\u2019s not work. It\u2019s a religion.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s the kind of religion that Bryan might\u2019ve practiced had he stayed in his small town of Leesburg, Georgia and worked in the pecan fields or the peanut plant with his dad instead of taking the leap of faith and moving to Nashville in 2001.<\/p>\n

Before he took the stage, and after I\u2019d received my very accelerated graduate degree in agri-business with Statz, I sat down with Bryan on his tour bus to talk about night one of his 11th year of Farm Tours.<\/p>\n

CMT.com: Do you remember what it was that made you even consider leaving your small-town life behind?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Bryan: It was kind of a leap of faith. It was me pushing all my chips in. But my dad was really behind me. He would tell me, \u201cWhile you\u2019re young, you have to go do it.\u201d And that\u2019s what I\u2019ve been telling my boys. My nephew Til is 17, and I tell him, \u201cYou have to think how precious the transition into college is. You can never get those years back.\u201d I had to go to Nashville, so that I could live the rest of my life knowing I tried. It\u2019s just like the Lee Ann Womack song \u201cI Hope You Dance.\u201d If you don\u2019t go and try, you\u2019re gonna have regrets and wonder what might\u2019ve happened.<\/p>\n

And you did try. So no regrets there. You moved there right out of Georgia Southern University, and then what?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I certainly thank God I did that. My first week in Nashville, I got a little dry-erase board, and I wrote about 20 of my goals on it: Write a No. 1 song, Sing a No. 1 song, Get a publishing deal, Get a record deal, and so on. And I\u2019ve hit them all.<\/p>\n

What a cool memento. Do you still have it?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I wish I did. But I moved around so much when I got to Nashville that it got lost in one of my moves. God Lord. I lived down in an apartment in Franklin. Then that was too much money. So I had to rent a one-room place for $100 a month. You just do what you have to do to survive.<\/p>\n

So you\u2019re saying that you had to give the uncertainty of the music business a shot, but that must\u2019ve meant leaving some sure things back home. Right?<\/strong><\/p>\n

It was tough to walk away from a secure little life and future in Leesburg. I could\u2019ve just stayed, married the sweetheart, had the big family, and this and that. But what people forget about when you enter into the music business, is that you kind of have to be anointed to deal with it all.<\/p>\n

Anointed how?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Just by having a lot of people in my town supporting me. I spent years having people truly encouraging me. That\u2019s what was amazing about my small town. Most small towns have their star quarterback that they rally behind. Somebody they feel can leave and go do big, big things. I\u2019m was that guy.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s a great analogy. That you\u2019re kind of like an athlete that has to eat, sleep and breathe your passion from the minute you wake up every morning.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Right. If you\u2019re a major league baseball player, you have to play through injuries, you have to hit a ball ten hours a day, and study the game constantly. It\u2019s the same with music. It requires a lot of focus and so much sacrifice. And I think you have to be kind of a different breed.<\/p>\n

How do you think working on a farm is like working a stage?<\/strong><\/p>\n

As long as you\u2019re content, and doing what you love, and you\u2019re growing and excited \u2014 in farming or in the music business \u2014 if you ever feel stale and stagnant, that is not a good feeling.<\/p>\n

After my tour of this family farm today, I can tell you with absolute certainty that it has grown from the 20 or so cows they had when they founded the place in 1966. And yet when you look out at the crowd, it\u2019s not 20,000 farmers. What it is is fans from small towns all over Wisconsin. How do you connect with a crowd like this one after a stadium crowd or a spring break crowd?<\/strong><\/p>\n

You stay yourself through all of it. No matter what I\u2019ve done or where I\u2019ve been, I\u2019ve gotten on stage with two goals: make sure I\u2019m the one having fun, and then make sure everybody out there is along for that ride. And I\u2019m fortunate now that I don\u2019t have worries, like, \u201cAm I gonna have enough hits to do a full show?\u201d There\u2019s still the challenge out there to push the music, and to try to make the best music you can. Bottom line for me is, I have to be myself and connect with crowd. Even though the vibe here is different, it\u2019s up to me to set the tone.<\/p>\n

And how will you do that on this Farm Tour?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I may get on the piano tonight. I may do \u201cWe Rode in Trucks.\u201d I may try to do some songs from (2016) Here\u2019s to the Farmer<\/em>. But when you have 20,000 people in one spot, if you go off the grid for too long with songs they may not know, it\u2019ll get a little sleepy. I want to always hit them with the hits and keep the energy up, because that\u2019s what\u2019ll keep them coming back. That\u2019s crucial. I\u2019ve never ever been a big fan of being like, \u201cHere are a few new songs I want to try on you guys.\u201d<\/p>\n

I know you\u2019ve worked hard to make this Farm Tour a priority for the past 11 years, but when you look out at all the young guys, does it make you pine for the days when you could just show up and be a fan?<\/strong><\/p>\n

What I really miss is being na\u00efve. I remember being a country music fan, and always wondering, \u201cWhat is going on backstage? What do those cables power? Where do they go?\u201d And then watching the drummer for five straight minutes. Then watching each individual band member do their thing. Even when I was out opening for (Tim) McGraw, (Rascal) Flatts, and Jason (Aldean), I was still geeking out over the whole experience. I was trying to take it all in. Those moments, being na\u00efve, that\u2019s the fun part. I mean, there might be a kid out there tonight who might be inspired to go do music. Maybe he\u2019ll remember for the rest of his life, \u201cThat crazy Luke Bryan put stage up in a farm field. I want to do that.\u201d<\/p>\n

When you first got here today, though, how about that smell?<\/strong><\/p>\n

What smell?<\/p>\n

The cow manure.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Cow manure? That\u2019s a good smell. That smells like money. Come on, city girl.<\/p>\n

\n

Knockin\u2019 Boots with \u2066@LukeBryanOnline<\/a>\u2069 #FarmTour2019<\/a> pic.twitter.com\/WqKewFAV6T<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Brewergurl22 (@brewergurl22) September 27, 2019<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

During my tour of the vast dairy farm, Statz told me that this show wasn\u2019t just for their farmers. It\u2019s for all of the close-knit farming communities up here. \u201cWhen this show comes to our town, it\u2019s kind of like a reunion that the farmers all deserve. That\u2019s the farmer way. We love getting up and going to work each day, but this day is even better,\u201d he told me. \u201cWe think it\u2019s gonna feel like you\u2019re back in the corn fields, with a bonfire and a half barrel of beer.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

Bryan\u2019s Farm Tour continues Friday night in Richland, Michigan.<\/p>\n

\n
Alison makes her living loving country music. She’s based in Chicago, but she’s always leaving her heart in Nashville.<\/div>\n

@alisonbonaguro<\/a><\/div>\n

via:: CMT News<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Alison Bonaguro 6m ago Wes Statz, one of the family farmers who runs the Statz Bros. Dairy Farm in Marshall, Wisconsin was up until 1:00 am on Thursday (Sept. 26), harvesting 250 acres of sorghum for the 8,000 cows on his dairy farm. It was a job the farmers had to get done before […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[159],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-1315058","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-music-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-13 23:19:45","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSKE Ski Country","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1315058","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1315058"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1315058\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1315058"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1315058"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1315058"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}