Koe Wetzel is bringing in some great talent to (hopefully) work on his country album.
As he mentioned previously, he’s been out at the Sonic Ranch in Texas working on new music, and he recently even detailed his vision for it on Steve Rinella’s MeatEater podcast, saying he was planning to head back there to start working on it after the holidays:
“I’ve always wanted… people consider me a country artist, but our music’s more rock, I feel like. We get thrown in that genre, but it’s rock music, man, alternative.
I’m gonna put out my first actual country record, you know? Like some fiddle, some steel guitar, going back to acoustic guitars.”
He added that he wants it to be very honest and real, and have a bit of a throwback sound to it too:
“It’s gonna be raw and real and like ‘What the fuck did he just say?’ I like talking about feelings and real-world shit.
It’s gonna be old school, raw, real. Just honest true shit. Not your everyday, ‘Man, lets put on some camo and drink some cold whiskey.’ You know what I mean?”
Of course, Koe is known for his unique blend of country, rock and grunge, mostly, and he would definitely tell you that he doesn’t consider himself a true “country” artist, which makes this project all the more intriguing to me.
And last week, we learned that he had recruited some great writers to come write with him, including Bones Owens, Pecos & The Rooftops frontman Pecos Hurley, Ben Burgess and Ernest.
Really, it already seems like a great a mix of Texas and Nashville (Ernest and Ben are label mates at major label Big Loud), but this week, he’s bringing in some of the best of the best and two mainstays in the Texas music scene… Wade Bowen and Randy Rogers.
Wade shared some photos of the trio hanging out at the Sonic Ranch this week, saying he loves “the freedom” Koe writes with, so it seems like they were able to pen some great tunes:
“Found some songs in the desert with these 2 buddies this week. Really love the freedom that @KoeWetzel writes with. Talented dude.
@randyrogersband ain’t too bad himself. Enjoyed the hell out of it. What a week boys! Let’s do it again soon.”
Actually, that sounds pretty dang country, if I may say so myself…
He’s also had William Beckmann and Dylan Wheeler in the studio with him, so no matter what this ends up being, I think we’re gonna get some great songs out of it.
Because while we don’t know 100% for sure that all of this is for the country album, because Koe said he wanted to write two records out there, most of the guys he’s been working with are country artists and songwriters, so I’m hopeful that’s the case.
And actually, Koe was really featured on Josh Abbott’s new EP, along with Larry Joe Taylor, for a cover of Ray Wylie Hubbard’s “Screw You, We’re From Texas”:
If nothing else, my mission is to at least make sure we one day get to hear the rest of “To Be Continued,” from Koe’s 2022 fifth studio album Hell Paso, which he had mentioned before would be a preview of the country record.
In the few short verses he included here, we already hear him questioning the way he’s been portraying himself and maybe even doing some really deep self-reflecting in a way that’s way more mature than anything he’s ever put out before.
It’s obviously a very different direction for him sonically, and I personally don’t think it means he’s going to fully go full on “country” forever (and I don’t really want him to, honestly), I do need this one record…
“To Be Continued”
