Nobody’s Everything, Tucker Beathard Releases Full-Length Debut
Tucker Beathard has been waiting for this moment. And now, it’s here, his debut full-length album, Nobody’s Everything, has been released to the world and he doesn’t hold back.
We’ve met and talked to Beathard twice in his young career. Once, at an acoustic showcase in Toronto when his debut single, Rock On was climbing the charts. And the second time at Boots & Hearts in 2017, when he thought his debut album was ready.
A lot has changed since then.
After a lengthy legal process, Tucker Beathard has officially gone indie, leaving Dot/Big Machine over creative differences. Those differences in opinion and timing and whatever else was going on have put Beathard in a new position, somewhere he probably didn’t think he was going to be at this point, but this is how it is.
When we spoke with Tucker at Boots & Hearts 15 months ago, he told us that he had an album nearly ready. The songs were ready. He was ready. But the label wasn’t ready, and so he was waiting. And while he didn’t get outwardly agitated or upset, it certainly seems (especially with the benefit of hindsight) that he was becoming frustrated with the situation. He had landed a single at #2 on country radio. He had played Lollapalooza and toured with Brantley Gilbert. He had written songs that he wanted to share as the followup to his 2016 EP, Fight Like Hell. But he was still waiting.
As the son of a successful songwriter (his father is Casey Beathard who has written hits for Eric Church, Kenny Chesney, George Strait and more) and the brother of an NFL quarterback (C.J. Beathard, San Francisco 49ers), it’s no surprise that Tucker Beathard is firm in his convictions and ideas. With success in his blood (go ahead and add his grandfather, four-time Super Bowl champion executive, Bobby Beathard) you can’t fault the desire to carve his own path, do things his way, and be his own man. And he has.
In a Rolling Stone article this week, Beathard is quoted saying, “I was getting pushed and pulled in different directions to where it wasn’t one hundred per cent true to what I would make my album sound like”. Those aren’t the words of a man in control of his music or his own legacy.
It also feels telling that Tucker Beathard has scrubbed his Big Machine work from Spotify, iTunes, and his YouTube channel. That might have been a condition of the dissolution of his record deal, or it could be an artist looking for a clean slate and a fresh start. We don’t know the answer, but we know what it looks like to us.
With the lead single, Leave Me Alone fronting a nine-song album, the first half of a double album (part two is scheduled for early 2019), Tucker Beathard has moved on and is ready to be heard.
“All I want to do is play my music”, Tucker told us in August 2017 as we stood in the shade of an old tree on a sunny summer day. That afternoon he took the stage and played for Canadian country music fans. They responded to Rock On, they applauded and enjoyed the guitar and swagger and talent in front of them. And they were excited for the album they too, thought was on the way.
The album they’re getting now is (as described in a press release from Mother Tucker Records) “a taut hybrid that is more street than studio, more grit and raw emotion than polished gloss”. It’s a description that both fits the nine-song collection and is everything we expected it would be from Tucker Beathard. Having seen him play and heard him speak, gritty and emotional feels right. And with Fight Like Hell as the only true reference we have of his music until this point, he’s gone ahead and showed us who is he and what he has to say.
The emotion that Beathard sings with on Leave Me Alone is an introduction to the rest of the album. And while not all nine songs have the same tempo or sound, they all bring an emotion, rawness, and genuine expression can be felt from start to finish.
Fans of Tucker Beathard will recognize Fight Like Hell and Ride On from his previous work. And they should latch onto Leave Me Alone, Picture To Prove It, Brother and more. This album drips with personal attachment from a songwriter and performer that has been itching to share his voice with the world. And with writing credits on each of the nine songs on Nobody’s Everything, Beathard has no doubt put his stamp on the whole damn thing. We hope that he looks at these songs and feels like he has been able to say what he wants to say, tell the stories he wants to tell and share the music that he wants to share.
In our 2017 interview, we asked which country artist he’d like to tour with once he had a full album out to the world. Tucker’s answer then was Eric Church. And after hearing the songs that he’s put together here, and remembering the early work that introduced him to country music fans, we can clearly picture that pairing sharing a bill and giving themselves to excited crowds.
The history of the music industry is filled with stories of artists that had to fight to do things their way. Artists who walked away from what seemed like a good situation so that they could be true to themselves and take ownership of their careers. Sometimes it works out, sometimes it doesn’t. Right now, with his debut full-length album available to the world, it looks like it’s working for Tucker Beathard!
Hit play now on Nobody’s Everything and stay tuned for part two of Tucker’s double album in early 2019.
Enjoy!
Tucker Beathard, Nobody’s Everything Tracklist
1. Ride On
2. Leave Me Alone
3. Somethin’ To Say
4. Picture To Prove It
5. Brother
6. Fight Like Hell
7. Hate It
8. This Life
9. How Gone Will I Go
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