Who the F*** Is This Giant Head on the Highway?

There’s a billboard on I-83 in my area that’s just a giant head of a bearded guy in a tan, fitted baseball cap staring off into the distance in front of a white background. He’s wearing a clean white button-down shirt and has curls of dark hair fanning out around his neck. He’s appearing at the Hollywood Casino soon, the sign promises me and I wonder what is the attraction of a man who looks like he teaches fishing professionally that justifies a billboard along the highway? It’s a striking image, for certain, but odd. If he were to walk by me on the street, he would look like someone demonstrating propane grills and setting up tree blinds outside a Bass Pro Shop. He’s unthreateningly handsome in this picture which makes him a perfect blue-collar pitchman for all your outdoor and sporting goods needs. He might even sell you a 90-day supply of survivalist meals online, perfect for that day soon when the government will come to take your guns and gas your family.

I felt old because I thought I should know WHO exactly this man with the eyes of a gunslinger and the hat of a bassmaster was and why his massive head deserved to hang high facing the northbound lanes along the capital beltway.

So I looked up the name a little later that day. Actually, I looked up the casino because I’d forgotten the name almost as soon as I passed the billboard. It was a simple name. A John Doe or a Jim Smith or a Steve Hunk.. two syllables that were easy to pronounce but apparently impossible to remember.

But that face – that “I played football in high school, served two tours in Iraq, got my agricultural sciences degree on the GI Bill, and now teach pesticide strategies to farmers in the corn belt” face stuck with me. What the fuck is this guy going to do to draw a crowd at the casino? Is he the host of a DIY show about flipping barns or building tiny country homes in the city? Is he some kind of evangelical Christian magician?

No one should have a casual head shot standing thirty feet tall with just a name under it in a simple font standing along the highway with no context unless he’s someone instantly recognizable. Like John Lennon. Or Big Bird. Or a cartoon taco representing a local Mexican restaurant. This guy could be a lawyer who specializes in representing motorcycle accident victims for all this sign told me. And it infuriated me that I was out of the know.

So I remembered the sign while sitting in a doctor’s waiting room and looked it up. Turns out, though, that this guy – this square-jawed, only-slightly-shaggy guy on the billboard is “multi-platinum-selling and award-winning hitmaker” who is now touring with his second album right here in central Pennsylvania.

Was I really so old and out of touch? I used to be able to list the Top 10 in the Hot 100 and read off the tracks of the best rock albums of the year. I can still talk about the history of the greatest bands of…oh my god they are THAT old? Damn, yeah. They’re all dead, disbanded, or have children older than my own.

We live in a time more distant from Grunge than Grunge was from Disco.

Sigh.

The sign didn’t show any of the tropes of the billboard storyteller. No concert image. No musical instruments. Nothing to suggest that a man I had decided to call Jack Flyfish until I could remember his real name — was a musician.

But there he was. And he’s pretty famous. Yeah, I’ve been living in a bunker. He’s been on the big shows, has a popular Insta with his wife who is also a very popular person I know nothing about. But this is a guy who doesn’t need more than just a casual headshot on the side of the road to announce his concert at Hollywood Casino. And I’d forgotten the name because it is just as unassuming as the picture: Sam Hunt.

Yeah. I’m sure you’re all like “WOW! That guy?! Holy crap you don’t KNOW Sam Hunt? Everybody with ears knows that guy.” And I’d be all like “Yeah, naw. I’m old. Music ended when Kurt Cobain died and my knowledge of country music only extends to people who appeared in concert with Jimmy Buffett. Or when the ones who execute cases of beer for being politically offensive to red Solo cups.”

Anyway, that was the mystery of the anonymous giant head on the side of the road who turned out to be a massive country star I never knew about. Wow. I wonder how much more is out there in the big, scary world of mainstream entertainment?

Oh well. Best of luck to you, Dr. Jack Flyfish (aka Sam Hunt). I wish you the kind of success that means even a hermit like me knows your work.

The Quail. They are Unlimited.