The Nashville Convention & Visitors Corp, Vanderbilt Health, and Ryman Hospitality Properties, Inc. are launching a new free program today, Good To Go, that will support Nashville-area businesses with extra resources and access to public health experts as the city begins to reopen.

The Good to Go program will help ensure a safer city for residents and visitors as Nashville businesses pledge to implement health standards in a consistent way across Music City. Participating businesses will be given a special green music note to display at their locations and on their websites and materials, indicating their commitment to following safety standards. Participating businesses will also be recognized on a new Good to Go website promoted to visitors.

The voluntary program asks businesses to commit to guidance from the Metro Public Health Department and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and provides access to toolkits and support to help carry out the recommendations. Vanderbilt Health’s leading infectious disease experts helped develop key elements of the program and will be involved with ongoing learning and information sharing. Businesses interested in joining Good to Go should sign up online at GoodtoGoNashville.com by June 4.

“We encourage every business in Nashville to join Good to Go. We believe this is the first program of this kind in the nation to provide uniform industry guidelines and comprehensive toolkits for businesses throughout the city in response to COVID-19. We want to show the world that through cooperation and collaboration, Nashville is safe and sound,” said Butch Spyridon, president and CEO of NCVC. “As destinations begin to open, Good to Go will help Nashville stand apart as it ensures that our business community is following all public health guidelines and has access to leading experts at Vanderbilt Health. It will give all those who live and come to Nashville confidence and peace of mind that we are safely open for business.”

To participate, businesses must agree to adopt all applicable guidelines set forth by MPHD and CDC and participate in Good to Go’s enhanced learning program. In return, businesses will receive regular information and insights from infection prevention experts at Vanderbilt Health, key learnings and best practices from Ryman Hospitality Properties leaders and access to new resources as recommendations change. Businesses which commit to Good to Go will also have access to training modules and other first-hand experience from Ryman Hospitality Properties.

“Ryman Hospitality Properties began working with Vanderbilt Health in the early days of the pandemic to provide the teams at all of our properties – including restaurants, entertainment venues and our hotels – direct access to the nation’s foremost experts on infectious disease control,” said Colin Reed, chairman and CEO of Ryman Hospitality Properties. “We helped spearhead Good to Go because we wanted to make elements of our early work with Vanderbilt Health available so that other Nashville businesses could have access to the tools, resources and information needed to operate a business until a vaccine or treatment is available for COVID-19.”

As a warm acoustic guitar tone introduces Kip Moore’s new album Wild World (out Friday), Moore’s rugged voice burns with urgency from his first notes on opener “Janie Blu,” the story of a girl struggling to combat the guilt laid at her feet by an absent father, a girl who numbs the pain with addiction and lovers.

There ain’t no shame in bleeding, he sings.

It’s true in life and it’s true in song.

While so much of today’s country radio fare has an external focus—treading the same lyrical tropes of parties, alcohol, and nameless girls—Moore again turns introspective on his fourth studio album for MCA Nashville, writing all but one track on the album and producing it with David Garcia, Luke Dick and Blair Daly on select tracks. He mines deeper into topics—seeking love, seeking freedom, seeking peace, making peace with old decisions—that have become the bedrock of his catalog, but infuses them with fresh intensity.

“There was a lot of self-reflection on this album,” he says. “There was a lot of digging deep and finding out what I’ve taken for granted and what God looks like for me, but also trying to find those simplicities and joys in everyday moments.”

Though Moore’s early hits “Somethin’ ‘Bout A Truck” and “Beer Money” reveled in working-class, Friday night freedoms and summer love on rural farmlands, Moore quickly set himself apart as a road warrior, an electrifying yet intimate live act with a breadth and depth of songwriting to back it up, such as the Platinum-certified “Hey Pretty Girl” or the Gold-certified “Last Shot.”

Two songs on the new album—“South” and “Sweet Virginia”—are the result of those long days spent on the road, with writing credits from Moore’s bandmembers Erich Wigdahl, Manny Medina, Dave Nassie, and Adam Browder (several of the bandmembers have previous writing credits on Moore’s albums including sophomore effort Wild Ones).

 

“’South’ came about as a completely organic thing during soundcheck,” Moore says. “They send me ideas and we brainstorm and try new things out. It’s not like, ‘I’m the artist and they’re the band.’ We’re all in this thing together.”

“Sweet Virginia” originated in a dressing room after a concert in Scotland, around 1:00 a.m.

“The set ended around 11:00 p.m., and for next two hours, we drank just about every bottle they had in that dressing room. We sang old tunes, rock and roll tunes, old country tunes and then it turned into writing our own music. I was humming that melody and then Manny blasted out the first line of the chorus. We just drank and wrote music.”

Another standout is the gritty, U2-esque soul rocker “Fire and Flame.”

I got this reckless heart that I can’t tame/just when I think I’ve reined it in a little/I’m still somewhere between the fire and flame, he sings with the urgency of a rebel seeking salvation, as he chronicles those who help push him toward a peace and light he’s seeking, be it lovers or homeless acquaintances. The track builds to a righteous, arena-ready chorus before simmering down to a reverent piano-vocal.

“That one was a little difficult to wrangle in the studio, ’cause there’s so many little musical things happening. There’s a lot of other ways we could have gone with that song, and we spent a good solid half-day just to figure out how to go about that. We thought about going with a very stripped down style, but we wanted that thing to be a massive anthem. They we brought it down at the very end to show how strong the melody and lyric is all by itself.”

The underdog-tale “Southpaw,” written with longtime co-writer Westin Davis, takes it name from a boxing term. On the gentle title track, Moore trades untamed roads for mama’s kitchen table, soaking in hard-earned words of advice on finding success in life and love.

The album’s heaviest emotional punch is paired with a Bob Dylan-esque melody on “Payin’ Hard” as he comes clean about the regrets that come with making a life as a music man—including the pain of losing his father in 2011, just months before Moore would release his debut album Up All Night, which went on to earn Moore his first successes as a Platinum album.

“It was very difficult to write and the hardest thing I’ve ever had to sing. That was the only time I’ve ever broken down in the studio, while trying to sing that vocal. For a couple hours, I couldn’t get through it. I kept having to gather myself and start over. It’s as personal as I can get.”

Normally, Moore would have spent the weeks leading up to the release of Wild World in a flurry of media appearances. In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, he’s been secluded at a rock climbing facility in Red River Gorge, Kentucky, an hour outside of Lexington.

“I’ve always kind of done things in isolation. I travel the world by myself. This is nothing new for me,” he says.

Moore built the lodge there, dubbed “BedRock,” nearly two years ago alongside his friend Jeremy Salyers.

“It holds about 28 people, and it was booked up for the next three months, to capacity. We had to cancel all those, but it’s a special place—lots of hikers, there’s waterfalls everywhere, lots of rock climbing, some of the best in the world. Lot of yoga retreats, a lot of cyclists from all over the world come. It’s a pretty amazing outdoor place to be.”

Despite the pandemic, Moore and his team decided to push forward with the album release.

“I think a lot of it is the tip of the cap to the fan base,” he says. “Now, it might come back to bite me in the ass. Normally, we’re out playing shows and promoting this thing, but I think we just have faith in the fan base being so tangible. And that they’re gonna go and get the record. We might fall flat on our face or it might be a big success.”

Moore has released his In The Wild Sessions, acoustic performances of many of the songs from the project, and today, he releases the documentary 7 Days At The Rock via Outside TV. Moore seems content whatever the outcome—his ultimate goal can’t always be measured in record or streaming sales.

“All I ever hope for when I’m making records is the music brings levity, and it helps people to process maybe some of those old regrets they’ve been suppressing for quite some time—or maybe [ones] they don’t feel vulnerable enough to pick ‘em back up and take another look at it. All I ever hope is whatever those feelings are, whatever you’re bearing, you can face them and try to learn.”

Brad Paisley recently surprised more than 600 nurses at the virtual Vanderbilt 2020 State of Nursing to thank medical staffers helping to fight the COVID-19 pandemic. The address was part of Vanderbilt’s ongoing recognition of National Nurses Week and 2020 being the “Year of Nurse,” which honors the 200th birthday of Florence Nightingale, founder of modern nursing.

In April, numerous artists in Nashville’s music community joined to send “Gratitunes” to Vanderbilt University Medical Center staffers, through messages of encouragement and musical performances. The initiative launched March 30, National Doctors’ Day, with performances from Paisley, Dustin Lynch, Jewel, Lauren Alaina and more.

To date, over 80 artists participated in the campaign reaching over 543,672 engagements. Over 1,300 Gratitunes were dedicated by fans and 5,447 songs added to the Gratitunes Spotify playlist.