Drew and Ellie Holcomb hit the road in web series highlighting COVID-safe travel in Tennessee

Drew and Ellie Holcomb have toured the world with their Americana band Drew Holcomb and the Neighbors, but Drew says his earliest memories of cross-country travel came in the back of a conversion van with his family. While the Memphis native visited almost every state in the country by the time he was in high school, his family's annual cross-state road trip to Knoxville and the Smokies stands out in his mind.

"Both of my parents were Tennessee grads, so we had a sort of standing tradition," Drew Holcomb said. "Every fall, we'd drive up there and stay in the mountains for a couple days and then go to Neyland Stadium and see a game."

About the series

This fall, Drew and Ellie took their family on an R.V. road trip of their own to promote COVID-safe travel across Tennessee. A web series chronicling their 1,600-mile journey premiered last week as part of "For the Love of Tennessee, Travel Safe," a new campaign from the Tennessee Department of Tourist Development. New episodes will debut weekly on YouTube, Instagram and Facebook until Nov. 11.

"The biggest surprise is definitely how much left there is for me to see in Tennessee," Holcomb said. "I've lived in every corner of the state. I still haven't even touched all of the really unique and beautiful places that are here."

Tennessee's tourism industry, which generated a record $23 billion in travel spending in 2019, was hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic. According to a press release from the state tourism department, travel spending in the state declined 87 percent in April.

For Holcomb, too, 2020 has been "the year of the pivot." Drew Holcomb and the Neighbors released a new album, "Dragons," in August 2019, but the band hasn't toured since the pandemic began. Holcomb said that while he and Ellie often bring their kids along while touring with their band, taking a road trip focused entirely on spending time with family was a new experience.

"You don't play a lot of concerts at state parks and zoos and museums, so it was cool to do things that you wouldn't have time to do if you were touring," he said. "The Museum of Appalachia was one, for example, where I've probably driven by that exit and seen those billboards so many times and never stopped."

Taking precautions

Part of the Holcomb family's pivot, of course, involved making sure their travels were COVID-safe. The trip was centered around outdoor attractions, like the Memphis Zoo, Bays Mountain and the Obed River. Canoeing, hiking and campfires are all highlights of the web series.

"Tennessee has so many places that are beautiful that you don't have to go indoors everywhere," Drew said. "We ate outside, we camped outside, and then everywhere we went, we tried to wear masks and social distance and abide by the CDC guidelines and public health experts' opinions."

New music

Drew and Ellie's music provides a soundtrack for the web series, with 2013 release "Tennessee" appearing in several promo clips. The couple wrote two new songs during their trip, and the story of those songs is captured for viewers.

"I don't think you can really tell the story of Tennessee without music, and so that made it a lot of fun for us as musicians," Holcomb said. "We still have the music. We can't gather in these big groups for concerts, but there's still music being made and music being experienced here in the state."

The series' first episode shows Drew and Ellie Holcomb writing a song about Rivers, their two-year-old son. The newest addition to the Holcomb family was named to honor Tennessee's most famous rivers, from the Cumberland to the Tennessee, but one of Drew's personal highlights came at a river he'd never even heard of before the trip.

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"The Obed River, I would literally tell anybody now, it'd be in my top five places to see in the state," he said. "I didn't even know it existed. I've been here for 38 years.

"I thought I knew Tennessee really well — again, I've been here my whole life — and I do know Tennessee pretty well," Holcomb said. "But there's a lot left to explore. It was a really cool opportunity for our family to realize much how much we even have here right at home."