Fancy Hagood

One Liner: A pop & country mix that leans a little into Leon Bridges-style soul pop
Wikipedia Genre: pop, country
Home: Nashville (via Bentonville, Arkansas)

Poster Position: Third Quarter - Line 20
Day: Friday
Weekend Two Only.

Thoughts: Jake Hagood was raised in Bentonville, Arkansas, the home of Walmart and a bunch of great mountain biking trails.  After high school, he moved to Nashville to attend something called Trevecca Nazarene University.  "Fancy" was a nickname given to him by his co-workers at Forever 21 during this time.  He was performing around town during his college time, until he was discovered by Scooter Braun, the guy that all Swifties hate.  He dropped out of college to hit the music thing full-time.

He was originally known as Who is Fancy, in a sort of campaign to make himself be viral or something.  The campaign to make him a thing involved his first single being released anonymously.  They released a series of psuedo music videos featuring actors lip synching to the song, and the single reached #29 on the Billboard Mainstream chart.  WHO IS FANCY?!?!?  

How weird, to be the singer of that song, and then see your video featuring some little Bieberite lip-synching your voice.  That dude's vibe annoys me for sure.  I like it better knowing it is a chunky Arkansasian than that scrawny little model.

A few months later, Hagood "finally" released his identity on a Jimmy Fallon appearance.  Funny to me that it was a mystery for all of four months.  His second single, performed on Dancing With the Stars along with Meghan Trainor and Ariana Grande in 2016, failed to chart, and so the evil Scooter Braun dumped his ass.  After some time, he relaunched himself as Fancy Hagood in 2020 with an initial single and some new genres including country, "confessional pop," and glam rock.  I'd say that the sound on the two albums aims more directly to the country sound in my estimation.

His first album available on Spotify is 2021's Southern Curiosity.  They've just erased the prior stuff from the initial attempt to launch.  This album feels less like a country thing though.  Maybe country adjacent, but it's more like a subdued Sam Smith - he's not quite belting pop ballads, but it feels like he is right below that level here.  The top track is called "Forest," with 8.3 million streams.  Only one other song gets above a million, just as a measure on numbers for this album.

That one comes on sort of like a Lord Huron track with the vocal delivery, before the chorus at least.  We used to have a trunk like that in my house growing up.  Always had the dress up clothes in it, which was entertaining.  I wonder what Fancy has in his forest trunk?  Very pretty song though.  The title song is very good too - a little more rollicking and powerful with the full choir involved.

After that album, a few singles, and then a fun covers EP from 2024 called Smothered, Covered & Fried (a Waffle House reference that works just perfectly).  Mostly country, except for "Landslide," but not the kind of country classics that I would expect here.  i.e. not Waylon and Willie and Dolly, instead you get The Pistol Annies, Shania Twain, Little Big Town, and Eli Young Band covers.  It is an enjoyable detour.  His tune with Kacey Musgraves, "Blue Dream Baby" is too disco pop for my tastes.

2025's American Spirit is a fun combination of country and soulful pop.  It almost sounds like the new Leon Bridges album at multiple points.  Not much in the way of streams for that new disc, I guess people aren't getting his schtick anymore.  The track featuring Michelle Branch is the top streamer, which feels like it can't be the one I offer up here.  So, this is "Through," the top track otherwise.  90k streams.

Feels kind of like the kind of guy who won American Idol and is putting our his tentative foray into Country because his coach was the country guy.  His voice feels ready to belt out something at any given moment.

This is fine.  Really good voice, kind of unremarkable songs though.  I like the newer album more, but that is sort of faint praise.  I've gone through it all a few times and while my general vibe is that I like it, I don't know that I would choose him if he was up against something more interesting.