For outsiders, Darius Rucker shifting from the rock world to Nashville seems like a pretty big deal. But for Rucker himself, making a country album wasn’t much of a leap from his main gig with roots rockers Hootie and the Blowfish.
“We were about as close to a country band as you could be, especially the last three, four records,” says Rucker. “I didn’t think I was doing anything different. I was just playing.”
Country fans took to last year’s “Learn to Live,” the singer’s second solo album and first country record, which reached gold status early this year and spawned three chart hits, including two country No. 1s: “Don’t Think I Don’t Think About It” and “It Won’t Be Like This for Long.”
“For me, the experience has been great,” says Rucker, who will open for Rascal Flatts Sunday, July 12 at Toyota Pavilion at Montage Mountain. “I feel like I’m part of country right now. The thing about crossing over, some people are thinking of doing it just because pop radio is so beat today. I don’t even think if a record like ‘Cracked Rear View’ came out today it would get played (on pop radio). (Country) is where the listeners are at.”
“Cracked Rear View,” of course, was the Hootie major-label debut which tied records by going platinum (one million sales) 16 times. Released in the summer of 1994, it was 1995’s top-selling album. For a few years, Hootie music was everywhere, with songs like “Hold My Hand,” “Let Her Cry,” “Only Wanna Be with You” and “Time” all over radio and TV.
While Rucker’s shift to the country genre does have something to do with sales and exposure, it was not a knee-jerk decision.
“I decided in ’86 that I was going to make a record after I heard Randy Foster for the first time,” Rucker says, referring to the country singer/songwriter. “Since then, I’ve been talking about it.”
Rucker also floated the idea of making a full-on country album with Hootie, but “they didn’t want to do it,” he says.
Hootie, he assures, is “still together” and plans to play some shows this year, although last year he said in an AOL Sessions interview that Hootie was split up until he puts out “three or four country albums.”
“I think everybody’s happy,” he now says of the South Carolina band, together since 1986. “We were going to take this time off whether I did this or not. And everybody realizes that the more success I have, the better it is for the band.”
And, despite the deep-voiced singer’s current country leanings, he will be playing some Hootie hits Sunday night.
“Oh yeah,” he says. “I’d be ripping people off if I didn’t play ‘Let Her Cry’ and ‘Hold My Hand.’ Those are classics that I have to play.”
Rucker is working on another country record, noting that “every Tuesday is my writing day at home.”
The second country record is the one he felt could be the success that “Learn to Live” actually became.
“I suspected maybe for this record to get my foot in the door,” he reveals. “I didn’t expect two No. 1s, that’s for sure. Now I’m sitting back going, ‘What’s next?’”
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Rascal Flatts, Darius Rucker, Sunday, July 12, 8 p.m. Tickets: $34-$73.50 at LiveNation.com, select Blockbuster locations.
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