Colony House: Nashville rock band's new album is a love letter to Tennessee (and Opryland)

For more than a century, musicians have taken inspiration from “Wabash Cannonball,” a classic folk song popularized by Roy Acuff and The Carter Family.

But for their new album, Nashville rock/pop band Colony House was inspired by a different kind of “Wabash Cannonball.” It was the name of frontman Caleb Chapman’s favorite ride at Opryland, before the famed Nashville theme park closed in 1997.

While working on a new song – a blistering brand of modern surf rock, with chest-thumping drums and immediately memorable “la-la” refrain – memories of that steel rollercoaster came rushing back to Chapman.

It became the title track of the band’s new album “The Cannonballers,” which is filled with similarly subtle nods to the band’s Tennessee roots.

“So many of the songs came out of being home for the first time in 10 years,” Chapman says. “And being like, ‘Oh, I love this place. I haven't seen the seasons change since we started touring.’”

That’s not hard to believe. The band – which features Chapman’s brother, Will, on drums – formed in Franklin, Tenn. in 2009, and named themselves after the local apartment complex they first lived in after moving out of their parents’ house.

They’ve released four albums in nine years, and their ceaseless travels have taken them from Lollapalooza to “The Today Show.” On Saturday, they play a sold-out concert at the Ryman Auditorium. It’s their first time headlining the historic venue.

Colony House’s sound has been on its own journey, as well. The band has a surprising ‘60s-rock-inspired undercurrent, evident in the surf guitar licks, tightly wound melodies and peppy tempos of several “Cannonballers” tracks. It’s an influence that Chapman used to not be completely aware of.

“After we released our first album, my dad was like, ‘I'm getting a ton of my friends commenting on how you sound like Roy Orbison,’” Chapman recalls.

“I was like, who's Roy Orbison?”

He knew more about the rock legend than he thought he did, obviously, and the band soon became big enough fans to name their second album “Only The Lonely.” The Chapman brothers’ dad has shaped path in countless other ways – he’s contemporary Christian music star Steven Curtis Chapman.

“You get the question of, ‘Do you feel like those are big shoes to fill? Do you feel like there's a shadow? I’m like, ‘Man, if it’s a shadow, then it’s a nice shadow to be in because I just respect him so much,” Chapman says of their dad.

“We’ve tried our best to really do this thing right, not cut corners, and earn it. But we've also been able to avoid some bad contracts, or avoid getting burned in ways that so many peers of ours have.”

The Ryman, of course, is another Nashville landmark filled with memories for Chapman, who sings of “chasing our dreams down the interstate” on the new album. He remembers going to shows often with his dad, and using funny names for their orders at San Antonio Taco Co. before the show.

“To be able to fill up that place with our name at the top of the bill is pretty wild,” he says. “It's just a very, very cool dream come true.”

This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Colony House interview: Nashville band's new album, Ryman