Lee Ann Womack’s “The Way I’m Livin'” Album Coming
Fans of Lee Ann Womack have been waiting not-so-patiently since 2008’s Call Me Crazy for new music from the multi-Grammy and multi-CMA Award winner, and on September 23rd they’ll finally get their wish. After years on major labels, Womack has teamed up with renown label Sugar Hill Records (Don Williams, Marty Stuart) to release The Way I’m Livin’ this fall. The record will be produced by Lee Ann’s husband, Frank Liddell.
As exciting as the news is about the new album from a new label, the list of songwriters she’s slated to draw songs from makes the prospects of The Way I’m Livin’ even more enticing. Contributors include Chris Knight, Hayes Carll, Bruce Robison, Buddy Miller, Roger Miller, as well as Neil Young, Mindy Smith, and Mando Saenz.
“I wanted songs that talked about how life really is, the raw spots, the tough places, the meltdowns and messy parts,” says Womack. “Hard, sad, rough”¦ all the stuff people pretend doesn’t exist! Because once you embrace that, you can figure out what to do; or not do! I live to sing great songs that tear holes in life just show living for what it is … And knowing these songs were written to be performed, not pitched, sets a bar! Every songwriter wrote intending to sing’em, to tell these stories, show these postcards, and you can feel the way they built the characters! Bringing that to music was just so incredible for everyone on the sessions.”
“Lee Ann wanted something wide open,” says husband and producer Frank Liddell. “So we immediately tracked the record with a handful of sides, just six people, and the rest of it with four people. So it’s a very sparse record and hopefully her voice is wide open and right in the middle of it. That’s our focus. We didn’t get too worried about songs or what she needed to say. We just took a bunch of great songs we’d amassed over the years and went into the studio. We’ve always gotten along real well song-wise.
The next album from Lee Ann Womack has been a much-rumored process. She released a single called “There Is A God” in October of 2009 that was supposed to be part of an upcoming album, but the album never came. Womack was also said to be working on new music in February of 2010. No word if issues with her previous label Mercury Nashville stalled previous attempts at new albums, but upon signing with Sugar Hill, Womack said, “I was looking for the right home for this record. I knew I wanted a label where passion for music and artistic integrity drive the decision-making.”
Musical contributors to the album include steel guitar player Paul Franklin, Matt Chamberlain on drums, Glen Whorf on bass, guitar player Duke Levine, and acoustic guitarist/pianist Mac McAnally.
After Lee Ann found great commercial and critical success with her signature song “I Hope You Dance”, the Jacksonville, TX native has struck a decidedly more traditional note lately, and considering the label and list of songwriters for The Way I’m Livin’, fans can anticipate more of the same. Lee Ann also recently contributed to Jamey Johnson’s Hank Cochran tribute, singing a duet with Johnson on the song “This Ain’t My First Rodeo”.
From Lee Ann’s previous album:
May 19, 2014 @ 5:35 pm
Totally excited for this one!!!!!
May 19, 2014 @ 5:40 pm
This is very good news. Lee Ann Womack has been by far my favorite female vocalist of the last 15 years and her sporadic output is very frustrating.
For my money ‘There’s More Where That Came From’ is a masterpiece in every way from the music on down to the retro packaging.
May 19, 2014 @ 5:58 pm
As further proof that traditional country has struggled at radio for many years her debut single ‘Never Again, Again’ stalled in the 20s on the country chart on it’s release in 1997. The followup ‘The Fool’ did reach #2 though.
This would make Tammy Wynette proud:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Es0Vs0O0kv0
May 21, 2014 @ 11:54 pm
The Fool reached number 1. It infact was her first number 1 record
May 19, 2014 @ 8:14 pm
Yes, indeed. For my money TMWTCF was the bet midstream country album to come out in the last three decades.
May 19, 2014 @ 8:14 pm
Best mainstream, even…
May 19, 2014 @ 5:57 pm
Wow! I’ve been waiting for a proper follow-up to “Call Me Crazy” for what has felt like eternity as of late, and so this certainly made my day.
The songwriters tipped in the involvement of this project sounds absolutely encouraging and a surefire step in the right direction. Color me wildly optimistic in that regard.
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My only relative concern is that the production will be single-handedly helmed by Frank Liddell.
Now don’t get me wrong. I understand much of it is attributed to the fact they are married, after all, and so they have a genuine connection and reciprocal understanding of how they want to flesh out the material and end goal at hand.
To date, however, I feel Frank Liddell’s output as a producer has been a mixed bag to me. I think he did a fine job on most of Miranda Lambert’s releases, in particular, Yet, on the other hand, I feel he has a tendency to overproduce.
He co-produced the Eli Young Band’s breakout album “Life At Best” in addition to their latest release: “10,000 Towns”. And, honestly, I think both of those records suffered from overly busy and cluttered production. Liddell resorted to the same mistakes as well on a small handful of tracks on each of Miranda Lambert’s albums (most notably “Fastest Girl In Town”, “Maintain the Pain” and “Sin for a Sin”). He also has co-produced most of David Nail’s material to date: an artist I genuinely like more often than not and think has already cut some outstanding tracks to date as a vocalist, but whose efforts are unfortunately marginalized by absurd usage of overproduction that drowns out the force of his vocal qualities.
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But that articulated, I still feel the songs will ultimately carry through on their own strength, and we may be looking at her best album to date.
May 19, 2014 @ 6:03 pm
Yeah it’s interesting to note that neither ‘There’s More Where That Came From’ or ‘Call Me Crazy’ were produced by Frank Liddell even though they were married and he was an established producer.
Fingers crossed!
May 19, 2014 @ 6:11 pm
My guess is there’s a tremendous back story and at least an album’s worth of material left behind in the wake of whatever happened at Mercury Nashville that took Lee Ann nearly a half decade to wiggle out of. Maybe someday we’ll hear the sotry, and maybe the music.
May 20, 2014 @ 11:15 am
Nepotism can give you tunnel vision. It did work for Mutt and Shania. I wish they were still married.
May 19, 2014 @ 6:07 pm
Hopefully this will be a kick to the balls of bro country. I know it’s a long shot, but I hope she has some radio and/or chart success with this material.
May 19, 2014 @ 6:19 pm
Unfortunately, it’s an improbable longshot at this point.
One thing is for sure: Womack is a fighter, and she has proven remarkably resilient even as her commercial stature has since long waned. The fact “Last Call” was able to hang in there and peak at #14 on the Billboard Hot Country Singles chart in 2008 was in itself something to cheer about.
The frustrating part in all of this, though, is that most everyone will only identify Womack as the singer of “I Hope You Dance”: even overlooking the fact she had a few hit singles prior to that crossover mega-hit including “A Little Past Little Rock” and “The Fool”. It’s agonizing; especially when I think, much like a fellow artist who shares her first name, that she has only gotten better as her career has advanced.
Unless a major seismic shift occurs and spells the end of the “bro-country” zeitgeist, I sadly see no way Lee Ann Womack will ascend to the higher rungs of the airplay charts with a set of songs about the highs and lows of living in a small town in all their raw points. But that may not even matter. Much like Kellie Pickler and Kacey Musgraves, she’ll sinew a loyal following that outnumbers the fanbases of even plenty of the B and C-list prototypal “bro-country” male entertainers.
May 19, 2014 @ 6:35 pm
It’s too bad that ‘I Hope You Dance’ is what she is best known for because while I can appreciate the sentiment of the song it is far from her best material.
I remember when that was a huge hit in 2000 I was driving across Montana flipping through the radio dial listening to small town radio stations and ‘I Hope You Dance’ was played and then some crotchety old small town DJ came on and said ‘well that girl sure can sing but that ain’t no country song’ and then moved right along to the next song.
I guess the world’s about tradeoffs though because that song probably gave her the juice to make the music she made in the following years.
May 20, 2014 @ 9:31 am
While Lee Ann has definitely had other great songs, I was surprised by the negative sentiments of some traditionalists towards “I Hope You Dance” at the time. I thought it was an excellent song, it successfully crossed over for the right reasons, and it was the kind of song that can help get new fans to appreciate country music. I wouldn’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good …
The same time the DJ you mentioned is a good example of how staunchly traditionalist much of the country music community used to be not that long ago, and how far the genre has fallen in the last two decades. Yes, I would prefer to hear mostly traditional songs on country radio. At the same time it is not feasible for a mainstream genre to reject any music more contemporary than George Strait as “not country”. I’d consider songs like “I Hope You Dance”, and most of Garth Brooks’ hits, to be on the pop influenced side of what could legitimately fall into the country genre. Even by such a fairly liberal standard, about 70% of the new songs played on country radio today are not country.
May 20, 2014 @ 11:51 am
I didn’t mean to imply that ‘I Hope You Dance’ was bad as much as I was trying to say that the vast majority of her career output is far better and definitely more country than that one hugely successful song. I think for most people and certainly me it was the production that was found lacking on ‘I Hope You Dance’ as it was really pure Adult Contemporary as opposed to country. Compared to what is on the radio now it is unbelievably good but I guess I’m not grading on a scale.
Sort of like saying Dolly Parton is best known for ‘9 To 5’ as opposed to the dozens of country classics she wrote and recorded.
May 19, 2014 @ 9:49 pm
Aw, I loved “The Fool”; I also remember another song she did called “I’ll Think of a Reason Later,” which I liked a whole lot (“I drew horns and blacked out her tooth with a marker / Childish, yes, but she made such a thin little target”).
Anything, her new project sounds like it might be really interesting. 🙂
May 20, 2014 @ 9:39 am
I agree, I really liked both of those songs. The lyrics are refreshingly straightforward, she doesn’t try to be hip or sophisticated. “I’ll Think of a Reason Later” was straightforward and humorous unsophistication, without the marketing gimmickry of Gretchen Wilson’s “Redneck Woman”.
May 19, 2014 @ 6:33 pm
This is great news, Lee Ann Womack has been greatly missed, her last two records were classics. Though I know I’m gonna love the songs, I really wanted to hear some more songs she wrote. She was really coming into her own as a singer/songwriter. Are there going to be any written by her on this record?
May 19, 2014 @ 7:58 pm
Not sure. The above listed songwriters would not account for all the tracks (unless they contributed multiple tracks) so she still may have one or a few on there. I couldn’t find any mention of her including her own songs on the album.
May 21, 2014 @ 11:59 pm
No she told me, she sadly didn’t write any on this record. I was hoped she had as well. She sure is a phenomenal songwriter
May 19, 2014 @ 7:30 pm
the article sez: guitar Duke Levine.
If that’s the same guy that played Telecaster w/ the Roy Sludge Trio up in Boston, man, he’s good. Real good.
May 19, 2014 @ 8:15 pm
This is intriguing news–thanks!
And for what it’s worth, the “love interest” in the posted video is Jack Ingram.
May 19, 2014 @ 8:46 pm
1997 both Lee Ann and Sara Evans came in like freight trains. Love both their debuts it’s a shame that Sara took a different route because “three cords and the truth” is as country as country can get.
May 19, 2014 @ 10:27 pm
Thanks for this Trigger. Looking forward to her new album.
May 20, 2014 @ 12:58 am
Thanks for posting “I May Hate Myself In the Morning”. What a gorgeous song. LeAnn’s soothing voice, the exquisite steel guitar and fiddle instrumentation, and the sad yet wistful lyrics all combine to make this song one of my all time favorites.
May 20, 2014 @ 1:56 am
LAW is about as good as it gets in this musical climate in terms of getting a great song to our ears delivered by a great singer and an always competent production.
This news gives me the will to go on .
May 20, 2014 @ 5:51 am
Awesome, I always like to go back and revisit her last two releases, think I might do that today. There’s more where that came from was a top notch album and worthy of any collection.
May 20, 2014 @ 8:06 am
I’m looking forward to this. Being Lee Ann Womack we know it will be great and seeping with traditional country. Much better than hearing a collaboration with Miranda and Carrie for sure.
May 20, 2014 @ 11:14 am
she’s got a beautiful slippery sliding kind of voice, effortless style.
Lee Ann Womack /Willie Nelson, Mendocino County line, for me is a special song.
What is going on in Texas? so much musical artistry out of that place.
May 20, 2014 @ 5:30 pm
My theory is that the beauty of Texas music stretches back to the 19th century. The original bluegrass-style country music of the Appalachian/Upland Southern settlers received an infusion of romantic music from the Mexicans and European classical music from the German and Czech immigrants to produce the smooth, slow instrumental style that characterizes the music of Texas country artists from George Jones to George Strait to Lee Ann Womack.
May 21, 2014 @ 6:08 am
Sounds like a good theory to me.
May 20, 2014 @ 4:16 pm
I fell in love with her when I heard (and eventually saw the video for) “Buckaroo” back in ’97. When she came out with Willie and sang “Mendocino County Line” my heart was already cemented (I’m from Mendocino County, Ca), but, let’s hope the songs are better than what I saw/heard Miranda and Carrie did the other night on the Billboard awards.
May 20, 2014 @ 6:59 pm
not too bad its pretty good I think it needs more steel but I gotta say that’s a decent country song its country
May 22, 2014 @ 12:01 am
Having heard several songs already, I can tell y’all this will be her best album to date! And yes it is COUNTRY!!
May 22, 2014 @ 9:23 am
I’ve been listening to Lee Ann Womack off and on all day(s) since I read this post.
Comments on youtube are interesting. Her tunes evoke a lot of feelings. Many women fans
May 22, 2014 @ 10:58 am
“why they call it falling”
“Editors at Billboard called the song “A stunning ballad that showcases the chanteuse’s heart-in-throat vocals.” They also said, “It’s a savvy lyric, and Womack’s tender, vulnerable delivery perfectly complements the song. Add to that Mark Wright’s production, which keeps everything swirling and swelling around her vocals, and it’s a small sonic masterpiece.
Womack continues to distinguish herself as the most compelling young female vocalist in country music.”
May 22, 2014 @ 4:07 pm
‘They Way I’ve Been Livin’ is streaming on Womack’s website and Soundcloud.