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Luke Combs was on the side of the stage watching Jason Aldean‘s headlining set when a gunman open fired on 22,000 country fans at Route 91 Harvest Festival in Las Vegas. But while Combs feels it’s important to mourn, he notes that it’s equally imperative not to let the massacre alter day-to-day living.
In an interview with Today on Monday (Oct. 2), the singer reveals that at first he thought the gunshots were pyrotechnics. Those gunshots went on to kill at least 58 people and injure 530.
“We heard the first four shots ring out, and doing music for a living — you deal with pyrotechnics a lot on stage,” Combs tells Today (quote via CMT). “Nobody on stage really even batted an eye. It just seemed like it was part of the show. Nobody on stage was concerned, and so at that point we were just standing there. And then the first burst happened.”
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Pandemonium ensued, and the bursts of gunfire kept coming. Combs remained calm, as he wasn’t sure what was happening.
“I’ve been around firearms, and it didn’t sound like gunfire to me. Then I was in the catering tent with a fan who had kind of wandered back, and we were both talking about how it wasn’t gunfire,” he recalls, “But then we heard the next burst and it sounded like maybe [the gunman] had put a weapon out of the window, which would completely change the sound. At that point, this is 100 percent gunfire.”
In the moment, Combs wasn’t sure if it was an attack targeting the festival or if it was violence going on in surrounding Las Vegas streets. One thing he is sure of: the festival shooting won’t stop him from playing shows for his fans.
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