Ringo Starr Releases Country Album ‘Long Long Road’ at 85

Ringo Starr, 85, will release Long Long Road on April 24 via Universal Music Enterprises, his second consecutive Americana album with producer T Bone Burnett and his third country record overall, following Beaucoups of Blues (1970) and last year's Look Up. The 10-track set was recorded in Nashville and Los Angeles and features collaborations with Billy Strings, Sheryl Crow, Molly Tuttle, Sarah Jarosz, and St. Vincent.

At a press event at Village Studios in Los Angeles, moderated by Jeff Bridges, Starr reflected on the deeply personal nature of the record. "The Long Long Road is me going through my things about my life, how it started out, and where it ended up. And some of it's bad, of course, but for most of it, I've been a lucky human being," he grins. "I got to do what I love to do."

The album ranges stylistically across its 10 tracks, from the skiffle-inflected "Baby Don't Go" and a cover of "I Don't See Me in Your Eyes Anymore" — a song written by Bennie Benjamin and George David Weiss and recorded by Carl Perkins — to a Cash-Carter-style duet with Tuttle on "She's Gone." Starr also revisits his 2005 song "Choose Love" in a countrified update featuring harmonies from St. Vincent's Annie Clark, and trades vocals with Tuttle again on "You and I (Wave of Love)."

Burnett, who co-wrote six of the album's 10 tracks, has long heard something distinctly American in Starr's playing. "I've always thought of him as a Texas musician, because he played so Texas," Burnett says. "He's the swinging-est drummer in the history of the United Kingdom, I can tell you!"

The good news for Beatles fans extends beyond Long Long Road, in that Paul McCartney has confirmed that his forthcoming album, The Boys of Dungeon Lane (due May 29), will include "Home to Us," a duet with Starr, described by McCartney as the first true vocal duet between the two former bandmates.