Dan Auerbach is not trying to reinvent the wheel. He’s just trying to find the weirdest guy in the room who knows how to play a G chord.
“Some people are so over the moon about it. Some people don’t understand it at all,” Auerbach says of his latest solo LP, Waiting on a Song. “I’ve never really released something that was so polarizing.” Which is rich coming from the guy who once dropped a spaghetti Western concept record with The Black Keys. But here we are.
This time, he’s ditched the fuzz pedals for Nashville’s fringe songwriting elite—the guys who never really fit the Music Row mold but have the battle scars to prove they tried. “They sort of live on the fringes of Nashville and have always done their own thing,” Auerbach says. “I’ve learned a tremendous amount from those guys.”
He’s talking about a crop of veteran co-writers with names you might recognize if you own a lot of dusty vinyl or once got dumped at a Guy Clark concert. And while he’s worked as a producer for years, he says this kind of co-writing—just him, a guitar, and someone who probably owns a Nudie suit—was a revelation. “It’s just traditional songwriting. Not even Nashville songwriting—just songwriting, historically speaking.”
That stripped-down simplicity ended up yielding over 80 fully produced songs. “With like, background vocals, strings, and horns,” he says with a shrug. “And we just picked 10.” Auerbach spent months writing songs on a strict Monday-through-Wednesday schedule, taping demo cassettes, and letting his studio band work from there. “You just play ‘em the tape and they start coming up with parts,” he says. “It’s kind of magic.”
But even Auerbach admits he’s not always in the driver’s seat. “The one thing you have to do is get out of your own way and just let it happen,” he says. “Once you start thinking about it, you’re just diluting it. Not every song has to be like Shakespeare. Some of my favorite songs are some of the dumbest songs on Earth.”
Still, one co-writer managed to raise the bar just by showing up: John Prine. “It was really fun,” he says of writing with the late legend. “I just remember these incredibly interesting phrases tumbling out of his mouth all the time. Like one of those slot machines—you pull the arm, and out comes brilliance.”
And while Prine never cared much for mass acclaim, Auerbach seems hellbent on posthumously dragging him into the mainstream. “I always felt like he should have been talked about as big as Dylan,” he says. “To me it’s been criminal.”
As if to prove he’s only half in control of his own career at this point, Auerbach also recently became the proud seller of sold-out 8-tracks. Yes, 8-tracks. “It was not my idea,” he laughs. “I thought it was crazy. But we put it online, and they all sold out immediately. I guess everybody’s just crazy.”
So what’s next? His new label is quietly loading the chamber. “We’re putting the finishing touches on a bunch of different records right now,” he says, with a calm that only comes from already knowing the weirdos are circling. “I’m not doing any one particular style. It just has to move me.”
And move it does. Even the non-dancers. “I danced around my house last night,” I told him. “Now I’m not a dancer.”
“Well, that’s great,” he replied. “I’m glad I can bring dance to the dance-less.”
Mission accomplished, Dan.
Listen to the interview above and check out the video for lead single "Shine On Me" below.
