Country Music

“WE’RE able to save the foot.”

That is what Kings Of Leon frontman Caleb Followill heard a doctor tell his wife after a freak accident at home.

“My kids wanted to play tag because they didn’t want to go to bed,” he recalls.

“I went to hurdle the couch, and when I did, my back foot caught it. So, I threw my legs underneath me to try to stick the landing, and it was just heels first.

“I was losing blood and there was a moment where they thought they might have to take my foot.

“They [the medics] said they’d only ever seen an injury like this when a man had fallen off a five-storey building.”

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In a video call with Caleb and his cousin, guitarist Matthew Followill, from their Nashville homes, the singer reveals: “The heel of my foot was in the middle of my foot, so it was like there was a massive lump in the middle.”

With the band then just weeks away from their 2025 UK and European tour, Matt initially thought Caleb was exaggerating the extent of his injury.

“He sent this text and I thought it was a joke,” says Matt.

“He was, like, ‘Guys, I hurt my foot really bad. We might not be able to go on tour’. And I was, like, ‘Yeah, right. How could you hurt your foot so badly?’ But the X-rays are pretty gnarly.”

What began as a nightmare would, however, become the inspiration for the band’s most personal, stripped-back album yet.

O My Beloved is the Nashville group’s tenth studio album and it sees them reflecting on family, love and loss.

Caleb admits: “I was going through a lot and had to mentally be strong.

“I couldn’t sleep at night. I would have panic attack after panic attack. I was so depressed, so helpless . . . 

“When you’re the man of the house and everyone’s taking care of you, it’s a bad feeling.”

But as he recovered at home with his wife, model Lily Aldridge, and their kids Dixie, 14, and seven-year-old Winston, Caleb picked up his guitar and found himself writing songs unlike anything the band had released before.

“I feel like my relationship with my children took a whole new step,” he says.

“The first song that came was My Whole World. As soon as the rhythm started, I began singing, and the words just very naturally came out.

“It was very therapeutic. And the songs that followed had a similar feel.” After that, the band scrapped the four or five guitar-driven songs they had been working on to embrace a quieter, more acoustic sound.

“I remember a couple of times during the demo process, I pulled my truck over to the side of the road and had tears in my eyes,” Caleb recalls. “I was, like, ‘Man, it feels so different’.

“It was kind of a miracle, in a way. It was something that needed to happen to stop the cycle of tour, then make an album and repeat.”

Matt adds: “This album is a way to turn something terrible into something positive.

“Now we’ve made this album, when you think about that time at home, it has a different meaning. And with it being our tenth album, we wanted to do something different.”

The enforced break also gave Caleb time to reflect on more than 25 years of Kings Of Leon.

“It was the first time since we started that I’ve ever really looked at what we’ve accomplished,” he admits.

“Instead of looking at the workload ahead, it was kind of looking back and going, ‘Whoa, 25 years, we’ve done more than we ever dreamed we would do’.

“It was a really beautiful time of reflection.”

For years, Matt, Caleb and his brothers — drummer Nathan and bassist Jared — wanted to be recognised for their music rather than family connections.

“For so long, we were tired of talking about being family,” Matt says. “We were, like, ‘No, we’re a band, just see us as a band’. But with this music, it’s all about family, and I guess it was time to quit avoiding talking about it.”

Caleb and his brothers spent much of their childhood travelling through Tennessee, Oklahoma and the South with their father, a Pentecostal preacher, often sleeping in cars or staying with relatives.

“It was the little moments that inspired the songs,” says Caleb. “Like small conversations with my uncle Larry or moments at our family reunions.

“We didn’t have, excuse my language, a pot to piss in, but we had love and each other and we created beautiful memories.

“We grew up poor, and that was always our thing. You know, ‘One day our ship’s going to come in’.

“One day, my older brother Nathan said, ‘I think our ship is the Titanic’, because it felt like our ship was never coming in.”

The family saying inspired a lyric in My Whole World when the siblings were excited about a forthcoming family cruise.

Caleb explains: “A picture of the ship said ‘29 days ’til . . . ’ so I wrote ‘29 days ’til our ship comes in. We’ll be together again’.” Matt adds: “I also love that that’s something your mum used to say.”

And memories of Caleb’s mum Betty Ann, who died in 2021, are woven into the new album.

“When I had messed up and everyone was mad at me, I could always call her,” Caleb explains.

“When you lose that person, it forces you to kind of really take ownership of who you are. For the first time, it’s ‘Oh, man, I’m the grown-up’.

“I didn’t really deal with the grief or loss, and this was the first time I was able to do it in a way that didn’t feel like I was whining about it,” Caleb admits.

“Sometimes I think, ‘Oh, man, she would love this’, or, ‘She would be proud of this’, and then I’m like, ‘No, she does love this and she is proud of it’.”

The freedom of childhood also runs through KOYSAR (Kick Off Your Shoes And Run) — a song Caleb wrote for his daughter about growing up in the age of social media.

Pretty Thing is a poignant story inspired by the old country songs Caleb grew up listening to.

He says: “It’s not autobiographical as we didn’t have that traditional high-school experience. It was the forbidden fruit.

“And I always admired songs about first love in high school — that glamorous football player with the cheerleader.

“As I got deeper into writing it, it felt like more than a break-up, like, ‘Maybe this man died, and so he’s watching her move on with her life. Every time I play that song for my wife, she cries.”

Other standouts include The Hand and Rose — which Matt cites as his favourites — while Caleb singles out Get You Down for its emotional depth.

O My Beloved is a stunning album, with its delicate, quieter sound allowing the band’s musicianship to shine.

Matt says: “We wanted everything to have a purpose, and not to have extra stuff muddying up the mixes. We tried to have clear sounds and a clear vision.”

“Us producing the album ourselves was a real opportunity for us to really home in on sounds,” Caleb adds. “We wanted to let the songs shine.”

As we chat about his lyrics, I’m surprised to hear Caleb admit he still struggles with insecurity over his songwriting.

He says: “I’m self-conscious about lyrics. For the most part, I’m so scared for anyone to hear anything.

“I never used to enjoy playing shows. But over the last five years, I love walking out on stage and am no longer scared.”

Matt continues: “Being in Kings Of Leon is hands-down better than it’s ever been for us, for touring and just being together.

“For some of the time, it wasn’t fun but now we look forward to getting together.”

The band return to the UK next month for a one-off show at the new British Airways ARC before headlining next summer’s Isle of Wight and Lytham festivals and playing a string of shows across the country.

Caleb admits they are still working out how to fit the new songs into their live performances.

“It’d be hard to put those songs in between Spiral Staircase and Sex On Fire,” he says. “You have to let them breathe and have their own little moment.”

And after a recent performance in Texas, he is keen to include strings in future shows.

“We had a big, beautiful string section with us, and it was pretty magical and maybe we want to grow that,” he says.

Britain has always held a special place in the band’s hearts, with fans here embracing them long before they found success back home in America.

“They were there first, and they have never left,” says Caleb. “Loyalty matters to us.”

Matt adds: “My wife is English, and she says that if you make a fan in Britain, you pretty much make a fan for life.”

London also brings back memories of the band’s wild early days. “When we’d be in London, we’d go crazy,” says Caleb. “We’d do interviews and get drunk before. Like, ‘No one’s going to see this. Who cares?!’”

A lot of the more memorable moments involved fights, too. “One time, me and Nathan ended up in a Koi pond,” Caleb laughs. I had hit him over the head with a frying pan. It’s a true story.”

Both he and Matt are relieved social media wasn’t around then to capture their antics.

“We probably just would never have gone to those clubs because we’d be on Instagram or TikTok the next day,” laughs Matt.

“It was, like, ‘Whatever happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas’,” adds Caleb. “We were just small-town guys let loose. And, thank God, we survived.

“There were a lot of crazy memories — a lot of moments that just didn’t feel real at the time.

“I’ll never forget when we walked on stage at Glastonbury [in 2008], when we got to headline it.

“Years ago, a man grabbed me by the hand, and said, ‘You will be in front of multitudes’. It scared me because I didn’t know what he meant by that.

“When we walked out on stage at Glastonbury, it was the first time it hit me that that was what he was talking about.”

Almost two decades after that unforgettable show, Caleb and Matt are enjoying being in Kings Of Leon more than ever.

“It really feels like we made our first album again,” Caleb says. “Producing it ourselves to the way that we wrote the songs, the instrumentation . . . it really felt like we were doing something for the first time.

“Most bands don’t ever get to make a first album. They certainly don’t get to make it twice.

“It feels like the beginning of something. I don’t know what that is, but I’m enjoying it.”

• O My Beloved is out next Friday.

KINGS OF LEON

O My Beloved

For John and TJ Osborne, work and family have long been intertwined.

Today the siblings are known to country music fans as Brothers Osborne, the rock-leaning twosome that’s put 13 songs on Billboard’s Country Airplay chart and been named vocal duo of the year half a dozen times at the annual CMA Awards. Before they moved to Nashville, though, the brothers grew up helping out with their dad’s plumbing business in the late 1990s in the small fishing town of Deale, Md.

“You know how every country star opens a bar in Nashville?” John asks. “I was thinking it’d be funny to start a Brothers Osborne plumbing company that services all the bars.”

With TJ on lead vocals and John on lead guitar, the brothers look back at those early days in Deale on their nostalgic new album, “Watertown,” which came out last week, 10 years after the release of their first LP. It’s got handsome, well-drawn songs about long-lost loves and teenage indiscretions, not to mention one tune about some of the colorful Osbornes who don’t play in the band.

“We got a mama that you wouldn’t want to take home to mama,” TJ sings in “Family Business,” which rhymes that line with “Got a daddy with a girlfriend who loves marijuana” and “Sister took a swing at her first boy’s father.”

“I always tell people that TJ and I are the most boring people in our family,” John says. “Our sister really did punch her ex-husband in the face.”

TJ, 41, calls the album a tribute to the people who shaped him and his brother, who’s 44. “When you’re a kid, you want to run away from home and spread your wings,” the singer says. “Then at some point, it’s like that place is almost calling you back.”

That the Osbornes are at an age to memorialize the old days puts them on the outskirts, to some extent, of a country scene crowded with ascendant zoomers like Ella Langley, Tucker Wetmore and Megan Moroney. Yet the brothers are hardly fuddy-duddys: In 2021, TJ became the first country artist signed to a major label to come out as gay; musically, he and John consistently make unexpected stylistic choices — take the ringing new wave guitars in “Family Business” — even as they court down-the-middle success, as with the new album’s lead single, “Born and Raised Hell,” which features the country radio kingpin Cody Johnson.

“John and TJ don’t make corporate country music,” says Ashley McBryde, who’s collaborated repeatedly with the brothers. McBryde calls John “a guitar god” and says TJ’s deep voice “could make your kneecaps come unglued”; she adds that she likes to listen to their records “while I’m doing yard work, slinging a chainsaw.”

“Our mission the whole time has been: How do we thread the needle of doing something that’s a little left of center while making it commercial enough that people can hear it?” TJ says over coffee at an outdoor cafe in Griffith Park. The Osbornes are in town on a recent afternoon between tour dates; last night they did dinner at Nobu in West Hollywood — “bougie as f—,” John acknowledges — then “climbed up the La Cienega mountain,” as the guitarist puts it, back to their hotel on Sunset.

“The last 50 yards, I felt like I was gonna puke,” John says.

Does Nashville have good sushi?

“They do now,” John replies. “Back in the day, there was just this place Ken’s — kind of a hole in the wall where you’d get these huge styrofoam containers of rolls. It was really cheap, and we’d all get really stoned and eat tons of sushi.”

The brothers learned to play from their dad in Maryland in a family roots-music combo called Deuce and a Quarter; each went to Nashville to do his own thing but didn’t really gain any traction until they teamed up — a union they say their mother envisioned from the jump.

“I think the second TJ was born, she thought to herself: I have a country band on my hands,” John says. “She’s very — what’s the word I want to use? — goal-driven, in a good way. So when we finally joined forces and things started taking off, there was a bit of ‘I told you so’ about it.” He laughs. “In her defense, she was right.” (The brothers’ sister Natalie also works in Nashville as an A&R exec at the indie label Leo33, where she signed Zach Top.)

Brothers Osborne — nominated again for vocal duo of the year at next month’s CMAs ceremony — came up in a tightknit peer group that also included McBryde, Maren Morris and Kacey Musgraves. The duo broke out with a No. 1 showing for “Stay a Little Longer,” a single from their platinum 2016 debut; since then they’ve scored hits with tunes with like “21 Summer,” “Nobody’s Nobody” and “Burning Man,” the last a collab with Dierks Bentley that also went to No. 1.

Asked why they’ve been embraced by the traditional Nashville biz in a way that’s sometimes eluded Musgraves, TJ shakes his head. “There’s so many Kacey songs that I’m just like, How was this not a huge hit for her?” he says. “There is a game you have to play with country radio — doing things for them that we were willing to do that I know Kacey was just like, ‘No thanks.’”

Why does he reckon he and his brother were willing to jump through the hoops?

“I mean, we knew it would help,” he says. “We grew up in a poor family where everyone worked their asses off just to get by paycheck to paycheck. So I think for us it was about the fact that we’re gonna put in the work and get noticed.”

“You have to be willing to compromise — not your art or your dignity but compromise your time,” John says, “in the hopes that you can pursue a career in music because it’s very competitive.”

Over the past few years, some of Nashville’s biggest hits have come from outsiders like Post Malone experimenting with country music. Speaking broadly, TJ says the trendiness of the genre “is a little annoying because people are like, ‘I hate all country music,’ until their career flounders and suddenly they do a country record. Some of these people, they don’t know anything about it.

“At the same time, the genre is the biggest it’s ever been, which probably set the stage for a song like ‘Choosin’ Texas’ to be the song that it was,” he adds of Langley’s pedal-steel-soaked mega-smash, which just logged its 25th week atop Billboard’s Hot 100 — longer than any other song in chart history.

“I was just up in Brooklyn at a gay bar, and I’m like, All the gays are singing along — what the f—?” TJ says. “Also very jealous of that. I want a song all the gays are singing.”

Five years after he came out in a widely publicized Time magazine story, TJ says he doesn’t think much about his position as one of the few openly gay men in country music. As we keep talking, though, some things seem to come to mind.

“There was a moment recently with all the equity and inclusion stuff where [my identity] started to feel political — that was weird,” he says. “It felt like picking sides, even though I’m like, This is just my sexuality. But I feel like we’re kind of getting back out of that a bit.”

Then again, TJ recalls his appearance at May’s ACM Awards, where he presented Langley with the prize for female artist of the year. “I made a joke about my gay ass being up here giving this award, and there were comments from people being like, ‘I don’t understand why you have to talk about it,’” he says. “It’s like, F—, maybe people aren’t as open to it as I thought. It was proof to me that there’s still a lot of ground to cover.”

Is TJ up for doing the work of opening minds?

“I am. And I think it’s important work because there’s so many different types of gay people. There’s also so many different types of rural Americans. We’ll go to some places, and there are people who I perceive to maybe have some sort of bigotry towards me but I read them wrong and they’re actually totally cool.

“Look, you’re not gonna be able to convince everybody,” he adds. “There’s people that just hate on people for the stupidest reasons. Girls have it the worst. Anytime a girl does anything — ‘She looks like a slut,’ ‘She’s fat,’ ‘She’s too skinny.’ There’s just some mean people out there.”

“We’ve heard it all,” John says.

“There was this amazing burn we got one time where we’d taken ‘21 Summer’ out of the set,” TJ says, “and someone commented, ‘I can’t believe Brothers Osborne played 21 guitar solos but not ‘21 Summer.’” He laughs. “See, at least that’s pretty clever.”

A CHART-TOPPING British band has revealed their “bittersweet” decision to split.

The country music duo, whose partnership has spanned 13 years and six albums, have confirmed their current tour will be their last.

The Shires, formed of Crissie Rhodes and Ben Earle and known for tracks such as Watching You Watching Me, hinted there could be a potential for a comeback and said: “Maybe one day we’ll be making music and touring again.”.

In a lengthy statement posted to Instagram, it stated Crissie would be “taking a well deserved break” for family life.

The band, who originally formed on Facebook, broke the news in a message which read: “After a busy 13 years together and six albums’ worth of stories shared on stages all across the world, we’re going to be taking time away from The Shires.

“With two young daughters at home, Crissie will be taking a well-deserved break to focus on family life and spend more time with her quickly-growing girls.

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“It’s a bittersweet decision, one that Ben completely understands and supports as a parent himself.

“We’ll both be cheering each other on for whatever our next chapters hold and who knows, maybe one day we’ll be making music and touring again.

“But for now, this will be our final tour as The Shires for the foreseeable future.

“We can’t wait to sing, dance and make some beautiful memories together on this tour, as we celebrate the amazing journey we’ve all been on together.

“Thank you for all the love you’ve given us, we’ll hold onto it forever. B&Cx”

Radio 2 DJ Bob Harris wrote: “…and we love you right back xx”

Country music singer Shania Twain then put: “Sending congratulations for everything you have achieved and all the best for what’s to come guys”.

On his personal Instagram page, Ben admitted he was struggling with the decision to split.

He told fans: “I completely respect and understand Crissie’s decision but truthfully it’s been a big adjustment for me and something I’ve been processing and working through.

“That’s why I’ve found it a bit tough to show up on here recently.

“I’m definitely turning a corner with it all though”.

The Shires’ 2026 UK tour will kick off in Glasgow on November 3.

It will wrap in Bristol on November 20.

Previously, Crissie said her pals feared the duo were “too young” for country.

She told us: “Our friends thought we were crazy and too young for country but we really believed there was a calling for country music over here.

“I was a wedding singer before, and I performed at functions and I sang everything I could possibly do, but I always loved country music.

“When we started working on this music, within eight months we had two record deals on the table. It was pretty amazing”.

Their 2015 release Brave peaked at Number 10 on the UK Albums Chart, making history as the first Top 10 album by a UK country group.

COUNTRY music legend John Anderson has died at the age of 71.

The iconic voice behind Swingin and Straight Tequila Night was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 2024 with his heartbroken family paying a touching tribute.

John, a native of Apopka, Florida, passed away on Wednesday.

His cause of death is yet to be announced.

An emotional statement from John’s family read: “It is with the heaviest of hearts that we share the passing of our beloved husband, father, grandfather, and best friend.

“To the world, he was a gifted country music singer whose voice and songs touched countless lives.

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“To us, he was so much more. He was the heart of our family, the one who made us laugh, loved us fiercely, and made every ordinary moment feel special.

“We are completely heartbroken.

“His music will live on, but for us, his greatest legacy will always be the love he gave his family and the memories we will carry with us forever.

“Please keep our family in your thoughts and prayers as we grieve this unimaginable loss.”

He boasted a trio of hugely popular number one hits on the country charts for Wild and Blue, Black Sheep and his signature song Swingin.

John’s last public appearance saw him appear alongside his fellow inductees at the Country Music Hall of Fame Medallion Ceremony in Nashville on October 18.

They were inducting the 2026 stars Tim McGraw, Paul Overstreet and the Stanley Brothers.

John said his own induction into the elusive club was one of his best achievements.

He told Rolling Stone at the time: “One of the main gratifications is I got to live to see it.

“Several of my friends were inducted posthumously.”

John leaves behind his wife of 43 years Jamie Anderson and their two daughters Brionna and Alexa.

IT’S not my first rodeo, as the saying goes. Actually, it is though, so I thought why not make it the biggest in the world?

Like many Brits, I’ve a new-found obsession for country music, listening to songs on repeat from Luke Combs and Ella Langley and binge-watching Western drama Yellowstone on Netflix.

But it’s time to pull on my boots and hat for real — and it doesn’t get much more cowboy than the Calgary Stampede.

Once a niche show of Western and indigenous cultures, the Stampede has evolved into one of Canada’s largest festivals, attracting more than a million visitors each year.

Every summer, the Blue Sky City is taken over for ten days by the self- proclaimed “greatest outdoor show on Earth” — and tickets have just gone on sale for 2027.

As well as the world’s biggest outdoor rodeo, the Calgary Stampede has live music, fairground rides and a gut-busting feast of food and drink.

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Boot heels click down every street and white cowboy hats bob past every window.

Rodeo director Kristina Barnes tells me: “This began as a last blast of the Wild West just as it was going away, and that’s what it continues to be. People come from all over the world to be here.”

Animals are the star of the show — the Alberta province has more cows than people — so the rodeo was top of my agenda at the festival.

Events including bronc and bull-riding, roping and barrel racing run every afternoon.

I watched as brave cowboys and girls clung doggedly to thrashing horses and bulls, or tried to lasso and tie calves in under eight seconds.

Later the crowds really got going and the beer flowed as the evening entertainment kicked off with chuckwagon racing.

This involves teams of four riders racing six horses and a wagon around the “half mile of hell” dirt loop.

And I got goosebumps when I watched the indigenous bareback relay event.

Here, athletic young riders leap from the ground on to their horses, thunder round a lap of the racetrack, dismount the moving horse and jump up on to a second horse, then repeat the feat for a third lap.

The crowd goes wild for the horses and riders, who wear barely any equipment — no boots, saddles or shirts.

If all this leaves you itching to get in the saddle yourself, the Boundary Ranch in Kananaskis sits an hour’s drive west of Calgary and offers hacking and trail rides suitable even for total beginners.

Kananaskis is in the foothills of the breathtaking Rocky Mountains, meaning the drive there was worth a day trip on its own.

That’s the other glorious thing about Calgary, it is the gateway to some of Canada’s most stunning landscapes in Banff, Jasper and Lake Louise, so a Stampede-based road trip practically plans itself.

At the ranch, I mounted my bay horse, Jake, for a group stroll through lush pine forest.

Jake turned out to have no respect for authority and a naughty habit of stopping to eat grass, but it was a pinch-me moment when we turned the final corner to a view of a huge snow-spotted mountain towering behind the trees.

If you are not one for riding, the city has enough going on to keep you entertained during the ten days of the Stampede.

Locals reckon the night-time party scene can compete with Nashville, the home of country music.

But it is not just that genre on offer. Big-name headliners this year included Rihanna’s rapper beau ASAP Rocky, punk-pop legends All Time Low and Canadian DJ Deadmau5.

Marquee stages are dotted around the city centre as well as in the Stampede grounds.

I was already a fan of young country star Bailey Zimmerman so seized the chance to see him on the festival’s biggest stage, Nashville North.

Music and drinking goes on into the early hours. And according to local legend, the city has a baby boom every spring, around nine months after the Stampede.

It’s also reportedly a great place to advertise if you’re a divorce lawyer . . . 

It is also reportedly a great place to advertise if you are a divorce lawyer . . . 

The late crowd is young and glamorous, with more skin on show but still heavy on the Western vibe with denim, boots and hats all-round.

But by day, the Stampede is more a family affair.

The Midway grounds, which sit at the heart of the festival, host a huge funfair with water slides, rollercoasters, a Ferris wheel and haunted house.

You’ll need some hearty grub to fuel the long days and the Stampede’s bonkers food scene is impossible, and foolish, to ignore.

There are more than 400 stands and if you can think it, you can probably order it.

Mad recipes included Oreos deep-fried in butter, moose pizza and Spam fries.

I tried loaded mac ’n’ cheese, ginger beef perogies (dumplings), a grilled cheese sandwich with spicy ramen noodles inside, churros in a pina-colada sundae, and a bison burger.

I can’t pick a favourite but I am gutted I couldn’t squeeze in the deep-fried pickle pizza.

On the last day we grabbed breakfast at one of the city’s 30-odd pop-ups, which give out free pancakes every morning through the Stampede.

It was set to be another 30C day in Canada’s sunniest city and a woman with a cowboy hat and guitar was standing on the roof singing Lainey Wilson song Country’s Cool Again.

Hot damn, she’s right.