“Coming off of a show like American Idol, the first thing that I thought of, the minute they said my name, after I got over the shock of it, it was, ‘I am a songwriter. How am I going to get these millions of people that watch and vote to get on board with that version of me?’” Lee DeWyze recalls.

Fast-forward 14 years, and the Season 9 winner has managed to do just that — becoming the Idol alumnus with the most TV and film syncs, most notably with a prominent placement of “Blackbird Song” in The Walking Dead. It was a long and sometimes arduous journey that DeWyze navigated with the unwavering encouragement of his longtime manager, Brett Radin, with whom he teamed during a transitional period one year after Idol. “Brett, if there’s one thing he always understood, it was like, ‘Dude, you’re more than this show. There’s a lot more to your career and things you should be doing.’ He was always very supportive of that. So, losing him was a big kick in the fucking gut, man.”

Radin, who DeWyze describes as “a best friend, like a brother to me,” shockingly died in February 2023, leaving DeWyze reeling and in a “space where I really had to do some soul-searching.” And his latest album, Gone for Days, is in fact his most vulnerable and soul-searching to date. Before his death, Radin only got to hear one track, the stunning “Into the Wild” (“I have text messages from him and he’s like, ‘Man, there’s something special about that song. It’s my favorite song of yours,’” DeWyze recalls), which fittingly opens Gone for Days. But Radin would no doubt be immensely proud of what DeWyze, now 38, has achieved with this entire album.

Recorded over a three-month period of unprecedented inspiration and creativity at Classic Recording Studios in Bristol, Tenn., with roots music luminaries like Grammy-nominated cellist/composer Dave Eggar and Union Station’s Barry Bales and Tim Stafford, Gone for Days is DeWyze’s career-defining record, and it has already garnered some early Grammy buzz. But DeWyze, the songwriter, made this album for himself — not for awards, not for Idol-style mainstream success, not even for even syncs.

“There’s this moment, which I think many songwriters face, where you ask yourself in the middle of the process, ‘Why am I doing this? Why am I writing this record? Why am I making these songs? Why am I doing this at all? Is it because I need to pay the bills? Is it because I can’t help myself? Is it because I feel like I guess I should put out music?’ It’s kind of a culmination of all of those things at times,” DeWyze confesses. “But on this one, I don’t think any of those things played a part. It felt for the first time, I don’t want to say ever, but in a long time, that I was like, ‘I really do have something to say and this is how I happen to do that. This is what I do.’ … This album has rejuvenated this thing in me. It feels like it’s my first record, almost. I’ve fallen back in love with why I do this, which is something I’ve been longing for. It definitely was this kind of rekindling of the fire.”

In the compelling video above and Q&A below, DeWyze opens up about the creative process and personal epiphanies behind Gone for Days —  and even surprises me with an impromptu acoustic performance of “by far, the most personal song” he’s ever released, the album-closing tearjerker “Butterfly Effect.”

LYNDSANITY: Congratulations on the release of Gone for Days. I get the impression that this album means a lot to you, possibly more than any other album you’ve ever put out. So, I’ll start with a very open-ended question, by asking why that’s the case.

LEE DEWYZE: That’s a very valid question, and I think it’s one that I was asking myself too before I made it — because it felt really important before I even started recording this album. I don’t know if it was just a combination of where I’m at in my career … over the years I’ve consistently put out albums, I’ve consistently put out music, so it’s kind of like, what makes this one different? And to start, I knew I didn’t want to make the record in Los Angeles. … Something told me to get out of here and make the record somewhere else. And a big firestarter for that was I got the opportunity to go play Bristol Rhythm & Roots [festival]. … I went and visited the studio where I would eventually end up recording the record, and I’m sitting there and I’m kind of like, “Everything just feels peaceful, everything feels right. It doesn’t have that Los Angeles cloud” — that competitive thing that can come with being out here. And I left and I just kind of told my wife, “Hey, I have something I want to talk to you about.” And she knew. She was like, “You want to make your album here?” And I’m like, “I do.” And she’s like, “You should.” … I kind of paused and said, “I’m going to go out there for three months. I’m just going to let whatever happens, happen. I’m going to get into this house that I rented and just be with myself and write.” And I did.

And what started to happen was the more I was being honest with myself out there, kind of all the things that you shove under the rug or tuck away or hide behind when you’re making a record — and I think every songwriter goes through that in some way or another — I just became comfortable with those things. The things that would scare me usually to write about, or the things that I didn’t want to do in the past, I was OK with doing. Obviously over the years we’ve talked at length about my journey from Idol and all that. And I think that’s something that happened to me over the years that I really came to realize before I recorded was being on a show like that… obviously we don’t have to dive too deep into it, but it is relevant to this, because I think for years it was really important to me to prove myself as a songwriter.

Now American Idol is much more open about letting contestants perform their own songs on the show, but that was not the case in your season.

No, not at all. It was actually frowned upon. But I think that after all that and making record after record, it was really a decision I made to not ever necessarily make my vocal be the centerpiece to the music. It was always: Let the story and the songwriting be the centerpiece. I think even the way I approached vocally or produced it, my vocals were in there and were beautiful and did their thing, but I never wanted that to be the showcasing piece. And that was because there was a part of me that may have felt like, “Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know I have a great voice or whatever, I know I was on Idol — but I’m a songwriter.” I got to a point in my life, in my career. It was a huge turning point for me for many reasons, from losing my manager…

Oh yes, I’m so sorry about that.

I was in such shock over the whole thing. He was my manager for 13 years and a best friend, like a brother to me. And so, losing him and then coming out of it was just kind of like this space where I really had to do some soul-searching. And I looked back at the albums that I always talked about in interviews… for me it really was Tea for the Tillerman by Cat Stevens. His voice is just telling the story, and that’s why I love it so much — his emotion. And so, it was a conscious decision by me, my call, to say on this album, “I don’t want to hide my vocals behind production. I don’t want to hide it under vibe.” I look at Ghost Stories or Paranoia or some of my other albums and I like to look at them as these long, beautiful poems that you can get lost in… but on this one, I was like, “I’d rather it be a book with chapters.” You could listen to each song and when you get into the next one, you’re in a different chapter of that book.

And so, while the other albums have had great successes as far as licensing and syncs, and I’ve loved every second of them, this one, to answer your question — this is the long answer! – I think it represents me as an artist, as a songwriter, as a vocalist, maybe the best of anything I’ve done. And at the end of the day, one of my mantras going into this was, “Make an album that you would want to listen to. Don’t go into it saying, ‘Oh, I hope this gets placed in a movie or I hope my fans like it or I hope this happens or that happens.’” Those things will come, or they won’t. I have a great relationship with license and sync and those things will happen. But to put that at the forefront felt counterproductive, almost. It was like, “Go and write an album that you love. Go and write that record. Go and make music that you would love to listen to, that’s honest and that can connect with people.” And the more and more I was [in Bristol] and the more and more I was writing and recording, it just kind of took on this life of its own. Halfway through it, I was like, “I don’t know what’s going on here, but I’m loving this process!” It didn’t feel like one of the darker times I ever had, which  was making Paranoia.

Why was the process of making Paranoia so dark?

Well, I’ve never really talked about this, but I think it comes through in that album itself. But there’s this moment, which I think many songwriters face, where you ask yourself in the middle of the process, “Why am I doing this? Why am I writing this record? Why am I making these songs? Why am I doing this at all? Is it because I need to pay the bills? Is it because I can’t help myself? Is it because I feel like I guess I should put out music?” It’s kind of a culmination of all of those things at times. But on this one, I don’t think any of those things played a part. It felt for the first time, I don’t want to say ever, but in a long time, that I was like, “I really do have something to say and this is how I happen to do that. This is what I do.”

You mentioned the death of your manager, Brett Radin, who was with you for this whole journey. He came on board shortly after you won American Idol, and was there when you had the whole Walking Dead breakout and sort of helped you rebuild your career.

That was one of the first things we did together. The Walking Dead song… I’ve talked about this onstage, but I don’t know if I’ve ever talked about in an interview format as much. But coming off of a show like American Idol, the first thing that I thought of, the minute they said my name, after I got over the shock of it, it was, “I am a songwriter. How am I going to get these millions of people that watch and vote to get on board with that version of me?” And I was younger and it was very confusing. It was a lot of things. But that was the first thing that hit me. And there came a point where I was like, “Well, what can I do? What can I do to let the masses know that I’m a songwriter?” And the thing I came up with was, “I’m going to write a song for the most popular television show, and I really don’t fucking care if anyone likes it or not. I’m just going to do it.” And Brett was one of the guys, where I was playing it in a rehearsal for something, and like, “What is that?” I’m like, “It’s this song I wrote and I want it to go into Walking Dead.” And he’s like, “OK, well, let’s record it.” So, the next day we go to Paramount Studios, we record it three days later, we send it through our channels. I was at Vanguard at the time. And that’s not how it works, for anybody! … The way it usually works is you write songs and you have someone that pitches your music.

When I talk license and sync, it’s not necessarily the prettiest part of the music industry, but it is a huge part of it — for someone like me, at least. I mean, back in the day after Idol, when people would say, “Get on that red carpet,” I would be like, “No, take me to the Durango [Songwriters Expo],” where you sit in a room with people. Again, it’s not the flashy thing, but you play your music, you get to know these people, and you get to let them know who you are. I did that stuff for years. But we literally just sent [The Walking Dead] the song. We’re like, “We’d love this to be in the show.” A week later, they send us a script and they’re like, “It’s going to be in the front; it’s going to be in the back.” And I was like, “Fuck yeah, dude!” It’s easy to go back and say Idol changed my life, and it did, but this changed my life in a different way. It was a different hurdle I was able to climb, and it opened up the doors for years and years from doing that. So yeah, Brett, if there’s one thing he always understood, it was like, “Dude, you’re more than [American Idol]. There’s a lot more to your career and things you should be doing.” He was always very supportive of that. So, losing him was a big kick in the fucking gut, man.

Again, I’m so sorry. Did he pass away before you started working Gone for Days?

It’s funny you ask that. He never heard any of the songs, but one, and it was “Into the Wild.” … I remember I have text messages from him and he’s like, “Man, ‘Into the Wild,’ there’s something special about that song. It’s my favorite song of yours.” And so, he did get to hear that one, and it happens to be the first song on the record. … It being the first song just to happened to feel right. It’s funny when you make a record, you sit with the songs and there’s people that do the Post-It Note thing where they have all the songs and you rearrange them. But then I kind of looked at it like a story and I’m like, “Well, what’s the story I’m telling, and how does that play out?” And it felt like “Into the Wild” was this kind of adventure into the unknown where I don’t know what’s going to happen. And then I end the album with “Butterfly Effect,” which is much more confident, much more calming, very personal — by far, the most personal song I’ve ever released.

Let’s talk about “Butterfly Effect.” Why is that one so special?

“Butterfly Effect” was a weird one. I got to a point in the album where everything was going, cruising, but then I felt like I didn’t have the last song. … This whole album almost felt like a dream sequence for somebody: They fell asleep and dreamt this whole story and they woke up and it’s like, “Well, what did you learn from your experience?” And so I got to this point where I just didn’t have a last song. I had so many ideas, but they all felt wrong. It just didn’t feel right. And it’s always funny when songwriters talk about how they wrote — so, it was at a Denny’s at 3 in the morning? Whenever I hear that, I’m like, “You’re full of shit. You spent days and hours on that thing!” But to be “that guy,” I was in my bed. I sleep with my guitar, essentially, when I’m on the road; I have it very close to me or in the bed because when I’m trying to fall asleep, I’ll just close my eyes and play. And I woke up at 3 or so in the morning. It wasn’t stress. It was more of, “What is it? What are you trying to write? What is the thing? I’m writing all these songs, so why aren’t they feeling right? Why?”

So, I am in bed, and I literally said to myself, “It doesn’t even have to rhyme. It doesn’t have to make sense. What you’re feeling right now, put that into words.” And I picked up the guitar, and the first thing that came out of my mouth was, “Yeah I miss California/A place that I should warn ya/You’ll probably fall in love with, if you ever go…” And I was like, “What the hell was that?” But it was very clear that that was the beginning of the song. I was like, “This is something.” And I just started rifling through the things that were important to me. Literally I’m thinking, “Sure, there’s still bills to pay and life can sometimes get away, but I know my love is waiting for me back at home.” I just kept going and going. … The way that this song came about was so crazy for me. I’ve never written a song like that. I mean, I’ve written songs quickly before, but this one, I literally woke up and I wrote this whole fucking song essentially in 30 minutes. And then I laid down and I’m like, “I don’t know, maybe that’s the best or worst thing I’ve ever written. I have no idea.” And the next thing you know, I’m laying there and I can’t sleep. I’m like, “You need to record that on your phone. You have to.” Because I know me: I will not remember that song in the morning.

So much of that song was so in the moment. … My birthday had just passed. I turned 38 when I was there. So, my birthday was on my mind. And I just started thinking about my wife, my family, my dog. That line [about my senior dog] still kills me when I play it live, because I was sitting there and this thought popped in my head. I’m like, “Man, I really hate that he’s getting old.”

And so, I just kind of went into the studio and I was like, “Hey guys, I wrote something last night. I don’t know what it is, but we’re going to try it.” So, everyone’s kind of in the studio listening, and I go in there and I play it, and everyone’s just quiet. And they’re like, “What the fuck was that?” I’m like, “I don’t really know.” Bu it was just very obvious after I recorded it and listened back: “This is the last song.” With that book idea in mind, it’s the afterword, and you’ve gotten to know me through this record.

I just wanted to write something so fucking real. And what’s crazy is I thought because of how personal it was, people wouldn’t connect with it. But it’s been the opposite. Everyone knows what it’s like to talk or not talk to their parents, or to have lost someone. And especially that dog line, I know it’s crazy, but how many people experience that? And it’s not a thing that’s really sung about. Just the way people have connected with that song has been really special. It’s been really gratifying to know that the idea behind all of it, I guess, was to connect with people. And it seems to be doing that. And I think as a songwriter, that’s your goal. I recently said out loud during something that I was asked, “What’s your job as a songwriter?” And for years, my answer would’ve been, “To be successful and to have people love the music.” But there’’s really this idea that I’ve grown to love, which is being an emotional locksmith. It’s my job as a songwriter to allow you, the listener, to open up doors in yourself and find a comfortable, safe place for you to experience these emotions. I hope that I can be a vessel to do that through the music and through the connecting. I’m just honestly really proud of the record.

It’s weird, man. In a weird way, I think that when you do this a long time… there does come a point where you say to yourself, “All right, maybe everything’s winding down.” I don’t know. You ask yourself this shit; you just do. I think that a lot of songwriters don’t like to talk about that, because it makes them feel like their career’s over or whatever. But this album has rejuvenated this thing in me. It feels like it’s my first record, almost. I’ve fallen back in love with why I do this, which is something I’ve been longing for. It definitely was this kind of rekindling of the fire.

That’s amazing! I’m so happy for you. I know you’ve made it clear that you didn’t make this album for accolades or fame or commercial successes, as wonderful as all those things are if they come around. But I do believe there is a little bit of Grammy buzz for this record…

Yeah, that’s come up. The people around me, and people that have never been around me, are like, “Hey, there’s something about this album. We think it belongs in this place for multiple reasons.” When you grow up, you think about things like that. Growing up, I think it was like, “What’s success?” When you’re young, it’s to have a lot of money…

Honestly, that’s sort of what American Idol is selling: “You got a record deal! All your dreams are coming true!”

Well, I turned down record deals on this album. Straight out. And it’s funny — those deals came after the album was done, after it was heard. But it just wasn’t right. And that’s OK. I’m actually very, very happy about that. But then it kind of moves to Grammys and awards and shit. And well, I think for me, success, or an element of it, is respect from your peers in the industry, respect from the people that you respect in the industry. And that’s kind of what a Grammy represents. I mean, that community is really all about that, especially the Americana category and community. I’ve always had those folk/Americana pieces of me, and I think many times I kind of fought it, almost. And then on this album, I just leaned into what I love and what I know I am. And so shortly after the album came out, or the single came out, I was playing at the Nashville Grammy chapter and getting to know those people. There’s rules to what I’m allowed to say and what I’m not allowed to say surrounding this stuff, so all I’ll say is if people love it enough to recognize it in any way, it’s an honor. I think when people see what kind of unfolds over the next year, it’ll be pretty exciting. I think it’ll be a really interesting thing for me at this stage in my career. I’m really happy about it. And people will definitely be seeing more about this exact topic sooner than later, I’m sure.

But right now, I’m just trying to not be the guy at the wedding who didn’t try the chicken. You know what I mean? When my wife and I got married, [at the reception] I remember people always said that to me: “Make sure to enjoy yourself and try the food.” And afterwards I was like, “I actually didn’t try the food!” And I think I could say that for a lot of my career. Even going back to Idol, there were so many moments that are just a blur. I don’t know whether that’s burying trauma or just not taking a breath to enjoy what was happening! [laughs] And I think that goes for a lot of my albums and writing. But I’m in a new stage of me, and I think there’s something to say about not living in past versions of yourself. Someone’s been going to therapy! [laughs] No, but it’s true. It’s letting go of all the things that maybe hold you back and embracing the things that keep you going. And this album’s been that for me. So, back to your question about that [Grammy] stuff, I’m very excited for whatever could happen and what might happen. The idea of it, even, is fucking crazy to me.

I’m happy to see you where you are in your life right now. Congratulations on everything, and thanks for being so candid.

Thank you. I’m at a point in my life and career where I just kind of feel like saying what I’m feeling. Songwriting is so important to me, and storytelling is so important to me. The “why” to that, I may never know. I just know that from a young kid sitting there crying in my living room on the floor. I’m like 5 years old, and my parents run in the room and they’re like, “Why are you crying?” And I was literally listening to John Denver’s “Sunshine on My Shoulders.” And my mom’s like, “What is wrong?” And I’m like, “It’s the song. “My mom’s like, “What?”

I’m like, “This song’s just so beautiful!” And my parents were like, “That’s why you’re crying?” And it was from that moment forward, they were like, “OK, music is a thing for him.” I’ve just always had a very, very deep emotional connection with music. I’m the guy that can cry listening to a song. I can get goosebumps listening to a song. I can get lost in that. It’s just very much a part of me. So, I think that the closer and closer I get to the best version of myself, the more comfortable I feel talking about it and just being real about it…. the industry wants you at times to be guarded, but there’s something about being like, “I’ll just tell you this is what’s up.” And if people don’t get a sense of who I am through [interviews] like this, they’ll sure get a sense of it through the music — because this album is, through-and-through, a piece of me.