While journeying through the creation of his new album, Different Shade of Blue, out today, Nashville-based singer-songwriter Nate Fredrick’s outlook changed: “Somewhere in trying to figure out how to craft a good song, I figured out how not to just write a pile of sad songs,” he says.
“A friend and I were running from the police one night, and I accidentally fell off a cliff,” Fredrick says. “During the two-year recovery process, I started actually making music instead of just playing music. The first show I ever had, I played with my jaw wired shut.”
After moving to Nashville from his native Missouri, Fredrick wrote more than 100 songs over the next two years. “The album eventually came to encapsulate something bigger than me,” he says. “I was lucky enough to be surrounded by people who were willing to grow together. It’s a culmination of the best I could give with a bunch of people who are now my best friends.”
Different Shade of Blue, recorded at Farmland Studios with producer David Dorn, offers 11 tracks that sound as familiar as what you might hear on a friend’s back porch with lyrics bound to get stuck in your head, as Fredrick works through his relationship to both himself and his home — where he’s from as well as Nashville, where he moved in 2015. Frederick learned to play guitar after his dad brought one home — that he never learned to play — when he was 12. But Fredrick didn’t start writing songs until a decade later.
You’ll hear his influences, such as Guy Clark, Creedence Clearwater Revival and Van Morrison in these songs, a certain familiarity with his own stories to tell in his own style.
“Be the One” kicks off the album with a Randy Newman-esque look at mutually beneficial relationships that — well, aren’t exactly relationships. “Different Shade of Blue,” reminisces on how the grass isn’t quite always greener on the other side, while “All Over You Again” creates a bit of clever wordplay.
“The Dreamer” is a nod of sorts to his songwriting heroes, Kris Kristofferson and Guy Clark, centering around a young man and the unattainable object of his affection. “Love Someone” proposes the idea that every relationship teaches us something — sometimes a difficult lesson. Wide Open Country noted the track “celebrates the beauty of learning to love.”
“Caroline” waxes poetic about that specific girl with a special aura about her, at once approachable and intimidating. “Forget Ever Loving Me” was inspired by unrequited love, or at least a joke about love, with Sounds Like Nashville noting its “soulful groove and steady heartbeat…whirring organ and classic guitar [that] give it a timeless feel,” noting “it’s the newcomer’s gritty, 100-percent-done vocal that steals the show.”
“Paducah” is a love letter of sorts to the process of finding yourself through miles spent on the highway, which Raised Rowdy noted offers “the sonic equivalent of the scene in which it is set; you can almost see the glow creeping up over the horizon, ready to cast pastel shades of coral and purple over the grey pavement.”
Written in March 2020, “To the Night” contemplates the difficulty of seeing the bright side sometimes, especially when there’s an unknown element. “Long Overdue” reflects on how good things come to those who wait.
“Patches” addresses moving on, told through three separate vignettes: an old pair of jeans, a hand-me-down car and a long relationship coming to an end. American Songwriter notes it’s “a quiet nod to the cycles we all go through in life… [with] melodies that slowly reel you into the body of the song.”
Different Shade of Blue may be Fredrick’s introduction, but if these 11 songs and the energy they hold are any indication—there’s plenty more to come.
Different Shade of Blue Track Listing:
1. Be the One (Ryan Nelson, Nate Fredrick)
2. Different Shade of Blue (Matt Daniel, Nate Fredrick)
3. All Over You Again (Ben Chapman, Matt McKinney, Nate Fredrick)
4. The Dreamer (Ben Chapman, Matt Daniel, Nate Fredrick)
5. Love Someone (Vinnie Paolizzi, Nate Fredrick)
6. Caroline (Chad Bishop, Matt Daniel, Nate Fredrick)
7. Paducah (Harper O’Neill, Nate Fredrick)
8. To The Night (Nate Fredrick)
9. Forget Ever Loving Me (Nate Fredrick)
10. Long Overdue (Ryan Nelson, Nate Fredrick)
11. Patches (Joybeth Taylor, Nate Fredrick)
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