Andrew Combs: 2015

Nashville's Andrew Combs represents an outlier breed of country-leaning singer-songwriter, making his way in a city that too often reveres glitz rather than true grit these days. There's no dim-witted, corporate-branded, bro-country songs for this Texas-born musician; Combs' music is restlessly intelligent, romantically lush, and sometimes darkly brooding.

 

On his second album, All These Dreams, there's a discernible spiritual tide gently tugging at each track, like "Foolin'," "Pearl" and "Suwannee Country." Although Combs admits to being shy discussing his respect for a higher power, a motif that lilts through his lyrics, he did touch on it when he visited Studio A recently for a session with his band. The soft-spoken musician also described his perspective of Nashville and his network of friends—all hard-working musicians who fall far outside of the Top 40 machinery of pop-country—and his collaboration with the duo of Steelism and his producers, Jordan Lehning and Skylar Wilson.

 

[recorded: 4/8/15]