Bryan can still party with the best
When Luke Bryan took up cycling, about 2½ years ago, he didn’t do it like regular people. He rode with Lance Armstrong. He broke his clavicle en route to a concert in Greenback, Tenn., then tweeted he was “all good” and performed while wearing a sling. And whenever he plays Wrigley Field, he hooks up with a local friend, Robbie Ventura, who happens to be a former pro cyclist, and rides 30 miles up and down the lakefront.
“When I hang the phone up with you, I’ll probably go ride 35 or 40 miles,” says the superstar country singer by phone from his Nashville home. “It changed my life when it comes to touring. It’s a very physical show when you’re singing and running and jumping up and down and it’s summertime. You don’t need to take it lightly.”
Being in summer stadium shape is crucial for Bryan, 42, who rose from early singles like “All My Friends Say,” “Rain Is a Good Thing” and “Someone Else Calling You Baby” to one of the most reliable headliners in the U.S. His specialty is party songs, and for a while it seemed like every other song he put out was about beer. He has a regular-guy charm, a smooth, Dwight Yoakamstyle voice and the ability to turn lyrics about trucks, tractors and cuties with Kentucky coozies into rally-the-troops anthems. Some call his style “bro country,” but it’s not far from what Jimmy Buffett has done for decades.
Bryan has recently been inching away from what he calls, in a 15-minute interview, “songs that are pure fun, so you might as well have fun with them,” and toward more reflective material. His latest album, last year’s “What Makes You Country,” sounds at first of a piece with 2014’s “Crash My Party” and 2011’s “Tailgates & Tanlines,” but the Saturdaynight drinking and partying depicted in the songs point to more difficult Sunday mornings. “Drinking Again” is an upbeat song about friends gathered in a bar who find any conceivable reason to reach for the shot tray, but Bryan repeats the chorus so frequently that it takes on a darker, almost numbing quality.
The album’s best song is “Most People Are Good,” a hymnlike plea for tolerance that concludes: “I believe you love who you love, ain’t nothing you ever should be ashamed of.” It’s not a protest song, exactly, but its brief suggestion of support for LGBTQ rights is surprisingly potent coming from a red-state hero from Georgia and Tennessee.
In response to a question about how the song was received, Bryan stumbles over his words a bit, clears his throat and apologizes. It’s early in the morning, and he’s having a rare day at home in the middle of steady touring. “It seems like in all of our ways we receive media, from TV to our phones, the bad people get shuffled to the top of the list,” he says. “When you hear a song that truly does remind you of the human element — the goodness of the human spirit — it’s really not even about a political stance for me. It’s really about a humanity stance.”
He pauses, then adds: “Hopefully that’s as good as I can say it.” Sept. 9 birthdays: Actor Topol is 83. Singer Dee Dee Sharp is 73. Musician-producer Dave Stewart is 66. Actor Hugh Grant is 58. Actor-comedian Adam Sandler is 52. Model Rachel Hunter is 49. Jazz singer Michael Buble is 43. Actress Michelle Williams is 38.