Thompson Square Say Baby Cooper Has Heavy Influence on New Music
Thompson Square’s 4-month-old baby boy Cooper doesn’t get to choose the final songs that make the married duo’s next album, but he might as well. Keifer and Shawna Thompson happily admit that becoming parents has changed everything, including how they approach songwriting and song selection.
A massive influx of emotion and a totally new life perspective are at the root of it, Keifer Thompson tells Taste of Country. More than anything the baby boy — and star of their new music video — is showing them what’s truly important.
“What Cooper did for us is he relieved us of worrying about things that we shouldn’t have ever been worried about,” Keifer says as Shawna nods in agreement. “We put so much pressure on ourselves to be the best … and we don’t really take time to enjoy where we’re at and what we’ve done.”
Suddenly hits like “If I Didn’t Have You” mean something different. So does “You Make It Look So Good.” The single has barely been out a few weeks, but they first heard it one year ago and put it on hold. Lyrically, it tied a lot of personal things together.
“When I was 18, I was like, ‘I never wanna get married, I never wanna have a kid.’ I met Shawna and I was like, ‘She makes it look good,’”Keifer says.
“Fast forward all these years of being married, we have this kid now, he makes being a dad look so good. It’s just a completely different thing.”
Thompson Square admit they didn’t want to have kids. In fact, they were dead set against it until Keifer started to get the itch. Their manager’s assistant brought her baby to an event, and he asked to hold the child and didn’t flinch after getting a dousing of spit up.
“It was really cute actually,” Shawna says. “I was witnessing this, I was like, ‘He wants to hold a baby?’”
A second child isn’t likely, but T2 aren’t totally ruling out becoming T4. They’re having a ton of fun with their baby boy. He’s part of the music video, and part of an adorable, Mission Impossible-style short video promoting the song. On how much is too much, they say they’re super proud of the boy, and want to show him off. “I don’t feel it’s an exploitation thing at all. It’s just, he’s part of the group. He’s T3,” Keifer says.
Nathan Chapman produced “You Make It Look So Good,” urging the couple to record vocals together live for the first time in their career. The result is a more organic sound that represents an album full of songs their fans have come to count on. Once again Thompson Square are leaning into being country’s most popular married duo. It’s a badge of honor, they say.
Look for Thompson Square at the 2016 CMA Music Festival. They'll play the Chevrolet Riverfront Stage on June 10 at 2:30PM.
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