Parker McCollum’s preliminary try at recording his fifth album was half finished when he determined to scrap it and start once more. His intention wasn’t to create a undertaking that will essentially impress followers or the Nashville music trade, however one that will impress himself.
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“I bought to some extent the place I used to be like, ‘I’ve bought to go problem myself once more and go discover that buzz once more,’” he tells Billboard. “It felt like, ‘Simply what are you manufactured from? What are these years? Is that this to experience off into the sundown now, or is that this to go make your greatest report?”
After completely having fun with working with producer-writer Jon Randall on his two most up-to-date hit-spawning initiatives — 2021’s Gold Chain Cowboy and 2023’s By no means Sufficient — McCollum determined to shake it up on his eponymous studio undertaking, out Friday (June 27).
He started working with producers Frank Liddell (Miranda Lambert, David Nail) and Eric Masse (Lambert, Waylon Payne, Charlie Worsham), and instantly after concluding his 2024 Burn It Down Tour in October, McCollum flew to not a studio in Music Metropolis — the place he had recorded a lot of his latest albums — however to New York Metropolis.
There, he spent per week laser targeted on recording on the legendary Energy Station Studio in Hell’s Kitchen neighborhood of Manhattan, the place such classics as Bruce Springsteen’s Born in the united statesA. and Rolling Stones’ Tattoo You had been recorded.
“Some individuals hate New York Metropolis. I adore it,” McCollum says. “It was the primary metropolis that got here to my thoughts. I used to be like, ‘You’re going to be probably the most assured son of a bitch for the subsequent seven days within the studio.’ It was lastly the album you at all times puzzled in the event you had been adequate to make — not for anyone else, didn’t want anybody else to love it.”
However moments of self-doubt interrupted that feeling of confidence, as he was intent on recording uncooked, unfiltered songs that felt unmistakably Parker.
“I’d report all day, then go to the resort, name my dad or [his longtime mentor and Texas music icon Randy Rogers]. I’d freak out, like, ‘What have I finished? That is profession suicide.’ Then I’d return to the studio the subsequent day and hold recording. You’re pressured to take a seat there and dwell with the album for a number of days in a row, so that you’re on this journey of ‘All proper, that is who I’m.’ However I simply by no means loved making a report as a lot as I loved this one. Being in New York Metropolis, being targeted and locked in to see what can I get out of myself musically if I actually go there and get it? And Frank and Eric had been prepared to go there.”
The ensuing undertaking is permeated with Lone Star State soul and grit, an album with not solely the potential to additional scale McCollum’s profession, however to peel again new layers of his persona and artistry.
“Hope That I’m Sufficient,” which he wrote with Jessi Alexander and Matt Jenkins, is a have a look at McCollum’s relationship with spouse Hallie Ray, whom he married in 2022.
“It’s how I’ve at all times genuinely checked out her and [my] relationship,” McCollum says. “She’s simply nearly as good as God could make a girl. I don’t know if I’m worthy of something I’ve gotten to do in my profession or the lady I’ve gotten to marry or any of these items. It’s only a very genuine feeling. I used to be sitting subsequent to her, taking part in guitar, and this track began to simply fall out. She’s a simple individual to write down songs about.”
A number of the songs on the album had been written on the Energy Station studio, although the majority of the songs had been customary in Texas. One of many oldest tracks on the album, “Everlasting Headphones,” dates again to when Parker was simply 15. He wrote it in his truck, parked exterior a Jack within the Field, in a second when he was “too stoned to go residence,” McCollum recollects. The track struck a chord together with his older brother Tyler, a songwriter himself, and have become the spark that pushed Parker to take music significantly.
“Tyler is six years older than me, and that was the primary track I ever wrote the place he was like, ‘Hey, okay.’” McCollum says.
He nods to songwriting luminaries Man Clark and John Prine on “Stable Nation Gold,” and welcomes fellow Texas native and nation artist Cody Johnson to sing on a remake of Danny O’Keefe’s Nineteen Sixties hit “Good Time Charlie’s Acquired the Blues.”
“I’ve at all times wished to chop it. I’ve listened to it for 15 years, and I’ve at all times considered Cody after I heard that track,” McCollum says. “I simply at all times thought he was so, so loopy gifted and such an excellent singer, and simply so obsessed with his enterprise and the way it goes about his life, and I simply admire that a lot. He is available in and simply kills it.”
It was additionally a full-circle second for the 2 Texas natives; Johnson is from Sebastopol, practically an hour north of McCollum’s hometown of Conroe.
“The primary time I had ever heard of Cody Johnson and [Johnson’s band] Rockin’ CJB, my older cousin Austin had gotten in a really, very unhealthy automobile wreck when he was in school. He’s nonetheless alive, however afterward that 12 months we did an enormous profit for him. Cody Johnson performed that profit present. Anyone on the town knew him from singing in a rustic band and I keep in mind being like, ‘Hell yeah. He’s actually good.’ He may’ve solely been round 20 years previous then. A couple of years go by, he’s on Texas radio and promoting out the bars. I finally opened for him a few instances after I began on the scene a number of years later. He’s at all times been actually good to me.”
Like Johnson, McCollum embodies that cussed Texas mindset of approaching one’s life and profession on one’s personal phrases, so discovering the gumption to do the sudden is nothing new. When he was first in Nashville and being courted by labels, McCollum was already taking a long-term perspective, partly, because of recommendation from early supporter Rogers.
“We had a proposal from each main label on the town. I used to be promoting a bunch of tickets and had alone tour bus and it was going rather well,” he recollects. “I had instructed Common Information Nashville [now MCA] I wished to signal with them. One other of the big-time labels, I received’t say which one, the man that owns it referred to as me and stated, ‘I’ll wire you 1,000,000 {dollars} proper now to not signal with Common.’ I used to be like 26, possibly 27. I keep in mind I referred to as my dad and I referred to as Randy Rogers. Randy was like, ‘Look, you don’t need them to have the ability to purchase you instantly. If you wish to signal there, do your factor, and run your small business the way you need to run your small business. However you’re an artist, and consider it from that perspective too.’
“I didn’t need anyone to assume they may purchase me in that city,” he remembers concluding. “I assumed that was a horrible option to step foot into Nashville and begin working up there. And one of many biggest selections I ever made was [to] flip that cash down and signal with Common Information.”
His new album comes as his label has undergone main adjustments this 12 months, together with the label’s rebranding from UMG Nashville to MCA, in addition to a management change, with Mike Harris being named CEO of the label.
“I’ve identified Mike for years now, since I signed my deal [in 2019],” McCollum stated. “He loves music and I feel he actually needs to see good music win. I instructed [the label] after I signed my deal, ‘Look, I don’t need some massive advance. I need to write the songs I need to write. I don’t need ever need anybody telling me what to do, creatively.’ And so they by no means have at any time limit, in anyway.”
Since signing, McCollum has earned a trio of Billboard Nation Airplay chart-toppers with “To Be Liked by You,” “Fairly Coronary heart” and “Burn It Down.” He additionally issued the major-label albums Gold Chain Cowboy and By no means Sufficient.
In 2021, he received the Academy of Nation Award for brand spanking new male artist of the 12 months. Final 12 months, his moody single “Burn It Down” earned nominations for the ACM’s single of the 12 months and the Nation Music Affiliation’s track of the 12 months (McCollum co-wrote it with “The Love Junkies,” Liz Rose, Lori McKenna and Hillary Lindsey). He’s been opening reveals for George Strait and Chris Stapleton, and earlier this 12 months, performed his third consecutive sold-out present at one of many Lone Star State’s most prestigious occasions, RodeoHouston.
However at the same time as McCollum has earned the eye of Nashville’s trade in addition to music legends akin to Strait, his household’s suggestions nonetheless reigns supreme.
“We ship one another stuff on a regular basis,” he says of his inventive relationship together with his brother Tyler. “Each report I make, I’m like, ‘Is my massive brother going to love this?’ We nonetheless write collectively from time to time. He’s come out on the street with me a few instances.”
Nonetheless, he attracts a line between household and enterprise. “I’ve at all times been very afraid of our relationship changing into transactional. Brothers within the music enterprise, there’s simply only a few of them who nonetheless like one another a number of years in. We’ve talked about him being on the street with me full time and taking part in. I’m like, ‘I don’t need you to be my worker, dude. You’re my brother.’”
The previous 12 months has introduced adjustments on the house entrance, too. In August, McCollum and Hallie Ray welcomed their first youngster, a son named Main.
“I didn’t know this facet of me existed. It’s simply the best factor ever,” McCollum says of being a father. “He crawls sooner than any child I’ve ever seen in my life. He doesn’t actually need to stroll but; he simply is aware of he can haul ass when he crawls.”
Nonetheless, followers shouldn’t count on a wave of baby-themed songs anytime quickly.
“I’ve by no means simply sat down and [intentionally] wrote a track about one thing. It may completely occur. Is it going to be the stereotypical ‘That’s my boy’ sort of factor? In all probability not. Like Kenny Chesney’s ‘There Goes My Life,’ that could be a baller track. And it’s bought the dad line in it, and so they hit so properly on that track. If I had been to ever pop [a song out], and it was of that stature of a track, sure, I’d reduce it.”
However as with all of his music, there’s one rule it has to observe: “It’s bought to be actual and trustworthy and proper.”