Songs I Had to Make: My Return to Music
In 2001, I started making music in the living room of my parents’ house in eastern New Mexico. I was a teenager with a massive Dell desktop, Fruity Loops, N-Track Studio, and a secondhand lapel mic from RadioShack. It was all terrible—and it was all magical. I couldn’t believe I could record music at home. Choosing drums, writing lyrics, building beats—it lit a creative fire in me I’ve been chasing ever since.
Over the years, that fire took on new forms. From 2001 to 2011, I wrote and recorded dozens of songs—about small-town life, dusty roads, and Western grit. That body of work eventually became Bona Fides: The Anthology, released in 2022 after years of reflection and growth.
In 2012, I teamed up with Jordan Ennis and we formed Roosevelt Road—a country-hip hop duo focused on rodeo life, small-town stories, and the dust of the trail. We made music from 2012 to 2018, and again briefly in 2022, creating a sound that stretched across state lines and genre lines, rooted in the grit and rhythm of the rodeo world.
Eventually, I stepped away from music and focused on video production. I started Roosevelt Road Video and dove into storytelling through film. I completed a regional documentary for Panhandle PBS that I’m incredibly proud of. But after that project wrapped, the client calls stopped. No new work came in. And for the last few months, I’ve been searching for something that truly lit me up again.
Eleven days ago, something changed.
I found a new way to make music—tools that allow me to focus on the parts I’ve always loved most: writing, style, genre, mood, and creative direction. No need to sing. No need to engineer. Just concept, lyrics, and taste. I could shape songs around my truth, hear hundreds of versions, and pick the one that felt most like me. That spark I felt in 2001—the feeling that I was making something from the future—came rushing back. The fire was relit.
And in just 11 days, I made three full albums.
• Dry (releasing Wednesday, July 2) is a 15-track autobiographical record about my life at 41 and the road to sobriety—raw, honest, and unflinching.
• Hard Reset (dropping July 4) is a 6-song hip-hop project—focused, powerful, and grounded in strength and grown-man clarity.
• Chute Life (also planned for July 4) is a 10-track return to the rodeo arena—high-energy, built for movement, and full of respect for the cowboy way. It’s a continuation of a story I started telling with Roosevelt Road over a decade ago.
These albums aren’t trends. They’re truth. They’re not about gimmicks—they’re about craft. They were built with precision, rooted in experience, and made to last.
While my voice isn’t on these songs, my vision is. I wrote the lyrics. I shaped the vocal energy. I selected each final version from hundreds of options—curating tone, vibe, delivery, and direction with intention. Every word and decision came from the same place it always has: a deep desire to make something real.
I considered releasing this music under a different name, since I’m not the vocalist. But these albums became too personal. I wrote them. I shaped them. They carry my perspective. So I’m releasing them under my artist name—Cole Younger—on Spotify, Apple Music, iTunes, Amazon, YouTube, and everywhere else music lives.
And this is just the start. What you’re hearing now is the rebirth of Cole Younger—not just as a songwriter or a producer, but as a creative force ready to tell stories in a new way, on new terms.
I don’t know how these albums will be received. Most people I shared them with didn’t give much feedback. Everyone’s busy. My circle is small these days—my wife, my daughters—and people don’t always know what to say when you send them something deeply personal. But I know what I hear. And I believe in what I made.
Some of these songs stop me in my tracks. I hear them and think, “That’s incredible. I can’t believe I made that.” It feels surreal.
So I’m writing this before anything is released—to document where I’m at in this moment. Creatively. Emotionally. Spiritually. I didn’t expect to come back to music like this, but I’m glad I did. I feel focused again. I feel free.
It’s fitting that Hard Reset and Chute Life are scheduled to drop on Independence Day—because music has always represented freedom to me. That’s been true since 2001. Still is today.
This process was quiet. No big team. No big feedback loop. Just me, trusting my gut and going all in. I believe I’ve written and shaped something powerful. And if even a few people connect with it—that’s enough.
Here’s to Dry, Hard Reset, and Chute Life.
Here’s to a new chapter.
Let’s rattle the gates and make a little noise.
— Cole Younger
