Texas singer-songwriter Dylan Gossett’s career so far has been defined by songs about navigating the grind and working to overcome pressure. As 2025 winds down, he’s succeeded at both. Gossett, at just 26, has played major sets at Stagecoach and ACL Fest, saw his fan base grow exponentially, and dropped his debut full-length album, Westward, via his label home Big Loud Texas.
“This year was like the first work year. I was settling in,” Gossett tells Rolling Stone. “The year before, there was just this explosion from ‘Coal’ and ‘Beneath Oak Trees’ and I was still riding on their coattails, just cruising. This year felt like a massive jump.”
After a pair of EP releases over two whirlwind years, Gossett released Westward this past July. The album featured 17 tracks, all of which were written or co-written by Gossett — including fresh takes on those two big breakthroughs, “Beneath Oak Trees” and “Coal.” The latter launched him into the country music consciousness when it found viral fame in 2023.
In October, Gossett seized on Westward‘s momentum with a deluxe version featuring three additional tracks. Two of those were collaborations on songs included on the initial record — with Noeline Hofmann on “American Trail” and Ole 60 on “Back 40.” A third song, the original and unreleased “Windy City,” rounded out the project.
“It just felt really perfect to put those out there,” Gossett says of the new songs, “just as a thing for the fans to sink their teeth into.” But, he says, he had reservations about releasing a goliath deluxe album.
“If I’m gonna do something like that, I’ll just put out a new record,” he says. “There’s three songs added, and ‘Windy City’ is the only real new one. It’s about being on the road, and it fits with the [album’s] theme perfectly.”
Gossett got the idea for “Windy City” after a sold-out show at Joe’s Live in Rosemont, Illinois, just outside of Chicago, in late 2024, and he finished it last summer when he performed at the massive Windy City Smokeout festival “If we can do this in Chicago and people here know our music, then we’re doing something,” he says of the song, in which he addresses his deeply Texas-rooted music winning over fans in more northern parts of the U.S.
For the other two songs added to Westward, Gossett asked his collaborators to add their own touches. Hofmann re-wrote the third verse of “American Trail,” re-imagining it as a pledge for her to remain wide-eyed to the world while “goin’ where your blood’s never gone before.” (Gossett’s original had him singing about growing up and learning to value work.)
“I think she has one of the best pens in music right now. And her way of writing feels so perfect for the song,” Gossett says of Hofmann. “I sent it to her, and I think she wrote her entire verse on a plane ride.”
Gossett chose Ole 60 to guest on “Back 40” because of its message of rural living and the sense of comfort that a familiar plot of land can bring. He heard it as much as an Ole 60 song as his own. In early 2024, as his career was taking off, the Kentucky six-piece caught a sustained buzz and opened a series of gigs for Gossett — including a sold-out show at Nashville’s Exit/In. In the year and a half since, Ole 60 have become a headlining band in their own right, releasing their debut album, Smokestack Town, in October and planning an extensive tour of theaters, casinos, and major rock rooms in early 2026.
“I don’t think I had any hand in it, but I think I was lucky to be a part of it,” Gossett says of Ole 60’s launch, brushing aside any impact he may have had. “I knew from the start, regardless of whether I brought them on tour or not, they were gonna be something.”
Looking ahead, Gossett is poised to build upon the foundation he laid in 2025. He’ll close out the year with a sold-out New Year’s Eve show at Billy Bob’s Texas in Fort Worth, and he has already announced a continuation of the Westward Tour he started in the fall, with a run of Midwest shows on tap for February. He also has an April date opening for George Strait and Zach Top at Jones AT&T Stadium in Lubbock, Texas, and a European run scheduled for the summer. He’ll be balancing it all with an expanding family, as Gossett and his wife announced in November that they are expecting their first child, a son, in 2026.
Releasing and touring behind Westward proved to Gossett that’s he’s already crafted a sustainable career. Now, he wants to spend the next year doubling down on what he does onstage.
“It really felt solidifying, this first project,” he says. “We’re not really chasing our next hit. We’re on the ground level and building this touring business by giving as much as we can to the fans. We’re trying to build off of a good live show.”
Josh Crutchmer is a journalist and author whose book (Almost) Almost Famous will be released April 1 via Back Lounge Publishing.
