Tanner Usrey's Latest Album Is An Authentic Depiction of Everyday Struggles

The Texas native is blending his juggernaut of influences into one universal project.

Credit Working Holiday, Chase Denton.

Take this is your sign to add Tanner Usrey to your daily listening. With a fresh point of view, vivid storylines and a gruff Texas vocal, Usrey is quickly proving why he is one to watch. Today, the riser gifts fans the 15 track project Crossing Lines. Tackling everything from love lost to internal battles, Tanner's innate ability to tell the stories of the everyday in a new way is awe inspiring.

Gritty and unconventional, Echo In The Holler sets the tone for the whole album. Country music is more than tailgates and beer, it is a way of life and reflective of where you come from. Leaning into that ideal, Tanner's smokey vocal narrates the ins and outs of the holler he calls home. Fed by the echos from the daily life around him, he begs to return home. Full of swampy production and a steady beat, the song is hard not to tap along to.

Cause you can tell your mother You can tell your father about

The echo in the holler

There's a storm a coming

And a river's flooding

And a rich man's hiding

But we're all running out of time

For the echo in the holler

Teaming up with fellow riser Ella Langley, the heart wrenching Beautiful Lies perfectly personifies the painful tapestry of complicated love. Yearning for more and ignoring the inevitable, Tanner would rather relish in the lies than face the truth. Adding an intoxicating yin to the yang Ella Langley's soul filled vocal speaks to the heaviness of the situation. A song for anyone who has been caught up in the aching moment a flame goes out, Beautiful Lies is one of those songs that will make a career.

“This song is kind of the one that “started it all” for me. It was the first song that got real traction and has always had a special place for me. I think this new version really shows how I’ve evolved as an artist, and how we've evolved as a band, not to mention I got to work with Ella Langley, who is absolutely amazing at what she does. I think this version is going to draw new people in, but still have the old feel to it, and I can’t wait for y’all to hear it," Tanner said in a press statement.

Feeling like a tenant in his own mind, Pick Up The Phone is a song for anyone who may need someone to extend a hug or a hand. Grappling with the intrusive thoughts in his own mind and 'living to fast,' Tanner realizes he needs the help from home to help him slow down his ways. Rattling off the hardships of the road, from missing a lover or sweating out the poison from the night before, Tanner aches for change. Highlighted by a simple guitar strum and a soft beat, the track offers up a since of hope.

Magical moments weave in and out of all fifteen songs. Tanner proves that country music does not have to be cliche stories or an overdone Odyssey, yet stories that tap into everyday life and amplifies them. Highlighted by creative narratives and a smokey vocal, Tanner Usrey is no longer a secret.