"There's a lot of hopelessness out in the world… I think that's what I'd want to leave behind in the music, is it's going to be okay," lead singer Brandon Coleman tells PEOPLE
Credit: Robby Klein
NEED TO KNOW
- The Red Clay Strays’ new album, Grateful, reflects on their journey from small barrooms to major music stages
- The band credits perseverance and faith during tough times as key to their success and personal growth
- Members say their close bond and shared experiences have been essential to navigating challenges and fame
The Red Clay Strays have spent the better part of the last decade working tirelessly toward the moment they're living now.
Ahead of the release of their new album, Grateful, out now, the band sat down with PEOPLE at The Pinnacle in Nashville and reflected on the long road that led them to crafting their most vulnerable body of work yet.
For the group, the title Grateful goes beyond a simple reflection of where their careers and personal lives are today. More than that, it is a conscious recognition of everything it took to elevate the Mobile, Ala. musicians from tiny barrooms to some of the biggest stages in the world.
"This is really the first record that we made after we went over the hump of playing small rooms and stuff and getting a crew and a bus and everything and really started gaining some traction after eight years of living out of our old bus," lead guitarist Zach Rishel tells PEOPLE. "I think we're really all really grateful to achieve this level of success."
Credit: RCA Records/HBYCO Records
That perspective consciously encapsulates even the most difficult seasons The Red Clay Strays experienced as a group before their breakthrough.
"I would say probably a good one would be grateful for even the bad times we had in that old bus, of the breaking down," bassist Andrew Bishop adds. "You don't realize till you get over that hump, like Zach was saying, that you look back and realize how important that was to mold you into the person you are."
He doubles down by adding, "We had a lot of perseverance to get through those situations where we're grateful for it now, it all paid off. It sucked in the time and we wouldn't be the same without it today."
Though The Red Clay Strays already helped redefine the sound of modern red dirt and greater Americana across their first two albums, Grateful arrives at a time of meteoric rise for the band. Recent accolades have included Group of the Year at the 2026 ACM Awards and 2025 CMA Awards, New Vocal Duo or Group of the Year at the 2025 ACM Awards, and the Groundbreaker Award at the 2026 Billboard Country Powers event. Despite it all, the members say success hasn't fundamentally changed who they are.
"I never thought it would, but I really found out that the fame and money and all that s— really didn't change me," Rishel says. "I still feel like the same person that I was six years ago."
Lead singer Brandon Coleman, whose versatile, Southern-drenched voice has come to define the group's music, agrees that the biggest adjustments often come from how others react to success rather than the success itself.
"It's usually everybody else that's treating you differently," he says.
Still, the members maintain that their friendship with one another is their rock-solid foundation, poured by hand over Alabama soil, that lies beneath everything they've built and carries the weight of their successes.
"We've been through a Grand Canyon's worth, the group of us through years," Bishop says of their experiences as a unit. "We're very close, closer than… I always say we're closer to each other [than] our own family members."
That hard-won bond has been the core factor sustaining the band through all of the challenges and triumphs they've navigated over the years, according to guitarist and vocalist Drew Nix.
"We're not blood, but we might as well be," he says.
As a whole, themes of faith (in its various interpretations), perseverance and gratitude form the emotional backbone of Grateful. Across its 11 tracks and 46-minute runtime, the musicians explore these concepts and reflect on how their shared and individual lives have informed their intent to pursue those ideologies for as long as they physically can.
"I think it's like this picture of what it looks like when you get on the other side of hard times and have faith through that… and seeing where you can be after," Nix says of the album.
Coleman, meanwhile, hopes listeners carry that message with them as intensely on release day as they do when they pick up a used copy of the record years from now.
"I think just having faith, having hope," he says. "There's a lot of hopelessness out in the world… I think that's what I'd want to leave behind in the music, is it's going to be okay."
Grateful is out on all major streaming platforms now.
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