{"id":2452821,"date":"2020-01-02T13:52:00","date_gmt":"2020-01-02T20:52:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.aspentimes.com\/news\/aaron-watson-discusses-red-bandana-in-advance-of-aspen-show\/"},"modified":"2020-01-02T13:52:00","modified_gmt":"2020-01-02T20:52:00","slug":"aaron-watson-discusses-red-bandana-in-advance-of-aspen-show","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/local-news\/aaron-watson-discusses-red-bandana-in-advance-of-aspen-show\/","title":{"rendered":"Aaron Watson discusses \u2018Red Bandana\u2019 in advance of Aspen show"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
Aaron Watson will play Belly Up Aspen on Tuesday.<\/strong>
Courtesy photo<\/em><\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

Aaron Watson hasn\u2019t been sleeping well for the last couple years.<\/p>\n

But the Red Dirt country star doesn\u2019t have chronic insomnia. He\u2019s sleepless from songwriting.<\/p>\n

The sleep deprivation began when Watson started trying to write songs on his Texas ranch, aiming at following up 2017\u2019s \u201cVaquero.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cGetting up really early every morning before the kids get up, before my wife gets up and writing, writing, writing. I don\u2019t think I\u2019ve slept that well for the last two years,\u201d Watson, who will headline Belly Up Aspen on Tuesday, said in a recent phone interview. \u201cI\u2019d wake up at 4 a.m. and go \u2018there\u2019s a song in my head.\u2019 I\u2019ve kept that going. I\u2019ve already written a bunch of new songs. I might never sleep right again.\u201d<\/p>\n

The first batch of songs Watson wrote make up \u201cRed Bandana,\u201d the album the independent Watson released on his Big Label in June.<\/p>\n

\u201cI just kind of had this idea \u2013 20 songs for 20 years I\u2019ve been doing this,\u201d Watson said. \u201cThis is a way of saying thank you to the fans. I know everybody\u2019s saying albums are a thing of the past and they\u2019re putting out three-song EPs, five songs, single. I just wanted to give my fans a bunch of music they can enjoy.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cRed Bandana\u201d opens with \u201cGhost of Guy Clark,\u201d in which Watson imagines the legendary Texas songwriter evaluating Watson\u2019s work \u2013 and not always in the most positive way.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s my hero,\u201d Watson said. \u201cI love (Paul) McCartney, John Lennon, (Bob) Dylan, (Bruce) Springsteen. But Guy Clark was the best. His songwriting is timeless. It doesn\u2019t get old. Honestly, it\u2019s like The Beatles, there\u2019s something about Guy Clark\u2019s songs, I\u2019ve listened to them hundreds of times and they never get old and it\u2019s just a guy and his guitar.<\/p>\n

\u201cI share Guy with a lot of new songwriters when they ask me about how to write songs,\u201d he added. \u201cFirst of all, you need to write. Then you need to listen if you want to be a better songwriter, listen to their songs, pay attention to what they\u2019re doing. I\u2019ve gone to the school of Guy Clark, just by listening. He\u2019s who I want to be when I grow up.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cGhost of Guy Clark,\u201d however, isn\u2019t really about Clark.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat song is kind of a manifesto,\u201d Watson said. \u201cThat\u2019s a song I wrote, telling me I need to stick to myself, to what I do. Staying independent, there are a lot of perks and there are a lot of obstacles. It doesn\u2019t matter how good the song is, if you\u2019re not signed to a major label, you\u2019ve decreased the odds of getting mainstream airplay about a million percent. But that song is about staying true to your brand, no matter what.\u201d<\/p>\n

Unusually structured \u2013 it doesn\u2019t have a chorus \u2013 \u201cGhost of Guy Clark\u201d starts an album that\u2019s got instrumentals, fun little numbers, a tune about cowboy poet\/singer Red Stegall, love songs and moments of self-reflection.<\/p>\n

\u201cI wanted to stay true to my brand of music, but I wanted to add different flavors,\u201d Watson said \u201cRed Bandana.\u201d I wanted to give them something better to be honest. I really pushed myself to be a better writer.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cRed Bandana,\u201d which debuted at No. 7 on the country charts, accomplished that goal \u2013 they\u2019re some of the best songs Watson has written. But it\u2019s caused him to look back at his earlier songs, including \u201cOutta Style,\u201d his top 10 hit from \u201cVaquero.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI think those songs are still good. I\u2019m so proud of them, but I see there\u2019s fat that I could have trimmed off,\u201d Watson said \u201cMaybe that\u2019s the key to it, to write just what it needs to be. I wasn\u2019t at that point in my career then. I think I\u2019m getting there now.\u201d<\/p>\n

Part of it of the reason Watson is \u201cgetting there\u201d stems from a change in his songwriting philosophy \u2013 \u201cYou stop going after a hit and you start going after your heart,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Then the songs, he said, start to appear more often \u2014 to the point where they can\u2019t be turned off.<\/p>\n

\u201cSong ideas, while they might be more challenging, I feel like they\u2019re coming a little more easy,\u201d Watson said. \u201cI guess that\u2019s honing your craft. My wife will say to me, \u2018You used to play golf, you used to like going out to hunt, you used to do this and do that. Now you\u2019re just writing songs.\u2019 I\u2019m still doing what I really want to do.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou don\u2019t have a choice. Even when I do play golf, I\u2019m still writing songs,\u201d he said. \u201cI can\u2019t turn off my brain. I can\u2019t even chill out. But I love it. For me, the most satisfying thing is finishing that song. For those brief minutes after, my life is complete. Then I start on another one.\u201d<\/p>\n

Writing songs, not recording them, is what Watson wanted to do when he gave up baseball for guitar and started working under the influence of George Jones, Merle Haggard and Willie Nelson.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy dream was never to be some big Nashville star,\u201d he said. \u201cThat was never my dream. My career as an artist is much bigger than I ever expected it to be. I wanted to be a songwriter, that guy who lived out on a ranch and wrote songs and messed with his cows all day. But no one would cut my songs, so I had to.\u201d<\/p>\n

That started in 1999 with the appropriately titled \u201cSinger\/Songwriter\u201d and has continued through 15 albums, including 2015\u2019s \u201cThe Underdog,\u201d the first independent album to top the country charts.<\/p>\n

Watson\u2019s albums include live records, evidence of the acclaimed live show that has built Watson\u2019s audience outside of Texas and Oklahoma<\/p>\n

\u201cThe live show is good,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019m really starting to hit my stride as a performer and the band is great. I always say if they had a good singer, they could really go someplace.\u201d<\/p>\n

via:: The Aspen Times<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Aaron Watson will play Belly Up Aspen on Tuesday.Courtesy photo Aaron Watson hasn\u2019t been sleeping well for the last couple years. But the Red Dirt country star doesn\u2019t have chronic insomnia. He\u2019s sleepless from songwriting. The sleep deprivation began when Watson started trying to write songs on his Texas ranch, aiming at following up 2017\u2019s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2452821","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-local-news"],"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-08-18 23:04:49","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSPN The Valley's Quality Rock","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2452821","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2452821"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2452821\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2452821"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2452821"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2452821"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}