I Have Never Been To Memphis (Feat. Delta Rae)
ORIGIN STORY
When I was meeting with publishing companies to sign with as a songwriter, I found myself set up in a writing session with one of my favorite songwriters, Marcus Hummon. He had written some of my favorite songs in country music: God Bless The Broken Road for Rascal Flatts and Cowboy Take Me Away for The Dixie Chicks.
I was nervous and had never met Marcus before when I walked into that writer’s room at 22. But he was the nicest guy! And we talked for 2 hours about life and music. Near the end of the session, he asked if I wanted to try to write a song. I frantically pulled out my phone and went through my voice memos, because I had come in with a song idea…
How many times must I wait
Must I wake up in Memphis
How many times must I wait…
I look at Marcus after singing him the idea. And his face told me “that was it?” I shrugged it off and said it was just an idea. He asked me what it meant. I answered “I don’t know… I’ve never even been to Memphis.” His eyes lit up! He sprang to the piano and started playing an iconic right hand riff.
We finished the song in two hours and loved it. He went home that night and recorded a version using his laptop mic to capture the idea. But it didn’t have a final line…
I played the song for Delta Rae and asked them to jump on harmonies. Marcus sent a studio recorded piano track and we sang along to it. It was the first time Delta Rae had ever performed the song.
My brother, Ian, heard it and asked “what if it said I’m on my way” and we had our ending!
I love this version. It is honest and sweet. But then the band started playing it together and the song felt like it wanted more from us. More energy. More sound. We did a performance of the song in the basement of our headquarters in Raleigh that captures some of what I’m describing.
But then another evolution happened when we started playing it in front of an audience. The song wanted to move more. It felt like I was holding back a horse that wanted to run. You can hear it in this performance at The Cat’s Cradle.
After playing this show for a few months we kept getting asked if we were a Christian band, because the song mentioned Jesus. We love Jesus, but didn’t feel like this would be the best first impression as we were defining our sound, so the song found its way to the sidelines of our sets, and our edgier Southern Gothic songs took center stage.
But I always loved this song.
Eventually the band Rascal Flatts recorded a version of it on their album Rewind. It was supposed to be the third single! But testing with their Christian audience found the lyric “You’re all crazy about Jesus” to be a little too edgy for their liking. So the song was never taken to radio.
With my version I hoped to invite the song to finally run as fast as it wanted it to. Delta Rae backed me in the vocals and we really let it soar at the end. At first I thought I would fade out the ending, but I couldn't. I loved it too much. I love driving to it. I love running to it. I love dreaming with it blasting.
This song marks my call to adventure. As a songwriter. As an artist. As a young man.
I am so excited to finally give it to you as I always imagined it.
