When the Hunter Brothers filmed the music video for their single "Born And Raised" in their hometown of Shaunavon, Sask., they'd figured a few familiar faces would show up for the shoot.
Roughly 1,200 people came to see the quintet ofcountry musicians perform. Shaunavon's population rolls in at 1,699 (as of 2016).
It's just another perk of living in a small town, according to Ty Hunter.
"We had the opportunity to record the music video for 'Born and Raised' in our parents' backyard, right behind the house we were born and raised in... it takes you back to the root and to the people, the experiences that taught you to be who you really are today."
Fast forward to today and they're no longer just household names in Saskatchewan. That's thanks to the group's knack for parody videos, borrowing Ed Sheeran's "Shape Of You" to highlight the messy side of parenting or Bruno Mars' "That's What I Like" for an ode to the world's largest Coke can in Portage la Prairie, M.B. (go ahead and Google it, it's a thing).
Despite their viral success with songs about tractors and parodies, Luke, J.J., Ty, Brock and Dusty, want to keep sharing the experience of growing up in small-town Canada.
"One of the things that we've really experienced and been fortunate to have around us is that small community, hometown, country feel and that country hospitality is very real," says J.J. Hunter during the group's first trip to HuffPost Canada. "We have neighbours that if you get stuck, if there's a fire, if there's anything going wrong, you don't have just one or two, you have the whole community out."
That country hospitality is very real.J.J. Hunter
It's that sense of community the group's happy to champion following their first performance and nomination at this year's Canadian Country Music Association Awards, regardless of the ups and downs.
"Our grandpa used to have a saying about living in a small community: 'You'd sneeze in the middle of the night and at the post office the next day you'd have a dozen people asking how your cold is,'" says J.J.
"That has its pros and cons because people know each others' business too, but there is a sense of camaraderie. There is that sense of support."