HARDY Covers a Stone Temple Pilots Classic for Apple Music Sessions

HARDY just released a six-track collection of live performances via Apple Music, titled Apple Music Sessions: HARDY, and it includes a cover of a Stone Temple Pilots classic.

The collection includes renditions of HARDY songs “Wait in the Truck” (featuring Lainey Wilson) as well as “A Rock,” but also a version of STP’s 1994-released hit “Big Empty,” which reached the top 5 on Billboard‘s Mainstream Rock Airplay chart.

“Big Empty” was originally released as part of the soundtrack to the film The Crow, and Stone Temple Pilots later included it on their second album, Purple, and released it as a single.

Of course, HARDY has been crushing things on the rock charts lately, in part thanks to the country-rock duality of his recent studio album, The Mockingbird & The Crow.

In 2021, HARDY released a rendition of Puddle of Mudd’s “Blurry” to rock radio and saw it reach the top 20 on Billboard‘s Hot Hard Rock Songs chart. HARDY previously told Billboard that he had considered releasing “Big Empty” instead of “Blurry” back in 2021.

“‘Blurry’ just fit my brand more,” he said. “We were testing the waters of rock radio to see if they would bite,” he says. “I’m thankful because rock is really intentional. You intentionally have to go there for it to be accepted and I’m thankful they have let me in that world a bit.”

He followed with the No. 1 Hard Rock Songs chart hit “Sold Out,” and earned three other top 10 Hard Rock chart songs from his The Mockingbird & The Crow album, with “.30-06,” “I Ain’t in the Country No More,” and “Radio Song,” featuring A Day to Remember’s Jeremy McKinnon.