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Billy Ray Cyrus Compares Little Nas X To Waylon Jennings

Billy Ray Cyrus and Little Nas X have a huge, an unexpected hit with their song “Old Town Road.” Little Nas X told ABC News, “This is only the beginning and…

Billy Ray Cyrus Compares Little Nas X To Waylon Jennings
Nicholas Hunt/Getty Images

Billy Ray Cyrus and Little Nas X have a huge, an unexpected hit with their song "Old Town Road." Little Nas X told ABC News, "This is only the beginning and people won't realize it until they realize it."

Little Nas X's "Old Town Road" charted country in the top 20 and then was pulled off the chart for not having "enough elements of today's country music to chart in its current version." That's when Billy Ray Cyrus joined him and redid the song as a duet. He said, “I just thought, ‘Wait, that's not fair. Waylon [Jennings], one of the greatest outlaws in the history of country music,  said to me, ‘The definition of an outlaw is one who has been outlawed.’”

Cyrus added, "'Old Town Road' was all of me: it was my past, present and future. It had everything that I've been raised on my whole life: bluegrass and that modern country hook. Country music is songs that touch peoples' hearts, if country music fans dig it then it's country. I'm 57 years old and never thought I'd feel anything like this again. I've never felt a stallion run like this song is running."

-Nancy Brooks

Nancy Brooks has been working in the country music industry for almost 30 years. She has interviewed pretty much any country star you can think of. In the late 1990s, she started working with Dolly Parton. And yes, Nancy reports that Parton is as sweet as you would think. She loves her life in country music and has been backstage at every CMA Awards show since the late 1990s. Many of her stories are from her one-on-one interviews. She was there at the beginning of the incredible careers of many music superstars today, including Taylor Swift, Shania Twain, and Blake Shelton, and has interviewed them multiple times throughout the years.