Ashley McBryde didn’t know what she was doing at the start of her career.
The 36-year-old country star self-released her first two albums – ‘Ashley McBryde’ and ‘Elsebound’ – without having any real understanding of the music industry, but Ashley doesn’t have any regrets about the path she’s taken.
She explained: "If if I had to do it again, I definitely would. I didn’t know what the hell I was doing, I didn’t know how to be in the studio, how to write a chart properly for a song.
"I had all these tracks I wanted to record and I didn’t know how to select them with some sort of strategy. I didn’t know how to go into a studio for eight hours and re-sing the same damn song 15 times."
Despite her struggles, Ashley thinks she’s ultimately benefited from the experience of releasing her own records.
She told Music News: "I’m really glad I did it because I got to learn it in my own way, and I got to learn from musicians that have been in the studio for forever and ever and ever and ever.
"During the ‘Elsebound’ record, it was me just learning. And also during that process, in 2010 and 2011, I had a really bad vocal cord injury and wound up having to go in the studio the night before surgery we recorded all the vocals for the record.
"Honestly, I think the universe put that record in my path so that when I eventually had to have surgery, that record was at least done. And then we go to make ‘Jalopies & Expensive Guitars’, and it was a lot of fun to walk in and know how to read a chart and I knew how to do something different vocally more than I did before, so if I sing something six times, I’ll change something every time.
"I had to learn that on my own, but now I know how to do that, it made recording sessions so much easier."
Ashley McBryde ‘didn’t know what she was doing’ in the studio
