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31 Days of Women: Lily Rose

Credit: Anthony Stone

Editor’s Note: In celebration of Women’s History Month, You Sing I Write is highlighting female country artists and songwriters throughout March.

Lily Rose moved to Nashville four years ago to pursue an artist’s career. The self-taught drummer and guitarist began writing songs at 15 from her home in Atlanta. In December, Rose posted a clip of her song “Villain” on TikTok that went viral. “Villain” reached No. 1 on iTunes’ all-genre chart, besting Taylor Swift. Now she hopes to replicate that success at radio.

Rose grew up on Top 40 radio, initially planning to try her hand at contemporary pop. Not until relocating to Music City did she realize she most often fell in love with writing songs that were country. She says co-writing in Nashville elevated her songcraft.

“I’m getting set up on so many incredible writes with these legendary songwriters,” Rose tells me. “It’s humbling to even be in the room with them.”

Rose penned “Villain” in November 2019 with Kyle Clark and Mackenzie Carpenter. She had put the title idea in her phone after going through a breakup which she thought ended cordially only to find out her ex didn’t feel the same. In “Villain,” Rose sings, “Whatever helps you sleep at night/ You can make me the bad guy.”

“I’ve learned that you don’t have to live in a small town to have a small town,” she says. “Social media has turned into that for all of us. I expressed to Kyle and Mackenzie what I was going through [and that] I had to actively choose the high road every day because this person was making me look like a villain.”

Rose posted a clip of “Villain” to TikTok on Dec. 1 and due to an overwhelming response teamed with Back Blocks Music’s Rakiyah Marshall to release the song independently on Dec. 15. “Villain” held steady at No. 1 on the iTunes all-genre chart leading into Christmas and remained on the iTunes Top 30 for five consecutive weeks. The song’s success resulted in Rose signing a joint-venture record deal in January with Big Loud Records, Republic Records and Back Blocks Music. “Villain” is officially at country radio today.

For more of my interview with Lily Rose, visit Country Insider.

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31 Days of Women: Nicolle Galyon

Credit: Julia Cox

Editor’s Note: In celebration of Women’s History Month, You Sing I Write is highlighting female country artists and songwriters throughout March.

Nicolle Galyon is an in-demand songwriter who has penned countless radio hits and garnered two ACM Song of the Year wins with Miranda Lambert’s “Automatic” and Dan + Shay’s “Tequila.” But long before she was a mainstay on country radio, Galyon moved to Nashville with the dream of either being an artist manager or working at a record label. This dream came to fruition last July when Galyon launched Songs & Daughters, a female-focused imprint of independent record label Big Loud Records, which represents Madison Kozak and Hailey Whitters.

“My desire to be behind-the-scenes in the business is what got me here,” Galyon tell me over the phone. “But I never fully understood how that was all going to come into play until Songs & Daughters. This last year has been a lot of reminding myself what it was that made me want to move to Nashville in the first place.”

Galyon celebrated the one-year anniversary of Songs & Daughters on July 22 and says she feels like she’s just getting started. “Creating the company was a full-circle moment, but then it started a new race for me to run,” she says of Songs & Daughters, which recently added a publishing arm in partnership with Big Loud Publishing and Warner Chappell Music with the signing of songwriter Tiera.

“Writers need artists and artists need writers. My vision for Songs & Daughters is for it to be more of a music house. It’s not just a record label or a publishing company: it feels more like a home for female creatives,” she says. “It completely makes sense that the next evolution of Songs & Daughters would be a publishing company. That’s how I came to be in the business — through the publishing and the songwriting world — and so that feels very natural for everyone.”

While Kozak is the label’s flagship artist, Whitters was signed to Songs & Daughters in June. Previously collaborators in the writing room, Galyon says the signing of Whitters happened organically. “We’ve been writing for a few years now and we built trust and a mutual respect and comradery as creatives with each other,” she says of her relationship with Whitters. “It felt like we had a beautiful foundation to build upon on the label front too.”

Galyon says serving as the label head of Songs & Daughters has made her a student again. She’s been learning from the young artists and writers she signs, and in return, she hopes she is teaching each artist to trust herself.

“To me, it’s important not only for them to feel like they have someone giving them permission to be the artist and writer that they want to be, but it’s also important that I feed myself in that way. That’s the beauty of our business: it’s not just a one way street. You have to keep reinventing yourself and have to keep learning from everyone,” she says. “I never want to keep having success and keep rising to a point to where I am not feeding off of the young, new energy in Nashville.”

For more of my interview with Nicolle Galyon last year, visit Sounds Like Nashville.

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31 Days of Women: Hailey Whitters

Credit: Harper Smith

Editor’s Note: In celebration of Women’s History Month, You Sing I Write is highlighting female country artists and songwriters throughout March.

Hailey Whitters moved to Nashville 13 years ago to follow her dream of becoming a country singer. Her latest album, Living The Dream Deluxe, was released in February and follows the singer’s long journey of navigating Music City, while also sharing elements of her small-town Iowa roots.

“My mom brought me to Nashville when I was 15-years-old and we went to the Grand Ole Opry,” Whitters tells me over coffee at Nashville’s Falcon Coffee Bar weeks after making her Opry debut in 2019. “That curtain went up and I saw those lights and that was the moment I was like, ‘This is what I want to do for the rest of my life.’”

Whitters has had several country artists record her songs including Little Big Town (“Happy People”), Alan Jackson (“The Older I Get”) and Martina McBride (“Low All Afternoon,” “The Real Thing”), and now the singer-songwriter is sharing her talent with the world. In 2020, she signed a record deal in partnership with her own label, Pigasus Records, and Big Loud Records/Songs & Daughters.

Below is an excerpt of my interview with Whitters from 2019 shortly after she released her EP, The Days, which she self-funded.

When was the moment you knew you wanted to be an artist?

I come from a non-musical family. I always had this draw to country music, and I have a memory of sitting on the back of my dad’s lawnmower while he mowed the lawn, singing to myself. I think I always had a really strong pull to writing. I remember being in elementary school, and I had a guidance counselor who knew that I had this passion for it, and he asked who I like. I liked the Dixie Chicks and the Spice Girls. He was like, “Well, you know the Dixie Chicks write their own music.” So then I got a guitar and I started dabbling with that.

What was the first song you ever wrote? 

My friends and I, we would try to start a chick band on the playground in elementary school and Spiceworld  had just come out. So we were making up dances and pretending we are the Spice Girls. We wrote this one song. I’m trying to remember how it went … I remember the feeling of writing a song back then. It felt like you could do anything and that’s still a feeling I get today when I write a song that I just love. You walk out and you feel like you’re on top of the world.

What’s the most autobiographical song on your EP?

“Ten Year Town” is probably the most autobiographical song because it feels so up-close and personal. [It’s] very much like my broken heart ballad to Nashville. I wrote that song with Brandy [Clark] two years ago and I was only 10 years into [living in Nashville]. Jake [Gear] was like, “You should change it. You’re only here 10 years.” It’s been this weird universe thing that we’re finally releasing it and I am 12 years in. It was just a weird timing thing.

What’s the story behind “Heartland?”

I was feeling really homesick and just questioning like, “Well, what’s my place in Nashville?” I was writing with Nicolle [Galyon] and Forest [Glen Whitehead]. Nicolle is also from the Midwest, so we started talking about going home and Nashville. [Songwriter] Barry Dean told me once, “Nashville will try and change you and make you someone you’re not. It’ll make you forget who you are and it’s important to find that place or those people that you can go to that bring you back.” That’s always been the Midwest [for me]. The Heartland and everything it stands for: hard work and honesty and good people. That is what always draws me to the Midwest. I like to go back a lot. It keeps me grounded.

For more of my interview with Hailey Whitters, visit Billboard. Her latest project Living the Dream Deluxe, which includes “Fillin’ My Cup” featuring Little Big Town, is out now.