Jelly Roll is quickly gaining plenty of friends and fans in the country music industry, including Chris Young. The Grand Ole Opry member recently praised Jelly Roll, for both his music and who he is as a person.

“At this point, I just want to talk about him and how welcoming and awesome and polite and nice that guy is,” Young shared with Everything Nash and other outlets during a recent media event. “He’s just having such a cool run right now.  I remember talking about this music he’s putting out,  I think well over a year ago, on some of it, and it’s just amazing. To see him having the moment he’s having, I think he is that person that he’s like, ‘Hey, I can do multiple genres. I can kind of hop back and forth. I just want to create,’ and I think not everybody can do that. And it’s really, really cool.”

Young also praised Jelly Roll for the adversities he has overcome in life, including being incarcerated as both a juvenile and adult, and his mental health challenges, which he has been open about.

“He’s just worked hard for a really long time,” Young praises. “And obviously, he’s had struggles in his life. He’s had things he’s been through. He is not your normal success story. He’s just himself and he’s welcoming to everyone else. And that’s why you see me and Sam Hunt and everybody else getting out to the show and getting to play with him. It was really cool seeing him at Bridgestone. It was really, really cool. And I was originally supposed to do that before COVID with him, when he was going to play the Ryman.”

Young joined Jelly Roll when he sold out Bridgestone Arena in December, one of several guest artists that also included ERNEST, Riley Green, Hunt and more. He hints there may be a collaboration between the two singers at some point in the future.

“I think you may see something from both of us at some point,” Young teases. “I think he’s just a great dude.  I always say this about collaborations. It’s got to be the right song. It’s got to be the song where I’m like, ‘This. That works.’ … But I absolutely could see something like that happening in the future.”

Young just dropped two new songs, “Looking for You” and “All Dogs Go To Heaven.” All of Young’s music can be found at ChrisYoungCountry.com.