He’s one of the few country stars today who wears a cowboy hat and almost two years after releasing his debut self-titled album, Dustin Lynch is preparing to release his second album titled, ‘Where It’s At,’ on September 9th. The 15 song album is a new chapter and a step in a new direction musically, both lyrically and subject matter wise, for Dustin. The new album is titled, ‘Where It’s At,’ because Dustin says, “this body of songs is really where I’m at in my life.” He has spent the majority of the last two years on the road, seeing the country, and playing shows. Lynch credits the Keith Urban tour and playing music festivals for much of the energetic influence that ‘rubbed off on him’ and shows throughout the record. We got to sit down with Dustin on Friday night before he took the stage at Mohegan Sun’s Wolf Den in Uncasville, CT to talk about his new album, his evolvement, and other topics.
Over the past couple years, Dustin has been lucky enough to tour with great bands and artists like Justin Moore, Dierks Bentley, Little Big Town and Keith Urban and what has Dustin learned from them? “They all love music, more than anything on Earth. They are all super sweet, down-to-earth people and they are just as sincere off the stage as they are on. I’ve learned how to command the stage, and anything that has to do with a live show, and how to manage the village (off stage) it takes to do this.” The most fun to tour with? Justin Moore. Dustin lived with two of Justin’s band members in Nashville before he got a record deal so he says it was like being with ‘brothers’ on that tour. But he says, “every tour has its pluses, and no minuses, at all.”
Touring all over the country, Dustin’s favorite venue that he has play thus far is the Grand Ole Opry, which is no surprise. With honorable mentions of Madison Square Garden and the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles while on his first major tour with Keith Urban. “Those are some dream venues, that as a kid you dream of playing. But there’s so many more. I think a lot of these festivals when we have 40 (thousand) to 50,000 people in front of us and into the show, those are the ones that you remember. And it’s funny because you can’t really call that a venue, it’s just a field. But that’s country music, that’s how it’s supposed to be.” There is one venue that Dustin has not played yet but still dreams of playing, Red Rocks in Colorado; which he was introduced to when he was in an Incubus cover band when he was 15 years old and he would watch the DVD from their performance at Red Rocks hundreds of times. The goal is to headline there, “to headline the first time we step foot in there would be really cool,” he told us.
He did say that he really enjoys coming up to the Northeast, especially with the great country fans in New England- which can be somewhat surprising to non-New Englanders. “You have people from the south who think that New England is big cities. You get up here and there’s incredible country, and a lot of rednecks. People always ask us where the biggest partying crowds are and it’s Wisconsin, Minnesota, and New England. And they love country music. There’s so many great country markets up here.”
Like many other country artists, Dustin enjoys all sorts of music and that comes out in his shows. “I’m a fan of all sorts of music. I listen to rap to Hank Williams, on the bus, back to back. I’m just all over the place. We know that our crowd listens to more than just country, so we try to give them a little taste of everything.” On this night at the Wolf Den, Dustin performed a cover of ‘Hold On,’ which is originally sung by Canadian rapper, Drake. In addition, he performed some Garth Brooks, Tim McGraw, David Lee Murphy, Travis Tritt, and Def Leppard.
On the new album, Mickey Jack Cones joins Luke Wooten and Brett Beavers, who both produced Lynch’s debut album, as producers. Dustin first worked with Mickey on the Merle Haggard tribute album, on which he sang ‘I Think I’ll Just Stay Here and Drink’ and ‘That’s The Way Love Goes.’ Dustin loved how Mickey recorded his voice so when it was time to record this album, he knew he had to bring Mickey on board. Dustin says that Mickey ‘completely brought a new card to the deck’ for him, which has brought a new sound to the album.
Dustin believes that there are a few songs on his new album that have the potential to live up to and surpass ‘Cowboys and Angels,’ which is Dustin’s most successful song thus far in his career. The 2012 hit single reached number 2 on the US country airplay chart and was certified platinum. His newest single, ‘Where It’s At,’ already has approximately a quarter of the sales, and is averaging an astounding 25,000 downloads a week since being released on iTunes, that ‘Cowboys and Angels’ has done, so we can only expect that this single will surpass ‘Cowboys and Angels’ from a download perspective, in the very near future. He described, “Cowboys and Angels was a long, slow climb up the charts and this song (‘Where It’s At’) has been a bottle rocket.”
During the time we spent with Dustin, he shared some interesting insight: how does a song surpass another song?
“I look at it as a business point- more downloads. I think we have some songs that will do that. As a song, and subject matter wise, they mean different things to people, and they mean different things to me. How people relate to songs is really what matters in this whole thing. I’m not in this for the money- I don’t have time to spend it. That’s the God honest truth. It’s all about now for me of getting to continue to play shows for a living to where I don’t have to cut grass for a living like I was before I got this record deal. But more importantly, I want my songs to affect people in a positive way. The success of ‘Cowboys and Angels,’ there’s so many stories. So many weddings that it’s been a part of, so many funerals that it’s been a part of. So many situations where there is a husband or wife overseas, fighting for the country, and that’s the song that keeps them together. It’s the song they listen to on the phone or on FaceTime or on Skype. That’s what music is about. I hope one day we get a song that affects people like ‘Cowboys and Angels’ has.”
So despite the excitement of a new album, it is pretty apparent that Dustin still holds ‘Cowboys and Angels’ close to his heart and says that it remains his favorite song to perform.
Dustin also holds high expectations for another song on the new record called ‘Your Daddy’s Boots,’ which is the song that he wrote that he is the most proud of. “It’s a song we went in with a specific purpose. To write a song that is going to have a lot of impact, a song to have some substance to it. It was just not your typical down-the-middle uptempo radio thing. We wanted to write a song that had a really good message to it; and that’s the one I am excited the most for people to hear because I think it’s going to mean a lot to a lot of people.” The song is an emotional ballad written from the perspective of the groom who is watching his bride dance with her father with the hope of being able to fill her daddy’s boots.
There’s another song on this album that means something special to Dustin, and it’s called ‘She Wants a Cowboy,’ which is a tip of Dustin’s infamous cowboy hat to his favorite singer and inspiration George Strait. “There’s something really addictive about his voice. At 60 years old, he still got it. The level of his songs is unbelievable. I grew up on his music and he’s conquered the world. He has done something that no one else will be able to do and that’s be the King for that long of the country music world.” Without wanting to give up too much about the song, Dustin describes it as a ‘throwback kind of thing with Garth coming back and George retiring… it’s about a few experiences I’ve had in New York City and just that way of life.’ The song was written by Dustin, Josh Leo and Tim Nichols- a trio that also wrote ‘Cowboys and Angels’ and ‘Your Daddy’s Boots.’
His loyalty to Little Big Town, Keith Urban and Justin Moore shows when he says that if he could create his own ‘countryfest,’ his lineup would consist of himself, Keith, Justin, and Garth Brooks as the headliner ‘with Little Big Town out there to sing harmonies for everybody.‘ And this is a guy who moved to Nashville around the same time as Thomas Rhett, Florida Georgia Line, Jon Pardi, Kip Moore, and Eric Paslay. Quite the class of guys to come to Nashville at the same time and are all succeeding in their music ventures.
Outside of music, Dustin is ‘addicted’ to water right now and everything involved with water. He also enjoys hunting and fishing with his family including his dad, his brother-in-law, and childhood friends.
If he was not a musician, Dustin would be a surgeon. That was the track he was on when he graduated from Lipscomb University with a pre-med degree. When he moved to Nashville at 18, he promised his parents he would go to college, and he did. Although his parents knew he was interested in music, they weren’t aware of how serious he actual was. If he had stayed the course, he would actually be in residency right now; but he is glad that it didn’t work out, and rightfully so.
There is another thing that Dustin is well known for- the ‘bicep chug.’ It all started on the bus when Dustin and his bass player were hanging out on the bus and Dustin looked over and he was drinking “really ridiculously.” A picture was taken, it was named ‘the bicep chug.’ And that was it. It was all over social media, national television, even Fox news. Knowing we were interviewing Dustin, we had to ask him to show me the proper technique, with a UFO Big Squeeze that we had brought with us. When we asked him if he would, he responded with a resounding, “oh, hell yeah” and obliged. He equates the ‘bicep chug’ to a new, hit song- he calls it “their thing” and of course Dustin did a bicep chug for the crowd on stage later that night.
What’s next for Dustin Lynch? After a few shows in New England, he will return home to see his mom for her birthday before returning to the road for 7 weeks and the rest of year will consist of promoting the album. Dustin loves to be on the road and it works right now while he doesn’t have kids or a relationship. For a guy who was on the road 312 days last year and expects to be on the road just as much this year. From what we have heard so far, and the success of the first single off the album, It looks like this will be a huge year for Dustin Lynch. And New England Country Music hopes nothing but the best for Dustin Lynch.
You can purchase Dustin’s single, ‘Where It’s At,’ on iTunes here.
Follow Dustin on Facebook and Twitter.
Track Listing for ‘Where It’s At’ (To be released September 9th):
1.) Hell of a Night (Zach Crowell, Adam Sanders, Jaron Boyer)
2.) To the Sky (Dustin Lynch, Ashley Gorley, Zach Crowell)
3.) Halo (Ashley Gorley, Matt Jenkins, Jimmy Robbins)
4.) After Party (Steve Bogard, Jonathan Edwards, Jason Sever)
5.) Where It’s At (Cary Barlowe, Zach Crowell, Matt Jenkins, Jimmy Robbins)
6.) Mind Reader (Rhett Akins, Ben Hayslip)
7.) Right Where We Want It (Marv Green, Rhett Akins)
8.) She Wants a Cowboy (Dustin Lynch, Tim Nichols, Josh Leo)
9.) World to Me (Matt Rogers, Ash Bowers, Adam Craig)
10.) Sing It to Me (Dustin Lynch, Jimmy Robbins, Josh Osborne)
11.) All Night (Matt Ramsey, Matt Jenkins, Trevor Rosen)
12.) Middle of Nowhere (Dustin Lynch, Zach Crowell, Ashley Gorley)
13.) What You Wanna Hear (Ben Hayslip, Rhett Akins, Ashley Gorley)
14.) Your Daddy’s Boots (Dustin Lynch, Josh Leo, Tim Nichols)
15.) American Prayer (Wendell Mobley, Marv Green, Jim Collins)
(Main photo credit: Justin Nolan Key)