Thomas Rhett Akins Jr. (born March 30, 1990), better known as Thomas Rhett, is a Country Music singer from The New '10s. The son of singer-songwriter Rhett Akins ("That Ain't My Truck"), he is signed to Big Machine Records.
Rhett made his debut in 2012 with "Something to Do with My Hands", followed by "Beer with Jesus", both of which made Top 20 on the country charts, but his breakthrough came in 2013 when "It Goes Like This" spent three weeks at the top of the country airplay charts, followed by "Get Me Some of That" and "Make Me Wanna". His second album produced further chart-toppers with "Crash and Burn", "Die a Happy Man" (his biggest hit to date), "T-Shirt", and "Star of the Show". Life Changes has produced the singles "Craving You" (featuring Maren Morris), "Unforgettable", "Marry Me", and "Life Changes".
Although his first album was largely indebted to the then-contemporary "bro-country" subgenre, Tangled Up and Life Changes have shown a move to more lyrically driven country-pop, as codified by "Die a Happy Man".
Discography:
- Thomas Rhett (EP) (2012)
- It Goes Like This (2013)
- Tangled Up (2015)
- Life Changes (2017)
- Center Point Road (2019)
- Country Again: Side A (2021)
- Where We Started (2022)
Tropes present:
- Advertised Extra: Maren Morris is credited for her backing vocals on "Craving You".
- Ambiguous Ending: In the music video for "Marry Me," the singer leaves the wedding early, unable to watch the woman he loves marry someone else. At the end, she shows up with tears in her eyes, still in her wedding dress, at the diner he went to, and shrugs; the viewer can interpret this as "I couldn't go through with it" or "Why did you leave?".
- Anguished Declaration of Love: Defied in "Marry Me." The singer considers doing this to the bride, but he doesn't want to ruin the happy couple's wedding, so he holds his tongue and just wishes them the best.
- Break-Up Song:
- "Crash and Burn" has the narrator admitting it's his fault.
- "Marry Me": He's watching the woman get married... but not to him.
- Broken Win/Loss Streak: After six #1 hits in a row, "Vacation" stalled out at #30 due to it being a very polarizing song.
- Call-Back: "Life Changes" references "Die a Happy Man" in the lyric "And I wrote a little song about holding her hand / And now everybody wanna die a happy man."
- Cassandra Truth: He acknowledges that "I'd tell everyone but no one would believe it" in "Beer with Jesus".
- Childhood Friend Romance: His real-life wife, Lauren, is an example, as this verse of "Life Changes" proves:I bought a ring and she said "I do"
But everybody else said, "man, you're 22
Whatcha trying to prove?
Hey, why don't you wait?"
'Cause I've been waiting on her since the second grade... - Double Entendre: "Something to Do With My Hands" is full of these.
- Early-Installment Weirdness: His first album was more indebted to "bro-country" than his later works, which found him recording more lyric-driven and often romantic country-pop. The debut album also has different producers; Jay Joyce, Michael Knox, and Luke Laird alternated instead of his usual production team of Dann Huff and Julian Bunetta.
- Massive Multiplayer Crossover: His 2020 single "Be a Light" features Reba McEntire, Hillary Scott, Chris Tomlin, and Keith Urban.
- Product Placement: Billabong, Coppertone, Motel 6, Solo cups, Walgreens, and Busch Light are all name-dropped in "Vacation".
- Rearrange the Song: The radio edit of "Make Me Wanna" had a completely re-recorded vocal track.
- Sexy Shirt Switch: The subject of "T-Shirt" ("I ain't ever seen anything like your dress, my floor / The way you wore my T-Shirt").
- Shout-Out: "What's Your Country Song" includes a reference to his father Rhett Akins' signature hit, "That Ain't My Truck."
- Song of Song Titles: "What's Your Country Song"
- Stuffy Old Songs About the Buttocks: "Get Me Some of That" is a borderline example as he mentions "shaking that moneymaker".
- Surprise Pregnancy: In "Life Changes", he reveals that this really did happen to him and his wife:I remember the day I told my Daddy and Mama
You're gonna have a grandkid, yep
From Uganda, that's right, we're adopting
And she is the cutest little girl that you've ever seen
Well I was wrapping my head around being a dad
A bigger wrench got thrown in the plans we thought we'd had
Now Lauren's showin' and got one on the waynote
Yeah that's two under two, hey, what can I say? - This Is Your Song: "It Goes Like This".
- Wedding Bells... for Someone Else: "Marry Me" starts to sound like the narrator is about to his marry his lover, until the Wham Line "She wanna get married, but she don't wanna marry me" reveals that she's getting married to someone else, because they are Just Friends and he never worked up the courage for a Love Confession.
