By Adam Lucas

PITTSBURGH—It takes a lot of work to make it look this easy.

The Free the Machine tour debuted in Pittsburgh on Friday night, one of the most daring shows Eric Church has put together in his nearly two decades on stage. In many ways, it’s the culmination of everything he’s been doing since the end of the Outsiders Revival tour in 2023.

There’s a little bit of the gospel-inspired Stagecoach set. A dash of the intimate residency shows he’s performed at Chief’s in Nashville and internationally at Royal Albert Hall. A full dose of the new album, Evangeline vs. the Machine, of course. And, because it’s Eric Church, even with 713 days between the last day of Outsiders Revival and the first day of Free the Machine, there were a few surprises he only cooked up in the last 48 hours.

“Since you’re the first show of the tour, you get the first look at what everyone else is going to see on this tour,” Church said from the stage.

The total crew hours that went into producing Friday evening have to be in the hundreds of thousands. There are as many as 24 people on stage during certain points of the show. Simply moving those people around the stage is an intricate dance. The band and crew rehearsed the show in Lititz, Pa. last month and came away with several tweaks. Part of Church’s genius is the way he meshes his creativity with similar masterminds like John Peets (who has been at every rehearsal, making sure the full Evangeline vs. the Machine story is told from opener “Hands of Time” to closer “Through My Ray-Bans” on every single night) and Butch Allen (the lighting is so intricate in the show that it’s almost the 25^th person on stage).

Together with Eric and Katherine Church, they’ve created a show that is the very best combination of all three nights in Red Rocks this past July, starting with the full two dozen people on stage and winnowing it all the way down during the night to just Church himself on stage for “Sinners Like Me.” “It’s just you and me now,” he told the packed house.

And until Friday night, that crowd was the one missing character. The full band rehearsed at an empty PPG Paints Arena on Thursday night, with the complete lighting setup. The songs are still great. “Hell of a View” is still an incredible piece of artistry. But it’s missing something in front of empty seats.

It’s even better with 15,000 people singing along, with “you holding me holding you” all over the arena and drinks in the sky. That was the part that had largely been missing over these last couple of months. You can practice it in an empty warehouse. You can turn on all the lights.

But to make it one of those unforgettable nights, you need the Choir. You need the people who lined up for early entry several hours before show time. You need the anonymous-to-protect-his-identity teacher from Canton who took a sick day to make sure he’d be there for the first show of the tour. You need the mom who plans a visit to see her college student daughter in Pittsburgh so they can go to the show together.

And you—sorry, yinz—need the city itself. “We don’t pick just any city to open a tour, you know,” Church told the crowd. “We’ve done some damage together over the years.”

Church’s younger son is traveling with him this weekend. He paid a visit to Acrisure Stadium early on Friday morning and got a full tour…and another souvenir.

“They gave him a Terrible Towel,” the nocturnal Church said of the iconic Steelers piece of fan gear. “And you know what’s really terrible about that towel? When you’re fast asleep and it hits you across the bridge of your nose.”

“Pittsburgh woke me up really early this morning,” he said with a grin. “And I’m hoping Pittsburgh keeps me up really late tonight.”

Church did his part to ensure that late curfew, playing for over two hours and taking some chances. He played an entire album, sure, but also a healthy selection of the best sing-alongs that make for a great show. He inserted “Springsteen” just over halfway through the set, an uncharacteristic slot for a generational song. That prompted him to recall, on the fly, a relevant story.

“Since we’re all friends here…We played the Steelers stadium with Kenny Chesney a few years ago,” he said, as guitarist Driver Williams began to chuckle.

“Yeah, you know what I’m going to say,” Church said as Williams doubled over with laughter.

“I was full of myself,” Church continued. “I decided we were going to start with Springsteen. So we’re backstage and I start talking to Kenny.”

The following conversation ensued.

Chesney: “What are you going to open with?”

Church: “Springsteen.”

Chesney (laughing): “No, seriously.”

Church: “Springsteen.”

Chesney: “Are you guys fucking nuts?”

Just thinking about the exchange made Church smile. “Yes,” he said. “Certifiable.”

But the crowd loved that hit and all the hits that followed, plus some that Church hasn’t played in a while. Other than a couple performances at small shows at the Country Music Hall of Fame, Church has played “Monsters” just once live since 2019. But he did it again on Friday night, a stripped down version where he was joined by only Joanna Cotten and Jeff Hyde.

“It’s been a tough week for America,” Church said. “I’ve been thinking about this song. It wasn’t something I was going to play tonight, but I remember when my three-year-old came to me and said he had monsters under his bed. I remember walking into his room and thinking, ‘If we only had to worry about just the monsters under the bed.’”

The work that went into preparing the show allowed the star to make last-second additions like that one. And there’s more to come. A second leg of Free the Machine was released on Friday via the tour t-shirt, which includes shows from Washington, D.C. to Toronto to Greensboro to Tulsa.

The entire crew will spend these next eight months trying to get it exactly right but never being satisfied with any of it.

“I’d be happy at two hours and 45 minutes,” ace stage manager Sambo Coats said as he clocked the load-out time and watched the crew start to break down what will be set up in Columbus early tomorrow morning. “But we’re shooting for 2:30.”

Columbus and Philadelphia and Boston and New York and over three dozen other cities…they’re on their way. The work never stops—Peets was still programming a couple last-second tweaks when doors opened Friday night—but damn an Eric Church tour is fun. It’s crew members Anthony D’Angio and Darrell Sullivan squeezing together into one crew t-shirt and walking around the production office. It’s Church standing on stage with the original members of the ECB and telling the crowd, “I’m not really sure what the plan is right now. We’re just playing songs.” And it’s every person who has a ticket, who lights up their phone during “Monsters” or yells “I…am…the storm!” during “Storm in Their Blood” or raises a glass to “turning up, slowing down, and cars that go real fast.”

It’s the very best combination of what you’ve seen and loved before, what you’ve never seen before, and anything the creative geniuses might dream up in-between. In other words, it’s an Eric Church tour. And it’s finally back.