A lot of artists have been experimenting with different genres and sounds in recent years, and we’ve seen quite a few make the leap from the hip-hop world into rock ‘n’ roll. Jelly Roll, from Nashville, Tenn., has explained his reasoning for that very type of transition.
During a chat with Loudwire Nights host Toni Gonzalez, Jelly Roll recalled being in jail and discovering that he had a daughter on the way, which made him rethink a lot of the decisions he’d made up until that point.
Once he started to take music more seriously as a career choice, he released an mixtape in 2013 titled Whiskey, Weed & Waffle House, that actually resulted in him receiving a cease-and-desist order from Waffle House — but it actually helped his career in a strange way.
“[That] was like the first national attention I’d ever got,” the musician said. “That’s kind of my story in a nutshell, I just kinda grinned my way in. I always had a love for the guitar, I grew up in Nashville, so you can throw a rock and hit a guy that can play the guitar.”
After growing up in a large household, Jelly Roll was inspired by many different genres of music, and was always interested in trying to create in as many of those genres as possible.
“That’s kind of what led me into rock ‘n’ roll,” he added.
In 2020, Jelly Roll took the plunge when he released the ballad “Save Me,” which featured the artist singing and playing the guitar.
“I’ve always considered my music cathartic, I always called it therapeutic music. So it’s always had this very serious, dealing-with tone, and ‘Save Me’ was just an extension of stuff I was… I just love experimenting sounds. I guess the only person I can really compare it to is Kid Rock — I always knew that I would cross from hip-hop into rock, I just didn’t know how or when. And I could’ve never guessed that it would’ve been a ballad like ‘Save Me.'”
In addition to “Save Me,” 2021’s Ballads of the Broken is full of deep and autobiographical songs, including the current single, “Dead Man Walking,” which the artist admitted is about his own struggles with obesity and alcoholism.
To hear more about Jelly Roll’s journey, tune into Loudwire Nights tonight at 7PM ET.
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