I am so glad to see Blake Shelton back recording really great songs again.  Taking nothing away from the rest of his long career, the past couple of years I feel have been among his best.

God's Country is a song that a whole lot of artists would have loved to have, but it's a song that had to be earned and it needed a seasoned artist to give it the real believe-ability it has.  Written by Hardy, and sung by Blake it was the perfect musical union. I loved that song halfway through my first listen to it, and I don't think I was alone in that. His follow ups with Gwen have been fun, happy, and easy listen too, and that has really been needed given our surroundings the past 9 months.

God's Country - What An Anthem!

His new song, Minimum Wage does the same thing for me as God's Country.  I loved it before it was over the first time I heard it.  We all know there are some who have an issue with some of this song, and that's OK. But that's another talk, for another time, in another place.

This is the Blake I really like.  Confident and singing songs that have strong musical vertebrae. I am not adverse to a Blake ballad, but I feel there were too many in too short of a time a ways back. This is what I feel he does best. Singing songs that have a real backbone with a blazing arrangement makes this song jump out of the radio and let you know right away that one of our biggest stars is getting ready to sing a big song. It's almost impossible not to listen to it once it starts.

We have always been an artist driven format, and that's great.  Seems we are in a trend lately where the songs are the star and that's OK, because you gotta start with a good song.  But when we are at our best is when we marry up one of our biggest stars with a song many others would love to have, now we've got a real hit.  When it begins, you know a big star is going to be singing a big song, you can just feel it.

If you have not heard it yet, here you go!

Song Of The Week - Last Week! We Were Rich / Runaway June