This is the second album release since Brooks’ return from temporary
retirement, following 2014’s Man Against Machine.
“The album title came to me when somebody asked me what my favourite thing
about being on the road was,” he says. “I said, ‘It just feels good to be
out there being a gunslinger again. Just aiming with the heart and shooting from
the hip, that's what you do on the stage, right? And, lucky enough, you've got
the ammo of 'Friends In Low Places,’ ‘Callin’ Baton Rouge,'
‘Shameless’ and you do. You're a gunslinger out there. And each
show's different and you just shoot from the hip all night long.' As soon
I said it, I knew that was the album title right there.”
The first single from Gunslinger – “Baby, Let's Lay Down and
Dance” – is an upbeat, Nineties country throwback.