Country music star Toby Keith, known best for his hit songs Red Solo Cup, Beer for my Horses and Should’ve Been a Cowboy, died on Monday at the age of 62, following a two-year battle with stomach cancer. The singer-songwriter was diagnosed in 2021, and largely kept his health issues out of the public eye. His first album, the self-titled Toby Keith, came out in 1993, and the performer had a career that occasionally dipped over into film and television.
According to a statement posted on the country star’s official website, Keith “passed peacefully,” and was surrounded by his family at the time of his passing. Naturally, tributes to the late country singer immediately started to flood social media as the genre’s top performers found out about the loss. Something in the Orange singer Zach Bryan remembered Keith’s legacy by sharing:
too many rides in my old man’s car listening to Toby Keith. really hard thing to hearrest in peace friend we love youFebruary 6, 2024
Outspoken sports media personality Pat McAfee also weighed in on Toby Keith’s passing with the following message:
Rest easy Toby Keith 🙏🏻🙏🏻 pic.twitter.com/xGdXlS8mrSFebruary 6, 2024
And Joe Castiglione, the Director of Athletics at Toby Keith’s beloved University of Oklahoma, had this to say about the country performer:
Can’t believe we lost our dear personal friend, Toby Keith. Filled with deep sadness but flooded with wonderful memories too. He was as authentic as they come & did more for people than anyone will ever know. Please 🙏 for his entire family. Rest high on that mountain Big T. pic.twitter.com/8BhoJuee10February 6, 2024
Toby Keith was an outspoken personality in the country music world, celebrated for his extreme patriotism but also considered divisive for the stances he took against other country music artists, dating all the way back to his days hosting the CMT Music Awards. Following his diagnosis with stomach cancer, however, Keith saw many vocal members of the country music scene lending their emotional support to his battle. The Voice judge Blake Shelton showed his backing for Toby Keith on the hit NBC program. And Keith was one of the many songwriters who bid farewell to Jimmy Buffet at the time of his passing, showing where he fit in the sprawling tapestry of country music’s history.
We expect to see more tributes to Toby Keith making their way online through the rest of the week as the country music community learns about his passing, and recalls all that he contributed to the genre over the course of his career. If you want to pay tribute to Keith by enjoying a movie about country music, there are several great ones to choose from. If you even have the time, try and dig up a copy of the 2010 film Bloodworth, an adaptation of the novel Provinces of the Night that starred Keith alongside Hilary Duff, Dwight Yoakam, Val Kilmer, and Kris Kristofferson. Now that’s southern fried.
