Since coming onto the music scene with pop punk band Hey Monday, becoming the first female to win The Voice, earning a GRAMMY nomination with Chris Young (“Think of You”), being selected to CMT’s Next Women of Country’s Class of 2019, facing a public breakup of an engagement and finding new love, it’s been quite a decade for Cassadee Pope. But as each thing that happens in our lives adds to who we are as a whole, Pope has turned her life’s ups and downs, its past, present and future into the eight songs on her latest album Rise and Shine available today.
Pope decided to strip down everything for this album – the production, minimal instrumentation, her pure vocals as well as herself. Rise and Shine is the most vulnerable and private look into Pope’s thoughts and dreams and she succeeded in every way, including co-writing each track and co-producing the project. The simple musicianship supports her powerful vocals by not only allowing them to blossom in a way that past recordings haven’t, but to also tell her stories through these songs. The listener can’t help but hang on to each word, each emotion as there is nothing to distract away from them.
In the lead track “Let Me Go” you can feel Pope’s struggle with someone who doesn’t understand her, doesn’t want her, but yet won’t let her go – referring to chains on her wrists, providing a physical image in one’s mind. These three lines stick out the most, perhaps because they describe something universal that happens to people in various situations: “I had to fall apart / To light the spark / That fired me up again.”
Pope released an intimate lyric video for three other tracks heading to the album’s release day: “Hoodie,” a catchy, dance-able track about finding a your ex’s hoodie in your backseat, bringing forth memories swarming around in your mind. And even if it made you smile, you remind yourself that you still have no desire to be with them – and you are sure to let them know that, because hey you had call them to let them know you found their hoodie right? “Counting On The Weather” shows the bonus side of being stuck inside (something we all are dealing with during this pandemic) and hoping the weather stays icky so you and your loved one have an excuse to just stay in bed. “Built This House” is a metaphor for Pope’s career and life as she sings about building a house “brick by brick, board by board” after knocking down the old house that someone else built for her.
“California Dreaming” takes a journey through several of our nation’s states while trying to forget someone, but rather unsuccessfully as there’s still a yearning to be on the West Coast with them. The lovely surprise to this track is the soft background male vocal from none other than Sam Palladio, whom Pope has been dating since 2017.
Pope has stated that “Rise and Shine is a collection of songs that talk about where I’ve been and where I’m headed.” After putting this album together with her own blood, sweat and tears lyrically, vocally and in the production, Pope has earned herself an even higher status among her peers.
Rise and Shine is available for download and streaming here.
Rise and Shine Track Listing:
- Let Me Go (Cassadee Pope, Tina Parol, Kevin Rudolph)
- Hoodie (Cassadee Pope, Johan Fransson, Emily Weisband)
- California Dreaming (Cassadee Pope, Alex Kline, Shane Stevens)
- Counting On The Weather (Cassadee Pope, Bobby Huff, Blair Daly)
- Hangover (Cassadee Pope, Butch Walker)
- Rise and Shine (Cassadee Pope, Danny Orton, Matt Scannell)
- Sand Paper (Cassadee Pope, Alex Kline, Shane Stevens)
- Built This House (Cassadee Pope, Forest Glen Whitehead, Kelly Archer)