Blame on it Playgirl. The magazine was the first to put hunky emerging country star Billy Currington on its cover.
Shirtless, with sculpted pecs, defined biceps and almost fuzzy fine hair combed on a perfectly chiseled chest.
The ultimate tease: He is wearing baggie blue jeans sagged at the waist to reveal tighty-whities and near six-pack abs.
"It was the first time I had my shirt off in any picture," Currington said in his soft, Southern-soaked accent. "And it was kind of just by accident how the whole thing happened. But ever since then, it just kept on goin'."
Playgirl put Currington on its March 2005 cover with this headline: "Making out with country superstar Billy Currington. He likes it slow and long."
The Q&A article was tame and reserved, much as Currington himself seems to be, focusing mostly on his honky tonk, Southern blues-tinged music. A couple of the questions did probe his bachelor love life, including one about his favorite kiss: "Long. Long and good. One of those 'I'll miss you, until I see you again' kisses," he told the magazine.
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The Playgirl spread snowballed into an avalanche of shirtless magazine covers. There's Currington ripped and bare-chested for People. His pulsing pecs peek out of an unbuttoned shirt for the United Kingdom's Maverick country music magazine. He's posed pensive and pouty in Nashville Lifestyles. And there he is barefoot and dressed in flowing white slacks and matching button-down shirt in Savannah Magazine.
But lest you think the 5-foot-9 Currington, who runs and lifts weights for two hours on most days, is all about the brawn, give his sophomore album, "Doin' Somethin' Right," a spin. The disc brims with honky-tonk sensibilities and soulful Southern blues vocals that might surprise folks who know him best from "Party for Two," his playful duet and video with super country diva Shania Twain.
Currington had two Top 10 singles and a freshman album under his belt when Twain called him up and asked him to join her on "Party," a frisky and flirtatious pop romp. The song was far afield from the harder-edged, traditional-leaning country that Currington cut his teeth on, but it turned out to be just the calling card he needed.
"I think the 'Party for Two' video was played so much, people just took notice because I was standing next to Shania Twain," the 32-year-old Rincon, Ga., native said.
Despite the success of his debut single, the bittersweet "Walk A Little Straighter," and the delightfully airy follow-up, "I Got a Feelin'," sales of his 2002 eponymous debut album lagged.
Currington spent the next four years tooling around the country, honing his vocal skills and guitar chops night after night. He mostly performed acoustic and solo — when he comes to the Rialto on Sunday, he'll have his band with him — which forced him to become a better singer and player, he said in a phone interview from his tour bus in California last week.
Last October, with the success of "Party" still lingering, Currington released his long-awaited second album, "Doin' Somethin' Right." In February it went gold (500,000 sales), and Currington is confident it will sell platinum (1 million) before too long.
And when that happens, he might find himself — bare-chested, of course — back on the cover of Playgirl or People.
Truth be told, he'll have himself to blame.
"I was just kinda doing it for fun," he says of that first shoot, when he pulled off his shirt for giggles. "Then it became the video. Then the People magazine shot."
Quick Take
Billy Currington in concert
When: 7 pm. Sunday, May 21
Where: Rialto Theatre
Tickets: $22-$30 through the Rialto, 740-1000
Et cetera: All-ages show
