In the nearly 19 months since Eric Church’s last concert in Charlotte — a three-hour marathon at Spectrum Center as the pandemic was receding — the country music star has become a bigger name than ever in his home state of North Carolina.
And he’s done so for reasons that have a lot less to do with country music than one might have ever expected.
First, during the 2022 NCAA men’s basketball tournament, Church famously (infamously?) canceled a concert in Texas with just a few days’ notice so he could take his family to see the University of North Carolina play in the Final Four against Duke.