Jake Worthington

One Liner: Real deal old school country from a young fella.

Wikipedia Genre: No Wikipedia, but Country
Home: La Porte, Texas

Sunday

Thoughts:   Absolutely classic country sound from a Texan who came in second place on a recent season of The Voice.  I read a Texas Monthly article about him earlier this year and fired up his tunes while I was in the shower, and it is a really good classic sound.  

He's been making country music since he was only 14, learning the ropes from his granddad who he called Paw Paw Guitar.  His granddad's advice?  "Boy, sing like you've got a jalepeno stuck in your ass, you'll get it."  Which is really weird advice, and I'm not so sure that Jake sounds like he is following the advice either.  When he was 17, he drove to Houston to try out for The Voice at NRG Stadium, and he made it to L.A.  His first episode was him looking choir-boy clean-cut, singing Keith Whitley and getting chosen by three different artists.

His family going apeshit after each choice is freaking amazing.  I don't watch this show, but that is a beautiful thing.  Of note, that season also featured Morgan Wallen, who was eliminated long before this guy.  Take that racism!  He lost to someone named Josh Kaufman, which I have never heard of but is apparently a soul singer from the Tampa Bay area.  He had a funny quote in that Texas Monthly article, saying that he dreaded when The Voice tour went to Houston because he didn't want anyone he knew to see "that shit," meaning him harmonizing with 12 other contestants on lame pop songs like Imagine Dragons.  Which is funny.

That experience led to loads of promoters trying to sign him to become another bro country dude in Nashville, but that wasn't what he wanted to do.  He turned down those offers, and sooner or later had to buy a crappy van and just go out on his own tour.  His Voice fans didn't like his twang, and he was struggling, about ready to quit.  But out of no-where, the CEO for Big Loud called him (the kind of label with Florida Georgia Line, Morgan Wallen, and fellow TSI artist Ernest) and said they thought his throwback sound could work.  "When England called him in Amarillo, Worthington worried that Big Loud wanted him to record something with drum machines. By the end of the call, though, England had started to calm Worthington’s fears. “He told me, ‘We don’t wanna pussyfoot around country music,’ ” Worthington recalls. “In my mind, there ain’t nothing else that needs to be said.”"

Handful of EPs where he still looks like a child, but then his lone album is 2023's Jake Worthington.  Top song is the first one - "State You Left Me In."  771k streams.

He's shed the baby-face and sounds like an old grizzled veteran of the country scene.  Some guy who played with George Strait and Randy Travis.  And in the tradition of many a country song, a good old fashioned double-meaning in the chorus as well as a sweet chord change.  I wish he wouldn't do quite so much work with his neck while he sings.  But otherwise, this is phenomenal.  If you are a fan of country music, that nails every note.  "Single at the Same Time" is the next biggest track on the album, but I want to give you "Next New Thing" instead.  292k streams.

I need to go to that dance hall.  Cool stuff.  Another one that really sounds like the classic stuff, although this time less like King George and more like Brooks & Dunn.  Laying the cheese on thiiiick in front of a smoke machine haze.  And I can't take the Ernest-assisted "Pop Goes the Whiskey."  "lookin' for a tipsy that'll fix me for good this time" is just too much for me.

I'd absolutely give him a shot.  I hope that he can take down some of the goofy ass drum machine country with this throwback sound.