David Archuleta wants to get you up on your feet this summer with his vibrant new single “Movin’” that has the 30-year-old evolving a great deal from his breakout smash hit “Crush” 13 years ago, which has since amassed more than 130 million streams on Spotify and 127 million views on YouTube. But is the upbeat summer track just a tease of more new music to come? While dishing on his latest single with PopCulture.com, Archuleta addresses whether the smooth dance track alongside other hits like, “Losin’ Sleep” and “Be That for You” will be part of a new record.
“I was just kind of releasing a song at a time as I wrote them. That way I felt like they were more fresh. But maybe I can,” the former American Idol star admits to PopCulture. “I was talking to my manager — I’m like, ‘Hey, maybe I can add a couple of songs and then put an EP out’ because I still have a couple more and I’m like, ‘Oh, I’m running out of time this year to release them.’ I’m like, ‘Well, maybe I can just place them all together, so people have something for our 2021.’”
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One of those tracks happens to be “Movin’,” his latest single all about having fun and challenging himself as seen in the music video where the singer-songwriter lets loose with a bit of dancing. “I don’t consider myself a natural dancer, but I have been taking choreography classes so that I can learn how to move better,” he said. “I get stiff in my shoulders and my back and hips. I have to practice that. But I want to try it more because I do like to dance. I love it. I just want to get better at it. So, this is just to push myself out of my comfort zone.”
The spirited, flirty track that blends a bit of spice to his usual style of music was written by Archuleta and co-writers, Michael Campbell and Nate Dodge — the latter of whom collaborated with the Nashville resident on his most intimate and honest album released last summer. “[Nate’s] someone I first started working with on my Therapy Sessions album. He was producer for my songs “Paralyzed” and “Just Breathe” and so then now, my friend Michael, he’s from Scotland,” Archuleta said, imitating a Scottish accent. “I just met him online! I’d never met him in person, but he would post songs that he would write. I’m like, ‘Oh my gosh, these were really moving for me.’ And so I was like, ‘Why don’t we do a writing session sometime?’ And he’s like, ‘Sure. Yeah.’”
From there, Archuleta says the rest came about like kismet, falling into place after the three got together on a WhatsApp call. “[Nate] started playing the track, but it was more groovy and dance-y. I was like, I wonder if Michael will be able to write this kind of music. I’ve never heard him write this kind. […] But he’s just a gifted writer and we came up with ‘Movin” because I wanted to do something fun,” he said. “2020 was kind of a heavier year. It was therapy and mental health and healing from that and figuring myself out and I was like 2021, I just want to have fun after a heavy year for the world with the pandemic too — I just want to give people fun. Something a little more lighthearted.”
He further admits “that was the point” of the new single, “just to get people moving and feeling good” with a danceable track. With Archuleta being most humbly creative and open to new sounds, he admits he was also quite taken with the “After Hours” remix inspired by Dodge. Teasing how he’s a “super indecisive person,” the singer adds it came to be after the writer sent him another mix. “He was like, ‘I experimented with it and I just took a completely different take on it. What do you think of this, taking it this way?’ And I was like, ‘Well, I really like this too.’ I’m like, ‘But I don’t know if I can go one over the other.’ I’m like, ‘Maybe I can have my fans vote for one.’ But then I was like, you know what? I’m just going to release both because I like both of them and I can’t decide, so I did.”
Since coming in second on American Idol‘s seventh season in 2008, the singer-songwriter has evolved greatly as an artist over the years with the cool new track being proof of his progression as a seasoned artist as fans gush over the mature sound. For Archuleta who is singing and songwriting his way through the music industry after more than a decade, it’s been both humbling and a better way to connect with himself. “I didn’t know I was allowed to write about what I actually wanted to talk about, because in the beginning, it was like, ‘Well, you need to write hit songs or you need to sing hit songs. And hit songs usually talk about this kind of stuff.’ And I was like, ‘Well, what about this song as an example?’ Or they’re like, ‘Oh, that’s out of the ordinary, that’s once in a blue moon, those are not common. So you’ve got to write about this kind of stuff,’” he said. “I thought, okay, I need to write about this kind of stuff. But as I got older, I realized, you know what, you can even try and write those hit songs and they’re not always going to be hits. Even a hit song is once in a blue moon, it seems.”
Archuleta adds it’s all about his own personal development as both a musician and an individual who wants to connect with fans and listeners through profound feelings and words. “If I want to feel fulfilled in what I’m doing, I don’t feel like I’m just here to be famous and be popular and do whatever I can to do that. Singing brings me relief,” he said. “It brings me healing and that’s why I love it. So why not try and share that with other people? Maybe I can bring yeah, sure, fun stuff too — I like to do fun songs. But I want to bring them healing and relief because that’s why I love music.”
With fun and his fans at the forefront of his mind, Archuleta rescheduled last year’s tour for 2022 but will keep a close eye on events as they transpire this fall. “[The tour is] supposed to still happen. I just never know because we don’t know how it’s going with the new Delta variant and I had some shows coming up just this month and next month that are already being postponed for next year because of the new rules and the state’s that they’re in,” he said. “So, I don’t know. We’re just kind of taking it a day at a time. I thought I was going to be on tour last year, I thought I was going to tour this year. I’m hoping for next year, but I think we just have to keep an eye on this Delta variant.”
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