Luke Bryan ruffled the feathers of family members of some of country music’s legends with some comments he made in an interview.
Luke did an interview with Hits Daily Double to help promote his upcoming new album Kill The Lights due out August 7th. In the interview he made a reference to some of the country legends like Waylon Jennings and Willie Nelson who were nicknamed with some others as “The Outlaws.”
Luke was quoted as saying; “I’m not an outlaw country singer. I don’t do cocaine and run around. So I’m not going to sing outlaw country. I like to hunt, fish, ride around on my farm, build a big bonfire and drink some beers — and that’s what I sing about. It’s what I know. I don’t know about laying in the gutter, strung out on drugs. I don’t really want to do that.”
That prompted some posts and responses from family members of Waylon Jennings asking for the reigning CMA and ACM Entertainer of the Year to apologize for the comments.
Luke responded to the controversy on his Twitter account through several tweets that together said; “Hey guys I’ve been thinking about this all day, every now and then I feel I need to defend myself in this business. I did a great interview with many topics discussed. It’s so frustrating that something negative has spun out of the story. I would never speak against any artist. It’s not my style. I consider Willie, Waylon and Merle musical heroes. I was trying to state what I was about and where I come from with my music. It’s simple as that.”
Personally I think that Luke was simply talking about the persona that the term “Outlaw Country” brings to mind and not meaning to say that Waylon, Willie or any of “The Outlaws” in country music did anything specific. I believe he was simply stating that the subject matter in his songs depicts the lifestyle he lives and that is why he sings and writes about what he does Of course that is just my opinion, but based on Luke’s Twitter post, I feel like it is a likely scenario.
By: Buck Stevens
