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Eric Church released a new single from the second installment of his massive triple album, Heart & Soul. “Doing Life With Me” is on &, a fan album that was available a vinyl exclusive to Church’s fan club and will be available on streaming platforms on August 19. Church wrote and recorded most of the songs for the project on a North Carolina trip that spanned 28 days, according to a press release from his record label. He recalled of his writing sessions for “Doing Life WIth Me,” with songwriters Jeffrey Steele and Casey Beathard:
“One of the songs I’m playing ‘Life With Me’ on the acoustic part of this, Jeffrey Steele I still remember. ..We had a little writer’s cabin that I would go to. That’s where the writers stayed and I would pop in and out because I couldn’t stand to be with them all the time because I would lose my mind, but I would pop in and out. And one day he had this little – that little riff on ‘Life With Me’ just up and down my neck. And he goes ‘I don’t know what this is.’ And then Casey Beathard walks in and he goes ‘Man, I had this lady I was just talking to and talking about her husband and she goes I guess that’s what he gets for doing life with me.’ And I thought that’s interesting. And all the sudden (sings) it just turned into a thing, but it was over Jeffrey’s thing. So, that night in the studio as opposed to having a session guy, Jeffrey Steele played that part and Jeffrey Steele sang harmony on that part and so did Casey.”
Church sings on the track: “I don’t pray much anymore/ For this old troubadour’s/ Happiness, wishes, wants and needs/ End of my ropes, hopes and dreams/ Spend my livin’ giving thanks/ For the ships I never sank/ Every big every little in the everyday things/ The notes and the words and the songs I sing/ To the ones doing life with me.” Listen to the song here: