Luke Bryan consoled Ryan Seacrest in an epic bromance moment following Emmy Russell’s performance of an emotional original ballad on American Idol.
Russell, 25, took the stage with “Want You,” a heartfelt original song “about me wanting somebody that didn’t want me back.” The Nashville, Tennessee-based singer-songwriter garnered cheers and applause from the audience — which included her mother and sister — following the Top 20 performance on Sunday evening (April 14).
“I’m crying,” host Seacrest said as he joined Russell on stage after the performance. Katy Perry asked from the panel of judges whether Seacrest wants “somebody to want you like that, too,” and he exclaimed, “love me! Love me like I love you!”
Bryan stood from his chair and approached the stage, saying, “Ryan, I’ll give you a hug.” Seacrest leapt up into Bryan’s arms, and judge Lionel Richie declared, “that was a moment!” Bryan has since shared a clip of that moment on his social media pages. He wrote in his caption on TikTok, “us Georgia boys gotta stick together.”
The judges hailed Russell an “A+ songwriter” when she auditioned for the competition show. Russell performed “Skinny,” an original song about an eating disorder, when she auditioned for Bryan, Perry and Richie. Russell also shared during her audition that she grew up singing with her late grandmother, country legend Loretta Lynn. Lynn “passed away peacefully...in her sleep” the morning of October 4, 2022 at her beloved Hurricane Mills ranch, her family confirmed in a statement at the time. She was 90.
“I would have never thought, ‘Hey, you're gonna be on American Idol, and you're gonna sing a song about your eating disorder that you're suffering with right now. And yeah, they're gonna say that you're also related to Loretta Lynn.’ I showed up to my audition with no makeup on, and I played my most vulnerable song. I think I can just be myself, and I'm really excited that I can just be myself. And being ordinary, and not changing everything about yourself to look like you're from Hollywood - it works, and people resonate,” Russell said in a recent interview on the Biscuits & Jam podcast of her audition. She also remembered a word of advice her grandmother once gave to her about performing: “While performing I would sing one song everyone knew, which was ‘If I Die Young’ [by The Band Perry]. And then I'd sing an original song. Memaw always told me to do that 'cause everyone wants to sing along with you. But then if you want to share your heart, do that too, but not too much. That's her advice. And then I sang ‘If I Die Young,’ and everyone loved whenever I sang that song. But yeah, I was like, 11 years old.”
Watch Russell perform “Want You” here: