Morgan Wallen confronts being 'America's problem' in fiery concert

USA Today

12 hours ago

GLENDALE, Ariz. − As a grinning Morgan Wallen was escorted to the stage at State Farm Stadium by Randy Johnson of the Arizona Diamondbacks on Friday, July 18, his latest album, 'I'm the Problem,' was still holding strong at No. 1 on Billboard's album chart.
Of course, it's only been eight weeks.
Wallen's previous album, 'One Thing at a Time,' spent 19 weeks at No. 1 − the most weeks any country act has ever spent on top, which followed the success of 'Dangerous,' a multi-platinum breakthrough Billboard named the most successful album of the century so far.
By any reasonable metric, he's the most successful country artist of his generation, requiring a two-night stand at State Farm Stadium to meet demand for ticket sales.
Morgan Wallen can't stop falling into fresh controversies
But there's a reason he would choose to name his latest tour and album 'I'm the Problem.'
It wasn't long after releasing 'Dangerous,' in early 2021, that TMZ released a video that showed the up-and-coming country star shouting the N-word at a carload of friends outside his Nashville home after a night of heavy drinking.
Wallen's label suspended his contract. Spotify, SiriusXM, Pandora, Apple Music, CMT and the nation's most powerful radio chains pulled his music.
Wallen did damage control as best he could: retreating from the spotlight; entering rehab; donating money to the Black Music Action Coalition and the National Museum of African American Music; urging fans not to defend him; apologizing for his actions.
Then, in April 2024, he was arrested in Nashville, having thrown a chair off the roof of Eric Church's newly opened bar. Pleading guilty to reckless endangerment, he was sentenced in December 2024 to seven days in a DUI education center and two years of probation.
Wallen's reputation took another hit in March in response to his hasty retreat from the set of 'Saturday Night Live,' posting an Instagram Story from his private plane with the caption, 'Get me to God's country.'
And the records just kept selling as he leaned into his image as the complex kid who doesn't always do the right thing, often sabotaging his own dreams with impulsive behavior, which may just make him that much more relatable.
From 'America's Problem' to 'not real country,' Morgan Wallen owns those negative headlines
At his Arizona concert, the screen above the stage was filled with headlines taking the singer to task as 'America's Problem,' 'the elephant in the room,' a breaker of COVID-19 mask protocols, 'not real country' and more as Wallen brought his set to an incendiary close with 'I'm the Problem,' which isn't about the aforementioned problems so much as it is about the narrator's relationship with a certain Ms. Never Do No Wrong.
By the time the song was through, he'd doused the runway with a liquid meant to look like gasoline and struck a match.
It was beyond intense, brilliantly staged and cathartic, ending in a huge pyrotechnic display as Wallen left the stage, returning in a Randy Johnson baseball jersey for a three-song encore that ended with 'The Way I Talk,' a debut single that didn't necessarily set the charts on fire but remains a staple of his live show.
Morgan Wallen's 2025 setlist favors 'I'm the Problem'
The setlist clearly favored 'I'm the Problem,' hitting 13 of the album's 37 songs in the course of a 25-song set.
Those selections included such obvious highlights as 'I Got Better,' 'Love Somebody,' the Post Malone collaboration 'I Had Some Help' (performed without Malone) and a heartwarming 'Superman,' in which a father tells his son, 'And when you ain't a kid no more, I hope you don't think less of me/ I try to hide my fallin' short, but you're gonna see.'
Show opener Ella Langley returned to the stage for a duet on 'What I Want' from the new album, singing Tate McRae's part, and Miranda Lambert came back for a spirited version of 'Cowgirls,' one of five songs Wallen did from 'One Thing at a Time.'
He's a commanding presence with a talent for putting the lyrics across in a way that's sure to resonate as the members of his six-piece backing band construct a richly textured wall of sound around him.
Midway through the show, he strolled through the crowd to a satellite stage at the opposite end of the venue to perform an unplugged mini-set that featured three of his best vocals of the night: the Jason Isbell song 'Cover Me Up,' an emotional 'I'm a Little Crazy' (in which the title is followed by 'but the world's insane') and a mournful rendition of 'Sand in My Boots' with Wallen on piano, which remains an undisputed highlight of his concerts.
Wallen did his best throughout to nurture the connection he's been building with his ever-growing fan base this whole time.
Before unplugging, he talked about the early days of his career when 'we'd play pretty much anywhere they'd let us in the door' as they traveled the country in a little van while working their way up to where they are today, headlining stadiums.
'And one of the things that I miss a little bit about those smaller shows is I could go out on stage and I could look at everybody in the eyes pretty much and just have that connection,' he added. 'These days, it's a little bit more difficult to accomplish that, but this is my effort to kind of bridge that gap a little bit.'
Morgan Wallen 2025 setlist: I'm the Problem tour songs
These are the songs that made the setlist when Morgan Wallen brought his I'm the Problem tour to State Farm Stadium in Glendale, Arizona:
B Stage
Main Stage
Encore