“Normally Takes Months To Plan What We’ve Tried To Do In A Few Days” – Eric Church Credits Luke Combs For Getting Wheels In Motion For Hurricane Helene Benefit Concert

Country artists from the Carolinas are doing their best to give back. Hurricane Helene moved up through Florida, Georgia, Tennessee and Virginia at the end of September, completely devastating mountain towns in western North Carolina. That prompted a number of artists to band together to put on a benefit concert to help raise money for relief efforts. The massive, star-studded "Concert For Carolina" will take place on Saturday, October 26th at Bank of America Stadium in Charlotte, North Carolina. Eric Church and Luke Combs will be the headliners - along with Billy Strings and James Taylor. Of course, Luke and Eric are western North Carolina natives, with Luke growing up in Asheville and Eric in nearby Granite Falls. Erich Church explained today on The Bobby Bones Show that the whole expedited planning process has been a whirlwind, and he credited Combs for getting things kickstarted: "Luke called me almost the day or two after. We were still in the process of... we have a lot of boots on the ground. That's where I spend half my year. The community that we live in there is gone. We were still kind of dealing with that part when Luke called. Credit to him, he had already reached out to the Teppers and the Panthers and we started putting it together from there. It's normally takes months to plan what we've tried to do in a few days." And when it comes to the disaster relief efforts, Church made it clear that the destruction that took place won't be fixed in a matter of months. The people in the Carolinas have a long road to normalcy ahead of them, which is why the "Heart On Fire" singer believes that this concert could lay out some funding for clean up and rebuilding for years to come: "If anybody has seen the devastation there, this (recovery) is not a months long thing. This is a years thing. Being able to shed a light on that and being able to maybe silo some of this money that we can then look at the rebuilding and restructuring 12 to 18 months from now is going to be critical." When Church took some time to talk about the actual concert that will take place later this month, he teased that the night will feature "a lot of surprises," and that fans will be get more than their money's worth when they attend (the headliners alone would be worth the price of admission). As to why Church and others felt the need to step in and put on this "Concert For Carolina," the Chief basically said that the people of North Carolina need help, and everyone has to do their part to make that happen. Church also mentioned that's why he went ahead and released his song "Darkest Hour," since he felt as though it could do some good during this time: "What's always been impressive to me about the area is they're tough people, but those small communities when they have trouble, they can always rely on the community next door to come for help. The unique situation here is... there is no community next door. It's gone too. So it's up to us, it's up to the country, it's up to the state to be that community next door. And that's really the genesis of where this concert came from, where the song 'Darkest Hour' came from, all of these things are about, 'How can we be the community that responds to what I believe is the very fabric of America?'" Well said, Eric. You can listen to all of the other great points the country star made in the interview linked below: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QQEUyZ9AKos