Luke Combs Enlists Old Crow Medicine Show for ‘Wagon Wheel’ in Nashville [WATCH]
Before capping off his two-night stand at Nashville's Bridgestone Arena on Friday night (Dec. 13), Luke Combs fulfilled his Grand Ole Opry membership duties by playing a short set for the long-running radio program. While there, he ran into fellow Opry members Old Crow Medicine Show and invited them to join him over and Bridgestone later that evening.
Old Crow took Combs up on his offer, resulting in an arena crowd-pleasing, collaborative version of the group's best-known song, "Wagon Wheel." Readers can press play above to watch the performance.
Old Crow Medicine Show singer and fiddler Ketch Secor wrote "Wagon Wheel" around an older Bob Dylan chorus for the band's 2004 self-titled debut. While the original recording alone made "Wagon Wheel" an ever-present scourge of bars frequented by country music cover bands, the song reached another level within popular culture when Darius Rucker released his own version in 2013. Rucker's hit reached the top of the Billboard charts en route to triple-platinum sales.
"We've been playing that song since we were like 17, and it's funny because we've never met Dylan, but the song is technically co-written by Bob Dylan," Old Crow member Critter Fuqua told the Island Packet in 2013. "What's great about "Wagon Wheel" is that it has grown organically. The popularity of it was all based on word of mouth."
Combs' two sold-out Bridgestone Arena concerts, the first of which took place on Thursday night (Dec. 12), conclude his 2019 Beer Never Broke My Heart Tour on a high note. The year has been a banner one for the singer, who released both an EP, The Prequel, and his sophomore album, What You See Is What You Get, in 2019.
In 2020, Combs will be touring in support of that new record, on his What You See Is What You Get Tour. The trek will begin on Feb. 7, at Columbia, Mo.'s Mizzou Arena, and will feature Ashley McBryde and Drew Parker as Combs' special guests.
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