During the course of The Long Road Festival taking place in Lutterworth, England over the weekend of the 6th to 8th September we got to catch up with an array of fascinating artists including a guy I had been wanting to talk to for a while, so before his incredible set headlining The Interstate Stage on the Friday night we had a really fun chat with the super cool Sam Outlaw!

Photo Credit: DJS Photography

Sam Outlaw on the appeal of making regular repeat trips to play live in Europe:

For any singer songwriter, if you have the opportunity actually get paid because people want to hear you perform your songs that’s very special and I think the key is to never take it for granted, and if you have an opportunity to sort of invest in that relationship because I think it is a relationship. It’s not just me coming over and throwing songs at people and them clapping! You know the Outlaw family were English, they were regular citizens living in England so I have heritage, have history and have ancestry in England. The rest of my ancestry is in Germany and in Norway, so being out in Europe I think feels special to me, I feel like I get to kind of connect with my roots.

Sam Outlaw on what is attracting musicians from the West Coast to Nashville and the genre opening up:

I think there’s a lot happening in Nashville. There’s still this strange bifurcation of like Music Row radio promoted pop country then you have all the other stuff happening which everyone’s kind of focused on called Americana but really I think it’s just a cool variety! It’s a lot of creative people doing a lot of different styles and there doesn’t seem to be any rules! I think people like that! I think it’s a sense of freedom to be yourself and to try new things! I mean none of us are millionaires! I mean we’re all we’re all just kind of making a modest living so that I think that gives you a sense of humility about it!

Sam Outlaw on US festivals compared to the UK:

I would say it’s just maybe feels a little more bombastic over there, it’s a little larger scale. Like I’ve played Stagecoach in Indio a couple times and that’s just massive it just feels like you know just a humongous sort of thing. Then these festivals feel a little more like intimate.

Sam Outlaw on the UK as a good place to try out new music:

I’m doing exactly that. I mean I open my set with a song I’m pretty sure people know then I’m doing like two brand new songs that have not even been released yet. So I definitely feel like the welcoming sort of spirit of “Hey let’s hear some new stuff!” I feel like I can try new things and if people start slowly backing out of the tent, then I will know that they hate it!

Sam Outlaw on working with Sarah Darling on latest single ‘Forever and Always’:

I wrote this little love song and right away I thought that it might make a good duet and then a mutual friend of ours a guy named Jeff Cohen, a songwriter based in Nashville. He sent it to Sarah and she liked it, said she wanted to do it. I was familiar with her but not her music, I looked her up on Spotify and I think it was 10 seconds into her song ‘Where Cowboys Ride’ then was like right away this person is perfect and fortunately she wanted to do it! So we recorded it and next thing I know I’m performing it on the Grand Ole Opry!

Sam continues his European tour tonight in Berlin with the UK leg starting on September 30th in Oxford with all dates listed below:

Sept 12th – Frannz-Club, Berlin, Germany
Sept 14th – Uebel & Gefährlich, Hamburg, Germany
Sept 15th – Loppen, København, Denmark
Sept 18th – John Dee Live Club & Pub, Grünerløkka, Norway
Sept 19th – Madam Felle, Beren, Norway
Sept 20th – Iris Scene, Odda, Norway
Sept 21st – Bryggerhuset, Halden, Norway
Sept 23rd – Kulturhuset Najaden, Halmstad, Sweden
Sept 24th – Nalen, Norrmalm, Sweden
Sept 25th – Holten Hulingen, Hultsfred, Sweden
Sept 26th – Tryckhallen, Skogstorp-västra Gärdet-arvidstorp, Sweden
Sept 27th – Pustervik, Haga, Sweden
Sept 28th – Kulturbolaget, Malmö, Sweden

Sept 30th – Bullingdon Arms, Oxford, UK
Oct 1st – Bush Hall, London, UK
Oct 2nd – Night & Day Cafe, Manchester, UK
Oct 3rd – Glee Club, Nottingham, UK
Oct 4th – Newbald Village Hall, North Newbald, UK
Oct 5th – Gosforth Civic Theatre, Newcastle Upon Tyne, UK
Oct 6th – Glee Club, Glasgow, UK