Eric Church

Like Dierks Bentley, Steve Earle and Waylon Jennings before him, Eric Church may seem like the proverbial square peg squeezed into this year’s Lollapalooza lineup. But to loosely quote a line from Hank Williams Jr., this country boy can survive. Born and raised in North Carolina, Church is country to the core, but his songwriting is closer to the true grit of Merle Haggard (and Illinois’ own John Prine) than most mainstream fare out of Nashville. He packs a punch as a performer, too, as shown on songs like “Ain’t Killed Me Yet” and “Lotta Boot Left to Fill” off of his sophomore album, this year’s Carolina (which went to No. 4 on Billboard’s Top Country Albums chart, and No. 17 on the Billboard 200 chart).

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