Straight from the mouth of the man himself, the old Koe is still alive and well.
It’s not hard to see that the 33-year-old has entered a completely new era of his life, with a workout routine that’s immediately apparent in his appearance and quite a few new additions to his life, like a one-year-old baby girl and his fiancée, Bailey Fisher, by his side. As the “High Road” singer continues to mature and evolve, many couldn’t help but question if this meant a subsequent change in his forthcoming music.
While Koe tells us he may have cut down his alcohol consumption to a few drinks a month and left behind his years of drunk tweeting, rest assured, his latest album, The Night Champion, is still a product of his rowdy rockin’ past. Marking the sixth studio album from the Pittsburg, Texas native, the 11-track project officially dropped today, June 12, adding to its previously released singles, “Hurts Like You,” “Time Goes On,” “Surrounded,” and “Dollar and a Bottle.”
In a recent interview with Koe before his CMA Fest performances, I asked him about the speculation of the album’s sound and whether or not it would be a true reflection of his lifestyle changes at which he confirmed, “a lot of this record was made before kind of all these changes came about and so the listeners probably not gonna be able to the change in it too much on this one.” He then added, “It was written about two or three years ago, and then we finished the record about a year ago.”
As he continues to grow alongside his fan base as a father, soon-to-be husband, and an artist, he noted, “This record is kind of like a closing the book on the last ten years.” Noting that the follow-up project to his last 2024’s 9 Lives album is still reminiscent of his past self, “I think the old Koe is still in there pretty good.”
For those also wondering why the heck an album written a few years back took so long to finally come into fruition, Koe also noted in an interview on the Bobby Bones Show today that he originally had no intention of making a new project. “We didn’t go into it thinking it was going to be an album, man. We went into it writing a couple singles, you know, to try and follow up ‘High Road’ and what it had done.” Adding, “We went in there, we wrote a few of them, a few turned into six or seven, then those turned what is now the night champion…it just kind of made itself.”
Koe was also very cogniscent in this interview that he’s well aware some of the tracks may lean into a more polished production than what die-hard fans may be keen on, such as the radio-friendly song on “Hurts Like You,” which he mentioned he didn’t even favor that much at first because of its mainstream sound. He noted it “grew on me” as the production developed and ended up being a great single, giving the album an upbeat teaser.
However, as promised, there are still remnants of his classic sound on slower songs like the round-out track, “When I Was.” Other standouts that have already surfaced as fan favorites are the previously teased “When I’m Gone” and the addictingly good “The Man.”
After spending a few weeks kicking things off on the Australian leg of the album’s coinciding tour, Wetzel will return to the stage in late July for a packed lineup of dates throughout the summer and fall. This gives fans plenty of time to learn all the lyrics to this new album before he switches up the set list and is joined by the likes of supporting acts like Shane Smith & The Saints, Ole 60, Wyatt Flores, Corey Kent, Wade Bowen, Bayker Blankenship, Kolby Cooper, and Logan Jahnke.
US Tour Dates:
- July 23 – Nampa, ID
- July 24 – Stateline, NV
- July 25 – Las Vegas, NV
- July 30 – Airway Heights, WA
- July 31 – Bend, OR
- August 1 – Tacoma, WA
- August 6 – Bonner Springs, KS
- August 7 – Evansville, IN
- August 8 – Nashville, TN
- August 12 – New York, NY
- August 13 – Reading, PA
- August 14 – Gilford, NH
- August 19 – Boston, MA
- August 20 – Washington, DC
- August 21 – Pittsburgh, PA
- August 26 – Buffalo, NY
- August 27 – Cleveland, OH
- August 28 – Rochester, MI
- September 3 – Austin, TX
- September 4 – Baton Rouge, LA
- September 5 – Bossier City, LA
- September 10 – Knoxville, TV
- September 11 – Greensboro, NC
- September 12 – Wilmington, NC
- September 17 – Alpharetta, Ga
- September 18 – Columbia, SC
- September 19 – Richmond, VA
- September 24 – Pikeville, KY
- September 25 – Huntsville, AL
- September 26 – Brandon, MS
- September 30 – Rogers, Ar
- October 1 – North Little Rock, AR
- October 2 – Tulsa, Ok
- October 3 – Wichita, Ks
- October 8 – Chicago, Il
- October 9 – Fishers, IN
- October 10 – Milwaukee, WI
- October 28 – Morrison, CO
- October 30 – Lubbock, TX