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Guitarist, keyboardist, singer and songwriter Coy Bowles has been part of the Zac Brown Band since 2007, co-writing hits including “Colder Weather” and “Knee Deep” and earning a trio of Grammy wins along the way.
But when he’s not lighting up stages with ZBB’s signature freewheeling, jam-band vibe, Bowles is crafting music for another audience: kids.
In 2020, Bowles released his first children’s album, Music for Tiny Humans. On Friday, he released a follow-up called Up and Up, crafting the album’s 13 kid-aimed songs with collaborator Carlos Sosa, who has also toured with Zac Brown Band.
The album features songs such as “Dance, Dance, Dance,” “I’m Hungry,” “See the World in Color” and “The Clean Up Song,” the latter of which was inspired by a friend of his who was tired of hearing the same song sung over and over when it was time for kids to clean up in the classroom. At the same time, Bowles and Sosa had been speaking about the 1987 Run-D.M.C. classic “It’s Tricky,” admiring its production and how modern and catchy the song is, nearly four decades after its release. Bowles wanted to write kids’ music that sounded modern and in line sonically with some of the melodies and beats kids are hearing around them. He also wanted to shy away from what he calls “toxic positivity.”
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“These songs aren’t always just sunshine every day,” he tells Billboard. “The song ‘How Do You Feel’ is about doing tough things. It’s not toxic positivity. There’s real songs about ‘I miss my mom’ or ‘I’m pretty sad right now, but I know things will change and we all go through things.’”
The album also has plenty of moments of levity, such as “I’m Hungry,” inspired by Bowles’ daughters, Hattie and Millie.
“They would come down and listen to a song and be like, ‘Dad, I love it. I’m hungry,’” Bowles recalls. “I’d give ‘em some food, we’d work on a song more, and they’d come down later, listen to it and say, ‘Oh, it’s even better now. Dad, I’m hungry.’ Then Carlos would be like, ‘Dude, is that all they ever say?’ So we started making kids’ voices and saying, ‘I’m hungry, I’m hungry.’ And he looked at me and was like, ‘Dude, that’s really good actually.’ So he and I, being a place where there’s not a lot of rules and regulations when we’re writing this stuff and humor can be part of it, it just turned into this cool, funny song about being hungry. So the kids had a lot to do with it and influenced the direction.”
Bowles’ albums Up and Up and Music for Tiny Humans extend his creative work in writing and releasing children’s books since 2012, when he released the book Amy Giggles, Laugh Out Loud, based on the story of a friend who was bullied for her laugh as a child.
“I wrote songs my whole life. I got to a place where I was on a tour bus with 12 people and you really can’t write songs by yourself — there’s no corner to go write in,” he says. “There’s always someone around, so I just started writing anything that popped into my head. I started writing short stories and jotting down stuff that was happening with the band in a journal. It felt like it was keeping me healthy, mentally and creatively. Zac [Brown] had three kids at the time, and I showed him a few things I wrote. He said, ‘That would make a great children’s book. I have three kids and we’re reading books constantly.’”
Amy Giggles, Laugh Out Loud resonated with readers. “It started connecting with teachers because of the anti-bullying sentiment. I had no kids at the time, and I didn’t know many teachers at the time as far as early education, but I started getting Facebook posts about them having ‘Amy Giggles Day’ in their classrooms and kids dressing up like Amy Giggles. I started connecting with teachers to create content for their classrooms and it expanded from there.”
Since then, he’s released books including When You’re Feeling Sick, Will Powers: Where There’s a Will There’s a Way, and Behind the Little Red Door. Bowles has even done some public speaking to encourage teachers.
“Almost everybody who’s successful in life, they have somebody who cared about them. And some people, the only person in their life who’s sheltering them and guiding them with love is their teacher,” he says. “I think that they’re overlooked sometimes, and I want to make it my life’s purpose to shine light on teachers and let them know how important they are to our society as of now and the future.”
Bowles has always been connected to the education system — he was a guitar and vocal instructor for eight years — but over the past five years, he’s been actively providing content that parents and educators can use at home and in their classrooms, including a social-emotional learning kit with Lakeshore Learning that incorporated songs from his first children’s album.
“That’s been successful and is in a lot of classrooms, so we decided to make another with Lakeshore, and the music we were writing for Up and Up is part of that. We were talking with teachers and they said they would love to have transition songs, songs that signal different parts of the day. We have a song about washing hands, a song about leaving school to go home. But so many people who do that try to make it very on the nose, and we tried not to do that.”
He’s deepened his focus on offering music and content for kids through his company called CoyCo (Creative Opportunity Yields Creative Output), offering a range of products including worksheets, the Lakeshore Learning Kits that focus on topics including social-emotional learning, language and literacy, and his previously released books.
“My goal is to be one of the nimblest companies, hopefully creating content that’s viable for what teachers are going through,” Bowles says. “Because we self-publish, there’s not a lot of red tape. If I sit down with teachers and they are like, ‘We are seeing difficulty with mental health right now,’ a few months later I can have a book and some songs and videos ready to be played in the classroom or at home. My goal is to be a leading content creator in the education space and in the kids space.”
By the time surging newcomer Zach Top released his debut country album, Cold Beer & Country Music, in April, the 27-year-old singer-songwriter was already seeing a groundswell of support from fans and his fellow artists. With his unabashed devotion to traditional country sounds on songs like “Bad Luck” and “There’s The Sun,” matched with his unmistakably country drawl, the singer-songwriter from Sunnyside, Wash., has drawn comparisons to such ’90s country luminaries as Alan Jackson, Doug Stone and one of his musical heroes, Keith Whitley.
Top, who is signed with label Leo33 and managed and published by Major Bob Music, has been on tour with reigning CMA entertainer of the year Lainey Wilson since May. He was a guest at Dierks Bentley’s early September headlining show at Nashville’s Bridgestone Arena and most recently teamed with bluegrass luminary Billy Strings to release a trio of collaborations for Apple Music.
As Top’s “Sounds Like the Radio” continues to grow on Billboard‘s Country Airplay chart, reaching a new No. 16 high on the Nov. 9-dated list, another track from Cold Beer & Country Music has also grown into a chart hit: “I Never Lie.” After the slow grooving, sarcastic song became his first entry on the Billboard Hot 100 in September (it has since reached a No. 68 high), his team pushed “I Never Lie” to country radio. It debuted on Country Airplay in late October, giving Top two songs simultaneously on the ranking — a feat more typically reserved for arena- and stadium-headlining stars in the genre.
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He’s up for new artist of the year at the CMA Awards later this month, and his rising career has led to additional dates to his 2025 Cold Beer & Country Music Tour, which launches Jan. 16 in Nebraska, with openers Jake Worthington and Cole Goodwin.
Billboard caught up with Top to discuss “I Never Lie” reaching new chart heights, as well as his thoughts on his upcoming CMA Award nomination for new artist of the year and who he thinks will take home the entertainer of the year honor.
“I Never Lie” was included on your debut studio album, Cold Beer & Country Music. How did the song come together?
I wrote it with Carson Chamberlain and Tim Nichols. I have one of my more clever rhymes on there, with the “Angel” and “April” rhyme in the first verse [“You still look like an angel/I heard you’re doin’ fine, got promoted back in April”]. We cut it pretty old-school with the band, and I sang and tracked the vocals as they were playing. They never hear the song until the day we record it. I’ll have an acoustic recording of it on my phone, and they hear it once or twice, and that’s it. It’s two or three takes and we play it like we feel it. We might overdub a thing or two or add some fills, but it’s all played live, nothing computerized about it. Carson produced it and [engineer] Matt [Rovey] mixed it up.
What has been your reaction to it connecting with fans on this level?
It may be the countriest song on the record. It sticks out and there’s nothing but steel guitar on there — you haven’t heard a song like that, sonically, in a long time. I think people have had an appetite for my kind of country for a little while, and we’re getting a dose of it. Songs like “Sounds Like the Radio” and “Cold Beer & Country Music,” you would expect those to be hits because they are up-tempo. This song goes in the face of what’s out there right now.
When did you first realize the song was a hit?
We had been playing it in live shows, so people already knew it. Around April 5, we had our album release show, and over the last four months, it has really taken off. Our fans know every word of every song on the album — they are not just waiting to hear one song. It gives me chills every night when we play that first riff [of “I Never Lie”]. They don’t need to hear no words, they know it from that first note.
“I Never Lie” debuted on Country Airplay in late October, giving you two current hits on the Billboard chart, including the top 20 hit “Sounds Like The Radio.” How does that feel?
I’m excited, because you don’t see that a lot with an artist as new as me. I’m proud to have the success so far and not be just a one-hit wonder.
You’ve also gained traction on TikTok with “I Never Lie.” What is your approach to social media?
I don’t get on social media much. There is a girl named Cheyenne in my band who has TikTok and she’ll tell me about videos that have “I Never Lie” or other songs in them. I was never very into social media — it was just a tool to get music out there. Early this year, I turned it all over [to my team]. I don’t have the apps on my phone, and I don’t think I have the logins. It can suck you in, scrolling through, and I think it’s probably healthy for me to stay off it.
You are nominated for new artist of the year at the CMA Awards on Nov. 20. What do you remember about finding out about your nomination?
It’s funny because I got a couple of texts that said, “Congratulations,” and I was like, “It’s not my birthday. What’s going on?” They sent me screenshots and filled me in. There are a bunch of big artists on that list, and I’m proud to be in this group.
Who do you think will win entertainer of the year at the CMA Awards?
I think Lainey [Wilson] would be a good pick. She puts on a hell of a show and is a great entertainer. And [Chris] Stapleton, I saw his show at [Nashville’s] Nissan Stadium, and I had not seen his show before and it’s pretty old-school with the band up there. He sings and captivates people with his voice and music, so he gets my vote, too.
A version of this story appears in the Oct. 26, 2024, issue of Billboard.
Kelsea Ballerini achieves her first No. 1 on Billboard’s Top Country Albums chart as Patterns blasts in atop the Nov. 9-dated list.
Released Oct. 25, the set earned 54,000 equivalent album units in the U.S. – a new weekly best for Ballerini – with 35,000 in album sales through Oct. 31, according to Luminate.
On the all-genre Billboard 200, the album arrives at No. 4, marking Ballerini’s second top 10 and highest rank, surpassing the No. 7 peak for Unapologetically in November 2017.
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First-week sales for Patterns were encouraged by the set’s availability across eight vinyl variants (including one signed edition). Her vinyl sales totaled 12,000 for the week – Ballerini’s best week ever on vinyl. Plus, two CDs were available (including one signed edition). On Oct. 28, a digital version was released on her website with two bonus cuts. Additionally, the album was sale-priced for $4.99 in the iTunes Store.
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Ballerini, from Knoxville, Tenn., co-wrote all 15 songs on Patterns. The LP’s first single, “Cowboys Cry Too,” with Noah Kahan, jumps 47-24 on the streaming-, airplay- and sales-based Hot Country Songs chart. The song, which debuted at its No. 16 high in July, drew 4.9 million official U.S. streams, up 69%, in the tracking week. On Country Airplay, it ranks at No. 43 (2.5 million in audience, up 3%); it began at its No. 27 best in July.
Patterns marks Ballerini’s eighth Top Country Albums entry. It follows Rolling Up the Welcome Mat, which opened at No. 21 in February 2023 before reaching No. 11 the next month. Her charted titles before that are Subject to Change, which started at its No. 3 high in October 2022; Ballerini (No. 9, September 2020); Kelsea (No. 2, April 2020); Unapologetically (No. 3, November 2017); The First Time (No. 4, June 2015); and Kelsea Ballerini (No. 40, March 2015).
Garth Brooks is set to release the next installment of his The Anthology series, when The Anthology Part IV: Going Home releases Dec. 6. The latest installment features never-before-seen photos and recounts the 14 years Brooks spent in Oklahoma after stepping away from the music spotlight to spend time with his children. Explore Explore See […]
Jelly Roll banks his sixth No. 1 on Billboard’s Country Airplay chart as “I Am Not Okay” rises a rung on the Nov. 9-dated ranking. It increased by 12% to 33. 8 million audience impressions Oct. 25-31, according to Luminate.
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The Nashville native (born Jason DeFord) co-authored the inspirational song with Casey Brown, Ashley Gorley and Taylor Phillips, and Zach Crowell produced it. The track is the lead single from Jelly Roll’s LP Beautifully Broken, which bowed at No. 1 on Top Country Albums and the all-genre Billboard 200 dated Oct. 26 with 161,000 equivalent album units, marking his initial leader on each list. His preceding set, Whitsitt Chapel, entered and peaked at Nos. 2 and 3 on the charts, respectively, in June 2023.
“I believe in the power that music has to connect with people, and being able to see the response out on the road touring and seeing and hearing from people about this song – it’s been unreal,” Jelly Roll tells Billboard. To fans and programmers, he added, “Thank you for continuing to shine a light on therapeutic music.”
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All six of Jelly Roll’s Country Airplay entries have reigned, marking the second-longest active No. 1 run. On the Oct. 26 chart, Kane Brown added his seventh consecutive leader with “Miles on It,” with Marshmello.
Jelly Roll previously topped Country Airplay as featured on Dustin Lynch’s “Chevrolet,” for a week in September, and as a lead artist with “Halfway to Hell” (one week, June); “Save Me,” with Lainey Wilson (two weeks, December 2023); “Need a Favor” (four, beginning in August 2023); and his debut entry at the format, “Son of a Sinner” (one week, January 2023).
Birge Moseys to Top 10
Plus, George Birge achieves his second Country Airplay top 10 as “Cowboy Songs” trots two spots to No. 10 (16.4 million, up 10%). The Austin, Texas, native’s “Mind on You” hit No. 2 in January.
Per his current hit’s traditional title, it joins 10 prior top 10s, dating to the chart’s 1990 start, with “cowboy” in their titles. Chris LeDoux lassoed the first with the No. 7-peaking “Whatcha Gonna Do With a Cowboy” in 1992. Most recently, Jon Pardi’s “Ain’t Always the Cowboy” hit No. 3 in 2020.
Among Texas born-and-raised entertainer Cody Johnson’s five nominations at the upcoming CMA Awards is an album of the year nomination for his 2023 Warner Music Nashville/CoJo Music project Leather, which spurred the No. 1 Billboard Country Airplay hit “The Painter” and the top five hit “Dirt Cheap.”
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Just a year removed from that album’s release, Johnson is already building on that work with the Leather Deluxe Edition, featuring 13 more songs, out today (Friday, Nov. 1).
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With Leather, Johnson aimed to create a work that represented his creative vision at that moment — a project worthy of an album of the year nomination — whereas the additional songs as part of the deluxe album offer Johnson a broader palette for exploration, musically and sonically, fusing elements of rock, ‘90s country, bluegrass and even blues.
“I wanted to have fun with Deluxe,” Johnson tells Billboard. “If you were to listen to one through 12 [on Leather] and then one through 13 [the deluxe version], it should all go together and it should make you feel like we put out two different things, but it should be something that’s kind of cohesive as one big piece.”
Even before partnering with one of Nashville’s powerhouse major labels in 2019, Johnson had already independently issued a half a dozen projects on his own CoJo label. He broke through to mainstream country radio success with 2018’s top 5 Country Airplay hit “On My Way to You,” rang the bell with his first Country Airplay No. 1 hit “’Til You Can’t” in 2021 and expanded on those laurels with Leather.
Along the way, pairing those releases and hits with steady-handed touring and his hard-charging, energetic stage show has aided in building Johnson’s reputation as one of traditional country music’s tip-of-the-spear torchbearers.
He’s also fast gaining prominence as a go-to artist for any songwriter with their sights set on potential awards recognition. The Johnson-recorded “’Til You Can’t” earned a Grammy for best country song. Two other Johnson-recorded songs, “Dirt Cheap” (written by Josh Phillips) and “The Painter” (written by Benjy Davis, Kat Higgins and Ryan Larkins) are contenders for CMA song of the year (the honor goes to the writers).
On his deluxe album, Johnson contributed writing to a trio of songs, “The Mustang,” “Georgia Peaches” and “Country Boy Singin’ the Blues,” but as with his previous albums, he largely turned to Nashville’s top-flight songwriters. Whether he is a writer on a particular song or not, he delivers each with his straightforward candor.
Another standout on Leather Deluxe Edition is the cinematic “The Fall,” which lays out an arc of triumphs over setbacks, heartbreaks, and failures.
“You can visualize a movie in your head when you listen to it and everybody’s story is a little bit different…that’s kind of the story of my life,” Johnson says, quoting a few of the song’s lyrics. “’The ride was worth the fall. The fall was worth the smiles. The smiles are worth the tears. The tears are worth the miles.’ [Durango Artist Management’s] Scott Gunter played me the demo and I just had tears in my eyes. It made me sit down and listen, just visualizing things I’ve been through, the climb and the fall and getting back up again and persevering. It’s a very well-written song.”
“I’m Gonna Love You,” an eight-year-old song, had previously been pitched to Carrie Underwood, before it made its way to Johnson, who asked Underwood to collaborate on the song with him.
“I had no idea that she had even heard the song,” Johnson says, adding, “When I sent it over to them, she was like, ‘Well this is the second time this song has made its way into my life.’ I think it’s a God thing. I think we were meant to sing that song together and the timing was right. And it could almost be a pop crossover, it has that feel to it, but we’re singing it like a gospel song.”
Both Johnson and Oklahoma native Underwood possess powerful voices, but he says their work together laying down the lead vocals and harmonies was easy: “A lot of times when you get big singers in the same studio, it can turn into a ‘who outsang who’ thing, but this was not the case. And I have a lot of respect for her as a person and as a vocalist.”
His prolific release of songs over the past year does present the task of continually updating his setlist, especially as he will launch his Leather Deluxe Tour in 2025, which will includes shows in Australia and New Zealand.
“There are a few songs that have similar values,” he says. “To me, ‘People in the Back’ from Leather is a huge live song, the rock moment. ‘How Do You Sleep at Night’ from the deluxe edition has a lot of that same value. There will be sections of the set that I will move stuff in and move stuff out. Because my set list is very strategically organized as far as the feeling of the crowd. But then again, with songs like [2011’s] ‘Diamond in My Pocket,’ it’s hard not to play that song.”
Another fan favorite that occasionally makes it into Johnson’s setlist is a cover version of The Chicks’ “Travelin’ Soldier” — but while fans have regularly asked for him to release a recorded version of the song, Johnson says, “I kind of think just let it live in the moment. If you try to overthink it, sometimes it might not turn out the way you want. I think there’s a live version out there. Until people just absolutely beat my door down and say ‘You gotta put this on there.’ There’s a cover I have in mind for my next album and it’s probably something nobody’s going to expect, but that will be another moment. We may never do that one live and just kind of keep people guessing.”
Just how to work in the Underwood duet into Johnson’s solo headlining sets presents somewhat of a challenge for an artist who has fashioned a career dedicated to giving fans authentic musicianship.
“My band and I don’t run tracks. We don’t have a single track onstage,” Johnson says. “But I think this is a track that if we run a video wall [featuring Underwood] and have her voice there, I think that’s an obvious track. It’s one thing if you’re listening to a band, you hear fiddle and there’s no fiddle — that’s just a track, man, and we ain’t never doing that. But if you obviously know that Carrie Underwood is not there [at the show] … I think that that might be the one that we can pull it off and say, ‘Look, come on. Y’all knew she wasn’t here. We’re just doing this so we can play the song for you, and it’s going to sound really weird if I sing it by myself.’”
In 2021, the Shaun Silva-directed documentary Dear Rodeo: The Cody Johnson Story spotlighted his journey from professional bull rider and corrections officer to arena-headlining, country music hitmaker. More recently, Johnson has been in talks with Yellowstone creator/director Taylor Sheridan about upcoming projects. Though there is nothing official in the works at the moment, Johnson says he is interested in prospects as an actor.
“I think I could play the villain just as well as I could play the hero,” he says. “I love movies and cinema, and hunting for little Easter eggs in the movie. I think it doesn’t matter what kind of part I get, I’ll try my best in that role.”
For now, Johnson is focused on two of his first loves: music and roping. A few weeks ago, Johnson launched the inaugural CoJo Open Team Roping event in Belton, Texas.
“This will be an annual thing,” Johnson says. “I think it was a huge success, and it was important for me to have something like that in the western world to not only give back to charities, but to give back to the rodeo and a cowboy, western way of life for these guys that live the same life I do. I just happen to play music on the weekends and be on camera and go across the world doing all that stuff. But at my core, that’s who I am, is a cowboy.”
Whether onstage or in the riding arena, the father of two is mindful of the message of ambition, resilience, and a dogged work ethic he’s sending to the next generation.
“I think it’s also important for kids to see me on stage and on TV, but then watch me go out there and battle it out in the arena. Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose, but [it’s about being able] to keep the same head on your shoulders and say, ‘Look, if we were roping tomorrow, I’d be back tomorrow competing.’”
Jamey Johnson is alive and well. That is more than evident on Midnight Gasoline, the acclaimed singer-songwriter’s first new solo studio album in 14 years, out Nov. 8.
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However, the 10-time Grammy nominee is the first to admit he was guided by the spirits of those who have passed while making the set. There’s Toby Keith, whose death spurred him to return to the studio. Then there’s Tony Joe White, who he was writing “Saturday Night in New Orleans” with when the “Poke Salad Annie” writer died (he finished the song years later with Chris Stapleton). Then Johnson recorded the album at Cash Cabin, Johnny and June Cash’s former studio now run by their son, musician/producer John Carter Cash.
Earlier this year, Johnson recorded 30 songs over three weeks at Cash Cabin, so dedicated to the effort that he slept outside the studio in his bus. The 12-track Midnight Gasoline will be the first in a number of albums called the Cash Cabin Series coming through Warner Music Nashville in conjunction with his own Big Gassed Records.
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Over Zoom in his first interview about the new album, Johnson stresses that he’s been busy touring and writing since he released his last solo album, 2010’s The Guitar Song, but also admits that while he never stopped writing completely, his output was often severely limited as he replenished his creativity. “I didn’t write unless I absolutely had to write. And that was taking a page out of Roger Miller’s book,” he says. “Roger told Willie [Nelson] years ago that if you’re not writing, it’s because your well is empty, and you need to go out there and live some and fill up your well. And that’s what Willie told me. I think it just took me a long time to get my well full.”
Johnson’s well has provided country music with some of its most resonant music over the last few decades. Johnson, considered one of the most significant country songwriters and vocalists of the last generation, is one of only two songwriters to win two song of the year awards in the same year from the Academy of Country Music and the Country Music Association — the other being one of his musical heroes, the late Kris Kristofferson. (Johnson won for “Give It Away” in 2007 and “In Color” in 2009.)
Johnson, who is on Life is a Carnival: The Last Waltz Tour ‘24 with musicians Don Was, Ryan Bingham, Lukas Nelson, Mike Campbell and Benmont Tench celebrating the music of The Band, talked to Billboard before he flew from Nashville for a date in Omaha.
Johnson is as eloquent in conversation as he is in song, giving thoughtful, reflective answers. He spoke candidly about his hard-won sobriety, what he thinks about the new generation of artists and why he and Keith had unfinished business.
You’ve been touring a lot the last several years. How did that inform your writing and getting back in the studio?
There’s the songwriter that just watches people and studies. There’s a part of that you get standing on the center of that stage, looking out over the faces and seeing how they react to certain messages or certain lines that enhances you as a songwriter. So, when you get that kind of positive feedback as a songwriter just off of the faces, you tend to go back in the writing room and you want to write something that draws a similar reaction or at least it feeds you to say that as a songwriter you’re headed in a correct direction or in the desirable direction.
The album’s emotional centerpiece is “One More Time,” about the deep longing to hold a lost loved one again and playing God to make that happen. What inspired it?
I wrote it with good buddy of mine, Rob Hatch, and Ernest. The inspiration behind that [was] in a short amount of time in my life I had a lot of death to deal with. It was very close friends, mentors, legends in the business, people that I was close to, people that I had benefited by knowing in a very heartfelt way, people that I owe a lot of my success to, people that I loved. And when they’re gone, you can’t help it— you dream of the day when you get to see them again. This song basically says. why would l feel this way unless there’s a time I can see you? If I were the Creator, I would create these things in such a way that I’ll always get you back one more time.
It was your first time writing with Ernest. You’re usually writing with your contemporaries more than the next generation.
We did a charity golf tournament together. It’s one that I do every year with George Strait. Ernest came to be my partner this year. And one thing I’ve learned about Ernest is he is quick-witted beyond belief. His mind’s always working. He and I were absolutely miserable golfers together, but we had the most fun out there doing it. That speaks volumes about somebody: how well can you keep your head up, keep your spirits up and have fun even while you’re losing on a golf course. You would have never thought we were losing, we looked like a couple of champions out there having the time of our life [Laughs.]
He’s just absolutely brilliant. He’s got to be one of the brightest in this younger class of songwriters today. And that’s saying something. He is holding his own with artists like HARDY and Riley Green, Luke Combs. He’s got that high frequency going on. Lainey Wilson, Ella Langley, Megan Moroney, Ashley McBride. I get around these people at the different industry things that we do, and I’m just mesmerized. There’s a reason these kids are on top of the world today, because they’re f–king good.
Another song on here that feels personal is “21 Guns,” a very moving song about being at the graveside of someone who dies in the line of duty, which you performed at PBS’ National Memorial Day Concert this year. As a former Marine, what does it mean to you that you’ve written a song that can be played on these very momentous, somber occasions?
One song could never be enough to properly acknowledge the sacrifice that’s been made by not just men and women in uniform, but also the Gold Star families that are left behind after that sacrifice has been made. It takes a bunch of songs to get to the heart of that subject and I’m glad I’ve got one to add to that mix. My only concern [was] I didn’t want to feel like it was pandering, because for me it comes from a really honest place. I’ve had friends die in combat. I’ve had friends die in the line of duty, whether it’s in combat or on the police force or fire department.
One of the first songs released from the project is Sober. How long you’ve been sober and what prompted that song?
I had my last drink in September 2011. Then I quit smoking pot in 2015. I think that lasted about eight years. Nine years. In that time period, it was all about sobriety. And with a sober mind, I’m able to do things like get a pilot’s license, manage a business, start a product line. I’m sober for the most part, but every now and then, I may still break out a joint if I’m writing or something like that. But I don’t play games with the alcohol. That’s what led me down a dark path of self-destruction back then and I barely survived. Alcohol was an incendiary way of destructing myself. Everything just went up in in flames and you couldn’t put the fire out, you just had to wait for it to all come to ashes and then try to rebuild when you got done. And it seemed to me like I owed myself a better way to live than that.
You recorded 30 songs. What kind of roll out do you see for the rest of the Cash Cabin Series?
We’re gonna keep them coming. I’m not waiting for a specific time period. I’m happy with whatever release [schedule] Warner decides to make. That’s what I’m using the label for. I don’t have a marketing department and I don’t have a bunch of people that that sit around testing the climate to find out when’s the best time to release this or that. I’m happy to let the label make that their contribution.
This is your first album for Warner Music Group. You signed with the label based on your relationship with co-chair/co-president Cris Lacy. What makes that so special?
We’ve known each other since both of us were starting our careers in this business. She was a song plugger. I was a songwriter and at the time, I didn’t even have or want a publishing deal. I was just a rogue writer running around singing demos, and everybody knew my name. We kept up over the years, but there never was an opportunity for us to work together. A couple of years ago she came to me and said, “You have got to start making records again.”
It wasn’t like the only reason she wanted a record was to have something to sell. She wasn’t coming to me from her position of authority at Warner [Music Nashville] Warner is doing fine without me. Chris Lacey is doing fine without me. She just wanted me to do fine, too. She wanted me to be doing better than what I was doing, and she knew that releasing the music was going to make me better. It was going to heal me, and she was right. She had to come and pull me through the motions. Everything that she did for me, I desperately needed it. And at this point, I have nothing but appreciation for her and gratitude for her as a friend coming and helping me through that process.
You’ve really stepped up your social media game recently and posted a really sweet post when Kris Kristofferson died a few weeks ago. You both were in the military and both are considered among the best country songwriters ever. Did you ever get to write together?
Well, especially with those guys I was reluctant to ever mention writing. I didn’t want to. As much as I wanted to as a songwriter, I always felt like it would have dampened the relationship if I seemed like just another handout going, “Hey, please give me some of your time. Please endorse me in this way.” I’d rather just be the friendly face that sits around gobbling up stories that they’re willing to share, so I spent my time around Kris and Merle [Haggard] and Willie [Nelson], just absorbing whatever they were willing to share. Hank Cochran and I even talked about writing, but I benefited more from my time being around him not writing than I would have if I had left there with a catalog of No. 1 hits.
You did write with Toby Keith. What was that like?
Toby Keith had one of the most amazing memories of anybody. I mean, perfect recall on lyrics he hasn’t seen or heard in 34 years. Remembers every chord, remembers every word. He could remember names, faces, conversations, ideas, just an infinite stream of memory. And as a songwriter, he was very picky about phrases he would use. If it didn’t sound like his vernacular, it had to change until it fit right because he wasn’t going to put something in there that didn’t sound the way he would talk… We were working on a song toward the end. I called him up one night and shared a few lines with him, and he added a few lines and we turned around and wrote this whole verse. We laughed a bunch, and it was one of those that I thought, “This is great. There’s gonna come a time I’ll get out to Oklahoma or maybe he and I will meet up somewhere at a golf tournament, but we’ll have some time sit down and finish this thing up.”
He always gave me the feeling that this wasn’t nothing. He was gonna beat this: “You don’t worry about me, pal. I got this” — and that lasted right up until February [when he died of cancer.]. I don’t know what happens with the songs now, but I know some time is probably going to go by, and I might break them back out and revisit them later on. But I think right now, the friends of his that I would consider finishing those songs with are still hurting, and it’s probably not time to start trying to do that just yet.
How did his death affect this album?
The writing was already coming back to me, piece by piece, but I still didn’t have any ambitions on making a record. When Toby passed away, it moved everything into high gear because I realized that that was the end of his discography, that we weren’t getting another Toby Keith record. And that’s what drove me to wanting to finish my own discography. It’s what made me understand that I’m nowhere near done, and so it’s time to get busy. After he passed away, I immediately started talking about this session and started trying to get all the particulars in order. It was time for me to get in the studio again.
Like many songwriters, you strongly feel that you are a conduit for God or a higher power to work through you with your music. How do you honor that gift?
Giving it my best is how I honor the calling. At the end, I don’t have to worry about how it’s being used. That’s up to God. Somebody’s going to hear that song that I would have never known existed and that this person would have never known that I existed except for the fact that my song reached them. When they come looking for me, they want to share that experience and they want to tell me all about it, but what they really want to do is connect with God and say, “God, I got the song you sent me through this bearded weirdo over here.”
Jelly Roll will make his Austin City Limits debut on Saturday (Nov. 2), with the premiere of a six-song set that includes his Billboard Country Airplay chart top 5 hit “I Am Not Okay,” as well as chart-toppers including his four-week No. 1 Country Airplay hit “Need a Favor.”
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In an early look at the performance, Jelly Roll tells the audience just before launching into “I Am Not Okay,” “The thing about these shows are, is that it’s more than a concert, it’s more than music. It’s bigger than me, it’s bigger than the music, it’s about the message. It’s about redemption, it’s about second chances, it’s about being OK with not being OK sometimes.”
At one point during his ACL appearance, he tells the crowd about how he grew up watching the show, recalling that he had posters of artists including Willie Nelson and George Jones on his walls at home. He also pays homage to Austin by making the “Hook ‘Em Horns” hand sign, a symbol honoring the University of Texas at Austin Longhorns.
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To date, Jelly Roll has earned five No. 1 Billboard Country Airplay hits, and with his new album, Beautifully Broken, the Antioch, Tenn., native reached new career heights, with the set debuting at No. 1 on the all-genre Billboard 200 chart.
The Nov. 2 episode featuring Jelly Roll’s debut performance will also feature husband-and-wife duo The War and Treaty performing songs including “Blank Page” and “Leads Me Home.”
Jelly Roll’s Austin City Limits debut comes as ACL is celebrating its 50th anniversary season, honoring five decades of presenting music’s top artists. The 50th season has already featured performances from artists including Kacey Musgraves, Black Pumas, Maggie Rogers, Nickel Creek and Brittany Howard.
Get an exclusive early look at Jelly Roll’s ACL appearance with his performance of “I Am Not Okay” below:
Just over a year after Oliver Anthony Music earned a multi-week Billboard Hot 100 chart-topper with his independently released song “Rich Men North of Richmond,” the singer-songwriter says he is aiming at making some big changes and essentially walking away from the music business in order to focus on ministry — though he will still be making music.
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In a YouTube video posted on Oct. 29, he noted that his grandfather was a traveling minister and said, “My plan is to change my entire focus to traveling ministry work.” He also added, “I want to create a routing schedule to exist parallel to Nashville that circumvents the monopoly of Live Nation and Ticketmaster, and goes into towns that haven’t had music in them in a long time. It stimulates their economy, showcases their culture, it uses local vendors and local musicians. You’re not having to drive out to Pittsburgh to a concrete amphitheater to see a show. It’s done out on a farm or on a main street that desperately needs the economic impact.”
Billboard has reached out to Live Nation and Ticketmaster for comment.
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He also noted that the past year or so of music-industry involvement has “opened my eyes to how much control and how much visibility there is on the top down.”
While he plans to continuing releasing music, those songs would come as part of his The Rural Revival Project, which would “be set up legally as a ministry,” he noted, and would aid in revitalizing farming and other rural communities.
The website for his Rural Revival Project also notes its aim to provide a place where “people who have just gotten out of rehab, with PTSD, and people are are depressed and suicidal can come here and reconnect with nature and learn to exist outside of a system that has just kind of been placed on us as a generation.”
“Rich Men North of Richmond” first went viral in August 2023, when a video of Oliver Anthony Music (real name Chris Lunsford) performing the song was posted on the YouTube channel for Radiowv. Since then, the video has earned 173 million views. “Rich Men North of Richmond” quickly topped the Hot 100, and he became the first artist in history to debut at No. 1 on the chart without previously having a song on the charts. Following the song’s success, more of his music populated charts, with his track “Ain’t Got a Dollar” topping Spotify’s Viral 50 list. He eschewed signing with a major label, but did partner with booking agency UTA.
“Rich Men North of Richmond” also became a lightning rod for political tension on both sides, drawing praise from right-leaning pundits who championed the song’s sentiments, while drawing ire from left-leaning commentators. In August 2023, Oliver Anthony Music said in a Facebook post, “‘Rich Men North of Richmond’ is about corporate-owned D.C. politicians on both sides.”
In April, he released the album Hymnal of a Troubled Man’s Mind, which featured Oliver Anthony Music offering a mix of music and scripture verses.
The first show he will play as part of the Rural Revival Project inititive comes on Nov. 2 with a hurricane relief concert in Morgantown, W.V.
Watch Oliver Anthony Music’s video announcing that he’s going to focus on ministry below:
It’s a classic love song, steady and true, delivered so crisply by its A-list vocalists that its unconventionality goes almost unnoticed.
Cody Johnson and Carrie Underwood debuted at No. 13 on the Hot Country Songs chart dated Oct. 12 with “I’m Gonna Love You,” blessed by a Randy Travis-like forever-and-ever lyric, applied to a musical foundation that blends several classic styles.
“It’s big, like a pop song,” Johnson says. “It kind of feels like a blues song, but we sing it like a gospel song.”
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They make it sound standard, too. But it’s not. For starters, the time signature moves around a bit. The verses alternate between 3/4 and 4/4 bars until their conclusion, when the “I’m gonna love you” hook arrives with backto-back waltz-time measures. Then, they ease into a 4/4 chorus — if, that is, the song actually has a chorus. It does have an uplifting, fourline stanza that fills the space where a chorus normally sits. But that section doesn’t include the hook and never makes it to the root chord. Instead, it resolves into the next verse, which ends up feeling like an extension of the chorus.
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“I consider that to be a bridge that you repeat, even though it does feel like the chorus,” says songwriter Chris Stevens (“Everything’s Gonna Be Alright”). “You can label it any way you want.”
“I’m Gonna Love You” took a long time to make it from creation into the public sphere, owing its earliest seeds of inspiration to the 2016 Dixie Chicks tour. (The band has since renamed itself The Chicks.)
Songwriter Kelly Archer (“Sleep Without You,” “Wild As Her”) saw them in Chicago on June 5, and Travis Denning saw them twice in August, in Atlanta and in Nashville. The morning after the Bridgestone Arena show, Denning and Archer met at Stevens’ writing room at Starstruck. When The Chicks became a topic, they discussed their propensity for simple, to-the-point choruses, matched with deeper verses. They decided to write with that approach, and Archer suggested “I’m Gonna Love You” as the simple title.
The process, however, was time-consuming. “We wanted to make sure that it was not only for your significant other,” Archer says, “but to your children, to anybody you love, to your parents, whoever.”
They worked on it until at least 5:30 p.m., building it sequentially with steady-and-true focus. The opening verse explored the dependability of the universe, with its stars, sun and moon. Verse two brought the story into Earth’s atmosphere, with birds, snow and April rain. In its finale, they narrowed the lens even further on the song’s couple, noting that even as the pair grows gray and weathered, its bond will remain firm.
“Everything just sort of fell together like puzzle pieces,” Archer says. “One line led to the next line, which led to the next line, which led to the next line, and then we put a big old solo in the middle of it.”
Stevens developed the pulsing keyboard part, changing the harmonic tuning on the third note of each 3/4-and-4/4 couplet in a way that created a gospel undertone. And Archer offered a key line in the bridge-like chorus, “Steady and true like a Bible verse,” that amplified that feel.
“It brought in another layer of depth to what the message was in the song, and not even necessarily religiously,” Denning says. “Like, when I think of a Bible verse, I think of tradition; I think of the test of time.”
Denning sang the demo that day and played a languid guitar solo, emulating Vince Gill’s melodic style. “I don’t know if anybody gets more out of single notes in country music as a guitar player than he does,” Denning says. “He can shred. I mean, he can do it all. But I think when he does that emotional thing, there’s nobody who does it better.”
Once Archer added harmonies, Denning realized they had something special. Stevens figured that out as he wrapped the demo’s production that night. “I had a panic attack,” he says. “I got this flood of adrenaline because I felt like there was a life to this. The song was coming to life as something that would be important in my career.”
“I’m Gonna Love You” was one of the three songs Denning recorded for a demo that helped him secure a recording deal the next year with Mercury Nashville. Early on, he boldly asked if Underwood would join him on a duet version — “They gave me the nicest answer of ‘no’ ever,” he says — and it got pitched separately to her as well.
“I thought it was a beautiful song,” Underwood remembers, “but I felt like it might be better for a male artist to sing, plus it didn’t really fit with the direction of where my new album at the time was going.”
When Johnson was shopping for a label in 2018, a Big Machine executive played it for him as an example of the kinds of songs they would bring him. He ultimately signed with Warner Music Nashville (WMN), but he periodically asked about the song. Denning eventually recorded it, but felt he needed to properly set up his career before releasing it. The pandemic threw a wrench into his plans, and in 2022, he finally let Johnson have it. Johnson had started a friendship with Underwood at the 2022 CMT Music Awards and thought she was the right vocal partner. She agreed.
Producer Trent Willmon (Granger Smith, Drake Milligan) cut it in two different keys in March 2023, and Underwood FaceTimed into the studio during the session to listen. She picked the lower key, a choice that would cast her voice in a new way. “[Her] voice has this sultry, Aretha Franklin-type quality to it in this key,” Johnson says. “I thought it was a piece of Carrie that we haven’t seen yet.”
The band played simply, framing the melody without drawing attention to itself, and Johnson was present when Underwood came into the studio later to overdub her part. During playback, Johnson sensed she was dissatisfied, and when asked, she said she would prefer they sing it together. “For me, the best possible situation is always when whoever I’m singing with, that we have the luxury of recording our vocals together,” she says. “I think that’s when the real magic happens.”
They each got into a vocal booth, able to see each other through the glass, and once they locked in, Willmon estimates that 95% of the vocal comes from one single performance. “It just reiterated why I love making music for a living,” he says.
Willmon turned to Gill for the solo, and he gave it the same kind of melodic, soulful phrasing that Denning would have expected. “He was out on tour with the Eagles, and it took him a minute to get to it,” Willmon recalls. “He played that solo, and it’s funny. He leaves this message: ‘Hey, T man, I just played what I felt like it needed, and if you don’t use it, I’m fine with it. It wouldn’t be the first time Carrie Underwood fired me.’ ”
The duet was held back from Johnson’s Leather album since its release didn’t fit Underwood’s timeline. WMN put out “The Painter” and “Dirt Cheap” instead, saving “I’m Gonna Love You” for Leather Deluxe, due Nov. 1. The duet was released Sept. 27, and it’s at No. 32 on Country Airplay and No. 21 on Hot Country Songs. Eight years after its creation and six years after Johnson started asking about it, “I’m Gonna Love You” is performing as he had hoped.
“I’ve been waiting,” Johnson says. “I’ve been chomping at the bit for this one.”