Dan + Shay just debuted their latest album Good Things, and the singing-songwriting country duo marked the occasion with an exclusive iHeartRadio Album Release Party.
Bobby Bones hosted the release party on Tuesday (August 17), which included performances by the beloved duo in front of a virtual audience. Dan + Shay â the award-winning team of Dan Smyers and Shay Mooney â kicked off the listening event with âI Should Probably Go To Bed,â which released last year. They also delivered fan-favorite songs like 2018âs âTequilaâ along with new tracks from Good Things âGlad You Existâ and âSteal My Love.â
Dan + Shay have been drumming up the hype for their fourth full-length album, especially since sharing on their social media channels on July 6 that they âjust finished our best album yet.â Itâs a bold statement they still stand behind. Taking a question from a fan, Smyers reiterated that the three words he would use to describe the Good Things album is âour best yet.â
Good Things finally dropped on Friday (August 13), marking the duoâs latest project since their self-titled album in 2018. Now, fans can listen to all 12 songs, including the ones Dan + Shay unveiled on social media with music videos (âGood Thingsâ and âLyingâ), the previously-released âGlad You Existâ and others. Speaking with Bones throughout the release party, Smyers and Mooney delved into what itâs like to get back to recording music, reflected on filming their latest music videos, dished on the stories behind their latest songs, and more.
Fans eagerly wondered whether Dan + Shayâs latest album would include any wedding-worthy tracks to follow âFrom The Ground Up.â Luckily, the duo delivered: âThat is always, to us, one of the biggest honors of people using our songs in their weddings,â Mooney replied. âThere is a song that comes to mindâŠThereâs a song called âYouâ on the album that I think will be the next Dan + Shay wedding hit.â Bones noted that the duo performed at his wedding last month, but he and his wife opted for a cover song inspired by Full House (which âwent pretty viral,â Smyers said). Fan questions also revealed which artists Dan + Shay would collaborate with (Smyers name-dropped Adele and Carrie Underwood), what it was like to collaborate with Justin Bieber on â10,000 Hours,â and more.
Since they first announced the upcoming album, Dan + Shay have premiered the music video to the albumâs title track âGood Things,â and released what they called âthe most funâ music video theyâve made for their new song âLying.â âWe got out of our comfort zones tremendously,â Smyers told Bones of the music video (he previously revealed that the last time he hadnât danced since his 7th grade talent show, âwhen me and some of the guys on the basketball team danced to *NSYNCâ). Smyers added that âwe needed lessonsâ from Bones, who won Dancing With The Stars in 2018.
Bones also included a nod to the late legend Bill Withers, known for âAinât No Sunshine,â âLovely Dayâ and other classic songs. Withers is credited as one of the writers on Dan + Shayâs âLying,â and Smyers explained how the duo included Withers as a writer on the track: The duo realized after a songwriting session on the road that a riff had a ââLean On Meâ vibe,â so Dan + Shay contacted Withersâ team to properly credit their subconscious inspiration.
Though Dan + Shay celebrated their current album for most of the release party, they also dove into the iHeartRadio box to reminisce on other moments throughout their career. Smyers and Mooney uncovered the Good Things album cover, a photo from Joe Jonas and Sophie Turnerâs wedding (where they sang), and a memento from hitting 1 billion total audience spins on âTequilaâ across iHeartRadio stations.
Now that Dan + Shay are looking ahead to hitting the road again on their arena tour, Mooney explained what it was like to take a hiatus during the COVID-19 pandemic â and what itâs like to come back. He explained, in part:
âThat was the hardest year and a half or so of our lives. You work your entire life as an artist to hopefully one day get to that point where youâre playing arenas, thatâs kind of like, thatâs the top. Everybody wants to do arenas and it was an incredible feeling⊠we were ready to play and got three shows in and obviously the rug was pulled out from under our entire industry, from everybody.
âBut man, it feels to me just like itâs new and fresh again. I feel like we were on the road for so long that â we didnât get jaded by any means, but â when youâre so busy like that itâs hard to take a moment and really appreciate what weâre doing, and I feel like that is one thing that the pandemic and all the time that we had off kind of gave back to us, was an appreciation (because) what we get to do is not normal, and a moment to just breathe and be like, âI canât believe that we get to do this.ââ