Lady A singer talks about dropping Antebellum, the fight with the other Lady A, new music

It's been two months since Lady A returned to touring with the What A Song Can Do Tour.

Charles Kelley, who shares the vocal spotlight with Hillary Scott, says, "The first week was kind of surreal because you didn't know if it was ever gonna happen." 

All that time away taught Kelley to appreciate the life of a touring musician even more. 

"It really is a blessing," he says. "It's kind of humbling, you know?"

The multi-platinum country trio are touring in support of "What a Song Can Do (Chapter One)," the first installment of their first full-length release as Lady A. The tour makes a stop at Ak-Chin Pavilion at 7 p.m., Thursday, Sept. 16.

From the time the trio came together (with Dave Haywood rounding out the lineup) in 2006 until June 11, 2020, they were known as Lady Antebellum.

They dropped the Antebellum part as Black Lives Matter protests were inspiring a national reckoning on racial justice. 

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The controversial name change to Lady A

In announcing the name change, Lady A said they were both “regretful and embarrassed” to not have taken the association between that word and slavery into account. 

The decision inspired a backlash on several fronts, from those who thought they should've kept the name to those who viewed it as a token gesture. 

"I think it's interesting how intentions can be twisted," Kelley says. "That's just the world we live in."

He and his bandmates never thought about the racial implications of the name, he says. 

"I don't know, you grow up in the South and you tend to attach a certain nostalgia and grace to some of these words. So when we came up with that name, it felt Southern rock and very graceful."

It wasn't until some non-white friends said they felt it was "kind of offensive" that Kelley realized it was maybe not as graceful-sounding as he hoped.

"I think that just shows you there's, I think the best word is blind spots," he says.

"You learn as you grow and get older. And I think when you know better, you do better."

Only time will tell how people view the name change in the long run, Kelley says. 

But he feels optimistic that their true intentions will prevail.

"I guarantee you, a lot of good is gonna come from this," he says.

Dealing with another artist named Lady A

As for the country fans who feel they should've kept the Antebellum, Kelley isn't buying that. 

"There's a lot of people that are like, 'Oh, you get caved in' and all this," he says. 

"That's such a silly concept. We're all evolving. This world is evolving. And as we create a more culturally accepting world, this is just part of the things that need to be done."

Within a day of the trio announcing their decision to rebrand themselves, the focus of the story had already shifted to the fact there is another Lady A.

A blues, soul, funk and gospel singer from Seattle named Anita White had been using the name professionally for more than 20 years. 

The trio approached the other Lady A and suggested they both use the name.

She came back with a counter-offer, saying she would find another stage name for $5 million and an additional $5 million donation to be split between Seattle charities, Black Lives Matter and a nationwide legal defense fund for independent artists.

The trio filed a lawsuit, asking that the court uphold its long-held trademark on the name. White countersued, citing "lost sales, diminished brand identity, and diminution in the value of and goodwill associated with the mark."

Kelley says they had "great conversations" when they met with White on Zoom and first suggested just sharing the name.

"I think there were some lawyers that probably knocked on her door and said, 'There might be some money to be made here,'" Kelley says. 

"And that's when it kind of turned into something a little bit nastier."

At this point, Kelley says, "It's kind of turned into the lawyer game ... But we're just musicians, man, just trying to make a mark, trying to put some music out that makes people feel good."

He's still hopeful they can work this out if the two parties could talk in person. 

"Because, again, our intentions are true with this," he says. "And I think her intentions are true with this. We just need to get on the same page of how to move forward."

The story behind 'What a Song Can Do'

In the meantime, he's thrilled to be back on the road, sprinkling songs from the new record into the set. 

The title track is probably his favorite of the new songs.

"It's so our story," Kelley says.

"It's obviously a song about how music can make you feel things and bring you closer to your relationship, whatever it might be. But for us, it's also kind of like this little love letter to the fans — like, wow, this music has let us live out our dream and brought us here."

They chose it as the title track because it spoke to the power of music at a time when many of us turned to songs for comfort as we made our way through COVID-19 and the isolation that entailed.

"We started talking about what this past year was," Kelley says. 

"And we were like, 'Gosh, music.' I listened to so many records over this past year. I went back to the basics, listening to a lot of older records I grew up on. It really did get me through such a dark time, you know?"

Most of the songs on the record were "brewed up" during the pandemic.

"Right around when everything shut down," he says, "we talked and we were like, 'How can we be productive? How can we take this and turn it into a positive?' And we hadn't had this much time to write since our first couple records."

They've all got families now. And when you're touring, Kelley says, "You're on what I would call the hamster wheel a little bit. You tour then you go right back in to make a record, and you don't really get time to kind of recharge those artistic batteries."

This allowed an opportunity for the recharging of those batteries.

"That's why this is the first record probably since the first record where we wrote almost every song," he says. "'Where Would I Be' is the only song that we didn't write or have a part of."

Kelley talks about writing during the COVID-19 pandemic

Kelley says he played a part in writing 50, 60 songs in just the past year. In addition to providing lots of options for the record, it kept his mind off the pandemic.

"I think if I didn't have songwriting, I would have lost my mind," Kelley says. 

To the extent that the pandemic is reflected in those songs, it's in the way they tried their best to counter-program the mood.

"We had the conversation when we were writing of 'I just don't think people, when they get through this, are gonna want to be reminded constantly about it or brought down by it,'" he says. 

That's part of why they went with "Like a Lady," a spirited anthem of female empowerment, as the record's lead single.

Given their history of heartbreak songs, they figured people would expect them to come back from the pandemic with some sad, depressing songs. 

"And we were like, 'Let's throw a curveball.'"

They're releasing the album in two parts — hence "(Chapter One)." 

As Kelley says, "I was like, 'What if we just give 'em a little bit at a time?' So we went through some different scenarios of how we could do that. And we kind of landed on this."

In January, Lady A became the newest members of the Grand Ole Opry at the invitation of Darius Rucker. Kelley calls it a "bucket-list" moment

"After a tough year of feeling like you've been a little bit misinterpreted, it was like, OK, our community, everybody knows our hearts here in this town," he says. "They know the legacy that hopefully we've made, but that we're gonna make."

And being invited by Rucker made it that much sweeter.

"We've toured with Darius, I guess, three times now," Kelley says.

"He and I are best golf buddies. And just to have him be the guy. I grew up listening to Hootie and the Blowfish. When I was in cover bands, that was some of the first stuff we learned how to play. So that was kind of just a crazy full-circle moment."

Lady A

When: 7 p.m. Thursday, Sept. 16. 

Where: Ak-Chin Pavilion, 2121 N. 83rd Ave., Phoenix.

Admission: $30 and up

Details: 602-254-7200, livenation.com.

Reach the reporter at ed.masley@arizonarepublic.com or 602-444-4495. Follow him on Twitter @EdMasley.

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