The recent success of LoCash’s hit single “I Love This Life” has proven to be a career game-changer, says the duo’s Preston Brust.
“That song has changed everything for us,” he tells Billboard. “Everyone in this town says, ‘Hang in there, man. A hit song changes everything. Keep at it and keep writing songs,’ but it really is true — especially for the artist. You’re finally able to get on the kind of shows and the kind of bills that you need to be on. Then, there are shows like Jimmy Kimmel that we’ve dreamed about all of our lives, they have finally happened. It’s like a pinch-me moment, and you wonder if it is really happening. I think with a song like ‘I Love This Life,’ we could be easily jaded.”
The single was far from LoCash’s first rodeo, which made the success even sweeter. “We’ve been doing this for about ten years. There’s been a lot of hits and bruises along the way that we had to get around,” explains Brust. “We could have thrown in the towel when things got tough, but when a song like ‘I Love This Life’ did what it did for us, that makes it even more special. That we’re the guys who will be remembered for a positive message — three minutes of feel good on the radio, that put everybody’s head in the right place.”
LoCash recently released their first full-length album in three years, entitled The Fighters. The title single came to existence because the guys felt there was something missing from the album — they just weren’t sure what it was.
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“The song was the last one that we got for the album. We had everything done, and were missing one song. Preston and I kept saying, ‘We need something to show what we’re about.’ Our record company even said, ‘You’ve written so many songs, just get one and wrap up the album,’ We just kept insisting there was something missing — some meat on the bone, if you will, that we weren’t sure about,” recalls member Chris Lucas. “We called [songwriters] Jeffrey Steele, Rodney Clawson, and Tom Douglas and said ‘’We’re not going to tell you what we want you to send us. Just go home and think about it, and send us one or two songs that you feel compelled to send us. There were no ground rules except for them to make it real and something that is a real message.’ When Tom sent it to us, he said ‘I don’t know a better fit for this song. I took one listen, and played it for Chris, and he said ‘That’s it. Boom. This is not only getting recorded, but it will be the title track of the album. It describes us, and everybody who has ever been down on their luck — at least once in their life. We all have to fight back, you just have to do it.’”
Besides music, LoCash have also enjoyed success with their Shipwrecked line of wines, selling out of their first edition. “It’s great to be a part of something like that,” says Brust. “We’re not in it to be millionaires. We’re wine guys, so it all fits. We’d do it for the free wine,” he says with a laugh, adding that a second wine in the Shipwrecked line will be released in the spring of 2017.
Needless to say, there’s not a lot that LoCash would change right now. Lucas says the CMA Music Festival was huge proof of that.
“When we performed live at the CMT Music Awards, it was our first time on an award show — ever. We’ve done red carpets and that kind of thing before, but performing live was amazingl,” he explains. “When we got done, and we went to our seats and one artist after the other giving is high-fives and genuine hugs — nothing you saw on TV. You hope that one day you might get that kind of acceptance, but if felt so good. I definitely felt we got off the right elevator that night!”