The Sit Down with Cody Pennington
Nashville native Cody Pennington has turned humble beginnings into a rising independent country career. With a unique journey spanning military service, law school, and international travels, Cody has sold over sixty thousand tickets worldwide and amassed more than two and a half million streams across major platforms. Known for his dynamic live performances and authentic songwriting, he continues to carve his own path in country music and proving that independent artists can thrive on their own terms, as shown by selling out numerous venues on the thirty date international tour which he is currently in the middle of.
You're someone that's kind of been in and around here for a little while, I've seen your name all over the place, predominantly over socials which that push has clearly worked because everyone that I know who has been out to see you has come away saying this Cody Pennington guy, he's great. Your show is a show rather than just a set, you're doing a mixture of covers, some of your new stuff and things people have really warmed to. Did you think that would really work this well here?
“Yeah, I don't know what I was expecting. I put the show together when I got back into music, because I stepped away from music for a long time, then I started writing again and really putting a lot of effort into it, but I wanted to keep playing music. So, I put together this show that eventually just became a vehicle for me to get around to everybody and what I'm trying to do is to become this name that's synonymous with a fun show that happens to have country music in it. When you hear Cody Pennington, I want it to be that his show is just so fun, let's go see him play and that's worked. I have horrible luck, I've never had a bet go my way, I've never had anything that I've bet on go right but this did go right, so I'm really happy to have been starting this around the time that the boom started in the UK. It was just right place, right time and again, that never happens to me, but I think it was due, I think it was finally past due. I did it and like you say, the crowds have gone a bit crazy for it. I mean, going from our first gig, which was like 150 people, to now I'm playing in front of 1700 to 2000 people that are screaming my songs back at me, it's turned into what I wanted it to turn into. I think people just seem to keep coming back, which surprised me but it's amazing how it's turned out. I'm really proud of it.”
I think the way you’ve planned this run is really smart, because it's almost like an American way of touring, where your generally doing Friday, Saturday, then either a Thursday or Sunday which are nights that people want to be coming out and making the most of it.
“Yeah, we've done both. I remember when I first started touring the UK, I think the first show we did was on a Wednesday, and that one sold out. So, then I thought, okay, let's start booking some more and obviously every tour wants to do weekends just because they're so easy to sell it in terms of a promotional standpoint. I remember the deciding factor of when I said I want to stop everything that I'm doing, I need to quit law, I need to quit everything else and just do music, was I booked four dates in Scotland. I might have done Edinburgh and Glasgow on a Monday and Tuesday, or I might have done two at each gig. I can't quite remember what it was but those all sold out and I thought, if I can sell out a Monday or Tuesday in Scotland of all places, this is something cool, so that was the deciding factor. Nowadays, we've got so many good connections now because we've made so much goodwill with a lot of the venues that they are more likely to actually let us have a weekend date. That's almost really difficult to do if they don't know you because they want to save those dates for the big shows and we're actually quite lucky now that people trust us enough to put on a good show. They know they'll get a good bar take, they'll know that there'll be enough people in the room and all that kind of stuff, so we're pretty lucky at this point now.”
Now you've sort of got the hang of it here, is London almost one of the hardest cities to think about where you’re booking shows? We were talking before about places like Norwich, where they don't have as much music coming to them so it's a really big deal for the people not just in the city but in the surrounding areas as well, whereas in London there is a lot more going on, so it must be harder to gauge how many people going to come here compared to other parts of the country.
“Yeah, kind of. It's all part of the business, because every country is its own market, then every city in that country is its own market as well. So, Norwich for instance, like you say, it's an easier sell because people don't as many gig as London or some of the other major cities in the UK do. That is an easier sell. Planning London is a bit different and it's always pretty much the slowest sell because there is so much going on and most people don't like to plan that far ahead in London. That's just the direction that all concerts are going nowadays, most people like to buy later. It's just how it is. It doesn't make it difficult to plan but I think the point where we're at, the hard part is deciding whether or not we upgrade to a bigger venue or not. Like, Norwich is a pretty easy decision because we played the biggest concert venue they have, which is the LCR. That's 1,500 people but everybody was packed in and they were very uncomfortable. The next size up there is their showground arena, which is 5,000 people. My thought might be, at that point, we might just upgrade that to the 5,000 cap, but plan to probably only to sell 2,500. A 50 capacity venue will not look empty, surprisingly, it doesn't look empty. It just means that everybody has a little bit extra space so they're not packed like sardines. In terms of London, sometimes it is better to just play it safe because it does sell so slowly. Where the venues start, like say, Islington Assembly Hall is around 800 to 900 people, then Electric Brixton is 1700 odd and that was, I think, comfortable. I think there's no point really to upgrade those until they start selling up crazy fast but for now, it's not too difficult. The hardest part of London is that people just don't like to plan ahead that far.”
You're someone that's kind of been in and around here for a little while, I've seen your name all over the place, predominantly over socials which that push has clearly worked because everyone that I know who has been out to see you has come away saying this Cody Pennington guy, he's great. Your show is a show rather than just a set, you're doing a mixture of covers, some of your new stuff and things people have really warmed to. Did you think that would really work this well here?
“Yeah, I don't know what I was expecting. I put the show together when I got back into music, because I stepped away from music for a long time, then I started writing again and really putting a lot of effort into it, but I wanted to keep playing music. So, I put together this show that eventually just became a vehicle for me to get around to everybody and what I'm trying to do is to become this name that's synonymous with a fun show that happens to have country music in it. When you hear Cody Pennington, I want it to be that his show is just so fun, let's go see him play and that's worked. I have horrible luck, I've never had a bet go my way, I've never had anything that I've bet on go right but this did go right, so I'm really happy to have been starting this around the time that the boom started in the UK. It was just right place, right time and again, that never happens to me, but I think it was due, I think it was finally past due. I did it and like you say, the crowds have gone a bit crazy for it. I mean, going from our first gig, which was like 150 people, to now I'm playing in front of 1700 to 2000 people that are screaming my songs back at me, it's turned into what I wanted it to turn into. I think people just seem to keep coming back, which surprised me but it's amazing how it's turned out. I'm really proud of it.”
I think the way you’ve planned this run is really smart, because it's almost like an American way of touring, where your generally doing Friday, Saturday, then either a Thursday or Sunday which are nights that people want to be coming out and making the most of it.
“Yeah, we've done both. I remember when I first started touring the UK, I think the first show we did was on a Wednesday, and that one sold out. So, then I thought, okay, let's start booking some more and obviously every tour wants to do weekends just because they're so easy to sell it in terms of a promotional standpoint. I remember the deciding factor of when I said I want to stop everything that I'm doing, I need to quit law, I need to quit everything else and just do music, was I booked four dates in Scotland. I might have done Edinburgh and Glasgow on a Monday and Tuesday, or I might have done two at each gig. I can't quite remember what it was but those all sold out and I thought, if I can sell out a Monday or Tuesday in Scotland of all places, this is something cool, so that was the deciding factor. Nowadays, we've got so many good connections now because we've made so much goodwill with a lot of the venues that they are more likely to actually let us have a weekend date. That's almost really difficult to do if they don't know you because they want to save those dates for the big shows and we're actually quite lucky now that people trust us enough to put on a good show. They know they'll get a good bar take, they'll know that there'll be enough people in the room and all that kind of stuff, so we're pretty lucky at this point now.”
Now you've sort of got the hang of it here, is London almost one of the hardest cities to think about where you’re booking shows? We were talking before about places like Norwich, where they don't have as much music coming to them so it's a really big deal for the people not just in the city but in the surrounding areas as well, whereas in London there is a lot more going on, so it must be harder to gauge how many people going to come here compared to other parts of the country.
“Yeah, kind of. It's all part of the business, because every country is its own market, then every city in that country is its own market as well. So, Norwich for instance, like you say, it's an easier sell because people don't as many gig as London or some of the other major cities in the UK do. That is an easier sell. Planning London is a bit different and it's always pretty much the slowest sell because there is so much going on and most people don't like to plan that far ahead in London. That's just the direction that all concerts are going nowadays, most people like to buy later. It's just how it is. It doesn't make it difficult to plan but I think the point where we're at, the hard part is deciding whether or not we upgrade to a bigger venue or not. Like, Norwich is a pretty easy decision because we played the biggest concert venue they have, which is the LCR. That's 1,500 people but everybody was packed in and they were very uncomfortable. The next size up there is their showground arena, which is 5,000 people. My thought might be, at that point, we might just upgrade that to the 5,000 cap, but plan to probably only to sell 2,500. A 50 capacity venue will not look empty, surprisingly, it doesn't look empty. It just means that everybody has a little bit extra space so they're not packed like sardines. In terms of London, sometimes it is better to just play it safe because it does sell so slowly. Where the venues start, like say, Islington Assembly Hall is around 800 to 900 people, then Electric Brixton is 1700 odd and that was, I think, comfortable. I think there's no point really to upgrade those until they start selling up crazy fast but for now, it's not too difficult. The hardest part of London is that people just don't like to plan ahead that far.”
I see that you are back off to Australia again and I’ve got some friends in Perth, who are very grateful for anyone touring there because they always complain about getting left out when people only tend to head to Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane. That's a huge country and it's a lot bigger than even looks on the map so given how vast it is and that traveling around is a much bigger factor and that you are as close to the market, do you have to kind of look more at demographics there to think about the size of venues and cities you're going to be playing?
“We're actually going in April next year, but we doing the same cities that we did last year. Last year I took a pretty strict business approach to it, I said, we need to break into a new market outside of the UK and we actually did two markets as we did mainland Europe as well. I said, we need to break into these markets so we have other markets outside of the UK that we can really work. Approaching Australia, we chose the best cities that we thought would be the most popular and I don't think we based it on anything in particular other than they were major stops, but Perth, I wanted to hit because it was a major part of the country. We went in with the mindset of saying, we might not have a profit off this tour because we might be choosing the wrong places and we might be choosing the wrong capacities or whatever but it turned out it was great. It was awesome and this year, when we announced the dates and put them on pre-sale, we sold pretty much 10% of all the tickets for the entire tour on just pre-sales alone. As an independent artist on the second tour there, that's really good and that’s with no promotion. Honestly, we approached it in a way of we might have a loss, but let's break into the market and just make sure we can make it a warm market for the next tours. Perth itself, like you say, never gets chosen and if it is chosen, people will probably play that, one month and then go east the next month. We ended up just flying to all the gigs and it worked really well. I think what we've done so far has worked really well for the Australian continent but it's incredibly difficult to get around, there's no way you could drive it comfortably.”
Coming on to your music, you had an EP that came out around eighteen months ago and we’ve had three new songs come out this year, so are you looking to now build towards something bigger with them or is it just the case of the way that the world works now, particularly for an independent artist where you have to focus more on one track, let that track do its thing, and then do another track rather than releasing a lot together where all of the exposure goes in one hit.
“Yeah, I mean, that is something I noticed on the last two EP’s, that there were songs on there that I really cared about that got no notice on the release week because they were just ignored just because it's the nature of it as it gets pushed in a certain way. The way I'm doing it now is that I'm trying to do both, which is hard. Right now, I'm writing my first album, which I think is great and I can't wait to release that but I have to have something coming out consistently as well. I'm not doing an EP, I am doing all of the singles I've got coming out now. I've got about four or five more singles lined up, which would then lead up to an announcement for an album but those won't be included on the album. I'm going to have something completely separate, that can then have its own release schedule as well. So, it's just having the content and that's the world we live in but also, albums are still important if you want to make a splash in some ways.I think I'm at the point where if I released an album and I put a lot of effort into it, that it could be successful. EP’s don't get as much interest when it comes to press, any sort of promotion or even Spotify still favours them because obviously the more songs you have, the more people stay on the platform. I'm trying to juggle both, I've got the singles planned out, I've obviously just released “Thanks To You” and I’ve got four or five more planned out from now, then I'll be looking at the album by the time those releases are done. It’s just keeping it consistent and having something that makes sure people know I'm still there and working.”
“We're actually going in April next year, but we doing the same cities that we did last year. Last year I took a pretty strict business approach to it, I said, we need to break into a new market outside of the UK and we actually did two markets as we did mainland Europe as well. I said, we need to break into these markets so we have other markets outside of the UK that we can really work. Approaching Australia, we chose the best cities that we thought would be the most popular and I don't think we based it on anything in particular other than they were major stops, but Perth, I wanted to hit because it was a major part of the country. We went in with the mindset of saying, we might not have a profit off this tour because we might be choosing the wrong places and we might be choosing the wrong capacities or whatever but it turned out it was great. It was awesome and this year, when we announced the dates and put them on pre-sale, we sold pretty much 10% of all the tickets for the entire tour on just pre-sales alone. As an independent artist on the second tour there, that's really good and that’s with no promotion. Honestly, we approached it in a way of we might have a loss, but let's break into the market and just make sure we can make it a warm market for the next tours. Perth itself, like you say, never gets chosen and if it is chosen, people will probably play that, one month and then go east the next month. We ended up just flying to all the gigs and it worked really well. I think what we've done so far has worked really well for the Australian continent but it's incredibly difficult to get around, there's no way you could drive it comfortably.”
Coming on to your music, you had an EP that came out around eighteen months ago and we’ve had three new songs come out this year, so are you looking to now build towards something bigger with them or is it just the case of the way that the world works now, particularly for an independent artist where you have to focus more on one track, let that track do its thing, and then do another track rather than releasing a lot together where all of the exposure goes in one hit.
“Yeah, I mean, that is something I noticed on the last two EP’s, that there were songs on there that I really cared about that got no notice on the release week because they were just ignored just because it's the nature of it as it gets pushed in a certain way. The way I'm doing it now is that I'm trying to do both, which is hard. Right now, I'm writing my first album, which I think is great and I can't wait to release that but I have to have something coming out consistently as well. I'm not doing an EP, I am doing all of the singles I've got coming out now. I've got about four or five more singles lined up, which would then lead up to an announcement for an album but those won't be included on the album. I'm going to have something completely separate, that can then have its own release schedule as well. So, it's just having the content and that's the world we live in but also, albums are still important if you want to make a splash in some ways.I think I'm at the point where if I released an album and I put a lot of effort into it, that it could be successful. EP’s don't get as much interest when it comes to press, any sort of promotion or even Spotify still favours them because obviously the more songs you have, the more people stay on the platform. I'm trying to juggle both, I've got the singles planned out, I've obviously just released “Thanks To You” and I’ve got four or five more planned out from now, then I'll be looking at the album by the time those releases are done. It’s just keeping it consistent and having something that makes sure people know I'm still there and working.”
One of the things I noticed when you look through your catalogue, is that a lot of the songs you have out there, you write a lot of them on your own rather than with co-writers compared to most people. Is it just the way you like to work or like the stuff that you've written with other people, you haven’t liked as much to cut?
“Well, I have co-written a lot with Gary Quinn, who's a UK country artist and he's really well connected in Nashville with other songwriters. I think I co-wrote pretty much all but one song off of my “Cowboy Enough” EP with him but scheduling has a lot to do with it too. I was speaking to a guy called Keith Harkin who used to be in a show called Celtic Thunder and he was the main tenor in that but he lives in Portugal now. I was trying to like schedule something with him because I'd love to, you know what I mean? He's just a cool dude and I loved his stuff so I started thinking of trying to get him writing for that. To be honest, I write so much on my own now that I'm trying to push as many songs as I can because I'm getting past the point of where I don't know if a song is going to be successful, maybe I should release it. I just think, no, I like the song, I'd like to release it and it just so happens that a lot of those I had written myself. I'm not against co-writing, but I think it's just nice to be able to release something that you've written and I don't like waiting on someone else to put a spin on it, maybe, if that makes sense. I guess having a co-writer when I have an idea is nice but when I bring a fully informed song to them and just say, what do you think, I just don't feel like I need to wait for that, especially if I get the production right. If I get the production of the songs right, I'm happy and also, I don't have to share the royalty then.”
You have done a bit with Ryan Hadlock. How did you first get to meet him and what makes him so great to work with as a producer?
“Yeah, I’ve done two songs with him so far. He’s awesome, I'd like to end up doing an album with him, but he's very expensive. I was in the military and when I was stationed in England in 2014, I reached out to him and he was the only producer that I reached out to that responded back to me saying let's see what we can do here, you know, let's see what happens. Nothing came from it then, but ten years later, when the show started taking off, I approached him again and his manager got back to me saying yes, let's talk about it. It Took another two years and then I finally was like, here's an offer, here's my offer for you guys, do you have space to do these songs? He liked the songs and they agreed to the offer, so I flew to Seattle and worked with him which was a really cool experience because the studio was iconic. It was so gorgeous, I mean, Foo Fighters have recorded there, Sound Garden recorded there, it was insane. It was nice working with him and he brings like a really cool vibe to the songs. He definitely brings a natural vibe which is something I was looking for those particular songs. If it's a song that I may not want that vibe for, I may not work with Ryan on it, like, I didn't work with him on “Thanks To You” because I wanted a different production song but he's awesome to work with on that particular Americana, folk vibe that I was really looking for on “Whiskey’s Better”. I think we nailed it with what I was looking for but yeah, he's a cool dude, he's really, really cool.”
“Well, I have co-written a lot with Gary Quinn, who's a UK country artist and he's really well connected in Nashville with other songwriters. I think I co-wrote pretty much all but one song off of my “Cowboy Enough” EP with him but scheduling has a lot to do with it too. I was speaking to a guy called Keith Harkin who used to be in a show called Celtic Thunder and he was the main tenor in that but he lives in Portugal now. I was trying to like schedule something with him because I'd love to, you know what I mean? He's just a cool dude and I loved his stuff so I started thinking of trying to get him writing for that. To be honest, I write so much on my own now that I'm trying to push as many songs as I can because I'm getting past the point of where I don't know if a song is going to be successful, maybe I should release it. I just think, no, I like the song, I'd like to release it and it just so happens that a lot of those I had written myself. I'm not against co-writing, but I think it's just nice to be able to release something that you've written and I don't like waiting on someone else to put a spin on it, maybe, if that makes sense. I guess having a co-writer when I have an idea is nice but when I bring a fully informed song to them and just say, what do you think, I just don't feel like I need to wait for that, especially if I get the production right. If I get the production of the songs right, I'm happy and also, I don't have to share the royalty then.”
You have done a bit with Ryan Hadlock. How did you first get to meet him and what makes him so great to work with as a producer?
“Yeah, I’ve done two songs with him so far. He’s awesome, I'd like to end up doing an album with him, but he's very expensive. I was in the military and when I was stationed in England in 2014, I reached out to him and he was the only producer that I reached out to that responded back to me saying let's see what we can do here, you know, let's see what happens. Nothing came from it then, but ten years later, when the show started taking off, I approached him again and his manager got back to me saying yes, let's talk about it. It Took another two years and then I finally was like, here's an offer, here's my offer for you guys, do you have space to do these songs? He liked the songs and they agreed to the offer, so I flew to Seattle and worked with him which was a really cool experience because the studio was iconic. It was so gorgeous, I mean, Foo Fighters have recorded there, Sound Garden recorded there, it was insane. It was nice working with him and he brings like a really cool vibe to the songs. He definitely brings a natural vibe which is something I was looking for those particular songs. If it's a song that I may not want that vibe for, I may not work with Ryan on it, like, I didn't work with him on “Thanks To You” because I wanted a different production song but he's awesome to work with on that particular Americana, folk vibe that I was really looking for on “Whiskey’s Better”. I think we nailed it with what I was looking for but yeah, he's a cool dude, he's really, really cool.”
Then, just coming back to the show down here, Brixton is an interesting part of town but it’s always cool to have a show in south London rather than everything being so central.
“It's hard on the point of where you plan to go in London because you never know how people are going to feel about having to travel to the gigs. We've done a lot of gigs at The 100 Club which is pretty central so it's pretty easy to get to but it's also not the biggest place. It's 300 people and we’ve sold that one out like five times, so we needed to go somewhere bigger, but hopefully people don't mind travelling.”
How are the shows working? Are you having a support? How long kind of is a Cody Pennington Show? What can people expect from this show?
“Yeah, Katy Hurt who is an amazing UK country artist will be the support for the majority of the shows. So, she'll be opening the show and my show is generally about two hours long, we can go over if we want to, depending on the venue, but I think London has a pretty early curfew, so we'll be doing two hours. It's about 70/30 originals to covers. I keep it to the originals that people seem to be singing along to like “Downtown”, “Cowboy Sitting At The Bar” and “Nothing On Us” is another big one that surprised me. Then there's a few others that people just vibe with, which is really surprising and obviously, we keep “Thanks To You” in and then a new one that I've not really spoken about really, but a new one that we've been playing to people and kind of judging reactions with. Then the covers are pretty much all of the big, fun songs so, it's fun to come to a Cody Pennington concert. Most of the people, when I'm advertising my show, they look at my streaming. They listen to my stuff and see whether or not they want to come, then they learn “Downtown” and all stuff so, when they come, they have a good time with that but if they bring their friends with them, maybe their friends haven't heard me, they hear “The Gambler” and just have a good time, plus I might throw out some Backstreet Boy or something like that. They hear something that they know and love which just connects them to the show and makes them have a good vibe at the show. Even if you're like the smallest country music fan or if you're not a country music fan, we've had so many people tell us we've converted their husbands or whatever. It's going to it's a night that’s worth trying out because honestly, it's a good vibe, we've worked really hard at just making it a fun show.”
Fri, 10 Oct: Glasgow - O2 Academy
Sat, 11 Oct: Leeds - Stylus
Fri, 17 Oct: Southampton - O2 Guildhall
Sat, 18 Oct: London - Electric Brixton
Cody Pennington concludes his UK tour this month with remaining dates shown above and ticket information is available on his WEBSITE whilst can keep in touch with Cody on socials by checking him out on INSTAGRAM TIKTOK & FACEBOOK.
“It's hard on the point of where you plan to go in London because you never know how people are going to feel about having to travel to the gigs. We've done a lot of gigs at The 100 Club which is pretty central so it's pretty easy to get to but it's also not the biggest place. It's 300 people and we’ve sold that one out like five times, so we needed to go somewhere bigger, but hopefully people don't mind travelling.”
How are the shows working? Are you having a support? How long kind of is a Cody Pennington Show? What can people expect from this show?
“Yeah, Katy Hurt who is an amazing UK country artist will be the support for the majority of the shows. So, she'll be opening the show and my show is generally about two hours long, we can go over if we want to, depending on the venue, but I think London has a pretty early curfew, so we'll be doing two hours. It's about 70/30 originals to covers. I keep it to the originals that people seem to be singing along to like “Downtown”, “Cowboy Sitting At The Bar” and “Nothing On Us” is another big one that surprised me. Then there's a few others that people just vibe with, which is really surprising and obviously, we keep “Thanks To You” in and then a new one that I've not really spoken about really, but a new one that we've been playing to people and kind of judging reactions with. Then the covers are pretty much all of the big, fun songs so, it's fun to come to a Cody Pennington concert. Most of the people, when I'm advertising my show, they look at my streaming. They listen to my stuff and see whether or not they want to come, then they learn “Downtown” and all stuff so, when they come, they have a good time with that but if they bring their friends with them, maybe their friends haven't heard me, they hear “The Gambler” and just have a good time, plus I might throw out some Backstreet Boy or something like that. They hear something that they know and love which just connects them to the show and makes them have a good vibe at the show. Even if you're like the smallest country music fan or if you're not a country music fan, we've had so many people tell us we've converted their husbands or whatever. It's going to it's a night that’s worth trying out because honestly, it's a good vibe, we've worked really hard at just making it a fun show.”
Fri, 10 Oct: Glasgow - O2 Academy
Sat, 11 Oct: Leeds - Stylus
Fri, 17 Oct: Southampton - O2 Guildhall
Sat, 18 Oct: London - Electric Brixton
Cody Pennington concludes his UK tour this month with remaining dates shown above and ticket information is available on his WEBSITE whilst can keep in touch with Cody on socials by checking him out on INSTAGRAM TIKTOK & FACEBOOK.
