Eric Paslay Reverts Back to ‘Raw’ Unedited Tracks on ‘The Work Tapes’

"I want fans to hear some new songs and see a little bit inside of the first version of the song and a little bit inside of how songs are born, how songs start out," Paslay explained. 

Written by Kelly Brickey
Eric Paslay Reverts Back to ‘Raw’ Unedited Tracks on ‘The Work Tapes’
Eric Paslay; Photo by Joseph Llanes

Forget the overproduced and auto-tuned sounds of today: Eric Paslay is stripping his music down to the pure basics on his new EP, The Work Tapes.

Although Paslay appreciates the advances technology enables within the music industry, he decided to focus on the unedited sounds he organically created in writers’ rooms throughout the years. Scanning through his wide collection of recorded demos, Paslay wanted to let fans get a listen at the behind-the-scenes part of making music and thus The Work Tapes was born as an ode to the simplicity in songwriting.

“My wife and I worked together for years, and she still always helps me with songs,” Paslay said during an interview with Sounds Like Nashville. “We were going through my catalog looking for new songs and seeing if there were ones that I missed that I should have recorded. We came across all these work tapes and songs going like, ‘These are amazing recordings of the first time we did this.’ Just having a voice and a guitar and the co-writers singing harmonies is a cool way for fans to get to hear music. It basically just came down to—there’s so many songs that we write and we can’t always share all of them. So trying to figure out other ways to share them, work tapes are a great way to do that.”

The passion project for Paslay may not be a complete revolutionary decision, but his more authentic approach to this EP release causes for a switch-up compared to the studio hits flooding country radio at the moment. Noting that The Work Tapes won’t just be a reflection on the hard work he’s committed into each previously unreleased track, he wanted his fans to connect to his sound on a deeper level by allowing them into the deconstructed layouts of songs they’ve never heard quite like this before.

“I just wanted to make sure fans got music. We are working on music, and hopefully very soon we’ll have a new single. Hopefully next year, the album will actually come out. It was kind of just, I want fans to hear some new songs and see a little bit inside of the first version of the song and a little bit inside of how songs are born, how songs start out. They all start out like that,” he explained to SLN over the phone.

Songs included on The Work Tapes host titles such as “Amarillo Rain,” “Back Home to You,” “Let Go,” “Come Back To This Town” and couple more tunes Paslay holds dear to his heart. While perfection may be what artists typically strive toward on this studio releases, the “Friday Night” singer just hopes the genuine emotion floods out through each unrefined number to create a more intimate atmosphere for his fans to gravitate toward.

“It’s raw. We tried to make sure we could mix very different recordings together, where when you turn it on, it’s not too loud and it’s not too quiet. You definitely have to listen close on a couple, that’s for sure,” he revealed.

Paslay’s The Work Tapes EP is available now.