Upbringing album — and riding off into a Texas sunset with his new girlfriend riding shotgun.
But that's not how real life works, and it's certainly not how his life works. Surviving a suicide attempt didn't cure all of his ills, and it didn't turn him into country music's Ned Flanders overnight. Take the song "In the First Place," a pivotal (if late) track on
Upbringing. Producer Jon Randall had him cut it several different ways over a week-and-a-half recording session at Arlyn Studios in Austin, Texas. The best take found him slumped in a diner chair in the middle of the tracking room.