Sturgill Simpson Sheds Light on 'A Sailor's Guide to Earth,' Shares New Single

Published Mar 03, 2016

Ahead of further details, Simpson offered up a taste of what's to come with new single "Brace for Impact (Live a Little)."

Psych-country songwriter Sturgill Simpson impressed fans of the genre back in 2014 with the release of his sophomore Metamodern Sounds in Country Music . In anticipation of his follow-up record, the Nashville-based performer appeared on Zane Lowe's Beats 1 radio show to shed some light on his forthcoming effort A Sailor's Guide to Earth."I wanted to express a lot of influences outside of country music, I think there's a lot of room to explore in terms of sonic templates in the genre," he told Lowe. "If there was any intentional approach it was that I wanted to sort of reverse engineer the song craft this time around. In country music especially, it can get very formulaic. You have to have your verses and a chorus but a lot of these songs were written as plain and simple poetry on the road. I decided I was going to frame those poems to music in the studio."When asked if he entered the studio with a renewed confidence after the success of Metamodern, Simpson was candid in his response. "I'm still pretty scared. If I didn't feel this way then I'd be worried," he admitted. "This record came from a lot of me figuring out my place in that world while it was all happening. We already did Metamodern... so I didn't want to make another psychedelic country album. The band's off the charts, we're just ready to go out and do it."Read through the tracklisting the track and conversation with Lowe in the players below.A Sailor's Guide to Earth:1. Welcome to Earth (Pollywog)2. Breakers Roar3. Keep It Between The Lines4. Sea Stories5. In Bloom6. Brace For Impact (Live A Little)7. All Around You8. Oh Sarah9. Call To Arms