Luke Grimes Says New Album “Red Bird” Is a 'Snapshot of My Soul’ and the 'Most Honest' Music He Has Ever Written (Exclusive)
Luke Grimes Says New Album “Red Bird” Is a 'Snapshot of My Soul’ and the 'Most Honest' Music He Has Ever Written (Exclusive)
Chris BarillaFri, April 3, 2026 at 2:50 PM UTC
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Luke GrimesCredit: Dustin Haney -
Luke Grimes explores themes of love, loss and personal growth on his sophomore album Red Bird
The album reflects his experiences of losing his father and welcoming his first child within a short time
Grimes credits his acting career for allowing him to focus on honest storytelling without commercial pressure
Luke Grimes is diving head-first into "the most honest" era of his storytelling that he has ever encountered.
With his sophomore album, Red Bird — out now — Grimes truly peels back the layers of the proverbial emotional onion, revealing deeply personal, internal discussions about the duality of great loss and great gain he has encountered in his life as of late.
"If it's a snapshot of my soul, then we have to put it all in there," he tells PEOPLE in conversation about the new project, which arrives just over two years after his self-titled debut album exposed listeners to his stripped-down, powerfully resonant sonics.
For Grimes, Red Bird is an exploration of all sides of himself, honed through the last few years he has spent intently focusing on his music with the backdrop of a massive acting career and growing obligations as a family man. “There is that immature guy in there that still raises his head and shows a bit of ugliness. That guy needs to grow up, but he's in there. We've got to represent him," he reveals. "Then there's the guy that's completely in love with his wife and his child and that's sad that his dad is gone, and all of these things are happening simultaneously.”
Though the track list for Red Bird is even tighter than his 2024 offering, coming in at just 10 songs, Grimes notes that it was by design, and a reflection of him truly putting himself all out there on this project.
“We cut 16 songs and then only chose 10 because they felt like the ones that were the most honest," he shares. "If there's any through line or anything in those songs, that's all it is really, is just the ones that felt like they really came from inside myself and where I was at the time.”
Additionally, the project largely came together in one burst of creative expression, as Grimes recalls. “Eight out of the 10 songs on this album were written either the night before or the day that we cut it. That was our process," he says of the Dave Cobb-produced project. “I never drove around with demos for months and got sick of the songs. It was all very off-the-cuff because I think we felt like that would be the way to be the most honest about it is not overthink it.”
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Randy Grimes, the singer's father, died at 70 years old in February 2022, and the loss has remained a profound driving factor in his life ever since. “Not having him here anymore made me really go back and hold on so dear to some of those memories,” he told Mr. Feelgood that summer of the death. “He taught me that you can be strong without having an ego, and you can be a leader and still be humble and still be kind.”
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Bianca Rodrigues Grimes and Luke Grimes in New York City in November 2022Credit: Dia Dipasupil/Getty
Just over two and a half year later, Grimes and his wife, Bianca Rodrigues Grimes, welcomed their first child, a baby boy, in October 2024. Having experienced a profound death and birth in such a short time set the trajectory for how the star came to approach his sophomore project.
"Life is a mixed bag, and sometimes the greatest and worst thing can happen to you simultaneously," he notes. "That's recently what my life has felt like. There's been a lot of love and loss at the same time. There's losing my dad on this album and having my child on this album, and sometimes in the same song, because that's how it feels sometimes.”
“Any bit of duality I think is just coming from just honest experience," Grimes adds.
The ability to pursue honest, raw storytelling and forego the typical trimmings associated with vast swathes of mainstream country music today is one that Grimes is fully aware comes from a place of stability he has thanks to his successful career on Yellowstone and Marshals. As a result, he isn't actively seeking commercial acclaim with his music.
“There is this underlying pressure to make these things perform so that everyone can make their bread and butter," he reflects of typical industry tropes. “I understand that for many people, the pressure to perform supersedes the pressure to be honest."
The artist admits, "I was in a very luxurious position of not having to worry about that [with Red Bird]. I just am in a unique position because I have this other career that has paid my bills, and I've been very lucky that I can just focus a little bit more on the honesty.”
By, in part, making Red Bird a love letter to his son and a eulogy to his father, Grimes hopes that he has created a timeless keepsake of his mental state at this defining stage of his life and career.
“I think the most positive thing would be that he saw that I was being brave in my expression, telling the truth," he says of what he hopes his son takes away from the project in the future. “Part of that truth being how much I love him, and that maybe he could see that if he ever wants to create, that he can do it honestly and in his own way.”
Red Bird is available on all major streaming services now.
on People
Source: “AOL Entertainment”
