For more than 100 years, “Where the West Begins” has been the town’s official slogan. In many ways, Fort Worth is a typical big city, boasting nearly a million residents and towering glass-and-metal structures comprising a quintessentially urban skyline. Yet it sits at the edge of the North Texas metropolis, opening to a vast and sprawling prairieland that stretches to the mountains of the far West and eventually to the sea. The untamed wild of the young American West of its origin is still infused into the culture of the city today.
As a child, Chase Johnson would visit his grandparents in Aledo, and he was moved by the transition along the westbound highway from the bustle of the big city to the sleepiness of the country, where the streetlights suddenly end and barren grassland was all that seemed ahead. It was this unique duality of Fort Worth, and its service as a gateway to the heartland of the country, that influenced the themes for Rodeo Fortune, the debut album from Spring Palace, the ’90s-indie-heyday-inspired rock band he fronts.
“It just feels very Fort Worth-y,” said Johnson about the album’s inspiration. “I wanted to capture that feeling and those thoughts of when you’re out there on the highway and you’re on the edge of a large city but also on the cusp of this greater Western American idea.”
Johnson says the sudden and somewhat unceremonious release of Rodeo Fortune — announced unexpectedly via social media just earlier this month — sits in stark juxtaposition to the amount of thought, intention, and effort that he, drummer Seth Gamez, bassist Jacob Jones, and a newcomer, keyboardist Katie Robertson, put into the record.
“I felt like when we had finished the EP, that was such a proof of concept for us,” Johnson said, referring to the hooky indie-rockers’ 2023 debut Whatever Happens. “It proved that we could do what we wanted to do and make this kind of guitar-rock music within the realm of the things that we liked. We had learned how we were going to work together and how we were going to write. When we started working on this album, the idea we talked about a lot was that we really just wanted to do something that felt like a big swing, something that really felt ambitious.”
Johnson qualified his meaning.
“When you talk about ‘big swings,’ for us, I think we felt we had to do it in a way that still felt very humble and authentic,” he said. “I think in ‘indie rock,’ your artistic currency is authenticity. So, we had to write and have the themes be things that felt true to us. It had to feel a certain way.”
A listen of the record bears out the group’s intentions. Though retaining the infectious melodies and drum-tight vocal harmonies established on the EP, Rodeo Fortune sees the musicians stretch their abilities and their creativity into new territory, musically mirroring the westward expansion that inspired the lyrical themes. Opener “Animal Skin” sets the bar for a new, epic, more layered sonic delivery. Thick guitars and fuzzed-out bass carry the main riff to titanic heights before falling into nearly empty space over the verses.
Similar space is used expertly across the album, widening the dynamic with songs like the standout “Reaching,” with its dreamlike waltz, and the title track, which, with its imagery of wild horses storming across the plains, most directly recalls the unbridled West. These are interspersed with tight pop numbers like “Holiday” and “Strange Rhythm,” providing a collection with as many different sonic hues as the sedimentary gradations on a canyon wall. Robertson’s atmospheric keys and her seraphic voice add yet more elements that push the effort into new territory for the band.
“When we were writing, instead of referencing certain albums or music, it was always more about the feelings of it,” Johnson said. “We talked a lot of how we wanted it to feel like a cathedral. Or like the short stories of Raymond Chandler or Flannery O’Connor. Or an A24 movie. Something where it felt like the creators had a vision, and a craftsmanship, and a purpose of journey, and they were taking you on this journey.”
The record stands as a result of taking chances, being faithful to yourself and your creative forces, and thinking big to achieve a big payoff.
“When you’re making art, you kind of feel like you stand in the shadows of everything amazing that’s come before you,” Johnson said. “You have these hang-ups and insecurities, but we just wanted to work in a way that completely stood in our own truth as artists. The idea was, ‘Don’t have any insecurities. Be honest, be sincere, and swing big,’ and what could we come up with out of those feelings? It was really refreshing making art in that headspace.”
Courtesy Spring Palace
