Blake Shelton Who? Niall Horan Brings His Country Charm to Thomas Rhett’s Track
Move over, Blake Shelton — there’s a new cowboy in town, and he’s traded his boy band roots for a cowboy hat. Niall Horan seems to be stepping into his…
Move over, Blake Shelton — there’s a new cowboy in town, and he’s traded his boy band roots for a cowboy hat. Niall Horan seems to be stepping into his country era, teaming up with Thomas Rhett for a collaboration that has fans saying, “Wait, is this the same guy from One Direction?” Spoiler alert: it is.
Niall Horan Teams Up with Thomas Rhett
In 2024, Shelton collaborated with Rhett for “Old Tricks,” a track from his album About a Woman. The Georgia-born singer/songwriter said, “The hook of the song is ‘My old tricks don’t work anymore.’ In college, I could drink 10 beers a day and wake up ready to do it again. At 35, it takes two full days to recover from that.”
For the 2025 version, Rhett tapped Niall Horan, Shelton’s frenemy during his time as a coach on The Voice.
To promote the newly recorded track, Rhett stirred some playful drama between the two. In a dramatized text thread between the three of them, he told Shelton that he had found a replacement for him since he was unavailable to “shoot content.” Rhett then added Horan to the text chain, who prodded Shelton if he had already heard about him being his replacement.
The “Austin” singer responded, “NIALL?!” He then proceeded to reveal his “grievance” with the “Heaven” singer during his last year as The Voice coach: “Let me get this straight. First, you steal my last chance at a win on The Voice, and now you're stealing my song? Unbelievable.” Rhett promised that Shelton would love the song. Horan shared a GIF of the two of them on the set of The Voice and wrapped up the chat with, “Talk to ya later, Dad!”
“Cowboy” Niall
While Horan might not have officially announced that he would soon pivot to doing country music, he did give fans a glimpse of what to expect in his collaboration with Rhett by posting a cover of the track on TikTok. Horan can be seen sitting down, strumming on his guitar while singing in his living room. After finishing the song, Horan said, “Yeehaw!” (If that’s not him practicing his cowboy holler, we don’t know what is).
Last year, he also performed in Austin, Texas, wearing a white cowboy hat, jeans, a sleeveless button-up, and cowboy boots, earning him a nickname: “Cowboy Niall.”
“Old Tricks” 2.0 will be released on Friday, October 17, and we’ll be waiting for Shelton’s reaction to it.
