Singer-songwriters within the nation music enterprise proceed to flourish in and round Nashville, however after years of turmoil, Caylee Hammack deserves a break greater than most of them. This might lastly be her yr. Expertise and onerous work have turned Hammack into not solely an completed performer who’s performed the Grand Ole Opry and Ryman Auditorium however a first-time novelist. On Friday (7 March), she’ll be in full bloom with the discharge of a two-pronged file/ebook challenge referred to as Mattress of Roses. 

The self-proclaimed obsessive gardener blessed with a inexperienced thumb can also be restoring a home within the Nashville space “that I might afford (together with) the land round it”, Hammack mentioned throughout our Zoom interview in late February. “After I work on the home, I really feel like I’m engaged on me. It’s the identical method with my backyard. That’s why I went with Mattress of Roses. That’s the good, most apt identify for what I’m making an attempt to domesticate inside my life.

“It kinda personifies ready 5 years and writing for ten years, you realize, after which getting this album,” she added. “I’ve needed to persevere by a number of years of kinda having a winter and now I’m lastly in spring. I lastly get to look at my mattress of roses develop.” 

There’s loads of work to maintain Caylee Hammack busy now that her sophomore full-length album is popping out, 5 years after her debut LP If It Wasn’t for You was purported to launch her promising profession. What’s occurred between then and now could be the main target of this text. Nonetheless, some backstory is critical to flush out the main points of a lover of romance novels who used to “smuggle” these books away from “my Aunt Punkin”, she laughingly admitted. 

Making the Transfer

The Georgia peach was born and raised mild years from Atlanta within the tiny city of Ellaville, the place her older brother and sister loved rock and pop tunes. Nation quickly turned Caylee Hammack’s ardour, particularly after her athletic profession was lower brief when, at age 16, the highschool tennis participant and school prospect underwent surgical procedure to take away a tumor from her again. “The one factor I really had left after that surgical procedure was music,” Hammack mentioned in a 2019 Billboard interview. 

Feeling like a “hippie in a hillbilly city”, she took an ebullient persona, glowing wit, open thoughts, free spirit, musical aptitude and her flock of flaming purple hair to Nashville searching for a profession in 2013. One of many first songs she performed in a membership alongside Nashville’s Decrease Broadway was an authentic a few topic she is aware of too properly: The raucous “Redhead”, cowritten with Natalie Hemby and Trent Dabbs, was the second lower on her first album and featured Reba McEntire, her associate in ginger. 

If It Wasn’t for You was launched 13 years after the 13-year-old (who started writing poems on the age of eight) begged her Dad, a water properly driller, to see Loretta Lynn carry out at Columbus Civic Heart in Columbus, Georgia, about an hour’s drive away. 

“I keep in mind watching her and going, she did magic,” Hammack mentioned throughout our interview. “All she did was inform her story in essentially the most trustworthy and uncooked, simply straight-to-the-bone method. She put it to a melody that my mind, it makes my mind completely happy, and he or she’s acquired us all on the sting of our seats watching her and listening.” 

Music Schooling

Caylee Hammack has been writing and singing music ever since, generally as a child with the help of a Shania Twain karaoke machine she owned. Signed to Capitol Data Nashville in 2018 after beginning to work as a workers author for Common Music Publishing Group Nashville, she handled trauma and temporary moments of triumph by these years of music training. One in every of Hammack’s first panic assaults occurred in 2017, when {an electrical} fireplace burned down her home and he or she “misplaced 70 % of every thing I owned”.

Through the world pandemic in 2020, “I’m dwelling on my own and making an attempt to determine issues out. I’d get executed with the Zooms all day making an attempt to advertise an album that I wouldn’t get to advertise in individual,” Hammack recalled. “I’m sitting there, lastly capable of put out an album, however I can’t carry out dwell. So I felt like a racehorse that simply broke its leg and I’m making an attempt to determine what to do. I had a number of panic assaults simply actually hit in the course of the day. I might lay down on the ground within the fetal place.” 

Hammack discovered reduction by the ability of music, although, particularly from two songs — Roger Miller’s “Little Inexperienced Apples” and the Dolly Parton/Chet Atkins collaboration of “Do I Ever Cross Your Thoughts,” that she began to sing fantastically to an viewers of 1. “I might simply repeat one or the opposite till I acquired to the purpose that I, like, steadied my respiration and I might get myself again up,” Hammack continued. “These two songs, for some cause, simply hit a soothing spot in my mind.” 

That’s the response Caylee Hammack hopes to elicit with Mattress of Roses. The 13-song LP consists of 11 she co-wrote with varied collaborators together with Tenille Townes (who got here to her help after the home fireplace), Stephen Wilson Jr., and co-producer John Osborne, together with one by herself (“Oh, Kara”). 

The bittersweet ballad “No I Ain’t”, co-written with Wilson and Mark Trussell, is an instance of 1 “I really need individuals to take heed to and hopefully join with,” Hammack provided. “I wrote that as form of a damaged coronary heart mantra. I used to be having a number of issue making an attempt to learn to love myself greater than I liked the one who by no means actually liked me, and didn’t need to love me.”

Instantly, Hammack laughs after getting interrupted by a falling lamp within the interview room. Gathering herself because the temper briefly lightened, she tried to get again on observe whereas discussing the power or injury that lyrics or imply discuss can carry. Remembering a line from 1986’s Labyrinth with a solid that included David Bowie, one among her musical influences, she says, “Phrases have energy.” Hammack continued that theme by paraphrasing Psalm 141:3 from the Bible, which reads, “Set a guard, O Lord, over my mouth; hold watch over the door of my lips.”

“It’s the stuff that comes out of your mouth that defiles you,” Caylee Hammack conveyed. “Watch out what you say to your self and others, and so it was simply a type of songs that I assumed, ‘Nicely, what if I wrote a track that whenever you’re broken-hearted, you possibly can sit and you’ll take heed to.’ You’ll be able to sing it again to your self till you are feeling higher, till you might be agency sufficient to say, ‘I really like myself greater than them and I will be their pal however I cannot enable this to go any additional as a result of I’m not getting the respect that I deserve.’”

Robust Help Group

It may very well be a sensitive topic for a warmhearted lady who’s handled fleeting romances but has skilled all types of kindness professionally. As the great acts mounted, she was happy to name herself a proud member of the nation household.  Particularly after sharing levels on excursions with “impactful” feminine artists like Trisha Yearwood, McEntire, and Miranda Lambert or Darius Rucker on the male facet. 

“He acquired me a frickin’ tour bus on the street when he noticed that I used to be driving my boys (within the band) in a van by a snowstorm from Boston to New York Metropolis with my tour supervisor,” Caylee Hammack mentioned of Rucker, who introduced her alongside as a supporting act on his 2022 tour when she couldn’t afford a nicer mode of transportation. “I used to be sleeping on the ground within the theater, within the dressing room. Simply the reduction that took off for me, that most likely gave years of my life again as a result of I used to be so stressed.” 

Yearwood, a fellow Georgian, took Caylee Hammack on her Each Woman on Tour in 2019, the yr earlier than they sweetly sang “Georgia Rain” collectively after making Peach Melba Pie on Trisha’s Southern Kitchen. The Meals Community cooking present aired the “Georgia Gals” episode once more on 1 March. After listening to that information a number of days upfront, a shocked Hammack excitedly yelped, “Nicely, heck, I need to watch it. I didn’t learn about that. (laughs) I’ve acquired too many issues occurring.” 

The looks that concluded with Yearwood’s 2005 track was the primary time I keep in mind seeing Hammack on TV, impressed that one other new face on the block made BBQ Pulled Pork and Onion Bacon Dip appear so endearing. “An enormous fan” of Yearwood’s, she additionally acquired some well-needed recognition from a extremely seen supply. 

“I at all times seemed as much as her,” shared Hammack, who was taught to prepare dinner by her Momma (“meals is our love language”) however lastly realized how you can make gravy from the present host. “After I was in sixth grade, I dressed up as (Yearwood) to be a well-known Georgian for this presentation. As a child going to Georgia 4-H present choir, I needed to undergo Monticello, Georgia, which she’s from, and there’s a freeway, Trisha Yearwood on it, on this inexperienced reflective signal. I keep in mind considering, ‘How large do you gotta be to have a street named after you?’

“Then I acquired to know her and have become a good larger fan. She’s only a genuinely nice human being. I believe that she’s actually good about making an attempt to offer platforms to individuals, particularly younger feminine artists that want it. She’s taken a number of feminine artists on the street, corresponding to myself.” Different supporting acts on that tour included Caroline Jones, Kim Richey, and Rachel Wammack. 

Caylee Hammack hopes some promising performers keep on Yearwood’s custom. “I really feel like (nation performers) have extra of a household interplay than lots of the genres. So I hope that younger artists really feel that, youthful than me, individuals simply now coming into it and experiencing a number of the issues I’ve skilled up to now few years. I hope all of us really feel that. As a result of they deserve it.” 

Caylee Hammack 2025

Stage Presence

As if she isn’t busy sufficient selling the brand new album and novel, Caylee Hammack will give a sneak peek of her newest batch of songs when she performs once more on the Grand Ole Opry on Friday (7 March). 

There additionally shall be an album launch social gathering backstage. “I’m very grateful for the Grand Ole Opry,” mentioned a humble Hammack, who went there lately as a spectator/supporter to look at pal Ashley McBryde hit the stage. “Taking part in the Grand Ole Opry was one among my largest targets in my life. Now, attending to do my sophomore album and having a launch there may be particular. … I hope that we are able to make the Grand Ole Opry … a hangout (for fellow artists). I believe that may be form of cool.” 

Recalling her debut there on 23 August 2019, Hammack reminisced about one among her fondest recollections and the way it pertains to the Opry exhibits. “My mother and father (Mike and Connie) introduced (Elberta peaches) to offer to all my staff. They’re form of like a delicacy. I used some pliers and I cracked the seeds, the kernels, open and planted them. This yr, I’ll lastly have fruit on these timber. In order that’s a great feeling.” 

Hammack’s first 45-minute opening set at Nashville’s famend Ryman Auditorium in 2021 naturally was a religious expertise. Earlier than taking the stage with a full band on the Mom Church of Nation Music, she pleaded for God to assist her attain out by the heavens to nation’s patron saints like Patsy Cline, Johnny Money, and Loretta Lynn.  

“I mentioned, ‘If I’m not meant to be right here, if I’m not meant to do that, be a musician in nation music, make it abundantly clear tonight. … But when I’m meant to be right here, please God, make me really feel at dwelling,’” Caylee Hammack recollected. “That was the most effective present I’ve ever executed in my life. And I barely keep in mind any of it.” 

Tour Guiding

Subsequent on Caylee Hammack’s checklist of targets is enjoying Carnegie Corridor. This New York Metropolis efficiency palace got here to thoughts when she learn a Ray Charles interview on-line, and noticed an image of the late legend and fellow Georgia native on that stage again within the day. “It was one thing that singularly pulled me in, in a method not many issues have,” Hammack declared. “One thing in my intestine mentioned, ‘You could do this. You could play Carnegie Corridor. You’ll. You will play Carnegie Corridor. So I believe generally I don’t give myself sufficient musical targets. As soon as I noticed that interview, my mind went, ‘Ding, ding, ding! That’s your venue now to consider.’” 

With a tour calendar slowly filling up whereas lastly attending to share her music dwell, it looks like a rebirth for Hammack, who believes she’s “form of beginning another time. The work appears to be working as a result of I get to do that. So the way in which I’ve at all times seen success is that if I might assist cowl my Momma and Daddy for the remainder of their life and if I may very well be completely happy doing what I do and know that I’m making a great distinction, then that’s success.”

Even when Carnegie Corridor has to attend. For now, although, her tour itinerary consists of stops on the Tortuga Music Competition in April, adopted by “some songwriting stuff” with Wilson in North Carolina and Tennessee. 

Then she heads throughout the pond to play two exhibits at London’s historic Royal Albert Corridor on 16-17 Might, the primary “particular evening” on a invoice with Molly Tuttle and Eric Church. Different European dates observe in Amsterdam and Cologne, Germany. “It’s an amazing factor,” she said. “I’m very completely happy.” 

Time to Shine?

If Caylee Hammack is heading towards her breakthrough baptism, it’s higher late than by no means. She cites Chris Stapleton for instance of an artist who bided his time “till he had his second to shine onstage on a significant platform” on the Nation Music Awards in 2015, and “lastly he was really heard”. The “Stapleton second”, as she calls it, was a supply of inspiration for the practitioner of the phrase “apply makes good”.

“My perception is at any time when my time comes, might I be simple,” asserted the decided multi-instrumentalist, who performs guitar, banjo, and harmonica. “The one method you possibly can turn out to be simple is in case you apply your craft and you actually take the instruments you’ve been given in your toolbox of skills, hone them, work with them, and get good with them. I simply need to make music that connects with individuals. What I imply by connecting is somebody finds both solace or pleasure inside my music and the songs themselves. I additionally hope to have the respect of my fellow musicians and such for being generally known as a form individual and an amazing musician.”

Whereas discovering herself acting at exhibits that included totally different rap artists or generally delving into pop, rock, and Americana, she’ll contend that selection is the spice of life. However with influences as wide-ranging as Bowie, the Chicks, Kate Bush, Dolly Parton, and Tom Waits, an outspoken Hammack reiterated that, in an business presently ravenous for consideration whereas branding turns into extra reckless than a actuality competitors present, “Nation music is extra of a household than every other style. … I discover that it’s a dog-eat-dog world. 

“These camps oppose each other and I simply hate that thought as a result of I don’t consider that music was meant to be subjective. I don’t consider that it’s one thing that we should always even be capable of give awards. … Most of that’s off of stats and figures.”

Caylee Hammack did share an Academy of Nation Music accolade in 2020 for Musical Occasion of the Yr (“Fooled Round and Fell in Love” with Lambert, Townes, McBryde, Maren Morris, and Elle King) and different Artist to Watch mentions. Nevertheless, she would possibly begin a pattern that’s worthy of a particular commendation: Greatest Twin Launch on the Identical Day. Her novel’s album and digital model will undoubtedly double the pleasure for followers of Hammack specifically and nation admirers usually. (Bodily copies of the ebook are anticipated to reach in June.) 

Caylee Hammack Bed of Roses Book

‘Newbie’s Luck Feeling’

The novel, co-written with New York Instances bestselling creator Carolyn Brown, focuses on the exploits of a redheaded lady named Samantha and her canine Nibbler as her 1965 Mustang breaks down on the way in which to Mena, Arkansas, and winds up in a spot referred to as Homestead. 

As a result of Caylee Hammack is aware of the format, it was simpler for her to put in writing the album, which “is a set of classes I’ve realized,” and end it first, she defined. “It’s me making an attempt to remind individuals of a silver lining in a storm cloud. I believe that it’s much more unhappy song-centric. Whereas I wished the ebook to be virtually like a delicate place for individuals to land.” 

What’s particularly intriguing is how Hammack makes use of every track title on the album as a reputation for every chapter within the ebook. She suggests listening to the file in reverse order, beginning with “Tumbleweed Males” and “Oh, Kara”. Then when beginning the novel, readers will uncover “totally different Easter eggs from both manufacturing or a songwriting inspiration or the backstory behind a track all through dialogue inside these chapters. I simply wished to have the ability to create a universe.

“My favourite romance novels are those the place they plop you into a spot that you simply really feel as in case you can go there. You’re feeling as in case you’ve been there. The individual, the lady particularly for me, is having to find out about herself by the teachings within the ebook. … She finds herself in addition to love.”

After failing in earlier makes an attempt to put in writing a ebook at ages 13 and 15, Caylee Hammack discovered “one thing creatively releasing about” this challenge.

“Have you ever ever gotten into one thing that you simply do virtually higher earlier than you realize all the foundations?” she requested. “You’re virtually higher on the sport earlier than you really apply the sport in any respect. You may have this newbie’s luck feeling. … So now at 30 years outdated, getting to put in writing this ebook, the third time’s a allure.” 

For the album, the second time could also be simply as charming. With a commanding voice that provides a contact of Dolly’s warble whereas versatile sufficient to drag off varied genres from rock (take heed to the album’s mighty “Cleopatra”) to pop (“Breaking Dishes” has Morris’ crossover enchantment) to R&B (take a look at her Invoice Withers cowl above), Hammack appears destined to transcend the nation group. 

Whereas the Southern bellflower admits she’s nonetheless not used to the Nashville chill, Hammack likes how her backyard grows, but hints at leaving the door open to department out for greener pastures. 

“I believe that my roots will at all times be in nation. I don’t see myself as ever actually leaving and by no means coming dwelling,” she concluded. “I’m a homebody, particularly in my music style. However I do love creating with different individuals. I believe that in a world the place genres are actually increasing and the boundaries are beginning to crumble and merge with each other, I believe that there’s like a tectonic pressure that’s making all genres mix higher. 

“Due to that I really feel like there’s extra liberty as an artist to get to go make totally different sounds and take a look at various things. So long as I get to make music, I’m completely happy. However I’m undoubtedly nation. I’m about as nation as cornbread, so there will certainly be a bit twang in every thing.” 

Even when each mattress of roses has a thorn or two, that ought to sound peachy eager to followers ready to see what handywoman Caylee Hammack creates subsequent — with loving care, in fact.