Tyler Rich speaks with Country in the UK

Country Music Week once again introduced the UK audience to a new American artist. This time, Yuba City, California native Tyler Rich was given the opportunity to play in England for the first time. Tyler spent the week supporting Striking Matches, before appearing at the Country Hits Radio Daytime Hub. We caught up with Tyler before his first show in London.
As this is your first time playing in London, what can we expect from a Tyler Rich show?
Thank you Tyler for taking the time to speak with Country in the UK and we look forward to welcoming you back to the UK very soon.
As this is your first time playing in London, what can we expect from a Tyler Rich show?
- Whether I am playing acoustic or with my band I always try to have as much fun as I can. Lots of people take themselves too seriously, I try to through in some unexpected covers, tells stories (especially in an acoustic show) as every song I write comes from something. The songs I play have a real story behind it. I even try to crack jokes – it doesn’t always work! I haven’t done a true acoustic show like this in a long time, I’ve done a tone of the Nashville writers rounds but this will be my first legit full acoustic set by myself in a long time and I’m excited.
- I’ve read a lot about it, I’ve heard a lot about it, and it seems to be kind of the same thing. It’s a more of a listening crowd than you’d expect to have in Nashville and across America. One thing you’ll find a lot in the States is that people really just want to come and party, hang out with their friends and have a drink. They know the songs they know and between that they’re like oh whatever – other than the die-hard fans upfront. I’ve heard the UK crowd is a listening crowd and they dive into people catalogues and aim to learn about the artist they are going to see. As an artist, that’s our dream. That’s the crowd you want to play to every night. I played a show in North Carolina one time and the crowd was so intent the whole time and I said to the person who put on the show that it was hard to tell if they were so focused or totally hated me. The lady thought I was complaining, I had to explain that that is our dream when they are listening to what we are saying and not being focused on the fact a song isn’t about drinking and don’t want to know.
- I am looking forward to tomorrow and getting to take the train to Leeds - getting to see the country and take it all in. I’m hoping to find small pubs and locals to talk to, any little, traditional English pub. I love traveling and have travelled across Europe, but I just love getting to know the locals and learning about the city I’m in. I’ve been in London for just over 24 hours and have already been to three museums. I’m excited
- I was in bed and asleep by 9:30 last night, which is the first time I’ve been to bed before midnight in a long time! I managed to sleep for 12 hoursish and now I’m on the schedule. I should now be on London time I hope and I guess I’ll find out in the next few hours.
- 6 and 0 baby! I’ve got a friend here and I spoke to him before I came over and was like, hey do you have an NFL team? He said no so I told him you do now as they are playing on Sunday at 9pm, we’re going to go find a bar and I’ve got you a 49ers hat!
- There is a pretty big country scene in California, but it’s just a California country scene. I was living in LA and as it’s such a big entertainment capital, I was convinced I could do whatever I needed to do there. Then I actually got an email from Dustin Lynch’s management company saying they loved what I was doing in California and wanted me to come to Nashville for a few meetings. I flew out on St Patrick’s day almost five years ago and was told we want to sign you and you should move to town. I ended up moving 3 weeks later. The coolest part of that meeting was Dustin telling me that he was a fan and loved what I was doing but I couldn’t do it in California - I had to do it there. It’s kind of like trying to do politics anywhere other than in Washington DC. Nashville truly is the mecca of country music.
- It changes everything. Six months after moving to town I went on tour with Dustin and met with songwriters on the road to write with during the day before the shows. I would have A-list songwriters saying we had to write and by my second year in town I was writing a few songs a week with the best people in the business. All of a sudden, my songs were better, my song writing was better and I was learning what to do and not to do. Its so much trial and error before you work out how the city works. Meeting all those people was just huge for my song writing. As far as my show goes, being able to watch everything Dustin did on that tour. From his eating habits; to his diets; his show; his talking; his performance; his production. Nashville is such a family and tight nit community where everyone loves each other and truly roots for each other to succeed.
- So much! Although, I was excited more than anything as I loved what I had written that song about. Your sophomore single is extremely nerve-racking as it has to alright, but performing that song over a whole summer and watching people connect with it live and receiving DMs of people asking for it to be released lead to that excitement. There is a lot of pressure. We are set to release a new song on Friday (25th October) and the first teaser will be released in the next few hours. I’m actually a little more nervous about this one as the third single is almost even more important.
- Yeah man! What’s funny is I got married a few weeks ago and we haven’t had our honeymoon as we’ve both been busy. We are going on honeymoon in January, but when I got booked for the cruise, I said to her do you want to come with me and call it our honeymoon? She said no straight away although she’d love to come with me, just not call it our honeymoon! We are doing a week here, a week in Germany and then I go home for one night. The next day I will fly to Florida, jump on a boat and I’ll be doing the Brantley Gilbert Kick It in the Ship Cruise down to Mexico and back. Its basically three weeks straight touring.
- I’ve never been on a cruise of any sort before. I’ve heard it’s set up just like a real music festival and there’s stages all over the whole ship. It sounds like one great party. I have about twenty friends coming too, some of my band members parents are coming and we have a day off in Mexico, hop back on and play all the days on the ship. It sounds awesome!
- I think the only reason that my friends didn’t come here as usually hey are like, oh you’re doing something cool? I’m coming, is because my bachelor party was in Budapest. 21 guys flew there, then fly to Nashville for the wedding and now some of them are heading down to Florida for the cruise so they are like no man I can’t afford that - I can’t come any more dude! They tend to chase the good time.
Thank you Tyler for taking the time to speak with Country in the UK and we look forward to welcoming you back to the UK very soon.
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