Jimmie Allen released a star-studded new album today Bettie James Gold Edition which features several collaborations including one with Brad Paisley. Allen and Paisley stopped by The Bobby Bones Show to talk about how their collaboration came together as well as perform their song "Freedom Was A Highway."
Keeping himself busy with all kinds of projects, Allen was performing at the Grand Ole Opry one night when he saw Paisley. The two had often saw each other in passing and kept saying they needed to get together, that's when Paisley made it happen after both of their performances that evening at the Opry. Paisley had his other country star friends coming over Darius Rucker and Tim McGraw as well as Bill Shatner. So he invited Allen to come hang out at his bar at the house. While they were all hanging out "just as dudes do," they also all played some new things they're working on and even covered some Hank Williams Jr songs. They both agreed that despite all of the country stars in the room and Allen feelings moments of intimidation, it really was just like a bunch of guys hanging out together. Paisley really solidified the dudes hanging out by sharing a story of McGraw opting to pee in the bushes instead of just going in to use the restroom.
After their fun guys evening, McGraw told Allen he'd love to work on something with him. But Allen really clicked with Paisley, and that's when he decided to send Paisley the song "Freedom Was A Highway" and asked him to be part of it. Paisley shared that "thankfully" he loved it, and he's excited to get to be on the road with Allen to perform their duet. It will be Paisley's first time he's ever been on tour with someone at the same time of having a released duet with them. Allen's new album doesn't just feature a collaboration with Paisley though, it has several new collaborations on it. He loved getting to work with all of the individuals on it where he shared that some of them are people he's fans of, and some of them are his friends. He admitted that he probably only got them all to say yes because we're coming off from the pandemic where no one was getting to do anything.
Recently, Allen got married to his wife Lexi and he's all about them focusing on their future family now. She's pregnant with their second child right now, and Allen has a son from a previous relationship. He told Bobby Bones that he hopes to have at least 7 kids with his wife. He really wants a big family, just like he grew up around.