CURRENT SINGLE: “Slow Down Summer”
Thomas Rhett announced on Friday that his new album, Where We Started, will be released on April 1st (no joke). After the release of his last album, Country Again: Side A, a lot of people were expecting Side B to come next, including Thomas, but he explains how the fans’ energy caused him to pivot.
Country Again: Side A, a more mellow, introspective album, was born during the pandemic, somewhat in a vacuum. “When I was writing Side A, I really didn’t have any context of anything,” explains Thomas. “There were no shows. Every show that I was doing was on zoom, not really getting any feedback from people that were at a show except for social media comments. And so, I kinda was stuck in my studio down here in my basement and wrote songs about what I was feelin’.”
By the time Country Again: Side A was released on April 30, 2021, Thomas was already writing and collecting songs for Side B. But a week later, he played his first live shows in over a year – the first three of five sold out shows at Billy Bob’s Texas in Fort Worth – and he says, “I was like, dang, people have not forgotten how to party. And I remember leaving the stage that day and I was like, man, we need to get back in the studio and record some things that I feel like are gonna make people wanna move and make people wanna jump and make people wanna throw their hands up in the air. And so I started kinda writin’ from a different perspective of kinda having that audience back in front of my face, and this record called Where We Started was the product of that.”
Thomas still plans to release Country Again: Side B later this year, but first he wants to give fans a more versatile album with energy and emotion and party songs and deeply personal songs all living together on one album. That album is Where We Started, which is available for pre-order now, including some exclusive bundles, on thomasrhett.com.
Thomas Rhett – Where We Started origin :45
“When I was writing Side A, I really didn’t have any context of anything. There were no shows. Every show that I was doing was on zoom, not really getting any feedback from people that were at a show except for social media comments. And so, I kinda was stuck in my studio down here in my basement and wrote songs about what I was feelin’. And then Country Again: Side A got released and we went and played those five shows in Billy Bob’s and I was like, dang, people have not forgotten how to party. And I remember leaving the stage that day and I was like, man, we need to get back in the studio and record some things that I feel like are gonna make people wanna move and make people wanna jump and make people wanna throw their hands up in the air. And so I started kinda started writin’ from a different perspective of kinda having that audience back in front of my face, and this record called Where We Started kinda was the product of that.”