Image Courtesy of Fueled by Ramenfun. frontman Nate Ruess kicked off a fall solo tour this past Friday night in Nebraska -- he'll be doing a mix of dates with Hozier, festival shows and solo headlining shows through the end of November. Surprisingly, the Grammy-winning singer says there's not that big a difference between being on tour with fun. or being on the road with his solo band -- as he puts it, "As long as you have amazing people on stage, the show will be great."
"It's just two great things," he tells ABC Radio of touring solo versus touring with his band. "The guys in fun. are unbelievable and so fantastic to have on stage, and so I made it a point that when I was gonna do the solo thing to have great people on stage too. And I'm lucky, I've got such a great band; they're as good as it gets to me."
Nate says he's also having fun -- pardon the pun -- mixing fun. songs in with the tracks from his solo disc, Grand Romantic, which debuted in the top 10 earlier this year. "It's cool to find ways to throw in these brand new songs that feel so foreign to maybe the songs that I was writing 10, 12 years ago," he tells ABC Radio."And finding a way to not only make them work in a set list, but to have people respond to over 10, 15 years of music."
Nate's touring on somewhat of a smaller scale than he did with fun., because as a solo act, he's essentially a new artist, despite fun.'s high profile. But he says he doesn't really mind, because he's used to having to struggle a bit. In fact, he says the massive success fun. had with their Grammy-winning album Some Nights was kind of weird for him.
"I've been lucky to have a career that the arc has felt natural," he explains. "It was a steady incline at the beginning, and then it kinda shot up when we did Some Nights, and then it's nice to be kind of back to working through, like, a steady incline; it's something that I'm much more used to."
Of course, it's always tough for an artist to launch a solo career when you still can't turn on the radio without hearing the songs you did with your band -- like "Carry On," "We Are Young" and "Some Nights." But Nate says he's happy that the fun. songs continue to be so popular.
"I would love nothing more than to have songs that people sing throughout the year," he tells ABC Radio. "Most of the music that I love comes from another era, so to think that there could be someone like me 15 years from now that's listening to those songs, that would mean as much as someone listening to them now, for sure."
Tonight, Nate and Hozier perform together in Rogers, Arkansas.
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