Easton Corbin’s love of traditional country music is evident throughout his latest effort, Let’s Do Country Right, available now via Stone Country Records. The singer blends traditional and contemporary country music on the standout project.
Videos by American Songwriter
“What I love most about this record is that I had a chance to get back to my roots and make the true traditional country music that made me want to do this for a living,” Corbin says in a release. “I’m really looking forward to hearing what the fans think and can’t wait to have them singing along to these new songs on the road.”
Corbin co-wrote 12 of the album’s 14 tracks. Learn more about Corbin and Let’s Do Country Right as he describes each song on the project in American Songwriter’s track by track below.
1. “Hey Merle”
Wade [Kirby] had brought that title that day. When I hear a good title, I immediately start wondering about the hook because sometimes it’s easy to accidentally waste a good title when you don’t approach a song in the right way. The more we all started talking about it, we knew we wanted to find a way to honor the greats (Merle, Waylon, etc.) and figured a good way to do that would be to put their song titles in our own lyrics.
2. “I Can’t Decide”
When going into the write for “I Can’t Decide,” we were actually struggling to get started because we weren’t sure what we were going to write about that day. In true Rhett [Akins] fashion, he threw out “I Can’t Decide” and as soon as he said that, we all jumped on it right out of the gate. I think this song is important because it really tells the message that it doesn’t matter what situation you’re in, as long as that special someone is there and a part of things–that’s all that matters.
3. “Marry That Girl”
The day that we wrote “Marry That Girl”–Adam Craig was telling us the story of how he met his wife. He knew that he was going to “marry that girl” before he had even met her. When he said that, I stopped the guys because I thought that could be a strong title for a song. I think MTG allows me to be a part of someone else’s story. It’s one of my favorite things to have my fans message me and tell me how they are proposing with it or using it for whatever they’re planning.
4. “Somebody’s Gotta Be Country”
“Somebody’s Gotta Be Country” is one of two outside cuts on the record. I’ll never forget hearing that song when I was driving down [Nashville’s] 8th Avenue one afternoon. I knew I wanted to cut it almost instantly because of how easily I related to it. You know you’ve got a good song when you’re jealous that you didn’t write it. I like to think of it as part two of “A Little More Country Than That.”
5. “Let’s Do Country Right”
People always have and always will have an opinion of how to do country right in their mind. But I try to stay true to what I do and remember what’s important to me and how I grew up. When we wrote “Let’s Do Country Right”–we kept talking about what our ideal weekend looks like. To me, it’s polishing off a buckle and spending the night out at a honky tonk dancing with your special someone. That’s how I think you do country right, but we’ll let the fans be the overall judge of that.
6. “Between You and Me”
“Between You and Me” actually had to grow on me. At first, I didn’t love the way we had the chorus. Sometimes you can write a song in an hour and it can take multiple sessions to get it right. Thankfully, we kept at it. The more we worked on it, the more it continued to grow on me, and obviously, I’m now a big fan of the song. I’m just grateful that Wade, Brad [Clawson], and Jim [Beavers] were patient enough with me to keep messing with it until we got it right.
7. “Where Do You Go”
“Where Do You Go” is a song about anyone, but really any man can relate to it. At one point or another, we’ve had some dumb moments where we ended up blowing it with a girl that we probably out-kicked our coverage on. When we all started talking about the mistakes we’d made, well–let’s just say the song basically wrote itself.
8. “Lonesome Drinkers”
I like to think that one of my strengths [in] knowing traditional country music is learning how to marry that sound with the modern way of doing things. I think this song is a great balance of old school and new school–both melodically and lyrically. When I’m working in the studio, that’s the most important thing to me–staying true to myself but also evolving with the industry in order to keep growing in that modern mentality. I think we’ve found the perfect mix with “Lonesome Drinkers.”
9. “Over a Girl”
This is the kind of song where the lyrics tell about it better than I can speak on it–Spent every dollar in my wallet and I’ve lost a lot of sleep. Just about every guy has lost sleep over a woman or spent too much trying to impress a woman before. It’s relatable. It’s real.
10. “Real Good Country Song”
This was a song that came together in sections and I don’t normally like to do that with my writes. One afternoon, we weren’t really sure what we were going to write about and Ashley [Gorley] said, “We need a real good country song” and it just kind of started there. I was going on the road that afternoon and over the next few days, Wade and I had several calls with different ideas. When we all got back together to try and finish it up, all of the ideas that we had separately just kind of flowed together and we wrote a “real good country song.”
11. “Whiskey Don’t Take Me Back”
This is one of my favorites. I think this is the kind of song that makes the entire project stronger, even if it’s not one of the official singles. That’s exactly how I felt about “Tulsa Texas” on my last project. I think this track brings so much depth and substance to the album because even though it might be a darker song, that can sometimes be someone’s reality.
12. “Honky Tonk Land”
I’d say that “Honky Tonk Land” is my version of Disneyland for adults… We all need somewhere that we can take all of our troubles and just forget about them for a little while. It was also a feel-good afternoon writing this with David Lee Murphy. I’ve always been a huge fan of his and loved that he got to help us construct one of my favorite songs to sing live.
13. “Wind You Up”
We wrote this during the peak of COVID and I have to say–I’m not a huge fan of Zoom writes but I understand that during that time we had to do whatever was necessary to keep working. It’s harder to grasp the same energy as you do in an in-person write, so I didn’t have the best outlook on this track in the beginning. The more we worked on this song and were able to get into the studio, the more it grew on me and I knew it had to be on the album.
14. “In It”
I think this is the song that helped Benny Brown give me a second chance. I had this on an old album that never got released. When we were working on this record, I called him because I just felt like this was one of the stronger songs that I’d been sitting on for far too long. Benny took a listen and instantly agreed. This is one of the two outside cuts on the project but I’m so happy we added it because good songs deserve to be heard–especially ones that are as relatable to this one.
Easton Corbin’s Let’s Do Country Right Track Listing:
1. Hey Merle (Easton Corbin, Rodney Clawson, Wade Kirby)
2. I Can’t Decide (Easton Corbin, Ashley Gorley, Wade Kirby, Rhett Akins)
3. Marry That Girl (Easton Corbin, Adam Craig, Shane Minor, Wade Kirby)
4. Somebody’s Gotta Be Country (Ashley Gorley, Rhett Akins, Dallas Davidson)
5. Let’s Do Country Right (Easton Corbin, Carson Chamberlain, Wade Kirby, Wyatt McCubbin)
6. Between You and Me (Easton Corbin, Brad Clawson, Wade Kirby, Jim Beavers)
7. Where Do You Go (Easton Corbin, Josh Jenkins, Wade Kirby)
8. Lonesome Drinkers (Easton Corbin, Shane Minor, Wade Kirby, Brice Long)
9. Over A Girl (Easton Corbin, Ben Hayslip, Wade Kirby)
10. Real Good Country Song (Easton Corbin, Ashley Gorley, Wade Kirby, Rodney Clawson)
11. Whiskey Don’t Take Me Back (Easton Corbin, Brad Clawson, Wade Kirby, Shane Minor)
12. Honky Tonk Land (Easton Corbin, David Lee Murphy, Wade Kirby)
13. Wind You Up (Easton Corbin, Wade Kirby, Kelly Archer)
14. In It (Jimmy Robbins, Josh Thompson, Laura Veltz)
Photo Credit John Shearer / Elicity PR
Leave a Reply
Only members can comment. Become a member. Already a member? Log in.