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Kacey Musgraves and Noah Kahan are teaming up to release a new duet rendition of Kahan’s “She Calls Me Back” on Friday (Oct. 6). Kahan revealed the upcoming collab through a social media post that included a voicemessage from Musgraves saying, “Hi, you’ve reached the voicemail box of Kacey Musgraves and Noah Kahan. We’ll call […]
Years ago, when Brad Paisley was racked with pain from a ruptured disc during a trip, a long-forgotten doctor gave him a prescription for OxyContin with instructions to take it as needed.
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“I knew enough at that point,” Paisley remembers, “to rip it up.”
But the experience also gave him enough information to understand how his home state of West Virginia had become ground zero for an opioid crisis. Paisley and co-writer Lee Thomas Miller (“In Color,” “It Matters to Her”) addressed the topic in “The Medicine Will,” a gripping overview that appears on Son of the Mountains: The First Four Tracks, an EP released Sept. 29 that teases his next album. They could have easily turned “Medicine” into a trudging ballad of anger and grief, but instead embedded it in a midtempo package that hints at the strength of resilience. Though to be clear, anger is distinctly buried in there, too.
“I really do believe that this might be the best song I’ve ever written,” notes Paisley. “I can say that humbly. I do think that it’s as important as anything I’ve ever written — whether anything I’ve ever written is important. It feels that way because I know what it can mean to where I’m from. If you’re going to write a song about where you’re from, you want it to do some good.”
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Paisley was already deep into the creation of his next album when Miller watched the Netflix series Dopesick, which premiered Nov. 10, 2021.
“It’s very damning,” Miller says. “It’s not a feel-good 30-minute [sitcom], but the more I researched after watching it, it was pretty accurate.”
The project documented how Purdue Pharma, owned by the Sackler family, twisted government connections and processes to con a vulnerable population into believing that OxyContin was nonaddictive. The company persuaded two congressional Republicans — Tennessee’s Marsha Blackburn (now a senator) and Pennsylvania’s Tom Marino (no longer in Congress) — to introduce a bill that made it difficult for the Drug Enforcement Administration to penalize drug companies. Once it passed, Purdue specifically induced coal-mining communities in West Virginia, eastern Kentucky and western Pennsylvania to use OxyContin to quell the pain caused by back-breaking work. Some 12 million pills were shipped to Kermit, W.Va., a town of just 350 people. As a result of the campaign, one county in the state estimated 10% of its population was opioid-dependent.
“Everywhere where [drug companies] should have been shut down, they doubled down,” says Miller. “They knew they would make all this money — I mean, they made Saudi Arabian money.”
Watching Dopesick, Miller scribbled down a thought: “If the livin’ here don’t kill you/ The medicine will.” He brought the hook and the topic to Paisley, who admits he was skeptical: “I said, ‘Yeah, I think that’s an interesting idea. I don’t know how good a song it would be.’ That was my instinct.”
But they toyed with it anyway at the bar in Paisley’s home studio, The Wheelhouse. Paisley established an acoustic guitar feel that sounded as dark as “Whiskey Lullaby,” and he grew more positive about the idea once he had the twisted opening lines to the chorus: “There’s coal under the mountains/ And gold in them there pills.”
“Whenever I play it for somebody, I watch their eyes because I need to make sure that they hear the word,” Miller says. “Once you get the word ‘pills,’ you know what we’re talking about.”
They sketched out some of the song’s repetitive themes, particularly one built around digging holes. They addressed digging the mines, digging graves for overdose victims and digging a hole that’s “hotter than the sun” where the Big Pharma executives can roast for eternity.
“No one’s gone to jail yet,” observes Paisley.
He “wrestled with the melodies,” he says, careful to make it inspiring and listenable, but not Pollyannic. Ultimately, the structure builds from a dark-sounding verse to a transitional pre-chorus (Paisley calls it a “channel” because it works almost like a mine shaft, transporting the listener to the next section), ultimately reaching an energetic chorus, offset by the stinging bite of bluegrass harmonies. Once they had a verse and chorus completed, Paisley went to the studio upstairs in a converted bedroom and put down an instrumental bed.
They continued working on “The Medicine Will” for several weeks, chipping away until they had a song that told the story without naming names and without wallowing in victimhood. Much of its power rested in their ability to shape a narrative that plays out like a news piece but still feels like a call to action.And when the band swung into action, “The Medicine Will” found its full expression. Working with co-producer Luke Wooten (Dierks Bentley, Dustin Lynch), Paisley augmented his road crew with three bluegrass pros — Dobroist Jerry Douglas, vocalist Dan Tyminski and mandolinist-vocalist Sierra Hull — whose presence underscored the Appalachian foundation of Paisley’s home state. Midway through tracking, Kenny Lewis switched from an electric bass to an upright model, enhancing that acoustic sound, though Paisley wasn’t strict about following the bluegrass tradition.
For starters, he still utilized drummer Ben Sesar on the track, and he added burning electric guitar at a later date. Additionally, he had Kendal Marcy apply a Hammond B-3 organ. Like each of the eight instruments in the mix, it gets subtle moments to make its presence felt without ever dominating the proceedings.
“That was one of the pieces of glue because if you’re going to make a song about this area of the country, it’s not all just bluegrass,” Paisley says. “There’s something about that B-3 that feels churchy.”
While he worked on “The Medicine Will,” Paisley heard from Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), who — unaware of the song — invited the singer to appear June 1-2, 2022, at a GameChanger prevention education event in White Sulphur Springs. Paisley performed the song live for the first time at the bipartisan gathering for 500 kids. He later shot a video in a Beckley, W.Va. mine.
“I can’t even express what that was really like, standing there singing and the water trickling, and the echo of it, and you’re however-many-hundred feet below the ground,” recalls Paisley.
The video features a number of recovering opioid victims as well as Manchin, who confirms the pharmaceutical abuse behind “The Medicine Will”: “They preyed on the people who did the hardest work, who sacrificed the most, because they figured they’d be the most dependent.”
“The Medicine Will” fits into a bigger arc in Paisley’s public persona. His recording of “Same Here,” featuring Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy (included in the new EP) and his participation in The Store, a grocery outlet that provides free food for needy Nashvillians, demonstrate his intent to use his platform for something bigger.
“It would be so much simpler, easier, to just be like, ‘OK, here’s a song about love, or a situation, or something funny,’ ” Paisley says. “But that isn’t what I’ve done. For better or worse, this is a phase of my career where I have to say something.”
When vocalist and piano player Ronnie Milsap worked with Elvis Presley on Presley’s 1970 hit “Kentucky Rain,” Milsap recalls The King possessing a keen sense of the feel and drive he wanted on the song.
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“He’d say, ‘More thunder on the piano, Milsap!’ You’d go to a low note on the piano and he just wanted more thunder,” Milsap relates to Billboard.
Thanks to his soulful singing and piano playing, and his exuberant stage presence, the Country Music Hall of Famer Milsap has been bringing the thunder for five decades, on such signature songs as “Stranger in My House,” “Smoky Mountain Rain” and “(There’s) No Gettin’ Over Me.”
Tonight (Oct. 3), the wide-ranging scope of his sound and influence on country and pop music will be highlighted during his final Nashville concert, taking place at Bridgestone Arena. A swath of artists will take the stage to honor the 80-year-old Milsap, including Trace Adkins, Ricky Skaggs, Little Big Town, Kelly Clarkson, Charlie McCoy, The McCrary Sisters, Ray Stevens, Steven Curtis Chapman, Pam Tillis, the Gatlin Brothers, BRELAND, Elizabeth Cook and more.
“I think we’re going to blow up the Bridgestone. We’re going to blow it up. I’m very thankful for everyone,” Milsap says of the evening.
In 1977, Milsap won entertainer of the year, and over his career has taken home album of the year four times and male vocalist of the year three times from the CMA Awards. He earned Grammy Awards for his Kenny Rogers duet “Make No Mistake, She’s Mine,” and his own “Lost in the Fifties Tonight,” “(There’s) No Gettin’ Over Me,” “Please Don’t Tell Me How the Story Ends,” and “(I’m A) Stand by My Woman Man.”
Several of the artists on the Bridgestone lineup collaborated with Milsap on his 2019 album The Duets, including Little Big Town, with whom he recorded “Lost in the Fifties,” and Chapman, who sang “You’re Nobody” with the singer.
“They’re really good, wonderful people,” Milsap says of LBT. “They are fun to be around. We did that song on [Jimmy Fallon]’s show and they were just wonderful.”
Of Chapman, “he used to pitch me and Ronnie songs,” Milsap’s current producer, Rob Galbraith, tells Billboard. “Sometimes he would text me from the road and just say, ‘Man, I’m listening to some of Ronnie’s old stuff. Thank you for cutting that music.’”
Milsap has an even closer tie with another performer on the bill: since 1976, Milsap has lived in a Nashville residence he bought from Stevens.
“I loved working with Ray,” Milsap says. “Ray wanted to move out of this house because Webb Pierce lived across the street and he was selling tapes and CDs out of his house there and Ray said he wanted out of that. Well, Webb also played music kind of loud.” He adds, “Ray Stevens is one smart cookie, I’m telling you.”
Having a plethora of artists singing his music and feting his work is light years away from Milsap’s difficult childhood. The North Carolina native was born blind and was subsequently abandoned by his mother, who felt her son’s blindness was a kind of divine punishment. He lived with his grandmother from age one, until he was enrolled in the State School for the Blind in Raleigh at age six.
The school had a premier music program, with Milsap learning classical technique. He took up violin at age seven and piano a year later, all the while soaking up sounds of Jerry Lee Lewis, Ray Charles and Fats Domino from the radio. Milsap studied at Young-Harris Junior College in Atlanta, but ultimately turned down a full law school scholarship to chase his dreams of music. His first release came with his 1963 single “Total Disaster.” He first broke through as an R&B singer, earning a top 20 hit on the R&B Songs chart with Ashford & Simpson’s “Never Had It So Good.”
He relocated to Memphis in 1968, working with legendary producer Chips Moman. Milsap was also playing several clubs around Memphis, including The Thunderbird and TJ’s; Presley would bring in Milsap in to play a few of his New Year’s Eve bashes.
“I said, ‘Elvis, any possibility you want to get up and sing anything? We know all your songs,’” Milsap recalls of those parties. “He said, ‘No, I’d rather sit here with my friends and enjoy the evening.’ Elvis went around kissing all the girls ‘Happy New Year.’”
Milsap calls those Memphis years “magical,” saying, “Everything that happened in Memphis, with Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins, Elvis … that energy was all over the place.”
Even so, Milsap’s heart was in country music. “I decided I needed to do what I wanted to do, not what everyone else was asking me to do,” Milsap recalls. After seeing him perform in a nightclub, Charley Pride encouraged Milsap to move to Nashville.
Milsap moved to Nashville in 1972 and quickly landed a gig playing five nights a week at a popular Nashville industry hotspot, Roger Miller’s King of the Road Motor Inn. Milsap, who was managed by Pride’s manager, Jack Johnson, recorded a batch of demo tapes, and they took them to then-RCA Nashville label head Jerry Bradley.
“Jerry said, ‘We know about Milsap. He’s down there in Memphis and he plays rock n’ roll and rhythm and blues. He’s not a country singer,’” Milsap recalls. “Jack played him a song I cut called ‘That Girl Who Waits on Tables,’ and Jerry heard that and said, ‘Well, that S.O.B. really is a country singer.’”
Milsap’s slate of hits in the 1970s and 1980s proved Bradley correct. Milsap’s first Hot Country Singles top 10 hit with RCA Nashville was 1973’s “I Hate You.” “That Girl Who Waits on Tables” reached No. 11 on the same chart a year later. In 1974, he earned his first No. 1 there with the Eddie Rabbitt-penned “Pure Love,” launching a string of chart successes that also included the Grammy-winning “Please Don’t Tell Me How the Story Ends,” as well as “Daydreams About Night Things.”
His blend of country and soul sparked even greater crossover triumphs in the 1980s, most notably with his 1981 hit “(There’s) No Getting’ Over Me,” which spent two weeks atop Billboard’s Hot Country Songs chart but also garnered Milsap his most preeminent pop chart hit, reaching No. 5 on the Billboard Hot 100 and earning a Grammy for best country vocal performance, male.
Milsap has earned 35 Billboard Hot Country Songs No. 1 hits, many of them recorded in his own studio, which he purchased from Roy Orbison in 1978 and renamed Groundstar Laboratories. Among the songs recorded at the studio with his then-producer Collins were 1979’s “Nobody Likes Sad Songs,” and the Mike Reid-penned 1983 hit “Stranger in My House,” which netted a Grammy for best country song.
“We cut everything there, as soon as Mike Reid would write a song, I’d get in there and record it,” Milsap recalls. Affectionately known as “Ronnie’s Place,” the studio is now under the ownership of Black River Entertainment.
Notably for an artist who grew up steeped in the soulful sounds of artists such as Charles, Lewis and Presley, Milsap was inducted into the Memphis Music Hall of Fame last year. Recently, he’s spent time recording in his home studio, cutting classics from the Great American Songbook for a project he hopes to release next year.
“It’s not a small studio; it fits like six or seven people in there, but it’s a wonderful studio,” Galbraith says. “We did an album like this back in 2004 [Just For a Thrill], but we’re doing other songs and more songs that Ronnie grew up on. We cut [Frank Sinatra’s] ‘Witchcraft,’ [Tony Bennett’s] ‘I Left My Heart in San Francisco.’”
Ethan Hawke and daughter Maya Hawke share one of their family’s beloved go-to playlist tracks on an upcoming Record Store Day Black Friday compilation Light in the Attic & Friends. The compilation, due out on Nov. 24, features covers of songs released on the reissue label including the Hawkes’ hushed take on Willie Nelson’s “We Don’t Run.”
The song appeared on the country icon’s bare bones 1996 Spirit album and in a statement, Ethan Hawke explained, “This song is off Willie’s brilliant album Spirit, which has been a mainstay in our home since it was released in 1996. Everybody needs a good anthem song. This is one of the best.”
The Hawke family Nelson cover opens with Ethan singing over gently picked acoustic guitar, “You are the road, you are the only way/ I’ll follow you forever more/ We’ll look for love, we’ll find it in the eyes/ The eyes that see through all the doors.”
Maya then comes in for the third verse, matching her dad’s hushed, vulnerable vocals with the lines, “There is a train that races through the night/ On rails of steel that reach the soul/ Fueled by fire as soft as candle light/ But it warms the heart of a love grown cold.”
The family then comes together for the inspiring chorus, “We don’t run, we don’t compromise/ We don’t quit, we never do/ We look for love, we find it in the eyes/ The eyes of me and the eyes of you.”
Stranger Things star Maya released her sophomore studio album, Moss, last month, which she said was “super inspired” by Taylor Swift’s Folklore. Dad Ethan has long kept a hand in music, from directing the 1994 video for Lisa Loeb’s breakthrough hit, “Stay (I Missed You),” to his 2014 documentary debut with “Seymour: An Introduction,” a profile of classical pianist/composer Seymour Bernstein. He also portrayed a fictional musician in the 2018 film Juliet, Naked and directed the biopic of obscure country singer Blaze Foley in that year’s Blaze; he also portrayed jazz icon Chet Baker in 2015’s Born to Be Blue
In a statement about the collection, archival label Light in the Attic said it has long sought to spotlight the “most unique — and often forgotten — voices” in music. “We believe that an essential component of archival work, aside from simply honoring the music, is to seek ways in which to bring fresh perspectives, context, and reverence to the original artists and their work,” said LITA Founder and co-owner Matt Sullivan. The 20-track collection collections LITA’s 7″ vinyl and digital singles from its Cover Series, in which contemporary artists pay tribute to their favorite LITA artists and songs.
Among the other notable covers are Iggy Pop & Zig Zags covering funk queen Betty Davis’ “If I’m in Luck I Might Get Picked Up,” Mac DeMarco taking on Japanese pop singer/songwriter Haruomi Hosono’s “Honey Moon” and Swamp Dogg, John C. Reilly, Jenny Lewis and Tim Heidecker doing the Louvin Brothers’ “The Kneeling Drunkard’s Plea.” The collection also includes covers by Vashti Bunyan and Devendra Banhart, late Screaming Trees singer and solo star Mark Lanegan and Angel Olsen, among others.
Listen to the Hawkes sing “We Don’t Run” and see the Friends announcement below.
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Thomas Rhett, Lainey Wilson and Lynyrd Skynyrd will help ring in the new year in Nashville, as the first performers announced for CBS’ New Year’s Eve Live: Nashville’s Big Bash, airing Sunday, Dec. 31 from 7:30 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET/PT. The annual concert will put Nashville in the national spotlight, highlighting a range of […]
A pair of collabs, from Wynonna Judd and Trisha Yearwood, and a collab between Flatland Cavalry with Kaitlin Butts, lead this week’s batch of new releases. Additionally, country group Sawyer Brown returns with a high-octane new song and new documentary, while Brittney Spencer pays homage to her musical heroes and CCM artist Anne Wilson continues her foray into country music.
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Wynonna Judd and Trisha Yearwood, “Cry Myself to Sleep”
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Two of country music’s most towering female vocalists—Yearwood and Judd—join forces to push this nearly four-decade-old song to loftier heights. In the mid-1980s, Wynonna and her mother Naomi originally recorded the Paul Kennerley-written song for The Judds’ 1986 album Rockin’ with the Rhythm. But here, sisters in song Wynonna and Yearwood trade angsty phrases, with Yearwood bringing one of her most blues-soaked vocals to date, matching with Wy’s snarling growl. The song will be included on A Tribute to the Judds, out Oct. 27 on BMG in honor of The Judds’ 40th anniversary.
Flatland Cavalry with Kaitlin Butts, “Mornings With You”
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Flatland Cavalry’s bandleader and chief songcrafter Cleto Cordero’s wife, ace singer-songwriter Butts, has been a frequent collaborator on the band’s previous albums. Their harmonies purvey a particularly conversational appeal on this warm, easygoing track about briefly leaving the grind of road life behind for contented morning moments with a lover. Cordero wrote the song with Nick Walsh and “The Blade” hitmaker Ashley Monroe.
“Mornings With You” will be included on Flatland Cavalry’s upcoming Oct. 27 album Wandering Star, which will mark the band’s first deal with Interscope.
Brittney Spencer, “Bigger Than the Song”
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In 2020, Spencer caught the attention of music lovers with her sterling rendition of The Highwomen’s “Crowded Table.” Since then, she’s release the EP Compassion, performed on the CMA Awards alongside Mickey Guyton and Madeline Edwards, and earned awards nominations from the Americana Music Association and from CMT.
On her latest, Spencer, a cooly assertive-yet-nimble vocalist, offers a thunderbolt of musical recognition for her sheroes on this masterly tuneful track, namechecking a platoon of artists whose music has left an indelible imprint — including Reba McEntire, Alanis Morrisette, Janet Jackson, Britney Spears and Beyonce.
Spencer wrote the song with Jennifer Wayne and Tofer Brown. “Bigger Than the Song” previews Spencer’s upcoming debut album My Stupid Life, which will be released Jan. 19 on Elektra.
Anne Wilson, “Rain in the Rearview”
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Though Wilson broke through in Contemporary Christian Music circles with songs like “My Jesus” and “Sunday Sermons,” her Kentucky twang and country-leaning songcraft sensibilities were apparent from her debut album (which featured Lady A’s Hillary Scott on one track). She’s since made her Opry debut, recorded with Josh Turner and performed alongside Jordan Davis during the recent ACM Honors. Now, she aims to expand beyond the CCM genre, fusing the two genres on her three-track project The Beginning, and releasing “Strong” to Christian radio, while releasing “Rain in the Rearview” to country radio.
She wrote “Rain in the Rearview” with Zach Kale, The Cadillac Three’s Jaren Johnston and CCM star Matthew West (also a co-writer on “My Jesus”). She nods to Carrie Underwood’s “Jesus Take the Wheel” on this moody track, as she sings of accelerating through pain and disappointment, her rootsy and soulful voice bolstered by spirals of acoustic guitar, while an acoustic coda showcases Wilson’s ceiling-scraping vocal capabilities — though here, she employs that power judiciously, keeping the focus on the message rather than the messenger.
Sawyer Brown, “Under This Ole Hat”
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As the appetite for revivalism for ‘80s and ‘90s country music stays high, Sawyer Brown nods to their own four-decade here, defined by high-octane performances and highly-engaging songs such as “The Dirt Road” and “Some Girls Do,” not only with new documentary Get Me to the Stage, but their latest song “Under This Ole Hat.”
The group proves they’ve still got plenty of swagger on this flat-out rockin’ track that sounds as if it would have nestled in perfectly on the group’s classic early albums. The rhythm charges with precision, and lead singer Mark Miller’s voice still sounds as energetic and charismatic as ever as sings of “40 years of road-dogging,” and ”breaking out of Nashville chasing a sound,” while namechecking Charley Pride, James Brown and the Charlie Daniels Band, and at times nodding melodically to “Some Girls Do.” The song will be included on the group’s Blake Shelton-produced new album, slated for 2024.
Veronique Medrano, MexiAmericana
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Brownsville, Texas native Medrano exalts the influence, roots and heritage of Latin music and culture within country music throughout her new album, MexiAmericana, which she crafted in Corpus Christi and San Antonio. Almost a decade ago, Medrano issued her debut album Encantadora, and has garnered several Tejano Music Awards nominations. Medrano’s 11-song album offers a range of styles, deftly melding country, airy pop, Tejano, conjunto and more. She nods to Latin country trailblazers, including Freddy Fender with “Wasted Days and Wasted Nights,” reimagining the song with an accelerated tempo and searing accordion. She offers a bilingual version of the Roy Orbison classic “Crying,” but also the irresistible Tejano dance grooves of “Pam Pam Pam” and the biting rock of “Que Suerte Tienes.” The smooth, plaintive pop of “Get to Heaven” resides alongside the blistering “Que Hueva,” a retort to the recent strike-down of Roe v. Wade. In the process, Medrano has meticulously crafted an essential album in the towering canon of Latino-country projects.
Meghan Patrick, “The Boy Who Cried Drunk” (Demo)
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Patrick sends off a warning shot against domestic violence, cataloging a litany of red flags in this dark, gripping song. Here, she’s the wise best friend delving into her own experience and pain, spilling truth about the temporary highs and toxic lows of getting involved with an abuser who blames his ways on alcohol. The track’s polished but never overdone production places the focus on Patrick’s warm yet world-weary vocal, and on this essential message. Patrick wrote “The Boy Who Cried Drunk” with Billy Dawson and Jacob Hackworth.
The Tennessee Bluegrass Band, “Coming Down the Line”
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With their 2022 debut album, The Future of the Past, this group of mostly 20-somethings quickly established their penchant and skill for performing — and in the process, helping pass down — traditional-minded bluegrass.
The latest iteration of the band includes newcomers Geary Allen, who wrote “Comin’ Down the Line,” as well as bassist/vocalist Anissa Burnett, who both join founding members Aynsley Porchak, Lincoln Hensley and Tim Laughlin.
This group releases the first look at their upcoming second album with a song that further conveys The Tennessee Bluegrass Band as keen bluegrass practitioners, while expanding the genre’s canon of train songs, with twin fiddles mimicking the sound of a train horn, followed by fleet-fingered picking and syrupy-smooth harmonies.
When Nashville’s Belmont University — then a mere college — introduced a music business degree in 1973, a good portion of the city’s music pros scoffed at the endeavor.
“There was a bit of resentment that somebody was going to try to take somebody’s job,” remembers Doug Howard, who started as a student in January 1976 and went on to become the dean of the Mike Curb College of Entertainment & Music Business from 2015-2022. “I literally had somebody say to me, ‘You can’t teach what we do in school.’ My thing was the 10,000 hours, you know — I discovered The Beatles in 1964, and I never stopped listening. I had been a student maybe longer than [they] had. I just couldn’t say that.”
Belmont will celebrate the 50th anniversary of its music business school on Oct. 3 in a different position. Scores of students with a passion for music debunked Music Row’s skepticism, demonstrating their enthusiasm by working for free at thousands of internships, learning a specialized business and contributing their formal lessons — and their determined ingenuity — to a Nashville entertainment industry that is arguably more professional in 2023 than the ’73 version.
Belmont is a big reason for that. Its vast list of former students includes Brad Paisley, Trisha Yearwood, Warner Chappell Nashville president/CEO Ben Vaughn, songwriter Hillary Lindsey (“Burn It Down,” “Blue Ain’t Your Color”), recording engineer Chuck Ainlay, Sony Music Nashville chairman/CEO Big Yellow Dog Music partner/CEO Carla Wallace, song plugger Sherrill Blackman, producer-guitarist Dann Huff (Kane Brown, Keith Urban) and Morris Higham Management partner Clint Higham, just to name a few.
In short, a Belmont music business degree is as helpful on Music Row as a Harvard law degree is in Washington, D.C., politics.
“I had no idea it would be this important to who I became,” Paisley says. “I got there, and I saw a recording studio and internship programs that allowed me to go hang out at ASCAP for free and walk into music meetings.”
In one of his first assignments, Paisley was required to interview someone active in music. He didn’t settle for one person — he interviewed three: former Desert Rose Band guitarist John Jorgenson, singer-songwriter Mike Reid (“I Can’t Make You Love Me,” “Stranger in My House”) and bluegrass musician Carl Jackson. In a stroke of luck, Jorgenson returned the student’s call with an invitation to come down to a studio where he was recording. Paisley ended up sitting next to Jorgenson while he played the session.
Belmont is one of dozens of schools that now offer music business degrees, but it has some advantages. It was one of the first colleges to develop a program, and it’s literally at the end of Music Row — an intern can work for two hours between classes and easily return to work when their last class ends. The locale itself creates potential.
“My first thing ever was as a seat filler for the TNN/Music City News Awards,” remembers Vaughn. “I ended up sitting in Kix Brooks’ seat most of the night because they were winning everything. So I sat by his wife, and we had this nice conversation, and I’m like, ‘This is crazy.’ I’m 18 years old, but even stuff like that, if you’re not part of Belmont, you’re just not knowing there’s all these little opportunities and things to be involved in.”
The program’s founder, the late Bob Mulloy, literally grew up on what would become Music Row — he was raised in a house that was eventually leveled to make way for BMI — and he had a stiff task. Belmont was a Baptist school, and there was plenty of pushback from higher-ups who feared that a music-biz degree would attract undesirable students. Howard, who had a shaggy appearance in the mid-’70s, remembers being grilled mercilessly by Mulloy.
“Those early years, he wanted guys and girls to come that were really committed to be in a profession,” Howard recalls. “He had this very stern [air]. And we’re scared of it. But I got it. He was under the microscope, and he put a tone to us that, ‘Hey, guys, the whole program depends on you.’ ”
Howard ended up becoming a publishing executive and Lyric Street senior vp of A&R, building on both his studies and the contacts that Belmont afforded. Mulloy may have seemed tough in the program’s earliest years, but he was a champion for his students.
“Mr. Malloy was my survey [of a music business] teacher,” says Vaughn. “He says, ‘Look to your left, look to your right. The people that are your peers and classmates will be people you work with in the industry.’ And he was right, man. He was so right.”
Indeed, Vaughn counts one of his biggest rivals, Sony Music Publishing Nashville president/CEO Rusty Harmon, as a classmate, as well as producer Jeremy Stover (Justin Moore, Travis Denning) and songwriter Ashley Gorley (“Last Night,” “Truck Bed”). Howard formed friendships with songwriter-producer and record exec Mark Wright and songwriter Gordon Kennedy (“Change the World,” “You Move Me”). Florida Georgia Line founders Tyler Hubbard and Brian Kelley met at Belmont. And Paisley was introduced to frequent co-writers Frank Rogers and Kelley Lovelace, as well as Cindy Mabe, now Universal Music Group president/CEO.
“You get what you put into it,” says Paisley, who transferred into the program. “That was the thing. I was interning, I was going to studios, I was interviewing people, I was shaking hands with anybody that would shake my hand. Because I was like, ‘Look, I’m a junior already. I got four semesters to do this. I got to figure out how to do this for a living or go back to West Virginia and teach guitar lessons.’ ”
Belmont has helped hundreds of students figure it out over the last 50 years. And those students have in turn brought an intense desire to participate in the industry and make a difference. Many are now running Music Row.
“These are passionate people coming to town,” Howard says, “who love this business and want to make it better.”
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Two years ago, Dustin Lynch deepened his collection of hits with the six-week Billboard Country Airplay chart-topper “Thinkin’ ‘Bout You,” a collaboration with MacKenzie Porter. On Killed the Cowboy, out Friday (Sept. 29) via Broken Bow Records, Lynch keys up another collaboration — this time with Broken Bow Records label mate and “Need a Favor” hitmaker Jelly Roll, interpolating the melody and groove of Dobie Gray’s 1973 hit “Drift Away.”
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Lynch says that he and Jelly Roll met through a mutual producer, Zach Crowell. “Jelly and Zach started making music years ago, before I even moved to Nashville, when Zach was making beats for Jelly when he was rapping,” Lynch tells Billboard. “When we couldn’t tour for those couple of years around the pandemic, Zach and I were staying connected and heard this song,” he says, noting that he first recorded the song in late 2022.
Lynch tested out the song during Luke Bryan’s Crash My Playa festival in January, with Jelly Roll adding his vocals a few months later in Austin, Texas. “I related to the lyrics so much, and we get to name-check Brooks & Dunn in there, so literally, it’s a perfect scenario,” Lynch says. “And with Jelly, ‘Drift Away’ is such a classic melody, and we kept this super loose and had some grit and rough edges to it, and Jelly has the perfect voice for it, with the soul he has in his voice.”
With Killed the Cowboy, Lynch is six albums deep into a career that has earned the Tennessee native eight No. 1 Country Airplay hits, including “Small Town Boy” and “Where It’s At (Yep Yep).” He’s steadily built a catalog ranging from tender tracks such as “Cowboys and Angels” to more sultry fare like “Seein’ Red.”
Much of his new album delves into heartbreak, from the title track to “Breakin’ Up Down.” But it’s the meticulously detailed, small-town love story “Only Girl in This Town,” written by Devin Dawson, Josh Thompson and Kyle Fishman, that launched the making of Killed the Cowboy. “This was a song that my ears perked up on making another album,” Lynch says. “It was one of those songs that stuck around and stood the test of time. I kept finding myself coming back to it and loving it even more.”
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Lynch is a writer on nearly half of the album’s dozen songs, including the evening romance-propelled “George Strait Jr.,” which nods to the Country Music Hall of Famer (though Strait’s son is named George “Bubba” Strait, Jr.). “He’s my hero, personally and professionally,” Lynch says of Strait. “He’s a class act. I wanted to tip my hat to him, but do it in a fresh way. I took us a while to really nail down how to do that without getting too heavy. We wanted to capture that late-night vibe.
“I think over the years I’ve learned to be in a present frame of mind and creative flow to really offer something to my co-writers,” Lynch adds of his writing process. “I’ve found a good balance of how much I like to write. I kind of need a break whenever we get done with an album to just reset a little bit. But then once I start writing, I fall back in love with the process of creating that magic that writing songs is and there’s no better feeling than getting in my truck and playing a new one and it making me feel something.”
Between tour stops on his 2023 Party Mode Tour, writing and recording sessions, Lynch has found that rejuvenation in the Rocky Mountains and in Canada, as well as on his farm outside of Nashville.
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“I’ve learned that’s important for me as an artist to go out there on the farm and have that time to myself,” he says. “I’ve left a lot of it wild and continue to improve the habitat for the native wildlife there. I’m a nerd when it comes to animals and conservation.”
Lynch, who studied chemistry and biology in college, also runs a small cattle operation. “I remember my first job was in middle school, helping out and making $5 an hour working down the street from my house on an angus [beef] farm. It’s great to be back in the game, kind of relearning a lot about that world.”
On record, his sound may run from traditional-minded country to sleeker pop fare, but when he’s on his farm or in the mountains, his musical tastes run the gamut from rootsy to R&B. “I’m listening to Mount Joy, Noah Kahan, Colter Wall, but then also, I’ve been for a long time obsessed with H.E.R. and SZA. I love R&B. But musically, that’s kind of where I’ve been living, in that Americana space. It probably just stems from the fact that, this time of year, I love being in the mountains and that music goes well with it.”
Looking ahead to 2024, Lynch will launch his Killed the Cowboy Tour featuring pop/R&B/country artist Skeez as an opening act.
“He’s kind of been a chameleon and able to pull the country fans and some top 40, hip-hop type of collabs off,” Lynch says. “I know he’s going to bring a lot of his fan base, which are going to be new eyes and ears for our show. Country music is as wide open as I can remember it being. We’re in a spot right now where we can be in front of a lot of new eyes and ears and blend those lines in the sand of genre, and just go off of good vibes and good music.”
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Kelsea Ballerini has an important PSA. After some viewers were convinced that the 30-year-old country pop star had lip-synched her performance of “Mountain With a View” at Thursday night’s (Sept. 28) inaugural People’s Choice Country Awards, she took to Instagram Stories to defend her vocals.
“I just want to say, if I was lip-synching, I would’ve sounded a lot better,” Ballerini joked in a video.
The “This Feeling” singer also provided a reason for why her performance may have seemed out of sync, something viewers tuning in to the broadcast pointed out. “One of the cameras was off,” she explained. “Thank you, and good night.”
Then, just to make sure she’d gotten her point across, Ballerini reshared a glammed-up photo from Thursday evening in her Stories, showing her looking slyly at something off camera on her left side. “Me singing live watching people thinking otherwise,” she captioned the snap.
Also on Ballerini’s side is NBC, the network home to the People’s Choice Country Awards. “nobody does live vocals like her!” it captioned an Instagram video of the star’s intimate performance, calling it “FLAWLESS.”
In addition to performing, Ballerini was nominated for several awards at the inaugural event, including people’s artist, female artist, social country star and album of 2023. Before the awards ceremony started, the singer shared her thoughts on a subject that’s on just about everyone’s minds right now: Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce’s rumored romance.
“I love Travis,” she gushed. “We did SNL together. I love Taylor. We were close for many years. I want happiness for everyone, so vibe.a
“I ship happiness!” she added in a separate red carpet interview. “Whoever is happy with whoever is what I ship. I adore Taylor. I adore Travis. So if they’re happy, I ship it. Period.”
Watch a clip of Kelsea Ballerini singing “Mountain With a View” at People’s Choice Country Awards below:
Morgan Wallen is doubling up on his One Night at a Time 2024 tour, adding back-to-back shows in each city and making his May Nashville stop a three-peat with a trio of consecutive nights at Music City’s Nissan Stadium.
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In addition to bringing a plethora of country radio hits, Wallen will welcome a slate of artists to open various shows on the trek, including Bailey Zimmerman, Jelly Roll, Jon Pardi, Lainey Wilson, Nate Smith, Bryan Martin, Lauren Watkins and Ella Langley. For his July 26 headlining show in Arlington, Texas, a special guest from the state will perform; direct support acts for the added Nashville shows will be announced soon.
Among the tour stops is a show in Oxford, Miss., making up for a concert that Wallen canceled just before showtime earlier this year. Fans who previously purchased tickets for the canceled April 23 show will have access to an early presale, and details will be sent directly to ticketholders via email.
Fans wanting to get their hands on tickets for the One Night at a Time Tour 2024 will need to register at Ticketmaster.com, through Sunday, Oct. 1. Once registration closes, fans will be randomly selected to receive a day/time of the presale along with a code that grants them access to the presale. Fans who previously registered for the presale now have the option to update their show preference to one of the newly announced dates.
Wallen is also using the tour to give back, with $3 from every ticket sold for his U.S. shows going to the Morgan Wallen Foundation, which supports programs for youth, focusing on sports and music. The organization recently donated $500,000 to Habitat for Humanity of Greater Nashville’s Parkwood community project, and has supported revitalization efforts at ballparks in Boston and Chicago.
On Thursday (Sept. 28), Wallen was one of the evening’s biggest winners during the inaugural People’s Choice Country Awards, picking up honors for artist, album and tour of 2023 (for his One Night at a Time World Tour).
The Live Nation-produced trek’s namesake album, One Thing at a Time, was issued in March and debuted atop the all-genre Billboard 200 and held the top spot for 12 consecutive weeks. His song “Last Night” remained atop the Billboard Hot 100 for 16 non-consecutive weeks, and was the most streamed song of the summer, becoming the first tune by a country artist to earn the top spot in Spotify’s “Songs of the Summer” list.
For the full list of 2024 concert dates, visit morganwallen.com.