Church earns three CMA Award nominations as Double Down Tour returns to the road
The man The L.A. Times calls “one of Nashville’s most forthright truth-tellers,” Eric Church returns to country radio with his reflective “Monsters,” the follow-up to recent No. 1 hit “Some Of It.”
Praised by Vulture for “turn[ing] a yarn about irrational childhood fears into an emboldening word about faith in the face of human cruelty,” the song celebrated by NPR for its “metaphors… broad enough to encapsulate an array of evils his listeners may imagine confronting” is the third single off Church’s critically-acclaimed Desperate Man.
“Anymore when a restless feelin’ keeps me up at night / Fallin’ on my knees is my new turnin’ on the light,” sings Church in the earnest chorus. “I keep my faith intact, make sure my prayers are said / ’Cause I’ve learned that the monsters ain’t the ones beneath the bed.”
As Entertainment Weekly notes, Church “believes in [music’s] power to heal, to transport you to the past, to make sense of the present and hold out hope for the future,” the full spectrum of which he accomplishes in this “blues-inflected tune contending with demons, real and imagined.”
Initially inspired by bedtime rituals with his two young sons, Church and co-writer Jeff Hyde broadened the metaphor to encompass the adult fears and worries that replace childhood monsters under the bed.
“A specific night, I can remember going in my oldest son Boone’s room… the dimmer wasn’t right, it wasn’t bright enough and he wanted it a brighter. And when I went in and made it a little brighter he said, ‘that’s good, that’s good, that’s perfect.’ And it wasn’t much… but that stuck with me that it’s kind of all he needed was just more light,” reflects Church. “It will always be a song that I think about where I was at that time in my life, where my kids were, and just how that little bit of light is what made the difference.”
“Monsters” comes on the heels of Church’s recently-announced CMA Award nominations, as he earned nods in three categories: Entertainer of the Year, Album of the Year (for Desperate Man, Producer: Jay Joyce) and Music Video of the Year (for “Some Of It,” Director: Reid Long).
Church also returns to the road with the Double Down Tour resuming in Green Bay, Wisconsin next Friday, September 13th and continuing throughout the fall. The uniquely-structured tour featuring back-to-back nights with distinct set lists in most cities has seen numerous sell-out crowds thus far, landing Church at the top of Pollstar’s LIVE75 and Global Concert Pulse charts for ticket sales averages while routinely earning praise from fans and critics alike.
