Colby Acuff’s most recent album release – Handmande Horsepower – might be the defining project of his career.
The country music artist (and 2026 Whiskey Riff Madness champion) joined Whiskey Riff Raff to talk about the viral origins of his “Dunk That Shit” mantra, the art of meme marketing, why he thinks social media is broken, and shared his thoughts on some of the most talented artists in the genre still not getting the recognition they deserve.
Colby also dove into his frustrations with modern country music, explained why he believes Nashville is still the place to be for aspiring artists, and shared why Handmade Horsepower is the record he wants to be remembered for. He also discussed the short film that accompanies the project, and the impact artists like Sturgill Simpson have had on his career.
One could argue that Simpson’s pivot to the Johnny Blue Skies era of his career acted as a guiding light for Acuff, who himself decided to change things up with his latest album. Everything about the new record – from the look, to the in-your-face sound, to the approach – was completely different than anything he’s done in the past.
He described it as planting his flag in the sand and letting people know here’s how things will be from here on out:
“This whole year is about a rebrand for me. I left the label and then it took me probably a year and a half to actually figure out what I want the rest of my career to look like. In a way, I kind of want it to look like there are no rules and we can do whatever. I’d rather be known as a creative than I would as a talking head.
This whole record is kind of planting the flag in the sand, or drawing a line in the sand – whatever you want to say – of just what to expect out of us in the future. Going back to that rock and roll but also ’70s outlaw sound. Trying to find that little piece of magic.”
Acuff has previously been quoted saying that Handmade Horsepower was the album that he wanted to be known for. It’s still early to tell if that’s how it’ll play out (we’ll have to revisit the project later on with some hindsight), but as far as what he set out to do with the album… Colby feels like he nailed it:
“Sonically (I feel like I reached that goal) for sure. Whether or not that happens, I don’t know. But I know we’ll be playing these songs for a long time. They’re fun to play. They’re great. It fits the thing that we want to do.”
Another fun fact about the songs on Handmade Horsepower? Colby Acuff wrote every single one of them.
That was always the plan going into the project, and once he knew what he wanted to say with his album (and he had a whole lot of great things to put out there) that came out earlier this month, Acuff knew he’d have to write the whole thing:
“This record I wrote all by myself. My first all by myself record since Honky Tonk Heaven. It was important to me, especially with some of the content I was writing, it’s very against the grain here. Obviously ‘LIPSTICK ON A PIG’ is just a giant f*** you.
The reality is I had to do this on my own. If I was going to do this big rebrand, and make this kind of record, and do all this stuff, I just felt like creatively, for me, as an artist for growth, I just felt like this was my thing to do.”
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You can hear about all of that and more from Colby Acuff by checking out the interview on YouTube or making sure to download the podcast on Apple Podcasts by searching “Whiskey Riff Raff” or by clicking here.
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Cheers, y’all.
