Dylan Jakobsen is giving PopCulture.com readers an exclusive first look at the lyric video “In America.” The song is from his upcoming I Am album, out on Friday, March 8.
“It’s kind of crazy that ‘In America’ is the first single off my upcoming album, because it was written over four years ago,” Jakobsen told PopCulture.com. “Right after I graduated, I went on my first tour ever and, thankfully, one of the last I planned myself. It was super cool in the respect that it was me and four of my friends playing music and touring down the west coast together – a lot of crazy memories were made.
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“That tour was definitely more coffee shops and frat lawn parties than venues, but it’s forever engrained in my mind and it’s an experience I wish everyone can have,” he added. “That’s where the idea for the song came from.”
Much of his travels are captured in the video for “In America,” even though that wasn’t his original intent.
“We’ve actually have been shooting this lyric video unintentionally for quite a few months now,” Jakobsen revealed. “All the footage you see are shots we took on our iPhones across America and we thought it’d be super cool to show the true beauty of seeing the country beyond the tourist attractions and landmarks that most people want to see!”
The Seattle native included “In America” on I Am, in part because it helps tell the story that unfolds throughout all of the songs on the record.
“I’ve been sitting on ‘In America’ — I wanted to make sure I had the right group of songs for it to fit into,” Jakobsen explained. “Taking such a personal road with this album, it felt time to put out a song that not only relates to my life on the road seeing the country, but also something that I think every person should experience — traveling America in their lifetime.”
Jakobsen has spent the past several years touring all over both the United States and abroad, including in Canada, the U.K. and Australia, performing both his solo shows and opening for artists like LOCASH, Cody Johnson, Drake White and more. His journey over the past several years comes out in all of the songs on I Am.
“This album is really a piece of my soul,” explained the singer. “I Am is the closest representation to who I am I think I could ever get. When I was eight, I learned guitar, and by age 12 I’d picked up drums, bass — you name it — and started laying down my own songs on a little Tascam 8-track. Now, at 25, I’m proud to say after years of practice, I have several instruments under my belt. And honestly, I’ve never been so proud to say I wrote, produced and tracked 100 percent of I Am in my home studio. That’s a feeling I can’t quite explain.”
I Am is a concept album, reflecting Jakobsen’s life in each of the tracks, becoming an arduous — and time-consuming — process that ended up better than even Jakobsen imagined.
“The songs are a huge part of my story,” Jakobsen reflected. “I’d actually started recording the album, got about halfway done, had already picked the first single and showed my team, the band started learning the tracks, and then I just realized it wasn’t me. We scrapped just about every song but the title track and I went back to the drawing board. Over half the songs came to me in about a two-three week period of writing this past fall, and the others came from rehashing old lyrics and melodies from my song books over the years.”
Although initially deterred by the setback, in hindsight Jakobsen insists it’s the best thing that happened to him.
“I basically locked myself in my studio and came out four months later with one of the purest pieces of me,” said Jakobsen. “I genuinely love every song — there isn’t one that doesn’t hold a special place in my heart. When you pick up the physical copy you get two bonus tracks that won’t ever be available online because we wanted the physical to bring this album to life.
“From the artwork, to the handwritten message in the middle, to the photo album booklet we put together to show my journey through all the best and most awkward stages over the past 25 years — every detail is me,” he continued. “And I’m so excited to show the world that.”
Pre-order I Am at his official website.
Photo Credit: Getty images/Mat Hayward
