Oh Great. It Appears Florida Georgia Line Is Getting Back Together

Well it can’t all be going in the right direction in country music, now can it? Despite all the gains over the last few years as twang has been on the rebound, great artists are finally getting worthy opportunities, and even women are being represented again in the mainstream, we’re getting word of one significant fly in the proverbial ointment.

You knew that Florida Georgia Line would resurface at some point. There’s just too much money to be made off of nostalgia for even the worst of music to stay gone forever. If there was one silver lining to the political acrimony swirling around the United States, it’s that it helped break up the quintessential Bro-Country band back in 2022. But now signs are pointing towards the Beavis and Butt-Head of country music getting back together.

At the ACM Awards on May 17th, Tyler Hubbard said when being interviewed by Entertainment Tonight, “We have been toying around and flirting with the idea of playing a handful of shows next year, and that gets us both excited. It’s been a really fun season of healing…We’ve been hanging out, laughing, cutting up, goofing around, it just feels like the old days. We’re just trying to soak it up, make the most of it, not rush anything.”

Well now there seems to be a dedicated buzz campaign behind the duo’s reunification. On Tuesday (6-2), the band’s previously mothballed social media assets came alive with a graphic reading “FGL LFG.” There have also been billboards displaying this same string of letters spotted around Nashville, along with the instructions, “Text 615-819-5007,” which leads to an auto-response of “Turns out, some things are just better together. Much more to come. FGL LFG.”

This week is CMA Fest in Nashville, leading to some speculation the duo might make a surprise appearance at some point. Or, they might just be trying to leverage all the attention and industry present at CMA Fest to help stir buzz. After all, Tyler Hubbard said “next year” is when they were originally planning to reunite.

But we’ll see. How successful can we expect a Florida Georgia Line reboot to be? It’s hard to say. If the dramatic backlash against Luke Bryan’s recent single “Fish Hunt Golf Drink” is any indication, the public has more than moved on from that era. Even though Tyler Hubbard has enjoyed a relatively successful solo career, it all seems to be propped up by radio play as opposed to organic appeal.

One problem Florida Georgia Line might face is the same one many performers are facing right now: a terrible economy for those not in the elite of society that is seeing major tours not selling through, including some being outright cancelled. Is there really an appetite for Florida Georgia Line, or an avenue for them to launch a successful arena tour? Sure, nostalgia for music is real. But it usually works on a 20 to 25-year cycle, while Florida Georgia Line is well ahead of that time period.

Florida Georgia Line could go on a limited run of amphitheater shows next summer to little or no real impact on the direction of country music. It would be releasing new singles and albums that could pose a real concern, but only if they peddle their original brand of Bro-Country and it was well-received, which indications are that it might not be. Unless FGL goes through some dramatic evolution, it’s hard to see them being much more than a nostalgia act moving forward.

But again, who knows? Don’t ever count bad music out. But this is not 2012. It’s 2026, and people demand more meaning in their music, even in the country mainstream.

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