New Selftitled Album

On June 28th, 2024, Gerry Beckley of the band America will release his tenth solo album, a self-titled affair that just was announced. Accompanying the announcement was the debut of a song called “Crazy”.

Beckley drew inspiration for the music on this album from a variety of sources, notably citing Tom Petty‘s "Wildflowers" and popular English indie and alternative band The 1975.

“I tend to do things in layers”, said Beckley, who mixed the album himself, in a statement. “I’ve been kind of dipping back into the Wall Of Sound stuff and using more echoes and just making it bigger. It might not sound like that at first, but if you were to put some headphones on and listen you start to notice little things that make the songs work”.

For the album, Beckley says there was a pragmatic reason for putting his own name as the title for his 10th solo outing. “There wasn’t an obvious title that was leaning in its favor, and I’ve never done a self-titled album, so it felt like, OK, this might be it”, he says with a small chuckle.

Beckley plays the bulk of the instruments on 12 tracks, but gets help from a core group of players that includes former Chicago bassist Jason Scheff, guitarist Steve Fekete, drummer Brian Young and backing vocalists Jeff Larson and Brian Eichenberger. Nick Lane and Matt Combs, also longtime musical fellow travelers, arranged horn and string parts, respectively.