WILMINGTON — Live Oak Bank Pavilion in downtown Wilmington has added two more concerts to its 2023 roster.
Country fans will have more to choose from in the upcoming year with the addition of Walker Hayes and Chris Rice. Live Nation already announced Parker McCollum and Tyler Childers would tour through next summer. As well, Azalea Festival announced Carly Pearce would perform at the venue in April.
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Tickets will be on sale for Hayes and Rice this week.
Walker Hayes
After starting his country music career as a songwriter in Nashville, Hayes scored his first hit with “Pants” in 2010, which ranked number 60 on the Hot Country Songs charts and number 53 on the Billboard Country Airplay.
Throughout the next decade, he had numerous singles also crack the top 100, including 2017’s “You Broke Up with Me,” ranking number 10 on U.S. Country Airplay, “’90s Country,” scoring the 52nd spot and 2019’s “Don’t Let Her” tracking number 56.
It wasn’t until 11 years later Hayes became a viral success on TikTok with “Fancy Like,” which propelled to number three on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100. He recorded a dance on the social media site, joined by his daughter, Lila.
The track was released as part of the EP “Country Stuff” on June 4, 2021, of which the tracks became the make up for 2022’s “Country Stuff the Album,” including singles “AA” (Hayes has been sober since 2015) and “U Gurl.” It’s his third album since 2011, though the musician has released five EPs.
Hayes will be at Live Oak Bank Pavilion on April 27 for his Duck Buck Tour. Special guests Ingrid Address and Ray Fulcher will join; tickets go on sale Friday, Dec. 16, 10 a.m.
Chase Rice
It won’t be Rice’s first visit to the Port City. He last took the stage in 2019 at Greenfield Lake Amphitheater, but before performed as part of the 2016 Azalea Festival. That year he even tweeted out his adoration for the Southern coast (his song “Carolina Can” also features a shout-out to Wrightsville Beach).
Though born in Florida, Rice grew up on a farm in Fairview, N.C., played football at UNC-Chapel Hill and spent time working for NASCAR, before becoming the runnerup on CBS’s reality show “Survivor: Nicaragua.”
A song he played on the series, “Buzz Back,” became part of his 2011 six-track EP “Country as Me.” It wasn’t until 2012, when Rice cowrote Florida Georgia Line’s “Cruise” featuring Nelly, that his first song charted on Billboard Hot Country Songs for 24 weeks.
Rice’s style is known as “bro country,” a blend of numerous genres including hip-hop, rock and R&B, often hailing a party culture. He worked with Florida Georgia Line again in 2020 on his single “Drinkin’ Beer. Talkin’ God. Amen.” It was the second single from his fifth studio album, “The Album,” released in spring 2021, and charted number one on Billboard Country Airplay.
Two months ago, Rice dropped a new track and video for “Way Down Yonder” in preparation for his forthcoming album, “I Hate Cowboys & All Dogs Go To Hell.” The 13-track LP will be released Feb. 10, 2023, and was written and recorded to honor Chase’s father who passed away when the musician was 22.
The 37-year-old artist posted to his Instagram account on Nov. 17: “For 10 years, I’ve put out glimpses of who I truly am in my music, but I’ve never been able to put it all together. … this one wrecked me. I finally deal with the loss of my dad in this music, and this is an album I know he would be proud of.”
Rice has released five albums to date and toured with top-hitting headliners, including Kenny Chesney. He will stop at Live Oak Bank Pavilion April 22 as part of his Way Down Yonder Tour, with Kameron Marlowe and Avery Anna. Tickets go on sale Thursday, Dec. 15, 10 a.m.
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