Zac Brown Thinks He’s Bruno Mars

Dahlonega’s own three-time Grammy winner and fried food lover Zac Brown has teamed up with longtime collaborators, Atlanta songwriter Niko Moon (who co-wrote the majority of the songs on the two most recent Zac Brown Band albums) and Nashville studio jockey Ben Simonetti (who engineered most of 2015’s Jekyll + Hyde and co-wrote the bulk of this year’s Welcome Home). The trio has formed one of the lamest, most contrived musical groups you’ll ever hear, Sir Rosevelt. Even the name is corny. Yet the members and their publicity team seem to think they’ve created something extremely “unique,” “original,” “electrifying,” “innovative,” “idiosyncratic,” “genre-busting,” and an “up-to-the-minute brand of Southern pop unlike anything else.”

All this boilerplate press release admiration is a false narrative for pushing a trite and phony product. Sir Rosevelt is nothing new or original, it’s not “Southern pop,” it’s shitty country/rap/dance music by white dudes. Their brand new single, “Something ’Bout You” was produced by Timbaland, but nowhere in the press release does it mention rap or hip-hop ’cause they think it’s this brand new genre, “Southern pop.” They’re delusional. They’ve taken the worst elements of two overproduced genres, nu-country and nu-rap, and smashed them together.

Pharrell Williams co-wrote Sir Rosevelt’s first single, “Sunday Finest,” which folks may have heard online or played ad nauseam during the coverage of this year’s NBA All-Star Game. “Sunday Finest” is different from the other two songs that have been released to the public thus far in that it’s not country/rap crap, but it’s still obnoxious. The song is on par with the insufferable Bruno Mars, which is bad enough, even though many will argue with you about how talented Bruno Mars is, but just imagine the annoying, chubby, bald, has-to-be-involved-in-everything-and-won’t-go-away Zac Brown warbling through it all.

If anyone would like to bring in the new year horribly, Sir Rosevelt are performing their first ever live U.S. concert on December 29th at The Cosmopolitan in Las Vegas in what is billed as CBS Radio’s “An Epic New Year’s Eve Weekend.” Sir Rosevelt’s album of the same name is due out December 15th everywhere, via Elektra Records. It’s sure to make a great Christmas gift for any dumb relatives you may have.

Photo by Diego Pernia.