Randy Houser 'Runnin' Outta Moonlight' AOL Sessions Performance (WATCH)

Posted Mar 20th 2013 10:20AM by Erin Duvall
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Randy Houser Runnin' Outta Moonlight Gino DePinto, AOL Music

Randy Houser is stepping into new musical territory with his latest single. "Runnin' Outta Moonlight" is a bit more rockin' than some of the Mississippi native's previous tunes and is indicative of what fans get with the rest of his recently released album, How Country Feels. (Watch him perform the new hit live in our studio below.)

"'Runnin' Outta Moonlight' is a song that one of my best friends, Dallas Davidson, wrote. He played me the demo, and I loved it," Randy tells The Boot. "It actually fit exactly what we'd been doing on this record so far. This record probably leans a little more modern for me than the things I've done in the past. My first record was a little bit like this album in that sense but my second album I really made more traditional, broke down. I just didn't want all the bells and whistles on it. I wanted to do more of a purist album. This album I wanted to do the opposite. I wanted to make it big and blow it up."'

In order to do that, Randy carefully chose who he wanted to work with, both when making the album and when signing his fourth label deal with Stoney Creek Records. "I knew who to call to make this record. It was the producer, Derek George," the singer-songwriter explains. "We had worked together for years before I went to Universal South, my second record deal. I knew that his kind of thing -- as far as country music -- is making it rockin', hip, that kind of modern thing. [My label head] Benny Brown had a lot to do with that, too. He was really encouraging me to try to match up a more modern rock-y sound with me having a more traditional voice. God, I can't be pop. Listen to me talk! [laughs] On 'Runnin' Outta Moonlight,' that's what we tried to do."

And he does mean "we." Randy credits everyone who worked on the album for the pleasing product that came out of it. "I've sort of been just going and hanging on," he explains. "Getting married, having a baby, trying to learn how to be a daddy, learning how to change diapers, be a husband, all that stuff. I didn't have as much time to put into making this record as I normally would. Usually, I was almost a control freak in a way about my music, because that's really the only thing I ever had in my life. Whenever that changed, I was able to let go of the reins a little bit and allow other people that actually do the things that I was trying to do for a living, and that are really good at them. I was able to let them have some of the control. This album is really a product of a lot of people doing what they do very well."

How Country Feels is out now.

Watch Randy's 'Runnin' Outta Moonlight' Sessions Performance

Flip Through Photos From Randy's Sessions