{"id":2073131,"date":"2025-10-06T20:27:04","date_gmt":"2025-10-06T20:27:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/?p=2073131"},"modified":"2025-10-06T20:27:04","modified_gmt":"2025-10-06T20:27:04","slug":"meet-rianne-downey-scotlands-boldest-new-voice-in-country-music","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/meet-rianne-downey-scotlands-boldest-new-voice-in-country-music\/","title":{"rendered":"Meet Rianne Downey, Scotland&#8217;s boldest new voice in country music"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><\/p>\n<div>\n<p>There\u2019s every chance you may have seen <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/riannedowney\/?hl=en\">Rianne Downey <\/a>but not, as it happens, heard her actual music. That\u2019s what tends to happen when you cover The Beautiful South online and the videos are discovered by Paul Heaton, who happens to be in need of a co-singer after his frequent collaborator Jacqui Abbott decided to knock touring on the head. Those dates across last year and this summer saw the 26-year-old prove that she has one hell of a voice to be reckoned with.<\/p>\n<p>But it\u2019s on Downey\u2019s debut album,<em> The Consequence of Love<\/em>, where her voice really shines. After over a decade busking and posting covers on YouTube, it\u2019s the first chance for Downey to truly prove what she\u2019s all about.  Recorded in Seattle with Ryan Hadlock, the album shows off the Scottish rising star\u2019s love of country, while the stories focus on love, loss (both romantic and familial) and on the soaring title track \u2013 the importance of putting herself first. <\/p>\n<aside class=\"rs-related-articles\">\n<h4 class=\"rs-related-articles__title\">Read next<\/h4>\n<\/aside>\n<p>\u201cThe most important relationship is the relationship with myself because I am my own worst enemy sometimes and I definitely have been in the past. I\u2019m not gonna get life in the way of my dream anymore,\u201d she defiantly explains.<\/p>\n<p>Give the album and a single listen and you\u2019ll soon realise that Rianne\u2019s dream and its potential in seemingly limitless. <\/p>\n<p>Read the interview and listen to her music via our Play Next playlist on Spotify below.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-spotify wp-block-embed-spotify wp-embed-aspect-21-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\">\n<p>\n<iframe title=\"Spotify Embed: Play Next\" style=\"border-radius: 12px\" width=\"100%\" height=\"352\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"\" allow=\"autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; fullscreen; picture-in-picture\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/open.spotify.com\/embed\/playlist\/7KIfh4Hyu2kN502knuL3Ud?si=QNk0bQpdTyOgsrHAg2HzLA&amp;pi=a9CrJxcnROiov&amp;utm_source=oembed\"><\/iframe>\n<\/p>\n<\/figure>\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">We\u2019re speaking weeks before the album drops. Excited?<\/h2>\n<p>I\u2019m dead excited but I\u2019m nervous as well. It\u2019s that feeling of when you were younger and it was Christmas Eve and you\u2019re buzzing for Santa to come. It\u2019s how I feel now, giddy but nervous because you never really know what\u2019s going to happen. It\u2019s a really special time. <\/p>\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">What does the record say about you as an artist? <\/h2>\n<p>I think encapsulates me and my journey. The album is rooted  in country and folk, but has these sort of classic Celtic touches which feel unorthodox. It\u2019s quite a unique and quirky and almost wonky album in a way and there is a sort of beauty to the wonkiness and I think that sort of really encapsulates me and my journey, as a person and as a musician, I\u2019ve had quite quite a unique journey.<\/p>\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Go on\u2026<\/h2>\n<p>Well, I  started off busking when I was 15 and then playing the pubs and my career started during lockdown when I was posting covers, but I went through a phase where I lost everything. I lost my job, my partner, my grandad and my mental health took a nosedive and it was rock bottom where I started to find myself and my career sort of grew through covers online and then it was through that I got the job with Paul Heaton.  I\u2019ve had immense highs so early in my career but I\u2019m still building as a solo artist as well and I\u2019m quite a messy person. Everything\u2019s kind of chaotic, but then there\u2019s order to that chaos as well, and the album reflects that.<\/p>\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">So was it a case of embracing the chaos to be true to yourself?<\/h2>\n<p>Absolutely, I really like that idea of embracing it. It\u2019s incredibly important to be as authentic to yourself as possible and it definitely took me a while to realise that. I\u2019m definitely a people pleaser and I was raised as a Catholic so that comes with the territory. <\/p>\n<p>And that was true with music too, for a while I was trying to put myself in the route I thought you had to do to be big in the UK. That\u2019s what people want from me and that\u2019s what I should be doing. But I could never escape my folk side and I eventually realised that being true to yourself creates that happiness and contentment and the success that you\u2019re you\u2019re searching for.  <\/p>\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">And this sound that you *did* land on. Was this your first musical love? <\/h2>\n<p>I think it\u2019s always been sort of in me in some way. I don\u2019t come from a musical family, but there was always music on in the house, so I grew up on a steady diet of my mum and dad\u2019s music tastes and my gran and papa\u2019s music tastes. I think a massive thing for me when I grew up was storytelling. I loved music that told a story that\u2019s just something that was more deep rooted within country and folk music.  I think being Scottish and that Celtic sense has that as well, it\u2019s ingrained into you. I\u2019d like the melodies of people like Patsy Cline as well, which just made me feel things  that I\u2019d never really felt before, it just woke something in me and I think that\u2019s always been there, but as you grow up, obviously you find your own sort of music. My parents were into indie and Britpop as well, and I did want to incorporate  the melody lines and the sort of instrumentation from things like that. It\u2019s a culmination of everything I love, really.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-4-3 wp-has-aspect-ratio\">\n<div class=\"jeg_video_container jeg_video_content\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Rianne Downey - Good in Goodbye | Official Video\" width=\"500\" height=\"375\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/qB8V7CmqEDo?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">And you got the proper country experience recording in the US, right? <\/h2>\n<p>Yeah I recorded with my producer Ryan Hadlock at a studio in Seattle called Bear Creek and it has that name because, well,  there\u2019s bears and there\u2019s a creek surrounding it. It was amazing, I didn\u2019t see a black bear but I did hear one at night one time when I was out in the garden and I was terrified.<\/p>\n<p>It made the full thing feel like dead enchanted. I felt so at one with myself and it was a nice way to shut out the world. Being in that setting where you\u2019re just in the trees, in a barn in the middle of nowhere, it\u2019s just completely about the music and myself really.<\/p>\n<p>Ryan was amazing for production as well. There\u2019s a song on there called \u2018Lost in Blue\u2019 which was maybe more acoustic and he turned that into this dreamy  Fleetwood Mac style song. What was lovely too is that he could sense what I needed without me having to articulate it and I think that\u2019s the beautiful thing about having the right producer. If you can just feel what each other are thinking then it\u2019s the perfect match. <\/p>\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">We know you\u2019ve performed with Paul Heaton at a string of his gigs. What\u2019s he taught you about music?   <\/h2>\n<p>It\u2019s strange because I\u2019m sort of learning as I\u2019m watching and listening to him, so it\u2019s never like we sat down and he\u2019s said \u2018this is what you need to do\u2019. I\u2019ve just learned  in the most natural way possible and almost like in a very simple way because that\u2019s who Paul is.<\/p>\n<p>There\u2019s no airs or graces and he\u2019s very down to earth and, he does things in his own way.  I think just being around him and watching him be such a lovely person and a good soul and the way that he treats people really brushed off. He knows it\u2019s all about the music and the importance that it doesn\u2019t get compromised, but it\u2019s nice to just see someone doing that while being such a kind person, a gem of a person, but still having that strong will. It definitely helped with my album and allowed me to realise that this is about me and what I do. Everyone\u2019s listening to the album because of me, everyone\u2019s coming to the gigs because of me,  so you have to sort of stay true to that.<\/p>\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">While also not, as you mentioned earlier, being a people pleaser? <\/h2>\n<p>Yes! I\u2019ve realised now that it\u2019s a bit like what RuPaul says: \u2018If you can\u2019t love yourself, how can you love anybody else?\u2019 <\/p>\n<p>This is my journey and I won\u2019t be able to complete the journey unless I prioritise myself and I\u2019ve sacrificed a lot to get here and I think  I\u2019m starting to realise that looking after yourself isn\u2019t a selfish thing. It\u2019s an amazing thing, this opportunity I\u2019ve got. There\u2019s a song on the album called \u2018Consequence of Love\u2019 and it explores all the different relationships that I\u2019ve had and the most important one in my life  is the relationship with myself because I am my own worst enemy sometimes and I definitely have been in the past. I\u2019m not gonna get life in the way of my dream anymore. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><script async src=\"\/\/www.instagram.com\/embed.js\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p><em> \u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n<p><em> \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.rollingstone.co.uk \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>There\u2019s every chance you may have seen Rianne Downey but not, as it happens, heard her actual music. That\u2019s what tends to happen when you cover The Beautiful South online and the videos are discovered by Paul Heaton, who happens to be in need of a co-singer after his frequent collaborator Jacqui Abbott decided to [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2073132,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25179],"tags":[388742],"class_list":["post-2073131","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-music","tag-play-next"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/Meet-Rianne-Downey-Scotlands-boldest-new-voice-in-country-music.jpeg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2073131","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2073131"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2073131\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2073133,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2073131\/revisions\/2073133"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2073132"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2073131"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2073131"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2073131"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}