Luke Combs

Luke Combs merges an affinity for traditional country with Southern-fried soul, drawing equal inspiration from contemporary outliers Eric Church and Chris Stapleton while threading in traces of modern R&B. That blend, especially potent on slower numbers, set him apart from both polished country-pop vocalists and rowdy bro-country acts, propelling him to immediate prominence. His debut single, “Hurricane” in 2016, initiated an unbroken streak of five Billboard Country Airplay chart-toppers: “When It Rains It Pours,” “One Number Away,” “She Got the Best of Me,” and “Beautiful Crazy.” All originated on his 2017 first album, This One’s for You, and its later expanded edition, a stretch that established Combs among Nashville’s leading figures. His standing solidified further with the Country Music Association’s Best New Artist honor in 2018 and the strong performance of his second full-length, What You See Is What You Get, released in 2019. Growin’ Up, his third album, arrived in 2022 and again topped the charts; it formed the first half of a paired project completed by Gettin’ Old the following year. That set contained his chart-topping interpretation of Tracy Chapman’s “Fast Car,” which earned him a Country Music Award. He then issued Fathers & Sons in 2024, a reflective and low-key concept album centered on fatherhood.

Born in Charlotte, North Carolina, Combs grew up in Asheville after his family relocated there when he turned eight. During his teenage years he played football and performed with vocal ensembles. While enrolled at Appalachian State—the same institution Eric Church had attended earlier—Combs shifted focus from academics to country music. He taught himself guitar, built a repertoire of original material, and performed regularly. Just short of graduation he left school, and after steady local gigs in North Carolina he moved to Nashville in 2014 to advance his career.

Combs independently issued the EP The Way She Rides in February 2014 and followed it with Can I Get an Outlaw in July. The single “Hurricane” surfaced in 2015, creating sufficient attention to land him a deal with River House/Columbia Nashville. The label put out the This One’s for You EP in November 2015, then reintroduced “Hurricane” to country radio in 2016 alongside another EP of the same name. The track reached number one on Country Airplay in early 2017, paving the way for the full-length This One’s for You, which entered the Billboard Country Albums chart at number one upon its June release. Follow-up “When It Rains It Pours” kept the project active through the remainder of the year, while “One Number Away” later became his third consecutive Country Airplay leader. The June reissue of an expanded edition titled This One’s for You Too added five new tracks, among them the anthemic “She Got the Best of Me,” which also topped Country Airplay and helped the album climb to number four on the Billboard 200.

Momentum carried into late 2018 with the ballad “Beautiful Crazy.” After first circulating online, the song dominated radio and reached number one on Country Airplay in March 2019, contributing to Combs’s Grammy nomination for Best New Artist that year. It held the top Country Airplay spot for seven consecutive weeks, surpassing prior longevity marks, and allowed Combs to become the first artist to occupy the summit of all five primary Billboard country charts simultaneously: Top Country Albums, Hot Country Songs, Country Airplay, Country Streaming Songs, and Country Digital Song Sales.

He previewed his sophomore album with “Beer Never Broke My Heart” in May 2019, his sixth Country Airplay number one. That single anchored the June EP The Prequel, which contained five selections from What You See Is What You Get; the full album arrived in November and debuted at number one on the Billboard 200. In May 2020 Combs released “Six Feet Apart” in response to the COVID-19 pandemic; the track peaked at number ten on Hot Country Songs and appeared on the deluxe edition What You See Ain’t Always What You Get, which also topped the Billboard 200.

A 2021 duet with Billy Strings titled “The Great Divide” preceded the Grammy-nominated ballad “Forever After All,” the Country Airplay leader “Cold as You,” the football anthem “South on Ya,” and “Doin’ This.” The last of these served as the lead single for Growin’ Up, Combs’s third album, released in June 2022. Reuniting with producers Chip Matthews and Jonathan Singleton, who had also worked on What You See Is What You Get, Combs maintained a familiar approach that yielded his third number-one Country Albums entry. The follow-up single “Growin’ Up and Gettin’ Old” announced the title of his next project. Recorded concurrently with Growin’ Up, Gettin’ Old appeared in March 2023 as both sequel and companion piece. It featured a cover of Tracy Chapman’s 1988 hit “Fast Car,” a song Combs has long cited among his earliest influences; his rendition became a major success, topping multiple charts and reaching number two on the Billboard Hot 100. The track earned him another CMA award, and he performed it live with Chapman at the Grammy Awards in February 2024.

Led by the introspective “The Man He Sees in Me,” Combs’s subsequent release took the form of a concept album. Issued in mid-June to align with Father’s Day, Fathers & Sons adopted a more contemplative, acoustic-oriented sound and explored themes related to his young children as well as his own father.