Blake Shelton‘s new album is finished. The Oklahoma native reveals he has turned his record into his new label, BBR Music Group/BMG Nashville.
“We finally turned the album over to the label … Some of these songs that are on this album, some of them I cut a couple of years ago even,” Shelton reveals on Audacy‘s Totally Private. “‘Cause it’s been a while since I’ve released any music of my own. I’ve had some collaborations and stuff out. It’s been a minute, and I didn’t really know what I wanted to do, what I wanted it to sound like. The album, just like most of my albums, it’s a little bit all over the map, because I love great songs. And that’s always been my focus, since I was a kid, since I was 21 years old going into the studio.”
Shelton has written several of his own songs, but he doesn’t reveal how many songs he wrote for his new record. For Shelton, it’s irrelevant to him who writes any songs he records, as long as they sound like hits.
“I don’t care who writes the songs,” Shelton maintains. “I don’t care where they come from. I just want to make the best record I can humanly make, whether I am a writer on it or it’s somebody I don’t know, or somebody that I hate wrote it, if it’s a great song, I don’t care. I want to make the best record that I can possibly make. That’s always my goal … For me, I feel like it’s my best foot forward, and I’m really excited about this particular project, because it’s been so long.”
Shelton has a Top 10 hit with “Texas,” the first single from his forthcoming project. Shelton’s debut single, “Austin,” was released in 2001. The 48-year-old is profoundly grateful that he is still making music — and having hits — even after all these years.
“How lucky am I to still be 25 years into this … to still have a song on the radio, at any capacity, much less moving the way this one has,” Shelton says. “This one has really taken on a life of its own. It’s exciting to know that, right when you think, ‘All right, I guess that was it,’ then something like this happens, and you’re still in there with these kids coming up, trying to keep my head above water.”
“Texas” was written by Johnny Clawson, Kyle Sturrock, Josh Dorr,and Lalo Guzman. It’s unlike anything Shelton has released int he past, which is exactly why he wanted to record it.
“It kind of walks a line that’s a little bit of a ‘Stranger In My House’ or something like that,” Shelton tells American Songwriter. “It’s kind of got this haunting thing about it, but you can also jam out and rock out to it at the same time … I knew I loved the song, but I don’t record songs that I don’t love. So that was the easy part to, know that I loved it. I needed to know what other people thought about it before I was willing to say, ‘Let’s come with it first.’ I haven’t done this in a long time, and I wanted it to have an impact.”
Fortunately, as soon as Shelton played “Texas” for other people, everyone else agreed the song was perfect for Shelton’s new musical chapter.
“When I went in and played three or four things for BMG, they’re the ones that went, ‘Oh my God, this song.’ Then as I went around and played it for other friends and family and people that I work with. It was unanimous every time I played it for people. They were like, ‘Play that again.’”
Shelton is currently headlining his Friends and Heroes Tour. Find “Texas” and all of Shelton’s music and tour dates at BlakeShelton.com.
Photo Credit: Robby Klein