FIRST 5 - Start With These New Releases (May 14th)

These are the FIRST 5 new releases of the week that I think you should hear. Rather than wasting your limited weekend time listening to every new song, trying to weed out the bad ones like its your job…I did. Cuz it is my job.

Last week we went to the IG Live for a video version, this week I’m back with 5 tracks to hit first. Music is that fundamental building block that lets us all connect through similar experiences. I always open up about the memories or stories that a song pulls into my mind. If you’ve got similar stories and want to share, definitely do! I’m intrigued by everything, and like knowing more about people and how music is hitting us all. These aren’t the only new songs I love, just the ones I know you should hear right out the gate.

All the stuff I’m listening to is on my official playlist TY BENTLI’S DAILY SOUNDTRACK

First things first..
Here are the FIRST 5 new releases you should hear:

“Mood Ring” - Maddie & Tae

Did you have a mood ring?  My parents must have done a kickass job telling me “no” when I needed to hear it, because I felt like mood rings cost a gazillion dollars and were too expensive for anyone to actually buy.  It was like the level of getting a new Nintendo (which I do remember talking my dad into buying with his own birthday money).  Just next-level big deal if you had one. 

I vaguely remember being amazed when a mood ring showing up in our house (maybe my sister had it?).  I thought they were magical.  I also remember this particular ring always seeming to work and now the scientist-side of me wants to know HOW they worked?  How do they work!?

Do companies still make mood rings?  If they do, have they advanced with technology?  There’s a collar that will tell you what your dog is thinking, there must be a ring that can quickly warn me if my kids are about to erupt in a restaurant or poop their pants…

SIDENOTE (we’re doing these today): I went on that mood ring tangent because all of those questions are real, but also because I didn’t want to do another relationship story - but there was a girl that would erupt over nothing, then get even madder when I calmly apologized and explained that I didn’t realize that (whatever) was a problem and then she’d yell “why won’t you fight with me!” and storm out of my apartment.  Usually 5-10 minutes would pass, and then she’d be knocking on my door tell me she forgot her purse or lip gloss or to hit record on Grey’s Anatomy on my DVR or something and then we’d have a slightly calmer conversation on both sides and then it would be fine until the next weekly event.  She is and was an incredibly thoughtful and special person, but she is also very artistic and constantly needed to “feel things” - so that’s what I actually would’ve written about.

Maddie & Tae have fully locked in on their identity and are knocking it out of the park over and over the last few years.  Mood Ring pushes some boundaries on country music production.  M&T push into new territory on their harmony decisions, and this song is just so ruthless, when you really get down to it.  I love it!  A song can so innocently cut somebody right back down to size, and I’ll bet you’ve got somebody you want to share this with…

LISTEN ON APPLE MUSIC: “Mood Ring”

“Call It Country” - Travis Denning

I’ve never taken a survey on whether people consider my Midwest upbringing to be a “country.” I’d guess not - farms are different from hollers and I just kinda know I grew up in a state of small towns (technically two states that were filled with small towns - Iowa and South Dakota). I’ve never called myself ‘country.’ We didn’t have a lot of “woods” in the Great Plains - just long long long stretches of flat fields.

But that said, we had a Main Street that was filled with little shops, we had soy bean fields ands and definitely had corn fields. I had a favorite truck (Rams when I was a kid…Chevy now that I’m grown). Any elements of country that I was missing were filled in by watching Varsity Blues and listening to songs like what TD is delivering here!

I’m sitting here PROUD of Travis Denning on this one. He’s always got a knack for writing a song that’s catchy, clever and fun to listen to. This one, though…this is a classic country tune. Like a Hank Jr. jam. Travis normally delivers in an identifiable rasp, but here he is so deep in his pocket that you have to lean in and wait for the moment where you can prove its him. This is so authentically country that it feels like a cover off a deep cut. Nope. This is the guy!

LISTEN ON APPLE MUSIC: “Call it Country”

“Down By The Riverside” - Willie Jones

I wasn’t near the bayou or any southern rivers I used to hear about in songs like “Chattahoochee” but I was ride on the banks of the Missouri. As a kid, I actually spent a lot of time on boats - my parents had increasingly cool Bayliners that they docked at the marina in Sioux City, IA (where I was born and lived until I was 8). I have no idea how they afforded that as 20-something young parents, but my guess is that they prioritized the life of being on a boat and made it work. Whatever the case, I spent many nights as a kid sleeping on those boats, staked out on the banks of the Missouri.

The story that stands out strongest to me is the day that my dad’s friend, Barry, was out on the boat with us and made the exciting revelation that there was a beach covered in free frisbees! He was totally right! There were some sort of organic, nature-made frisbees covering the sand on the side of the Missouri. I hopped out of the boat (probably 5-6 years old) and my sister and I began tossing the frisbees around. I have no idea how long we were actually doing that (can kids estimate time?), but at some point my mom stepped out and realized what we were doing and was not thrilled to inform us that we had been chucking cow pies back and forth. That’s poop. Dried in a flat circle. Covered and baked in sand. This happened in the 80s, and I still want to wash my hands every time I think of it. But…that’s my riverside story. It was no San Antonio Riverwalk, it was the great flat Heartland. And somehow its also something I love having in my background. Not a ton of New Yorkers had stories to match that kind of experience. It gives me understanding on why even the dirtier sides of the life you know are the things you are proud to call yours!

WhileTravis Denning conjures up pickup trucks filled with letterman jackets riding through the middle of small town usa…Willie Jones identifies the life that he knows in verses that pull forth the picture of tall grass, hot sun and being so far off the beaten path that only someone who knows where there headed can find it. No GPS. The geographical marker where the most exciting parts of life unfold. Its unabashed, and challenges us to decide which side of the line most of the details falls on. But why judge? The lyrics acknowledge the grey area and the ease with which the same person can find themselves on either side of sainthood. Infectious beat, infectious phrasing and lyrics that add a layer every time you listen. I might even consider coming within 10 feet of the Cumberland just to test this life..

LISTEN ON APPLE MUSIC: “Down By The Riverside”

“California” - Alana Springsteen

I’ve lived this song. I’ve lived in California three times - all in Los Angeles. As a kid, I always dreamed of that - the possibilities that feel like they’re around every corner in LA. You can be working at Ralph’s one day, and the next you could be flying down the 405 in a Ferrari (a lot of my perception of Hollywood was based on Entourage).

Round one, I’d gotten so fed up with radio that I moved out to Los Angeles with a girlfriend I’d been dating in Austin, TX. I didn’t love California that time. I felt like everyone was thinking “what can you do for me?” That seemed to be how your value was established in that town, and its the opposite of my default. I was really broke during that period of my life - luckily finding a really great living situation and an interesting small record label job that afforded me the luxury of a movie ticket every weekend and very little else. After I found a group of friends who didn’t have that desperate “how can you help me” attitude and who are just kind, hilarious, and fun, I felt a lot happier there. Just in time for radio to chase me down and offer me a bigger radio job than I’d ever dreamed. I struggled with the decision to leave California. I was now becoming enchanted with it and the unpredictable possibilities it held. But I ended up flying to Chicago for an exploratory visit and fell even more in love with that city - it led to my first huge success in radio, and the only reason I ever left was…to return to California.

I got offered a promotion within radio and returned to LA in a very different circumstance. Now I wasn’t worried about finding a roommate, in fact I got my own 2-bedroom apartment just to give my dog some space to wander around inside. I could fly back to Chicago and see my friends, I had a kickass car (as opposed to the hand me down Mazda with the missing side-view mirror that I’d been driving the last time). I worked in The Valley - making traffic a lot less miserable. The old friends were there, and my radio job meant a lot more friendships and opportunities (several tv networks were actively finding a fit for me, amongst other great experiences in helping fundraise for causes I really wanted to help like MDA). And yet…something happened in my family that made me desperate to escape LA (long story I’m happy to share, but that’s more complicated than an anecdote)…so I clawed my way out of the city I’d become comfortable in. (I would be back, and the third time it was because LA has now become almost my default town - I am comfortable there, and we have a lot of friends. We know our grocery stores, and coffee shops, we have memories and ‘our spots’).

The part that really ties me to this new song from Alana happened right at the end of that second time I called LA home, though. As I was working very hard to get out of my contract and move all the way across the country, I got to know a girl I had met months before at an MDA event. She was just a girl who I’d learned lived near my neighborhood in the Valley. About the time I took Corri on our first date, I was also moving to New York. I wonder if I’d have started dating her just a few months earlier if she’d have helped me find a better solution or path and if we would still be in LA? Would we have the kids we have? Would we have lasted if we hadn’t had to miss each other? All I know is that for the six months after I moved away, I just wanted to be in California.

This will carry you away like a 70s Eagles song. Alana continues to be one of my favorite new voices in music. The guitar drives the story forward - each time it is representative of the way a mind wanders as we try to figure ourselves out. Especially as so many of us have been on lockdown for months and months and can’t find the simple escapes, those California dreams or images of the ocean just call louder than ever, clouding the truth behind what we want and what we should…


LISTEN ON APPLE MUSIC: “California”

“Sad Songs and Waltzes” - Cody Johnson & Willie Nelson

This is the second time in two weeks that Willie Nelson has been involved in my FIRST 5. Last week, he was the titular inspiration behind Grover Anderson’s new song based on the worst “our song” a couple could choose (in this case “Blue Eyes Cryin in the Rain”) called ‘Willie Nelson.’ This week, Willie is actually heard alongside Cody Johnson on this track about writing what you want people to hear, not worrying about what they WANT to hear.

Do you ever post something on social media solely because you want to see how many responses, shares or likes it gets? The gold in this song is that it is being redelivered to us in the age of Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, etc. When all of this started (MySpace and the invite-only The Facebook) , we all just posted random stuff we were doing and it gave friends a chance to keep up on the latest news, or see what songs we were cranking all day. Then it took a turn into that “instagram reality” (did the Kardashians build it?) where there was pressure to lead the most-exciting or perfect life. Dress differently, ring lights, selfie-mode. Especially in this business, I feel like I’m supposed to keep my socials on-point so that I can make a difference when it is actually important to me: if I put the right filters on the right pictures of my backstage experiences, then people will follow me, and I’ll have more people aware of the month that I’m raising money for cancer, or when I want to share a kickass new artist that deserves attention. I have to post what other people are asking of my life, not what I actually find the most-important (my kids, my wife, my snowboard, Space-X rockets, Cubs, Packers and Dairy Queen).

In a life where we are constantly asked to think about what others want from us, Cody Johnson was moved by this Willie Nelson classic. The song itself is so amazing because its brutal with its selfishness. Willie was at his best when a song was stripped down, and this new version (which is leading the charge for Cody’s new album) pays homage to the minimal production before diving into a full band reimagining. The lyrics continue to be the payoff for me - but I’m openly biased to love the songwriting aspects - but credit must be given to the artists telling the tale. Cody has found a perfect home in a song that was around before he was even born, and Willie is like Dolly - just their voice makes you feel like YOU are home.

LISTEN ON APPLE MUSIC: “Sad Songs and Waltzes”

Its Not Over

There is more 🔥 new music to share. New releases alongside my favorite tunes to play on The Ty Bentli Show. A playlist built to showcase every avenue and you’ll love it start to finish:

TY BENTLI’S DAILY SOUNDTRACK is on my homepage on Apple Music.