Jelly Roll shared his first single since filing for divorce from Bunnie Xo.
On Wednesday, June 24, the country star (real name Jason DeFord) released the gospel-tinged country stadium anthem “Hands Up.”
Throughout the track, Jelly, 41, looks at his life with grace and meditates on his determined spirit.
In the chorus, he preaches, “Everybody get your hands up / Evеrybody put your hands up / If you ain’t perfect but you try / Put ‘em way up to the sky / Touchin’ heaven kinda high / Ain’t that where we wanna go when we die / Whoa, whoa, whoa / Just put your hands up / Everybody put your hands up.”
Ahead of the song’s release, Jelly shared an inspiring Instagram Reel where he discussed finding motivation for his weight loss journey. (He has shed nearly 300 lbs.)
The video features past footage of the “Save Me” singer pushing himself to walk in the rain and later running in the rain to his new song “Hands Up.”
In an interview clip featured in the Reel, Jelly spoke about finding the motivation to work out.
“Every time I said that I was. gonna lose the weight yo, I said I lied to myself. I would tell myself, ‘I’m gonna do this. I’m gonna go do that.’ And then I’d go tell my family that. There’s a big person listening to this right now or a drug addict or somebody who wants to change some part of their life that right now is going, ‘I’m gonna start next Monday’,” he said.
Jelly continued: “That first Monday comes, yo, it is pissing rain, cats and dogs, dude. And I wake up and I’m like s—. My daughter was just like, ‘Just wait til the rain quits or go on the treadmill.’ But in my mind, I was like, ‘I’m going outside. I’m done lying to y’all, and I’m done lying to me. I told y’all I was gonna do this walk, and I’m gonna go do this walk.'”
“On day 1, I walked in the rain. Today, I’m sprinting in the rain. Because one day, not that long ago I stopped lying to myself,” he wrote in text over clips of him running in the rain.
Jelly continued, “I barely made it up my driveway that day. I’m alive today because I didn’t lose faith. F— Monday. Start today. ‘Hands Up’ out at midnight.”
“Make the choice. You can do it,” the “I Am Not Okay” performer captioned the post. “‘Hands Up’ out at midnight.”
