Blake Shelton and Keith Urban are two of the biggest names in country music, but they didn’t get that way overnight. Both have been putting out music for decades now, and let’s just say that the hottest trends in celebrity fashion and hair have changed quite a bit in that time. The duo, who are currently co-hosting the Taylor Sheridan-produced singing competition The Road, took a trip down memory lane, and their comments on each other’s awful haircuts are giving me life.
Keith Urban is a force to be reckoned with on The Road, but when he’s not making brutal eliminations to his opening acts each week (episodes air Sundays on the 2025 TV schedule and can be streamed with a Paramount+ subscription), he’s yukking it up with Blake Shelton. It’s become the partnership I didn’t know I needed, and this acknowledgment of their “awkward phases” is all the proof you need to see why:
Wow, I was familiar with both of these artists back when they looked like that, and time really does heal the memory. I love that these two stars aren’t afraid of some self-deprecating humor, as Blake Shelton first showed a decades-old photo of Keith Urban in a red vest with no shirt and long, straight blond hair, styled with that classic side part that celebs like Sydney Sweeney have been trying to bring back.
When the former coach of The Voice inquired of the ex-American Idol judge, “Do you care to explain this to me?,” Keith Urban really had no excuses, saying:
Well, that’s what I looked like when I got here, and I couldn’t for the life of me figure out why we couldn’t get signed. I don’t know what the hell was going on.
Blake Shelton didn’t get off easy either. The man is no stranger to the mullet, but that wasn’t even the issue when Keith Urban pulled out a pic of a curly haired Shelton, with perfectly gelled tresses framing his smoldering gaze toward the camera. Urban said:
I don’t know when this was, Blake, but you got the Unibomber thing going on. Sort of a Charles Manson influence. What was going on here?
Blake Shelton joked that there must have been a breeze coming from behind him. The “Straight Line” singer then pulled out a 2000s-era country music magazine that featured both of the artists, who seemed equally horrified at their appearances for different reasons:
- Blake Shelton: Is my face, like, two feet across? I think I thought if I grew my hair and had it come down, it would hide my jowls.
- Keith Urban: I think this might be from Madame Tussauds.
Give yourselves some grace, guys. Anybody who’s lived a couple of decades has fallen victim to hair trends of years past. The funny thing is how those trends tend to come back around, so who knows?
If Blake Shelton’s big belly laughs and Keith Urban’s quips put a smile on your face, you’ll probably want to check out what they’ll get up to next on The Road, with new episodes airing at 9 p.m. ET Sundays on CBS and streaming on Paramount+ the next day.
