Country music act Rascal Flatts has announced their farewell tour, Taste of Country reports. The band asked its fans not to be sad about the stalwart act coming to the end of the road but to be excited about the new projects its members will be undertaking.
On Tuesday, the band took to Instagram to announce that the 2020 “Life Is A Highway” tour will double as a farewell tour. In the announcement, the band was quick to try to head off any sadness fans might be feeling about the breakup, saying that the tour is all about them, the fans.
The band also appeared on CBS This Morning to explain why they’re calling it quits. Lead vocalist Gary LeVox noted that after 20 years of performing, much of it on the road, they’re tired and need a break.
“We haven’t really had a break in 20 years. Our fans have given us so much, we’ve achieved so many milestones in our career,” he said.
Band member Jay DeMarcus noted that, for now, none of the guys in the group have specific plans for the next phases of their careers.
“We want to take the year and focus on celebration and thanking our fans for 20 wonderful years,” he said.
LeVox added that no one is sick, heading off rumors that a bandmember’s illness was causing them to call it quits on their careers.
Asked if they were open to reuniting in the future, DeMarcus didn’t rule it out.
“We make music, that’s what we do… we may do it again some day,” he said, joking that they weren’t going to sign any sort of pact ruling out a future reunion.
Rascal Flatts, which consists of LeVox, DeMarcus and Joe Don Rooney, burst onto the country music scene in 1999 after forming in Nashville , Tennessee. Beginning with their hit, “Prayin’ For Daylight,” the band went on to have 14 number-one singles on the Billboard Country Music charts.
One of the band’s best-known and signature songs, their 2006 cover of Tom Cochrane’s “Life Is A Highway,” was never actually released as a single. Even so, the song was featured prominently on the soundtrack to the runaway Pixar hit movie Cars and became a hit on country music radio stations. However, it failed to reach number one.
The “Life Is A Highway” farewell tour kicks off in Indianapolis, Indiana, on June 11 and concludes on October 17 in West Palm Beach, Florida.