By ANDREW DALTON, Associated Press
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Country comes naturally to Ringo Starr.
It’s been a low-key part of his of his career since his Beatle beginnings, so it was not a serious swerve for him to make a whole country album, the forthcoming “Look Up,” a collaboration with the modern maestro of classic country and Americana, T Bone Burnett.
“I’ve done 20 albums and there’s always a track that’s country-ish on each one,” the 84-year-old Starr told The Associated Press recently.
His love of the music — Hank Williams and Kitty Wells are favorites — began in childhood, alongside his acquisition of affection for blues, swing and whatever else came to his hometown.
“Liverpool, it’s the capital of country music in England,” Starr said, “because a lot of I think it stems from it being a port, and why we got rock ‘n’ roll music physically, was because the lads on the boats would be going to America, they’d be going to Egypt, would be going all over. But they were bringing music in.”
Starr — even his stage name has cowboy vibes — had a star turn with the Beatles in 1965 when he sang the Buck Owens’ honky-tonk classic, “Act Naturally.” Many of the Beatle originals the drummer sang, including “What Goes On” and “Don’t Pass Me By,” had country undertones.
It would culminate with his second solo album, 1971’s “Beaucoups of Blues,” going full country.
He kept dabbling — he recorded an “Act Naturally” duet with Owens in 1989 — but he didn’t make a full country album again for decades.
Enter Burnett, the culture’s chief curator of classic country for the last 25 years, the man behind the soundtracks to “O Brother Where Art Thou” and “Inside Llewyn Davis,” and the unlikely pairing of Robert Plant and Alison Krauss.
Starr had known Burnett for decades, but had never collaborated on an entire project with him.
“In the ’70s I used to throw a lot of parties and, and he was always there and I never invited him once,” Starr said. “We often laugh about that.”
The two were both at the Sunset Marquis last year for a poetry reading from Olivia Harrison, widow of Starr’s former bandmate George Harrison.
Starr had been doing a series of EPs with different writers and producers, including a recent release with Linda Perry, and suggested Burnett give him a song for the next one.
Burnett quickly came back with a country tune.
“It was beautiful. The most beautiful song I’ve heard in a long time,” Starr said. He began to think, “I’m going to do a country piece.”
An inspired Burnett would write nine songs that along with two more, one of them written by Starr with his friend Bruce Sugar, turning the EP into an LP.
Starr played the drums and sang in Los Angeles, while Burnett recorded parts of the record in Nashville, bringing on young neo-classical country artists Billy Strings and Molly Tuttle for several tracks apiece.
And Krauss sings with Starr on the song he co-wrote, “Thankful,” released Friday as the album’s second single, in which he managed to smuggle his catchphrase, “peace and love,” into a genre that’s usually about anything but.
“Yeah, I put it in the song,” he said with a smile.
“Look Up,” to be released in January, comes at a major country moment across music, with everyone from Beyoncé to Post Malone pulling on cowboy boots and breaking out out the twang.
“Mine just came together. I mean, I didn’t think of any of that,” Starr said. “I just thought, I’m going to do it.”
Beyoncé did come up at one point in Burnett and Starr’s work.
“He asked, ‘what are you going to call the album?’” Starr said. “I thought, ‘BE-ON-SAY.’ But nobody laughed.”
In January, he’ll get to play one of his favorite places, Nashville’s Ryman auditorium, former longtime home of the Grand Ole Opry, for a pair of concerts and a TV special.
“I’m excited because we’re going to be doing like some of the other songs and some of the country songs,” he said. “We’ll be doing ‘With a Little Help From My Friends’ in a country fashion, country style. So let’s see.”
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