In June, Parker McCollum released his fifth album, a self-titled effort that’s finished raw and real, leaning into personal songs and a straightforward delivery.
Parker McCollum is also, in his opinion and that of many critics, the best record he’s made in a fast-moving career that’s taken him further from country pop and bro-country into the realms of his songwriting heroes.
“It’s so much better than anything I’ve ever done by 100 miles,” McCollum said. “I’d send it to Steve Earle tomorrow. I haven’t always felt that way about my records. I’m very, very hard on myself. I don’t think anything I’ve ever done is very good. Every record I’ve ever cut. I’ve said, ‘Man, I’m better than that. I can do better than that.’ This is the first album I’ve ever recorded that I said, ‘Man, this is probably as good as I’m ever going to get.’”
The 14 songs on Parker McCollum work together to merge singer-songwriter Americana with traditional Texas country and just enough Nashville pop.
McCallum, who grew up in Conroe, Texas (near Houston), comes by his sound naturally. While growing up he soaked in classic country, got introduced to red dirt country, and then songwriters like Bob Dylan and Townes Van Zandt.
He started writing songs as a teenager, working his way, in a sense, through his musical heroes.
“I just went through so many phases when I was much younger,” McCollum said from his southeast Texas home. “You know, I wanted to be Steve Earle. I wanted to be Shooter Jennings. I wanted to be Todd Snider. I wanted to be James McMurtry. I wanted to be Robert Earl Keen. I wanted to be John Mayer. I wanted to be George Strait. I wanted to be Randy Travis. I wanted to be Chris Knight, on and on and on.”
Eventually McCollum realized how those artists achieved their own singularity.
“I just was like, ‘I’m one of them. I know I am,’” he said. “And it was probably my mid 20s, and I said, ‘Man, I think I’m better off just being me.’ And that was about the time that it all took off, and I’ve never looked back.”
McCollum came on the national scene with his 2015 debut album, The Limestone Kid, and had a Texas regional radio hit with “Meet You in the Middle,” which helped him build a strong following in the Lone Star state.
He landed his deal with Universal Music Group Nashville in 2019 and in 2020, released Hollywood Gold, which became the best-selling debut country EP of that year.
His 2021 major-label debut album, Gold Chain Cowboy, hit No. 1 on the country charts with his platinum single “Pretty Heart” and he won the ACM Best New Male Artist award for 2021. He took his second ACM Award last May for Visual Media of the Year for the music video for “Burn It Down,” a song from his fourth album, Never Enough.
Despite all the success, McCallum wasn’t satisfied with either Gold Chain Cowboy or 2023’s Never Enough.
“I got a little too comfortable on the last two albums and was touring just nonstop, relentlessly,” he said. “I was about halfway through last year…I said, ‘I gotta go get uncomfortable again and I gotta go into a studio with a band and me and my guitar and just record songs,’” McCollum said. “I thought ‘I really need to get focused, I really want to be intentional with this next record.’ That’s what we did. And, man, it’s pretty wild.”
McCollum signals where the album is coming from on “Solid Country Gold,” which names Guy Clark, John Prine and Rodney Crowell, and he covers the Leon Russell hit “Good Time Charlie’s Got the Blues.”
“I decided to go in and, you know, just strip everything away,” McCollum said. “That one there when I very first started, you know, sonically and sometimes want to sound just like me. This is raw Parker as it can be and still [be] put on the radio.”
McCollum has in over just three years moved up from honky tonks and opening slots to headlining theaters, amphitheaters and arenas, transitions that have gone smoothly for him.
“It’s the same,” he said. “No matter whether you’re playing in the bars or you’re playing a stadium, you’ve got to go out there and sing the songs. I always say, and it’s true, man, if there’s 1,000 people or 20,000 people, if they’re rocking and that crowd’s into it, and I’m singing and feeling good and the energy’s there, man, it doesn’t matter how many people are out there.”
Regardless of whether he thinks he’s done a good show, McCollum is certain of one thing—he’ll be boogying back to Texas as quickly as possible after the weekend runs of his tour, which takes him to the SAP Center on Aug 15, with Ashley Cooke opening.
“That’s why I moved to Texas and bought an airplane,” he said. “I said ‘To hell with this. I gotta get home. I gotta be a dad too, but still I gotta go out and rock every night.’ Luckily, it’s going pretty well right now.”
Parker McCollum plays at 7:30pm on Aug 15 at SAP Center, 525 W Santa Clara St, San Jose. Tickets: $38-$158. sapcenter.com
