Song Of The Day: Brody Price — “Just Might Be”

With An Experimental New Sound, Brody Price’s Latest Single Gives Us A Slightly Haunting Preview Of His Forthcoming Release.

Welcome to Song of the Day, where we hip you to all the new local releases you should be caring about. By highlighting one new North Texas-sprung tune every week day, our hope is that you’ll find something new to love about the rich and abundant DFW music scene five days a week.

Brody Price – “Just Might Be”
RIYL: Sturgill Simpson.
What else you should know: Musically, Brody Price’s new song “Just Might Be” from his upcoming October 18 release Hoop Dreams is a massive step forward for the Dallas singer-songwriter.

Beginning with a slow, lilting acoustic guitar over a weeping slide guitar, the sound builds with the intensifying images present in Price’s lyrics until ending in a digital soundscape with drum loops and synthesizers — a sign of exciting things to come when the album finally drops.

“The new record is the first time I’ve started doing that,” Price says of his updated country sound. “There’s a lot more experimental stuff – backwards guitars, digital drums, et cetera.”

By embracing digital music in this way, Price finds himself in good company with artists such as Sturgill Simpson, who also uses digital elements as a way of adding depth of emotion to a song, as opposed to using a digital snap-track to sound like literally everything else in country music right now.

“It was inspired by an artist from Austin named Buck Meek,” he says of adding the electronics, “as well as the soundtrack from the movie Midsommar.”

Though not as haunting as this summer’s most unsettling Swedish horror film, there is a certain haunting quality to Price’s lyrics and delivery.

With a soft voice similar to that of Texas Piano Man Robert Ellis, Price sings of loneliness with quiet acceptance as if he’s exhausted all other options and made the decision that this is his best course.

Addressed to his mother, Price free-associates through images of aging, moving on and living a life without all of the friendships and pleasantries of youth.

Coupled together with the digital liftoff, the song makes the case that while life alone may be frightening, it just might be the only way to move forward.

Cover photo by Jacob Gruth courtesy of Brody Price.