Singer melds old and new sounds
True Youngblood sings to the crowd. Photos submitted
By Tom Victoria
True Youngblood found his calling by making melodies.
The musician explained what music means to him.
“Music to me is finding exactly something that I'd been looking for for a long time,” he said. “I did so much growing up, tried so many different things, but I never really found a place in those, I guess. And then, I started playing guitar and singing, and really felt like that was what I was meant to do. Music to me is a calling. I guess that's a corny answer, but that's what it is.”
True, 22, described his musical style.
“Big blend of the old school things you're used to, the old school sounds infused with a little bit of a new edge and newer themes,” he said. “In terms of writing and stuff, that's the best way I could probably put that.”
True cited a band with a similar sound.
“I look up a lot to The Red Clay Strays,” he said. “I really like what they got going on. Their sound that they're crafting, obviously it's not the exact same. I'd be fine if I was doing the same thing as the Strays. I love their music, but we're probably closest to them in terms of old and new fusing together.”
True’s latest debut is What It Costs.
“The most recent release was What It Costs, which is sort of a Wicked Games, Chris Isaak-inspired track that we worked on,” he said. “And I think it came out really good. I really enjoyed it. That was the first ever song I had co-written with two other people. The general consensus that we had going into that song was it's about a girl is the PG way I could put that. Because if you listen to it, it's all about shadows dancing on the walls of a bedroom, that sort of thing. I'll leave it at that. It's fun.”
True poses by a Cadillac DeVille.
Anyone True knows could end up inspiring a tune.
“It's not even people dating me,” he said. “I look in the situations that they're going through and I'm like, man, that sucks for him. But it's a really good song that could come out of that. You're the song now.”
Some pals wouldn’t mind the songs being more vague.
“Most of the time, it's: you didn't have to be so damn direct with it,” he said. “They don't mind it, though. Most of the time, it seems like they like it, makes them feel cool to have a song about them. Whether it's good or bad, they still like it.”
True took a breather from releasing music.
“We're in the process of figuring out what the next release is going to be,” he said. “For about six months, it was just bang, bang, bang. Back in May, we were like, maybe it's time we just take a breath. It's summertime. Gonna be doing a lot of traveling, so let's step back and find a really good next song. We’ve decided to take the summer and fall to just write and experiment for what comes next.”
True savors performing live.
“I love it,” he said. “That's why I got into music in the first place. I love to get up on stage.”
True is a native of the Peach State, but spends much of his time in Music City.
“I'm bouncing back and forth,” he said. “I spend a lot of time in Georgia playing. Nashville is cool, but I'm very proud of Georgia.”
True attends college in Nashville, but is mainly there for his art.
“I'm there for music,” he said. “I had to come up here conditionally. My parents are like, if you're going to go to Nashville for music, you at least have to try college for a while. I'm at Belmont (University). That was my condition to come up to do the country music thing.”
True recalled the first musician to leave an impact on him.
“I was young,” he said. “I don't remember the exact age, but it was a Tim McGraw song that my mom was listening to called Ghost Town Train. It's very upbeat, but it's sad. And, man, I remember just feeling crushed when I heard it and really paid attention to it. I guess I was 12 years old. It just destroyed me at 12 years old, because I had so much to be destroyed with.”
True started singing as a teen.
“I believe I was 15,” he said. “Growing up, we had a little theater drama program at the school I went to, and they would make me and my four or five classmates sing because we were a really small school. Everybody had to pitch in and sing. But I never would get up on stage by myself.”
The King inspired True to perform.
“My grandma, when I was really little, had bought one of those musical clocks,” he said. “You ever seen those that play a song on the hour? I kept hearing this one song that I thought was pretty on the clock called Are You Lonesome Tonight. I was like, man, that's gorgeous. I'd heard about Elvis growing up of course, but I looked up Elvis, and the first video I saw on YouTube back then was him in Tupelo in 1956 performing. I saw the way people were just going ballistic over him. It was that moment where I was like, all right, well, that's what I'm doing the rest of my entire life until the wheels fall off. I want to be like that. That's the coolest thing ever, so I started singing right after that.”
True also has an affinity for who may have been the smoothest crooner: Dean Martin.
“Sinatra's obviously got probably the better range, but Dino's voice is just more what I like to hear,” he said.
True played the keys before belting out tunes.
“I started piano before I ever started singing,” he said. “I started lessons at 7 and then around the same time, I started learning to sing. I started teaching myself guitar. It wasn't hard to translate piano to guitar because if you knew where the chords were supposed to go, as long as you could press the strings down hard enough, you could figure it out from there.”
True enjoys the capacity of a guitar and piano to cover any song.
“Knowing how to play that guitar/piano combo especially, then you really can pretty much cover any song you want to because it's all you need,” he said.
True aspires to perform on the biggest country western stage of them all.
“One of my goals I've always had is I've always wanted to play the Grand Ole Opry, ever since I heard about it as a kid,” he said. “It was when I didn't even want to sing. I was like, man, that'd be cool to get up on that stage because it's legendary. That's probably top priority. And then I just want a tour. I want to go see all these places and play for all these people that I've never seen before and I'll probably never see again. Just to see what's different out there.”
True isn’t daunted by the prospect of becoming a famous musician.
“I would take it as far as it could go,” he said. “I've always never hated people coming up and talking to me and the getting mobbed thing. That would probably not be the most fun in the world. But if it's making somebody's day to see me that would make me feel really good about myself and I hope that it's making them feel good that I would take the time to stop. So if I can give that to somebody, I hope I can one day.”
True said some people unfairly stereotype the south.
“A lot of times, the people that you hear from the south, the ones that seem to talk the loudest, they're not really who Southern people are,” he said. “You see these guys with their squatted trucks, and they're flying Confederate flags behind them. They're being obnoxious and uneducated, and that's not who we are. That's the one guy in town that everybody literally hates. Everybody hates to see that guy coming, and then the rest of us get a bad rep for it. There's a bit of an unfair perception and fun fact: Deliverance was filmed not far from where I grew up actually.”
True resides near the filming location for the iconic John Boorman film starring Jon Voight and Burt Reynolds.
“It's 30 minutes away from my house,” he said.
True is familiar with the infamous Dueling Banjos tune from the film.
“To me, it's not too hard,” he said. “I'm self-taught and it very much shows. But my guitar player, he grew up in bluegrass. His grandpa's in the Georgia Bluegrass Hall of Fame. He used to play with Bill Monroe back in the day. And he can rip Dueling Banjos, but if you ask him to play it, he's like, you're seriously gonna make me play that stupid song again? Yeah, dude, it's fun. Everybody likes it except for you.”
True draws all of his songs from his life.
“Every song I've ever written has been based on something that's happened to me or somebody I know,” he said.
Both parts of a song, music and words, may come simultaneously to True.
“A lot of times if I'm writing a song, they both hit me at the same time,” he said. “I'll get a line and how it would be sung in my head all at once. And then it's about finding the rest of the song with it and which direction that's going to go. But if it doesn't happen like that, typically it's trying to find some melody to go off of first. That way, you have your guideline in a way, makes it easier for me that way.”
True periodically gets butterflies before hopping on stage.
“That depends on a few things,” he said. “One, what kind of mood am I in? Because if I'm being pissy, then there's no stage fright. I'm just getting up there and getting after it. But a lot of times, there is a lot of stage fright. But as soon as you start, there's no going back. You just gotta rock with it.”
True would like folks to remember his sound more so than his writing.
“I hope that one day when I'm dead and gone, that people will look back and remember the voice more so than the lyrics themselves,” he said. “That's what I've always strove to be is considered a great singer. That's what I'm trying to prove, not just to everybody but mostly to myself, is that you are a good singer. I hope that's what they remember me for one of these days is the fact that I could hold a tune.”
True takes care of his voice.
“I worked with a vocal coach,” he said. “She taught me how to properly warm up and warm down and taught me what's good for my voice and what's not. Told me I needed to stop drinking energy drinks and Pepsis all the time. But I can't change that habit. So she said just make sure you're drinking some water. And I was like, all right, we can make that one work.”
True’s band is a disparate group.
“They're a ragtag group,” he said. “What I like about it is for some reason, man, it's just when every time we come together, things seem to click. I remember my guitar player, the one I was talking about earlier. He grew up in bluegrass and when I started playing gigs, we weren't even that close back then. I hadn't seen him in probably four years, but I just remember calling him one day and being like, hey, you want to come play guitar for just one time? Let's see how it works. And he started harmonizing with me that day, and it just clicked. It worked.”
True eventually found the right man to lay down the beat.
“On down the line, I met my drummer,” he said. “He's very Greek, and he's very proud of that, and he would tell you that, too. But I was very skeptical about this guy at first, and I'll admit it now. I didn't know this guy. He was one of my friend's friends when I moved to Nashville. And again, he started playing with us, and he just got it. I remember one show we did. We had run out of songs on our set list, so I turned around, and I went, can you give me this beat? And he gave me exactly that and then some, and I just thought that was perfect.”
Then, True found his bass with Easton’s younger brother, Carson.
“We were like, do you know how to play bass? And he said nope,” he said. “And I said, well, you better figure it out. And ever since then, he's been the number one bass man. I just love how things have worked out with the guys in the band and we're all super close and good friends and know how to have a good time with each other. So I wanted to shout them out because they do a lot of good work for me.”
True stays motivated to make music.
“In the summertime, I'm playing somewhere and during the winter, I try to get as many shows as I can, mostly up here,” he said. “Having a good show will light a fire under your butt like nothing else will, because you see what it could be. You get just a little bit of a glimpse of how good it could be and how good that would feel to have people cheering for you in the thousands instead of just the handful of crowd at the little dive bar you're at. That always keeps me motivated is you're getting closer every day. Just keep at it.”
True creates another type of art in his spare time.
“I got into woodworking quite a bit,” he said. “It is about the most boring hobby imaginable. It's not thrilling at all. But I do love to do it. It's definitely very time-consuming. But when you get something done, you're like, man, I just made that out of a two-by-four, that's awesome. You pat yourself on the back.”
True offered advice to aspiring musicians.
“I'd tell them to wait make sure that the first song you put out is exactly what you want it to be,” he said. “You need to get friends with you that'll tell you that maybe your song is not perfect. Maybe it needs a little work. Thank God I have friends and brothers that don't just praise me for everything that I do and that's helped me a lot. That's what helped probably my first song have any kind of success is I had people saying, is this ready yet? Are you sure? Let's make sure this is good enough.”
True said some musicians jump the gun.
“I see a lot of people that get on GarageBand or whatever and will record themselves and just put the song out and it's not ready,” he said. “It's not had time to sit and you just got to be ready for that sort of thing. I'd tell them to wait and make sure you're in the right spot to put that first song out. But by that same token, don't be afraid to put it out when you know it's right.”
True’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/true_youngblood/
True’s YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCTucezLKP8_Gk6I_WMioNag