Lanco Know Their Fans Want Them to Keep It Real
Over the past few years, Lanco have garnered a fanbase that has helped launch them from five guys with a dream sharing a rental house to a must-see country band. The group -- who have gotten pretty autobiographical with their writing lately, they share -- say Lanco's fanbase isn't made up of any one type of person, just people who appreciate their realness.
"It wasn’t a look or style; it wasn’t a way they dressed. It’s a very diverse crowd," Lanco frontman Brandon Lancaster recalls of the audiences on the band's last headlining tour. "I think that’s one of the cool things about it: Somehow, whatever is in our head, whatever things we’ve gone through, we found on that tour that we’re not alone. There are other people out there. Hopefully, that keeps growing.
"A Lanco fan relates to us, has been through the things we’ve been through or appreciates the fact that we’re telling those stories," he adds. "All I know is that we have just told stories about what we’re going through and who we are, and that seemed to work -- seems like we have a lot of people out there that relate to that."
Lanco are currently on the road for their own headlining What I See Tour, with opening dates on Miranda Lambert's Wildcard Tour sprinkled on their calendar between those shows. They've spent a lot of their career on the road, bringing their music directly to their fans. The five-piece country group is known to rock out and improvise in the live setting, much to the excitement of the crowd and the advantage of their vast relatability.
"We might jam for four minutes or five minutes and all swap solos, and they’re into it," Lancaster says of the band's fans. "They are watching and they are glued in."
The band also engages with their fans quite a bit through social media. The members take turns picking records to play on the tour bus during their free hours, which is an activity they cherish as they learn about new music and bond over favorites. Recently, they decided to bring fans into one of these moment and were happily surprised by what they shared.
"We posted a thing the other day that was like, 'What are you guys listening to?' on our story, and a lot of the music that they were listening to, we also listen to," Lanco member Tripp Howell recalls. Fans listed artists including the Band, Chris Stapleton and the Lumineers, all of whom the Lanco guys also enjoy.
It was a moment of enlightenment: The fans are attracted to Lanco's music because it's honest, just like the classics. The band operates with a staggering knowledge of music history, listing favorites such as Crosby, Nash, Stills and Young and Glen Campbell during the press event. Those influences come through in their own songs, and fans can clearly spot it.
"You start discovering, somehow, this music is connecting us to people," Lancaster says. "If we had a party and they brought a record, they would bring a record that we all wanna listen to."
The common thread in all of these fan experiences is authenticity, according to Lanco member Jared Hampton. The band is genuine no matter what they're doing, and that's a quality many country music fans crave.
"I think that our fanbase is people that are drawn to authenticity and pursuing authenticity," Hampton reflects. "They think about their lives in an authentic way, and I think that that is an MO for us, to try to be our most authentic selves, whether that’s right here right now, whether that’s in the studio, that’s on the stage, when we’re singing "Greatest Love Story" or jamming for four minutes. It’s all us.
"I think people can see that, they hear that," he adds. "That’s why we like the same music, too: They like authentic music."
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