Lanco Are Ready for Big 2020 With Headlining Tour, Miranda Lambert Trek
Five-piece country outfit Lanco kicked off their What I See Tour in early January. They’re headlining through March, but they're also appearing on select dates of Miranda Lambert's Wildcard Tour, between their own shows. Safe to say, these guys will be busy for the first part of 2020.
Lanco released the song that serves as their tour's namesake, “What I See,” along with “Old Camaro," in the fall, and they're taking the two songs -- and more new music -- on the road this time around. The What I See Tour will be their second-ever headlining run, following their Hallelujah Nights Tour in 2018. In 2019, they supported Luke Combs on the Beer Never Broke My Heart Tour, and played with some other big-name artists, too.
“I’ve loved all the shows we’ve played, but really, when you have a tour named after your own music and it’s your fans and they know all the words to those songs, it’s hard to not have that every night," Lanco's Brandon Lancaster told The Boot and other media at an event. "So to be able to go back out starting in January -- not only with our own fans again and our own rooms -- but with new music ...
"Even before we released the record, we’ve been playing all those songs for a couple years. We have some people that have seen us two or three times and had to see the same songs. To be able to debut new music that we’ve released, and, honestly, we’re gonna play some music on that tour that we haven’t released and start giving as much music as we can to our fans," Lancaster adds. "We’ve been working on it and they deserve to hear it whether it’s released or not.”
Lanco use their live shows as a way to road test new music in front of fans, often before it’s released. The crowds are a gauge to tell them what will garner the reception they’re after.
“I really am excited to start playing these new songs because … your fans will tell you. They’re always nice, they’ll clap and cheer, but you can see,” Lancaster says. “This happened with "What I See," the first time we played it: We did that last line, ‘What you see are some stars and stripes, but I see boys ain’t afraid to fight.’ The whole chorus, people kept cheering because now the whole song kind of clicked; it was that final staple. [I thought], ‘This song isn’t even out yet, and these people have never heard it, and this might work.’"
The group is also excited to see the limits to which they can take their live show. Supporting on tours gives them a chance to get their music in front of new audiences and learn from seasoned professionals, but headlining shows are where the real fun happens. They keep their shows off a strict grid, technically speaking, allowing them to switch things up on the fly, leaving room for guitar solos and acoustic moments.
“It’s also just a playground for us when we get to do our own tour. We’re such live show guys,” says Lanco's Chandler Baldwin. “It’s a playground, like, 'What can we dream up? What is the coolest thing we can do? How can we move these people up and down through the set with our music?'"
As for the Wildcard Tour, Lanco are pretty excited. Lambert is an artist they’ve all looked up to and greatly respect as songwriters, and they’re looking forward to both the cool backstage vibe she creates and getting to see her play every night.
“You get to this point where you’re touring a lot, getting to open up for these people, realizing that these are people that you’ve looked up to forever as artists and you’ve bought tickets to their shows, and now, all of a sudden, you’re on the stage and they’ve asked you to come out with them," reflects Eric Steedly. "And you’re like, 'How in the world did we get here?'
"It’s one of those tours where I will be excited to play our own show every night," he says, "and then I’ll be excited to go back, take a break and then come out with a beer and watch her whole show every night, which is always fun.”
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