Lady Antebellum goes back to basics with unadorned new album ‘Golden’

TORONTO – If Lady Antebellum has yet to have another hit to match the spectacular success of its smouldering 2010 ballad “Need You Now” — a six-times platinum single that elicited five Grammy Awards including song and record of the year — it hasn’t necessarily been for lack of trying.

As the band’s sweet-natured multi-instrumentalist Dave Haywood explains, the Nashville trio (which also features vocalists Hillary Scott and Charles Kelley) did sit down and try to write more songs like their signature smash. They just never turned out any good.

“We actually tried that, (but) those songs never made it anywhere,” he said in a recent telephone interview. “There were a couple times right after that (song hit) where we felt that pressure, and tried to write songs that were just the exact same thing as ‘Need You Now’ — like, ‘Man, let’s just write something like that, just try to do something a little better than that.’

“But you can’t. You just have to write what comes out. And you can’t force it.”

To hear Haywood tell it, Lady Antebellum has never been less forced than on their new album, “Golden,” out today. After “Need You Now” and 2011’s Grammy-winning “Own the Night” explored sweeping, meticulously orchestrated country ballads, Haywood talks to The Canadian Press about going back to basics, the band’s growing families and when they might finally take a break.

CP: This is the first Lady Antebellum record that doesn’t feature orchestral strings. Why did you make that choice?

Haywood: We’ve kind of done some more serious songs on the last few records and always done strings and these big arrangements, big overdubs. And yeah, this one we said, “You know what? Let’s get in, play these dang songs, and get out.” We really just didn’t spend much time adding a bunch of stuff. It’s not like we’re in there adding like thousands of guitars all over and adding all these extra things. So for us it’s all about the songs — finding a great song and finding a great arrangement that fits that song.

CP: “Goodbye Town” is one of the more emotional songs on the record. What’s it about?

Haywood: Growing up in a small town, sometimes you’re kind of stuck in that town. And it’s like, man, what am I going to do to get out of here? Whether or not you had a relationship there, places you go remind you of somebody and it’s like: I gotta just get the heck out of this place. I think that was something we all reached down and felt like we’ve experienced. Musically I think it really conveys that. There’s this kind of energy throughout the song where it’s just, man, I want to get the hell out of here. I think that was one of our favourites to include on the record.

CP: You got married last spring, Hillary’s expecting her first child and Charles has already been married for a few years. You all have burgeoning families. Has that changed anything for you?

Haywood: It’s changed stuff for sure, but I think it’s all been positive changes. Our family keeps growing. When I got married last year, my wife is such good friends with Charles and Hillary and their spouses as well, it’s one big family. And I think it adds a level of seriousness to what we do. It’s like, you know what, we really care about this and we love to bring people into it. It makes it more special I think for us. And especially having Hillary expected to have a little baby girl this summer. It’s going to be a beautiful addition to the Lady Antebellum family. She’s our little Baby Antebellum.

CP: The band’s profile has obviously grown a lot over the years. How have you handled that evolution as a group?

Haywood: It’s definitely been a whirlwind. When we started, it all happened organically. We started off just writing together because we loved writing music and we still do to this day. I think a lot of people from the outside looking in say: “Didn’t y’all just get put together and you got thrown out there, and didn’t the record label pick all these songs?”

That’s really not the case here at all. We wrote all these songs and we said, let’s try writing them for fun, let’s just get a crazy name and do this for fun and the we’ll go back to our other day jobs. It’ll be a side project. Having that mentality from day one, I feel we’ve always kept and tried to preserve how authentic we began, and we don’t want to lose sight of that.

CP: Did the success you had with “Need You Now” put pressure on the band?

Haywood: Yeah, well, we’ve always felt a lot of pressure…. After that night at the Grammys where we won five Grammys for “Need You Now” the song and the album collectively — that was one of those holy crap moments, “I can’t believe what just happened,” and then there’s this weight on your shoulders of, how in the world do you top that?

We try not to focus on that and let it deter us. I think what can happen to some groups or bands or artists is it can have a negative effect. We took that night as an epic, incredible moment in our career and it allowed us to tour around the world, meet a lot of great people. But let’s just keep doing what we do, and that’s sitting in a room, writing songs, having fun, goofing around, and trying to put our heart and soul into our music.

CP: You’ve put out five full-length albums since 2008, including the holiday release “On This Winter’s Night.” Do you ever think about taking a break?

Haywood: It’s funny you said that. I was doing the math the other day and (realized that) I guess we’re right around the year and a half mark every time between records. But for us, it feels like an eternity between albums because we play those songs every single day. So I guess from the outside looking in, it might seem probably close back to back, but man, for us, we’re always itching to get new music out there. We just love writing and that’s just what we feel like we do naturally, so as long as that doesn’t stop I don’t think the record-making process will stop either.

But I’m sure there’ll be a time where we’ll want to take a little bit more than that amount of time off and maybe have a couple years. We’ll do like Justin Timberlake and disappear for seven years.