Jon Pardi’s Up All Night tour brought him to New England at the end of October, including stops in Foxboro, Portland, and Mohegan Sun. His own headlining tour comes after Pardi spent the summer opening up for Dierks Bentley, whom he refers to as a ‘big brother,’ on his Riser tour, alongside Chase Rice and Chris Young. While in Foxboro, Pardi took the time to talk with New England Country Music about his move to Nashville, songwriting, and his appearance on ABC’s The Bachelorette.
Jon Pardi arrived in Nashville from California in 2008 after driving for three days with his dog Bandit as his co-pilot, and an atlas. Pardi says he arrived before the ‘boom’ that is current day Nashville. “I can’t believe all the sky rises going up, Virgin Records is building a big studio, everyone’s coming to Nashville. When I came in ’08, it wasn’t booming. It was before social media was big.”
Jon is known for his upbeat, positive, and ‘in-your-face’ country sound. “I like to write upbeat, positive stuff. People don’t go to concerts to hear sad songs, especially at the Toby Keith bar outside of the Patriots’ stadium!” It may be because of his traditional country sound that country legend Alan Jackson picked Pardi to open up for him on his 25th anniversary tour that kicks off in January of 2015. “It was awesome, I was blown away,” said Pardi when he first heard the news. It was his dad’s reaction that meant the most for Pardi. “I called my mom and told her, and she cried. My dad, I could tell him I was going on tour with Luke Bryan, and he’d be like that’s cool but when I told him about Alan Jackson, he was like that’s like going on tour with George Strait, or Merle Haggard! Man, he was just so excited. My mom cries at everything, but to get that reaction out of my dad, that was fun.”
His favorite songs to perform are “What I Can’t Put Down,” and “When I’ve Been Drinkin’.” Pardi knew “When I’ve been Drinkin'” had to be released to radio because the fans would sing it as loud as ‘Up All Night.” “I was like man, people really dig this song, we gotta put it out on the radio and see how it goes.” “When I’ve Been Drinkin” was released to country radio on September 2,2 2014 and was the fourth single from his debut album, ‘Write You A Song,’ – one that he co-wrote 10 of the 11 tracks for. He has no method for song writing; he just gets an idea, gets a melody, and hangs out with good song writers. “That’s how it works, you get your good ones, you get your bad ones, and you just figure it out. There’s no method for me. It happens when it happens.”
Pardi performed in Virginia the night before his show in Foxboro and was looking forward to the grand finale of his ‘Toby Keith Weekend’ tour. “I’m really excited – we have a great crowd coming out tonight and we haven’t done a show around Boston in a while. To be honest, I’m not really surprised by the amount of country music fans in Boston. There are raving country fans all around here in New England, and it’s pretty cool. It proves the fact country music is everywhere and that’s really cool. Shoot, I love it.” Jon knows that while on his own tour the fans are there to see him and they’ll know the songs off his album and will be singing them back to him.
Pardi’s success as an artist and performer caught the producers of ABC’s The Bachelorette and he ended up performing on Season 10 of the hit show. They were great and we had a blast. It looked great; they had a waterfall in the back. I love they chose a song that wasn’t on the radio (“It Happens All the Time”), it was like ‘wow, they’re actually paying attention to what I’m doing,’ and that meant a lot to me.” When Jon was asked if he would ever go on the show himself, he gave a quick response of “hell no.” His rationale for the answer was he hates making girls cry, and said he isn’t a heartbreaker.
While talking to Jon, it was clear to see what a fun personality he has. When he performs, he wants his crowd to be into it and have fun with his music. He is going to continue touring, on his own tour and with Alan Jackson, and also work on a new album, while ‘trying to take over the world one day at a time.’
For more information, you can follow Jon Pardi on Twitter, Facebook and on his official website!
You can purchase Jon’s debut album, ‘Write You a Song,’ on iTunes here.