The Family

The Family is a quartet from the Muscle Shoals, Alabama area, made up of singer-songwriter Dylan LeBlanc, his father and veteran studio songwriter James LeBlanc, 2007 Nashville Star winner Angela Hacker, and her son Bay Simpson, a songwriter and Outlaw Apostles frontman. They aren't just a band; they're two families grown into one, and together, the sum is greater than its parts.

During the pandemic, invited into FAME Studios by Rodney Hall, The Family cut a '70s-tinged folk-rock album that then sat unreleased for years while everyone returned to their own endeavors. Now, at the urging of Dylan's brother-in-law Jesse Walker and his Big Black Cow Records, Delusions of Grandeur is finally coming out, roughly six years after they finished it. It was the creative project they couldn’t shake, and once you hear it, you’ll understand why.

Analogue: These songs feel like they've always been around, and the melodies so good. What's the soundtrack for you all, the paints on the palette here?

James LeBlanc: For me, when I was growing up, it was the Eagles, Linda Ronstadt, Neil Young, James Taylor. I grew up in the '70s. My mom and dad, in my opinion, had impeccable taste in music, so I feel like I got real lucky on that note. And my dad was a guitar player, so my mom would love a song and ask him to learn it. That palette is everything from what I just said. And then once I became a teenager, of course, it was other rock and roll of the '80s or whatever. But my favorite music, and probably most of our favorite music, is from that era.

Dylan LeBlanc: Yeah, it's the same. As far as the older types of classic singer-songwriter music, Neil Young and Linda Ronstadt—love Linda. And then I love Lucinda Williams, love her. But I also love War on Drugs, and I love that kind of stuff too, which also pays homage to Bruce Springsteen. I mean, they sound like they could be the E Street Band.

So I think if you love something, you're a derivative of it because you love it. Everything is derivative. There's nothing original under the sun. And we consciously and subconsciously want our records to sound like the records that we love, because that's what we love. That's what moves us emotionally and makes us feel something.

Analogue: Take me into the impetus for going all in. At some point, a decision is made to pause all these disparate, individual things and put time and energy into this thing all together. Was there a turning point?

James: We started the process during Covid, and the whole world shut down. Rodney Hall is the guy who runs FAME Studios and FAME Publishing, and I've been in business with him and the whole Hall family since the '90s. He just invited us to come to the studio since the whole world was shut down. And it was actually his idea for us all to get together and cut something collectively. It's funny that we never really... we've all done stuff together, but never formally and officially until that suggestion. So we just started from there. And then Brad [Crisler, producer] thought that was a great idea and wanted to be involved, and he started shaping the sound in a way that we thought was awesome.

Bay Simpson: I think if the music wasn't good, we probably wouldn't be as into it. When we hear the record back, and we hear how special it is and we fall in love with it—at least for me, that seems like the main motivating factor behind wanting to work at it. If we didn't believe in it, I don't think all of us would come to the table and try to make it happen.

Analogue: Is the fulfillment level different on something like this than on other things you've worked on?

James: Absolutely. I've had what you'd call commercial success with different country artists and stuff like that. That's been the largest part of my success. But the fulfillment level — there's no comparison between what that felt like and what this feels like, just because it's family. And I love these people. They're my best friends. They're my flesh and blood.

Angela and I have been friends since 2001 and together as a couple since 2007. At that point, Bay was about eight years old. So we've all just been together forever, and this whole thing, for me, is a fulfillment level totally unlike and much more intense than any of the other stuff I've done.

Dylan: For me, it's just fun to see. Yesterday we played a show, and I was just listening to the dynamic between James and Angela's voices and how long they've been doing it together. It's so good and so instinctual because of how much they've been singing together for the last 20 years. And then to watch Bay come into his own, give it 110 percent—his voice has just developed. You can hear him coming into his own as an artist. Getting to witness all of that and hear everybody's A game whenever we play and write and sing together, you can tell that it's inspired.

You can tell that we love it and that we love each other. Throughout our lives we've had all kinds of ups and downs, but the one thing that's always been a constant is the music. It's the one thing that holds us together.

Analogue: Was there ever a thought of, maybe we're not going to use that stuff like I thought we were?

Angela Hacker: Absolutely. For me, I'm used to going in the studio and cutting songs I really love, and past that point, I'm just the worst at knowing what to do with something. What I remember mostly is every time the album would come up to people, we'd be like, yeah, we did that record, and we'd share a SoundCloud with them. And they'd hit back, whether it was one of James's writing friends or producer friends or whoever, with like, 'Oh my God, y'all need to put this out.' That's been going on since we originally recorded it. So for me anymore, it's not a fear. It just becomes a way of life, that we do these projects and then they just kind of lay there.

But there was always a thing in the back of my mind, and certainly in my deep desires — I would love to hit another run. And with these guys, I feel like we can't lose if we're all in, because we all believe in it. The one constant I know for sure is that we go away from it these past five, six years, and when we come back to it, we still love the material. And I can't say that about every project I've ever been on.

Analogue: If you've had this done this long, is it safe to assume there's more under the surface? If this is now the time, does this stay the time?

James: Absolutely. We're going to push for a while. Anything worth doing is worth doing. So we have to talk about our son-in-law and brother-in-law, Jesse Walker. He's a vinyl enthusiast, and he has a little record store in his house with my daughter. He started selling vintage vinyl and really doing well. And then he inquired about our family album. He said, 'Is anybody doing anything with it?' And we were like, 'No, not really.' And he goes, 'I want to.' And we said, 'We want you to.'

That was the thing that put this in motion: somebody ready and willing and able, with time and energy and money, to help make a push. We had certain partners in certain aspects, but we didn't have this particular part of the package figured out until this year.

Dylan: To see my brother-in-law especially believe in us so much—he believes in us with everything he has. I've been on three different labels in my career, and I've never seen anyone at those labels work as hard as he's working on our behalf. It really, truly is a family thing. We're not relying on anybody but each other to make this happen. I'm all in because I genuinely love the music.

Angela: We go through what any other family would go through. Then we get to share what we love, which is music. That's so freaking cool to me.

VISIT: The Family