Country Living

Say “hello” to The Band Perry – or, if you prefer, the new Garth Brooks. “A lot of people have paved the way for us, but I think it began with Garth Brooks,” says front-woman Kimberly Perry, who started the group with siblings Neil and Reid in Greenville, Tennessee eight years ago.

“We’ve been described as country. I prefer to think of what we do as ‘American’ music. If Tom Petty and Bruce Springsteen were beginning today, that’s what people would call them.”
It takes no little chutzpah to name-drop Garth Brooks and Springsteen in the same sentence. Especially as, really, neither have much of anything in common with The Band Perry’s sugar-slathered Nashville pop. If they have an antecedent it is Taylor Swift who, like them, has parlayed country rock respectability into a mainstream career (they have emulated her in another way too, with one of their songs featured on the soundtrack to the new Hunger Games film).
“The lines between pop and country are increasingly blurred,” Kimberley proffers. “We don’t think too much about where we fall in terms of genre. It’s about making music people want to hear.”
While they mightn’t it out loud, they clearly see Swift as a performer to follow in terms of international success. Few country artists fare especially well outside the US heartland. The Band Perry, though, are determined to ‘do a Taylor’ and achieve a global breakthrough, even if it means headlining the sort of venues they’ve long since graduated from back home.
“In the States, it’s pretty much arenas and amphitheatres,” says Kimberly. “The first time we played Dublin, it was to 200 people. It does feel as if we’re going back to where we were maybe a few years ago in the US. That’s cool. European audiences are fantastic. They respond very strongly to everything you do.
“Different types of venues bring different types of experiences,” she adds. “When you play a small club there’s such tremendous energy there. And fantastic banter back and forth with the crowd. You can interact one on one. Whereas, in an arena you have to pretend you’re interacting one on one.”
They arrive in Europe with a fair gust in their sails. Released over the summer, second album Pioneer reached No. 2 in the US chart and topped the country one. With kitchen-sink production and lashings of hooks, it’s a glimmering, gaudy affair, though with an undertow of darkness. In person, Kimberly comes across as a bit of a cheerleader, all blinding smiles and bouncing curls. As a lyricist, however, she’s prepared to travel to some dark places and Pioneer serves up a series of moving ruminations on dead relationships and crushed hopes.
“I’ve always felt it was important to communicate honestly,” she says. “You want to be straight with your audience. At the same time, you do have a responsibility to write pretty songs. So that was on my mind also.”
Back home, they’ve won friends in high places, with no less a figure than Barack Obama emerging as a champion. When it was suggested the White House host an evening of country rock, he insisted the Band Perry be on the bill.
“It was completely surreal,” Kimberly admits. “We were there with Kris Kristofferson, James Taylor, Alison Krauss – people we’ve been listening to for years. For three hours, we were all in a little room together rehearsing. Our mom is just the biggest James Taylor fan. To have an opportunity to play with him – it was difficult to take in.
“It feels like it’s happened quickly but we’ve been working at this a long time. We’ve played together since we were kids. We’ve paid our dues.”

Pioneer is out now. The Band Perry play Vicar St., Dublin on December 5