Rumer - Nashville Tears

Double LP

An album of songs from the catalog of songwriter Hugh Prestwood

Southern American folklore tells of song-catchers: individuals who possess a spiritual, almost supernatural, connection to the music of a culture. They gather important songs and preserve them, providing voices to give them life and ensuring they're remembered.

Rumer is such a song-catcher. Songs written by the British singer, like "Slow" and "Aretha," made her a worldwide million-seller but she also has an unerring instinct for the work of others. On Nashville Tears, Rumer immerses herself in the catalog of Hugh Prestwood, a songwriter whose name is spoken with reverence by his colleagues. An album to savor, Nashville Tears collects 15 of Prestwood's finest songs, many never recorded until now, revealing truths of the heart, both intimate and universal, realistic and romantic.

For several years, Rumer made her home in the American South — in the forested area of northwest Arkansas, then central Georgia.

"After having a baby, I was living very quietly in rural Arkansas and my husband was away a lot on tour," she says. "I got lost in laundry and housework and sleepless nights. I just wasn't able to find the space to write and I wasn't sure when I would be able to again."

Rumer had most certainly experienced dramatic life changes since her 2010 debut album, Seasons of My Soul, was certified platinum in the UK and Ireland and earned her a MOJO Award for Best Breakthrough Act. Life changes notwithstanding, the singer's deep-seated desire for music discovery has been a constant throughout her career and it eventually led her to Nashville on a search for hidden gems.

The results of her search became Nashville Tears, which owes its existence to Rumer's long-time desire to find the saddest of sad songs Music City had to offer.

"There are so many wonderful songs that don't get the attention they deserve and I wanted to find them," she says.

Combing through hundreds of demos, however, Rumer wasn't finding what she was looking for. Then, Nashville Tears producer Fred Mollin sent her "Oklahoma Stray," a song by Hugh Prestwood about a cat so mistreated it has grown distrustful of human contact. When a second Prestwood song made just as strong an impression, they asked to hear his entire catalog.

That's when Rumer discovered why transcendent singers like Alison Krauss, Trisha Yearwood, and Judy Collins have fallen under his spell. She heard the songs no one has heard before and wanted to give them a voice. She heard the "magic" of Prestwood's body of work and felt it demanded an entire album.