A band such as Old Dominion needs no introduction to country music fans, especially here in the UK where the band have really begun to lay their roots. One of the most groundbreaking bands within the genre, the multi-award winning band have released five albums and various EP’s and show no signs of stopping anytime soon. For that, we are grateful. Old Dominion introduced a unique sound to country music that was and is like no other act out there. Across their career, Old Dominion have gifted us with some epic tunes such as Snapback, Break Up With Him, Song For Another Time, Hotel Key, Written In The Sand, No Such Thing As a Broken Heart, Make It Sweet, I Was On A Boat That Day, Memory Lane and many more! More recently, the band have released their song Me Most Nights which will likely feature on their new album.

Old Dominion first graced a UK stage during C2C Festival 2016 where they played the BBC Radio 2 Stage and took part in some of the Bluebird Songwriting Sessions. The latter being an incredibly special experience where the band played stripped back versions of songs like Snapback, Break Up With Him which is unlikely to be repeated. Matthew Ramsey, Whit Sellers, Trevor Rosen, Geoff Sprung, and Brad Tursi who make up Old Dominion have been loyal to the UK fans by returning on a number of occasions including supporting Thomas Rhett, selling out headline shows and returning to the main stage for C2C Festival in 2024. In fact, they were set to play C2C Festival in 2020 but pulled out due to the pandemic. What broke my heart a little bit during this interview was when we spoke about returning to C2C Festival after having to pull out in 2020 due to covid, Matt said that they were aware of all the backlash they got for that. Still, the band have an ever growing fanbase here and will return in October for a string of shows.

We talk to Matt Ramsey, lead singer of Old Dominion about their UK tour, new music and old and much more!

Last time you were here was for C2C Festival – What was that like coming back? Because as you know, your first show here was at C2C.

Yes, it was the first time we ever played there was C2C. Then, of course, we were scheduled to come back, but COVID kind of canceled that. So to come back for C2C was really, really great for us, because it had been a number of years since we’d been there, and we missed it. You know, we felt like we had been building a good, a good following there, and then we hit that little road block. So it was really great to go back and realize, you know, there was still, there was still a market for us. There were still people that cared about our music there.

Yeah, it was a tough time, wasn’t it? Because I think you pulled out when covid first started happening, because it was before the festival actually cancelled, they didn’t cancel the actual festival till the day of it so I always applauded those who were ahead of it and cancelled with good time.

We caught some flack for that. For sure, we definitely upset some people. But we just had to make the best decision we could think of, you know, with our families in mind and our crew in mind. And it just, it just felt like the right thing to do, and we knew we were going to upset some people, but it turned out to be the right, right decision.

It was! I was with you from the minute you did it, because I just found out I was pregnant, so it was a very terrifying time, so I was 100% on your side.

But tell us about this tour, because you’ve got a World Tour starting soon and it doesn’t look like you’ve got a break. Do you change it up for the UK at all? Because, you know, we’re deep cut fans.

Yeah, we definitely know that about you guys. So it’ll probably be a little different, especially because about halfway through the tour, the plan is to release a brand new album, so we’ll have a lot of new music to play for you guys by the time we get over there. And so that’s going to be very exciting. And then, you know, we’ve also learned that not only are you guys deep cut fans, but our true fans too, really love everything off of all our albums. So we have learned to take requests during a lot of shows, so people bring their signs or hold up their phones and we like to turn the set list over to the fans at some point, so we’re looking forward to see what kind of requests that everyone there has.

‘We Got It Right’ for me please haha!

All right. All right.

What can you tell us about the new album? Can we know anything about it?

We just finished it. I can’t give you too many details, but right now, it’s looking like there’s 13 songs on there. I can’t tell you the name of the album yet or the release date yet, but we just shot the album cover two days ago. So it’s, it’s very Old Dominion. It’s a very Old Dominion album cover. We’re so excited about this music.

One song you have released is ‘Most Nights’. What was the process behind that song? Was it a lengthy one?

It was an interesting, interesting process to write and record that song. I had that idea of that title. I’m pretty proud of the way that we kept bringing it around, and kept finding new ways to twist that phrase a little bit, and, you know, especially with a line like “maybe we both share a little bit of blame for the stupid fights, but with a little hindsight, I can see it was me most nights”. I’m very proud of that, that we kind of dug into that hook, and it seems to be resonating with with a lot of people, so we’ve started playing it in the live show now, and it’s a really, really fun moment in the show.

As you just said, you can’t share many details of the album, but I’m always fascinated about the bookends of an album, and I wanted to know what your process is with book ends. Is it an important thing to you?

Yeah, we do think about that. And you know, Trevor is usually the album sequence guy. He’s the guy that really labours over that and he does a really good job, so we just kind of trust him with it. He sends us what he’s working on, and we will make comments here and there on it, but he keeps, kind of like whittling it down on what he thinks is best, and it’s hard to pick, it’s harder to pick the last song sometimes than it is the first song because especially with the way that some audiences listen to to your album, sometimes they lose the attention span, you know? And you don’t, you don’t want them to miss what’s at the end, you know? But I will say there was one song on the album that it just had to be the last song. So it was no choice.

I love the sequencing of an album. I used to fall asleep listening to CDs. So I would listen to the whole album and fall asleep doing so and then on some CD’s, people had a secret song, and you’ve just fallen asleep, and then suddenly, it scares the heck out of you

(Laughs) I know we talk about that, sometimes we miss those days of the hidden track, like there’s no way to do that on streaming. How do we? Because we have so many ideas that would be like our wheelhouse, we would have so much fun with the Hidden Tracks, but there’s just no real way to do it.

I guess even if you had like it hidden on another track, you’d know about it by it being like 10 minute track, song, right?

Exactly!

So how do you dive into a new project? Do you have goals that you want to achieve? Do you go with the mindset of what songs are going to translate live?

Some about what’s going to translate live. We’re not like a concept album type of band. We just want to make sure we’re not repeating ourselves, and we want to stretch who we are as musicians and as writers. You know, lyrically and sonically, we want to explore new territory and just whatever is inspiring us. We want to put that into our music, without sounding redundant, or putting out something we’ve already done. There’s a lot of times where we find a song where we go, “Well, that sounds just like us” and that means we’re probably not going to record it or a song that sounds like anyone could do, we don’t want to do. So we try to find what really narrows down the songs where we go, “Wow, this sounds like something we’ve never done before, and something that is not like anything you hear on country radio. So let’s, let’s explore that”. So that’s typically how we start.

I love that! Old Dominion does have that unique sound. What was the first song that you wrote together as a band? Not necessarily first released but actually sat down and wrote and then knew as a band that it was magic!

The first song that we all five, all five wrote together as a band was ‘Break Up With Him’. That was the first time we were like “yeah, we must do this”. That’s how we knew that we must have something special, because we created something that didn’t sound like anything else altogether. We were in room, created this song, and it became our first big hit.

Wow, I love that. And what about songs that you’ve written for other artists? Has there been any particular song that you’ve had difficulty giving away because you wanted it yourself, but you decided that it fitted better with their project rather than yours?

Yeah, in the beginning, it was hard to let go of some of them, not because we thought we could do them better, just because we were at a point where we needed to pay our bills and here was an artist that wanted our song. There’s no higher honor as a songwriter than another artist saying “this song is for me”. So you’re always very honored that they would pick your art. In the meantime, here we are as a band and, you know, typically when that happens, you’re like, “Oh no, that’s our best song”, you know? haha but so, in that regard, I think ‘Say You Do’ . That was a song that we wrote for Dierks Bentley and that was a really tough one to let go, just because it was such a big part of our set, and we didn’t realize that in that moment, that that was going to help us. That song was still part of our set, but now people knew it, and so we’re very grateful for Dierks and the care he showed with our song.

That was the song I was going to ask about, because I love it so much, and it’s so Old Dominion.

So let’s talk about Odie’s. What made you want to decide to open a bar? And can you tell us some of the things that will make us want to go?

We were approached by a friend of ours who is in that business. When we were back in the van and trailer days playing bars, we played his bars a lot, and he was, he was a great guy, and he approached us and said, “Hey, I’m thinking of opening a bar. I want to work with you guys”. And so we got excited about it. The one thing that we were most excited about was that it was not down on Broadway, where all of the other artists bars are in Nashville. It’s crazy down there, and it’s fun to visit, but for us, it’s not quite our vibe. What we liked about the location he was looking at is it’s right by Music Row, where the songwriting community is, and that’s how we got our start and there was a bar right across the street from our bar that we would play every week to nobody. We just had a lot of history in that area of town, so we got very excited about opening a bar in Midtown as opposed to downtown. And then as the project grew, it got more exciting. You ask, Why would you come see it? I mean, it’s the only bar that I know of that has the full size boat in the bar that you can sit on and it’s got a great stage of live music. And it’s the really, really fun, chilled, chilled vibe. It’s got a nice open air backyard patio with picnic tables and games and good food. It’s a fun place.

I hope to go one day! Is there any part of you that’s sad that you didn’t call it memory lane?

Haha no, no, I think we made the right choice.

I know that you got your record deal at a baggage claim, and forgive me if there’s already a song out there, but have you written a song about that? Because I know Miranda has a song called baggage claim but will Old D have one?

Haha, No, we haven’t, but that’s a great idea. No, that was a crazy whirlwind of a time in our lives. No, we haven’t. We haven’t written that, but that’s a great idea.

What is the most obscure thing you’ve written about?

We take some, you know, some interesting angles, I think, on the album, ‘Time, Tequila and Therapy’. The song “I Wanna Live In a House with You Forever’, it’s not an obscure concept to want to spend your life with someone but I think the way that song came about was a joke. Whit was actually complaining about love songs and anytime he would hear like a country love song, he would just go, “Aww, I want to live in a house with you forever, man”, you know, he would kind of make fun of it. And so we thought like, you know, well, okay, let’s write it – Let’s write that, and see if we can come up with a fun angle without making fun of other love songs. Let’s come up with a way to write it with that as the title. I think that was definitely one of them. The other one is just like, you know, that obscure line from ‘I Was On a Boat That Day’. You know, “drunk as a skunk, eating lunch with a cross eyed bear”. That’s, that’s a pretty obscure thing

What Old Dominion song is your family’s favourite?

Oh, you know, my family, especially my kids, are privy to every song I write, so their favorites probably don’t even make the albums. They dig into to just my entire catalog, and sometimes their input helps us pick songs for the album, but they really love to hear anything that I’m writing and I send them demos for opinions. Sometimes they are heartbroken at the songs that they love that don’t make the albums. So they know the deep, deep cuts.

That must be the greatest feeling having your kids love everything you do? How beautiful! Do you have songs that you’ve just written for the children that are never, ever going to go out in the world because it’s too special?

You know, I think there’s some songs that I’ve written for my kids that, you know, at some point I may put out myself, but maybe aren’t right for Old Dominion because, you know, it’s, I don’t know that the five dudes want to record a song about my kids, you know, even though they’re going to identify with them as fathers it would probably be something I would do on my own.

Oh, that sounds beautiful. Well, we’re really, really looking forward to having you over in October. Thank you so very much for talking today. It’s always so lovely to speak to you.

Thank you so much. Yeah, we’re really looking forward to it. Can’t wait to get back over there.