When the world shut down due to the Coronavirus pandemic, several individuals took a step back to wait out the storm; meanwhile, Jennifer Fiedler and Trey Smith of SmithField found the silver lining within the global shutdown and channeled their inner creativity to reinvent their sound and hone in on their unmatchable skills.
As touring and live performances came to a sudden halt, Fiedler and Smith joined forces to create new content that represents their brand, which they have vigorously spent building from the bottom up for years. After several song writes, bouncing ideas off of one another, and calling in award-winning professionals in music city – their recently released EP New Town was born.
“We feel like it’s a new version of us. It’s a new sound. It’s a new evolution of what SmithField is and what we do,” says the emerging musicians in an exclusive Celeb Secrets Country interview. Although SmithField couldn’t physically interact with their fans in person, their ears were open and they were listening closely to what their community wanted.
The New Town EP is out now! https://t.co/mleUYFOrEa
Each song has its own story to tell, but the project as whole weaves together to form a longer narrative about relationships. All harmony-filled songs that explore love, loss, and life from both sides of the story. pic.twitter.com/3aEnCeAp8W
— SmithField (@SmithfieldMusic) June 16, 2021
“We discovered the thing that people say the most about us. Is like, ‘Oh, you guys are great’ or ‘you guys are good, but you’re great together. Like your harmony and your unique blend is really what makes you special.’”
Their loyal fan base will notice that the fresh six-track collection embodies who SmithField is at their very core – as each ballad showcases chilling harmonies, flawless blends, each of their wide vocal range, but most importantly, their powerful storytelling abilities.
The unique EP takes listens on a rollercoaster ride that comes along with being in a relationship. Luckily, fans can receive the best of both worlds – as SmithField delivers the male and female perspectives. A coed duos tend to be hard to come by in country music nowadays, since there are only a select few that successfully made their mark on the industry.
With that being said, Celeb Secrets Country sat down (virtually) with SmithField to talk about their new EP New Town, finding their space in the industry as a male and female group, and how they are prepping to turn their first LIVE concert since COVID-19 into a release party. So, pour yourself a cup of whiskey or a tall glass of wine and learn more about SmithField by reading our full Q&A below.
You can keep up with SmithField by giving them a follow on Instagram + Facebook + Spotify.
Celeb Secrets Country: SmithField took time off to focus on its sound. Now, you guys are back and better than ever with new content on the way. How are you guys feeling?
Jennifer Fiedler: “We spent a whole year – like everybody else trying to figure out “what to do with our lives,” since touring was taken away from us. In fact, we were actually in the studio the day before all the studios closed in Nashville. So, we had the music done…but we had to do all the vocals remotely.”
Trey Smith: “It’s been a long time coming because we kept putting it off last year. But, the title track is New Town, but it’s all about like this new energy, this new Smithfield, this new music. It’s like, we just didn’t feel right. Putting it out in the middle of COVID. So, I feel like this is just the best time we could put it back. I think people have been craving music, live music, but also our fans are craving it from us. So, I think there’s more buzz and excitement this go around just because people have had to wait for a little bit.”
CSC: You guys just released your third EP called New Town on June 16, could you tell us more about this exciting new project?
JF: “So, it’s called New Town. We feel like it’s a new version of us. It’s a new sound. It’s a new evolution of what Smithfield is and what we do. So it’s almost like you’re in a new town, something you’ve known for a long time, but it’s all brand new because it sounds new. So, we wanted it to be about that… but the whole purpose is really kind of the story of relationships.
It kind of goes through new towns about the newness of it. This record is something exciting and fun when you go through the pitfalls of the heartbreaks and you go through the redemptions. It just this wonderful story of what our relationship is told from a girl and guy’s perspective, both of which are unique in our genre right now.”
We hope the #NewTown EP blows your expectations of what you think a duo like us should be. There is no lead singer or just harmony singer in SmithField. It’s 2 voices creating one unique sound. This project is dropping soon, have you pre-saved it to your favorite playlist yet? 🎶 pic.twitter.com/MZD1gOdBuJ
— SmithField (@SmithfieldMusic) June 7, 2021
CSC: On Instagram, you guys shared that this collection of songs “have never felt more genuine to who SmithField is” — could you elaborate on this statement? How are these six songs different from anything else you have released before?
JF: “We discovered the thing that people say the most about us. It’s like, ‘oh, you guys are great’ or ‘you guys are good, but you’re great together. Like your harmony and your unique blend is really what makes you special.’ Something that is really cool about SmithField is like, none of us is the “lead singer.” Like we can intermix leads with harmonies with every single song that we do. When fans see us live, they totally get it because we’re both singing pretty much at all times.
But, when you hear it on the radio, it can be kind of confusing. If it’s like one person’s all lead and I’m harmony and vice versa. So what we really wanted to do with this EP is hone in on what makes us special, which is our harmony and our blend. The fact that we are one of very few female and male groups out in country music, and we need to rock that. We need to own what makes us special!
So, that’s why we feel like this music is so genuine to us. It’s because you can’t listen to one song on it and not say ‘that’s SmithField,’ because nobody else really does what we do and I’m really proud of that. Also, we feel like the stories are very genuine as well because we say, coffee is equally as important as music to us. We have coffee talk almost every day and we just talk about our lives and our relationships. So, we’re kind of inviting people with this new record to have coffee, talk with us, you get to sit down and hear me and Trey just hash out our hearts and the real parts of it, which is sometimes really hard to be vulnerable, but that’s what makes it genuine too.”
CSC: Out of all six tracks on the, which song should us fans listen to first and why?
TS: “That’s like trying to tell me to choose my own children, but ‘I’ll Never Stop.’ I feel like heartbreak is such a strong emotion and everyone loves a good cry in your car.”
JF: “I’m going to say… because I’m the country girl and I’m the one who grew up on country music – I’m going to say ‘Something Sexy,’ because that’s the one that pays tribute to all of the sexiest country music songs, particularly Tim and Faith’s. Faith Hill was like my idol. So, she’s like one of the reasons why I do what I do.”
CSC: Which song on the EP was the hardest to write and why?
JF: “I’m going to say, ‘We’ll Figure It Out.’ We wrote that song two months before the pandemic. Trey and I were just personally going through a really hard time where we didn’t know what was next. We wrote ‘We’ll Figure It Out’ because it literally was our hearts. Then two months later we figured out that the whole world felt like we did… so, I think that was the hardest one to write because it’s the one that we were the most vulnerable in. Even though it’s relatable to everybody at the time, we felt like we were the only ones going through that.”
TS: “It’s funny cause several songs on this EP, just fell out. I would say ‘Sunday Best‘ was probably the one that was the hardest to write, just because it ended up being a different idea than what the original idea was in the most perfect, amazing way.”
CSC: Could you walk us through the songwriting process behind the EP New Town, as you both play vital roles?
JF: “We usually like to come in with a game plan, with an idea or a melody or both – it’s just a collaborative effort. We just go in and say, ‘Hey, I’m really feeling like this.’ I mean, you know…writing with somebody is such a personal experience. You go and basically just throw your heart out there and say, let’s write about it. But you know, it gets easier over time. So I would just say it’s just a collaborative effort of melody and idea and you go in and hope that you come out with something, great.”
CSC: Your music video for “Something Sexy” is similar to Tim and Faith’s “I Need You” music video – what inspired you to recreate this intimate moment?
TS: “I got to give that one to Jenn. This was kind of her brainchild. She had this idea. She asked me if I have ever seen the music video of ‘I Need You’ by Tim and Faith. She wanted to recreate that because the first lines of the chorus of ‘Something Sexy’ is ‘Little Tim and Faith, bout to make love all night long.’
We knew we wanted to do something. It was like a nod to them, especially since they were the only girl/ guy duo that we mentioned in the song and we really wanted to play that up. We’ve tagged them in every post and I’ve heard through the grapevine that Tim’s manager has seen it and like loved it.”
CSC: How would you like your fans to feel when they listen to “Something Sexy“?
TS: “Hopefully, maybe they’re with their significant other, I would say first. I feel like that would really set the mood better. But, if they’re by themselves – maybe they’re sitting there thinking, ‘you know what? I should do something with my significant other tonight.’”
JF: “All these songs bring back a different memory for me that we mentioned like I remember the Tim and Faith video and watching it on CMT. I remember blasting it in my car on the way to school in the mornings. I just have different memories associated with these songs. So for me, if you’re a true country fan – I hope that when you listen to it, it just takes you through some of your favorite memories of your life, and everybody’s is going to be different.”
LISTEN TO “NEW TOWN” EP BELOW:
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