The happiest place on earth is facing a haunting reality — recent incidents raise serious questions about safety amidst the magic. Continue reading…
Country Music News – Taste of Country
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Breaking through country music’s doors was a little harder as a Nashville-born musician, Jelly says. Continue reading…
Country Music News – Taste of Country
Jelly Roll will be at the judges table! Continue reading…
The Boot – Country Music News, Music Videos and Songs
The Mavericks frontman has been gone for nearly a month now, and he’s left a huge hole in the hearts of those that loved him. Continue reading…
The Boot – Country Music News, Music Videos and Songs
Mason Ramsey, who became an overnight viral sensation at just 11 years old after a video of him yodeling Hank Williams’ “Lovesick Blues” inside a Walmart took the internet by storm, is opening up with a major update on his career.
Now 19, Ramsey has broken a lengthy silence on social media to reconnect with fans and explain why he’s been absent in recent months. In a candid message, the singer revealed that he has been navigating a challenging period behind the scenes, marked by several major changes in his professional life.
According to Ramsey, the past few months included being dropped by his record label, as well as cutting ties with both his agent and manager, developments that ultimately led him to step back from the spotlight and reset as he figures out his next chapter.
“Hey y’all, happy new years! I took a much needed break from social media so I could get my business and head on straight,” Ramsey wrote. “I wanted to say thank you for the birthday wishes in November and all the Merry Christmas messages I got in December.”
He went on to share just how difficult the past year had been.
“Last year was one of the most difficult years of my life. My label dropped me, my agency left me and I had to part ways with my manager.”
Despite the setbacks, Ramsey assured fans that things are beginning to turn around and that new music is on the way.
“Since then I have brought on a whole new team and have been making music that I have never been more excited about,” he shared. “I can’t wait to share everything I’ve been working on and to get back on the road.”
In closing, Ramsey promised followers that he plans to be “a lot more active” on Instagram moving forward and encouraged fans to “say hi.” His account, which boasts more than 1.5 million followers, has been wiped clean and currently features only his latest career update.
The post has since been flooded with supportive comments from fans, many encouraging him to keep going and celebrating what appears to be a fresh start.
After first going viral, Ramsey appeared on The Ellen DeGeneres Show, made his Grand Ole Opry debut, and later signed a record deal. He is best known for songs like “Before I Knew It” and “Twang.”
The post ‘Walmart Yodeling Kid’ Mason Ramsey Shares Major Career Update After ‘Difficult Year’ appeared first on Country Now.
Country Now
Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban have officially closed the chapter of their relationship after nearly two decades together. According to a new report from PEOPLE, their divorce has been finalized just three months after Kidman filed, due to irreconcilable differences. Despite their split, their co-parenting agreement reflects a shared commitment to their family.
On Tuesday, January 6, the pair of stars brought their divorce to a close with a court-approved settlement, which indicates that they have agreed to forgo any child or spousal support, with each responsible for their own legal costs.
Under the new arrangement, their daughters Faith, 15, and Sunday, 17, will continue to be brought up in a stable and loving environment, as both parents are expected to “behave with each other and each child so as to provide a loving, stable, consistent and nurturing relationship with the child even though they are divorced.”
Even though Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban are no longer together, the agreement lays out a clear approach for how they intend to keep their family life as steady as possible
“They will not speak badly of each other or the members of the family of the other parent,” the agreement continues. “They will encourage each child to continue to love the other parent and be comfortable in both families.”
The girls will live primarily with their mother, the Babygirl actress, who will have them for the majority of the year, 306 days in total. Keith Urban will be allowed to spend 59 days out of the year with them, including every other weekend from Saturday morning at 10 a.m. to Sunday evening at 6 p.m. Additionally, both parents intend to equally share the responsibility for important decisions affecting their daughters’ lives.
Faith and Sunday were most recently seen celebrating the new year alongside Kidman. The actress posted a photo of her and the girls to her Instagram story on Friday, January 2.
Word first spread about the couple’s separation back in September when TMZ reported that multiple sources with “direct knowledge” of their personal life, had informed the outlet that they had been living apart “since the beginning of summer.”
At the time of the original reports, the split was also believed to be one-sided, with sources claiming Kidman has been making an effort to try and salvage their marriage while Urban has already stepped away from their Nashville home.
“Keith has acquired his own residence in Nashville and has moved out of their family home,” a source told TMZ.
PEOPLE also confirmed this, sharing a statement that read, “She didn’t want this…She has been fighting to save the marriage.”
“She didn’t want this,” the source added. “She has been fighting to save the marriage.”
The country star and the the Oscar-winning actress tied the knot in June 2006 and went on to build a life together that included support each other in their careers and creating a family with their two teens.
The post Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban Finalize Divorce, Reveal Co-Parenting Plan for Teen Daughters appeared first on Country Now.
Country Now
Jelly Roll is undeniably a storyteller. But before he even opens his mouth to share the vulnerable stories of his life through song, people notice his face and the tattoos that offer a glimpse into his past world. Looking back, he says that the ink reflects the judgments and assumptions he’s faced throughout his life.
Now that he’s a mega country star and has lost nearly 300 pounds, it’s clear that Jelly Roll is not the same person he once was when he got a cross under his right eye, teardrops, the music man across his hairline and more while incarcerated. While many could see these pieces of artwork and think he’s trying to get attention, Jelly Roll sets the record straight saying, “It’s the polar opposite.”
He goes on to explain to Men’s Health, “The way shame sometimes shows itself is not always the way we expect it to be. We think shame is somebody in the streets on their knees, with their head down. But shame sometimes is pride. Sometimes shame is just bravado. Behind real bravado, I can normally find shame. I can normally find guilt. I can normally find insecurity. I was the biggest, the loudest, the toughest, the meanest, the growliest, the fattest. There’s normally deep inside of that a really, really small, insecure human. I was that, for sure. Then a by-product of that was I got fat as fu**.”
Even though the majority of these tattoos represent a lower point for him, the “Son of a Sinner” singer revealed that some lighter memories are also attached to them. During an appearance on Taste of Country Nights, he shared a story about when his daughter was in kindergarten and her friends were fascinated by his face art.
In a attempt to sheild them from the real stories behind the tattoos, he told them a white lie.
“When she was in kindergarten it was so funny because all of her little friends would go ‘What is all that stuff on your face?’” he recalled. “I would go ‘You won’t believe this, I only draw this on when I come see y’all so y’all are excited about it.’”
Eventually, the kids caught on and began to question how he was able to keep this up this routine so perfectly.
“Finally, they were like ‘how do you draw it on the same way every time?’ I said ‘I got the little sticker things now because I been coming so much.’”
Jelly Roll also started to noticed that some parents hesitated to let their kids over to his home, making judgments based solely on his tattoos. This was a small but real-life example of how the world has constantly made assumptions about the singer/songwriter based on his appearance.
With the new chapter he’s reached in his life and the commendable strides he has made along the way, the Tennessee native admits he’s considered removing some of the tattoos entirely. However, he also knows that every piece of ink he has is a part of his story and shows just how far he’s come.
These might be a look into his past, but his recent weight loss reveals the path he’s carving out for his future. His journey to this point hasn’t been easy. Because of the time and effort he’s put in, he’s dropped from over 500 pounds to nearly 250 as of January 2026.
At the start of his fight to reclaim his health, the singer/songwriter admittedly tried weight-loss medication for only two weeks before realizing that wasn’t the solution for him. So instead, he looked internally and started by trying to solve the problem from the inside out with the help of a therapist.
“Even before I got into getting my blood work done, I went and got mental health therapy about my overeating. I started treating my food addiction like what it was: an addiction. Why did I treat cocaine a certain way? I went to meetings for cocaine and found a sponsor and detoxed off of it and shit myself and went through real hard life-changing emotional choices to get off cocaine and codeine,” he says. “I didn’t look at the food addiction different. Once I started treating food like an addiction, it started changing everything for me. When I started really looking at the source of why I was eating. What was I eating for?”
From there, he did a blood panel which revealed he had “super high” insulin levels, abnormally low testosterone levels, and high cholesterol.
“The first couple of blood panels were like, how are you alive?” he shared with the magazine.
Jelly Roll decided he was done feeling “never-ending sadness” while being a “prisoner” in his own body. Every day tasks from going to the bathroom, to bathing, driving and more were a real struggle and he determined it was no way to live.
“Every decision I made in life had to be based on my weight. If it could hold me, facilitate me, or fit me—people don’t think about every facet of ‘I still want to be able to do that and I can’t.’ I was so inspired by that kind of stuff.”
Between hiring a chef and sports nutritionist named Ian Larios and focusing on his workout routine, Jelly Roll started to consistently lose between 9 and 15 pounds each month.
He has already come so far, but Jelly Roll’s story is far from finished. In fact, with his health getting under control and his music soaring to new heights, he’s proving that the past doesn’t define you and that change is possible, no matter where you start.
The post Jelly Roll Talks Face Tattoos, Weight Loss, and Reclaiming His Life appeared first on Country Now.
Country Now
When Rascal Flatts recorded “What Hurts the Most” in 2006, they were searching for the perfect song to kick off a new era. From the first listen, it was a stand-out for them, but according to Jay DeMarcus, the band almost missed out on what would become one of the biggest hits of their career, as Keith Urban was in line to record the song first.
Sitting down with Audacy’s Katie Neal, DeMarcus explained that the song was brought to the band by producer Dann Huff as they began shaping what would become their iconic Me and My Gang album. It was first recorded by Mark Wills in 2003, but Huff was determined to give this track a chance to come to life in a new way. So after Keith Urban ultimately passed on it, the award-winning producer believed it was a perfect fit for Rascal Flatts.
“I think it was one of those moments we were looking for a big song to release first,” DeMarcus shared. “[Huff] said, ‘Look, this has been cut before.’ Mark Wills had cut it. He said, ‘But I’ve held onto it for Keith and Keith passed on it…And I feel like you guys could really, really do this song, do a great job with this song.’”
He recalls him and his bandmates Gary LeVox and Joe Don Rooney seeing the chorus Jeffrey Steele had written and thinking it was a “no-brainer.” It turned out following their gut instinct paid off because “What Hurts The Most” went on to become their fifth No. 1 on the Billboard Hot Country Songs, their first Top 10 on the all-genre Billboard Hot 100, and a No. 1 on the Adult Contemporary charts. Additionally, it earned two GRAMMY nominations.
“Throughout our careers, we’d always been really good about not being precious about songs we had written, we’d always let the best song win,” DeMarcus continued. “And this song just stood out as one of those pieces of music that was so far above everything else we had had held at that point…it just felt like one of those moments we’d captured some lightning in a bottle.”
Had Urban decide to record it, the song could have had an entirely different sound and feel to it, but Rascal Flatts’ soaring harmonies and emotional delivery gave it the kind of powerful vulnerability that would resonate with millions.
The song appeared on the Me and My Gang album alongside other landmark tracks like “Stand,” the title track, their cover of “Life Is A Highway” and “My Wish.”
“It was another Jeffrey Steele song. He was on fire at that time. I remember every time he would do a demo session, people were chomping at the bit to listen to the demos and hear what songs and what genius he’d come up with,” DeMarcus shared. “And that song was very personal for him. And you could certainly hear it through the demo. When he sang and delivered the vocal, you could tell there was so much emotion behind it. And I think our job was to try to recapture some of that magic and some of that emotion in the vocal delivery of what he had because it was so magical and so special hearing him sing it.”
He admits it was a “tough job” to try and replicate that immense passion, raw emotion and vulnerability within the lyrics that were inspired by Steele’s love for his youngest daughter.
“It’s just a testament to Gary too and what an incredible singer he is and how he’s able to digest something and make it his own and turn it into something so powerful.”
“What Hurts The Most” marked the first single from heir 2006 album while “My Wish” served as the fourth single. As a whole, the project remains an iconic project in their career. It was named the best-selling album and the best-selling country album of 2006 and went 4x platinum.
DeMarcus went on to recall the moment he realized just how big of an impact this collection really had made in the music world at the time.
“The whole ‘Me and My Gang’ record is kind of our Joshua tree. I think all the stars aligned came together…At the risk of sounding egotistical, that record that year sold more records than any other record in the world, six and a half million records. And we were sitting at the Grammys, and I never will forget during commercial break, Gary leaned over to me and he said, ‘Hey cuz, look at the people that we’re sitting in the room with. There’s Beyonce, there’s Jay-Z, there’s this Lady Gaga, Elton John.’ And I was like, ‘Yeah, I can’t believe this, man. We’re sitting in the same room.’ And he goes, ‘Now think about this. We sold more records than anybody out here this year.’”
“And that’s one of those memories that chokes me up because when you dream about being an artist, you hope you make it to the Grammys, you hope you have a hit song, but that’s one of the memories that I’ll always share with Gary that was uniquely our own just between the two of us.”
It’s safe to say that Rascal Flatts’ musical journey only continued to climb and flourish from that moment. Even to this day, fans continue to flock to their shows, and sing along to the songs that cemented their place as one of the genre’s most powerful vocal groups.
Last year, they returned to the road with the Life is a Highway Tour and are set to reunite with their supporting acts Chris Lane and Lauren Alaina in 2026 for even more dates. Kicking off on January 15 in Raleigh, North Carolina, the tour will make stops in Nashville, Chicago, Tampa, and more before wrapping up on February 28 in Buffalo, New York.
The post Jay DeMarcus Reveals Keith Urban Almost Recorded Rascal Flatts’ Iconic Hit, ‘What Hurts The Most’ appeared first on Country Now.
Country Now
Keith Urban and Nicole Kidman’s finalized divorce agreement details custody of their daughters, asset division, and the financial terms behind their split. Continue reading…
The Boot – Country Music News, Music Videos and Songs
Gallino’s loan to Cami Miller is a true win-win situation for him. Continue reading…
The Boot – Country Music News, Music Videos and Songs