Eric Church dropped his first taste of new music since 2015 to fans. The lead single and title track of Church’s forthcoming Desperate Man album (October 5) leaves fans excited and curious to see what directions he’s taken on his new project.
Co-written with Ray Wylie Hubbard (who released his own album, Tell The Devil That I’m Getting There As Fast As I Can, last year), both writers have their own stories about how the song came about. Per Church himself, the October 2017 shooting at the Route 91 Harvest festival in Las Vegas affected him greatly.
“I was a little lost for a while. I think like a lot of people I was in a little bit of a funk after something like that,” he says. “I was still a little burned out. A little bit going through the motions. I think that’s part of what happened when I first went into the studio, is I still wasn’t quite ready to get there.”
Hubbard said on Twitter: “Eric said lets write about a desperate man. I said I once was so desperate I went to a fortune teller to get my future read and she said I didn’t have one. He smiled, laid down a groove and we rode it to town.”
With Mr. Misunderstood in 2015, Church released the album as a total surprise to his Church Choir fan club before it hit the market, and with Desperate Man, he did the same thing. The single was available to stream for fan club members last Thursday before being officially released the next day. Fan club members will also receive the album on October 5 for free. The album will once again be produced by Jay Joyce.
Church has a history of releasing unique lead singles, and this is no exception. “Homeboy” saw him tackling a dark rocker track that spoke to family issues and peaked at #13 prior to the release of 2011’s Chief. “The Outsiders” saw him embracing full-on heavy metal for the 2014 album of the same name. “Mr. Misunderstood” also peaked at #15 despite featuring an upbeat, catchy sound. It’s clear by now that Church is looking to be himself with his music, and “Desperate Man” is certainly that. With its swampy, southern-rock sound that has nods to The Rolling Stones and Creedence Clearwater Revival, “Desperate Man” is sure to be a track that’s on repeat until the album drops this October.