Phil Vassar is back with a personal fifth album

By John Benson

Vassar performs Saturday at the Cuyahoga Jam at the county’s fairgrounds.

When looking for a reason why it took country singer Phil Vassar nearly four years to release the follow-up to his 2004 album “Shaken Not Stirred,” the Lynchburg, Va., native admits life simply got in the way of his music.

While a label change is the easy answer, the 44-year-old artist acknowledges a tough personal period that ended up in a divorce was a huge reason. However, Vassar is back with new album “Prayer of a Common Man,” which includes hit singles “This Is My Life” and “Love Is a Beautiful Thing.”

Considering Vassar was already known for crafting everyman tales, such as No. 1 hits “Just Another Day in Paradise” and “In a Real Love,” you better believe this country singer found a wealth of material in his own life.

“Absolutely, whenever you have that kind of stuff to write about, it’s huge,” said Vassar, calling from Buffalo, N.Y. “It’s huge in the process, and it makes for a real, a true record. Like the title track ‘Prayer of a Common Man,’ I went back home and wrote that record basically about my dad and me growing up as a son of a factory worker. A lot of people are having a rough time, and it’s just pretty poignant.

“Then there’s current single ‘I Would,’ which I wrote when I was in [Las] Vegas last year. It was my first holiday really being divorced and it was kind of an odd time. So I went up to my hotel room, where there was a piano, and I wrote that tune.”

Wait. You were in Las Vegas and your hotel room had a piano?

“It was a nice hotel,” Vassar laughed. “It was one of those places where they asked me if I wanted a pool table or piano in my room. So I took the piano and one of my buddies took the pool table. We had the party in his room, and I just wrote songs in my room.”

Proving Vassar is a gambling man, the 1999 ASCAP Country Songwriter of the Year scored major hits writing songs for other artists — Jo Dee Messina’s “Bye, Bye” and “I’m Alright,” Tim McGraw’s “For a Little While” and “My Next Thirty Years” and Alan Jackson’s “Right on the Money” — before deciding to parlay his success into musical stardom of his own. Eight years later, the singer-songwriter-pianist has released five studio albums.

In looking back over his career, Vassar, who is scheduled to appear at County Jam on Saturday at the Cuyahoga County Fairgrounds, feels as though there’s been a tangible evolution of not only his live performance talents but also his studio efforts. However, for this artist it all comes down to — nothing more, nothing less — being a singer-songwriter.

“I’ve always hated labels,” Vassar said. “I’m just a singer and songwriter. While I think you evolve as a person, and your writing has to evolve too, you have to have enough guts to write about what you’re feeling and not candy coat it. You just have to say it.

“So hopefully I’m on the right track. At least that’s what I’m thinking. I’m starting to get it right, or at least that’s what I’m hoping, but I feel really good about where it’s going. I really do.”