“I Was Never Scared To Fail” – Luke Combs On His Mindset When He Was First Got To Nashville To Play Country Music

The conversation between Luke Combs and Garth Brooks continues.

The two stars sat down for an “Artist-to-Artist” conversation on the BIG 615 radio station. Garth launched the station (on TuneIn) in June of 2023, and in his words, it was an effort to take country music to the global scale, while honoring where it comes from (hence the 615 area code).

The radio station is currently in the middle of airing an in-depth discussion that Combs and Brooks shared – split up into multiple parts. The first conversation focused on Combs’ humble beginnings, the second clip showed the country stars praising Randy Travis’ impact on country music, and yesterday’s revealed that Combs’ cover of “Fast Car” almost didn’t happen.

Today, the clip that was shared showed a backwards-chair-sitting Brooks talk to Combs about how lucky artists have to be in order to break through in Nashville. Garth mentioned how blown away he is by the talent in the city, yet he admitted that he doesn’t know how some people make it and others don’t.

Combs agreed, and related it to when he was getting started in Music City:

“It really is wild man, and I felt that way for a long time. I’d be like, ‘Gosh, when I’m in town, am I really good enough to be here (in Nashville)?’ I felt like I was. I believed in myself. I was never arrogant, but I always thought, ‘I feel like I can do something.'”

The “Ain’t No Love In Oklahoma” singer went on to say that part of what helped him when he made the move to Tennessee to try and make it in music is that he was willing to do quite literally anything. He described his mindset by relating himself to tofu, and it’s one of the greatest Luke Combs quotes you”ll ever read:

“I was just cool with whatever when I got here. There wasn’t an, ‘I need to be an artist,’ or ‘I need to be a this.’ It was more of a, ‘I’m just a piece of tofu dude. Whatever you put on me is what’s going to happen.’ You know what I mean? That’s what I’m going to taste like.”

Luke Combs: the Tofu of Country Music.

That sounds insulting, so forget that I said it… though it was Luke that said it first. Anyways, Combs went on say that his relaxed mindset paired with his steadfast work ethic helped him stay the course when he was first trying to make it in music. And he explained that he had something to fall back on if things didn’t work out:

“As long as music something was in my job title, that was my goal when I got here. So if Nashville didn’t work, I always had the thing that still inherently made me happy at home that I knew I could do cause I had already done it.

I was never scared to fail when I got here. I would have been appreciative of anything. Everything I’ve achieved is just extra. I just wanted to not work a job that I hated, and I wanted to do music and make a living doing it.”

And Combs achieved exactly that.

You can hear more from Garth and Luke in the interview below: