Darius Rucker's New Album Has a Very Personal Title
Darius Rucker has unveiled the name of his new album and it has a very personal title. The country music superstar revealed that his new record is titled Carolyn's Boy, after his mother. "At the end of the day, I'm really still just Carolyn's Boy," Rucker said in a press release following a Today show interview with anchor Craig Melvin, wherein he announced the album's title for the first time.
"I wanted to name the record Carolyn's Boy because Mom never got to see any of my success," Rucker said of choosing the album title. "She died before any of this happened, so it's just another homage to the greatest woman I've ever known." Melvins inquired as to why the musician choose this time to memorialize his mother through his craft. "Years ago, I wasn't really sure what my place in Country music was," Rucker said, "and I was trying to find it. Now I have found it – I know – and I think it's time to give that record."
In a subsequent Instagram post, Rucker shared the album's cover, which features an old photo of his late mom — seen above — who died from a heart attack in 1992. "Thanks to the [the Today show] for hanging with me this morning and revealing the title of my new album, Carolyn's Boy," Rucker wrote in the post's caption. "It's an homage to my mom, the greatest woman I've ever known! I can't wait for you all to hear it next year."
Previously, Rucker spoke with Holler about his career, teasing that new music was on the horizon. "Oh, I'm very excited. I had a lot of stuff to write about on this record," he said. "What's been crazy for everybody has been crazy for me. So I had a lot of stuff I wanted to write about, and I just can't wait for people to hear it. I'm still in that place where I still listen to it a lot. When you're making a record, you listen to it so much. I just think we've written some amazing songs – like my next single, which is ready to come out."
Elaborating, Rucker said, "I wrote it with the same guys I wrote 'Beers and Sunshine' with. It all started when J.T. [Harding] was listening to me on a radio interview; they asked me if I was learning something new during the pandemic. I said, 'Yeah, I'm trying to learn a piano', they asked if I was any good and I just said, "I can't play piano, like Ray Charles". That stuck with him, so we wrote a song around that." At this time, Rucker does not appear to have announced an official premiere date for Carolyn's Boy.