Dan + Shay Reintroduce Themselves by Harnessing ‘Something That AI Can’t Replicate: The Human Spirit’
Categoria: Musica
After a step away from the spotlight, the country hitmakers return with new management, a mature approach and Young, the most personal album of their career.
Por Billboard | 24/08/2026
Dan + Shay know when they have a hit on their hands. In their 13 years together, the duo of Dan Smyers and Shay Mooney have become one of country music’s surest bets. Songs like “Tequila” and “10,000 Hours” with Justin Bieber (which reached No. 2 on the Billboard Canadian Hot 100 ) have topped Billboard ’s Country Airplay chart, they’ve won multiple Grammys and CMA Awards, and heard their lyrics sung back at them from stages across the world. Related Inside the Art of Choosing Who Sings the National Anthem At Major Sporting Events Dan + Shay Call ‘Say So,’ Their Tribute to a Departed Friend, ‘The Most Important Song That We’ll Ever Do’ Dan + Shay Sign With New Management Team: ‘The Best Is Yet to Come’ So when they left their writing room in Nashville with their new batch of songs for their follow-up to 2024’s Bigger Houses , they knew the feeling. The songs were hits. But there was another, more unfamiliar feeling behind it. “We had cold feet,” Smyers admits. Speaking after Dan + Shay played a triumphant Billboard Canada THE STAGE show in Toronto at NXNE, the duo recount a pivotal few years. After admitting they nearly broke up in 2022 , the duo released 2024’s Bigger Houses and, after finishing their tour, took an unofficial hiatus. They slowed band activity and their public presence and focused on themselves. They strengthened their relationships with each other and with their families. They went to therapy. Both fathers in their mid- to late 30s, they grappled with maturity and their new stages in life. “We wanted to do our due diligence and not settle,” Mooney agrees. “We thought: Let’s not just find hit songs. Let’s find hit songs that really matter to us.” The result is the just-released Young (Warner Records Nashville/Warner Music Canada), an album Dan + Shay describe as their most autobiographical album to date, “a snapshot of who we are and what we’ve gone through.” It grapples with love, loss, mental health and aging alongside classic romantic country themes that permeate their discography. To introduce this new era, Dan + Shay led with their most personal and poignant song as the lead single. “Say So” grapples with the death of Ben Vaughn , the head of Warner Chappell Music, who died by suicide in 2025. Mooney says his death “shook our community — not just on the business side, but as a friend and mentor.” He was the first to truly believe in them as songwriters before they were even a band, he says, signing them to their first publishing deal and championing them throughout their career. The duo were in the writer’s room in Nashville when they started working on it. They weren’t even trying to write a song, Mooney says, just sharing stories about their friend with others who knew him. When the song poured out of them, they didn’t even know if it would be a Dan + Shay song. “You know, we’re kind of known as the wedding song guys,” Smyers says, referring to their history of sound