On March 7th, Americana Award winner Sam Outlaw returns with Terra Cotta – a new album of ten original songs.
Terra Cotta’s sound is indicative of Sam’s evolving “New Wave Western” and “So Cal Country” styles and longtime fans will make immediate connections to Sam’s previous albums, Angeleno (2015), Tenderheart (2017), and Popular Mechanics (2021).
The lead track, Pretty Good Singer, recalls Sam’s origins as a Classic Country apologist and pairs him with one of Americana’s most impressive female vocalists: Nashville singer-songwriter Lauren Morrow. Other country-leaning songs like Ways To Go and Heart and Soul feature Smith Curry on dobro and pedal steel (Randy Travis) and mandolin from producer and co-writer Cheyenne Medders (Secret Sisters). The live acoustic production of these songs will remind listeners why an alert critic deemed Sam Outlaw’s debut album “a polished and cosmopolitan West Coast take on traditional country music” (The Guardian).
Elsewhere on the LP are upbeat genre-benders like the homesick title track Terra Cotta (co-written with Steven Fiore from Young Mister) and the Petty-esque-anxiety-attack-in-a-song Figure It Out, co-written with Americana super-talent Aaron Lee Tasjan.
Terra Cotta also offers a romantic country duet with Opry favorite Sarah Darling, and a Gerry Rafferty-inspired rocker called “Someone Quite Like You,” featuring Tyler Summers on saxophone (Dave Stewart of The Eurythmics and Martina McBride).
Terra Cotta’s high-energy closer features Nashville indie darling Molly Martin in an Alternative Rock duet that could have been plucked from your fatally scratched copy of the 1998 “Now” compilation CD.
The Grand Ole Opry performer will begin a U.S. tour in March with stops in Phoenix, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle, Portland, and Salt Lake City. A European tour will follow.