Miley Cyrus just unlocked a vulnerable new layer of her upcoming visual album Something Beautiful, dropping fourth single “More to Lose” Friday (May 9) just a few weeks ahead of the LP.
Related
Miley Cyrus Reveals the Best Piece of Advice Dolly Parton Gave Her
Singing over cinematic piano, guitars and strings, the pop star steps fully into the power of her voice on the new track. “I knew someday that one would have to choose,” she belts introspectively. “I just thought we had more to lose.”
The ballad arrives after about a week of Cyrus teasing it on social media, eventually sharing a black-and-white preview of “More to Lose” on her YouTube channel two days ahead of its release. In one clip posted to Instagram, the Grammy winner shared snippets of the song while describing how it came together in the studio.
“I tried to keep it a singular take,” she explained to followers, addressing the camera in an elegant black dress. “It’s really a song that’s more of a story, and I never want that to be interrupted or overthought or chasing perfection. I never wanted ‘More to Lose’ to be perfect, I wanted it to sound beautiful and emotional.”
Following “Prelude,” “End of the World” and Something Beautiful‘s title track, “More to Lose” marks the fourth song fans have gotten to hear from the album ahead of its May 30 release. At a recent Spotify listening event in New York City, Cyrus revealed that she thinks the 13-track project is “not only my best album, but also my gayest.”
https://i0.wp.com/neztelinc.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/station.nez_png.png?fit=943%2C511&ssl=1511943Yvetohttps://neztelinc.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/nez_png.pngYveto2025-05-09 04:50:452025-05-09 04:50:45Miley Cyrus Has Nothing ‘More to Lose’ on ‘Emotional’ New Single: Stream It Now
Halsey and Amy Lee of Evanescence are feeding fans well this week, serving up new collaboration “Hand That Feeds” for new movie Ballerina on Friday (May 9).
Haunting and cinematic, the track matches the intensity of the June-slated film as the two musicians harmonize with one another. “Too late ’cause you know you can’t turn around and bite the hand that feeds,” they sing over eerie piano and siren-like drones, as first heard by fans in a snippet sent out by the “Without Me” musician in a text blast a few days prior.
Starring Ana de Armas and Keanu Reeves, From the World of John Wick: Ballerina is set to hit theaters June 6. According to a description, the flick will take place during the events of 2019’s John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum, following the Cuban-Spanish actress’ character Eve Macarro as she begins her training as an assassin in Russia.
The “Hand That Feeds” duo first announced that the collaboration was in the works just three days prior to its release, simply sharing a promotional photo — featuring Halsey and the “My Immortal” vocalist reaching for each other across a platform on a dimly lit stage — in a joint post on Instagram. The team-up is a long time coming considering the “Closer” artist’s almost lifelong fandom of Evanescence, which manifested in Halsey cosplaying Lee during the rollout of 2024 album The Great Impersonator.
“Yes, I am freaking out about it,” Halsey wrote of collaborating with her idol in a recent text message to fans.
“Hand That Feeds” marks the About-Face Beauty founder’s first release since February’s “Safeword.” Evanescence last dropped music in March, releasing “Afterlife” for the Netflix series Devil May Cry.
https://i0.wp.com/neztelinc.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/station.nez_png.png?fit=943%2C511&ssl=1511943Yvetohttps://neztelinc.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/nez_png.pngYveto2025-05-09 04:50:442025-05-09 04:50:44Halsey & Evanescence’s Amy Lee Unite on New Song ‘Hand That Feeds’ for ‘Ballerina’ Movie
2025 could be Doechii’s year. The TDE rapper continued her winning streak on Friday (May 9) with her surprise guest appearance on The Weeknd and Playboi Carti’s “Timeless (Remix).”
Days after rumors ran rampant on social media of Doechii hopping on the Pharrell-produced hit, the “Timeless (Remix)” landed on streaming services on Friday (May 9).
Doechii bats leadoff and wastes no time bleeding her swagger into “Timeless” with a braggadocios assist flexing on the competition.
“Hop in the booth, I advance on the beat/ B—h, it’s a wrap like lettuce and cheese/ Why would I f–k a n—a that’s fanned over me/ I do what you n—-s do with my hands on my knees/ This s–t too easy,” she raps.
The Swamp Princess closes out her guest appearance with a nod to her record label and Kendrick Lamar’s pgLang.
“Top Dawg cashin’ out Doechii stock/ Pull up to the pgLang on the dot/ Now I got a timeshare wrist watch/ I been that girl since hopscotch, I’m too legit,” she boasts.
“Timeless” sits at No. 35 on the Billboard Hot 100 and could receive a boost in the coming weeks thanks to the timely remix.
Coming off a Grammy Award win and her Met Gala debut, Doechii’s been in the mix for the first half of the year and it’s all eyes on when her anticipated debut album will arrive.
As for The Weeknd and Playboi Carti, they’ll kick off the After Hours Til Dawn Tour in Glendale, Arizona’s State Farm Stadium on Friday.
The XO singer and Carti will be invading stadiums throughout North America with stops in Detroit, Chicago, Inglewood, Las Vegas, New Jersey, Philly, Miami, Toronto, Montreal, Atlanta and Orlando before wrapping up in San Antonio on Sept. 3.
https://i0.wp.com/neztelinc.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/station.nez_png.png?fit=943%2C511&ssl=1511943Yvetohttps://neztelinc.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/nez_png.pngYveto2025-05-09 04:50:432025-05-09 04:50:43Doechii Joins The Weeknd & Playboi Carti for Braggadocios ‘Timeless’ Remix: Stream It Now
The Academy of Country Music Awards celebrated a major milestone with this year’s ceremony, commemorating 60 years of feting many of the top performers and artists in country music. Held Thursday night (May 8) and livestreamed on Amazon Prime Video, the ACM Awards featured performances that highlighted six decades of enduring hits, as well as many of today’s biggest songs.
When it came to awards, women dominated, with Lainey Wilson taking home honors for entertainer of the year, artist-songwriter of the year, album of the year (for Whirlwind) and female artist of the year. Meanwhile, Ella Langley, who led the nominees this year with eight nominations, picked up five honors including new female artist of the year, while her Riley Green collab “You Look Like You Love Me” earned single of the year, visual media of the year and music event of the year.
Other winners included Chris Stapleton (male artist of the year), Brooks & Dunn (duo of the year), Old Dominion (group of the year), Zach Top (new male artist of the year) and The Red Clay Strays (new duo or group of the year).
Women not only dominated the winner’s circle, but helmed the show, as Reba McEntire returned to host the show for the 18th time. Overall, the show was a mighty representation of the enduring impact of the genre’s past, present and future. While each artist turned in a top-notch performance, some performances stood out more than others.
Here, Billboard counts down the top performances at the 60th annual ACM Awards.
The ACM Awards are produced by Dick Clark Productions, which is owned by Penske Media Eldridge, a joint venture between Eldridge Industries and Billboard parent company Penske Media.
Marking his first solo release in two years, Stormzy has returned with a new freestyle entitled “Sorry Rach!” – listen to the track below.
The Croydon rapper has not released an album since the soulful This Is What I Mean sailed straight to the top of the U.K.’s Official Album Charts in November 2022. In the interim period, he has worked on collaborations with a series of major artists, including Chase & Status (“Backbone”) RAYE (“The Weekend”) and Shawn Mendes and Jacob Collier (“Witness Me”), among others.
In March, Stormzy – born Michael Ebenazer Owuo Junior – picked up a BRIT Award in the fan-voted hip hop/grime/rap act category, beating the likes of Central Cee and Little Simz to the prize. The win followed the criticism he received online for teaming up with McDonald’s earlier this year on a promotional Stormzy meal, a controversy which he addresses on “Sorry Rach!” “I heard they wanna hang me out to dry for a nugget meal,” he raps. “The world might never love your way again but my mother will.”
The McDonald’s backlash began to spread after some of the 31-year-old’s social media followers pointed out that the Boycott, Divestment & Sanctions (BDS) movement had previously initiated a global boycott of the fast food chain for their support of Israeli forces in the Israel-Gaza conflict.
Prior to the collaboration, Stormzy had been vocal in his support for Palestine. In January 2024, he performed alongside acts such as Clairo and Mustafa at an event called Artists For Aid in New Jersey to help raise funds for the ongoing crisis in Gaza. In recent months, meanwhile, the rapper appeared to remove an Instagram post from October 2023 that called for a “Free Palestine.”
Speaking on the latter incident in February this year, Stormzy clarified: “I didn’t archive the post where I came out in support of Palestine for any reason outside of me archiving loads of IG posts last year. In that post, I spoke about #FreePalestine, oppression and injustice and my stance on this has not changed.”
In the same statement, he continued to speak on the reaction to his McDonald’s partnership, adding: “The brands I work with can’t tell me what to do and don’t tell me what to do otherwise I wouldn’t work with them. I do my own research on all brands I work with, gather my own information, form my own opinion and come to my own conclusion before doing business.”
“Sorry Rach!” was followed by a second track, “Hold Me Down,” Wednesday evening (May 7). A poignant ballad that reflects on life in the public eye, the latter arrived with a live performance video.
Elsewhere, Stormzy will be performing a short run of European festival shows this summer, with appearances booked for Norway’s Palmesus, Roskilde in Denmark, and Dour Festival in Belgium. Further information and tickets can be found on his official website.
Put American actor Nicolas Cage and Australian musician Nick Cave in the same room, and it seems no one can tell the difference – at least that’s what the former has claimed in a recent interview.
Cage (that’s the actor, not the musician) is currently promoting his recently-released film The Surfer, which was both filmed and set in Cave’s home country. Speaking to The Guardian, Cave responded to a reader’s question about a 2022 tall tale from Cave which recounts the pair apparently meeting based on their similar names.
“I don’t think there’s a day that goes by where I’m not mistaken for Nick Cave,” Cage explains. “People also say: ‘Hey, Nick, you were great in The Hunger,’ which is this great David Bowie movie.”
Though Cage didn’t appear in Tony Scott’s 1983 film The Hunger (and neither did Cave), the actor turned his attention to an anecdote in which he claims to have met the musician.
“I do remember that Cave was very nice,” he continued. “We were at an animal sanctuary, I believe – I think Sealy Animal Hospital in Texas – and he was terrific. I said hello and wanted to shake his hand. I said: ‘Only one letter separates us – G. Nick Cave, Nick Cage.’”
Cage’s comments somewhat echo the 2022 story which Cave shared on his Red Hand Files website, responding to readers who respectively asked if Cave has ever met Cage, or added an “untrue component to a story to make it more interesting than it actually is.”
“People mix me up with Nicolas Cage all the time,” Cave recalled. “Like, I’ll be going through customs and the customs officer will look at my passport and say, ‘Happy to have you with us, Mr Cave. Loved you in Face/Off’. Or whatever. Sometimes it can be a bit of a pain in the neck, but you get used to it.”
Cave then continued with a lengthy tale about how he was apparently mistaken for Cage while purchasing a didgeridoo for his late son Arthur from the gift shop of the Healesville Sanctuary in his home state of Victoria. On their way home to Melbourne, Cave claims their meal at a local pub was interrupted by an apparent interaction with Cage.
“I follow the security guy into a small private room, adjacent to the main bar. Sitting there is Nicolas Cage,” Cave writes. “He is wearing a pork-pie hat and holding a didgeridoo. Nicolas Cage shouts, ‘Only one letter separates us!’ and leaps from his seat and eagerly pumps my hand. I’m pretty confused by all of this, but say, ‘It’s an honour to meet you, Mr Cage. Have you just been to Healesville Sanctuary?’ and he shouts, ‘Yes!’ and I say, ‘Well, me too.’”
Though it remains to be seen whether Cage’s own claims of mistaken identity are truthful (and for that matter, where the truth – if any – lies in Cave’s own story), Cage also used his interview with The Guardian to comment on the existence of Australian band Nicolas Cage Fighter.
“I think they’re terrific,” he explained. “Their songs are empowering. The lyrics are all about taking ownership of your mistakes, never being a victim, figuring out how you can fix your problems.”
https://i0.wp.com/neztelinc.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/station.nez_png.png?fit=943%2C511&ssl=1511943Yvetohttps://neztelinc.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/nez_png.pngYveto2025-05-09 04:10:402025-05-09 04:10:40Nicolas Cage Claims He Gets Mistaken for Nick Cave Regularly: ‘Only One Letter Separates Us’
After winning the Latin Grammy for best new artist in 2024, Colombian singer-songwriter Ela Taubert finally released Preguntas a las 11:11, her debut album, on Friday (May 9). The 16-track set, which took two years to bring to life, is a reflection of her deepest thoughts and her tendency to overthink.
All the song titles are framed as questions except for one, which is simply titled “Pregunta” (Question) and is the 11th track on the album.
Related
Ela Taubert Seized a Life-Changing Opportunity & Won Latin Grammys Best New Artist
“I’ve always overthought things since I was little, and that hasn’t changed now that I’m an adult,” explains the 24-year-old artist to Billboard Español. “When I started writing [these songs,] I realized all that came out were questions, which I think reflect my tendency to question everything. Obviously, when all the songs started to have this kind of title, we said, ‘Well, it’s going to be Preguntas, and a las 11:11 (at 11:11) because at home we always make a sacred wish at 11:11. So we unified these two universes.”
Sonically, Taubert says that for this album — released under Universal Music Latina and featuring the singles “¿Cómo Pasó” (with and without Joe Jonas, and in a third live version with Morat), “¿Quién Diría?” and “¿Cómo Haces?”, among others — she drew inspiration from the pop superstars she grew up listening to.
“I used to watch the Hannah Montana movies. I literally wanted to be like that, a pop star. I’d wear sparkly gloves and everything,” she says enthusiastically. “Maybe I’m still holding on to that childhood dream of bringing the sound of the artists I listened to as a kid, like Miley [Cyrus], Taylor Swift, and Adele, to our language, Spanish — obviously while keeping my Latin roots super present, because I also grew up listening to Reik and Jesse & Joy. So I’d say it’s like a fusion.”
Designed to be listened to from start to finish, the LP weaves a narrative that feels both intimate and universal, addressing themes like love, heartbreak, and the complexities of human connection in songs like the focus tack “¿Trato Hecho?” as well as “¿Es En Serio?”, “¿Te Imaginas?”, “¿Qué Más Quieres?”, “¿Si Eras Tú?”, and more.
“This album is like a midnight diary for me. It’s about those moments when there’s no TV, no phone, nothing, and you can’t sleep, so you start thinking about 45,000 things at once,” Taubert summarizes. “I hope that the people who listen to me, who support me, find refuge in each of these songs and see themselves reflected in them. That’s been one of the most beautiful things about these last two years — growing the family, realizing I’m not the only one who feels the way I feel, and learning to grow together through this whole process.”
Below, Ela Taubert breaks down five essential tracks from Preguntas a las 11:11. Listen to the full album here.
“¿Quién Diría?”
Contextually, the album as a whole is a love story with all its ups and downs and emotions. But “¿Quién Diría?” (Who Would Say?) is precisely the track that starts it all. It’s the only love song on the album, so it opens up this universe and speaks about the first time I truly felt I was in love. I was always very rebellious about that kind of thing on a personal level — like, “I’m not going to fall in love, I’m not in love, I don’t like anything romantic.” And in the end, I fell in love, and that’s how the story begins. That’s why it’s so special, because it opens up this world. And also because fans were always asking me, “When are you going to release a love song?” So it’s like giving them a little taste of the fact that love has existed in my life — and it still does.
“¿Cómo Pasó?”
I think this was one of the most fun songs to make and also one of the quickest. It’s about my first heartbreak as a teenager, the first time I felt like my heart was broken. But it’s very beautiful, because when we started writing it — obviously I’m in a different place now. The idea behind this song was that I wanted people to feel exactly what I felt during that strong heartbreak. I wanted to share how I truly felt. That’s why at first it gives you the sense that it’s a love song — just like how I felt when I got my hopes up — and then suddenly, your world falls apart and you think, “Wow, this is a heartbreak song.” I wanted to allow people to navigate that emotion with me, the way I felt that intense disappointment.
And the twist with Joe Jonas — well, that was a dream come true for me. Joe was one of my childhood idols. I think he was for everyone, honestly, for people who watched Camp Rock and all those kinds of childhood series. It was a blessing, and I’m proof that dreams really do come true. Right when I got nominated for the Latin Grammy, I decided to look for a video of myself as a little girl singing, and I found one of me singing “This Is Me” from Camp Rock. So I wrote him thanking him for inspiring me, and then it was crazy, because a few days later, he replied — which blew my mind, because I never thought he’d reply. And the rest is history. This version is something I’ll carry in my heart forever, thinking about how it fulfilled my inner child’s dream.
“¿Cómo Haces?”
This is a very special song for me. It’s track No. 7 on the album because, for me, 7 is the number of my family. Everything has its reason. I wrote it for my mom, because my mom has been my anchor and my grounding force — she’s always there. It’s a very beautiful song, and I also realized it’s a song for all the people who’ve been there for me — the fans, everyone. So when we announced the album, the most beautiful way to do it was paying homage to her, to my whole family, my friends, and everyone who’s been there. That’s why, at the end of the song, during last year’s tour, after 40 attempts during the show in Bogotá where my mom was, where the fans were, everyone learned the song and we were able to record them and include them in the song [with a live snippet at the end].
“Preguntas”
Well, “Preguntas” (Questions) is the epicenter of the album. “Preguntas” represents where I’m at in my life right now on a very personal and emotional level. It’s the 2.0 version of a song I wrote for my first EP called “Crecer”. It talks about that difficult moment I experienced back then, about how hard I found it to grow up. I left my country alone at 18 or 19. It was really hard for me as an only child. So this song is very special to me, and honestly, “Preguntas” feels like the answer, almost three years later, to what I’m living now and how I see growth now. The fans will understand it deeply because they know what this symbolizes for me. That’s why it’s the 11th track, because it’s the most vulnerable part of me, and it’s the epicenter where questions are born.
“¿Trato Hecho?”
This is one of my favorites. To me, writing music is immortalizing memories, but this song specifically — the lyrics teleport me over and over again to that same place and bring me so much peace, for some reason, [even though] is a super sad song. Sonically, it’s one of the ones I feel most proud of as well, in the sense that I was able to pour all the emotions I felt in that moment into the song. That’s why it’s the focus track and why it’s the third track — it connects the whole story of the album very well. It’s been one of those promises, so to speak, that I’ve broken. It’s like a trato hecho (done deal) that we wouldn’t see each other again, but we saw each other again and tried again.
https://i0.wp.com/neztelinc.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/station.nez_png.png?fit=943%2C511&ssl=1511943Yvetohttps://neztelinc.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/nez_png.pngYveto2025-05-09 04:06:122025-05-09 04:06:12Ela Taubert Breaks Down 5 Essential Tracks From Her Debut Album, ‘Preguntas a las 11:11’
The Who’s Pete Townshend and Roger Daltrey will gather the press in London on Thursday (May 9) for a special announcement tied to a new project titled The Song Is Over.
According to the band’s official channels, the announcement will include a livestreamed Q&A with fans worldwide, with questions already being collected on social media, building anticipation for what could mark a significant moment in The Who’s six-decade career.
The project’s title references “The Song Is Over,” a deep cut from the band’s 1971 album Who’s Next. The group also performed the track live for the first time in March at London’s Royal Albert Hall, although that rendition was interrupted when Daltrey experienced technical difficulties. “To sing that song, I do need to hear the key,” he told the crowd at the time. “And I can’t hear. There’s no pitch here. I just hear drums, boom boom boom. I can’t sing to that.”
This would not be the first time The Who has suggested the end of the road was near. In 1982, the band launched what was billed as a farewell tour and appeared on the cover of Rolling Stone with the headline “The Who The End.” At that time, Townshend was 37 and Daltrey was 38. Today, Townshend turns 80 later this month and Daltrey recently turned 81.
Longtime drummer Zak Starkey, who briefly exited the band earlier this year, is expected to be part of any future live plans. Starkey left following the Royal Albert Hall show but was soon reinstated. “There have been some communication issues, personal and private on all sides, that needed to be dealt with, and these have been aired happily,” Townshend said.
The band has not confirmed that The Song Is Over will be a tour. Fans have also speculated the project could be a studio album, a biopic or even a new rock opera. Daltrey has discussed the idea of a Keith Moon biopic for years, although no official updates on that project have been shared recently.
The Who last released an album in 2019. Who debuted at No. 2 on the Billboard 200, marking the band’s highest-charting album since Quadrophenia reached No. 2 in 1973.
Full details of The Song Is Over will be revealed Thursday.
https://i0.wp.com/neztelinc.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/station.nez_png.png?fit=943%2C511&ssl=1511943Yvetohttps://neztelinc.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/nez_png.pngYveto2025-05-09 04:00:562025-05-09 04:00:56The Who Tease ‘The Song Is Over’ Project Ahead of Special Announcement
The late One Direction singer Liam Payne left behind money, property and possessions worth more than £24m ($32m) with no known will when he died last year, official records have shown.
Related
Liam Payne: His Life in One Direction & Beyond in Photos
Girls Aloud vocalist Cheryl Tweedy, his former partner and mother of his eight-year-old son, Bear, is legally responsible for Payne’s fortune after being named an administrator for his estate. The pair were in a relationship between 2016 and 2018 but did not marry. U.K. rules of intestacy state that a person’s spouse, and then any children they have, are first claim to the estate.
Court documents also show that music industry lawyer Richard Mark Bray has also been given administrator duties. According to the Letters of Administration, the gross value of Payne’s estate amounts to £28,594,888 ($37,956,568). With the deduction of debts and expenses, the figure comes to approximately £24,279,728 ($32,222,598).
Last year (Oct. 16), Payne died at age 31 after falling from a third-floor room at the Casa Sur hotel in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Toxicology tests revealed that before his death, the musician had traces of alcohol, cocaine, and a prescription antidepressant in his body. His cause of death was “polytrauma” from multiple injuries and internal and external bleeding, a postmortem found.
At the BRIT Awards in March, Payne was remembered with a video montage showing a clip from his time on The X Factor and then with One Direction, who won seven gongs at the music awards before they went on hiatus in 2015.
Throughout the mid-2010s, the band became one of the most successful pop acts of all time. Comprising Payne, Harry Styles, Zayn Malik, Louis Tomlinson and Niall Horan, One Direction notched four No. 1 albums on the Billboard 200, six top 10 hits on the Billboard Hot 100 and billions of streams alongside four sold-out world tours.
After the group parted ways, Payne launched his solo career in 2017 with the Quavo-assisted “Strip That Down,” which peaked at No. 10 on the Hot 100 and No. 3 on the Official U.K. Singles Chart. His debut album, LP1, arrived in December 2019.
https://i0.wp.com/neztelinc.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/station.nez_png.png?fit=943%2C511&ssl=1511943Yvetohttps://neztelinc.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/nez_png.pngYveto2025-05-09 04:00:562025-05-09 04:00:56Liam Payne Left Behind $32m Estate With No Known Will
Brooks & Dunn remember the first two ACM Awards they won in 1992, when they snagged both top new duo of the year and duo of the year.
“It felt like we were in the game,” said Kix Brooks. “Those were our first major awards.”
“I remember we were walking the off the stage, I was looking this way, and [Kix] was looking that way, and we were both fighting back tears,” Ronnie Dunn added.
Twenty-five ACM awards later, including winning the coveted entertainer of the year three times, the acclaimed duo received another award Wednesday night (May 7): the ACM Diamond Chairman’s Award. The honor, presented at the ACM Lifting Lives Gala at the Omni PGA Hotel in Frisco, Texas, goes to an artist who has left a mark on the academy and on the country music industry as a whole through their artistry and humanitarian efforts.
The evening, held the night before the 60th ACM Awards, raised more than $1.3 million for ACM Lifting Lives, the philanthropic arm of the academy, which provides aid to people in need through health-related initiatives, including national music therapy programs, mental and physical health organizations, children’s hospitals and more.
The pair, talking to Billboard at the start of the evening, were more than happy to lend their name to raise money for a good cause. “If we can find something that somebody can attach anything that’s worthwhile and good for something, then we’re good to go,” Dunn says.
They were feted by a number of artists who had grown up on their music and many of whom had developed deep personal ties with the most successful duo in the history of country music.
Keith Urban remember shortly after moving to America from Australia hearing the duo’s music, when songs like “Brand New Man” and “Hard Workin’ Man” “were just leaping out of the radio with so much energy,” Urban told Billboard. “They weren’t just great songs, they were great records.”
Urban, who performing a smoking version of “Brand New Man,” first met Brooks when Urban and his then band, The Ranch, were playing in a dive bar called Jack’s Guitar Bar that held around 80 people, “with wretched shag carpet everywhere that was beer soaked and just dreadful.” Brooks had heard of the band and after a formal event one evening came into the bar with his wife. “Kix is dressed to the nines and so is Barbara in this absolute sh-thole pub,” he says with a laugh. After finding the last seat for his wife, Brooks sat on the carpet in his tuxedo “and watched our whole set.” Even though The Ranch didn’t have a record deal, Brooks extended an offer to have the band open for Brooks & Dunn, which they did in 1997.
Similarly, Brooks & Dunn took Megan Moroney, who performed a sultry version of “Ain’t Nothin ‘Bout You,” out on her first arena tour in 2023. “They kind of took me under their wing. I would come out and sing ‘Cowgirls Don’t Cry’ with them every night, and I remember being really nervous to do that. Their confidence kind of [rubbed] off on me a little bit, and made me feel more comfortable,” she says. “I thought that that was really sweet of them to take a chance on me and let me open up for them. It was like a dream come true for me and my parents, so anytime I’m asked to do anything for Brooks and Dunn, I’m there.”
After growing up on Brooks & Dunn’s music, Cody Johnson first met them when he performed “Red Dirt Road” with the duo on 2019’s Reboot collection, which reimagined some of the pair’s greatest hits with other artists. The first line of the song, “I was raised off of Rural Route 3,” always resonated with Johnson because he actually was raised off a Rural Route 3 in Texas, just as Dunn was in Arkansas. “We just hit it off. I think that they figured out that they were my heroes, but also, I didn’t treat them any different,” he said. “And even though I was a young aspiring artist, they didn’t treat me any different either.” Johnson performed “Red Dirt Road” to open the gala’s entertainment portion and will perform the song with the duo on the ACM Awards on Thursday.
Lainey Wilson electrified the crowd with a soaring version of “My Maria,” and called the duo on stage with her to sing the last half of the song. “I was not expecting you to get up here with me,” Wilson said with a laugh after they finished the song to great applause.
“They truly are the soundtrack of my childhood,” she said backstage. “We used to steal my daddy’s hunting spotlight, and we’d turn all the lights out in the house, and my sister would follow me around the living room with [my singing into] a hairbrush. ‘My Maria’ was one of the ones that I would belt out. It is pretty wild to think that I actually really know them now.” As Dunn once again proved as he hit “My Maria’s” sky-high notes, “he is one of the best singers on the face of the earth,” Wilson said. “It’s like how is this even coming out of [his mouth?]”
Also performing in honor of the duo were Zach Top, who played “My Next Broken Heart” and Eric Church, who sang “You’re Gonna Miss Me When I’m Gone.”
The evening closed with a singalong on “Play Something Country” with Brooks & Dunn, Church, Wilson, Urban, Top and Moroney.
Brooks & Dunn, who released Reboot 2 in 2024, are inching toward recording an album of new material, which would be their first since 2007’s Cowboy Town. “We’re kicking along,” Brooks says. “We’re working on it, we’re pushing that row,” Dunn says, adding that their new label chiefs at Sony Nashville—chairman/CEO Hilary Lindsey and president/COO Ken Robold—are also encouraging them to progress. “We’ve got a label that we had a really great meeting with. They can’t make us make a record, but they would love to see us do it,” Brooks says. “They don’t want to put out a record that’s not a great record.”
The pair also acknowledge they are among the top tier league of acts who have been so successful that they are competing with their own legacy.
“He’s not a country artist, but I love quoting Billy Joel,” Brooks says, “He said ‘I haven’t made a new record in [32] years and it’s working quite well.’”
But they admit there’s the nagging feeling that they have more left to say. “I still think we have the juice to be able to sell a new one,” Dunn says. “I just want to put one more through the goal posts.”
https://i0.wp.com/neztelinc.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/station.nez_png.png?fit=943%2C511&ssl=1511943Yvetohttps://neztelinc.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/nez_png.pngYveto2025-05-09 04:00:552025-05-09 04:00:55Brooks & Dunn on Being Honored by ACM Lifting Lives and Potentially Making New Music: “I Just Want to Put One More Through the Goal Posts.”