Leave it to Brooks & Dunn to drop yet another an epic collaboration project that we can’t stop talking about.
The iconic country duo unveiled their highly-anticipated Reboot II today (November 15), and it once again shows how their music stands the test of time now and years after as they give their best hits a fresh twist for the new generation. Serving as the sequel to their acclaimed 2019 release Reboot, Kix Brooks and Ronnie Dunn recruited 18 of today’s biggest chart-toppers in the world of country music and beyond to collaborate on songs from their iconic catalog to continue to push genre boundaries for Reboot II.
Featuring Lainey Wilson, Morgan Wallen, Marcus King Band, Megan Moroney, Warren Zeiders, Jelly Roll, Riley Green, The Cadillac Three, Halestorm, Mitchell Tenpenny, The Earls of Leicester, Jake Worthington, Hailey Whitters, Christone “Kingfish” Ingram, HARDY, ERNEST, A Thousand Horses and Corey Kent, Reboot II is something that’s never been done before, as Ronnie told media that this project is “just the opposite” of what they did for Reboot as the artists were given maximum creative freedom.
“For ‘Reboot,’ the mandate was kind of to keep everything between the lines and not venture off creatively too much further than what would have been done to the original recordings. ‘Reboot II’ is just the opposite,” the 71-year-old shared of how Reboot II came about in a media session. “We brought 18 artists in for 18 songs and they got to pick [the songs] and the arrangements. We don’t do any pre-rehearsing or anything, so we showed up in the studio and had a little creative fest,” he continued.
“It was really much a freedom thing where we just promised them that we were going to be there and contribute in whatever way we could but it’s kind of your baby as far as you want to go with it,” Kix added.
“And then somewhere in there, we had to find a spot to show up to end the song; we got the work done,” Ronnie laughed.
Revealing that management “picked and made the calls” to who would be featured on the record, fans are able to hear songs like “Neon Moon,” “Boot Scootin’ Boogie,” and “Believe” in a new light on Reboot II, giving the dynamic and eclectic collection the opportunity to span more genres and generations than ever before.
“There are no rookies on this album; it’s just the fact that we’ve been around awhile and have had some pretty unbelievable success. These are all real hard-working and talented people that do the same thing we do. It’s just interesting that we found a really fun way to get together to collaborate… it was a great experience and a great experiment,” Kix says of each artist they collaborated with.
“And that’s what surprised us more than anything is that how surprisingly versatile these songs were, which kind of takes it out of our hands,” Ronnie adds. “People used to ask us when we started out what we wanted to be remembered by, and it’s just the quality and the longevity of the music that we make. I don’t know how to describe it — it’s all over the board — but our sound is [still] found in this project somewhere.”
While making such an iconic project is filled with many sentimental moments, the guys tell Celeb Secrets that the most memorable was when they were in the studio reimagining “Hard Workin’ Man” with Christone “Kingfish” Ingram.
For those who don’t know, the Clarksville, Mississippi blues prodigy has been making waves in the genre and beyond thanks to his incredible vocals and guitar skills. Being open about crediting artists like Robert Johnson, Lightnin’ Hopkins, B.B. King, Muddy Waters, Jimi Hendrix, Prince and others as his inspirations, Brooks & Dunn knew they had to give the 25-year-old a signed (and played!) Black Beauty guitar from B.B. that their manager Clarence Spalding was given to by a mutual friend of the blues icon.
“He’s a big fan of B.B., and our manager came up to us, opened a guitar case and he’s got a Black Beauty in there… a B.B. King guitar that [B.B.] signed. You could see the gold pickups were like half rubbed off, so you knew it was a guitar that he’s been playing,” Brooks tells Celeb Secrets host Juliet Schroder in a media session.
“Our manager has a friend that played a whole festival with B.B., and at the end of it, gave him this guitar. He’s close friends with Clarence [Spalding], our manager, and gave it to him. Clarence apparently put it in his closet and it’s been collecting dust in there for some reason, so he said, ‘you know what? You guys need to give this to Chris,'” he continues.
After Clarence insisted that Chris would much rather get a guitar from country legends rather than an artist manager, Kix and Ronnie went in to the studio to see the 25-year-old to do the honors, which was seen in an Instagram post Ingram shared on his account.
“We hand him this guitar and said, ‘hey check this out.’ And he goes ‘thanks for letting me see that’ and tries to hand it back,” Kix laughs. “And I go, ‘no man, we want you to have it. It’s yours.'”
With excitement on this face, Chris asked Brooks & Dunn how long they’ve had this guitar. Their response? “Not very long.”
“I didn’t tell him [we had it for] like five minutes,” they laughed.
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To celebrate the release of Reboot II, Brooks & Dunn will be joined by Jelly Roll for a live TV debut performance of “Believe” at the 2024 CMA Awards next Wednesday, November 20th @ 8/7c on ABC, streaming next day on Hulu. Up next, the guys will kick off the first leg of their NEON MOON TOUR in 2025, with a full list of dates and ticket information here.
For more on Brooks & Dunn’s music, make sure to watch our full interview with the guys below, and don’t forget to let us know what you think of the new album by leaving a reaction at the bottom of the post or by sliding into our DMs on Instagram at @celebsecretscountry.
LISTEN TO REBOOT II HERE:
