Gloriana Return to Roots as a Trio After Cheyenne Kimball’s Departure

It's only been a few weeks since Gloriana's Cheyenne Kimball announced that she exited the group, which now consists of founding members Rachel Reinert and brothers, Tom and Mike Gossin. The news not only came as a shock to their fans, but to the band, as well.

"We were out on the road, and we didn’t notice anything out of the normal going on with her," Tom Gossin tells Taste of Country. "Like I said in our press statement … Bands are like families or like relationships. There are tough days, and we’re under a lot of pressure out here. We travel constantly. This has been four years of pretty serious grind. They do say the business isn’t for everybody. I think a lot of artists when they finally get into it and they realize what it’s going to take and how long of a commitment it is, especially people who get into it when they’re young, I think as they grow up, sometimes they realize, ‘Oh man, what did I get myself into? What did I sign up for?’ And even though they might love it, they’re missing out on the other parts of life."

"For me, and I know for Mike and Rachel, this has always been such a dream of ours," Gossin continues. "It’s been such a long struggle to get here. I wake up every day and thank God that I get to do this. It’s all I ever really wanted, and here I am. I wake up every day and say, ‘I can’t believe this is my life! This actually worked! This is awesome!’ All of the time I put into making music and writing songs and playing countless, countless gigs to try and ‘make it’ … now, here we are. I’m in the bus touring right now. I can’t really speculate [Cheyenne's] exact reasons for everything because she hasn’t really spoken to us since. I don’t know if it was just too hard for her to talk about it or she didn’t want to have the confrontation or whatever it was. I’m assuming because she’s been in the business since she was a kid and because she tweeted about being engaged like two days later, I think she’s chosen to settle down instead of continue on this path, which like I said, is a 24/7 thing. Unless you really love it and it’s really 100 percent of what you want to be doing every day, I see how that would be tough."

But Gloriana fans can rest assured that this is not the end of the band by any means. "The funny thing is, we started off as a trio," says Gossin. "Not a lot of people know this, but when Mike and I moved to Nashville, Rachel was one of the first people we met. We kind of stalked her out. We saw her MySpace page, and we were like, ‘Man, this girl’s got a great voice … I wonder if she would be into doing a group thing.’ We started playing the bars in Nashville for the whole beginning of Gloriana. It was just the three of us. We used to call ourselves the Midnight Three, which is like a horrible, horrible name [laughs]. It was all we could think of at the time. Now that we’re back to being three, it’s been really great. We’re back to our roots. I feel like we’ve got a whole new direction, and we got that kind of fire back that you have when you’re a new band. It’s all been positive. I mean, you try to do your best when something negative happens and turn it into a positive situation. I just think because of our passion and because of our commitment and because of our love for what we do, that there’s no other option for us but to move forward."

Gossin and his bandmates did, however, need to make a few adjustments because of the gap Kimball left upon leaving the band. "I think there were two songs we had to swap out in the set list for the live show," notes Gossin. "Then on the new album, Cheyenne had only written one song, so we recorded extra, as most bands do when they make an album, so we’re actually going to go back into the studio in about two weeks, and we’re just going to kind of clean up the record. Creatively it’s a little speed bump, but we’re going to be totally fine."

Gloriana's current Top 40 single, 'Wanna Take You Home,' is a tune Gossin co-wrote with their producer, Matt Serletic, and hit songwriter Wendell Mobley. The tune was the first song penned for the band's forthcoming sophomore album on Warner Music Nashville. "This [song] was like my very first thought about the new album," notes Gossin. "I really enjoy it. It’s fun to play live. The video is steamy. We wanted a really fresh take on it, and we’re just so stoked with how it came out. We had a blast filming it."

Gossin does admit that he blushes when he receives comments about the sexy scenes he stars in with his love interest in the vid. "It’s embarrassing when my relatives call me," he says. "They’re like, ‘I saw your new music video … that was kind of fresh. What are you doing with that girl on that pool table?’ [laughs]"

Gloriana's new album is slated for a fall release date with everything still "on track," according to the band. "People leave and join bands all the time throughout history," says Gossin. "That’s a regular thing that happens, but the core is still here, and the music is still going to move on."

Watch the Gloriana 'Wanna Take You Home' Video