26 February 2020

Just a year after his last release, Willie Nelson will be putting out a new album on April 24, which will be titled ‘First Rose of Spring’. You can pre-order the album here. Last summer, iconic star Nelson released ‘Ride Me Back Home’, of which the title track won Best Country Solo Performance at the recent Grammy Awards, but his immediate return to the studio for a new record will come as a surprise to many. While Nelson has joined forces with his long-time associate Buddy Cannon, ‘First Rose of Spring’ has also seen him work with a number of younger songwriters, while he will also cover Our Song by Chris Stapleton. The tracklisting for ‘First Rose of Spring’ by Willie Nelson is: 1. First Rose of Spring – (Randy Houser, Allen Shamblin, Mark Beeson) 2. Blue Star – (Willie Nelson, Buddy Cannon) 3. I’ll Break Out Again Tonight – (Sanger ‘Whitey’ Shafer, Doodle Owens) 4. Don’t Let The Old Man In – (Toby Keith) 5. Just Bummin’ Around – (Pete Graves) 6. Our Song – (Chris Stapleton) 7. We Are the Cowboys – (Billy Joe Shaver) 8. Stealing Home (Marla Cannon-Goodman, Casey Beathard, Don Sampson) 9. I’m The Only Hell My Mama Ever Raised – (Wayne Kemp, Bobby Borchers, Mack Vickery) 10. Love Just Laughed –(Nelson, Cannon) 11. Yesterday When I Was Young (Hier Encore) – (Charles Aznavour, Herbert Kretzmer)

Nashville based duo Haley & Michaels have released their first UK radio single in the shape of fan favourite Drinking About You. You can listen to the song here. The song was co-written with Jeff Cohen (Sugarland, The Shires) and Zach Abend (Chris Lane, Filmore) and had gained a fair bit of traction in the US and beyond before being cherry picked as a single, with two million streams to its name on Spotify alone. Speaking about the song, Haley & Michaels – made up of Shannon Haley and Ryan Michaels – said that the song is indicative of their sound and representative of them as musicians, while they also tried to incorporate as many influences as they possible could within the song. “Drinking About You really defines our sound and who we are as artists and songwriter,” the duo said. “We really wanted to capture both perspectives in a relationship in a way that highlights the raw honesty of country songs and also incorporates all of our musical influences in Country, Pop and Rock N’ Roll. We’re really excited to have this song as our first release in the UK!” Haley & Michaels will be at C2C this year for a number of performances and have just added another one for the Sunday in London, where they will partake in an acoustic set as part of the Country Hits Radio Sessions.