Country Music Singer Toby Keith Dies at 62

The larger-than-life nation music singer Toby Keith, recognized for his patriotic swagger, died on Monday on the age of 62.

The “Beer For My Horses” singer-songwriter had been battling abdomen most cancers since 2022 and died peacefully surrounded by his household, according to a statement posted to his web site.

“Toby Keith handed peacefully final night time on February fifth, surrounded by his household. He fought his struggle with grace and braveness. Please respect the privateness of his household at the moment,” the assertion added. 

The 6-foot-4 singer was born in Oklahoma and spent the primary decade of his skilled life as a roughneck in the oil fields earlier than he was laid off when the oil market started to tank within the Nineteen Eighties. He then went on to play semi-professional American soccer earlier than lastly discovering success as a singer-songwriter. Within the early Nineteen Nineties, he moved to Nashville, TN, and shortly afterwards signed a file take care of Mercury Data. 

In 1993, he launched his debut album “Toby Keith.” The breakout single of the album, “Ought to’ve Been a Cowboy” obtained greater than 3 million performs on nation radio and have become a primary hit on Billboard Hot 100 Country songs.

Keith usually expressed controversial political beliefs in his music. Within the aftermath of the September eleventh assaults, he launched a track referred to as “Courtesy of the Crimson, White, and Blue” which threatened those that dared to hurt the U.S. “You may be sorry that you just messed with the U.S. of A.,” the track states. “We’ll put a boot in your ass—it’s the American means.”

After Natalie Maines, a singer from The Chicks (beforehand referred to as the Dixie Chicks) referred to as Keith’s track ignorant and advised a crowd that she and her bandmates have been ashamed of President Bush due to the U.S. invasion of Iraq, Keith responded by photoshopping a picture of Maines subsequent to Saddam Hussein and carried out in entrance of the picture as a backdrop for his concert events.

Fellow singer-songwriter Steve Earle had referred to as “Courtesy of the Crimson, White, and Blue” as “pandering to individuals’s worst instincts at a time they’re harm and scared.” 

Keith’s political activism wasn’t confined to music. He went on 11 USO excursions and carried out for American service members abroad. He had additionally raised hundreds of thousands for charities in his native Oklahoma, together with for youths and households combating most cancers.

Keith was inducted into the Songwriters Corridor of Fame in 2015.