Grammy-winning bluegrass band The SteelDrivers return today (May 23) with their seventh studio album, Outrun. More than a continuation of the Nashville-based group’s legendary catalog, it marks a major turning point for them. Outrun is their first release on the iconic Sun Records label.
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Ahead of today’s release, The SteelDrivers’ fiddle player and songwriter, Tammy Rogers, sat down with American Songwriter to talk about Outrun, working with Sun Records, and more.
Tammy Rogers on The SteelDrivers’ Partnership with Sun Records
Sun Records is one of the most iconic labels in the history of American music. Their early roster included Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash, Carl Perkins, Roy Orbison, and many more. With that in mind, we had to ask Tammy Rogers how it felt for The SteelDrivers to release an album on the label.
“You mean to be labelmates with Elvis Presley?” she asks with a laugh. “It’s unbelievable. I think all of us who are lifers in this business get up every day, and you get your coffee and you get to work. It just becomes the fabric of what you do and what you’ve done,” she says. “Sometimes it’s hard to sit down and take stock of, ‘Wow! This is iconic.’”
The band’s partnership with Sun is good for the fans, too. The label reaching out spurred them to make Outrun. “We didn’t know if we were going to do another record. We don’t do records that often,” Rogers says. “Most of the time, there’s at least two or three years in between, and it’s stretched as far as five years at some points,” she adds. “We’ve always been very song-driven and have remained committed to that all the way through the history of the band. So, we’re not just going to put out a record to try to generate money or create buzz for a tour. It has to be the right material. So, it was just kind of crazy when we got the call that Sun Records wanted to talk to us about a possible collaboration. It was like how do we not do that?” Rogers explains.
Putting Songs Together for Outrun
The SteelDivers had no intentions of making a new album before the offer from Sun came along. However, they didn’t have to worry about not having enough songs for the new project.
“As far as the material goes, I write all the time. I have been writing since I was 15. So, it’s rare that a few weeks go by and I don’t write something. So, when it comes time to put a record together, I always have a bunch of songs laying around. I can’t think of a time when I couldn’t go, ‘Okay guys, here’s 25 songs. Check ‘em out and see what you think,” Tammy Rogers explains.
“When we decided to move forward with the record, it was like let me reach out to some of my best buddies and favorite co-writers and write specifically for the project. So, along with having this library of older songs, just getting down to it and getting to it and writing some new stuff. The album is a combination of some old songs and some very recent songs,” she says of the range of songs on Outrun.
“The title track, I just happened to run into Leslie Satcher at a social event literally the week before we were going to do the record. I hadn’t seen her for a couple of years, and I walked up to her and said, ‘Leslie, the SteelDrivers are going to record and we don’t have a Leslie co-write!’ She said, ‘I’m open Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday.’ We got together on Tuesday and wrote two songs. The second one became the title track.”
How The SteelDrivers Keep Their Sound Alive
The SteelDrivers have seen many lineup changes since forming in 2005. At the same time, they’ve evolved sonically over the years. However, their core sound has remained the same. Tammy Rogers explained how they’ve kept their signature sound alive for more two decades.
“I think a big part of that is really, really knowing what the band is all about,” Rogers begins. “We’re fortunate in that we have three core members who have been there from the very beginning. Mike Fleming, the bass player, and Richard Bailey, the banjo player,” she explains. Rogers is the other core member who has been with the SteelDrivers since the band’s inception.
“I’ve said this before, and I’ll say it again, Richard Bailey is the secret sauce that makes it all work. His banjo playing is so integral to the sound and to the groove that if he’s not there, it doesn’t work,” Rogers says. “That has been the deal from the very beginning. Yes, we had Chris Stapleton and that voice, which really defined the vocal sound. I was singing the harmony, and Mike Fleming was singing the other harmony part. So, we had a three-part harmony, and that part is still intact. So, there have been key elements to the music that have maintained that consistency through the years,” she explains. “It’s just been a matter of continuing to write songs that not only fit that original intent but have expanded it and pushed it in different directions as well.”
It’s obvious the SteelDrivers have adhered to that core ethos on the new record. Their Sun Records debut, Outrun, is available to stream across digital platforms today.
Featured Image by Paul A Hebert/Shutterstock
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