Morgan Evans joins Kelleigh Bannen for an interview on Today’s Country Radio to talk about his new EP ‘The Country And The Coast Side A,’ protecting his privacy with wife Kelsea Ballerini, hosting Country Wide Radio on Apple Music Country and more. Tune in and listen to the episode in-full on-demand here.
Morgan Evans Discusses What Has Happened in the Three Years Since He’s Released an Album
That was a pretty specific point in time for me. I was new in America, meeting my wife [Kelsea Ballerini] like that. That was all kind of the main things that were happening there. And then I think I spent the next couple of years after that just promoting that record. You know what that feels like. You put out your first music, that first single kind of takes forever and then you finally get the next song and the next song out. I got to experience America for the first time, which was great. Went on all the big tours for the first time with Chris Young and Kane Brown and Dan and Shay. It was a big deal. That was kind of a really exciting time. That kind of culminated in the world tour we did at the end of 2019, which after doing all those opening spots, I got to go do my own shows. That was awesome. That’s probably my favorite three months of touring I’ve ever done. We did all over America, Europe, Australia, New Zealand. Yeah, then 2020 had such grand plans, but like everyone, they kind of died and it was kind of a long year and a half for me personally and creatively. So this music and now this moment with no masks doing the interview is kind of the feeling of that ending.
Morgan Evans on “Love Is Real”
“Love Is Real” was definitely the first step in this whole thing. It felt like it did when we wrote “Kiss Somebody.” I remember when we wrote that song, it was like, “Okay, the rest of the album starts there.” And so this was during a writing camp in September last year. It was kind of the first time that we’d been around other humans for six months or something. So it was a very inspiring time. I had the title for a little while and every time I went to write the title, I would get too clever about it. I would try to like say things that weren’t real and then say… You know what I mean? And that always just feels like you’re too planned. So I think the whole point of this song was just to capture that feeling of one of those moments where everything’s right in the world.
Morgan Evans on Protecting His Privacy with Wife Kelsea Ballerini
Look, if you’d have asked me this before I met Kelsea, I would’ve said, “Absolutely, I’m completely private. I don’t want to talk about this.” But I don’t get a choice in that. She’s just like, it’s all out there. I remember the first time she posted about us being together, I was like, “Let’s not post about this, because we’re going to have to talk about it. If it doesn’t work out, we’re going to have to talk about that. Let’s just not.” She just did. That has been very relaxing because I don’t have to be cagey or anything like that. I find it very easy to talk about and inevitably I’m going to write about it. So it makes that easy too.
Morgan Evans on Growing Up as a Country Music Kid in Australia
Growing up, [country music] definitely wasn’t around as much in my hometown of Newcastle at least. But my folks are from a town called Armidale, which is out West in the country. And we grew up on a bunch of Aussie country music and these six country music albums that they got in America when they came here for my uncle’s wedding… It was Garth Brooks ‘The Hits.’ Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, ‘Twenty Years of Dirt.’ So the one before “Fishin’ In The Dark.” Glen Campbell, The Green, ‘Best Of…’ It was a Best of Eagles…. Very 80s… or earlier. Yeah. 70s, 80s. That Nitty Gritty Dirt Band… It’s funny too, your perspective when I moved here, to me, those Nitty Gritty Dirt Band songs were the biggest hits in country music because that’s what I grew up listening to. And whenever I say that name, everyone’s singing “Fishin’ In The Dark.” I’m like, “I didn’t even know that.” And then so I had to learn that when I got here. It’s a funny perspective you grow up with. But obviously in Australia too, we have our own legends of country music. And that was a big influence on me as well.
Morgan Evans on Hosting His Own Show, Country Wide Radio, on Apple Music Country
I just love it. I’m so passionate about traveling. And I think growing up in Australia maybe when I did, when country music wasn’t as mainstream as it was here, in Australia, but me being so in love with it and then sort of being passionate about sharing that. I remember my first job was working at a CD store… It was called “In 2 Music.” But the “two” was the number “2” of course. It was the day before Keith Urban’s song “Days Go By” came out… And we got CD singles in and I was like, “I need to take this home.” And my boss let me take it home to listen to it all night. And the next day I just played it all day long. To me, people were just coming up to the counter, “What is this?” And I was like, “Well, it’s this guy. He’s Australian.” To me, having this show is being able to do that with artists all over the world.
