On "Crushed Coins," Caleb Caudle Sings Of Love, Loss And The Open Road

Singer/songwriter Caleb Caudle calls Winston-Salem home, but he's been spending most of his time on the road the past few years. Stopping occasionally to make an album, his last was the country record Carolina Ghosts. His latest, Crushed Coins, pulls from a wider net of influences.

With Caudle's longtime producer Jon Ashley now living in Los Angeles, the band headed to California for a change of scenery and a fresh approach. Caudle spoke with WFDD's Eddie Garcia about the new record.

Interview Highlights

On married life on the road:

Now Lauren [Caudle's wife] is traveling with me full-time; she's tour managing. It's just been cool. That was the dream all along, for us to be able to do that together, and now we're finally at a place where we can. It got to a point where either she could come with me on the road, or we would be apart for really long, extended periods of time. Which neither one of us wanted. So this has been really nice; now I get to be with her all the time.

On Recording in LA:

We wanted to mix things up, get me out of my comfort zone. Going into the record we just wanted to try whatever, you know? There were no limits. There wasn't anything that was like, 'that's not in the American world, we don't want to try that.' It was kind of like, 'let's go to a place I've never been to, throw a bunch at the wall and see what sticks.' And we linked all the songs together to make it feel like an album rather than just a batch of songs. I wanted it to be like, 'Here's the album, you got to listen to it start to finish to really get it.'

On the significance of albums:

It's the way I listen to music. I take it in one side at a time with vinyl, and so when we went to put the record together I definitely wanted it to feel like tracks one through five were side A, and then the rest of the album was side B. I look back and I think about all my favorite songs or albums, and I have a lot more favorite albums than I do favorite songs. And I just think that we've kind of lost that in this age where you're just trying to have a single of any kind - not even a hit single these days. It's just like, 'here's the single.' And that's cool, but I would rather it consume an hour of my life. Here's the full album, and you get the big picture. It was just really important for me to do that this time around.

Crushed Coins is available now on LP and CD in stores and online. Its release is being celebrated in Winston-Salem with a concert at SECCA on February 23 with Durham's Jake Fussell opening the show. You can find additional tour dates here.