“To be on a song with Toby was a no-brainer when it got presented to me. That was something I had always hoped to do but never knew if it would happen or not,” Combs shares. “It being one of Joe’s songs, especially this one, made it even better; he was there the night I got inducted into the Opry and actually gave me my Opry member award.

“I grew up listening to both of those guys’ music, so to be a part of this version of the song and it now be Toby’s last recording is kind of hard to put into words,” he adds. “Country music misses them greatly, but I hope we’re doing justice to continue what they started.”

Shortly after Keith passed away, Combs paid tribute to the country music legend by performing “Should’ve Been A Cowboy”  while at the Ryman Auditorium. Watch his performance here.

Keith was honored with a televised tribute, Toby Keith: American Icon, with performances by Luke Bryan, Carrie Underwood, Jelly Roll, Eric Church, Ashley McBryde, Parker McCollum, Darius Rucker, Lainey Wilson and many more.

Also performing as part of Toby Keith: American Icon was Keith’s own daughter, Krystal Keith, who closed the show by singing “Don’t Let The Old Man In,” and says her famous father deserved the televised special.

“I think to us, I don’t want it to sound pompous, but it’s fitting,” Krystal tells UMG Nashville. “I think he would have rejected it a little bit. He always did reject it. In fact, the BMI Icon Award that he received, they talked to him about giving him that for several years before he actually received it. And he kept turning, he kept telling our manager, ‘I’m not ready for that yet. I feel like those types of awards are given to people that are at the end of their career, that are already retiring, that have kind of stopped touring … I’m still selling out arenas. I’m still putting music out. I’m still climbing and I haven’t started a decline yet.’

“I think he just wasn’t willing to say, ‘Okay, this is the level of what my iconic status will be, because I’m still going. I still have room,’” she continues. “For us, especially now that he’s gone, very few artists attain the statistics of success that he attained. I mean, he is a Hall of Fame songwriter, all genre and country. He’s now being inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame. Those aren’t given to people. The New York Songwriter Hall of Fame is one of the greatest honors any songwriter can get, all-genre, across the world, and he’s in that. It’s a very select group of people and there’s a reason for that.”

Toby Keith: American Icon is streaming now on Peacock.