The Couldn’t Be Happiers are a married, songwriting alt-county/Americana duo whose music travels to the borderlands of traditional country and folk-rock. Together they believe they’ve been given a second chance at embracing all the beauty life has to offer. Their hope is to contribute to that beauty by providing others access to it.
Their songs cover as much of life as possible, from lonesome Sasquatch hunters to their first date in Jackson Square where they’d get married a year later. The duo draws its Texas country vibe from Jordan Crosby Lee, a Texas native who decided he was supposed to have been born in North Carolina. Jordan plays guitar and sings. Jodi Hildebran Lee was born and raised in North Carolina. She sings and plays drums and harmonica.
The couple’s first full-length album, Songs for Butchie, goes live today. I was struck by “Treehouse,” the lead-off single, that truly is an apocalypse love song.
Explain the title of your album.
Our first full-length album is named Songs for Butchie in honor of Jordan’s father, who passed away on November 3, 2020. Butchie (a nickname Jordan gave his dad years ago) was our biggest fan, by far. He loved every song we wrote. About a year ago, we discovered he had an undiagnosed brain tumor that spread so quickly, we only got to say goodbye to him via FaceTime because he lived in San Antonio, TX, and we were living in North Carolina. This was also during the midst of a winter COVID surge, and vaccines were not yet available. The hospital had strict policies in place, so only one person was allowed to see him – although Jordan’s sister somehow managed to convince the hospital staff to bend the rules so she could trade off “shifts” with her mother. When he was still conscious, Jordan’s sister would FaceTime with us from his room because he wanted us to sing to him. When he was too tired to FaceTime, she said he would ask her to play our music for him on Spotify as he was falling asleep.
We got word from Jordan’s family that Butchie passed away early on Election Day. We were signed up to be poll greeters that day, and although we thought seriously about staying home, we knew he wouldn’t have wanted us to do that. So, we cried our eyes out, got dressed, and spent the day at the polls.
The plan for the full album is to release 12 songs, in 3 separate releases. The first release has 4 songs on it, and volumes 2 and 3 will also have 4 songs each, and are scheduled for release a month apart. Songs for Butchie, Vol., I will go live on all streaming platforms on November 3, 2021 – the first anniversary of Butchie’s death. We are truly proud of it. We think Butchie would have been, too.
Do you start off with the music or lyrics first? Why?
I guess you could say as a band, we do both. Jordan tends to start with a guitar in his hand, trying to come up with a melody. He might just sing nonsense words or silly lyrics about what he wants to eat for dinner or how cute the dogs are at that moment. Then, he will start to play around with a real “theme” for the song before he gets into the lyrics. Jordan’s process is shaped by his background as an English major, so it is pretty rare for him to start with lyrics. He has to have a theme in mind and a story framed out in his head before he can start writing lyrics, and he will revise them a million times.
Jodi has been singing since she was a kid, and she only picked up a guitar as an adult to try to learn enough chords to write. Her process almost always starts with a lyrical hook she’s composed in her mind. Sometimes she composes a whole chorus in her head while she’s driving to work based on lyrics she scribbled down in the middle of the night. Then she sends a bunch of random voice memos to Jordan so he can piece together chords that fit. The two of them will usually work on the song at that point to tighten up lyrics to fit a theme or tweak the melody.
All songwriters seem to have their own process, and we don’t think there’s any right or wrong way to do it. Part of it may just depend on what strikes you as something you want to write about. For example, in a rare turn for Jordan, he decided to write a whole song around the phrase “living between lightning and thunder” just because he liked it. What we do know is that when you find inspiration, you should seize it.
Who would you love to collaborate with? why?
This is a really hard question because there are so many artists we love. Our musical tastes sort of run parallel to one another, but crossover for a few artists. We both love a fabulous band based in Charleston, Shovels and Rope. They are also a husband-wife duo. They do these fun little projects called “Busted Jukebox” where they collaborate with other artists to reimagine and record cover songs. One of our first “dates” together was seeing S&R play at the Millennium Center in downtown Winston-Salem in 2017. Jordan flew up from San Antonio to go to the show – it was a Sunday night – and had to catch an early flight back on Monday to go to work. When we got married in New Orleans in 2018, Jodi walked down the “aisle” (metaphorically, since it was outside) to a fiddle version of S&R’s song, “St. Anne’s Parade.
How are you using your platform to support marginalized people?
Of course, the honest answer here is that we don’t feel like we have done enough to support marginalized people, but we made a decision as a band early on to write about topics that may not be popular in our genre. We’ve heard people say that Americana music is really just left-wing country – and frankly, it’s nice to feel like you have a place to fit there. We have definitely lost fans when they realized our political leanings or actually listened to some of our lyrics, but that’s okay. We released our first real music video and protest song in 2018, called “Listen.” We were so outraged over the child separation policy in effect at that time, but also incredibly touched at the scenes of mothers protesting at the Capitol with their foil blankets being walked out and arrested one at a time while singing, “This Little Light of Mine,” so we incorporated that song into “Listen,” and some of that footage into the music video. In the lyrics, we also give a shout out to the Black football players kneeling for the anthem: “When you dream, dream of our triumphant celebration – down on one knee while the crowd sings out the anthem.”
We followed that song with “Panic, Now!” which has a bit more of a rock sound than we normally have, but we take aim at all kinds of political issues, including the attempts to erase Black history and Black votes in America.
We know we aren’t famous enough to have a platform that reaches millions and spreads a message, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try to draw attention to these issues when we can. We also try to take charity gigs that support marginalized communities when the opportunity arises.
Setting aside what we might do with our music, as a couple, we also try to direct our charitable donations and support to charities that support affordable housing and voting rights, among other things. There’s still a lot more we can do, and we have so much to learn, but we are going to keep trying. After all, Americana music itself owes so much to the contributions of Black Americans, and we are so grateful we get to be part of this genre.
What do you think you could do to make your music or shows more accessible to a more diverse audience?
In general, our hope is to make our music more accessible to a diverse audience, and if we can do that, then the shows will follow. We want to try to elevate some of the issues that are affecting these communities in our songwriting, and we want to acknowledge that country music wouldn’t exist without the blood, sweat, and tears of the Black community in particular. We also try to support venues that support causes we believe in and that make an effort to bring in diverse acts. One of our favorite venues in Winston-Salem where we live is called The Ramkat. The owners have been outspoken in their support of marginalized communities and make an effort to host diverse bands and sponsor events to support communities of color and the LBGTQIA community.
Songs for Butchie Vol. 1 is available on all streaming services now.
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