Jack Schneider Announces Debut Album With First Track, “Josephine”
Out November 11, Best Be On My Way features ten songs backed up by Vince Gill, David Rawlings, Stuart Duncan, and more.
Americana newcomer Jack Schneider has a laundry list of eclectic descriptors fitting to precede his name — record producer, songwriter, tape machine enthusiast, Vince Gill’s rhythm guitarist, and NYU grad, to name a few — but on November 11th of this year, Schneider will be adding “recording artist” to that list with the release of his debut LP Best Be On My Way. Recorded live to tape in Nashville with some of the city’s biggest names — the aforementioned Gill, David Rawlings, Stuart Duncan, and Dennis Crouch — Schneider’s inaugural record is a testament to tradition, timelessness, and the modern relevance of old ways. As a whole, the record is a testament to the necessity of looking at the past in order to know just where you’re headed. Riddled with raw truths, compelling stories, and unforgettable sonic motifs, Best Be On My Way is necessary listening for life’s long road ahead.
Holler premiered Best Be On My Way’s first single, the album-opening “Josephine.” Showing their highest praise for the opening track they stated, “If listening to Jack Schneider feels like travelling back in time then maybe that’s because in some ways you are. Records are capable of taking you places and Jack Schneider and his band have every intention of setting you on a journey back through the years to a time when everything felt a little more real somehow.” The song finds Schneider strumming his beloved 1956 Martin D-28 guitar, “Big Jim,” in front of an all-star band of acoustic musicians. A delicate blend of love and longing, “Josephine” will be a shoo-in for fans of The Band, Bob Dylan, or James Taylor—and contemporary favourites like Gillian Welch, Watchhouse, or The Avett Brothers. Fans can hear “Josephine” now at this link and pre-order or pre-save Best Be On My Way ahead of its November 11th release right here. A list of Schneider’s upcoming tour dates can be found below or at jackschneidermusic.com/tour.
More About Best Be On My Way:
Best Be On My Way was recorded on a hot day in June at Nashville’s Sound Emporium. Inside the air-conditioned studio, there was a slight quiver in the air—the hum of a tape machine, the impression that the atmosphere was churning inside a black-and-white photograph. There was an unspoken sense, among those who knew Schneider well, of momentousness: the session itself felt as though it were a real-life culmination of a long and tenuous journey on Schneider’s part, in which he had collected friends and strangers along the way and gathered them together for the odyssey’s retelling. From childhood friends to recent mentors, the motley crew of musicians sat in a wide circle in the live room as around a campfire, much to the contemporarily trained Engineers’ dismay. The players themselves were evidence of a gap Schneider is bridging between musical generations: Grammy award-winning artists Vince Gill and David Rawlings played alongside both Stuart Duncan and Dennis Crouch—longtime Nashville session musicians—and Liv Greene and Griffin Photoglou, two twenty-something artists fresh out of college.
Throughout the long months of quarantine, Schneider began working intensively with former Gruhn Guitars colleague and frequent collaborator, Wes Langlois. Shut up in the studio together for weeks, the two wrote, recorded, and released what they referred to as “vanishing albums:” full-length records accessible for a week at a time each during the pandemic, after which they were removed from streaming services and unavailable for physical purchase. It was from these ephemeral collections of songs that the seed for Schneider’s (permanent) debut record was born.
Best Be On My Way Tracklist:
Josephine
Farewell Carolina
Marietta
Tennessee
Best Be On My Way
Don’t Look Down
Slow Things Down
Nothing Left To Show
In The Morning
Del Rio Blues
The world of Jack Schneider is one strewn with eccentricity and nostalgia, where a New York cowboy wanders the streets of East Nashville donning a Stetson Range, a purist philosophy, and his beloved 1956 Martin D28 guitar, Big Jim. He is, as some would say, a Nashville triple threat guitarist, songwriter, and singer, in addition to producer, guitar collector, and tape machine enthusiast. Born in New York and raised in Georgia, Schneider picked up the guitar at three years old and began making trips to Nashville when he was in high school. There he sought out the legendary Gruhn Guitars, hoping to quench his insatiable thirst for knowledge of fretted instruments. Despite attending university in New York City, Schneider spent most school breaks and long weekends in Music City, working summers at Gruhn’s; it was there that he met and befriended Vince Gill, among other musical heroes. With one foot in New York and one in Nashville, Jack expanded his network as a session player and an artist in both cities, gracing the stages of The Bitter End and The Bluebird Cafe with equal character and charm.
Upon graduating from NYU’s Clive Davis Institute of Recorded Music in 2019, Schneider added rapidly to his laundry list of accomplishments: touring with Vince Gill as both guitar tech and rhythm guitar player; producing records for multiple up-and-coming Nashville artists (recorded to tape, of course); releasing his first singles to critical acclaim; and playing the Grand Ole Opry. Throughout the long months of quarantine, Schneider began working intensively with former Gruhn Guitars colleague and frequent collaborator, Wes Langlois. Shut up in the studio together for weeks, the two wrote, recorded, and released what they referred to as “vanishing albums:” full-length records accessible for a week at a time each during the pandemic, after which they were removed from streaming services and unavailable for physical purchase. It was from these ephemeral collections of songs that the seed for Schneider’s (permanent) debut record was born.
