MCA NashvilleCreating the cover of the long-awaited follow-up to a multi-platinum album would often involve an elaborate set-up and lots of forethought, but for Sam Hunt, capturing the Southside image was more instinctual.
It revolved around the place where his breakthrough album, Montevallo, was created — plus one of his favorite companions.
“Yeah, that’s my dog. That’s one of our dogs,” Sam reveals. “I’m not big on…posing for photo shoots. And we started talking about ‘What are we gonna do for the album cover?'”
“And I said, ‘Well, what if we went to…the house that I lived in with the guys when I first moved to town that I wrote that first record in?'” he explains. “And my brother lives there now. I sold him the house.”
Almost the moment Sam arrived, his photographer captured the cover.
“I pulled up and I’d just come from church, I think,” Sam tells ABC Audio. “And I jumped out and the dog was in the truck, so I was sitting there holding the dog. And I think I had a bag of like groceries or something in my hand, too.”
“And he said, ‘Well just stand over here, and let’s see if the spot looks like a good spot,'” he continues. “So I’m walking with the dog and I stopped there. He took the picture and he’s like, ‘Yeah, this looks like a good spot.’ And we were all like, ‘That could be the picture, too.'”
In fact, the photo session ended right there.
“I had these clothes that I was gonna change into,” Sam adds. “And we ended up just throwing them back in the truck and saying, ‘… Let’s don’t overthink it.’ So at least it was honest.”
Sam Hunt’s Southside comes out on Friday.
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