Morgan Wallen is launching a new festival. Is the music world ready for his takeover?
On Saturday night, Morgan Wallen lights up a cigar before taking the stage in Charlotte, North Carolina for the 87th and final show of his One Night at a Time world tour. For the past two years, the 31-year-old country musician has traveled the world with a life-size replica of his grandmother’s small Tennessee town’s front porch as a backdrop during his stadium shows, hinting at to his third album cover. , One thing at a time. On the first night of the tour, March 15, 2023, in Auckland, New Zealand, Wallen was a genre favorite but a transition to pop wasn’t guaranteed. Since then, he has become one of America’s biggest music stars and one of Nashville’s biggest bets, recently breaking his own record for a country tour with Highest revenue in history.
Now, Wallen is planning what’s next. Last week, he released his first new single, “Love Somebody,” and announced the Sand in My Boots festival, in partnership with concert promoter AEG, scheduled to take place through the 16th. through May 18 in Gulf Shores, Alabama. Naturally, the three-day festival will include sets from his friends and collaborators. post Malone, Ernest Keith Smith, who performed as ERNEST and Michael Hardy, better known as HARDY and other big names in country music, including Brooks & Dunn, Bailey Zimmerman, And Chasing after Com. But Wallen also carefully selected performers beyond his original musical scene, with rappers Wiz Khalifa join Three 6 Mafia, T-Pain, 2 Chainz, And Moneybagg Yo, and indie-rock band War on Drugs—one of Wallen’s longtime favorites—headlines a roster of bands that includes Future Islands, Real Estate, And Nothing wild.
Working with Wallen on the festival was “a dream come true,” said Stacy Vee, vice president of festival bookings for Goldenvoice, the production company behind the Coachella and Stagecoach festivals. She added that the line is “one of the most eclectic and fascinating experiences” she has done.
This festival marked a few years of Wallen’s rapid rise to pop stardom. “There was no way when they signed Morgan that they thought he was going to be the one, he was going to be next. Taylor Swift–the kind of people in this genre,” said Hardy VF. He acknowledged Wallen’s talent as a singer and songwriter, but compared the overall figure to a small-town businessman with a Midas touch. “I know a guy in my hometown, he’s a business owner and everything he touches turns to gold. He was a hard worker and really smart, but some of that was just luck.”
Wallen’s current industry stature is a far cry from what it was in February 2021, when the artist and his longtime record label, Big Loud, faced a crossroads. They had a No. 1 national album, several critically acclaimed songs to follow, and heated controversy after TMZ posted a video of Wallen using a racial slur to a friend in a driveway his. Condemnation from inside and outside Nashville was swift. His music is pulled from the biggest radio stations, Spotify removes ads for his recent releases, Danger: Double Album, from its playlist and other famous musicians, incl Maren Morris, Jason Isbell, And Kelsea Ballerini, spoke out against Wallen. The singer must prove that he wants to be an entertainer for all, or embrace the “canceled” label and hand himself the worst kind of second act.
He made his choice quickly and it seemed like an easy choice. After filming a hangdog apology video, he went to a rehab facility in San Diego for 30 days to work on his relationship with alcohol. He even told his fans that they shouldn’t support him. “I was never who people portrayed me to be,” Wallen said in an interview with Billboard in December 2023 regarding videos. “If I were that guy I wouldn’t care. I won’t apologize. I wouldn’t do that if I really was who people say I am.”
Strangely or not, this album remained at the top of the charts for over a year. Did the scandal actually help his career? Fearing that had happened, Wallen and his team did some back-of-the-envelope math and decided $500,000 was the rough value of all the press he had received, even if it was spent. extreme, and promised it to organizations that serve Black people, including the Black Music Action Alliance. And with that, Wallen was left in a strange place—too popular to ignore but seemingly too toxic to remain mainstream.
