Country music duo Sugarland eyes ‘Bigger’ ambitions
It’s a father-daughter moment embedded in a song of the times, one intended to be as resonant as the tornado-siren-powerful voice that delivers it.
The week that the youngest of his two children turns 13, Kristian Bush — one half of country music duo Sugarland — will also commemorate the release of the group’s latest record, “Bigger,” its first in eight years.
The album carries a tricky objective: “finding ways to communicate with people about what’s going on in the world around us without being political,” says Bush, an affable, bright-voiced conversationalist.
When composing the record’s title track, Bush was particularly mindful of his daughter.
“I was very conscious of, ‘What do I want her to hear? How do I explain to her what’s been happening, all the #MeToo stuff, the (Harvey) Weinstein stuff?’ ” Bush recalls from a tour stop in Anaheim, California. “Kids have really short attention spans and you teach them by repetition. ‘What do I want to repeat at her?’ ”
The answer: “You’re going to be bigger than this. Don’t let this information contain you. This is not your only definition. You’re so much more than the thing in front of you,” he says. “How do you tell your child that? My best bet was, put it in a song, put it out in the world, and see if anybody will sing it back to you.”
For a little more than a month now, sizable crowds have been doing just that, as Sugarland has been opening its “Still the Same” arena tour with the song in question.
The tune is a fitting tone-setter for where Sugarland is at these days. Breezily anthemic, with singer-songwriter Jennifer Nettles exuding an off-handed soulfulness, it’s a country-pop pick-me-up that promises “we were born for better days.”
Country comeback
“Bigger” is an exclamation that punctuates the end of a five-year hiatus. Sugarland recessed after completing the touring cycle for 2010’s “The Incredible Machine,” a polarizing record among some country partisans for its arena rock leanings and polished pop sheen.
“When we rolled into that little writing room, there was just no fear, because we had gone through our baptism of fire from the album where they all looked at us funny,” Bush says of commencing work on “Bigger” after the mixed reception to “Machine.”
But to hear Bush tell it, Sugarland might not have reached this point without the anything-goes approach of its last record.
“There’s a scariness to getting into your career far enough that there’s nobody left to tell you no,” says Bush, 48. “There’s a certain amount of self-awareness that happens in an artist’s life. I know that I’ve felt it a few times where you’re staring at this spaceship of a recording environment, and there’s nobody there except you and your partner, and you can kind of go anywhere you want.
“ ‘Incredible Machine,’ that’s such an interesting point in the turn from country music into pop,” he adds. “It was right before bro country hit. As it exists, I’m super proud of it. But I really can’t wait for another eight years or something before I listen to it again and go, ‘Holy smokes, what was that? What were we even thinking?’ And I think without that, you wouldn’t get what you’re going to get (with ‘Bigger’).”
‘You get on a treadmill’
Before that five-year break, Sugarland had been working at a feverish clip, releasing an album every two years, beginning with its 2004 debut, “Twice the Speed of Life,” and touring heavily.
Bush acknowledges the toll that kind of lifestyle can take — he cites his 2011 divorce as an example — but he embraces the process instead of bemoaning it.
“You work your whole life to get a break, and during that time, you’ll try anything you can,” he says. “You learn this (reflex) of just constantly throwing darts to see if you can hit one. And then when you hit one, that (reflex) doesn’t stop.
“It’s the psychology of creativity: You get anxious if you’re not creating at the same speed that got you there,” he adds. “You get on a treadmill that doesn’t allow you to really stop. It can be immersive. And I think that’s good. It’s a little bit of a luxury to sit around and talk about the breakneck pace. Get on the rocket and ride. Don’t complain. Put on your flight suit and go.”
This spirit informs “Bigger,” which doesn’t push as hard against the bounds of contemporary country as its predecessor. But that’s partly because the music has evolved in the direction that record foreshadowed eight years ago.
Sugarland has always been an across-the-aisle kind of band.
The goal: being just as capable of building an audience outside country music circles as within them.
“At some point, you’ve got decide if you’re going to close yourself off to new fans or you open up your hands to new fans,” Bush says. “We’ve always been an open-up-your-hands-to-new-fans band.”
Contact Jason Bracelin at jbracelin@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0476. Follow @JasonBracelin on Twitter.
