RESOLVING THE LEDGER
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Country’s retro sounds are experiencing a resurgence, with traditional-leaning songs proliferating the charts, and enduring favorites resonating anew with today’s audiences.
Scotty McCreery has seen just how popular generations-old hits continue to be — he recently released a snippet of himself performing a version of Conway Twitty’s signature 1970 hit “Hello Darlin’” on Instagram, and the video quickly earned over 44 million views.
“That was kind of unexpected,” McCreery tells Billboard . “I guess you never really know what’s going to hit. But it’s great to see there’s a hunger and thirst for traditional country music and the throwback sound, all the way back to Conway. It makes me happy, and that’s the music I love to sing.”
In 1970, “Hello Darlin’” became Twitty’s fourth hit to top Billboard ’s Hot Country Songs chart, spending four weeks at the pinnacle. The title track to Twitty’s 1970 album garnered nominations for both single and song of the year at the CMA Awards that year. In 1999, “Hello Darlin” was added to the Grammy Hall of Fame.
The deep-voiced McCreery has always been known for his ability to do older country songs justice, auditioning for American Idol in 2011 with his rendition of Josh Turner’s 2005 hit, “Your Man.” He went on to win the competition and has long since become a mainstay in country music, earning six No. 1 Billboard Country Airplay hits, becoming a member of the Grand Ole Opry, and being inducted into the North Carolina Music Hall of Fame.
McCreery originally recorded a version of “Hello Darlin’” around 2014, for a project that was ultimately never released. But his new version appears on McCreery’s recently released career retrospective album, 15 — alongside a few other cover songs, and previous hits including “This Is It,” “Damn Strait” and “Five More Minutes.” The latter is seeing a surge in interest after it was included in the Apple film The Dink .
McCreery has new music on the way, too; he is writing for his next project and plans to head into the studio next month.
“We’ve been writing for a while now,” McCreery says. “ 15 kind of gave me a chance to reflect and have a breather from the ‘go, go’ pace of the music business right now. I appreciated my label being on board with that. But we’ve never stopped thinking ahead and getting ready for the next thing. We have a lot of songs in the vault and ready to go. In a couple of weeks, we’ll be putting them down on tape. If [fans have] liked what we’ve done before, they are going to like this project. I’m trying to stay true to who I am and tell the story of where I’m at in my life right now.”
Before he turns his attention fully to looking ahead and new music, McCreery looked back again with Billboard , picking five of his favorite classics to cover.
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