Darius Rucker photo by Russ Harrington, courtesy of Capitol Nashville.
Jan. 6, 2009 — Darius Rucker is counting down to Jan. 15, when he begins his first major country trek as one of the support acts on Brad Paisley’s Paisley Party Tour.
It will be an interesting vantage point for Darius, who got a chance to see Brad’s Bonfires & Amplifiers Tour when that concert package — including Rodney Atkins and Taylor Swift — played Charleston, S.C., in November 2007. By that point, Darius had already met Brad in the studio during sessions for the album Learn To Live.
"He came and played on the record and then a week later, he played my hometown," Darius told the national radio show GAC Nights: Live From Nashville. "So I went to the show. He gets on stage and hits the first song and I’m — my eyes are huge and my mouth is open. After the first song, I’m thinking, ‘Okay, it’s gotta chill out for a second.’ And the second song is a crazy, rock ‘n’ roll, kill number. And I turned to my best buddy and I go, ‘Dude, do you see this?’ And he goes, ‘Yeah.’ And we sat there for two hours saying to each other, probably every third song, ‘This is unbelievable.’ I couldn’t believe how awesome his tour was. And I laughed, and I called Frank Rogers, his producer and mine, I said, ‘Man! You’ve got to call Brad and tell him I will do whatever it takes to go on tour with him, just so I can see him play every night.’"
Darius gets to see Brad, Dierks Bentley and Crystal Shawanda regularly during the Paisley Party’s two-month run.
In the meantime, had he been in Nashville on Sunday, Darius could’ve seen Brad in another star-studded lineup. The Jonas Brothers performed at the historic Ryman Auditorium, where they trotted out a whole list of guest musicians. According to USA Today, Brad joined the band for a run-through of "Waitin’ On A Woman," while Martina McBride, Brad, Vince Gill and Phil Vassar were among the stars on hand for renditions of "Independence Day" and the Band’s classic "The Weight." All of those artists — plus pop singer Jordin Sparks and Christian acts Amy Grant, Michael W. Smith and Steven Curtis Chapman — gathered for a show-ending version of Don McLean’s "American Pie."
Darius might have missed that, but he did have some pretty good seats of his own. He was on the field at Dolphins Stadium that same day to sing the national anthem when the Baltimore Ravens played Miami in an NFL playoff game. Martina will see those same Ravens this Saturday: Baltimore is slated to visit Nashville’s LP Field to face the Tennessee Titans, and Martina will sing the national anthem.
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