Chris Young has changed.
Yet, in every way, he's still as approachable and relatable as ever.
He's down 70 pounds after the COVID-19 quarantine and a constant schedule of touring and recording had his physician worried about his health. His change in physique has made him just as much of a gym rat, comfortable with breaking bread and tossing back a few with his friends (in his case, "NFL players and actual athletes who are pushing (him) to keep up"), as any other 38-year-old male professional in downtown Nashville in 2024.
So yes, the news of his Jan. 22 charge for resisting arrest, disorderly conduct and assault on a Tennessee Alcohol Beverage Commission agent (the charges were later dismissed) doesn't paint far outside of the norm for a night spent on the town that maybe extended a drink or two past expectations.
"I'm staying busy, which is better than being wrongfully arrested," jokes Young almost immediately upon picking up the phone and speaking with The Tennessean.
"I'd rather be known for assaulting people with new music than being falsely accused of assault."
To thank his fans and friends for their support, he released "Double Down," the fourth song (alongside "Right Now," "Looking for You" and "All Dogs Go to Heaven") from his March 22 album "Young Love & Saturday Nights."
Comfort yields ambition
Twenty years into a 10-year town, the Murfreesboro native is a rare local-to-global mainstream country star.
He's also nine albums into a career in which he has sold 2 million albums or singles a year as physical units, downloadable MP3s, or streamable-equivalent units.
Realizing his staying power drives the record to sound louder and rawer (or more earnest, in the case of the ballad "What She Sees in Me") than most other top releases in the genre, heading toward pop-ready low-end bombast or acoustic yet intense stylings.
The true star of the album, alongside Young's pairing of his songwriting chops on over 75% of the record with his frequent producers Chris DeStefano and Corey Crowder, as is always the case with the multiple-time chart-topper, is his soul-tinged vocal.
"I'm that guy who grew up listening to Boyz II Men and Keith Whitley, so I'm always a fan of singing," Young says, "but I'm never one to (make a song feel overwrought). Sometimes all it takes is one note."
'Young Love & Saturday Nights'
At 18 tracks, "Young Love & Saturday Nights" is Young's most ambitious release. It arrives — by taking three years to complete — like 2021's seven-time Academy of Country Music award-nominated and multiple-time chart-topping album "Famous Friends."
That album featured two No. 1 collaborations: "Famous Friends," featuring Kane Brown, and the Mitchell Tenpenny duet "At the End of a Bar."
Conventional wisdom would state that cutting such prolonged periods between albums in half would be more advantageous for Young in a marketplace driven by content more than ever before.
However, he's also at a place where he believes that marrying a heightened quality standard alongside slightly more quantity than usual rewards his fans for their continued support and his recent spell of success.
Currently, he's on a rare trajectory of two decades of success mirroring each other, similar but different than an artist like Toby Keith.
With age and time, he also feels his voice has grown into its heaviest and most robust-sounding form yet. The album's length reflects as much a desire to craft art as it spotlights Young's desire to showcase how "incredible" he feels it is to be able to sing so well after two decades.
Balancing critical and country radio acclaim
When asked the perennial question about balancing critical and country radio acclaim for his art, Young notes that he's in an intriguing place of valuing them as "different parts of the same side of the coin."
Young's career spanning three different movements in country's aspirations for mainstream crossover appeal is valuable because he easily identifies the fundamental talents and through lines required to maintain relevance and success.
Thus, the album's title track, borrowing strongly from David Bowie's "Rebel Rebel," may feel like a stretch. However, Young's fanbase extends back to an era of country music history when Keith Urban, Bon Jovi and Dierks Bentley's banjo-aided rocker "Free and Easy (Down the Road I Go)" were chart-toppers.
As well, his current top-20 country radio single "Looking for You" has tentacles in Johnny Lee's pop-ready, 1980-released "Urban Cowboy" soundtrack classic "Looking for Love."
In an era when country music's mainstream is more defined by what the genre is becoming rather than celebrating the best of what it has always been, Young's latest finds a comfortable pocket in the latter.
Regarding the album in full, Young has arrived at a place where he's comfortable releasing songs that are "authentically" himself.
Young reminisces about being a Belmont University student and walking along the same path he's taking while speaking with The Tennessean. It's a poignant moment that ties together how much his career has likely existed in a bubble, free from time but perpetually driven by acclaim being yielded from tireless-seeming labor.
He's awestruck by the "consistency and longevity of his career."
"The end-all be-all of every song hit or not is whether (my fanbase) can relate to it," he says. "When someone hears my album and, more often than not, can say that they've felt that way or had those experiences, I know that I'm on the right path."
