Veteran country outlaw Dallas Moore is ready to drop a new album in April, but he’s giving The Boot’s readers a sneak peek. “The Rain,” the title track of and lead song from the singer and songwriter’s next record, is premiering exclusively on The Boot; press play below to listen.
A rocking country shuffle, “The Rain” is a profession of rebirth and love: “I swear that high black water saved my soul / So take me as I am, my dear / And I’ll take you far away from here / And live that life we lived out in our dreams,” Moore promises over a twangy melody of guitar and pedal steel, led by a steady drum beat and accented with jaunty fiddle courtesy of two-time CMA Musician of the Year winner Jenee Fleenor.
“I wrote what ended up being the title track for The Rain towards the end of the three-week period in which I wrote all of the songs for the album,” Moore tells The Boot. “I was upstairs in my little studio at our ‘Texahio Ranch,’ just kinda knocking around ideas, when all of a sudden, it went from the blue skies and sun of an April day to almost-instantly black clouds outside, thunder roaring and lightning streaking across the sky contrasting a deluge of rain flooding down from the skies.
“The song literally felt like it wrote itself in that moment,” he concludes.
Due out on April 9, The Rain follows 2019’s Tryin’ to Be a Blessing. In 2020, thanks to the COVID-19 pandemic, Moore traded in a packed tour calendar for time on his Harley, where the singer says he does most of his writing, and penned the album’s 10 tracks within three weeks.
Moore and his band headed to OmniSound Studios in Nashville to record The Rain with producer Dean Miller. In addition to the aforementioned Fleenor, the album features Moore’s longtime guitarist Chuck “Lucky Chucky” Morpurgo and guitarists Tim Galloway and Guthrie Trapp, drummer Chad Cromwell, dobro and pedal steel player Steve Hinson, piano and organ player Gordon Mote, bassist Lex Price, harmonica player Sweepy Walker and backing vocalist Perry Coleman.
“These sessions were the most relaxed and enjoyable of my career. We had a lot of laughs and grins as the songs took shape and came to life organically, and we got most of them in one or two takes, which gave everything a live feel — which I’ve always wanted to capture in the studio,” Moore reflects. “I think this album is my most focused and realized yet and another step in my journey as I kick the can a little farther down the road.”
The Rain is available for pre-order now. Full album details are below.
Dallas Moore, The Rain Tracklist:
1. “The Rain”
2. “Every Night I Burn Another Honky-Tonk Down”
3. “Better Days”
4. “Locked Down and Loaded”
5. “Ride Down By the River”
6. “Blue Jean Jesus”
7. “California Highway”
8. “Ain’t No Place in the Sun”
9. “On Through the Night”
10. “In My Last Days”