Leon Bridges Celebrates His Texas Roots
“Fort Worth, Texas, is my home. It’s my sacred space,” says Leon Bridges. “There is a spectrum of sounds that are so unique to it.”
Although he didn’t start playing the guitar until he was in college, where he studied dance, the singer and songwriter quickly began to develop his own sonic style. Rooted in the R&B he grew up listening to and ’60s-era soul music, it also featured folk and country undertones, drawn from living and playing in Fort Worth. “I felt like soul was a dying genre,” Bridges says. “I wanted to bring my own stories and experiences into it.” In 2015, he dropped his debut album, Coming Home, which was an instant hit. Two more solo efforts followed, along with a pair of collaborative records with Houston psych-rockers Khruangbin. But on his latest album, Leon, out October 4, Bridges returns to his roots with songs steeped in old-school soul and lyrics that “reflect on my time in Fort Worth and my childhood,” he says.
For this issue, he curated a playlist around the concept of home, including Hermanos Gutiérrez’s cumbia-inspired “Barrio Hustle,” Kacey Musgraves’s moving “Deeper Well,” and Townes Van Zandt’s indelible ballad “Kathleen.” “Van Zandt was a Forth Worth guy,” explains Bridges. “I’m proud to be among such an amazing lineage of musicians.”
Listen to Leon Bridges's playlist exclusively on Apple Music.
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