Dierks Bentley photo by Jim Wright, courtesy of Capitol Nashville.
Dec. 31, 2008 — Dierks Bentley had some substantial concert highlights during 2008: He played the Nobel Peace Prize concert in Norway, appeared in the lineup of Chicago’s Lollapalooza rock festival and spent most of the year headlining his own tour.
So Dierks raised a few eyebrows in Nashville when he decided to move into 2009 as an opening act once more. He’s one of the support troops on Brad Paisley’s Paisley Party Tour, and part of the reason it works for Dierks is that having top billing is not his biggest priority.
"Everyone's just done such a great job of building up our own headlining tour," Dierks told Dial-Global. "It's a real entity. It's a real thing. It's got real legs it stands on, and it's growing and it's great, but it's also a good time to come back and take a little time away from it and see what else is out there before we go back out and do it again. I love being the senior in high school, but you know, when you're the senior, sometimes you look back and remember how much fun it was to be like the sophomore or the junior where you had some people to look up to and be part of that culture, too. So it's fun to kind of be able to have the freedom to step back and do that."
Brad and Dierks will be joined on the Paisley Party by Darius Rucker and Crystal Shawanda. It kicks off Jan. 15 in Southaven, Miss.
Get Social With GAC
Message Boards
Join the conversation about your favorite artists.
Fan Photo Galleries
Share your photos with country music fans.
Superfan
Watch GAC. Earn points. Get cool prizes.
Blog
Stay up-to-date with all of our daily country news.
facebook
Become a fan on Facebook.
twitter
Follow us on Twitter.
YouTube
Watch our videos on our YouTube channel.