After swirling rumors of a potential split between the Grammy-winning singer/songwriter and podcast host, Zach Bryan officially took to Instagram minutes ago to announce the breakup with his girlfriend, Brianna LaPaglia, better known as Brianna Chickenfry.
The couple have been dating since July 2023 after meeting at the ACM Awards in May of the same year. Since then, they have been extremely public with their relationship with LaPagila making multiple appearances at Bryan’s shows both on-stage and in the crowd.
Additionally, she famously went to bat for Bryan after he was accused of backing out of an appearance at Noah Kahan’s Fenway Park show this past summer.
However, all good things must come to an end. In an Instagram story posted minutes ago, Bryan said, “Addressing something: Brianna and me have broken up with eachother and I respect and love her with every ounce of my heart. She has loved me unconditionally for a very long time and for that I’ll always thank her. I have had an incredibly hard year personally and struggled through some pretty severe things. I thought it would be beneficial for both of us to go our different ways. I am not perfect and never will be. Please respect Brianna’s privacy and space in this and if you have it in your heart, mine too. With everything I am and to anyone I let down, I am sorry. I try my best in everything. I failed people that love me and mostly myself.”
Bryan’s statement here echos his response after his Taylor Swift/Kanye West Twitter controversy that led to him deleting his Twitter account entirely. After receiving backlash for claiming that he preferred Kanye’s music over Taylor’s, the “Something in the Orange” singer said he has been “going through a hard time in my own life,” and also said he will take a break from “tweeting stupid stuff” while he finishes his tour.
As mentioned, this statement comes off the back of previous rumors claiming that the couple broke up weeks ago, primarily due to the fact that Bryan was seen on the dating app Raya and was rumored to be direct messaging women on the app.
Unlike standard dating apps such as Hinge and Tinder, Raya is an app primarily for celebrities that requires authentication from the user, meaning that a random person couldn’t have simply made an account pretending to be the “I Remember Everything” singer.
Additionally, LaPagila took to Instagram yesterday to share a hand-written poem with lines reading, “You’ll believe life is cruel for continuing on while your feet are stuck.You’ll find people and moments to blame for your concrete feet. Then there will come a morning when you wake and realize things go on, life isn’t cruel your feet are.”
It’s a known fact that Bryan has used the phrase, “concrete feet,” in many of his songs, primarily in “From Austin” and most notably in his Grammy-winning duet with Kacey Musgraves, “I Remember Everything,” so it’s safe to assume that the poem was written about the 28-year-old singer/songwriter.
UPDATE:
LaPaglia posted to her Instagram story minutes ago and addressed the breakup, saying, “I’m feeling really blindsided right now. Gonna hop off social media for a while and attempt to heal privately, when I’m ready I’ll be back and ready to talk. I love you guys so much thank you for all of your kind words. Remember you are so loved and everything’s always gonna be okay.”
