Country music star John Rich teared up Tuesday during an interview with Tucker Carlson on Fox Nation.
In a clip shared on Instagram, Rich tells Carlson how the first thing he bought when he started making money from music was a house for his grandparents. During the conversation, Rich’s eyes “filled with tears” according to the caption in the post.
View this post on Instagram
Rich was raised in a blue collar family in the Texas panhandle, according to Fox News. He turned down going to college in favor of pursuing his music career, which has since flourished. His latest single, “Progress” went straight to #1 on Apple iTunes, overtaking performers like Lizzo and Billie Eilish. (RELATED: John Rich Has A Blunt Message For Progressives, And It’s About To Become An American Anthem)
“First thing I did, my Granny Rich and my Papaw Rich, World War II vet, and here’s a woman that was born in the Dust Bowl days in the middle of west Texas in the Great Depression,” Rich told Carlson. “Simultaneously these things are going on, and they were social security, she’s still working 40, 50 hours a week at the dollar store. He’s trying to flip used cars. I get my hands on this money and I thought, you know what, the only reason I get to go chase down dreams like this is ’cause an old man like that, that went out and fought and bled for our right to go do it.”
The property was out in the country, according to Rich. After he purchased it for his grandparents, he remodeled the basement and lived there for four years as his career took off. He called the experience the “time of his life.”