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Cory Morrow is striving to keep it country
By David Irvine
Old Gold and Black Reviewer

When I first met Cory Morrow, he was sitting alone on his tour bus watching Tommy Boy and drinking wine from a red plastic cup. "Have you seen this?" he asked, pointing towards the television screen. "This is my favorite part."

So the man Willie Nelson called "one of the major reckoning forces in the fast-coming Texas music scene" and I took a break from our interview after his April 25 show at Ziggy’s to watch Chris Farley and David Spade sing along with their car radio in a classic scene from the 1995 comedy.

And despite the singer/songwriter’s near-superstar status in his native state of Texas and his ever-growing fan-following throughout the West and Southeast, he seems to maintain a carefree attitude nearly all of the time.

Indeed, the 30-year-old Morrow, soon to tie the knot with his longtime girlfriend, admits that he has yet to totally leave behind the happy-go-lucky lifestyle so expertly exhibited by the collegiate audiences that flock to his concerts and comprise the bulk of his fan base.

"You’ve got to enjoy your life," he instructed me as he poured another cup of wine. "You’ve got to loosen up."

This frame of mind, developed and nurtured by his years at Texas Tech, has been the catalyst for a number of Morrow’s rock n’ roll-edged country compositions which celebrate the lighter side of life. These include "Big City Stripper," "Drink One More Round" and "Texas Time Traveling." Morrow concedes, however, that different, mature emotions and experiences have since come knocking as inspiration for his more recent work.

"I haven’t really grown out of that mindset," he explained, "but I have seen a lot more things than just the college campus and done all the fun things that you do while you’re in college when you don’t really have any cares or responsibilities."

Having recorded four solo albums to date, Morrow’s life has been presented to us in song. His signature "Nashville Blues" expresses the singer’s frustration with the country music establishment based in Music City.

Morrow is enthusiastic about the challenges which lay before him on the East Coast.

"It’s tougher financially more than anything else, because we kind of have to start over working our crowd up, making fans. That’s the hardest part but that’s also the funnest part," Morrow said. "The stuff we’ve been doing over and over again is brand new to them, so that’s cool."

Morrow’s college buddy, country artist Pat Green, recently landed a major label record deal that has allowed him to bring Texas music to new audiences. With one collaborative album, Songs We Wish We’d Written, already under their belts, many in the industry have begun to label the duo as the next "Willie and Waylon."

"People have been referring to us that way, and we look at each other and just grin," Morrow said. "That’s about as cool a compliment as you can give somebody who is in the business."

And if Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings earned the title of "outlaws" in the 1970s for turning their backs on the Nashville music establishment, Morrow may be following in their footsteps on another level. "I’ve seen a lot of people with horrible record deals and they get pushed to the back burner when things don’t take off at the beginning," he explained. "That’s where ("Nashville Blues") came from. The deal that they would offer me would be horrible."

Nevertheless, Morrow was sure to tip his hat to the quality music that was – and still is – recorded in the city on a daily basis.

"I think the music scene is great. Nashville is where some great county music has come out of," he said. "I hope I get to fit in, but I’m not too concerned about all that. I’ll cross that bridge when I get to it."