Dustin Lynch has been on the road with Luke Bryan since 2015, when Lynch opened several dates on Bryan's That's My Kind of Night Tour in 2015 before serving as the opener on Bryan's Kick the Dust Up Tour that same year. Still, Lynch admits to being "surprised" when the country superstar asked him to open his 2016 Kill the Lights Tour as well.

"He asked me in person and then apologized that he asked me in person," Lynch recalls to The Boot. "He’s like, ‘I know management is probably going to be pissed off. I’ve never done this. I’ve always done it the right way. I just want you to know I’m excited.'

"I was like, ‘Man, thank you so much,'" Lynch continues, "because, at that point, I already knew that he had asked Little Big Town, and he didn’t know I knew that."

The Tennessee native has already watched Bryan perform many times, but he knows that there's plenty more to learn from him.

"I watched almost every single one of his shows, from different vantage points," Lynch explains. "I would say the No. 1 thing [I've learned], though, that I’ve kind of taken upon myself too hard is to be comfortable with who I am on stage, not be so absorbed in what I’m looking like or where I’m at or what I’m doing. It seems like he’s so comfortable, and I know for a fact he doesn’t know what the hell he’s doing, because every time we go on stage and sing together, we just kick off some song we never rehearsed.

"That’s allowed me to not take myself so serious, not be so calculated and interact more with who’s in front of me," Lynch adds. "I guess, be more present and not locked up in my head when I’m on stage."

A list of all of Lynch's upcoming tour dates, both solo and with Bryan, are available on his website.

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