Dan + Shay join Today’s Country Radio with Kelleigh Bannen to talk ‘Bigger Houses,’ the duo’s fifth album, rediscovering their love for making music and prioritizing their friendship.
Tune in and listen to the episode in-full this Friday (September 15th) at 7am PT / 9am CT / 10am ET or anytime on-demand at apple.co/_TodaysCountry.
Dan Tells Apple Music About Not Forcing the Sound of ‘Bigger Houses’
We weren’t forcing anything or we weren’t trying to be something or we weren’t saying like, “Okay, cool, we had this song with Bieber, now what do we do from there?” It wasn’t a very intentional pivot. It was just being ourselves for the first time in a long time. I think when we got through that and when we listened back to the album, I was like, “Man, this feels like there’s an intangible lightness to this, an intangible happiness to this album that we didn’t set out to accomplish.”
Shay Tells Apple Music About Being Burnt Out After Their Last Tour
We just got to this place where Dan and I had no plan on making an album. We both got off the road and were just really crispy. We were just burnt. Just like, man, that wasn’t as fun as it should have been. We were just so tired going on and on and on and on doing all these incredible things and reach all these goals, but it was just so much had built up over time and little things over time and you just resent what you have to do. You’re around the same people all the time, so you’re all just like, “I’ve been with these people forever.”
Shay Tells Apple Music About the Conversation with Dan Where They Decided Whether or Not to Continue as a Duo
There was a night that Dan called me and we got together and that changed everything because we finally had a conversation that needed to be had over the years. We got back to that square one of what if nothing else happens with our career, if we never make music again, Dan + Shay is always going to be a tattoo on someone’s arm. It’s always going to be a first dance. It’s always going to be these things. It means something to so many people.
We knew that whether we continued on with the band or not, we had to get to this place where we were in the beginning. That’s where we started with this album.
Dan Tells Apple Music About the Meaning Behind the Song ‘Bigger Houses‘
You start to have these things where it’s like these goals. Three, four years ago, I would be like, all right, I got this better house, but there’s this other one we’d have room for this or whatever it is. You think when you get it immediately it would be like, “Oh, okay, perfect. I can stop doing what I was doing and wanting this next thing.” It’s the great lie that we tell each other because you get there and I got that new house and I was immediately on Zillow being like, “All right, what’s the future goal of this?” It amazes me what you can get used to of the thing. Yesterday’s dreams become today’s necessity. Almost like, “This isn’t even as cool as I thought it was.”
