Mackenzie Carpenter Signs With The Valory Music Co.

Pictured (L-R): Big Machine Label Group Chairman, CEO and Founder Scott Borchetta, Mackenzie Carpenter, Valory’s George Briner

Mackenzie Carpenter has signed with The Valory Music Co. Her new single “Can’t Nobody” will be available on all streaming platforms this Friday (May 20).

The 22-year-old Georgia native attended Belmont University, and while there immersed herself in the Nashville songwriting community, which led to her co-writing Lily Rose’s breakthrough “Villain.” On the road Carpenter has opened for Parker McCollum, Craig Campbell, Ryan Hurd, and fellow The Valory Music Co. labelmate Conner Smith, among others.

“In today’s world,” Big Machine Label Group Chairman, CEO and Founder Scott Borchetta says, “it is extremely rare to find a voice–as a songwriter or a vocalist–that is truly unique. Not only is Mackenzie both a completely original writer, capturing the experience of being a young woman from an authentic place, her voice is immediately recognizable. But even more uncommon is the mystery around her: where everyone is everything on social media, Mackenzie was a mystery who required actual seeking out. We are so proud to welcome her into the BMLG family.”

“I’ve always been all about the music and writing,” Carpenter adds. “My dad told me if I was going to do this, I needed to write the songs before anything else could happen. So, I’ve been really focused on that, on trying to be the most true I could be to who I am…Scott, Allison [Jones], George [Briner] and the team at BMLG really got to know me, so they understand my vision. Partnering with them is more than a dream come true.”

Carpenter joins the Valory roster that includes Tim McGraw, Thomas Rhett, Lady A, Carly Pearce, Sheryl Crow, Brantley Gilbert and Brett Young.

Steve Moakler’s Seventh Studio Project, ‘Make A Little Room,’ Set For August

Steve Moakler

Steve Moakler has announced he’ll release his new album Make A Little Room on Aug. 12. A first glimpse into the project will be available this Friday (May 20) with the release of the record’s title track.

“It really is the overarching theme of the record,” Moakler explains. “You can hang it all on that, this shift toward what ultimately matters. It’s the people around you and the little things. Having some margin in your life, and some space for magic to happen.”

Produced by Andy SkibMake A Little Room features tracks co-written or solely penned by Moakler with Luke Laird, Marcus Hummon, Neil Medley, and Lucie Silvas, among others. The 10 songs showcase an easy-going spirit, rootsy rhythms and tender vocals.

Moakler has enjoyed songwriting success for other artists as well, having penned songs for Reba McEntire, Jake Owen, Ben Rector, and Dierks Bentley’s Gold-certified track “Riser,” among others.

Make A Little Room Track List:
Make A Little Room (Steve Moakler/Kelly Archer/Nathan Spicer)
Tennessee Girl (Steve Moakler/Oscar Charles)
Pack It Up (Steve Moakler)
Autumn Came Back (Steve Moakler/Andrew DeRoberts/Lucie Silvas)
Start A Band (Steve Moakler/Neil Mason)
Better Days (Steve Moakler/Marcus Hummon/Neil Medley)
Let’s Go To The Lake (Steve Moakler/Luke Laird/Barry Dean)
Northerner (Steve Moakler/Stephanie Chapman)
You Being You (Steve Moakler)
Numbered (Steve Moakler/Andy Skib/Jacob Davis)

SOLID Raises $28,000 At Annual Music Row Madness Fundraiser At Topgolf

Pictured (L-R, front row): Jenna Smith, Darcie Van Etten, Maddy Sundquist, Chantrel Reynolds, Tatiana Angulo, Rio Van Risseghem; (L-R, back row): Rachel Guttmann, Jenn DiChiara, Avery King, Sean Fallon. Photo: Kenzie Leigh

The Society of Leaders in Development (SOLID) recently held its annual Music Row Madness fundraiser at Topgolf, raising over $28,000 for its 2022 SOLID Shares partners.

Proceeds from the event will go to ACM Lifting Lives, Equity Alliance, Music Makes Us, The Onsite Foundation, and The Store. Music Row Madness was led by Solid’s Community Outreach chairs, Maddy Sundquist of Madkat Management and Chantrel Reynolds of mtheory.

“We’re grateful for another great Music Row Madness season and to all the teams, donors, and friends that contributed to this amazing cause,” Reynolds states. “It was truly a great night and we’re already looking forward to next year!”

“Every time we have the chance to bring together our peers to fundraise for the community is a special opportunity,” adds Sundquist. “We’re so thankful for everyone who donated and our committee who made this whole event possible.”

The young leadership organization has been able to donate over $430,000 to local charities and nonprofits and in the past four years members have donated more than 500+ hours of their time to the Nashville community.

My Music Row Story: Make Wake Artists’ Chris Kappy

Chris Kappy

The “My Music Row Story” weekly column features notable members of the Nashville music industry selected by the MusicRow editorial team. These individuals serve in key roles that help advance and promote the success of our industry. This column spotlights the invaluable people that keep the wheels rolling and the music playing.

 

This edition of “My Music Row Story” is sponsored by Worldwide Stages.

 

Chris Kappy is the founder and owner of management company Make Wake Artists, and is in his sixth year as manager for superstar Luke Combs. During that time, he has grown the Make Wake roster by adding the talents of Niko Moon, Hailey Whitters, Drew Parker, Flatland Cavalry, Jackie Lee, Tyler Dial, Red Shahan, The Panhandlers and Keller Cox.

MusicRow: Where did you grow up?

I grew up in Stone Mountain, Georgia. I was born in Texas and lived there for two years. We moved to St. Louis and lived there for two years. My dad worked for the airlines. We moved to Georgia when I was five so I grew up in Stone Mountain.

I ended up going to Georgia State University. It was a commuter school then, now it’s a traditional campus. That’s where my love for music started. I grew up in a household of music. My mom was a big believer in The Temptations, the Four Tops, Otis Redding, and Gladys Knight. My dad listened to big band music. As I was coming up, I was listening to pop radio. Z-93 and 96 Rock out of Atlanta were the stations I was listening to.

Pictured (L-R): Kappy, Luke Combs, Niko Moon

What got you interested in country music?

I met a girl in college that introduced me to the band BlackHawk, and I was like, “What is this magic?” The harmonies were insane. “Goodbye Says It All” was the first song of their’s I ever heard. Then I started digging into country music and I really fell in love with bands like Shenandoah, Diamond Rio, and Little Texas. That’s the world I got into as I was listening to everything from Pearl Jam, Nirvana, Hootie and The Blowfish, and Sister Hazel. I fell in love with country.

How did you get into the music business?

In 2000 I was working in IT selling web hosting and stuff like that. I was killing it, I was doing very well for myself for my late twenties. A good friend of mine, Andy Levine, said, “You should come work for me. We’re gonna do this thing called The Rock Boat where we put bands on a cruise ship and go out to sea with their fans. I’ll pay you a third of what you’re making now, but you’ll be in the music business.” I was like, “Man, that’s a great idea. I should do this.” And I did. I quit my job and I went to go work for Andy. That started a 15-year relationship with bands and their fans on a cruise ship in the ocean.

Sister Hazel was the catalyst. They were my college band that I fell in love with. I would travel to go see them play anywhere and everywhere. To this day, I still am very close with all the guys in the band. We’re all very good friends and I still love their music. I learned from them how important it was to have the relationship with the fan. Their big hit was “All For You.” They had all these unbelievable songs, but they had a relationship with their fans that was beautiful. They cared so much about them and then they created The Rock Boat. From that event, it spawned off to Kiss, John Mayer, Florida Georgia Line, Paramore and 311. So for 15 years, I traveled with rabid fan bases, took 2,500 of their biggest fans on vacation, and essentially gave them a backstage pass for four days in the Caribbean. I thought I had the greatest job in the world.

Pictured (L-R): Kappy, Drew Parker

How did you end up in management?

I was living in Huntington Beach, California when I got a phone call from a buddy of mine named Bradley Jordan. Bradley calls me and says, “You’ve always wanted be a manager your whole life. That’s all you’ve ever talked about and you’re not doing it. You’re in your early forties. If you don’t do this, you’re going to regret it.” I was like, “Man, you’re right.” You have to have a friend like that to be able to tell you that. I packed everything up, broke my lease and moved to Athens, Georgia in November of 2014.

Bradley was [promoting] a Sam Hunt show at the Georgia Theater. This is when Sam was just blowing up. He put the show up for sale on Oct. 31 and it sold out in four minutes. He had me that day as the runner for that show, so I’m driving Brad and Sam all over town. I saw the kind of relationship they had and I was like, “I can do this.” I didn’t know what a point was on an album, I had no idea what a publishing deal was, but I remembered [a conversation I had] on a cruise with Brandi Carlile. Brandi and I had become very good friends and I remember talking to her asking, “Do you think I could do this?” She goes, “Kappy, I don’t even know what points are. I don’t care. You can do this.” That’s what I needed to hear.

[A little while later], I get a phone call and it’s Bradley. He said, “I found your guy. His name is Luke Combs.”

What was your first meeting with Luke like?

[We organized a show for Luke.] He shows up with the band in the van. They unload and start loading in and I meet Luke. He’s a nice guy. They’re starting to soundcheck and I’m like, “This guy can flat out sing!” I got to experience that moment that you have when you see Luke for the first time. The charisma and the passion that he had was there without even being in show mode. The show was awesome. I was like, “This is the guy. I want to manage this guy. I’ve got to get him another show to show him that I have some yank.”

[After another show,] I told him, “I’d like to manage you.” He goes, “What do you know about management?” I said, “Not a lot, but I got you this show. I’ve been around a lot of managers. I know that I can work just as hard as they can. I can be just as passionate as they can. Nobody will out-care me or out-appreciate what you bring to the table and we’ll do this together.”

He said, “Let me go talk to three managers in Nashville.” So he came to talk to three managers here in Nashville and all of them said he was a songwriter. He calls me up and says, “Hey, I met with all three managers.” I said, “What’d they say?” He goes, “You tell me what you want then I’ll tell you what they want.” I was like, “I want you to stand on stage every night and sing your songs, just like you do, and connect with the crowd. I’ll handle everything else.” He goes, “You’re my manager.”

I moved here Sept. 6 of 2016 and we got started.

Pictured: Kappy and Luke Combs embrace after Combs wins the CMA Entertainer of the Year

What was it like when you guys got to Nashville?

Early on I asked Luke what one of his goals were. He’s like, “Man, I drive this piece of crap Dodge Neon. I need a safe car. I don’t know if the brakes are going to work, it doesn’t have AC, and I have to drive this to writes and I hate it because people see me in this and this isn’t indicative of who I am.” I was like, “Alright, I won’t take any commission from you until we can buy you a new car—however long that takes.” I wasn’t rich. I had a small amount in savings and thought things would get going pretty quickly.

So we started and we had no money coming in. We had just enough money to pay the bills and if we didn’t have enough, I would pull money out of my savings to put gas in the van and stuff like that. Soon I am destitute. I have less than $50 to my name. Every night I’m taking the merch bin to the green room and taking all the food and water and stuff that’s left behind and putting it in there so I have something to eat. No one ever knew. Every penny that came in that was left over went into a Maxwell House coffee can that sat on top of Luke’s refrigerator. We would just stack cash in there. We were doing that and I was bleeding my account dry trying to figure it out. I sold stuff and did whatever I could to just make it work. I was driving our Sprinter van everywhere because I [had to sell] my car. I was going to meetings in this giant Sprinter and people were just laughing at me, but I couldn’t let Luke know that.

We saved enough money. We had $15,000 and we bought a 2013 Ford Fusion for him. That next weekend we did a show. We had $500 left over and Luke goes, “I got my car now. Take commission.” It was $75 bucks and I felt like I was Mark Cuban. The very next day we got a phone call that somebody had pulled out of an ATV park show and they were desperate to get somebody, so we got a $10,000 offer. Three days later we got an offer to play a private for a guy whose daughter was graduating high school. He offered us an obscene amount of money. Instantly we made all this money and I was like, “We’re gonna make it.”

Pictured (L-R): Hailey Whitters, Kappy

Now Luke is one of the biggest stars in our format, and you’ve added more artists and team members to your management company. Did you ever see yourself building out Make Wake to what it is now?

Absolutely not. I had no idea that it was going to turn into this. As I sit around my office and see the Niko Moon plaques, and I see the shows for Hailey Whitters, Flatland Cavalry and Drew Parker… I never thought I’d come to town and create a management company that would have 10 artists on the roster and 17 full-time employees. That was never a part of the plan. I have the weight of the careers of our artists on my shoulders and the weight of the employees that I have to take care of for them and their families. I never thought that I would ever have to worry about that stuff.

It doesn’t scare me, it’s just a lot to deal with. I’m lucky I have fantastic people out there that I can call on. I’m the first person to say if I don’t know something. I have great people that I can pick up the phone and call. I talk to either Kerri Edwards, John Peets, Clarence Spalding, or Marion Kraft once a week.

What’s something people might not know about you?

I lost 200 pounds. That’s something people might not know about. I ended up having gastric bypass surgery. I didn’t have good control of my weight, it was an unhealthy relationship. I knew that I needed to get control of it.

I remember being in the hospital after getting it done and being so depressed. I was thinking, “I can’t believe I just had to do this. You were such a loser. You couldn’t get this done.” Then I thought, “No, this is not how you need to be thinking. You just didn’t have a handle on it. You didn’t have control. You needed to get control and you got control.” I’ll see people now who haven’t seen me in forever and they’ll be like, “Woah, I didn’t even recognize you.” I talk about it because I want people to know that there shouldn’t be a stigma around it.

If someone was to ask you what your definition of success was, what would you say?

Being able to shop at Whole Foods without looking at prices. (Laughs)

When you sit with an artist and you’re like, “What are your dreams? What are your passions? What are your goals?,” and you can accomplish those. Some of them are extremely realistic, some of them are over the moon, but if you’re able to do that, that’s success. Seeing an artist on stage, seeing their fans sing their songs back to them—they’re so elated and they come off the stage and they’re like, “They were singing my songs!” That’s it, man. There’s nothing better than that.

Bonnie Marquez Named Senior VP, Marketing At Premier Productions

Bonnie Marquez has been named Senior Vice President of Marketing at live event promoter Premier Productions.

Marquez joins Premier with over 20 years of experience in the entertainment industry. She most recently worked as the Executive Vice President of Marketing at Activated Events, the company behind Boots in the Park, Wet Electric, Fiesta De Taco and Coastal Country Jam.

“We’re excited to have Bonnie on our team,” says Michael Pugh, CEO and Owner of Premier Productions. “Her experience, personality and excitement for the industry will only be able to push Premier and live music forward.”

“Premier Productions embraces faith, family and country,” adds Marquez. “All three of those values are extremely important in my life. I’m excited to work with this passionate group of people in taking Premier to the next level.”

In the first half of 2022, Premier launched the “Blippi The Musical Tour” and the “2022 Elevation Nights Tour.” This summer, Premier is behind tours for some of the entertainment industry’s biggest names, including Chris Tomlin with United, Dude Perfect and Baby Shark.

Thomas Rhett Teams Up With SiriusXM, Pandora For Exclusive Nashville Concert

SiriusXM and Pandora have partnered with Thomas Rhett for an exclusive concert for SiriusXM subscribers and Pandora listeners on Tuesday, June 7.

Rhett’s performance will take place at Nashville’s Marathon Music Works at 8 p.m. CT and will air live on SiriusXM’s The Highway and on the SXM App. Country singer Conner Smith, who was named one of Pandora’s 2022 Artists to Watch, will open the show.

SiriusXM subscribers and Pandora listeners can RSVP for free.

“I can’t wait to hang out with SiriusXM, Pandora and fans at this live show,” Rhett shares. “This concert is one week before my ‘Bring the Bar to You Tour’ kicks off, so it’ll be one of the first times I get to play some of these new songs live. It’s going to be a lot of fun.”

Ahead of the event, sponsors will provide a variety of activations and giveaways, including MGM Rewards welcoming fans to the show with a pre-show performance. Magnum ice cream will also invite attendees to strike a pose in a photobooth inspired by their new duet ice cream bars and treat fans to a complimentary sample. Tire Rack will provide fans with stadium-regulated totes for use at the event and throughout CMA Fan Fest weekend and Zaxby’s will provide bluetooth speaker keychains so fans can keep the music going after the event.

Additionally, Pandora will present several songs to fans on July 13 at 8 p.m. CT from Thomas Rhett’s performance during “Pandora Live in the 615: Thomas Rhett.”

Former T.J. Martell Foundation CEO Laura Heatherly Joins Monument Realty

Laura Heatherly

Laura Heatherly, formerly the CEO of the T.J. Martell Foundation, has joined Monument Realty in Dallas. She has relocated to Dallas and will begin her new role effective immediately.

A native of Farmers Branch, Texas, Heatherly started her career in sports marketing with positions at the Texas Rangers, the Harlem Globetrotters and the Los Angeles Olympic Organizing Committee. She later landed a longtime leadership role with the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation and then with the T.J. Martell Foundation where she rose to CEO and was based in Nashville.

“My passion for helping others and working with people from all walks of life fits perfectly with my decision to work with Monument Realty and I look forward to helping people find the home of their dreams,” Heatherly shares. “I am also so happy to be back in the Dallas-Ft. Worth area, a place near and dear to my heart with so many memories. Assisting people with purchasing their dream home is exciting and I am thrilled to be able to assist those who are relocating to the DFW area.”

“We are thrilled to have Laura join our team. Her ability to manage all types of personalities and people and her own personal sphere of nationwide contacts is an invaluable asset to our organization. Just like the Dallas Cowboys, Laura is quickly going to compete among the best,” adds Eddie Burns, CEO of Monument Realty.

To contact Heatherly, email Lauraheatherly@Monumentstar.com.

The TJ Martell Foundation for Cancer Research was in the news recently when Melissa Ann Goodwin, the former Exec. VP/General Manager for the foundation, was charged with wire fraud for allegedly embezzling nearly $4 million from the charity.

MTSU’s WMOT-FM Launches New Radio App

WMOT-FM, Middle Tennessee State University’s public radio station, has launched a new radio app, now available in the iOS App Store and via Google Play.

The app will allow listeners to tune into a livestream of WMOT’s programming from anywhere around the world. Users will also be able to access WMOT’s on-demand content, including recent interviews and performances such as “Wired In,” “Words and Music,” and “Finally Friday.”

“We’re excited to offer our listeners a new way to experience WMOT’s programming,” Executive Director Val Hoeppner notes. “Our new app will make it easier than ever for people to connect with the American roots music they love, whether they’re at home or on the go.”

Features in the app include DVR-like controls allowing listeners to pause the live stream or rewind to catch anything they might have missed; on demand availability for its signature shows, including “The String,” “The Local Brew,” “The List,” “SongTellers,” “Strange Roots Radio,” “The Old Fashioned” and “Somebody Say Amen;” access to the music editorial section of the station’s website; an alarm feature; and more.

WMOT Roots Radio 89.5 is a nonprofit arts organization dedicated to building community around Nashville’s musical heritage, championing music discovery, curating live music experiences and training the next generation of leaders in the media and entertainment industries.

Darius Rucker Revives Charleston Mansion In New Design Network Series

Darius Rucker is getting into the home renovation craze on a brand new show, Rucker’s Reno on the Design Network.

Rucker’s Reno follows the singer-songwriter as he revives a historic mansion in his Charleston, South Carolina hometown. The entire six-part series from The Design Network is available early to viewers now on Samsung TV Plus before rolling out to other services on May 30.

With an eye for design and an innate love of Charleston, Rucker and his team tackle the restoration of the home one room at a time, while also meeting up with local chefs, entrepreneurs, fishermen and friends as he highlights some of the top attractions in the area.

“It’s always an honor when I get to showcase my hometown of Charleston to the world, and I’m thankful to The Design Network for such a great platform to do just that,” Rucker shares. “The team on this project was so talented and made it such a fun, creative process from start to finish. I can’t wait for everyone to see the transformation!”

“We are thrilled to have been entrusted to tell this story and work with Darius and his amazing design team,” adds Jason Harris, founder and CEO of The Design Network. “It’s a big moment for our burgeoning network. It’s the perfect project, with the perfect person at the perfect time.’

A Look Into A History-Making No. 1 With Carly Pearce & Alexa Campbell [Interview]

Carly Pearce & Ashley McBryde. Photo: Courtesy of Big Machine Label Group

Over the past few years, country music has seen quite an increase in collaborations between some of the format’s biggest and brightest stars.

A hearty amount of the most successful collabs and highest rising songs of the last few years have been duets from artists such as Jason Aldean and Carrie Underwood (“If I Didn’t Love You”), Ryan Hurd and Maren Morris (“Chasing You”), Chris Young and Cassaddee Pope (“Think Of You”), and Blake Shelton and Gwen Stafani (“Happy Anywhere”), to name a few.

However, the number of female-driven collaborations has been few and far between before Carly Pearce and Ashley McBryde decided to join forces on their recent No. 1 single “Never Wanted To Be That Girl.”

Released in mid-September of 2021, the track is sung from the perspective of two women discovering the man they’re involved with has someone else, and finds the two women considering their own blind spots.

“I was in the middle of writing [29: Written In Stone] and had the idea to have another collaboration,” Pearce shares with MusicRow. “I’ve always loved Ashley, her music and the way she sang, so I just asked her if she would ever write a song with me. I reached out to her and she said yes.

“We had an honest conversation that day and she was trying to be sensitive to what I was going through in my personal life. Through that experience that I had, we were able to talk about something that so many women have been on at least one side of, but in a lot of cases, both sides of.” She continues, “We didn’t really know what we were writing until we had the first verse and the chorus, which is not typical. You don’t usually start writing and form it as you go, but in this case we really did write it from top to bottom. It almost wrote itself.”

“Never Wanted To Be That Girl” saw early signs of success as it became the most added single upon its release to country radio. Only months after its debut, the pair were also able to give a stirring performance of the track at the CMA Awards last November, and took home the Music Event of the Year at the 2022 ACM Awards in March 2022.

As Pearce carefully explains, there are a lot of things that must align for a song to be a single at country radio, and especially so when two artists are involved.

“Every star has to align and, in this case, it really did. Ashley was in a place where she could have it be her single and I wanted it to be my single,” the Kentucky-bred singer-songwriter gushes. “It all felt so meant to be and it’s crazy to see what it has done. It has been so special to see the power of music, honesty and vulnerability, which I think country music does the best.”

Carly Pearce & Alexa Campbell at the 57th Annual ACM Awards. Photo: Courtesy of Big Machine Label Group

In addition to the song’s success at country radio, the single’s accompanying music video has also racked up its own list of nominations, including Video of the Year at the 2022 ACM Awards and Collaborative Video of the Year at the 2022 CMT Music Awards.

The video’s director and Pearce’s photographer, Alexa Campbell, made her directing debut with the picturesque video which brings the song’s gripping story to life in vivid color.

“I got the idea for it when we were in the studio. Carly was about to record the song and I was there filming her,” Campbell recalls. “You can only hear a song for the first time once, so I just remember how it made me feel… I thought of my niece. She is seven and is at that age where she is starting to talk about what she wants to be when she grows up and the type of boys she likes at school. None of our conversations are ever about heartbreak or anything bad happening, though. It really got me thinking about how no little girl ever wants to grow up and have this happen to them.

With the storyline, Campbell wanted to incorporate the theme of Pearce and McBryde looking at themselves in the mirror and not recognizing who they see based on their individual circumstances. All taking place in one night, the pair recognize what was happening and both realize that they deserve better.

“I didn’t want to focus on the guy at all, but I thought he was necessary for the story to progress,” Campbell shares. “I really wanted to be intentional about him only being in the background and really focusing on Carly and Ashley’s emotions.”

She continues, “When it came to the end with them driving and coming together at the stoplight, I had actually overheard Carly’s idea for it. She had said something about them meeting at the grocery store, and I just thought it would be really cool to have them meet at a stoplight because in any kind of small town affair, you probably know who it is or you know of them. I wanted to try to incorporate that really small town feel of even when you’re on a night drive you could see her.”

The smash hit marks only the second female duet to top the country charts in 30 years since Reba McEntire and Linda Davis‘ “Does He Love You” from 1993. It also lived in the top 10 alongside another female duet chart-topper, Elle King and Miranda Lambert‘s “Drunk (And I Don’t Wanna Go Home),” further demonstrating the push for female representation in the country format.

“I have felt like [over the last few years] we’ve made such strides. I’ve felt positive about the women that I’m surrounded by in this industry, as well as the ladies that are ahead of and behind me,” Pearce notes. “I think you can see it in the last year with what has happened with me, or the way that this song and Elle King and Miranda Lambert’s song was the first time in the history of country radio that two female collaborations were inside the top 10 at the same time.

“Seeing what’s happening to people like Lainey Wilson, I think it’s a really amazing time to be a female,” she continues. “What we’ve been lacking over the last however many years is that we need to really focus on the music and the art that’s coming through, and not so much on the lack of it. We just need to really give these songs and artists a chance, and I feel like we’re starting to really see that.”

Pearce and McBryde have a packed summer ahead of them as Pearce serves as direct support on Kenny Chesney‘s “Here And Now 2022” tour, which will visit nearly two dozen stadiums and a handful of newly added amphitheaters through August.

Pearce and Campbell also have some plans and projects in the hopper as Pearce continues working on her highly-anticipated next project and Campbell teases new directing credits in the works.