Riley Taylor is no stranger to small towns, but the country singer from Burton, N.B., is finding a whole new kind of hometown connection on his latest tour through Alberta.
“I've been loving it,” Taylor says. “This is all brand new to me,the mountains, the Prairies. I think it’s awesome.”
The 27-year-old artist, who won the 2021 Boots & Hearts Emerging Artist Showcase, is currently on the Small Town Hometowns Tour, making stops across Western Canada before wrapping up in Ontario.
Taylor, who’s racked up over 5 million global streams, released his debut single “Good Things” in 2021, hitting No. 33 on the Canadian Country Music Charts.
His latest single “Hometowns” is already gaining a lot of attention across the country.
“‘Hometowns’ was the first song I ever wrote in Nashville,” says Taylor. “We were just talking about growing up in different places and realizing we all kind of did the same stuff riding bikes, getting in trouble, drinking too early.”
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Now, Taylor just released his debut album with a bold 30-tracks.
“It’s ambitious, I know, but that was kind of the point,” he says. “We don’t have the big label backing, but we have access to great production and a lot of songs.”
He says the record stretches across genres, offering a mix of styles that reflect country music’s growing diversity.
“There’s some songs that would fit in the ’90s, some that sound like today, some that lean more folk than country.”
“We’re trying to hit everything at once and see what sticks.”
While Taylor is used to playing familiar venues out East, he’s enjoying the fresh energy out West in Alberta.
“It’s kind of like starting over again, getting those boots on the ground, shaking hands,” he says. “There’s definitely a lot more real cowboys and cowgirls out here.”
“We call ourselves saltwater cowboys back home,” he says with a laugh. “But these folks out here, they’ve got the cattle to prove it.”
He’ll open for Cooper Alan at the Strathmore Stampede on June 21, a major stop on the tour.
