How country hit-maker Hardy became Nashville's nü-metal king
LOS ANGELES — Michael Hardy wanders into the bar at the Troubadour on a recent morning — last night was a long one, so he's wearing mirrored shades beneath his camo-print trucker hat — and catches sight of some heroic-looking scuzzbuckets on the wall.
"What's that say?" he asks, pointing a skull-ringed finger toward a framed flier advertising a Guns N' Roses gig at the Troubadour in the mid-1980s after one (or perhaps several) of the band's members just got out of rehab.
"'Fresh from detox,'" Hardy reads aloud. "God, that's f— awesome."
In a few hours, this 32-year-old singer with a dozen No. 1 hits under his belt will take the same West Hollywood stage that once hosted GNR, then zip up Doheny Drive to play a second sold-out show at the Roxy. Hardy, who performs under his last name, didn't ascend through the Sunset Strip's storied hard-rock scene. His success has come on the country charts with songs he wrote for other acts like Blake Shelton's "God's Country," Florida Georgia Line's "Simple" and a string of tunes by his good buddy Morgan Wallen that includes "More Than My Hometown" and "Sand in My Boots." In 2020 he scored his first No. 1 as an artist with "One Beer," a slyly touching account of a couple's quick trip from shared Bud Lights to a shared baby.
