NASHVILLE (CelebrityAccess) – Award-winning songwriter and entertainer Dierks Bentley announces the establishment of the Broken Branches Fund with a multi-year financial commitment to provide mental health resources to the creative and touring communities. The Broken Branches Fund will be administered in partnership with Music Health Alliance (MHA) and will provide mental health grants for qualified candidates and their families to cover outpatient counseling and a follow-up care plan. More information on how to apply for access to all resources that MHA’s groundbreaking Music Industry Mental Health Fund provides is available HERE. Additionally, fans can donate to the fund throughout the summer at tour stops, other activations, and online HERE.
“Making this album and prepping for the tour, I’ve never been more aware of the sacrifice that the people in this town make every day to keep country music playing. Whether you’re sitting in a room all day trying to write the perfect hook or leaving home on a bus for weeks at a time, it can be isolating and exhausting. This just felt like the right opportunity to make a bigger commitment on my part to supporting those folks and their families in a more direct and intentional way,” said Bentley.
“Dierks was one of the first artists to believe in and support Music Health Alliance, and from day one, he’s led with both heart and action,” said Tatum Allsep, Founder & CEO of Music Health Alliance. “Creating the Broken Branches Fund at MHA to support music’s mental health shows his deep commitment to the people who power our industry both on stage and off, and to their well-being for many years to come.”
Bentley will kick off his 30-city Broken Branches Tour on Thursday (May 29), joined by Zach Top and The Band Loula, ahead of his forthcoming 11th studio album, Broken Branches, out June 13 (MCA). As he leans into this new chapter, Bentley embraces the knots and imperfections that have shaped his journey, proudly honoring the outliers of both country life and country music.
The upcoming album’s lead single, “She Hates Me,” blends elements of Whitley and Weezer, scoring Bentley his career-high charting debut with its playful edge to Bentley’s signature country sound. He counts eight Number One albums, 22 Number One songs, and over 9.5 billion global streams to his credit—plus 15 Grammy nominations and membership in the historic Grand Ole Opry. Continuing the path built from the ground up, as an entrepreneur, he has four locations of the gastropub and live music venue “Dierks Bentley’s Whiskey Row,” has a Flag & Anthem lifestyle collection “Desert Son” and recently released ROW 94 – a Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey crafted with only “three ingredients and the truth” at Kentucky’s Green River Distilling Co.