2 Lane Summer

There are at least a hundred country lanes between Illinois and Mississippi. But when it comes to country music, the ones that led Joe Hanson and Chris Ray to Nashville and to each other are the only ones that matter.

Hanson’s migration from the Chicago suburbs down to Nashville happened in 2018, after mastering his craft on the open-mic circuit in and around the Windy City. “I went to college for about a year. I always joke with people that technically, I’m still on winter break,” he laughs. “Because I never went back. I started pursuing music full time.”

Ray’s journey on that path was similar, but he had a head start on Hanson. He moved from Jackson, Mississippi in 2015, straight out of college. “I dropped out so that I could give this crazy dream a shot,” he says. “I moved to Nashville, and was living in a house with six other guys. We slept on the floor.” Ray took a job at Cracker Barrel, which gave him time between shifts to work on making music.

Then came the epiphany that together, they could have a more distinctive sound as a duo. One that was rich with the harmonies and vocals that come so naturally to both Hanson and Ray.

“I give all the credit to God, because I went from playing for empty bar stools to this,” Hanson says. And Ray says “We knew this was something special. Once we started getting into the same writing rooms, we just clicked as friends and as singer-songwriters.”