Chase Rice has been on a new musical journey for the past few years, and he says that what he’s doing now is “so much better than” his older music. Always a man of strong candor, PopCulture.com had a chance to chat with Rice in support of his brand new independent album, Go Down Singin’ —which features the scorching outlaw track “Haw River” — and he did not hold back when it came to sharing his feelings on the difference between his early years and now.
In early 2023, Rice dropped <a data-shortcode="link" data-label="Chase Rice Made the Best Country Album of the Year By Not 'Faking S— Anymore' (Exclusive Interview)" data-asset-type="article" data-uuid="889299cd-c579-43af-92f1-7e95903e8e92" data-slug="chase-rice-made-the-best-country-album-of-the-year-by-not-faking-s-anymore-exclusive-interview" data-link-text="I Hate Cowboys and All Dogs Go to Hell” data-target=”_blank” data-href=”https://cms.cbssports.com/content/article/889299cd-c579-43af-92f1-7e95903e8e92/version/us” data-edition=”us” href=”/country-music/news/chase-rice-made-the-best-country-album-of-the-year-by-not-faking-s-anymore-exclusive-interview/”>I Hate Cowboys and All Dogs Go to Hell, the country music star’s sixth studio album but the first of a new era in his career. The album is grittier and much less polished than Rice’s previous work, and there was no denying that he was making a statement about who he is as an artist. The near night-and-day change is rivaled only by that of country heroes like Waylon Jennings and Willie Nelson, two men who began their careers as clean-cut young men but ultimately went on soul-searching and wound up finding themselves as leaders of Outlaw Country.
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If you had to pinpoint a song on Go Down Singin’ that captures this conversion for Rice, we’d probably say that it’s “Oh Tennessee,” which finds him reflecting on his career without rose-colored glasses. “I was getting to the end of my rope with my record label,” Rice says about where he was while writing the tune, “and I was getting to the end of my rope with myself about the way I chose to go about the last 10 years.”
“I did everything the way I thought was right,” he continued. “Came to Nashville. Got the success early, squandered the success early… and I feel like it just screwed up everything in my life. It screwed up my personal life. It screwed up who I am as a dude. It screwed up who I was as an artist.”
In the song, Florida-born and North Carolina-raised Rice sings to “Tennessee” about giving “everything I had to you,” only to get “sex, booze, and self-abuse” in return. While the Volunteer State is the object of Rice’s justifiable ire here, it’s clear that he’s speaking to much more than that… temptations in disguise, faceless record executives, the callousness of the music industry as a whole, and even himself. “You’re blaming the state, you’re blaming the people,” Rice said, “when in reality you only have yourself to blame.”
Finally, sharing how he feels about the songs on Go Down Singin’, Rice said, “It’s so much better than what I used to do, and I’m OK with saying that,” then added that he hopes “people dig it.” Rice clarified that he believes it’s important to “honor the past, and honor my journey” but asserted, “There’s not a chance in hell I’m changing what I’m doing, so people can get on board or don’t.”
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