Earlier this summer, when Josh Abbott learned he achieved a third gold single, his first thought was about the big-picture symbolism.
“To have it happen in the second decade of my career, makes me feel validated,” Abbott says. “It says that we are a band that will last and be around a long time. It says that I can write successful music, and that I don’t need to rely on national radio to get it to gold.”
The Josh Abbott band announced on Thursday that “Settle Me Down,” off the group’s 2020 album of the same name, received the certification from RIAA. The song joins Abbott’s 2010 recordings “She’s Like Texas” and “Oh, Tonight” — the latter recorded as a duet with Kacey Musgraves — in hitting the milestone of 500,000 sales.
Abbott wrote all three of his gold-certified songs, but the first two were some of his earliest compositions. He began pursuing music in 2006 while attending Texas Tech University in Lubbock, and the Josh Abbott Band has been touring since 2008. “Oh, Tonight” was instrumental in launching not only Abbott’s career, but that of Musgraves as well. Both that song and “She’s Like Texas” received gold recognition in April 2021. All three were independent releases on Abbott’s Pretty Damn Tough label.
“‘Settle Me Down’ is a song that I wrote about my wife,” Abbott tells Rolling Stone, “with a couple of buddies of mine who happen to be from Texas. To get to record that song at a later stage is special, and it went gold faster. Those first two took more than 10 years. ‘Settle Me Down’ came out at the end of 2020, and it essentially qualified for gold at the end of 2023.”
Abbott is acknowledging the milestone by releasing “Settle Me Down” as part his “Hangar Sessions” project — a YouTube-based collection of recent songs, recorded full-band, at an airplane hangar in Austin.
“It just had a really cool sound in this huge, empty room, and it gave it a lot of natural reverb,” Abbott says of the project. “We were mostly doing new stuff, off of our latest record, Somewhere Down the Road, and I just decided that I was feeling the vibe, and I wanted to play an acoustic song. I chose ‘Settle Me Down’ because it’ll always be one of my favorite songs. I was really happy with how it came out. I did it in one live take, and I think that’s what music is all about.”
Released in January, Somewhere Down the Road is Abbott’s seventh studio album. He has spent the year on a headlining tour named for the album (with three new members added to his eight-piece outfit in the past two years). He also made his debut at Stagecoach in April and continues to play with the Panhandlers — a Texas supergroup featuring Abbott, William Clark Green, John Baumann, and Cleto Cordero of Flatland Cavalry.
As the country music landscape has shifted toward younger artists using social media to reach new fans, how have you adapted?
There’s some days where I feel super content and appreciative of the career that I’ve had, and the band members I’ve had over the years, even though some have changed. But there are also days where I find myself hanging on, trying to stay relevant. When you’re a younger artist, it’s all eyes on you. You can’t record enough, or soon enough. Every single time you put out something people are all over it. But, eventually, way down the road, you get revered as a legacy act, and I’m caught in the middle. It’s been challenging, really, emotionally and mentally, for me.
If I’m being truly transparent and vulnerable here, there have been days that I wonder if I have a career ahead of me. But then there are others where I go, “No. I’m gonna be fine. I’m gonna be doing this the rest of my life.” Perhaps all artists feel this way, but that’s what it’s been like for me these past couple of years.
In that context, what motivates you now, especially as a songwriter?
My family. I find it really challenging to write songs that are sad. I can’t write a breakup song. I’ve already done that in my past. I’ve had a whole album that was about that sort of thing. I’m in a spot now, where it’s hard for me to write those songs, and be balanced as a songwriter. But I’m also not at a stage in my career where I’m writing beer-drinking college songs. I’m writing songs that inspire me about real things. Thankfully, the Panhandlers have been a good outlet for songs like that.
There’s also not a ton of pressure on me to write a lot of songs for myself. We’re seven albums in. The fans know what they like. They want to hear the old shit. I’ve heard Paul McCartney make that joke at a concert. I’ve heard Garth Brooks make that joke. I’ve heard Bruce Springsteen make it. We get it. You want to hear the old shit. But we still want to make new music, and we just have to accept that the new shit might not be smelled as much as the old shit.
So what does success look like to you at this point in your career?
My best day would be the worst day ever for someone like Luke Combs. Everybody’s high is somebody else’s low, on an artificial level. So, I have to look at it like, I’m able to make a living. I’m able to provide a living for all these guys I care about who share this bus with me 180 days a year. From that perspective, yeah it’s challenging, but to provide for these guys over 16 years, I know I should not let that go by so easily. I really value that, especially because, what’s really behind it is the fact that all these years in, there are still fans. We might not sell quite as many tickets in some markets, but we are selling more tickets in other markets than we used to. I think it’s really just about appreciating the moment, the fans who come to the shows holding signs, and the people who tag me and say our song was part of their wedding, or funeral, whatever it may be. To know that our songs are impacting people on a real level, and that they still want to come see us play live, you have to be appreciative of that.
Is there a takeaway from reaching gold-level sales while staying independent?
I think it’s inspiring for younger artists to be able to see that you don’t have to sign a label deal, and you don’t have to put a song out to national radio, or sell a million records, for a song to be credentialed with an award like this.
Josh Crutchmer is a journalist and author whose third book, Red Dirt Unplugged, is set for release on December 13, 2024, via Back Lounge Publishing, and available for pre-order.