Zac Brown Band’s ‘Leaving Love Behind’ Shares Their Softer Side [LISTEN]

Zac Brown Band trim back their Southern rock and pop influences for their vulnerable new single "Leaving Love Behind." The track appears on the group's newest album, The Owl; press play above to listen.

"Leaving Love Behind" is an emotive, piano-driven breakup song. The slower pace allows Brown to shine as a well-rounded vocalist. Coincidence or not, the song arrived within a year of Brown's divorce from his wife of more than a decade, Shelly.

"There’s some really personal songs on the record and some other ones that are pretty heavy. Then there’s some other ones that aren’t,” Brown tells Billboard. “There’s some songs that are so personal and so real that some of them I couldn’t even imagine having to play six months ago when we were writing them. There’s some songs that we wrote and perform that still just tear me up."

Brown co-wrote "Leaving Love Behind" with Brandi Carlile's twin bandmates and collaborators Phil and Tim Hanseroth, as well as his bandmates Clay Cook, Coy Bowles and Jimmy De Martini. Brown and friends' The Owl, their first collection of songs since 2017's Welcome Home, arrived in September, and the single will be at country radio on Jan. 13.

Don't fret if you'd rather hear Brown's genre-defiant material, though: Collaborators on The Owl include EDM artist Skrillex, rocker Andrew Watt, Justin Bieber collaborator Jason “Poo Bear” Boyd, award-winning producer and songwriter Max Martin, songwriter and producer Benny Blanco and OneRepublic member Ryan Tedder, among others.

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