We caught up with Travis Denning ahead of his performance at Introducing Nashville at Cadogan Hall – alongside Danielle Bradberry, Rachel Wammack and Walker Hayes – to talk all about his forthcoming album, the inspiration behind ‘Her World or Mine’ and more. The full interview is available on the podcast on Spotify or iTunes.
So, back here in the UK – we didn’t scare you away too much the first time?
No not at all, it’s good to be back.
You’re a part of the ‘Introducing Nashville’ tour – must be cool to be a part of this?
Yeah it’s been really interesting doing it as a tour because I’ve never really done it as a tour, obviously I’ve done it before in Nashville, kind of one-off things in town and I’ve done it a few times in other places, but this is the first time as a full tour. It’s really cool, I mean it’s easy soundchecks… that’s what’s made the tour so fun because we’ve had a lot more time to kind of just kick around and explore things, that’s an aspect of international touring that’s so awesome – kill two birds with one stone – you can go play and do what you want to do but also spend some time in some awesome cities that I never could have imagined.
You grew up in Georgia, Warner Robins, what was it like growing up there in terms of building your music from the ground up?
Warner Robins is an airforce town, it’s one of the largest airforce bases on the East Coast, it employs over 20,000 people, so a huge chunk of the population. I grew up with a lot of different people from a lot of different places, of course Southern rock was a huge influence growing up. I mean, the Almond brothers band are from Makin, Georgia, which is 25 minutes north of my hometown – that was such a huge influence, whether you wanted it or not to be honest with you. I love it, I always did. So it was very Southern rock based, but I loved rap and heavy metal and country music, and I loved everything that I just enjoyed listening to.
You got into music through playing the guitar, do you still start off with the guitar when you’re writing – starting off with the licks and stuff like that?
I don’t start on it necessarily when I’m writing the song, but it is a huge part of my recording process. I just focus on songs when I’m writing. There might be a lick that someone thinks is cool, let’s lay that down so we have it and it becomes a part of the song, but really it always starts with the song and I then get in the studio and think about things that could be cool or hook you. Now, a song like ‘After a Few,’ the signature lick of the song was written on the day we wrote that song.
When did you decide to move to Nashville? It must have been important to you given the importance of songwriting in your music.
I decided to move to Nashville in 2012, but I did not move till 2014. I just wanted to be 21 and save up money and just get all those things out of the way. I didn’t want David Ashley Parker meeting people, I wanted to be Travis Denning meeting people, so I maybe waited till I had a valid ID. I’ve been there nearly for 6 years.
You’ve had some songs picked up and recorded by incredible artists. ‘Her World Or Mine’ is one of my favourite tracks, what was that inspiration behind that song in the moment? It’s taken up such a different meaning now, particularly with Michael’s new video.
Yeah it’s so crazy, I loved that he went for it on the video. I think there are songs that just demand a great picture and he just did a great job. I wrote that song on my birthday in 2016 and I wrote it with a guy named Jamie Paulin and Brett Beavers and both of them are great friends of mine, I’ve written so many songs with them and Jamie is really one of my close friends. He just came in the room with this title ‘Her World or Mine’ and my head just went into the stark, complete, 180 degree flip difference, between how things can be after a breakup. I know, just from the get-go, this needs to be so detailed, we need to hit at the core of just what hurt us. I think the cool thing about the song is it never says who does it, which one thing I wasn’t really prepared to know and has been such a pleasant surprise and honour, is you can listen to that song for closure or healing or you can listen to it because you’re right there. It just doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter who it is. Some people listen to it – and I’ve read some comments that some people say it solidified why they left. It shows that the country fanbase is so much smarter than we think, they find layers of the song that I didn’t even know were there.
You’ve released five songs so far, was that a really conscious decision and why did you choose those tracks to initially introduce yourself with?
Yeah I really wanted to paint pictures and the sides of me that I really wanted to focus on with these songs, so when the record comes out people will understand who I am. ‘David Ashley Parker’ is my humour as a storyteller, I want to have a good time when I’m on stage, I want people to party. ‘Red, White and Blue’ – I love where I come from and I’m really proud of that. Then ‘After a Few,’ I just love rock n’ roll.
‘David Ashley Parker’ has taken on such a life of its own and become synonymous with your name. Was that an interesting one to pitch to your co-writers, a story about an ID that people probably never think you could write a song about?
I do remember thinking this is going to be weird to explain. I was writing with John Randall and Jessie Alexander, two phenomenal songwriters who happen to be married and they’re just a blast to write with and I said I’d had that idea for years. I have no idea why at that time in that co-write it seemed like the right time to bring it up, I said I have this idea of this story about who I was with that ID, I said the title and said it’d be called ‘David Ashley Parker from Powder Springs.’ John Randall just said ‘that’s awesome, I think that’s incredible and we should write that.’ He was the one that thought that could be insane. I think we were thinking about it and the vibe, I didn’t want it to be all in your face, I don’t want it to be cheesy – I mean it’s quirky and it’s fun, but I really wanted it to be a story. I will never forget, we were messing with this idea and I just said ‘bought it with cash, one week’s cutting grass from a senior in a parking lot’ and we hunkered down so hard. I think that first line was so important because it opened up the door for the story, it could be a story that a grandparent is telling a kid about getting in trouble and what they went through. I don’t really remember ever having a hang-up, I was so worried constantly about how we were going to get back to the hook of the song, but just when I would hit a wall, Jessie would go ‘got a license that said I was,’ and I thought ‘that’s so good.’
Obviously you are working on your first record. What can we expect from it and what do you want fans to take away from the record?
I want this record, when it comes out, I want people to feel like it was worth the wait and exactly what they were expecting. I mean ‘David Ashley Parker’ in March will have been out for 2 years, it’s been a part of why I’ve been putting out songs slowly giving a taste, because I know I’m not done with it, I want it to be perfect. I just want people to listen to it and feel like it was worth the wait.
Complete the sentence…
Music is… everything.
Country music is… damn everything.
Travis Denning is… hopefully somewhere in there.
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Listen to the full interview on the podcast
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