Following her performance at C2C Festival, Hailey Whitters will this week release her sophomore album – Raised – through Big Loud Records, including her new single ‘The Neon.’ Pre-order/pre-save the album here.
This Friday, Hailey Whitters will release her sophomore album – Raised – kicking off a new era of her music, following the widespread success of her debut album Living The Dream. The project cements her status as an artist of immense and unique talent. Much as Carly Pearce’s 29: Written in Stone changed the game for Pearce last year, if there is any justice Raised will do the same for Whitters.
The record kicks off with the sweeping, orchestral introduction ‘Ad Astra Per Alas Porci.’ The title, famously written in every book Steinbeck wrote as his personal seal, is a supposed reference to the fact that he was told by a grade school teacher that he would be an author “when pigs fly.” Given the fact that the Latin is wrong – sorry to all those poor souls who willingly got this inked – it was a supposed tongue in cheek reference. Still, the point stands, Steinbeck – one of the great American writers – made it and so Whitters too is making it, flying in the face of anyone who told her that she couldn’t. This sweeping, orchestral choral piece sets the scene for the record to follow – a cinematic sonic landscape that paints a broad brushstroke picture of America itself and Whitters reconnection to her Midwestern roots and hometown of Shueyville, IA, while reflecting on family, first kisses, and life amid sprawling cornfields. More than that, ‘Raised’ is a homage to the old school country record, replete with interludes that further fill in the details of the cinematic sonic landscape of Shueyville that she creates.
This picture begins to be elaborated on title track ‘Raised’ where Whitters sings about those roots and what her upbringing taught her about love. ‘I can’t help that I’m this way / My heart goes wild and that won’t change / If I take this love right to my grave, it’s ‘cos I fall / How I was raised.’ Throughout the record, Whitters songwriting is humble, tender and compelling – immensely reminiscent of Lori McKenna, one of her mainstay co-writers. Nowhere, is this jubilant celebration of her roots and that love more evident than on ‘Big Family.’ It’s a humble and authentic track – elevated by a fiddle part – about blue-collar living and the quirks of family. ‘I learned how to ration out the pie / and how to dirty dance when Aunt Tina had too much wine… There ain’t nothing small about big family.’ The track fizzes with charm and nostalgia, down to the raucous final chorus where she is joined by a number of voices to create a singalong feel. Whitters love for her hometown shines through from the jump, so on ‘Beer Tastes Better,’ Whitters returns to Shueyville to pick up exactly where she left off, as she questions ‘Don’t beer taste better in your hometown? … Seventeen we couldn’t wait to get out / Now we’re all coming back.’ It’s a track filled with love and pride for her hometown.
Whitters’ perspective is of a long-time love with her hometown, acknowledging its flaws and quirks, as on ‘Boys Back Home,’ where Whitters is at her best with the specificity she applies to the lyrics of her love letter to the boys she left behind in Shueyville. ‘They’d drive me around on those Friday nights / And they’d taught me to drink and taught me to fight / When I think about all of the men that known / There ain’t none like the boys back home.’ It’s a quietly reverential and immensely loving picture of the boys from her hometown, brimming with nostalgia that she infuses onto the penultimate track on the record – ‘In a Field Somewhere’ – where she looks back down memory lane at her first love and the memories they made ‘in a field somewhere.’ Elsewhere, on ‘Middle of America,’ Whitters continues her tradition of shrewd and thoughtful collaborations. Here, she collaborates with American Aquarium, for the first time, in a more rock-edged track, about the way of life in the middle of America. The unique qualities of both vocals are brought to the fore as they celebrate their roots.
Still, Whitters retains her tongue in cheek, quirky tracks that made The Dream so charming. On ‘Plain Jane,’ Whitters celebrates her own quirks with the refrain, ‘Love me or hate me / Take me or leave me / Don’t try and change me, I’m cool with the way I am / Throw shade or praise me, that’s how God made me / How my momma raised me, to go a little ‘gainst the grain / I’m worn out boots over straight lace / A little more messed up Mary than Plain Jane.’ It’s a euphoric, swelling track, simplistic in its melody to allow the intricacies of the lyricism to shine, whereas ‘Everything She Ain’t’ is a jauntier track with a plucky banjo part, teasing a potential lover to leave their uptight girl – ‘She’s all wrong for you / Just the girl-next-door you know is right as rain… She’s got a little style and a Hollywood smile / But believe me, honey, good as money in the bank / I’m everything she is and everything she ain’t’ – and ‘The Neon’ offers an alternate sonic perspective in a thrumming track about the onset of heartbreak, ‘Here comes the neon, here comes the sad part / Salt on my wounds, some blue on my broken heart.’ It’s a driving, hand on heart honest track that will have you begging to belt out the toxins of heartache, with Whitters’ guiding hand.
The Dream set Whitters up for success, establishing her as an artist confident in her own sonic and lyrical identity, but Raised amps that up a notch. On Raised she can’t help but infuse love and charm into every lyric and note, creating a quirky and tender picture of the town she left behind when she moved to the ‘College Town’ of Nashville. It’s a euphoric and genuine celebration of her roots, one that acknowledges Shueyville’s quirks to create a more compelling and charming picture, establishing Whitters once more as a country songwriter and lyricist who is here to stay. Raised is a sheer delight.
