Simon RushworthNashville trio The Cadillac Three have been blazing a trail across the UK this month ahead of a headline slot at this summer’s Highways Festival at the Royal Albert Hall. Rushonrock editor Simon Rushworth caught up with the country fuzz trailblazers.
Rushonrock: The Years Go Faster tour hit the UK this week but how do you reflect on the years gone by?
TC3: We spent a whole bunch of years in a van and then making our way to the place where we can do this as a job and for a living. You’re not really thinking about the end game in the early days — you’re just going and going and going. We stopped a bit for during the pandemic and then the kids came along and we all got married. All of that stuff kind of contributed to us getting to the place where we are now — making our sixth album and having some time to breathe. It’s the first time we’ve been able to do that and that’s when you realise how fast the years pass.
Rushonrock: It might have been tough in the early days but do you have fond memories of those formative years?
TC3: Yeah, for sure. Especially in the UK. That was all just such a new adventure for us. And it still feels that way every time we get to come out on the road. Coming over for a couple of weeks at a time every 12-18 months isn’t ideal — it feels a little unbalanced. But the fact that we’re only in the UK for a short time makes it more special. The crowds have always really appreciated that we’ve consistently come back and we always feel energised for those tours. We wish we could do even more of it. But as far as the early days go those club tours were super fun. Seeing new new cities, new countryside, hearing different accents, eating lots of fish and chips and drinking very warm beer — that’s what we remember from the first few tours!
Rushonrock: Although the years have gone fast there have been highlights…
TC3: Oh yeah. I remember we were so excited when we sold out the Barfly in London. We’d never been over to the UK but Spinefarm had just put our record out and we sold out that show. We were so excited to come over and suddenly it felt very real. It was actually happening — something we’d always wanted to do — and that was a very cool thing. We got to headline the Ryman in Nashville and Download was crazy with Aerosmith.
Rushonrock: Didn’t Steven Tyler perform with you one time?
TC3: That was in Nashville too. He got on stage with us and performed Sweet Emotion. I felt like we’d all joined Aerosmith just for one song! That was insane and a pretty big one for us. Our very first show as The Cadillac Three was opening up for ZZ Top in a little amphitheatre in Nashville and we learned a lot from them. It just feels fitting, all these years later, that we opened up for another three-piece band. They’ve always been really cool to us — along the way they’ve told us what to do and what not to do and that advice has always been right.
Rushonrock: What’s your schedule been like building up to the UK tour — have you had time to wrote any new material in the last few months?
TC3: We’ve had a little bit of time to work on other stuff but we’re just getting rolling this year and remembering how to be in our band again! Jaren’s finishing the latest Kip Moore record and he’s started on the new Charlie Worsham album. He’s also working with Chris Shiflett from the Foo Fighters but yeah we’re writing new Cadillac Three music all the time. I think we’re just looking forward to playing the stuff from The Years Go Fast. We put the album out last year but bringing it over to the UK’s really exciting. New Cadillac music’s going to happen but it takes a bit of time.
Rushonrock: When you’re so heavily involved with other artists how do you choose what’s the right fit for them and the right fit for The Cadillac Three?
TC3: Well we choose the best songs for the other guys and seem to pick the worst ones for The Cadillac Three — the songs that are never going to get played on the radio! But we really don’t know what makes a Cadillac record any more. It’s weird. There’s no secret formula. It changes all the time. Sometimes a song just speaks to us and we know that’s ours. But the way our band changes you just never know what’s going to happen musically. There is a song on the Kip Moore album that probably should have been a Cadillac Three song but we don’t have any rules as such. It’s just a dilemma that we face when we write as many songs as we do.
Rushonrock: How much of an undertaking is it for US bands to tour the UK and Europe right now?
TC3: It’s a pretty big undertaking. We’re doing Ireland again, this time around, which we haven’t got to do since before the pandemic. But I think we were one of the first bands to come back over after the pandemic. We’ve done this enough times now that we do have kind of a method to it all. It’s not always the easiest financial thing to pull off but as far as the actual logistics of playing the shows, it’s pretty straightforward. We’ve even got a little storage unit in London now so we don’t have to bring everything over every time.
Rushonrock: Is Beyoncé good, bad or middling for country music?
TC3: Well the jury’s out on whether her album’s a country record but we liked it anyway. She’s an icon and so it was bound to be amazing. Anything that shines a light on country music and gets new ears listening to the genre must be a win. It could help an undiscovered talent get heard for the first time and I think what Beyoncé’s already done is pull in features with country artists who are less well known. That’s awesome. She’s bigger than any one genre and even though she’s said it’s not a country record it’s been pegged as that. That’s no bad thing.
Rushonrock: Beyoncé aside, is country music enjoying another global growth spurt?
TC3: It’s only getting bigger, that’s for sure. It’s also getting broader in regards to all the different kinds of sub genres within the genre. It’s like there’s a different kind of country. In the 80s and 90s there was a degree of variation but I think most people thought of it as cowboy hats and acoustic instruments. And now there are so many different variations. I think that’s great. It’s people taking different flavours from the music that they grew up on and the blend is sweeter than ever.
Rushonrock: Where do The Cadillac Three fit in?
TC3: As a band we were born and raised in Nashville and we’re probably more country than most people you could meet. It used to be that if you heard a bit of distortion or a very low country and western vocal then that was rock. That’s not the case any more. And if you listen to our songs then they’ve always come from a place that’s country.
Live image by Gordon Armstrong
Read the review of The Cadillac Three’s Newcastle show here