Joshua Hedley signs to New West Records and announces new album – Neon Blue – to be released on 22nd April 2022.
Joshua Hedley has announced that he will release his anticipated new album Neon Blue on April 22nd, 2022 via New West Records. The 12-song set was co-produced by Jordan Lehning (Rodney Crowell) & Skylar Wilson (Justin Townes Earle) and mixed by Kyle Lehning (George Strait, Randy Travis). Neon Blue is the follow up to his critically acclaimed 2018 debut Mr. Jukebox, which was released by Jack White’s Third Man Records. Hedley’s breakout debut showcased his deep knowledge of country music history, in particular the beery ballads of the 1950s and ‘60s. His mentors were George Jones, Ray Price, and Glen Campbell, but his most remarkable accomplishment was putting his own spin on their style. Neon Blue, on the other hand, examines a very different, often forsaken era: the early 1990s.
“The last bastion of country music,” says Hedley, “was the early 1990s, roughly 1989 through 1996. You could turn on the radio and immediately know you’re hearing a country song. You could still hear steel guitar and fiddle. But there was a hard fork around 1996 or ‘97, when country veered off into pop territory. Neon Blue asks, What if that fork never happened? What if country kept on sounding like country?”
The era may have been dismissed by traditionalists at the time as slick or overproduced, but Hedley finds something exciting in that sound. Neon Blue plays up the excitement of bigger-than-life choruses, the relatable emotions of those sad-eyed ballads, and the inventiveness of the lively production. Hedley says, “The sound is modern, but it’s still discernibly country.” Neon Bluesongs would sound right at home on a playlist between Garth Brooks’ “Friends in Low Places” and Alan Jackson’s “Chattahoochie,” and at times you can see a thousand lighters held high during an encore. After making Mr. Jukebox with a close group of friends, Hedley decided to record his follow-up with professional session players — a Nashville tradition. Lehning & Wilson corralled an all-star crew featuring some of the city’s best players, who made Hedley step up his game. “All the players on this record are the people who are playing on Top 40 hits. They’re the professionals playing two or three sessions a day, and it was crazy to see them work…I came in with skeletons and they put flesh on them. They made them into human beings,” Hedley shares.
Joshua Hedley’s Neon Blue will be available across digital platforms, on compact disc, and standard black vinyl. A limited “Coke Bottle Clear” colour vinyl edition, as well as an autographed compact disc edition, will be available at Independent Retailers worldwide. Limited, signed compact discs and a limited, transparent blue colour vinyl edition autographed by Joshua Hedley is available for pre-order NOW via NEW WEST RECORDS.
Joshua Hedley Neon Blue Track Listing:
1.Broke Again
2. Country & Western
3. Old Heartbroke Blues
4. The Last Thing In The World
5. Down To My Last Lie
6. Free (One Heart)
7. Neon Blue
8. Bury Me With My Boots On
9. Found In A Bar
10. Let’s Make A Memory
11. Wonder If You Wonder
12. River In The Rain
