Jordan Rowe is Redefining the “Country Boy” Narrative
Photo via OH Creative.
When most people hear the term “country boy,” they don’t immediately picture an uber-humble class valedictorian who has friends like Lainey Wilson and started a scholarship fund at the ripe old age of twenty-four. Yet, that’s exactly who Jordan Rowe is.
The fresh-faced rising country music artist was born and raised in the quaint farming town of Adel in southern Georgia. Like many notable Georgians before him, he fell into the UGA-to-Nashville pipeline and has been making a name for himself in the country music scene ever since.
Rowe, as I quickly came to find out, is not one to shy away from pursuing his wildest dreams. His innate drive is what helped him become the valedictorian of his high school class – a feat that was also inspired by a backhanded compliment he received as an impressionable eighth grader just a few years earlier.
“In middle school, we had Honors Day and I remember the teachers were like, ‘Alright, now we’re going to give out the awards for the second-highest and highest averages in the class,’” Jordan says. “There were probably like eight hundred people in this gym, and they announced me as the second-highest average in the class. I had to go up there in front of all those people and I was so embarrassed because, in my mind, I took it as, ‘Hey you’re not as smart as this guy that they’re about to call up for the highest average,’ which is a terrible way to take it, and I know that now,” Jordan reflects. “But I was like, ‘I’m never gonna feel like a dummy again. I’m gonna be the valedictorian of my high school class.’ I worked hard at getting it so that I didn’t have to feel like that again,” he shares.
During his time at the University of Georgia, Rowe didn’t slow down. He double-majored in Agribusiness and Music Business, all-the-while flirting with the idea of pursuing country music full-time. A newfound friendship with Peachtree Entertainment’s Bradley Jordan catapulted his music career during his junior year and allowed him to open for acts like Riley Green and Muscadine Bloodline at the Georgia Theatre. By the end of the year, Rowe had fallen in love with performing and knew that he’d be moving to Nashville after graduation.
Since making the move in 2019, Rowe has not wasted a single day. Not only did it take him just two years to release a debut album, but he was also able to secure features for the project from country music legends Tracy Lawrence, Lainey Wilson (one of Rowe’s good friends), and Rhett Akins (a.k.a. Thomas Rhett’s father).
The album, aptly entitled “Bad Case of the Good Ole Boy,” includes an upbeat barnburner of a title track, the amusing “10-4” (“If you think I got a bad case of good ole boy/Well, you're damn right, buddy, that's a big 10-4”), and the emotional ballad on which Wilson lends her vocals, “Mama Ain’t Jesus.”
That same year, Rowe also launched his merch line and decided to use a portion of the proceeds to fund scholarships for agriculture students. “The scholarship,” Jordan says, “is still going strong.” He’s currently looking to partner with the Georgia chapter of the Future Farmers of America to award the first scholarship at the state convention next April.
Fast forward to 2023, and Rowe is now within reach of getting his first major-label cut as a songwriter in the form of Jordan Davis’s upcoming release “Good News Sold,” a reflective song that questions what the world would be like if good news was as marketable as bad news. “We wrote it in December 2021 off of the idea that there was just so much bad news in the media cycle at that time,” Jordan recalls. “Bad news sells and everybody freaks out about it. You can’t turn it off, so we were like ‘Well, what if good news sold?’”
When he’s not busy writing new music, Rowe spends his time running Music Row Ministries, a Nashville-based faith community that he started earlier this year as a small Bible study group.
“It started out in February as five or seven guys getting together on Wednesday mornings at Sony Publishing and doing a Bible study. Then, it just grew and grew and now we’ve got like fifty guys each week,” Jordan proudly shares.
“It’s artists, songwriters, publishers, A&R, like everybody industry-wide, and it’s been so cool. Around the fall of 2022, I felt like, for the first time, the Lord started putting it on my heart to create a Christian community in the Nashville music industry, and there wasn’t really anything like it at the time. I just felt like I was supposed to create some kind of community, so I pondered it for six months and was trying to figure out the perfect way to do it. I finally realized that I just needed to take that one small first step and He’ll do the rest,” Jordan says.
“I was actually on a hunting trip in Mississippi with my pastor, and I told him about the idea and he’s like, ‘Let’s go to lunch and game plan it. Let’s just do it.’ So, we went to lunch and came up with the first meeting and sent out a text to a bunch of dudes and said, ‘We’re starting a Bible study at Sony,’ and people just started showing up and we started meeting every Wednesday morning and doing like a twenty-five-minute devotion, and guys were getting vulnerable and real. And that’s what’s so cool about it – it’s just raw and everybody’s in the music industry, so you kind of understand what they’re dealing with on a level you just can’t get in other small groups,” he says.
“This past September, we baptized three guys in the Sony parking lot, and the group exploded after that and we average around forty-to-fifty guys each week. Now, Music Row Ministries also has a women’s Bible study on Tuesdays with around fifty girls. We’re kind of building a plane as we fly it,” Jordan says, laughing, “but it’s just been really cool to see God work in that way. It’s been so cool growing this year as I have in that brotherhood and it’s really helped a lot – having a community to lean on and realize that it’s not Sunday school faith anymore,” Jordan says.
“We’re getting older, you’re getting out there in the real world, and you’re having to really put it into practice and have faith when you feel like nothing’s going right and nothing’s happening, and you’re in that season of waiting and all you wanna do is doubt and worry about the future. Sometimes you wonder like, ‘Who am I to get in here and try to lead fifty guys in their faith?’ I’ve got problems of my own, but you realize we all do – we all kinda end up together,” he says.
Rowe, always appreciative of a good “God moment,” then pauses mid-sentence and says, “This is literally crazy, I’m driving on the interstate right now, and I’m driving to Kentucky to some hunting land, and I look over and there’s like three wooden crosses on the side of the road right now. This is wild that we’re talking about this, but like that’s one of a million things that I’ve seen this year where God’s presence has been so evident,” he says in awe.
Finishing his prior thought, he tells me, “Through the things I’m hearing around Nashville, I truly believe there’s going to be a new genre born, and I think you’re going to see a lot of songs and more artists and writers start doing a Christian-country thing,” Jordan informs me.
“It’s not contemporary country or contemporary Christian. It sounds like country music, but it just talks about God. It’s music that a country fan would still like to listen to, but it lets them listen to something about their faith at the same time,” he explains.
Rowe plans to capitalize on this exciting new genre emerging out of Nashville with his upcoming release, “God’s Gotta Be a Country Boy,” which is set to come out in March. The song is the focus track of three new singles Rowe is putting out, which includes “Boots in a Bar,” which was released earlier this month, and “Thanks for Nothing,” which will be out in January.
“‘God’s Gotta Be a Country Boy’ is more of a country-Christian approach,” Jordan says. “It can be played on country radio, but it talks about God a little more than your average country song. After it’s released, I’m gonna lean more into that lane of Christian and country,” he shares.
“Boots in a Bar,” the first of the three new singles, “was just one that always stood out to me,” Jordan says. “The melody and phrase and all that was so fun and catchy and it just always rose to the top of the pile when I was listening back for songs because I write several a week. We thought it’d be a good one to lead the new stuff with because it’s something you can get moving to.”
Rowe’s next release, “Thanks for Nothing” is a play on the old saying of the same name. “Usually, you’re being sarcastic when you say ‘thanks for nothing,’ but the song personifies the town I grew up in and is genuinely saying, ‘thank you for nothing to do.’ There was nothing to do in my town, so we had to make our own fun,” Jordan explains. “Whether it’s hunting and fishing or just riding around or hanging out with your friends, that kind of upbringing is something I would never trade. I’m from Adel, Georgia and it’s your stereotypical small town. We only have six red lights and we just got a WalMart a few years ago. They’re breaking ground on Starbucks now I think,” Jordan shares with a laugh, “so it’s super small.”
Although he’s from a classic small country town, Rowe doesn’t need to fear ever running out of new concepts to write about, thanks to his dad, who often texts him lists of song ideas that he thinks of when he’s riding around on his lawn mower at home.
“Every now and then, there’s some gold in there,” Jordan laughs. “I got to hear the demo for Luke Bryan and Jon Pardi’s ‘Cowboys and Plowboys’ just before it came out, and a couple days later, my dad sends me his lawn mower list and ‘Cowboys and Plowboys’ is on there. I called him and I’m like, ‘Man you’ve got a number one sitting on here, but it’s already been written,’ and when he heard it come out and he was like, ‘Dang it!’”
Needless to say, Rowe’s story is one of breaking molds and crafting a narrative that defies expectations. From academic excellence and philanthropy to faith-based community building and pioneering a new wave in country music, he showcases the rich complexity that lies within the “country boy” label. Jordan Rowe embodies a modern narrative that transcends stereotypes and proves that the essence of a country boy isn’t confined by tradition, but is a vibrant tapestry of talent, passion, and innovation.
