Illinois

1. Fire
2. You Can't Stop Me (feat. Thomas Rhett)
3. Lose My Mind
4. Wanna Be That Song
5. Time Well Spent
6. If You Were My Girl
7. Illinois
8. Just A Taste
9. Drunk On Your Love
10. Lose It All
11. Shadow
12. Going Away For A While

Get ready to hear one of 2015’s most anticipated albums as Brett Eldredge prepares to release his second Atlantic Records /Warner Music Nashville album, Illinois, this Friday.

The reigning Country Music Association’s New Artist of the Year leaned on a lifetime of influences to record the 12-track LP, co-produced with Ross Copperman and Brad Crisler. The result is a mix of sexy, funky, romantic and high energy songs, like the nearly Top 5 and climbing lead single “Lose My Mind.”

“I grew up listening to so, so many different kinds of things, so when I get in a writers room I like to make it an adventure,” Eldredge said. “One day I might write the most sad song ever and it’s just a rainy day. Or if I feel some crazy groove in my head I’m going to chase it.  The day that we were writing ‘Lose My Mind’ I had this groove in my head, you know one of those laying-in-bed-all-night kind of things, and I was going nuts, just like ‘what is this?’ And I went in the writer’s room and I just said let’s just get wacky with this and it ended up leading us to writing “Lose My Mind. 

Eldredge co-wrote and co-produced all tracks on Illinois, the follow-up to his self-titled debut. The album was written with his home state in his heart and is flavored with his influences like Frank Sinatra, Ray Charles and Ronnie Dunn. Eldredge enjoys exploring all sides of his music and incorporating elements that are complimentary - soulful vocals and a debonair look to go with storytelling lyrics and true-to-heart emotions.

Illinois takes the listener through a range of emotions and experiences, many of them originating with events in Eldredge’s life. “Just a Taste,” for instance, comes from a near-miss with a girl he had his eye on.

“And then she just kinda disappears off the map and does her own thing,” Eldredge said. “I was totally confused and thought, ‘Gosh, all you left me was just a taste, just a glimpse of what we could have had.’ I think that a lot of people have been through this situation and it’s never fun, but it was really good for that moment in time and that’s what I try to capture.”

“Drunk on Your Love” is an irresistibly groovy track Eldredge has been holding in reserve for years, waiting for the right opportunity to release it.

“We wanted to capture the feeling of being drunk - beyond that or any kind of drug; this feeling is beyond any of that – on this girl’s love,” Eldredge said. “It was just one of the most catchy songs I think I’ve ever written. I wanted to put it on my first album and then I decided, ‘Well, I want this to see the light of day. This might be a song I want to put out to radio,’ and so we held it for the second album and went in and recorded it and it just came out to be such a magical song. I think people are dancing to it right now as I speak.”

And “Wanna Be That Song” grew out of a simple reporter’s question: “Somebody asked me what I wanted to do with my music in 10, 20, 30 years, where do I picture myself with my music. And I just sat there and I thought, ‘Well, you know, I’ve seen people starting to dance to my songs and say it was their first dance at their wedding, or maybe it was a song that made them fall in love, or maybe it was a song that just made them want to party when they were in a tough spot in their life. And I thought about that, and I was like that’s the coolest thing in the world.’”