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Jason Eady & Courtney Patton
Since the 2005 release of his debut album, Mississippi-bred singer/guitarist Jason Eady has brought a rare balance of unguarded honesty and poetic sophistication to his songwriting. With his catalog spanning from blues-infused Americana to bare-bones reimagining of classic country, Eadys seventh full-length takes on a looser, livelier, more groove-driven sound than ever before. But while I Travel On brims with a feel-good spontaneity, the Fort Worth-based artist continues to instill each song with the subtle insight and emotional depth that makes his music so powerful.
The follow-up to his 2017 self-titled effort, I Travel On marks the first time that Eadys recorded an album with his road banda lineup whose rhythm section is made up of musicians from an R&B/roots background, and whose lead players hail from the bluegrass world. With Grammy Award-nominated duo Rob Ickes and Trey Hensley joining them in the studio, I Travel On wholly captures the unbridled energy and kinetic camaraderie that the bands recently displayed in their relentless touring and in sharing stages with the likes of Sturgill Simpson.
One of the best things about making this album is that it was all done livejust six guys with acoustic instruments sitting in a room together, playing these songs wed been working out for a while on the road, says Eady. It was a much different and more organic process than hiring studio musicians and then making an album right after youve met each other.
In another departure from his previous work (including 2014s critically lauded Daylight & Dark and 2012s AM Country Heaven, a top 40 debut on Billboards Top Country Albums chart), Eady wrote most of I Travel On in a month-long burst of creativity. Normally I take my pick of the songs Ive come up with since the last album, but this time I was writing specifically for this record, he says. And because the albums so groove-centered, I focused on the way words rolled off the tongue and how they moved with the music. If something felt good to sing, I just let it be instead of going back and editing myself like I mightve done in the past.
Co-produced with Eadys longtime collaborator Kevin Welch and recorded at the Blueroom Studios in Nashville, I Travel On instantly proves the power of that approach with I Lost My Mind in Carolina: a joyfully stomping album-opener that recounts the bands on-the-road hellraising in the city of Charleston. On lead single Calaveras County, Eady details their wanderings in California Gold Country, paying homage to its Wild West ruggedness as the song unfolds in tumbling guitar lines and big-hearted harmonies featuring Eadys wife, Courtney Patton. Although much of the album speaks to enjoying the journey youre on rather than wishing you were somewhere else, I Travel On explores everything from the indiscriminate destruction of natural disasters (on Below the Waterline, a gently devastating bluegrass waltz co-written with Patton) to the foolishness in playing life so safe you forget to actually live (on the gloriously gritty Pretty When I Die, co-written with singer/songwriter Justin Wells). And on the hypnotic and haunting Always a Woman, Eady begins by offering a darkly charged reflection on love and regret, then shifts into a mood thats far more hopeful but equally intense.
No matter what emotional terrain hes treading, Eady imbues each track on I Travel On with a brightness of spirit. Even on the sad songs, theres always a positive spin, he points out. In adding that spin to the albums more heavy-hearted moments, Eady shows an elegance of songcraft that traces back to his musical coming-of-age, when hed carefully study the writing of such artists as Merle Haggard and Guy Clark. Growing up in Jackson, he got his start gigging in bars at age 14, then moved to Fort Worth and began playing open mic nights after spending six years in the Air Force. As he gained a devoted following, Eady self-released From Underneath the Old in 2005 and steadily expanded his touring radius. Later, with the release of Jason Eady, he earned acclaim from outlets like Rolling Stone, who hailed the album as [h]eavily steeped in his storyteller lyrical style and cleverly framed by uncluttered, acoustic-rich arrangements.
From song to song, I Travel On reveals an artist hitting a new stride by fully embracing his instincts. Over the last couple of albums Ive relaxed into trusting myself and doing what feels right, he says. I havent added anything to the processI just keep peeling more and more away, so that all that matters is whatever song I need to write right now. And in closing out with the albums lilting but determined title track, Eady purposely chose an open ending for I Travel On. I like how nothing gets wrapped up at the end of the record, he says. Its my way of saying Im going to keep on doing thisIm okay with this path that Ive chosen, and Im just going to keep moving on.
Courtney Patton is a storyteller.
Shes also a mother, a wife, a producer, a singer, a songwriter, a tour-van driver and a musician- as well as a world-traveler when shes out on tour throughout the continental U.S., Canada and Europe. But to anyone lucky enough to be sitting in the audience while listening to her expansive Texas twang belt out her version of deep and soulful country music, shes a storyteller. In a musical era in which clichés and bravado are mistaken for bold noteworthiness, there is something far more brave in peeling back highly personal and emotional open-book songs and delivering them with sensitivity and sentiment. Patton does just that. She is the consummate storyteller in her music. Heartache isnt just described, it is tangibly felt.
Following her previous solo albums, Triggering a Flood (2013) and So This Is Life (2015), and her acoustic collaborative project with her husband and fellow Texas troubadour Jason Eady, Something Together, (2017), Patton has drawn on true life day-to-day autobiographical life experiences and released her third album, What Its Like To Fly Alone, earlier this year.
Patton explains the genesis behind the project, The album is titled after one of its songs, What Its Like to Fly Alone. The title sounds melancholy, but the resolve isnt. This record is full of songs about people who have had to fly alone in some way, whether through grief, loss, life choices, addiction or love. We have to work through our struggles, choose our own destiny, just like the characters in each song. We have to make ourselves happy. No one else can do that for us. Ive been down in all of those ways, but I chose happiness. In the end, flying alone is soaring because you pick your path and you find your way.
Shes shared the stage with leading lights of the country-folk scene including Walt Wilkins, Bruce Robison, Jamie Lin Wilson, Cody Jinks, Sunny Sweeney, Brennen Leigh and Drew Kennedy. Musicians on her latest project include musical talents such as Chip Bricker, piano player with Gene Watson's highly acclaimed Farewell Party Band, Austin City Limits Hall Of Fame member Lloyd Maines on pedal steel, Heather Stalling (wife of Texas troubadour Max Stalling) on fiddle, and Jamie Lin Wilson (The Trishas) and Dan Tyminski (Alison Krauss & Union Station) on background vocals.
What might be most remarkable, however, is that Patton is doing this all independently. After having Kennedy produce her last album, Patton took the production reins this time around, further cementing this as her most personal work to date. There is no marketing team or music label support. Its Patton and her spirited passion for the music that has her hands-on over every part of her career.
That makes the fact that What Its Like To Fly Alone debuted as high at #4 on the i-Tunes country chart and made a mark across four different Billboard album charts (including a Top 20 mark on their Americana Albums Sales chart) all the more remarkable.
But then again, Patton is a storyteller. It only makes sense.
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LocationZeeland Street Market (View)
2031 Perkins Rd
Baton Rouge, LA 70808
United States
Categories
| Kid Friendly: Yes! |
| Dog Friendly: No |
| Non-Smoking: Yes! |
| Wheelchair Accessible: Yes! |
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