About Me
WHIT'S MYSPACE PLAYER TRACK X TRACK
WHEN I SAID I WOULD--Whitney Duncan, John Shanks, Gordie Sampson
I think this was the third day we wrote together. We wrote it pretty quickly, and I remember we had the chorus first and then we looked around for John and he was in there putting guitars down. We're like, 'Whoa! Let's finish the song before we start making the record!" When I started doing scratch vocals, I don't think we even had the bridge written yet. But then I remember walking away that day not being able to get the song out of my head. I sang it all night long. I knew then that it was special.
ENOUGH--Wrote this one with one of my best friends, Chris Tompkins, and Joe Collins. It took us awhile to finish this one because we had a tough time staying focused, thanks to Chris' A.D.D. and his love for telling jokes, ha! It’s about all the simple things in life..."If we laugh hard enough to cry and we live like we're never gonna die, and we give all we've got to give, if we smile, if we love, if we're happy, then baby...That's Enough!"
CHANGING MY MIND-- So...I change my mind a lot...and can be indecisive...and unpredictable...Just keeping it interesting, ha! This song is about the one thing that I won't be changing my mind about..."Baby there's no doubt when I look into your blue eyes." Whitney Duncan, Justin Weaver, Kelly Archer
SKINNY DIPPIN'—Writing with Chris Tompkins is always interesting but this song was an absolute BLAST to write! Now, I'm not one for taking my clothes off and throwing 'em in the bushes often...but this one time...So, I'm a sucker for that "sly southern grin" ha. BUT "we weren't doing nothing wrong, we were just cooling off!" One of my favorite songs I've ever written. Every time I hear it I feel like it's summer.
ALL HELL BREAKS LOOSE—All Hell Breaks Loose was written with my cousin Jonathan Singleton and Ted Jones. This song's about a girl that's fed up. She's about to let her guy have it if he messes up one more time...we've all been there.
SOUTHERN GIRL—I wrote this one with my girl Leslie Satcher. Two southern girls with similar backgrounds...big fans of Elvis and red lipstick; daddy's girls; sometimes a mess; both been taken out of church to get our butts tore up more than a few times; can be very stubborn. So…… it takes quite a man to handle a Southern Girl with Attitude! (This song is just a warning!)
Bio:
For Whitney Duncan, it's always been about the right relationships. They helped shape her as a young girl nurturing her passion for music in a small Tennessee town. They were there to support her efforts to break into the upper reaches of the music business as a teenager. And, not long ago, when her path seemed uncertain, she knew she would find them again.
"There were times when I wondered, 'Is this going to work?’†she says, "and times when I was frustrated, but I realized a lot of people go through this. 'I'm young,' I thought. 'I still have time. I don't need to freak out and get impatient. Eventually the time will be right.'"
Her patience paid off, and the breakthrough came, she was introduced to Mark Bright through her booking agent.
Her first meeting with Bright, whose production credits include Carrie Underwood, Rascal Flatts and Sara Evans, would be a major career turning point, although at the time it felt more like a therapy session.
"I met with Mark and he was the coolest guy," she says, "so I just spilled everything. I told him about the struggles I'd been through and what I hoped to accomplish.' We totally connected and he got it. He said, 'I'm on board. Let's do it.'"
The two kindred spirits had recorded three sides when the final piece of the relationship puzzle fell into place in the form of John Shanks, known for his work with Sheryl Crow, Keith Urban and Kelly Clarkson. Shanks was working at the time with Bon Jovi, and had stopped to visit Bright at his offices. Bright, says Whitney, "went on like a proud parent" to Shanks, who asked if he could write with her then and there.
"What are the chances?" she says with a laugh.
The three-way combination--with Shanks and Bright co-producing--resulted in Right Road Now, a debut album that introduces Whitney as an intriguing new voice in contemporary country music, a woman who matches her vocal prowess with songwriting of real depth and breadth. She wrote every song on the CD, in conjunction with Both Bright and Shanks, as well as top-drawer Nashville tunesmiths like Hillary Lindsay, Brett James, Chris Tompkins and Gordie Sampson. It finds Whitney celebrating love, both new, in the steamy "Kinda Crazy," and well established, in the joyfully sensual "Fireflies"; chronicling love's failure in the self-assured "When I Said I Would" and the moody "Burn It Down"; and doing justice both to pure sass, in "The Bed That You Made," and to the raw pathos of "God Close Your Eyes." With the title song, Whitney and co-writers Shanks and James perfectly encapsulate the roses-from-thorns dynamic that infuses both the relationship in the song and the musical rebirth Whitney has experienced.
It wasn't long after she joined forces with Bright and Shanks that she gained interest from Warner Bros., and an acoustic showcase helped seal the deal.
The result, Right Road Now, sums up the journey.
"I've been down a few wrong roads musically," she says, "but it all feels right now--the right writers, the right songs, the right producers, the right team--the right road. It's really the perfect title for this record."
