Georgie Thorogood interviews Josh Turner about his forthcoming album ‘Country State of Mind.‘ In the interview, she chats to Josh about choosing the songs for the record, the state of the industry now and his path to the UK.
We’ve obviously got to talk about your forthcoming record. What was your inspiration to do a collaboration album? Is it something you’ve wanted to do for a long time? How long have you been planning it?
Not very long. My manager and I had a discussion about possibly doing a record like this, and it just kind of went from there. I was talking about it in the last interview about how literally a few days ago, I ended up back in the same specific location where I had had that initial conversation with my manager about doing a record like this. When I went back to that location, it was interesting to be in that place, because now we’ve done the photoshoot, we’ve finished the record and put all the packaging together. And we’ve set a release date, and we’ve released a couple of songs already. Here we are about to release the record and it made me realise how much we had gotten done since that initial conversation. It’s cool to see how something can be accomplished when everybody gets on board with an idea, and I’m very excited about it.
Did you ever have a conversation about delaying the release? I know obviously with the current situation some artists have chosen to delay their release. Was that ever a possibility?
Yeah, we, we’ve delayed mine for a month and I feel like that was the right decision. Honestly, the reason we delayed it a month was because we were having trouble meeting deadlines, because we had already had to reschedule a photo shoot. We were struggling trying to get guest artists in the studio and there was a lot of travel restrictions and everything. You know, that kind of stuff put us behind on our deadlines, so we decided to kind of push things back a month and I definitely feel it was the right decision.
Yeah, absolutely. I think probably the question that lots of people are wondering is how on earth did you choose which songs to include and which artists to collaborate with?
You know, for me being a country music fan and being a student of country music pretty much my whole life, it was fairly easy for me. Narrowing down to 11 or 12 songs was somewhat difficult, because there’s just so many great country songs out there.  I even said, in my album liner notes, this is by no means a comprehensive list. I could easily do five more records like this and still have songs left over. So I really tried to gravitate toward songs that really meant something to me. ‘I’m No Stranger To The Rain’ is the song that I feel like most country music fans are familiar with. I also really felt like that song was one of the most well written country songs in history and just the way it was written musically, lyrically, the production you know, and the delivery that Keith Whitley gave it initially. It’s just hard to beat, so I didn’t spend time going out trying to find other versions of it that other people had done and I just really kind of focused on the original version. And then I was like, okay, you know how Josh Turner would sing this and that that’s what you’re hearing on this record. I’ve had people even come to me saying that this is better than the original which I didn’t think was possible – that’s still debatable – but it’s been so much fun to sit down and try to come up with the way to just record my favourite country songs.
It all kind of started with ‘I Can Tell By The Way You Dance’, an old Vern Gosdin song. Vern is one of my favorite singers of all time and for years I’ve wanted to record this song and give it a new updated treatment. And so that was actually my first pick for this record ‘I Can Tell By The Way You Dance’ and I feel like we really made it fresh and new and I think it could be a hit today.
Absolutely. When you were singing with people like John Anderson and Randy Travis on their songs did the fact that they were singing with you, does that affect how you approach their song? Or were you just having a great time and putting your stamp on it as far as you could?
It’s really hard to play a John Anderson song and not sound like John Anderson, for me anyway, but yeah, knowing that he was going to come in and play on it with me, I really had to focus on how I was singing. That’s not hard for me to do. I mean, I’ve established myself enough, I’ve written enough songs of my own to where I know what my own style is. But as a fan, it’s just a lot of fun sometimes to just try to mimic other artists – that was one big way that I learned how to sing was to mimic other artists and to try to pick up on little things that they did. And so I just have to be mindful of that when I’m when I’m doing a record like this.
Do you think it’s important to have records like this that are bringing kind of a fresh feel to the old classic country songs because obviously, country music has progressed and developed so much and recently, it’s got such a, well a lot of it has got such a pop influence and there’s all these snap tracks and things like that, that wouldn’t have been around however many years ago. Do you think these songs are classics that people wouldn’t know or should know anyway? Or do you think it is important for artists like yourself to put a fresh feel on them and keep them kind of in the in the forefront of people’s or country fan’s repertoires.
Well, all of the songs on this record that the musicians play real instruments and we really, we listened to the original version before we went in to cut it and then we talked about how we wanted to approach it and I chose some of the songs that were recognizable yes and then other songs were very obscure. I feel like maybe a lot of fans have never heard [some of them] before. So, not only is this record gonna bring back memories for fans, but I think it’s also gonna be educational and enlightening for a lot of people too. So, I think it’s a little of both. As far as the production goes, and the musicality and all that, you know, we weren’t trying to, turn it into what you’re hearing on the radio today with a lot of the electronic kind of stuff and digital stuff – the instruments that you’re hearing were played by real people.
I’m really interested to know how artists select who produces their songs? Obviously, you’ve worked with Kenny Greenberg quite a lot before. Was he an obvious choice? And how do you kind of go about selecting who you want to work with in terms of production?
Kenny has really kind of proven himself over the last several years because he kind of came in and helped me finish up my Deep South record and then and then we did the whole I Serve A Saviour record together and so. I had already kind of developed a rapport with him. We really figured some things out you know, working together and just kind of developed a bond and a relationship and, and he’s really just kind of brought the best out in me as a singer. He’s really allowed me to go in and not feel like I have to be perfect every time I go into the studio, so he’s allowed me to just kind of go in and have fun again. Like I say, just really kind of focus more on the heart of the song rather than trying to sing every note, every line perfectly, so it’s really taken a lot of pressure off of me and he’s just been a joy to work with.
Yeah, I love that you say it’s let you have fun again, because I think from an outsider’s point of view anyway, it seems such hard work for all artists. It’s just absolutely non-stop, so it’s so important, obviously to keep that fun element because everybody does it because they love it and it’s important to keep that.Â
We probably can’t do an interview at the moment without discussing the state of the industry, and in fact the world. How have you handled the restrictions? Obviously, you’ve been working on your record but what’s been the most positive aspect of the period for you? Is it because you’ve had time to dedicate to doing that or just you’ve had time to be at home with family? Have you felt that you’ve been more creative because you haven’t been rushing around here, there and everywhere?
You pretty much summed it up. It’s been a little of all of it, you know? Not being on the road I think has been the hardest part because I’ve been doing that for almost 20 years now. Now don’t get me wrong, it’s been great to have a break. I’ve been able to sleep in my own bed at night. I haven’t had to live out of a suitcase, I have spent substantially more time with my family. So I don’t regret any of that, all of that’s been awesome and great. And if I could figure out a way to make touring income without touring, I’d stay home all the time but I do miss the road. I miss being out there playing for the fans and all this but I’ve been busy this whole time that we’ve been shut down. I’ve been working on this record. I’ve been writing for whatever the next project is and I’ve been  doing things around home with my family and it’s been a productive time. But I think it’s time for everybody to kind of get back to living and just getting together again and I can’t wait to get back out on the road.
You headlined The Long Road festival over here in the UK last year. How important is it for you as an established artist versus the newer, younger, upcoming artists to keep traveling and keep touring in other countries? Is that something that you will continue to do? Is that really important to you? Or will you kind of leave the long distance traveling at some point and just stick to the States?
I think it makes more sense for an artist of my stature and somebody who is established as I am to go tour in other countries. I think it makes more sense for somebody like me to do it than, let’s say, a new artist, unless you’re really trying to target a very specific audience because when somebody like me goes over and plays The Long Road festival,  hose fans have had time to figure out who I am as an artist, they know a lot of my songs, I have been able to put songs out on the radio, and I’ve really kind of established myself not just in America, but throughout the world. You go over there and the fans, they have a demand for your catalogue and your repertoire. It’s not like some artist is coming over and you know this song and that song, but that’s about it, I don’t know what else he’s going to do. There’s a demand there for artists that have been around as long as me and I felt that when I was over there, when I went to London, Manchester and played The Long Road festival, the fans were so excited and everything that I had been told leading up to that trip to England was, “Oh, you know, the fans are gonna be real quiet, real reserved, are not gonna really respond to us, but that doesn’t mean that they don’t like us. Everybody had been kind of preparing me for that, but it was the exact opposite. And before I even set foot on stage and sang a note in the microphone in the Union Chapel, the fans were just going crazy and throwing babies in the air. They were incredible. And from that moment on, we just had just an exceptional time over there the whole time, they really just treated me like family and made me feel right at home.
I think it seems from the feedback we get anyway that lots of US artists do enjoy coming over here. And for us, it’s fantastic because it’s so accessible for us now, which it never used to be. So, from our point of view, country music in the UK has had a real resurgence and it’s brilliant to have access to such wonderful artists coming over from the States. So, I think leading on to my final question, knowing what you know now, in the situation that you’re in now, if a young musician or artist asked if you would recommend embarking on a career as an artist, what would you say to them?
I guess it just kind of depends on what their question is, but I feel like every artist has a different set of questions. But I would, you know, I would make sure that they have good representation, they have to have, you know, a good manager, they have to have a good attorney, you know, and it has to be somebody who’s trustworthy, and that is looking out for their best interests, because artists can really get taken advantage of, if they don’t have that good representation. So, it doesn’t matter how good you are or not, if you don’t have somebody speaking on your behalf regarding the business side of it, then you might as well just hang it up now, so that’s the one thing that I would strongly recommend. You know, it’s beyond the art, I would make sure that you get good business representation.
Okay. Well, thank you very much, Josh. I look forward to seeing you back over here again in the future.
All right, thanks Georgie.
