Sat. Dec., 16 –
Riverspirittulsa.com: Initially, the members of Old Dominion got together to showcase the songs they had been writing for other acts, but they formalized their arrangement as a band in 2007 when they began to catch fire on the live circuit. “We already knew we were hit songwriters because people were recording our songs and making them hits,” Rosen says. “People were coming out to see us. We just couldn’t get a record deal. So we said, ‘Let’s go out and play a million shows and build it ourselves. Let’s keep writing and record something that we think is the album.’ Then a hit happened. And a hit changes everything.”
That hit was “Break Up With Him,” a sly, hip-hop-influenced toe-tapper that became the first single off Old Dominion’s 2015 debut album Meat and Candy. After going into heavy rotation on SiriusXM’s The Highway, “Break Up With Him” spent two weeks at No. 1 on Billboard’s Country Airplay chart. One of the band’s favorite memories is performing it at the Boots and Hearts Festival in Ontario and having 20,000 people sing along. “We weren’t a big name, and we had never been to Canada,” Rosen recalls. “We were just looking at each other going, ‘What is happening? This is actually working.’”
It was during their endless touring that Old Dominion began coming up with ideas for their second album, which was produced by Meat and Candy producer Shane McAnally. Happy Endings finds the band excavating lyrically driven, melodic gems with true emotional depth and a nostalgia-laden, happy-sad appeal. “We love feel-good songs,” Ramsey says. “Sometimes you just want to put on something that makes you smile. It’s a big part of who we are, but we definitely wanted to show that we were capable of writing more than just fun, party tunes. We think we have the potential to be around for a long time. To stick around you have to have meaningful songs.”
The album’s first single, “No Such Thing As A Broken Heart,” signifies the band’s desire to deliver songs with a message. With lyrics like, “You gotta love like there’s no such thing as a broken heart,” the song, which reached #1 on Billboard Country Airplay and Mediabase charts, is a powerful directive to live fearlessly.
