Month: July 2020

Burke/Triolo Productions/ThinkstockSugarland bandmate Kristian Bush is teaming up with Ram Trucks tonight for the next installment of their virtual concert series, Ram Jam Sessions. You can catch his live performance on Ram Trucks’ Facebook page at 7PM ET.

Country newcomers Avenue Beat have scored almost 10 million views on TikTok with a snippet of their very NSFW song, which shares how they really feel about the year 2020. The song found a famous fan in Maren Morris, who voiced her approval on Twitter.

John Prine has been named the first-ever honorary Poet Laureate in his home state of Illinois. He’s being honored posthumously, following his death in April of complications of COVID-19.

By Carena Liptak
Copyright © 2020, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

Matthew BerinatoAs America prepares to celebrate its birthday this weekend, it’ll be an Independence Day unlike any we’ve experienced before, due to the ongoing protests and the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Still, for Matt Stell, the Fourth of July brings back memories of summers spent in his native Arkansas.

“Me and my dad always threw a big Fourth of July party,” he reminisces. “We’d cook and we’d eat and have people over, and we’d shoot off a bunch of fireworks and throw bottle rockets at each other. It was a lot of fun.”

With everything going on, the “Prayed for You” hitmaker still has hopes of keeping the tradition alive, even if it’s scaled down quite a bit.

“This year will be a little bit different for everybody,” he reflects, “but man, hopefully, we’ll still get to maybe get outside and cook some meat outside. That’ll be fun.” 

Matt also has another reason to celebrate: His heartbreak ballad “Everywhere but On” is on the verge of cracking country’s top twenty.

Meanwhile, Matt’s just released the socially-distanced “Many Matts” music video for “If I Was a Bar,” where he plays all the characters in the clip. At the same time, he’s continuing to ready his major label debut for later this year.

By Stephen Hubbard
Copyright © 2020, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

ABC/Image Group LAOld Dominion are gearing up to share more new music, and from the snippet they posted to social media this week, the next song they’ve got coming is a flirty, tropical summertime anthem.

“This is one y’all haven’t ever heard yet,” the group revealed on social media, posting a 30-second clip of their new song along with a portion of the lyrics. Called “Everything to Lose,” the tune focuses on the early stages of a new relationship.

“Everything that you do is driving me crazy / Dancing and singing along and it’s catching my ear, catching my eye,” the song begins. “Think that it’s been long enough, girl, you know I ain’t playing / So let’s blow this popsicle stand, girl, and kiss it goodbye…”

“Everything to Lose” will be the first taste of previously unheard music from Old Dominion since May, when they dropped three older songs that they’d written for previous projects but that didn’t make the cut.

The band released their self-titled third album in October of last year. That project includes hits like “Make it Sweet” and “One Man Band.”

By Carena Liptak
Copyright © 2020, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

This is one y'all haven't ever heard yet. #everythingtolose is out tonight. #previouslyunreleased pic.twitter.com/L7kiYjHsk0

— Old Dominion (@OldDominion) July 2, 2020

ABC/Image Group LARandy Travis and his wife, Mary, consider themselves to be lucky during the COVID-19 lockdown: They live on a farm, with plenty of opportunities for fresh air.  Plus, the country legend has plenty of personal experience with having to adjust to a dramatic life change overnight. In 2013, he suffered a debilitating stroke that robbed him of his ability to speak or sing.

“Randy and I were talking about it, reflecting on how our world kind of shut down and came to screeching halt seven years ago, when the stroke happened in July 2013,” Mary tells Rolling Stone in the couple’s latest interview.

“That’s when we hit a brick wall and everything changed and we were isolated from everything we had known before,” she continues. “So to us, [the COVID-19 shutdown] was not that much of a transition.”

Still, the pair acknowledge that for much of the rest of the world, the pandemic has brought life changes on an entirely new scale.

“But for people that have never been through something like [Randy’s stroke] in life, or a tragedy where your whole world has shattered and it changes in an instant, I’m sure that it’s hard to adjust to, because it was hard for us to adjust seven years ago,” Mary reflects.

Though Randy is still unable to perform the way he could before his stroke, he continues to recover, even doing things that his doctors didn’t think he would ever again be able to do.

For example, Randy will deliver a landmark performance on Josh Turner’s upcoming project, Country State of Mind, contributing to Josh’s rendition of “Forever and Ever, Amen.” His participation in the new version of the song marks Randy’s first recording session since his stroke.

By Carena Liptak
Copyright © 2020, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.