Rick Monroe and The Hitmen didn’t just make a song about community. They built the visual around it. “Our Love,” out now via Asylum 1212 Records/TLG/Virgin Music Group, arrives with an official lyric video crowd-sourced entirely from fan and friend submissions, candid real-life photos from the people who’ve followed Monroe throughout his career.
The song itself draws from 1970s country-rock with warm harmonies, ringing guitars, and emotionally grounded storytelling. The Eagles and Jackson Browne are the obvious reference points, but Monroe’s vocal delivery carries its own weight, unhurried and lived-in, the kind of voice that makes a lyric feel like something that actually happened.
“‘Our Love’ is about staying grounded when life pulls you in every direction,” Monroe says. “It’s about choosing love, even when it isn’t perfect, and seeing how fans connected to that message made this release even more meaningful.”
The Hitmen didn’t exist before the pandemic. Monroe had spent years as a solo act running through Nashville’s rotating cast of hired players. When the world shut down in 2020 and a planned West Coast tour evaporated, Monroe, Bobby Perkins, and Alan Beeler stayed together instead of scattering. Live streams from basements and garages kept them connected, and a standing Tuesday writing session between Monroe and Beeler eventually became the foundation of their current album.
Producer Malcolm Springer came in through mutual connections, and when he brought Jason Bohl into the studio, the band’s sound locked into place. The name came from a joke one night about how well everything was working. Someone said “The Hitmen” and it stuck.