Bio

Colby Acuff didn’t know where to go next. Arriving in the waning summer days of 2024, American Son was sprawling, stylistically expansive, and wracked with dark and heavy ideas about life in the USA. It marked the end of a major label deal that had first brought Acuff to Nashville, where he’d quickly realized he’d always be something of an outsider to Music City’s well-oiled mainstream machine. Just before release, Acuff lost his father. Never one to shy away from difficult emotions in his music, Acuff had nevertheless reached a sort of impasse. Whatever came next had to be a reset, had to readjust the lens. 

Enjoy The Ride, Acuff’s sixth album in as many years, may initially seem an aggressively optimistic rejoinder to where we heard him last. Yet staying on the furiously prolific clip he’s maintained is a form of therapy for Acuff, and Enjoy The Ride sought to strike a balance. Acuff sat down with his right-hand man, producer Eddie Spear, and they puzzled over a new approach to the next album. They decided to go out and talk to people, take the temperature, see what listeners wanted to hear. The resulting album still boasts the thoughtful reflections on American life that Acuff has made his name on, but refuses to simply stare into the void. Instead, the throughlines of Enjoy The Ride became resilience and optimism even in the bleakest times.