Country
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The People’s Choice Awards is expanding with the announcement of the first-ever People’s Choice Country Awards airing in September across NBC and Peacock, live from the Grand Ole Opry stage in Nashville.
The two-hour telecast will give NBC a country awards show to compete with the CMA Awards, which have aired on ABC since 2006; the CMT Music Awards, which have aired on CBS since 2022; and the ACM Awards, which have streamed on Prime Video since 2022.
NBC aired the CMA Awards from 1968-71 and the ACM Awards from 1979-97 but hasn’t been in the country awards game for years.
“We’re excited to partner with the Grand Ole Opry to bring the year’s biggest celebration in country music to Nashville,” Cassandra Tryon, senior vice president, live events, NBCUniversal Television & Streaming, said in a statement. “Country fans are passionate about their music and there’s no better place to host this event than from country music’s biggest stage.”
As the show’s name implies, the winners will be chosen entirely by the fans, though several honorary awards will also be bestowed.
The People’s Choice Country Awards will extend to social platforms with All-Access Live bringing fans at home behind the scenes as well as interactively connecting country’s most popular stars with their biggest fans.
The telecast will be produced by Den of Thieves with Jesse Ignjatovic, Evan Prager and Barb Bialkowski serving as executive producers
The People’s Choice Awards aired on CBS from 1975-2017 and was highly rated for many years. E! acquired the show in 2017; it aired on that channel for the first time in 2018. NBC joined E! in airing the show in 2021.
The People’s Choice Awards has long included country categories and performances. At the most recent People’s Choice Awards, which aired Dec. 6, 2022, Shania Twain performed a four-song hit medley. Carrie Underwood was voted the country artist of 2022, beating Kelsea Ballerini, Kane Brown, Luke Combs, Miranda Lambert, Maren Morris, Thomas Rhett and Morgan Wallen.
The 2022 People’s Choice Awards bucked industry trends with year-over-year ratings growth on the broadcast network, and delivered 173 million total engagements across linear, digital and social platforms, according to an NBC statement.
This new project is an example of collaboration resulting from NBCUniversal’s equity investment in Opry Entertainment Group alongside Atairos, which was finalized last year.
The upcoming awards show is the latest in a series of moves from Ryman Hospitality Properties and Opry Entertainment Group. This week, OEG revealed a minority investment in country music lifestyle brand Whiskey Riff. In 2022, Ryman Hospitality Properties closed on its purchase of Block 21, a property that includes ACL Live at Moody Theater, the home venue of the television program Austin City Limits. 2020 saw the launch of Circle Network, a joint venture between OEG and Gray Television that featured Grand Ole Opry performances and more.
—Jessica Nicholson assisted in preparing this story
We won’t officially know until Sunday (March 12) how big Morgan Wallen’s new album, the super-sized One Thing at a Time, will debut on the Billboard 200, but we know the 36-track set is already a blockbuster.
As of Wednesday (March 8), the 36 tracks have accumulated 315 million on-demand streams, already the biggest week for any 2023 album, according to Luminate. In its first four days, OTAAT surpassed the 240 million tally hit by Wallen’s 2021 album, Dangerous: The Double Album, in its first full week.
The album, which features collaborations with Eric Church, HARDY and ERNEST, was culled from 42 songs to its final 36 tracks.
“The songs just kind of naturally came in,” Wallen previously told Billboard. One Thing at a Time producer Joey Moi added, “It seemed like the more we cut, the more songs would show up. So it just kept piling up.”
Moi also noted Wallen’s involvement in the studio has become deeper with each album release.
“The first record, in a budding career [from a] new artist is weird, you kind of get stripped of all your time to make the record, so we really panicked our way through that one,” Moi said. “He was on tour, and then we would cut the songs together in the studio, and then he’d go off on tour. I’d squirrel away and work on the music getting ready for him to come back. He’d sing like six songs in one day. It was that process. Second record, we were able to engineer the calendar a little better but he was still heavy in obligations [but] he was present for way more than the first record. This one I feel like we nailed the calendar, and he was there for every moment of it. It was amazing having him in the room the whole time with me.”
Upon the album’s March 3 release, we picked the top 10 tunes, but now we’re back to rank all 36 songs on the Moi-produced set, from the least to the greatest.
“Ain’t That Some”
One of the rap-influenced tracks on the set with trap beats and rapid-fire lyric delivery (or as rapid-fire as Wallen gets), the song recalls early Florida Georgia Line above all else and may be good for a hell-raising night but feels by the numbers. Listen here.
“F150-50”
Like many songs on the album, “F150-50” takes a clever idea—in this case, taking the popular Ford truck name and using it as the vehicle his ex leaves in, but also to say the chances are “F150-50” that she’s coming back. It’s fun, but ultimately, unlike the popular truck, goes nowhere. Listen here.
“180 (Lifestyle)”
One of the several rap-influenced tunes, the programmed drums and synths details how Wallen’s girl has done a complete 180 turnaround since coming into his world. She’s gone from a “Broadway city girl” to a “red dirt wild child” and she’s not mad about it. Listen here.
“Tennessee Fan”
In what some folks are wondering is an answer to Megan Moroney’s “Tennessee Orange”— though he switches the woman’s allegiance from Georgia to Alabama — Wallen converts a die-hard Alabama fan to a Tennessee Volunteer after just one night together in this story song. Listen here.
“Keith Whitley”
Country music is filled with song titles taken from artists’ names: Taylor Swift’s “Tim McGraw” and Eric Church’s “Springsteen” to name two. Here, Wallen throws in a number of Whitley song or album titles, including “I’m No Stranger to the Rain,” “Kentucky Bluebird” and even “Miami, My Amy” as he drinks over her memory and laments that “The things I love got a way of gettin’ gone too soon/kinda like good whiskey, Keith Whitley and you.” Listen here.
“’98 Braves”
For non-baseball fans, the ’98 Atlanta Braves mounted a comeback during the playoffs, but ultimately lost to the San Diego Padres. In this mid-tempo track, Wallen compares his relationship to the Braves and, similarly, coming up short despite giving it his best. Listen here.
“In the Bible” feat. HARDY
Nature is where many people feel closest to God and Wallen and HARDY are no different in this sweet, guitar-driven ode. “Can’t get no closer to the Man upstairs/Than way out there, where the river runs,” they sing. But they admit, they may be spending too much time on old barstools instead of reading “them words in red,” but somehow these country boys will survive. Listen here.
“Days That End In Why”
There are some lovely adjectival descriptions here from his “dead grass drive” to her “hand-me-down earrings,” that instantly paint a picture of what life was like before she left — and the sadness that has followed as the days blur into each other. “It’s been nights that start with whiskey/ and days that end in why,” with no answer forthcoming. Listen here.
“I Wrote The Book”
Wallen celebrates his southern and athletic bonafides in this gently chugging track, celebrating that he “wrote the book” when it comes to those his skills. However, when it comes to obeying the Bible and being an expert at following the rules therein, that’s “one book I didn’t write,” he ruefully admits. Listen here.
“Cowgirls” feat. ERNEST
There’s something about a cowgirl in this easy-going, heavily programmed track that features Wallen with one of his besties. They marvel at the “never gonna settle on down girls,” who may leave you sorry they left, but never sorry that they came into your life, even if it’s only for a short while. Listen here.
“Whiskey Friends”
In the time-honored country tradition, Wallen’s keeping company with “Jack and Jim” after he just “took a hook on my heartbreak chin.” He’s looking for a little consolation from his liquid “friends,” with the aid of Whitley and Jones on the jukebox on this catchy track. Listen here.
“Hope That’s True”
In this loping, steel-guitar driven track, she may have left him, but he’s not crying over her departure. She was high class while he was, by her account, white trash and never the twain shall meet. That’s just fine, as he sings, “when you say that I ain’t ever gonna find nobody just like you/Well, I hope that’s true.” Listen here.
“Tennessee Numbers”
Tailor-made for a cinematic video, this mid-tempo ballad shares the tale of how the protagonist’s ex used to have a photo of them together at her sister’s wedding as her screen saver, but now “It’s just some ocean waves.” He laments that he’ll never get the chance to apologize because he knows “she quit taking calls from Tennessee numbers.” Listen here.
“Man Made A Bar” feat. Eric Church
A lyrically clever tale of how God created the earth and man and woman, but it took a man to make a bar so men have a place to go when women break their hearts. Church sings harmony and then grabs a verse of his own on this twangy tune, but it feels like a little bit of a wasted opportunity that he’s not featured more prominently, especially given Wallen’s adoration of Church. Listen here.
“Money On Me”
If you’re looking for a good time, Wallen’s your man in this swirling song, but if you’re looking for “a soft place to land/arms you can trust,” he’s not the one. There’s something to be said for the self-awareness displayed in the lyrics. He’s pretty believable when he says, “honestly, I wouldn’t put my money on me.” Listen here.
“Thinkin’ Bout Me”
Via a hypnotizing melody, Wallen sings directly to a past lover who isn’t in the past as much as her new boyfriend may think. No matter where she and her new man go, Wallen’s ghost is there. “Do you hide your phone/did you change my name,” he asks, even wondering “when you’re up in his bed/am I up in your head making you crazy?” He knows the answer is yes. Listen here.
“Sunrise”
Unlike “Ain’t That Some,” where the rap intonations don’t work, they enhance the insinuating “Sunrise.” Handclaps and undulating synth programming bolster the strong lyrics. He broke up with her aw hile ago, but just like the sunrise, she “keeps coming up…at 8 a.m.,9 a.m./ all the way to 10 pm when my day ends.” Listen here.
“I Deserve A Drink”
In this guitar-drenched tale boasting unusual vocal inflections and one of the album’s catchier melodies, Wallen falls off the love wagon when his ex walks into the bar, “burnin’ hotter than a bourbon with no water.” He compares her to drink that he can’t resist: “You’re another shot that I shouldn’t knock bad, but damn, baby,” he sings, helpless to resist her spell. Listen here.
“Me To Me”
Wallen figures he’s just the perfect remedy to a woman who’s lost her way romantically in this fun ditty. He’s not promising he’s Mr. Right, but he might be Mr. Right Now as he declares, “You’ve been locked down for a while/You want some more wild and free/I don’t know who you’re waiting on but/kinda sounds like me to me.” Listen here.
“Had It”
Wallen cuts bait on a relationship that has turned sour in this acoustic guitar-based ballad. They are fighting more than loving and no matter how much they talk, they can’t find their way back to the good times. “I knew what I had when I had it, but, girl, I’ve had it,” a done Wallen sings. Listen here.
“Last Night”
Wallen’s latest No. 1 on Hot Country Songs—and the third already from the album— is a finger-snapping mid-tempo track with an undeniable synth line. “You call your mama/I call your bluff,” a cocky Wallen sings, confident that last night was definitely not their last night together, even though she left him staring at her taillights as she left in a blaze of anger. Listen here.
“Outlook”
The penultimate track is a highly autobiographical track that features Wallen’s sister singing harmony, as he revels in his changed outlook from his destructive ways to more upbeat now that he’s realized “someone’s up there/lookin’ down and lookin’ out for me.” Clearly written on a good day, Wallen feels nothing but gratitude as he’s emerged “on the flip side of crazy.” Listen here.
“Good Girl Gone Missin'”
With its gentle acoustic guitar intro, “Good Girl” is sobering, but catchy tale of Wallen blaming another failed relationship on “good whiskey/bad decisions.” Even though he knows better, it’s a “new story/same ending.” The listener benefits from the protagonist not learning from his mistakes with this well-rendered track. Listen here.
“You Proof”
The first No. 1 on Country Airplay from the album, “You Proof” relies on finger-snaps, a buzzy synth line and sharp production that draws in the listener as Wallen complains that the whiskey ain’t working as he drinks to forget his lost love. No matter how much he imbibes, can’t find something that’s “You proof.” Listen here.
“Me + All Your Reasons”
No one is harder on Wallen than Wallen and on this twangy tune, even he is sick of his actions. His girlfriend has left and he can’t blame her. Between the “Copenhagen, whiskey straight, and empty bottle, promise breakin’,” there was no room for her in his life. Now that she’s gone, he’s still not alone, since all the reasons she headed out still swirl around him. Listen here.
“Last Drive Down Main”
Wallen is the one leaving in this musically upbeat but lyrically down tune. He takes one last spin around town before he heads for the outskirts as looks into the future and sees his ex telling her friends she’s fine but dreaming of him and the memories they made. Listen here.
“Neon Star (Country Boy Lullaby)”
Grab your boots and get ready to do a slow two-step to this finger-snapping tune that would sound right at home on a Thomas Rhett album. His girl’s gone and he’s gone straight to the local watering hole to drown his sorrows. He’s “wishin’ on a neon star” hanging behind the bar that “there’s a u-turn in your car” and she’ll return home. “Neon Star (Country Boy Lullaby)”Listen here.
“Dying Man”
After pulling the listener down to the depths of his despair, Wallen closes the set on an optimistic tone, letting us know he’s found happiness and he’s no longer “bound to hit a wall before I ever hit the brakes.” Though he once thought just as “Codeine it got Elvis /Whiskey it got Hank,” he’d find a similar premature fate, he’s found a love that has brought him contentment and a reason to live. Maybe it’s coincidence that the song opens with a guitar intro nearly identical to “Born With A Beer In My Hand,” but it feels like Wallen is bringing the listener full circle. Listen here.
“Thought You Should Know”
This genial ode is Wallen’s second Hot Country Songs chart topper from One Thing At A Time, following “You Proof.” But the two songs couldn’t be more different. Written by Wallen with Nicolle Galyon and Miranda Lambert, this track, bolstered by the great Paul Franklin’s steel playing, is his end of a phone conversation with his mother while he’s on tour. Wallen’s eager to let her know that “all those prayers you thought you wasted on me/must’ve finally made their way through.” Listen here.
“Born With a Beer In My Hand”
Written by Wallen with buddy HARDY and Zach Abend, the album opener sets a tone that runs through much of the release: Wallen wrestling with his alcohol-fueled dark side. Here, as he catalogs how he comes from a long line of drinkers, he also paints a picture of someone trying to stay in the light no matter the temptation as he embraces sobriety, at least for a while: “I ain’t saying I swore it off for good/I’m just sayin’ I’m doing the best I can,” he sings in this mid-tempo swayer. Listen here.
“Wine Into Water”
In a song that could be part two of “Neon Star,” Wallen wraps his vocals around this woeful tale of regret as he waits on the porch for his love to return so he can apologize and they can sink into the bottle he’s brought. Country lyrics are known for their clever word play and this song is no exception as Wallen hopes to put their problems behind them “and turn this wine into water under the bridge.” Listen here.
“Single Than She Was”
Wallen is charmingly confident as he woos a woman in a bar who’s possibly been stood up by her beau, and by the time they say good night, he’s liking his odds that he may soon be the replacement: “I ain’t sayin’ her and her man’s got any plans on breakin’ up/But I tell you what/She’s a little more single than she was,” he boasts as the track progresses. Listen here.
“Everything I Love”
Wallen, who co-wrote the song, kicks it old school country on this chugging tune framed by solid slide guitar. Though the melody is ridiculously bouncy (think Kenny Rogers in the mid-‘80s), Wallen is shattered that he can’t go to any of his old haunts or enjoy his old lifestyle because everything reminds him of the gal who broke his heart. An interpolation of The Allman Brothers’ “Midnight Rider” includes several lyrical references to “one more silver dollar.” Listen here.
“One Thing at a Time”
Just try not to sing along to this toe-tapping tune that features one of the most infectious melodies that Wallen has ever recorded. It’s pure pop — so much so that it feels like it should be played back-to-back with Kelsea Ballerini’s similar earworm “Heartfirst.” But since it’s Wallen, there’s no joy, only the acknowledgement that if he’s going to have to give up his ex, he can’t relinquish his cigarettes and liquor, too. “If you ain’t gonna kiss me/Then I’ll take some whiskey,” he sings. Facing her loss sober is a bridge too far. Listen here.
“Don’t Think Jesus”
Written by Jessi Alexander, Mark Holman and Chase McGill, the introspective “Don’t Think Jesus” features Wallen’s strongest vocal delivery on the album as he slides from a growl to a falsetto, taking on the persona of a boy living life way too fast who realizes he’s moved far from Jesus’s teachings even when it comes to turning the other cheek: “World likes to rear back and throw a few stones / So boy wants to throw a few stones of his own / But Lord knows I ain’t perfect, and it ain’t my place / And I don’t think Jesus done it that way.” Listen here.
“Devil Don’t Know”
This ballad, written by Travis Denning, Jared Mullins and Ben Stennis, highlights what Wallen does best—wallow in love’s misery. “I’ve been tryin’ to drown these demons, but damn if they don’t swim,” he sings of the knowledge that the one he loves is with someone else sinks in. “Even the devil don’t know this kind of hell,” he sings convincingly. Listen here.
The Cadillac Three members Jaren Johnston and Neil Mason have teamed with Warner Records via a joint venture to launch the Nashville-based label War Buddha Records.
The first signing to the venture is Los Angeles-based singer-songwriter Rett Madison, who recently wrapped a run of shows with St. Paul & The Broken Bones and is slated to play during SXSW 2023.
“As artists ourselves, we created War Buddha first and foremost as a home for artists,” Johnston said via a statement. “In partnering with our longtime friend Aaron Bay-Schuck, alongside Tom Corson and the stellar Warner Records team, we saw the opportunity to mix our dirt with Warner’s power to create a venture fostering both creative expression and commercial success.”
“We want the label to offer a platform for artists with unique perspectives who fit out, not in, and feel unafraid to tell their stories unapologetically,” Mason added. “Rett is the perfect first signing for the label: an artist with the incredible ability to capture life experiences in songs that make the listener feel they are in those moments with her. We’re so grateful to Aaron and Tom for the chance to build this label together.”
Nashville natives Johnston and Mason, along with their The Cadillac Three cohort Kelby Ray, have released albums via Big Machine Records including 2016’s Bury Me in My Boots, and a pair of 2020 projects, Country Fuzz and Tabasco and Sweet Tea. As songwriters, Johnston has written songs recorded by artists including Tim McGraw (“Southern Girl”), Keith Urban and Eric Church (the duet “Raise ‘Em Up”). Mason has written songs recorded by artists including Miranda Lambert (“Old Sh*t”), and Jake Owen (“Days of Gold”).
“For as long as I have known Jaren and Neil, they have never taken a conventional path,” said Bay-Schuck, co-chairman & CEO of Warner Records, via a statement. “They’ve been fearless in their pursuit of great art, never compromising any integrity or authenticity in their approach to their own artistry or collaborations as songwriters and producers for other artists. As we continue to build the Warner Records brand as one that is always a safe and encouraging place for artists who dare to be different, take risks, and have a point of view, it made total sense to partner with War Buddha on their mission to do the same. We are very excited to welcome Rett Madison as the first artist from this partnership and we can’t wait to see what other unique and amazing talent Jaren and Neil discover.”
“I couldn’t be more thrilled to be joining the Warner Records family with War Buddha!” Madison said. “I’ve felt such genuine enthusiasm from Neil and Jaren in regards to my music and their total support of me sharing my most authentic, artistic voice feels refreshing. I can’t wait to see what we all build together.”
Opry Entertainment Group (OEG) has made a minority investment in country music lifestyle brand Whiskey Riff in an effort to draw a younger audience to its properties.
OEG, which counts the Grand Ole Opry, Ryman Auditorium, WSM Radio and the Blake Shelton-inspired Ole Red slate of restaurants/music venues among its portfolio, plans to use the alignment with Whiskey Riff to reach a younger demographic, attract new audiences to its brands, develop a stronger digital presence and further support emerging artists.
“They have created a really compelling brand, one that has built an incredibly loyal following,” says Mark Fioravanti, president and CEO of Ryman Hospitality Properties of Whiskey Riff. “They attract a younger demographic, and this gives us another way to connect our brands and the artists we support with younger fans.”
Fioravanti declined to comment on the specific percentage invested in Whiskey Riff or if OEG plans to increase its ownership stake in Whiskey Riff in the future.
Created by Steve Gazibara and Wes Langeler in 2015, Whiskey Riff has become a destination website for consumer country music news and content, as well as for outdoors and lifestyle content that resonates with the country music audience.
Across the Whiskey Riff brand umbrella as a whole, including Whiskey Riff social media accounts as well as @RIFFOutdoors, @WhiskeyRiffShop and @WhiskeyRiffRaff, the company says the sites have collectively drawn over 3.3 million social media followers. Over half of Whiskey Riff viewers are between the ages of 18-44.
Gazibara tells Billboard of launching Whiskey Riff, “I just thought, ‘If you are a college kid sitting in class, you don’t have a place to go to get a playlist, a podcast, a funny story, an outdoors thing, music stories and maybe a funny t-shirt if you want to get it for a concert.’”
“We share a certain segment of fans with Opry Entertainment, but we also have different fans in certain capacities,” Langeler adds. “The Opry does a great job of promoting rising artists that are independent and then they also bring on seasoned veterans, [Country Music] Hall of Fame members. I think we can really just help each other grow and continually bring new fans to each other.”
One element the Whiskey Riff co-founders insist won’t change is the site’s distinctive voice.
“The Opry knows we’re gonna have opinions,” Gazibara says. “They don’t have a say in the content, obviously, but of course you want to amplify their content that fits with our audience—and there is plenty of that from their end.”
Currently, OEG supports emerging artists in multiple ways, including Grand Ole Opry debut performances, as well as the “My Opry Debut” series, which runs on television network Circle, OEG’s joint venture with Gray Television. Additionally, new acts garner support through the Opry NextStage program, and performances at various Ole Red locations (Ole Red is set to add a Las Vegas location later this year).
OEG and Whiskey Riff are considering a range of collaborative options, including podcasts and cross-promotional retail/branding opportunities. “You might see some of their brand of products in our brick and mortar locations,” Fioravanti says. “We are just starting to have those discussions, but it’s an opportunity to collaborate with our retail capabilities.”
Gazibara and Langeler envision further amplifying Whiskey Riff’s lifestyle content, including food, hunting, fishing and other sports. Meanwhile, the Colorado-based Whiskey Riff will soon have a full-time Nashville presence; the site’s operations manager will relocate to Nashville, while the site’s Nashville-based assistant editor will move to a full-time role.
“They will have access to go backstage [at the Opry], talk to people, maybe get some fun, rapid-fire content before artists go onstage, or show the jam band-kind of thing that often happens backstage,” Langeler says. “We want to give fans an inside look at stuff they maybe wouldn’t have seen.
“The Opry is the greatest country music institution in the world,” Langeler adds. “I think we will be a machine going forward, pumping out content, giving fans that access and telling great stories. Country music is such a rich storytelling fabric and we will be able to help the Opry amplify that, and they will be able to help us to be able to tell these stories.”
In recent years, a trio of Big Loud-signed artists — ERNEST, HARDY, and Morgan Wallen — have become country music’s ultra-collaborative hitmaking machine, churning out an array of hits for themselves and other artists.
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Earlier this month, ERNEST, HARDY and Wallen were all honored during the Country Music Association’s Triple Play Awards, which honors songwriters who have written three No. 1 songs within a 12-month span. To date, Wallen has been a co-writer on several Jason Aldean-recorded songs, including “Make It Easy,” as well as Keith Urban’s “Brown Eyes Baby” and Corey Kent’s “Wild as Her.” HARDY has been a contributor to Wallen’s “Sand in My Boots,” Blake Shelton’s “God’s Country,” Michael Ray’s “Holy Water,” LOCASH’s “One Big Country Song” and Breland’s “Praise the Lord” (featuring Thomas Rhett). ERNEST’s Triple Play-earning contributions this year are Wallen’s “Wasted On You,” Sam Hunt’s “Breaking Up Was Easy in the ‘90s” and Kane Brown’s “One Mississippi.”
While Nashville is no stranger to hitmaking songwriter trios — such as the Peach Pickers (Ben Hayslip, Dallas Davidson and Rhett Akins) and the Love Junkies (Liz Rose, Lori McKenna and Hillary Lindsey) — it is additionally notable that over the past year, Wallen, HARDY and ERNEST have each issued albums representative of country music’s expansive soundscape. ERNEST’s March 2022 release Flower Shops (The Album) and subsequent deluxe album Flower Shops: Two Dozen Roses this February incorporated a throwback, traditional country sound, while this January saw HARDY issue his country/metal amalgam The Mockingbird & The Crow, reaching No. 4 on the Billboard 200 albums chart.
This month, of course, the two sets are followed by Wallen’s juggernaut, 36-track project One Thing at a Time (Big Loud/Republic/Mercury)– which has already earned 315 million official on-demand U.S. streams in its first four days of release (March 3-6). It’s not only the biggest week of any album so far this year (and larger than its predecessor, 2021’s Dangerous: The Double Album, which opened at 240 million in its first full week), it’s also already the biggest streaming week any country album has ever posted.
“Everybody just truly does such different things, and we all bring out the creativity in each other,” HARDY tells Billboard of the trio’s fruitful collaboration. “Ernest might say something that would sound like something I would never think of, and that would spark a lyrical direction maybe they wouldn’t think of. We do what we do, and bring out the best in the rest of the triangle.”
ERNEST notes a common thread that runs through each of their respective projects: the production work of Joey Moi (Florida Georgia Line, Nickelback).
“I think about how many country music acts Joey Moi has helped craft into a sound, and how different all of those sounds are,” ERNEST tells Billboard. ”My sound is a little more traditional, like [an] Opry band. HARDY’s got the rock stuff, and Morgan’s down to go the 808s route. But Joey is able to make it sound really f–king good every time.”
ERNEST first met Wallen in 2015 at a party thrown by Big Loud co-founder and hit songwriter Craig Wiseman. They followed each other on Instagram and discovered they had competed against each other on opposing high school baseball teams — Knoxville’s Gibbs High School (Wallen) against Nashville’s David Lipscomb High School (now Lipscomb Academy) (ERNEST).
“They beat us and went on to win State [in 2010] and then we beat them for State [in 2011],” ERNEST recalls. “So, technically we met in 2015, but we had been rivals before we were friends.”
HARDY and ERNEST met on a writers’ bus on a Florida Georgia Line tour around 2017, when ERNEST was a rapper still going by the name Snow. HARDY and Wallen also began writing together in 2017.
“He came to my little apartment in Green Hills [in Nashville] and we just started writing. Me, Morgan and Jameson Rodgers wrote a song and then ate Martin’s BBQ after,” HARDY recalls of his first writing session with Wallen.
The trio’s collaborative efforts were apparent even on Wallen’s 2018 debut Big Loud album If I Know Me. Wallen, HARDY and ERNEST co-wrote the title track, alongside co-writer Ryan Vojtesak. HARDY and Wallen each contributed to around half of the songs on that album. Wallen’s follow-up, 2021’s record-breaking Dangerous: The Double Album features more songs from the trio: they all contributed to “Somethin’ Country” and “This Bar,” as well as “More Than My Hometown,” which became a No. 1 hit on Billboard‘s Country Airplay chart before the album’s release in 2020.
“I remember being very difficult that day,” HARDY recalls with a laugh of writing “More Than My Hometown.” “I had a vision for the song, and so did Morgan. I was just being very picky because I could feel that the song was going somewhere and we really dug into that lyric. We always make the joke that Ern accidentally went to Midtown and got really drunk before that song, so he wasn’t really much help — but he contributed as good as he could. I just remember we really dug into the lyrics hard that day. The leadup to the hook changed so many times and we finally settled on those [lyrics].”
The trio have also traded features on each other’s albums, with Wallen appearing on the track “Red” from HARDY’s The Mockingbird & The Crow, as well as on two tracks from HARDY’s Hixtape, Vol. 1: “Turn You Down” and “He Went to Jared,” which has become a fan-favorite in concert. Meanwhile, Smith co-wrote another song from Hixtape, Vol. 1, “Redneck Tendencies.”
Wallen also teamed with ERNEST for “Flower Shops,” the traditional-minded top 20 Country Airplay hit. Meanwhile, Wallen’s Dangerous: The Double Album features seven tracks cowritten by HARDY and 11 contributions from Smith (including two tracks, “Dangerous” and “Wonderin’ About The Wind,” written by Wallen and Smith).
ERNEST contributes to 11 songs to Wallen’s sprawling One Thing at a Time, while HARDY contributed writing to three tracks. HARDY and ERNEST also lend their voices to respective features: HARDY on “In The Bible” and ERNEST on “Cowgirls,” a track he also wrote with Rocky Block, Ashley Gorley, James Maddocks and Ryan Vojtesak.
“A few months after we wrote it, I sent it to Morgan,” ERNEST says. “When I was singing and freestyling it, I thought, ‘Morgan’s gonna sound sick on this.’ Then, I think, with like eight hours left on the clock before they had to turn the album in, I was at the No. 1 party for Jelly Roll’s ‘Son of a Sinner’ [ERNEST is a co-writer on the Country Airplay chart-topper] and Morgan called me to sing a verse on ‘Cowgirls.’ I was like, ‘I thought you’d never ask’ — so I had to get my award and then run to the studio to put my vocal on ‘Cowgirls.’”
A similar situation led to HARDY’s vocal on “In The Bible.”
“The day the record was supposed to be done, Morgan texted me to ask me to sing on it,” he explains. “[Wallen] said the record had to be done by midnight that night. I listened and it fit me perfectly. If it was something stupid, I wouldn’t have done it — and I won’t ever send him a song that doesn’t sound like him.”
The trio’s camaraderie extends far beyond the writing rooms and recording studios. HARDY and ERNEST will open on Wallen’s international One Night at a Time tour, kicking off later this month. In 2022, HARDY opened shows on Wallen’s The Dangerous Tour, while ERNEST filled in the opening slot for a few shows after a tour bus carrying HARDY was involved in an accident.
“If any of us are going through anything on a personal level, any of the other ones would be there for them in a heartbeat in real life — and you’d never even know about it on Instagram,” adds ERNEST. “We are blessed to have these careers with our friends and get to cheer each other on.”
“I talk to either Morgan, ERNEST or both almost every day,” HARDY says. “We’re buddies, even outside of music. We’re always sending memes. I Facetimed Morgan on the way to this [Country Music] Hall of Fame event I did yesterday and I just worked out with Ernest this morning.”
Given their ultra-prolific songwriting and solid camaraderie, HARDY says it’s not out of the question that he, Wallen and ERNEST could at some point add to country music’s storied canon of collaborative albums — such as Wanted! The Outlaws, the Trio albums from Dolly Parton, Emmylou Harris and Linda Ronstadt, the Parton/Tammy Wynette/Loretta Lynn album Honky Tonk Angels, or projects from The Highwaymen, Pistol Annies, The Notorious Cherry Bombs, Chicks With Hits and more.
“We’ve definitely talked about it,” HARDY confirms. “I think it would be awesome. I think it would do really well, and would set up a tour perfectly. I don’t think anybody in our little trio would be opposed to that. It would be fun.”
Kelsea Ballerini is laughing off rumors about her relationship with Chase Stokes.
In a since-expired Instagram Story from Tuesday (March 7), the country star joked about her romance by posting a photo hand-in-hand on the Outer Banks actor’s lap backstage at Saturday Night Live, quipping, “idk seems staged. probably pr.” (Earlier in the week, she had shared another snap with her new love from Studio 8H, writing simply, “Hi chase stokes” — a cheeky reference to his Instagram handle.)
On the March 4 episode of NBC’s late-night sketch series, Ballerini performed two songs — “Blindsided” and “Penthouse” — off her new divorce-centric EP Rolling Up the Welcome Mat and its companion short film, which tell the singer’s side of her split from ex-husband Morgan Evans.
In the wake of that divorce, Ballerini revealed in a sit-down with the Call Her Daddy podcast that she met Stokes the old-fashioned millennial way: by sliding into his DMs. “I was ready to open back up,” she said. “I just felt, why not? I’ve never really dated; I don’t know how it works. I’m like, ‘Let’s just put ourselves out there — let’s just vibe.’ And it’s been fun.”
For his part, her ex recently addressed the former couple’s split with his own song “Over for You,” which Ballerini called “really opportunistic” in the same interview. “I felt really used in that moment,” she said at the time. “And again, his healing journey is his healing journey, I respect that. But publicly exploiting it feels a little nasty to me, before it’s final.”
Ballerini has previously addressed speculation that her romance with the actor is for publicity. The singer mentioned the rumor on TikTok by showing a screenshot of a message sent to gossip account DeuxMoi claiming her recent appearance with Stokes at a college football game a “PR play.”
“I know, I know. Stop reading, stop looking,” Ballerini says in her TikTok, gesturing to the message. “But what is happening, guys? What? Let’s not do this, you know?”
Gospel music luminaries David and Tamela Mann, as well as Dr. Bobby Jones will be honored during the upcoming 22nd annual Trailblazers of Gospel Music Awards on March 30.
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The event, to be held at Flourish Atlanta, will be hosted by BMI president/CEO Mike O’Neill and BMI vice president, Creative Catherine Brewton.
“BMI is thrilled to be back in Atlanta celebrating the best in Gospel music,” said Brewton via a statement. “We’re extremely proud to honor powerhouse couple Tamela and David Mann for their incredible contributions to the Gospel community, the enduring legacy of Dr. Bobby Jones and the songwriters and publishers behind the top Gospel songs of the previous year. Through song and praise, they deliver inspirational messages of hope, faith and goodwill to music lovers around the world. We feel truly blessed to bring these trailblazers together in fellowship and celebrate their creative works.”
In the 1990s, Tamela and David toured the world as part of the gospel group Kirk Franklin and the Family, before launching solo careers and joint ventures, creating Tillymann Entertainment in 2005 as a base for their various entertainment projects. In 2018, they released Us Against the World, their first collaborative album as a duo. A companion book to the album earned the couple a NAACP Image Award for outstanding literary work, while the album launched the hit “Ups & Downs.” The Manns also launched the Overcomer Family Tour, with their son David Jr. and their daughters La’Tia and Tiffany.
Beyond music, the Manns have appeared in several Tyler Perry plays, films and movies, and starred in their own sitcom, Mann & Wife, and the docuseries It’s a Mann’s World. As a solo artist, Tamela has issued six studio albums and earned a Grammy, BET Award, Billboard Music Award and multiple NAACP, GMA Dove and Stellar Gospel Music awards.
Singer, television host and radio broadcaster Jones will be honored for his more than four decades in entertainment. For more than 35 years, he served as the host of Bobby Jones Gospel on BET, and is credited with giving artists including Yolanda Adams, Kirk Franklin and Mary Mary their first national television exposure. In 1984, Jones earned a Grammy for best soul gospel performance by a duo or group for “I’m So Glad I’m Standing Here Today” with Barbara Mandrell. He has also received recognition from the GMA Dove Awards, and the Stellar Awards, and was inducted into the Black Music & Entertainment Walk of Fame earlier this year.
Throughout the ceremony, BMI will also recognize the songwriters, producers and music publishers of the past year’s 25 most performed gospel songs in the United States. The BMI gospel song, songwriter and publisher of the year will also be named during the event.
With only three months into the new year, Morgan Wallen‘s new album, One Thing At a Time, has outperformed every other album released so far in 2023 — and just three calendar days after its release.
Continuing the format of his second album, Dangerous: The Double Album, One Thing At a Time is a triple LP that contains a total of 36 songs from the country singer. The set, released on March 3 via Big Loud and Republic Records, so far has released four singles: “You Proof,” “Thought You Should Know,” “Last Night” and the album’s title track, “One Thing At a Time.” Each of them hit the Billboard Hot 100 following the album’s release, with “Last Night” and “You Proof” peaking within the top five (Nos. 3 and 5) while the album’s title track and “Should Know” settling within the top 40 (Nos. 12 and 37, respectively).
On March 3, Spotify revealed that Wallen’s One Thing At a Time earned a total of 52.29 million streams, setting the record for being the streaming service’s most-streamed country album in a single day by a male artist. Wallen has also topped the Billboard Artist 100 chart (dated March 11), becoming the top musical act in the U.S. for a seventh total week. While the data continues to pool for One Thing At a Time, the set is anticipated to perform well on next week’s Billboard 200 and Top Country Albums charts (dated March 18).
With so many songs to choose from, we want to know: Which of the 36 tracks from One Thing at a Time is your favorite? Vote in our poll below.
As a continued wave of anti-LGBTQ bills are being passed in Tennessee, a number of artists are saying enough is enough with a new benefit concert.
On Tuesday (March 7), Maren Morris, Sheryl Crow and may other artists announced their participation in Love Rising, an upcoming benefit concert taking place in Nashville to support Tennessee-based LGBTQ organizations including Tennessee Equality Project, inclusion tennessee, OUTMemphis and The Tennessee Pride Chamber.
The show, which will take place at Bridgestone Arena on March 20, is set to feature performances from Morris, Crow, Jason Isbell, Hayley Williams, Brittany Howard, Julien Baker, Allison Russell, Brothers Osbourne, Amanda Shires, Joy Oladokun, Yola, Jake Wesley Rogers, Mya Byrne and the Rainbow Coalition Band.
Last week, Tennessee passed two controversial anti-LGBTQ laws — one banning gender-affirming care from being performed on minors, another aiming to prevent drag queens from performing in public spaces. According to the Human Rights Campaign, Tennessee has passed more anti-LGBTQ laws than any other state in the U.S.
In a statement released alongside the concert’s announcement, singer-songwriter Allison Russell wrote that as “a queer, intersectional artist and mother raising my child in Nashville,” she knows how valuable organizations like the ones being supported through the concert are. “LGBTQIA+ contributions and creativity are foundational to every genre of modern song and arts performance,” she said. “I think it speaks volumes that so many in our community are feeling the same call to support, celebrate and uplift!”
Meanwhile, Isbell used his statement to condemn the latest bills signed into law in Tennessee. “SB3/HB9 and SB1/HB1 are clearly targeted attacks on Tennesseans who haven’t done anything wrong,” he said. “These bills add up to an attempt to eradicate a valuable part of our community and force good people to live in fear. We can’t in good conscience just stand by and let that happen.”
Throughout her career, Morris has been an outspoken advocate for the LGBTQ community. Just last year, the singer called out Brittany Aldean (the wife of country star Jason Aldean) for posting misinformation about gender-affirming care on Instagram. Morris went on to raise more than $100,000 for transgender organizations fighting against this kind of misinformation by selling T-shirts bearing the words “Lunatic Country Music Person,” in reference to Fox News commentator Tucker Carlson referring to her as a “lunatic” on his show.
Tickets for Love Rising officially go on sale Wednesday, March 8, at 10 a.m. local time, with net proceeds benefiting the organizations listed above. Get your tickets here.
It’s amazing how fast two minutes and 55 seconds can go.
That’s the amount of time it takes Jordan Davis to follow the life of a relationship — from confirmed bachelor, to husband, to father, to grandfather — in “Next Thing You Know,” a moderately unconventional ballad that practically has awards-circuit contender stamped on it. MCA Nashville released it to country radio via PlayMPE on Feb. 6 based on the reaction from fans, who frequently confess in YouTube comments that the song makes them cry. That response is not much different from the reaction of the four men who created it.
“I’m not the only one that probably had a few tears in the writing room,” Davis says. “That usually means you’re writing something real.”
“Next Thing” was basically a last-minute bonus as Davis worked on his Bluebird Days album, released Feb. 17. Greylan James (“Happy Does,” “For What It’s Worth”), Chase McGill (“5 Foot 9,” “Never Say Never”) and Josh Osborne (“What He Didn’t Do,” “Body Like a Back Road”) had a co-writing session booked at Universal Music Publishing Nashville for June 14, 2022, and Davis was added to the appointment just a couple of days before it took place. He had a June 21 recording session on his schedule, and the implication put pressure on the group to come up with something great.
“If we do it, we get a cut,” recalls James. “If we don’t, we’ve missed an easy opportunity.”
McGill had the title, “Next Thing You Know,” when they gathered in a basement writing room, and he saw it originally as a device for a tale about a couple who meets in a bar — the guy swears he’s staying single; next thing you know, he’s not. Davis liked the idea but wanted to shoot for something bigger: not just the first exchange of glances, but the whole sweep of a lifetime romance.
Everyone agreed, though they knew it was an ambitious concept. They briefly took time to lay out the chapters up front, making sure they had a sense of the journey.
“On a song like this, it felt like we needed to have a little bit of a road map before we got too far into it,” McGill says. “Fairly quickly into writing a life song, you think, ‘OK, if we spend 47 seconds of the song being 21, then we’re not going to get a lot of life in there.’ So kind of delicately, you have to think about how we get [in] the really important parts and yet move time along.”
The “Next Thing You Know” title became a significant part of the story. Each verse used the phrase twice to set up a change in perspective or life circumstances, allowing them to speed through some moments and linger on others. And one of them suggested that if they really wanted to pack a lot of life into the piece, they should make the lyrics in every chorus different and cover more events.
“That’s usually the kiss of death, if we change stuff,” says James. “We’re like, ‘Are we?’ We’re all looking around the room, just waiting for somebody to go there, and Jordan’s like, ‘I’ll do three different choruses. I don’t care. Let’s do it.’ ”
McGill and James played interlocking guitar parts, creating a “Meanwhile Back at Mama’s” musical vibe, and they headed down the road with the couple marrying in the first chorus, leaning on Davis’ own experiences to tell the narrative. “The best man giving the half-drunk speech — that was me,” he admits. “I probably had a few too many cocktails before I gave my best-man speech for my brother.”
The second-chorus scene in the hospital nursery, the singer dressed in scrubs and talking with the doctor, provoked some of the tears in the room. “I do specifically remember our doctor,” says McGill. “I might have looked a little faint or something, and I just remember him going, ‘How you doing there, Dad?’ It hit me right then: ‘Holy crap, this is real, man. I’m fixing to be a dad.’ ”
The protagonist’s kid heads off to college at the end of that stanza — “It’s amazing how fast 17 years go” — and next thing you know, the couple is back to two again, experiencing life as grandparents, with the story falling off before it reaches an obvious conclusion. “We didn’t kill anybody in the song, which we’re very proud of when we’re talking about life,” James says.
All four writers sang along to a guitar-only work tape with plans to do something more elaborate, but Davis didn’t have time to do another vocal for it over the next week — and didn’t need to. The group’s performance was highly emotional, and it sold the song perfectly. “The second I turned it in to my team, everybody was kind of like, ‘We need to get this out,’ ” recalls Davis.
Producer Paul DiGiovanni recognized that the words needed to carry the song, and was careful to keep the studio band restrained even as it moved the sonic narrative forward.
“It was all about the biggest moment being that last chorus, but we still didn’t want the song to be too huge,” he notes. “How do we get from zero to, say, 40, and slowly accelerate in between there? That was the whole key. We didn’t want to go zero to 60, we didn’t want to go zero to 100. We really wanted to just have a smooth runway to get us up to that last biggest chorus but still not be overbearing, not to get in the way of that vocal.”
Ilya Toshinskiy played the acoustic guitar part twice — once for the left channel and again for the right to create a depth of sound without using too many notes. Drummer Nir Z also loosened the screws on the snare, playing with his bare hands to develop a bongo sound. Other percussive elements, like shaker, tambourine and a programmed sound that approximates the African talking drum, subtly fill in gaps without covering the vocal. Guitarist Derek Wells topped it off with a mysterious, atmospheric solo that underscores the inspirational weight of the story.
“It’s very dreamy; there’s a lot of delay and reverb,” says DiGiovanni. “It’s not like a ‘Here comes the guitar player to the front of the stage’ moment. It just adds a little bit of a mood to the track.”
“Tucson Too Late” was originally slotted as the second Bluebird Days single, but listeners were already streaming the fire out of “Next Thing.” When Davis saw the audience’s overwhelming reaction to it on the first few dates of his new tour, the label called an audible. It commands No. 19 on the Hot Country Songs chart dated March 11 after 25 weeks on the list and rises to No. 42 in its third week on Country Airplay. Davis is learning to let it elicit tears in his live shows without breaking down himself.
“You just kind of have to remember there’s probably somebody here that came tonight to hear this song, so get it together and present it well,” he says. “That’s what I tell myself every night. I see how special this song is.”