OUT TODAY! America's Gerry Beckley Releases Self-Titled 10th Solo Album

Gerry Beckley, singer, songwriter, performer and co-founder of America, releases his 10th solo album, titled simply Gerry Beckley, TODAY!  For the album, Beckley says there was a pragmatic reason for putting his own name as the title for his 10th solo outing. "There wasn't an obvious title that was leaning in its favor, and I've never done a self-titled album, so it felt like, OK, this might be it," he says with a small chuckle.

With America on an open-ended hiatus from touring, Beckley found time to go through some of the songs he had put away for a rainy day. Beckley had a lot to choose from -- chronologically, stylistically, topically. For instance, "Crazy," dates back more than 10 years, first written between breaks of America's then-grueling tour schedule. Working with longtime producer and collaborator, Jeff Larson, Beckley explains "Jeff and I found it on a hard drive, and I thought, 'That's pretty good. Gimme some time,'" remembers Beckley, who maintains studios in his two residences of Venice, CA and Sydney, Australia. "So, I went in and just did a bunch of extra stuff, layered it up, and it came out great.

But it was one of those songs that I'd forgotten about." Beckley also likens it to the America smash "Sister Golden Hair," "in that it's not about anybody in particular. There's not a relationship I'm dancing around. But it's just themes that I've had in my head."

Beckley plays the bulk of the instruments on 12 tracks but gets help from a core group of players that includes former Chicago bassist Jason Scheff, guitarist Steve Fekete, drummer Brian Young and backing vocalists Jeff Larson and Brian Eichenberger. Nick Lane and Matt Combs, also longtime musical fellow travelers, arranged horn and string parts, respectively.

"I tend to do things in layers," says Beckley, who mixed the album himself. He cites influences such as Tom Petty's Wildflowers and, more recently, The 1975. "I've been kind of dipping back into the Wall of Sound stuff and using more echoes and just making it bigger. It might not sound like that at first, but if you were to put some headphones on and listen you start to notice little things that make the songs work."

All told, Gerry Beckley continues a musical path that's now in its seventh decade and, in Beckley's mind, a continuing conversation between a songwriter and his audience. "I'm proud of all (the albums)," he says. "But I really like this album a lot. I think the sum of all the parts is really great. And I can't wait to do more."