Brian Falduto Serves Up Some Country Romance With New Single ‘Free Coffee’

There’s something pretty irresistible about a song that compares falling in love to your morning coffee, and Brian Falduto is leaning all the way into that feeling with his latest single, Free Coffee (featuring Will Leet). Released today, the new track gives us a warm, playful taste of what’s coming on the queer country artist’s upcoming EP, I Could Be Happy.

Built around acoustic instrumentation and an easygoing folk-pop groove, Free Coffee captures the giddy feeling of having someone in your life who can instantly make an ordinary day feel a little brighter. Falduto keeps the romance light on its feet, trading overly sentimental declarations for playful lines about being perked up by someone’s love and having your cup filled by the way they live.

The track also marks a collaboration with Will Leet, guitarist for Sammy Rae & The Friends. For Falduto, the song was particularly personal because it was one of the first love songs he had written. He brought the lyrics to Leet, who helped shape them into the warm, energetic track we hear today.

“I met Will, the guitarist for Sammy Rae & The Friends, after being a fan of the band’s music for a long time, and he quickly became one of the easiest people I’ve ever written with. I brought him the lyrics to ‘Free Coffee,’ which was one of the first love songs I’d ever written, and he created such a warm, receptive space for me to be vulnerable while still having a lot of fun, which is actually a pretty perfect reflection of the relationship the song is about: my partner has this infectious energy that is capable of bringing you into the present moment. I love that we captured that in a way that feels less mushy-gushy and more like a big, joyful jam session.”

That sense of joy is especially fitting for I Could Be Happy, which finds Falduto allowing himself plenty of room to experiment. His previous work has often centered on reclaiming ’90s country music as a queer artist and creating LGBTQ-inclusive Christian music, but this new project seems determined to simply have fun with the music. “A lot of my past music was built around reclaiming ’90s country music as my own and writing LGBTQ-inclusive Christian music, but with this project, I really just let myself have fun.” He shared.

“The EP has bluegrass vibes, groovy vibes, country vibes, crooner vibes, ballad vibes. Its sound is a little hard to define, which feels fitting because I listen to and love so many different kinds of music. With this project, I was also intentional about protecting the joy of making music. I think prioritizing joy and comfort throughout the process comes through in how great the project sounds and in where I was able to take myself vocally.”

Free Coffee follows Takin’ This City Back, the first single from I Could Be Happy, which arrived earlier this spring alongside a music video directed by Falduto. While that song drew from his experience embracing unapologetically queer country music and finding a new relationship with a genre that hasn’t always made space for LGBTQ+ stories, his latest release gives us something a little more intimate: a joyful love song about simply enjoying the person who makes life feel better.

And if Free Coffee is any indication, I Could Be Happy is shaping up to be a pretty fun place to spend some time. The EP arrives November 13, but we have a new song to keep us company in the meantime. 

Go ahead and stream Free Coffee (featuring Will Leet) wherever you listen to music.

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Featured Image: Image Courtesy of The Karpel Group. Photo by Curtis Brown