Jennifer Nettles Talks Differences in Solo Career Songwriting

Jennifer Nettles and Kristian Bush developed a songwriting rhythm as the duo Sugarland, but now that Nettles has ventured into solo territory, the singer has had to change her process.

“From a writing perspective, (Bush) and I had written together for so long … there are things that you instinctively start to know about the other,” she tells the Spokesman Review. “We were definitely at that place with writing with each other. I don’t know all the things that I miss (about that partnership), but I do know the way Kristian and I wrote together was such that it was very familiar, and that obviously now is different.”

By the time Sugarland announced that they would be taking a break, Nettles and Bush had been working together for almost a decade. Taking on a solo career isn't extremely different for Nettles, but the music she's writing on her own is a change of pace.

“My job is the same, which is to write and record and then go out there and be a frontwoman and sing,” she says. “What feels different is the music style, in that it is much more intimate, and more nuanced, and consequently more personal.”

Nettles is currently touring to support her solo album 'That Girl,' with dates on the books through September.

“I’m having a blast. I’m loving it,” she says. “It’s really, really exciting to be able to play this new music live for fans. That has been a real joy.”