Is your ‘Fancy Like’ dance ready? Walker Hayes to perform next week at the Bryce Jordan Center

In the space of just over 12 months, country artist Walker Hayes has experienced just how quickly a breakout song can change the trajectory of a music career, as he’s ridden a rocket-like rise from club-level gigs to headlining arenas, all fueled by the hit song “Fancy Like.”

Little did Hayes know what was in store when he made an outlandish prediction on stage at one of the concerts he played soon after touring resumed after the pandemic.

“I made a joke on stage one night just because I loved (‘Fancy Like’) so much, I said ‘This song is going to go quadruple platinum.’ And I just smiled. I was laughing,” Hayes said in a mid-April phone interview.

He had good reason to be facetious with that prognostication. At the time when “Fancy Like” was being readied for a June 2021 release as a single, Hayes had notched one top 10 country single in his career — “You Broke Up with Me” in 2017. Four singles had come and gone since with minimal impact.

But two years later, Hayes is laughing in wonder, as he’s seen “Fancy Like” certified as a mind-boggling five-times-platinum hit.

“It’s kind of hilarious,” Hayes said. “My team and my family, we laugh, every time we hear it in a Walmart or a restaurant, you know, it makes us laugh pretty hard.”

As Hayes comments indicate, he’s been through enough hard knocks that it’s doubtful he’ll ever take arena-filling success for granted.

The Alabama native came to Nashville with his wife, Laney, in 2004 with the dream of a career in country music, but that was about it. He had yet to write a song and noted he didn’t even know he could get paid for writing a tune.

Eventually, though, Hayes made headway, landing a record deal with Mercury. But promise turned to disappointment when the Mercury deal fell apart and a subsequent contract with Capitol ended after a 2010 self-titled EP and 2011 full-length debut, “Reason To Rhyme” made little impact.

Still, Hayes persisted, and five years later, things began to turn around when by chance he met Shane McAnally, an acclaimed songwriter, producer and industry pro, who signed Hayes to a production deal.

Hayes got right back to recording, releasing a pair of EPs — “8 Tracks (Vol. 1): Good S---” and “8 Tracks (Vol. 2): Break The Internet” — followed by a full-length album, “Boom,” in 2017. That album, his first under a deal with Monument Records, got Hayes’ career moving forward with “You Broke Up With Me.”

But then, after releasing the ‘8 Tracks (Vol. 3): Black Sheep” in 2019, COVID hit. Shut out from touring, Hayes got busy cranking out tunes that revealed his eclectic influences.

“What my team noticed is, I mean, I’d turn in a different song every day. And they didn’t have anything to do with each other,” Hayes said. “And I found that my team appreciated that. I always wondered why we couldn’t release an album that did that. Why did we have to dumb down (for) fans so much and say ‘Hey, you can’t deviate too far from this song?’ Why does an album have to have such a common thread?’ Why can’t I turn into the world what I turn in to my publishing company?’ And honestly, my team, they thought that was great. They were like ‘Why not?’”

With that thought in mind, Hayes and his team picked six songs to release on the 2021 EP “Country Stuff,” just to give fans some new music. The songs ranged from the grooving hip-hop country of “Fancy Like” and the title track to the rootsy balladry of “Briefcase.”

With the blockbuster success of “Fancy Like” in hand, Hayes and Monument added seven songs (including the chunky ballad “AA”) to the six from the EP to create the even more diverse “Country Stuff the Album,” which was released in January 2022.

The success of “Fancy Like” was as sudden as it was shocking to Hayes, who was keeping his expectations for the “Country Stuff” EP modest upon its release.

What really propelled the song was as spontaneous and fortuitous as it gets — a decision to make a video of Hayes and his then-15-year-old daughter, Lila, dancing to the song on the front porch of their home. The father and daughter (one of six kids in the Hayes family) posted the video to TikTok, where immediately it went viral. After four days, views had reached 4 million and the video was starting to inspire other celebrities (and many fans) to make their own videos doing the “Fancy Like” dance.

On Hayes’ current tour, which stops at the Bryce Jordan Center on April 27, Lila is one of four dancers and she has choreographed dance routines for the entire show.

It’s not just the dancers, as well as Hayes’ band, that bring plenty of energy to the stage.

“There is only one ballad,” Hayes said of his set list. “We sing ‘Don’t Let Her,’ and then the rest of the songs are fast. I noticed that in rehearsal. I was like, ‘I need a Gatorade and an oxygen tank.’ But it’s perfect. I love the pace of this show. It never slows down.”

Hayes will perform at 6:30 p.m. April 27 at the Bryce Jordan Center. Visit bjc.psu.edu for ticket information.