Ty's FIRST 5 - Start With These New Songs 2/19
This week’s anticipated new music was a list of songs that felt like walking past the Christmas tree in mid-December. My heart beats a little faster with excitement about what might be hidden inside each box that’s tagged with my name. I don’t know exactly what it is, but I know its gonna be incredible!
As the music started coming my way, it was like tearing the paper off those packages after days or weeks of anticipation. New projects from Lainey Wilson and Carly Pearce! Songs from Walker Hayes, Kylie Morgan, Maggie Rose…and a guy named Redferrin!
The songs I share on the FIRST 5 list aren’t always going to be my favorite songs of the week. They are the songs that I think will best start you down the road to exploring what’s new. This week, though, these all land on Favorites, and I actually had to add some bonus recommendations at the end!
Here are the FIRST 5 new releases you should hear…
“29” - Carly Pearce
The toughest time in my life was when I got fired from a radio station in St Cloud, MN. I’d used a (legal, but unnecessary) bad word on-air. I was 19 and had just moved into my own apartment a few months before. I had to break the lease, and pile all my stuff into the guest room of a friend who lived down the hall. I’d loaned money to a loved one that they weren’t able to pay back…so I was behind on my car payment (bye bye credit), maxed out my credit cards, and dropped out of college for the first time. Geez - seeing that written down, it feels like the most-embarrassing thing I’ve ever shared.
I had other difficult times, but even as I’d sit in the dark in my next apartment in Little Rock, waiting for the power to be turned back on (wishing I could open the fridge, instead of eating cereal with water), I had gained perspective on how meaningful those days would be and how proud I would be of obstacles I’d overcome.
”29” is not only one of the FIRST 5 songs you should hear, this week. It should be the FIRST. I woke up today with some curiosity in this project from Carly Pearce. I did something a little out of the ordinary for me, though. Since Carly had already released some of the songs before dropping the EP, I decided to jump straight to the last track and listen to “Day One” - a song that time travels like Billy Pilgrim, exploring Carly’s expectations for the future.. I decided to just start where I should: track 1. When I got to track 3, time stopped. The groove and strings immediately set the tone of reflecting on life. The lyrics mirrored the future that I’d pictured while sleeping on my futon in Amos’s spare room. Then the chorus hit, and it is brilliant. That’s what I want you to know. Its: Brilliant. Go listen
LISTEN ON APPLE MUSIC: “29”
“Sayin’ What I’m Thinkin’” - Lainey Wilson
The first time Luke Combs walked into my studio, even before he’d released music, I new he wasn’t simply a “rising star in country music.” And that’s better than “a newbie” or “exciting newcomer.” He was already It. LegIt. The first time I heard Ashley McBryde, as I wandered into Blue Bar, where she was playing a gig before she even knew a record deal was in her future, I knew she was special (check my tweets). There is a giddy excitement when I come across a STAR that hasn’t yet been revealed to shine.
Since I first heard Lainey Wilson, I have been bouncing off the soundproofed walls of my studio. I could hardly contain myself as I geared up to share her debut album with the world on The Ty Bentli Show
Starting Monday, Lainey’s debut album is my Global Spotlight - 2:30pm ET (click here)
“I can’t lie to you cuz I can’t lie to me” - that lyric from the title track sets up the entire debut album from Lainey Wilson. But here’s the wild part - its on the last song of the album. She proved it before she told you. I actually hope you’ll ignore my advice to start here, with a new track, and that you’ll, instead, start at the beginning of the album that I’ve had on repeat since someone slipped it to me months ago. Lainey told me she decided to start the album with a ‘showstarter’ - that’s why we come out of the gate with “Neon Diamonds”. She wraps it with this validating song - it reassures me of everything I learned about Lainey in the course of the 11 songs before it. The driving rhythm is faster than the strings that are involved will lead you to believe. Lainey’s about to answer her own question - as this music is bound to be heard by millions and shared by friends, and reach the ears of the inspiration behind the songs…. she’ll learn whether its harder to be the person hearing the tough words, or singing them ..
LISTEN ON APPLE MUSIC: “Sayin’ What I’m Thinkin’”
“I Hope You Miss Me” - Walker Hayes
Walker is back (insert a billion exclamation points, I love this dude’s music) and he’s apparently lost a girl to Hollywood dreams. Hers. She went off to chase a star on the Walk of Fame, and he wishes her well. Ironically, I’m now married to a genius, sweet, SO talented songwriter who also happens to have a $#** ton of movie and tv credits on her IMDB page, but this song actually reminds me of a girl long before Corri.
Living in Austin, I fell for Robin amid a lot of changes in her life. She was a in the process of finalizing a divorce when we first started dating, and shortly after that she was cast in a movie (I honestly can’t remember if she’d been in any movies or commercials or anything before that role, but I think it was a big moment in her life). I remember her taking acting classes in Austin, but she owned a business as an aesthetician. She was awesome at it - its the only time I ever got facials in my life, but I see why people find them relaxing. Then the movie and a decision to move to LA after being cast in a second movie. I decided to move, too and we lived in her cousin’s guest room (weird through-line in today’s list) as she pursued acting and I pursued any job that would allow me to afford an apartment of my own. We broke up, obviously, but she’s super cool and a great person and deserves the things Walker is wishing for someone in his new song!
Walker is immediately identifiable for the reasons I love every Walker Hayes track I’ve ever heard (literally). He has that laid back groove with hits on the 3 count, and his staccato-phrasing style. Walker has one of the most creative, eclectic ways of creating music (that’s not a routine - his inspirations are unpredictable, and what starts in a writing room doesn’t always stay there…it can take trips outside or in the car and grow as time goes). This whispy reminiscence is true to those moments where we look at life and honestly hope that we made our mark on the world. I’d say I love it because it is so personal to me, but I think that connection is Walker’s real gift.
LISTEN ON APPLE MUSIC: “I Hope You Miss Me”
“Bad Spot” - Jaden Hamilton
When I head home from downtown Nashville, there’s an area on southbound I-65 where I always have to patiently pause my phone conversation…service gets sketchy. Its usually at the beginning of the call I’m making (my studios have all been downtown, so it was often that first call as I left work) and a very awkward place to be with people. Finally, I started to realize that it was easier to just put the windows down, crank the radio up, and stop trying to utilize that time for a phone call in a Bad Spot. It was the beginning of slowing my life down (something exacerbated by all of us by this global pandemic). Those drives were much-needed. I started using that ride as “Ty-time” to decompress and recenter and come home more relaxed and a better version of Ty.
Jaden Hamilton - yet another young Louisianan on my list today - has been making a habit of connecting with music fans. The production on “Bad Spot” feels like it follows a river of emotions. The lyrics draw you into an all-too-relatable experience for us. In a year where so many people have found themselves in a bad spot at points, this is a needed break. And with the acknowledgement of falling into a bad place, there is a strong foundation at the core of this tune - a strength behind the fortitude that was shown as this story unfolds to bring the protagonist into a better place.
LISTEN ON APPLE MUSIC: “Bad Spot”
“Do It” - Maggie Rose
This past year has informed every type of artistic expression. The boundaries and expectations have been obliterated. For instance, my songs have been sneaking into the studio with knock knock jokes and Batman-related requests for the past hour - its not undistracting,. But it forces me to put on the music I need in this circumstance - a wholly new experience. I loved when Dolly dove into funk with “Gettin Happy” and Kenny Rogers did similarly with a midwestern-set “Tulsa Turnaround”.
As I normally surround myself with country music, the breaks I take from it can spark completely different moods or ideas for me & Maggie Rose created a wild, unexpected shift in my day! Much like The Cadillac 3 taking that funky dunk for Tabasco & Sweet Tea.
Maggie Rose is getting ready for an entire album that should show up late this summer (timed for live shows?) and the first sample of what we’re in for is definitely digging hard into the territory of unconventional. She’s singing all about keeping yourself from letting others define you - and refusing to let others limit you!
Out of the gate, I was trying to figure out who was teamed up with Maggie to create this bop! My mind raced to Jaren Johnston (cuz TC3), then Ron Fair (cuz I’ve also been listening to Daves Highway, lately)…but turns out Maggie hit up the iconic FAME Studios in Muscle Shoals. You hear Muscle Shoals in every measure of “Do It“ thanks to the production by Ben Tanner (of Alabama Shakes) and the horns, stomp, groove is addicting. I can’t turn it off, I can only turn it louder on every listen.
**If this thing is geared toward a tour in the fall, I’m getting out my trumpet and petitioning for an alternate slot in the band!
LISTEN ON APPLE MUSIC: “Do It”
DON’T MISS:
“Shoulda” - Kylie Morgan
”Red In My Last Name” - Redferrin
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