Thomas Rhett’s freshman It Goes Like This album came out in 2013. In the 12 years since then, Rhett has had hit after hit at country radio. A proven country music hitmaker, even Rhett has had a few surprises over the years, including these four songs, which totally shocked his fans.
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“Marry Me” by Thomas Rhett
“Marry Me” came out in 2017, on Rhett’s Life Changes album. When fans saw the title, ahead of its release, they expected a romantic song about his wife, Lauren Akins. Instead, the song, written by Rhett, Jesse Frasure, Ashley Gorley, and Shane McAnally, is about a man who attends the wedding of a woman he loves.
In an even more surprising twist, the video ends with the bride leaving her wedding to find the man still in love with her. The song wasn’t about Akins. But it was inspired by Rhett thinking that it could have been him if he had never told her his true feelings years ago.
“The song was written out of this space where I knew that if I had never told Lauren how I felt about her, I probably [would] have been invited to her wedding,” Rhett tells The Boot. “And [I] would have watched her marry somebody else. I probably wouldn’t have been quite as sad as the guy in the music video for the song, but it would definitely still have wrecked me.”
“Where We Started”
“Where We Started” is the title track of Rhett’s sixth studio album, out in 2022. By the time Where We Started came out, Rhett had enough success that he could have had his pick of duet partners in country music. Instead, Rhett went to a pop music icon, namely Katy Perry, to join him on the song.
Perhaps no one was more surprised than Rhett that Perry agreed to be on the song with him. She also agreed to appear in the music video. Someone on Rhett’s team reached out to Perry, an invitation Rhett felt certain she would decline.
“Literally within 24 hours, Katy responded and said, ‘I love this. I resonate with this so well,’” Rhett recalls to Taste of Country. “When she put her vocal on it, it took her like two weeks. She really put a lot of time and effort into this vocal…This reminded me of how amazing a vocalist she is, and I feel like it really came to life.”
“Craving You”
“Craving You” came out in 2017, also a duet with a female artist. This one is with Maren Morris, which may not be that surprising, except for where Morris was in her career at the time. An undisputed powerhouse vocalist, “Craving You” was released on April 3, when Morris had just released her third single, “I Could Use A Love Song”.
Rhett wasn’t initially sure he wanted to make “Craving You” a duet. But once he heard Morris sing the song, he was blown away.
“I think she adds so much life and so much intensity to this song, that was already this kind of longing song,” Rhett tells Taste of Country. “I think having a female voice on top of it made it just more that way.”
“Be A Light”
Thomas Rhett proves he is willing to embrace all genres in “Be A Light”. Rhett sings the song with Keith Urban, Reba McEntire, Lady A’s Hillary Scott, and gospel artist Chris Tomlin. But perhaps the biggest surprise in “Be A Light” is when it came out.
Rhett wrote the song with Matt Dragstrem, Josh Miller, and Josh Thompson, releasing it on March 30, 2020, when the world was just beginning to shut down. Even harder for Rhett was the negativity and hatred that were running rampant on social media.
“It drove me nuts,” Rhett says (via Country 97.5). “And I think at this point in time, I was like, ‘Man, instead of like addressing the meanness and the negativity, why don’t we just address for people just to be kind?’”
Photo by Hubert Vestil/Billboard via Getty Images
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