Last Friday (August 8), Hayes Carll released We’re Only Human. The 10-track collection sees the lauded singer/songwriter working through the difficulties of self-improvement. However, the songs aren’t preachy. Instead, Carll takes listeners along for the ride he took while striving to be the best version of himself possible. In short, his new LP is the kind of thing the world needs right now.
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Recently, Carll sat down with American Songwriter to discuss his new record. During the conversation, he revealed the process he went through while writing the songs, the backbone of the collection, and more.
[RELATED: For Hayes Carll, Songwriting is About the Journey, Not the Destination]
Hayes Carll on How His Son Inspires Him
In the liner notes of We’re Only Human, Hayes Carll thanks his son, Elijah, writing, “for inspiring me to be a better human. I’m fortunate beyond measure.” During our conversation, he expanded on that gratitude.
“Not only is he my kid, he’s one of the best people I know. He’s someone who has shown me a lot of grace and has a great attitude about life and people,” Carll says. “At some point, I went from feeling like I needed to teach him everything to realizing I had a lot to learn from him,” he adds.
“I just sort of stand back in awe of him and how he goes about life and his attitude. It’s amazing,” Carll continues. “It makes me feel a little less guilty about the things I did wrong, knowing that, one way or another, he turned out to be an incredible human being.”
He Wrote the Album He Needed to Hear
We’re Only Human has a common thread of peace and understanding. We had to know how Hayes Carll found that mindset.
“I haven’t reached that state. I had to write about it,” Carll says with a laugh. “The driving force behind these songs is that I didn’t have enough of that in my life. I got tired of the same struggles, tired of hitting the same walls, tired of having the same feelings, anxieties, and insecurities. I just wasn’t living life the way I think it should be lived,” he explains. “That’s nothing new for me, but it reached a point where I decided I couldn’t spend any more years having the same conversation with myself. That started the process of trying to figure out what was working for me and what wasn’t, and the why and how behind it all. That kind of bleeds into the music,” he says.
“I’ve done every self-help program and made every commitment, pledge, and vow you can make a hundred times over. But it’s easy to forget,” he admits. “So, a lot of this was trying to make sense of some things and make note of things I wanted to remember. Because when the next TV show comes on or I get on social media or my lifelong habits of disconnection kick in, all those lessons go out the window. This is just a selfish exercise to put musical reminders into the world for myself,” he adds.
Hayes Carll Reveals the Heart of We’re Only Human
We’re Only Human wasn’t just another album for Hayes Carll. For him, it was an important part of his journey to be the best version of himself. More than that, he learned a lot about himself and how he wants to change while writing and recording the LP.
“The theme of the record and something I’m trying to incorporate in my own life is the idea that your attitude or your mindset is the one thing you can control, and nobody can take that from you. That’s something that, when I can apply it, has been really liberating for me,” Carll explains.
“So, these songs, I think, the takeaways for me were about having grace for each other, handling what you can handle, and creating an environment to be able to do that–the space and stillness to hear your own heart and mind. Then, honoring that and not letting it get swept away by anything else,” he reveals. “Those were my basic discoveries through that process and what I hope to take away and build from. The record was a long-winded way of me getting to that basic state of mind and hopefully serving as a reminder when I get off track, which I most certainly will.”
Finding Connection and Growth Through Grace
It’s no secret that we’re living in a deeply divided world. Disagreements among friends and family members can quickly become estrangement or constant arguments. Hayes Carll is not immune to this. However, he’s trying to turn down the heat and find as much common ground with other people instead of looking for the next hard line to draw.
“I have friends and neighbors that I disagree with politically or have whatever issue with. I just find that I do better when I try to find the good in people rather than my differences with them,” Carll says. “That doesn’t mean surrendering my integrity or my beliefs or standing up for what I believe in. But it does mean that those ideas and opinions aren’t all that I am, and if I make them all that I am or make somebody else’s politics or belief systems all that they are, I’m losing out on a lot of potential goodness,” he explains.
“Again, it’s a bit of a reminder for myself because it’s hard to stay in a positive place about humanity and a lot of your fellow citizens in this time when everyone is leading with their outrage and their anger and their demonizing of people,” Carll adds.
“It’s not that there are not things to be outraged about. It’s just that if we lead with that and that’s all that we see people as and it’s all we’re seen as, we’re doing everybody a disservice,” he says, clarifying his position.
Hayes Carll Finds Common Ground Through Common Goals
At the end of the day, Hayes Carll believes that most people want the same thing. However, it may look different for some.
“I think we all want what’s best for our family and friends and community and country. I think, at heart, people are good and I can vehemently disagree with them about something and, for the most part, it doesn’t mean that they’re bad people,” he explains. “They’re just operating under their circumstances and their belief systems. It goes back to the whole idea of grace. I can disagree, but I don’t have to demonize your whole process. There’s a lot of good in everybody, I believe.”
We’re Only Human is available to stream across digital platforms now.
Featured Image via All Eyes Media
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