Country
Page: 272
Zac Brown Band canceled its concert in Vancouver on Friday (Oct. 21) after some of the group’s members were denied entry at the Canadian border.
Frontman Zac Brown took to social media just hours before the concert at Rogers Arena to break the news to fans.
“We’re sorry to announce that we won’t be able to perform in Vancouver tonight. Our Canadian fans are incredible, and we would love nothing more than to share an evening of music together,” Brown wrote in a statement on Facebook.
“Some of our crew members had charges on their records from over a decade ago that have since been removed. Our team has regularly performed in Canada for 10 years, including two performances this year alone.”
Explore
Explore
See latest videos, charts and news
See latest videos, charts and news
The singer explained that each time the group has traveled to Canada, its members have “been at the mercy of a single border agent who decides who is allowed in to work, and unfortunately, not everyone was able to make it in the country last night.”
Brown concluded, “We are a family, a tribe. We stick together and support each other and we never leave anyone behind. As a band who prides themselves on showing up with excitement and professionalism, we will always play where we are welcome and appreciated, and we’re so sorry we can’t be there tonight.”
Rogers Arena wrote on its website that the show was canceled “due to unforeseen logistical issues” and that tickets would be refunded at point of purchase.
Read the Zac Brown Band’s full statement on Facebook below.
Country Music Hall of Fame member Reba McEntire brought her REBA: Live in Concert Tour, featuring “You’re Easy on the Eyes” hitmaker Terri Clark, to Nashville’s Bridgestone Arena on Friday (Oct. 21), and each turned in sets stuffed with hits (McEntire has 24 chart leaders on what is now Billboard‘s Hot Country Songs chart, and 60 top 10 hits, while Clark has two chart-leaders and nearly a dozen top 10 hits on the same chart).
Explore
See latest videos, charts and news
See latest videos, charts and news
Together, McEntire and Clark played to a tightly-packed, primarily female audience inside the arena, effectively laying waste to the tired adage that “women don’t want to hear women.” Incredibly, the show was billed as McEntire’s first solo headlining concert at Bridgestone Arena.
Of course, McEntire, who won the Country Music Association’s entertainer of the year honor in 1986, and in 2018 received the prestigious Kennedy Center Honors, had the audience on their feet and cheering before the first note, as she stepped onstage in the first of many outfits adorned with sparkles aplenty.
She began her headlining set with her first No. 1 hit, 1982’s “Can’t Even Get the Blues,” followed by her most recent chart-leader, the 2011 Hot Country Songs No. 1 “Turn on the Radio.”
“Thanks to y’all, those were No. 1 records — my first and latest,” McEntire said. “In between is a lot of life, love and hairspray,” she quipped. Not to mention nearly two dozen additional chart-topping hits, many of which filled her set list, including “Ride Around With You,” “Little Rock,” and two of her most dramatic hits, “Whoever’s in New England” and “The Night the Lights Went Out in Georgia.”
She noted her current work on the Lifetime movie The Hammer and the ABC series Big Sky, both of which find McEntire working with her boyfriend, actor Rex Linn.
“He’s definitely my somebody,” she told the audience, launching into her 2004 chart-topper by the same title.
In an era of country music that has in recent years seen so many hits center around the kind of lighthearted fare — trucks, alcohol-fueled parties, girls in cutoff jeans — that prompted Maddie & Tae to write the kiss-off hit “Girl in a Country Song,” McEntire’s set seemed an oasis for women, a musical communal space for the audience to share their triumphs (“I’m a Survivor”), ambitions (“Is There Life Out There?”) and, of course, heartbreaks.
Donning a long, sparkling blue dress, McEntire devoted an entire segment of her set to songs plumbing the nuances of a broken heart.
“I love singing sad songs. Sometimes I feel like it’s the glue of country music. Sometimes when your heart is broke, you just need to waller in it,” McEntire said in that unmistakable Oklahoma twang, before adding these were some of her “favorite wallering songs.”
She offered some of her most vulnerable performances here, both love and pain etched into her expressions, on the 1990s chart-toppers “And Still” and “You Lie,” the 1980s songs “Somebody Should Leave,” and “The Last One to Know,” as well as “Tammy Wynette Kind of Pain,” from her 2019 album, Stronger Than the Truth. At the end of the segment, and clearly finished “wallering,” McEntire ripped away the lower half of the dress to reveal sparkle-fringe short skirt as the fiery, determined side of the multi-faceted entertainer returned with the determined “Consider Me Gone” and the post-breakup, get-back-to-living anthem “Going Out Like That.” Many across the majority-female audience lifted their hands, singing every word like an emotional balm.
Later in the set, she addressed a different type of pain — a daughter who never heard the words “I Love You” from her stoic father — as the crowd hung on to every word of “The Greatest Man I Never Knew,” while images of McEntire’s late father, steer roping champion Clark McEntire, who died in 2014, flickered across the screen.
“I had my mama’s will, but I had a lot of my daddy in me, too,” McEntire said.
Brooks & Dunn appeared virtually on the large center screen to accompany McEntire on “Oklahoma Swing,” which McEntire had a top 20 hit with in 1990 as a hit with Vince Gill. During the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, McEntire welcomed Gill for a rare live performance of their 1993 power ballad duet “The Heart Won’t Lie” on the stage of the Grand Ole Opry House. Fans hoping for a repeat performance at Friday evening’s Bridgestone show briefly thought their dreams were coming true, as McEntire concluded the song’s first verse and chorus and gestured toward center stage. The wave of cheers from the audience swiftly swelled and then slightly subsided as Gill did not appear in-person, but rather via a virtual performance.
McEntire, who won her third Grammy in 2018, for her gospel album Sing It Now: Songs of Faith and Hope, also devoted a segment to several classic hymns, including “Oh Happy Day,” “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot,” as well as “Back to God,” a song that originally appeared on Randy Houser’s 2008 album, and which McEntire included on Sing It Now.
She welcomed longtime friend Clark back to the stage as the women paid homage to one of their favorite vocalists, Linda Ronstadt. They traded lines and were clearly relishing in the moment to collaborate as they sailed through “You’re No Good,” “When Will I Be Loved” and “Heat Wave.”
The evening closed out in expected fashion, with “Fancy,” which McEntire has often closed her shows with. The band led an extended vamp before McEntire appeared in a pale blue dress to sing the story of a woman whose mother “Spent every last penny we had to buy me a dancin’ dress,” and thus setting into motion the rags-to-riches story. The song’s midpoint brought one of the concert’s rare pyrotechnic moments, as sparks soared to the ceiling in front of McEntire, fading to reveal her resplendent in a red sparkling dress, with her thousand-watt smile, a victor after hard-fought journey, reveling in a triumphant ending, and thus representing the hopes and aspirations of so many in the audience.
Opening for Reba was Clark, who played her set like a headliner, stacking the deck with hit after hit, including “Poor, Poor Pitiful Me,” “Girls Lie, Too” “Everytime I Cry,” and more.
In the mid-1990s, Clark set herself apart from other female artists by taking a page out of the playbook of the hit male artists of the time, becoming one of the few female artists at the time to regularly wear a cowboy hat — evoking a style of honky-tonk glamour that perhaps owed more to artists like Dwight Yoakam than any number of female artists.
But over the ensuing decades, she’s of course proven herself has much more than a “hat act.” Like many of her musical heroes, Clark co-wrote many of her hits (including “Better Things to Do,” “Boy Meets Girl,” “You’re Easy on the Eyes,” “In My Next Life” and “Emotional Girl”). She also sang traditionalist-leaning music in a country music era often dominated by power-pop, and wasn’t afraid to stay true to herself regardless of what musical style was “in fashion.” Clark is a too-often under-heralded influence on today’s female artists.
During her set, Clark shared the story of how a song she wrote by herself, “If I Were You,” changed her life. She wrote the song when she was 21 and going through marriage struggles. She turned to a female friend, who was single, for advice, and later wrote the song based on that experience.
She recalled being turned down by record labels, before singing “If I Were You” as part of her audition for Mercury Records Nashville in 1994.
“I have this song to thank for the record deal, and to thank for paying for the divorce,” she deadpanned, to the cheers of the audience.
And the cheering didn’t end there. The crowd half-sang, half-shouted every word of “Better Things to Do,” to the point that Clark turned the singing duties over to the audience for entire final chorus, and they capably sang as though the song were a current chart hit.
The smart pairing of McEntire and Clark made for a rich, hit-filled and emotionally-resonant evening of song, with plenty of sparkle thrown in for good measure.
Related Images:
In 2019, when Brandi Carlile and Shooter Jennings began working with country music veteran Tanya Tucker on While I’m Livin’, Tucker’s first album of new music in nearly two decades, they aimed to create the kind of critical and commercial career resurgence that Rick Rubin’s American Recordings series had for Johnny Cash’s career. Carlile also heeded key advice from Rubin, who told her to bring in a camera crew to film her studio sessions with Tucker.
Explore
See latest videos, charts and news
See latest videos, charts and news
Of course, Tucker — who once led her own reality television show, Tuckerville — had no qualms about filming the process.
“I love it — I think everything should be documented,” Tucker tells Billboard. “I’ve thought about, ‘How much would it cost to have a cinematographer video everything, from the time I get up to the time I go to sleep?’ I mean, you can throw away what you don’t want, but at least we got it.”
The result of that filming — the nearly two-hour documentary The Return of Tanya Tucker (Featuring Brandi Carlile) — appears in select theaters in New York and Los Angeles beginning today (Oct. 21) and nationwide Nov. 4. Helmed by Kathlyn Horan, the film chronicles the three musicians’ time spent at Sunset Sound in Los Angeles, crafting the album that would ultimately garner Tucker her first Grammy wins.
In 2020, nearly 50 years after earning the first of her 14 Grammy nominations (for “Delta Dawn” in 1973, when Tucker was only 14), Tucker celebrated winning her first two Grammy awards: best country song (“Bring My Flowers Now”) and best country album (While I’m Livin’). Poignantly, she took the stage with Jennings and Carlile, as Carlile noted that after the death of Tucker’s parents (her father and longtime manager Beau Tucker died in 2006, and her mother Juanita died in 2012), Tucker didn’t want to record music and that she felt her life had “more love behind her than in front of her.”
Interspersed between modern footage from the studio are home videos and archived video interviews from throughout Tucker’s career, piecing together the story of a spunky, self-determined teen who became one of country music’s brightest — and at times, most controversial — stars.
Tucker was ushered into the spotlight in 1972 as a 13-year-old teen phenom singing “Delta Dawn” and “Would You Lay With Me (in a Field of Stone),” and later appearing on the cover of Rolling Stone at age 15 (With the confident headline: “Hi, I’m Tanya Tucker, I’m 15, You’re Gonna Hear From Me”). And the world did: In the 1970s and 1980s, she notched 10 leaders on Billboard‘s Hot Country Songs chart, and over the course of three decades, earned 40 top 10 country hits. In 1994, she became one of the few country artists to perform during the Super Bowl halftime show, appearing alongside The Judds, Clint Black and Travis Tritt.
But even as Tucker notched No. 1 country hits in the 1970s and 1980s, she also took criticism for releasing the rock-oriented 1978 album TNT — as well as its suggestive album cover, which featured a leather-clad Tucker straddling a microphone cord. She also contended with the sexism and double standards of an industry that often penalized Tucker for partaking in many of the same vices (smoking, drug use, alcohol, and tumultuous romances) that helped make icons of her male counterparts.
At one key point in the documentary, Tucker is asked about her female musical heroes and influences. Tellingly, she is unable to point to a particular female artist she looked up to, instead namechecking Elvis Presley and Merle Haggard (“Haggard was everything to me,” she says in the documentary). Early on in her career, Tucker traded the long, modest dresses that were the norm for female artists, opting for flashy jumpsuits a la Presley, costumes that allowed her to move freely onstage and fit her hard-charging style. It was Haggard who would later offer Tucker a pep-talk when she was contemplating quitting music (“He jumped all over my a—about that. You know, what are you gonna do?” she tells Billboard).
The documentary also spotlights the sweet chemistry between Tucker, Jennings and especially Carlile, who serves as producer, co-writer, supporter and astute interviewer of Tucker, often gently pulling out the star’s childhood memories. Tucker recalls turning down “Happiest Girl in the Whole U.S.A.” — which would become a huge crossover smash for Donna Fargo — in order to record her own breakthrough hit, “Delta Dawn.” Elsewhere, viewers are reminded that after she signed her first recording contract while barely a teen. The documentary also shows a diary entry from Tucker on her 16th birthday — the same day she signed a $1.6 million record deal.
“Brandi’s always waiting for me to get something out, and she unscrambles it,” Tucker says. “She’s so smart, she hears things that other people don’t hear in conversations, and she acts on it.”
The documentary captures one such conversation, as Tucker recounts singing to Loretta Lynn — who died Oct. 4 at 90 — a chorus she had written, and the two artists promising to get together to co-write.
“Me and Loretta talked about it for years: ‘We’ve got to write a song together, we gotta write a song together,’” Tucker says. “But we never did. Me, at my core, is a singer, and an entertainer. But Loretta’s real core was writing songs — though she happened to be a really great singer, too, one of the greatest.”
However, Tucker did finish the song with Carlile, creating what would become “Bring My Flowers Now,” which would help propel the project to Grammy success. For Tucker, it has been her intense devotion to finding top-shelf songs that pair with her wisdom-cracked voice.
“When I was a kid, I thought, ‘Why do people put two great songs on every album and the rest of it is s–t?’ Publishers loved it, because they could get a free ride. Put 10 songs on the album, and they should all be capable of being singles. Then [Tucker’s former Capitol Records labelmate] Garth Brooks came along and did that. We were real close there on Capitol. I think he made a lot of great decisions based on the mistakes I made.”
As much as she loves the idea of chronicling her every move, Tucker has yet to watch the documentary in full.
“The first time I tried to watch it was in Austin, and I didn’t see all of it because I had a hard time sitting through it. Really, what got me and the reason I was hesitant to watch it in a group of people is all the old home movies — my mom and dad, reliving those. That gets me emotional, and I got this reputation,” she says with a chuckle. “I’m tough. Brandi thinks I’m real tough, so I can’t be there crying with her — I’ll just go to the bathroom.”
Working with Carlile and Jennings has energized Tucker, who says she has three albums “in the can,” including a follow-up project with the pair.
“It’ll be out around June, I think,” she says, proudly discussing some of the songs set for the project, including the Tucker/Jennings co-write “Dearest Linda,” inspired by Linda Ronstadt, and several Carlile co-writes, including “The List” — as well as another song, “Ready As I’ll Never Be” which will be released Friday (Oct. 21).
“I adore her,” Tucker says of Carlile. “After that last album, I didn’t know we were going to make another one, but one day she sent me a message and said, ‘We got to work together again.’ One of my first thoughts was, ‘Oh god, now we gotta make this even better than the last time,’” she says, laughing. “It’s a lot of pressure to win those Grammys and stuff. You know, I was comfortable with losing, but I like winning a bit better. It’s gotten in my blood now.”
Even as a two-time Grammy champion with numerous No. 1s to her credit, one honor still eludes Tucker: induction into the Country Music Hall of Fame.
“You know, it was never like I just had to be in the Hall of Fame, so maybe that’s why I ain’t done it — so now, maybe I shouldn’t want it and then I’ll get it,” she says. “Of course, [2020 inductee] Marty Stuart, I congratulated him and he said, ‘It’s ridiculous that I’m in there before you. Hell, I was campaigning for you to get in there.’ But I would much rather that people want me to be there, rather than have people going, ‘What is she in there for?’ And there are a few people that are in there that people wonder about—How did they get in there when they were [babies] while I was doin’ my stuff? But I don’t have the anger that some people have, and I’m just not a political person.”
Ultimately, Tanya Tucker Returns (Featuring Brandi Carlile) showcases Tucker’s decades-long fight for respect and creative freedom in a male-dominated industry, and introduces her story and music to a new generation of fans.
“People ask me, ‘How do you think you lasted so long?’” she says. “I won’t go away, so you’ll just have to put up with me.”
First Country is a compilation of the best new country songs, videos & albums that dropped this week.
Thomas Rhett, Merry Christmas Y’all
Thomas Rhett is already feeling festive, with the release of his first holiday project. The polished four-song EP finds the singer-songwriter bringing his warm, relaxed sound to classics including “Winter Wonderland” (bolstered with sleek horns and soft percussion) and “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas.”
Scotty McCreery, “Small Town Story”
Explore
See latest videos, charts and news
See latest videos, charts and news
McCreery’s latest continues in his winning arc of songs pulled from chapters of his own life, chronicling his own small town story, from learning guitar and playing sports, getting his first truck and falling in love. The song will be included on his upcoming deluxe version of his album Same Truck, out Nov. 18.
Tanya Tucker, “Ready as I’ll Never Be”
In 2020, Tanya Tucker experienced a career resurgence when her album While I’m Livin’ and song “Bring My Flowers Now” earned Tucker her first Grammy wins, nearly 50 years after she got her start in the industry. Today, the documentary The Return of Tanya Tucker (Featuring Brandi Carlile) releases in select theaters and chronicles the making of the project. The doc also includes this new track, which matches Tucker’s wisdom-filled, life-weathered voice with lyrics of life, nostalgia and moving on.
Tyler Hubbard, “I’m the Only One” (Video)
A newly minted solo artist, Hubbard highlights his comedic and acting skills in this new music video. He works at an upscale clothing store, and when the shop closes, it’s time to cut up and have fun. The clip is a lighthearted complement for this jovial love song, which will be included on Hubbard’s upcoming debut solo album, which releases in January 2023.
HunterGirl, “Hometown Out of Me”
Former American Idol contestant HunterGirl makes her debut release following her time on the show, with her first release for 19 Recordings/BMG. On her first post-show song, she makes sure fans know she hasn’t left her Winchester, Tennessee roots. She wrote the song with Laura Veltz and Jimmy Robbins, and the lyrics nod to the small town as the reason for her fearlessness (“Maybe you ain’t scared of crashing/ When you got a place to land”). The sweetly sentimental song is a perfect foil for her likable, girl next door-made-good persona and strong voice, and a pleasant pop/country outing that chronicles her current moment of transcending from talented aspiring artist, to make her first steps toward the big leagues.
Jessie James Decker with Billy Currington, “I Still Love You”
Decker and Currington reunite for another duet, following the song “Good Night,” which was featured on Currington’s 2015 album, Summer Forever. “I Still Love You” centers on a couple that falls apart, only for each to discover they are better together. Sonically, the song falls neatly into Currington’s slow-groove, R&B-tinged wheelhouse and gives Decker space to let loose on some soulful vocal runs. While it would never be mistaken for Currington’s 2004 duet with Shania Twain on the boppy “Party for Two,” it does further showcase the influence Twain’s career has had on Decker.
Greylan James, “Old Truck Young Love”
This laid-back, radio-ready track is the latest release from singer-songwriter Greylan James, known as a writer on Kenny Chesney’s “Happy Does,” among other songs. Here, he continues to show his knack as both an artist as well as a writer, on a track he wrote with Jessi Alexander, Ben Hayslip, and NBA All-Star Jimmy Butler.
Noah Thompson, “Make You Rich”
Thompson draws on his Kentucky roots and past career as a construction worker, as he passes on lessons he’s learned along the way, like valuing family and friends over materialistic things, and being a person of character. “A man is measured by more than a treasure stacked up in a bank,” he sings, adding, “Be a better man than your old man was.” A promising release from this former American Idol winner.
Three top female artists will team up for a searing performance during the upcoming CMA Awards, which is slated to air on ABC on Nov. 9 from Nashville.
On her latest album, Subject to Change, Kelsea Ballerini welcomed friends Carly Pearce and Kelly Clarkson on the rowdy track “You’re Drunk, Go Home.” The trio of artists will make their debut live performance of the song during the CMA Awards. TMZ first reported the news, and Billboard has independently confirmed the trio will be performing the song together during the awards ceremony.
Explore
See latest videos, charts and news
See latest videos, charts and news
The track is a piercing kiss-off to a drunk guy trying hopelessly make a romantic gesture, and proves to be a fine female empowerment moment. Notably, all three of the women have weathered divorces in recent years, with Clarkson splitting from Brandon Blackstock in 2020. That same year, Pearce divorced fellow country artist Michael Ray, and in August 2022, Ballerini revealed her split from fellow country artist Morgan Evans.
Ballerini previously told Billboard about the song’s origins and how Pearce and Clarkson came to be on the track.
“I felt that there’s some sass and comedy to this song,” Ballerini explained. “So I thought, ‘Who are the women in my life that are artists that have both of those things?’ Carly and I have been friends for, like, 10 years, before either of us had anything going on and we’ve just seen each other personally and professionally through so many seasons of life. We’ve always wanted to do a song together and this made sense.”
When it came to Clarkson, Ballerini said, “I thought the biggest ask I could make is Kelly Clarkson, and I texted her that morning. She did her vocals that night.”
At last year’s CMA Awards, Ballerini picked up two wins for “Half of My Hometown,” her collaboration with Kenny Chesney, netting video of the year and musical event of the year. This year, the song is nominated for single of the year heading into November’s awards ceremony.
Pearce is one of the most nominated artists leading into this year’s awards show, with five nods, including musical event of the year, music video of the year, and single and song of the year (all for “Never Wanted to Be That Girl” with Ashley McBryde), as well as female vocalist of the year. Pearce took home the CMA’s female vocalist of the year honor for the first time last year.
To date, Clarkson has earned six CMA Awards nominations, as well as a win for musical event of the year in 2011 for her collaboration with Jason Aldean, “Don’t You Wanna Stay.”
“People say ‘unforgiveable’ a lot, but we don’t use the word ‘forgivable’ much,” says Bart Millard, lead singer of contemporary Christian music act MercyMe. “With all the craziness going on in the world today, sometimes it feels like that forgiveness and grace is the most insane thing, especially with cancel culture. We are very good at eating our wounded.”
Millard is referring to the song that serves as the fulcrum of MercyMe’s new album, Always Only Jesus, out Friday (Oct. 21). For nearly three decades, the Brickhouse Entertainment-managed MercyMe has grown a back catalog of hits like “I Can Only Imagine,” which was just certified 5x platinum by the RIAA; “Word of God Speak,” and “Even If.”
Their new album strikes the balance between experimental and the style of polished worship music that MercyMe has become known for, as it dives deep into celebratory wonder (“Hands Up,” “Always Only Jesus”), keeping faith amid doubt (“To Not Worship You”) and finding refuge (“Heart Beats for Your Good”).
The band, which has won six Dove Awards, hopes the new music inspires reconciliation within communities that have become fractured through the COVID-19 pandemic, fiery political divides and more over the past few years.
“In our perspective, we’ve seen a lot of division within the body of Christ, a lot of people drawing lines, taking different stances on things,” Millard says. “And, man, if there was ever a time to remind ourselves that there is one thing we have in common and that’s Jesus, [it would be now].”
MercyMe had initially planned to record only a five-song EP; however, that began to shift with the writing of what became their current single, “Then Christ Came.”
“Then Christ Came,” which stands at No. 11 on Billboard’s Christian Airplay chart, was originally slated for their 2021 album inhale (exhale), but the song, penned by Millard and co-writer David Leonard, wasn’t fully finished by the album’s deadline. So they instead included only a snippet of the unfinished demo.
“We couldn’t crack the code on it for some reason,” Millard recalls. “We knew it was a special song, so we decided that for the first time, we were going to pull the song and wait for the next album.”
Millard joined with singer-songwriters Jason Ingram and Phil Wickham to finish the song, which gets an amped-up refurbishing on Always Only Jesus — a technique reminiscent of Rich Mullins’ “Step by Step,” which was a chorus included on the first album of Mullins’ two-volume project, The World as Best as I Remember It, released in 1991. The chorus, written by David “Beaker” Strasser, became a popular worship song. Mullins added verses to it, and included it again on the album’s second volume, under the name “Sometimes by Step.”
“I’m a huge Rich Mullins fan and I love that he did that,” Millard says. “With ‘Then Christ Came,’ our label said, ‘What if we did a demo — since we know it’s going to be the first single, whenever the next record comes out, a kind of foreshadowing?”
As with inhale (exhale), the group recorded Always Only Jesus at Imagine Cabin, their cabin-turned-recording studio just outside of Nashville.
“It’s been a dream of ours forever to have a space like this,” MercyMe guitarist/vocalist Barry Graul says. “We can leave stuff set up however we want and work as much as we want. If inspiration strikes, we can just chase it. It’s great to go to new areas and find new inspiration, but there’s something special about having your own space, too.”
“This is us getting back to the heart of being a band again,” Millard adds.
The group reunited with the same trio of producers that worked on their previous album: Brown Bannister, known for producing a string of contemporary Christian music artists including Amy Grant, Steven Curtis Chapman and Third Day; Tedd T (Delirious, Newsboys, for King & Country) and The Afters’ Jordan Mohilowski (Andrew Ripp, Walker Hayes).
“They are each very different in their approach,” Millard explains. “Jordan is very in-the-box programming, kind of directing us, whereas with Ted, you could accidentally drop your guitar or something and he would be like, ‘Oh, do that again so I can record it.’ And Brown is like the zen master of encouragement in the room. He’s been doing this for so long and really knows how to work with a band, he’s very diplomatic. He’s the king of giving a band space to get it right. It’s been cool to watch each of them bring their own style to the process. Then there are five producers within the band, so you’ve got like eight producers, but it makes everybody better.”
According to Millard, there was another artist who also gave input into the album — CCM icon Grant, who had been instrumental in MercyMe recording and releasing what became their signature hit, ‘I Can Only Imagine.”
“I’ve had a thing for years where I’ll send a new record to Amy before it ever releases, and she’ll take notes and tell me what she loves — or doesn’t love — about it,” Millard says. “She will be brutally honest. For [“Forgivable”], she said, ‘The lyrics are so heavy… The drums kind of get on my nerves, because I’m wanting it to be a ballad.’ When I’m writing lyrics, I tend to save those for the power ballad, but I do love that this is one of the deepest lyrics on the whole album, but it’s also like an upbeat John Mayer song.”
The album closes with a revamped, harmony-rich version of the hymn “Nothing But the Blood.”
“There are some songs that, due to time and scheduling, I’ll do all the background vocals because I’m there, and [his MercyMe bandmates] do it live and they are more than capable,” Millard says. “This is one of those, like [2008’s] ‘Finally Home,’ where there’s no programming, that’s strictly the band. That’s literally us, trying to find the kick drum sound by hitting things on the wall or the couch cushions, creating it right there in the room.”
This week, the band launched their MercyMe Live 2022 tour, and will team with Chris Tomlin for a winter U.S. outing beginning Dec. 1. For all their achievements, including 17 No. 1s on Christian Airplay, the band members say they still have a few career goals left on their wish lists — including some areas where they’ve still never performed.
“There are some overseas places we would love to play,” says MercyMe bassist/keyboardist/vocalist Nathan Cochran. “We’ve done very little international touring; we haven’t done anything in Europe. We’ve played Australia. We did a USO tour, which was amazing. We would love to do that again — though it is a balancing act because either we take all of our families with us, or we would have to be gone from our families for two weeks.”
And atop the bucket list is winning a Grammy — for which they have been nominated six times, but have yet to take home the golden gramophone. “That’s the one. That would be cool,” says Cochran.
Zach Bryan‘s songs have dotted the Billboard country charts over the past year, but he recently revealed he’s also a fan of another singer-songwriter with strong country ties: Taylor Swift.
Bryan recently shared his enthusiasm for Swift’s upcoming album Midnights, which releases Friday, Oct. 21.
“miss swift what are the vibes at midnight good morning everybody and happy almost sweekend, get in we’re going crying,” Bryan tweeted Thursday (Oct. 21). That message prompted one of his followers to ask the singer about his favorite Swift songs.
“‘August,’ for sure,” Bryan responded, referring to a track from Swift’s 2020 album Folklore. He also noted that his girlfriend asks him to cover Swift’s 2006 debut single, “Tim McGraw.”
Like Swift herself, who released albums Folklore and Evermore in 2020, followed by last year’s re-recordings of her previous albums Fearless and Red, Oklahoma native and Navy veteran Bryan has also proven himself a prolific writer.
In May, Bryan’s Warner Records debut album American Heartbreak debuted at No. 1 on Billboard‘s Top Country Albums chart and at No. 5 on the Billboard 200, while his song “Something in the Orange” has been certified platinum by the RIAA, and is at No. 44 on Billboard’s Country Airplay chart).
In July, Bryan followed American Heartbreak with the release of the nine-song EP Summertime Blues, which debuted at No. 7 on Billboard’s Top Country Albums chart, as well as at No. 2 on the Top Americana/Folk Albums chart.
Leading up to the release of Midnights, Swift has teased song titles (including “Mastermind,” “Anti-Hero,” and “You’re on Your Own, Kid,” as well as “Snow on the Beach,” a collaboration with Lana Del Rey), lyrics (via a series of Spotify billboards that have popped up in cities around the world), and inspirations for the album.
See Bryan’s tweets about his favorite Taylor Swift song below.
miss swift what are the vibes at midnight good morning everybody and happy almost sweekend, get in we’re going crying— Zach Bryan (@zachlanebryan) October 20, 2022
august for sure but my gf actually forces me to cover Tim McGraw for her so it’s all up in the air— Zach Bryan (@zachlanebryan) October 20, 2022
George Strait, Brandi Carlile, Keith Urban, Tim McGraw, Little Big Town and Wynonna are among the artists who will pay tribute to Loretta Lynn on Oct. 30 during Coal Miner’s Daughter: A Celebration of the Life and Music of Loretta Lynn.
The event, helmed by CMT and Sandbox Productions in partnership with the late legend’s family, will air live and commercial-free on CMT at 7 p.m. ET from Nashville’s Grand Ole Opry. Lynn, 90, died at her home in Hurricane Mills, Tenn., on Oct. 4.
Hosted by NBC’s Today show co-host and family friend Jenna Bush Hager, the evening will also include performances and appearances from Barbara Mandrell, Lynn’s sister Crystal Gayle, Darius Rucker, Emmy Russell & Lukas Nelson, Faith Hill, Margo Price, Martina McBride, Sheryl Crow, Tanya Tucker, The Highwomen (Carlile, Amanda Shires, Natalie Hemby and Brittney Spencer) and more artists to be announced later.
“We are truly honored to work closely alongside Loretta’s family to create a celebration of life fit for a true queen of country music, Loretta Lynn,” said CMT’s senior vp of production, music & events Margaret Comeaux and senior vp of music strategy and talent Leslie Fram, who serve as executive producers along with Sandbox’s Jason Owen, Ladypants Productions’ Patrizia DiMaria, Lynn’s daughter and manager Patsy Lynn Russell and Essential Broadcast Media’s Ebie McFarland. “She was a true original, a woman who always sang from her heart, never shied away from challenging the status quo and blazed the path forward for her fellow female artists. From her firecracker spirit and signature musicality to her unmistakable country style and unparalleled authenticity, we look forward to honoring her in the best way we know how: sharing stories and songs with her family, friends and the legions of fans she loved dearly.”
Lynn, whose hardscrabble life story was turned into the 1980 Oscar-winning biopic Coal Miner’s Daughter, recorded 16 No. 1 singles and was among country music’s pioneering female artists.
The memorial service comes five months after CMT and Sandbox joined together to honor the life and career of another Nashville icon, Naomi Judd, for a similar televised live event. Judd died April 30 at age 76.
Also coming from CMT is Nov. 8’s Next Women of Country: Celebrating the Songs of Loretta Lynn showcase at City Winery Nashville. Fram and Wendy Moten will co-host the evening, featuring performances in the round from Bowen + Young, Brooke Eden, Caylee Hammack, Erin Enderlin, Miko Marks, Sacha, Stephanie Quayle and Tiera Kennedy.
CMT dedicated its Oct. 14 broadcast of the 2022 CMT Artists of the Year celebration to Lynn’s memory, with her sisters Gayle and Peggy Sue Wright delivering an emotional performance of “Coal Miner’s Daughter,” and with special presentations from McBride and Tucker.
Two additional commercial-free encores of the Oct. 30 celebration will air on CMT on Nov. 2 at 8 p.m. ET and Nov. 6 at 11 a.m. ET. The special will also be made available on Paramount+ in early 2023.
Privacy may be one of the most valuable commodities of life in 2022.
With internet tracking, the proliferation of public cameras and the frequent ping of text-message spam, keeping personal space personal is much more difficult than it was when the biggest issue was a neighborhood snoop.
Finding time alone — specifically adult time alone — is at the heart of “You, Me, and Whiskey,” a new Justin Moore duet with Priscilla Block. It’s also a real-world issue for Moore, who shares a house in Arkansas with his wife of 15 years and their four kids.
“One night, [it’s] softball practice for one of them, the other night is basketball lessons for this one and the next night is church,” he says. “It’s difficult to make time for Kate and I — for just us — so you have to make a concerted effort to do that. So I really related to the song.”
Landing a cut with Moore was the goal when Brock Berryhill (“Homesick,” “What Happens in a Small Town”) hosted a 9 a.m. writing session with Cole Taylor (“Home Alone Tonight,” “Nothing To Do Town”) and Jessi Alexander (“Never Say Never,” “I Drive Your Truck”) on Music Row on Jan. 10. Specifically, they intended to write a potential duet for Moore and an unidentified female.
“I love writing duets and almost can’t get tired of them,” enthuses Alexander. “In a duet, you kind of get more dimension. And I love layering. You can alternate melodies and shift around and [have the singers] accompany each other.”
Taylor brought the title “You, Me, and Whiskey” into the room, and all three thought it lent itself to a song about a casual hookup. But they wanted an angle that was authentic to Moore’s home life and focused on a long-term couple.
“He’s happily married,” Taylor says. “When you’re writing with certain artists in mind, you have to keep their story in your head.”
They wrote the anthemic chorus first, beginning the stanza with the hook and filling the next six lines with rising passion and alcohol, the “black-label buzz” aiding the couple’s private pursuit of “things that stay in the dark.” That led to the setup line, celebrating the romance as both sweet and strong, before they repeated the hook once more.
That setup line “was the hardest one for us to find,” recalls Taylor. “We knew we had something special with the melody and the title and the duet part. And the most important part of the song is how you set up the hook. None of it matters if you don’t have a good hook. We searched and searched and searched for that, and then I want to say Jessi maybe said, ‘Nothin’ as sweet, nothin’ as strong.’ We’re all, ‘Yeah, that’s it.’”
They made the chorus ultra-flexible. If Moore — or some other artist — wanted to cut it solo, they wouldn’t have to change a single word. But it was also perfect for two singers to trade lines or sing the entire chorus in harmony.
“I’m a big harmony guy, so I love everything harmonized,” Berryhill says. “I’d harmonize drums.”
They used the same four-chord progression for the verses as the chorus, applying a different melodic approach to provide variance. The progression is dark and mostly unresolved, creating a near-constant tension. The chorus’ big, bright melody hides it a bit, though the verses, using a lower melody and more cautious phrasing, make that subliminal need for resolution clearer. That’s quite appropriate for a song about interpersonal tension and release.
In the second verse, they addressed the release a little more with a cheeky line about “talkin’ dirty” at 10:30,” knowing that it might cause an issue for some programmers. “Obviously, it’s really risky,” allows Taylor. “If it needs changing, we can change it. If not, we just got ‘talkin’ dirty’ on country radio.”
Alexander believes allowing the characters to behave in a public song the way they would in private makes it more likely to connect. “There’s going to be people in the carpool lane, people that are also married, that hopefully will go, ‘I remember those kids,’ ” she says. “That’s exciting because I don’t know that they’re spoken to a lot.”
“You, Me, and Whiskey” didn’t get completed during that Monday’s two-hour appointment, but they reassembled on Friday to finish it. Taylor and Alexander laid down the vocal parts for the demo that day, and Berryhill produced it with scratchy programmed drums and acoustic guitar, offset by a shimmering banjo.
“Being a rock dude, I normally take things to 10,” says Berryhill. “But this one, we kind of kept it like 60%, 70%. The demo doesn’t have all the big drums.”
An hour after Taylor turned it in to his publisher at Creative Nation, owner/producer Jeremy Stover (Travis Denning, Jack Ingram) forwarded “Whiskey” to Moore, who identified Block as his first choice for a duet partner. They both appeared at a WUSY Chattanooga, Tenn., guitar pull on March 29, and Moore was impressed by her voice and her poise while performing alongside artists who were all more established.
“I thought Priscilla stole the show that night with her interaction with the crowd,” he says. “She sang her tail off. The songs were really, really good. I was just highly impressed.”
He told her that night he would be happy to help her any way he could. Getting her to sing on “Whiskey” would fulfill that offer. She was interested, but of course wanted to hear it before she agreed. It was an easy “yes.”
“It feels like me,” says Block. “I tend to drink quite a bit of whiskey, so that one was like, ‘All right, we’re on brand here.’ ”
Stover and his co-producer, Big Machine Label Group president/CEO Scott Borchetta, kept some of Berryhill’s drum programming from the demo but otherwise rerecorded “Whiskey” with a full band, providing a tougher sound while cutting six tracks at The Castle in Franklin, Tenn.
“It’s out in the country, and there’s not a lot of distractions, so everybody’s hyper-focused just on the music,” Stover says. “They’re not running somewhere to make a bank deposit or run an errand. Everybody’s just there for the day.”
Stover visited Arkansas to capture Moore’s lead vocal at his home, and he worked with Block at Nashville’s Blackbird Studios to get her part, intentionally highlighting her unique tone and enunciations, even when the two singers are locked in harmony. “Sometimes you can line up the vocal so tight that it just sounds like a background singer,” says Stover. “We left those vocals where you really hear two distinctive voices, but at the same time, you don’t lose the melody.”
He encouraged Block to adjust the part to accentuate her persona, and she found that “Whiskey” went down rather easily. “Thank you, Jesus, they weren’t sending me any Christina Aguilera/Carrie Underwood [song],” Block deadpans. “There’s just no way that my voice would be able to do amazing things like that.”
Valory released “You, Me, and Whiskey” to country radio via PlayMPE on Oct. 10 with an official add date of Oct. 24. Their two voices fit together publicly the way the song’s characters mesh in private. In the process, the singers meet in the middle, using a production that walks the line between Moore’s usual classic country instrumentation and Block’s more progressive sound.
“It reminds me a little bit of ‘Somebody Else Will,’ ” he says. “So we’re being pushed a little bit out of my comfort zone. But sometimes that’s good. We didn’t get outside of the box, but we got a little closer to the edge of it.”