Whenever Emily Nenni is onstage, she welcomes everybody to the dancefloor. The California-born, Nashville-based singer-songwriter wants the honkytonk to be a place of escape, where fans can shed their troubles for a few hours and feel safe and free. “You can have trouble whenever you mix late hours and alcohol,” she says. “I’ve been in bad situations before, and I’ve tried to learn from those experiences. But it’s heartbreaking that some people don’t feel safe or don’t feel like they’re allowed to exist in this world. So I’m always watching the dancefloor and making sure everybody’s being respectful.” Or, as she sings on the supremely funky title track to her new album Movin’ Shoes, “Here’s where you dress for you and dance the way that you want to.”

Movin’ Shoes is an album about how we treat each other and how we treat ourselves—whether we’re at the honkytonk or not—and Nenni writes and sings like someone who has seen enough shit go down that she’s not going to allow any more, at least not on her watch. “When I was writing these songs, I was thinking about just how hard it is to live in this world,” she says. “How are we leaving our mark in this world? How are we interacting with other people and with ourselves, too? Pain is part of the human experience. The world is so scary, but there’s so much beauty to it. And so much of that beauty comes from how we treat each other and ourselves. That's the album's entire message.”

These are lessons she’s learned from some of her favorite artists, from Aretha Franklin to Stevie Wonder, and her new songs reflect these influences that extend beyond the honkytonk. “This isn’t strictly honkytonk like my former records, even though it’s still all the same influences,” Nenni explains. “I’m just drawing from more artists and genres than I have in the past.” Confident in its touchstones and compassionate in its insights, Movin’ Shoes eloquently and wryly blends southern soul from Memphis and Muscle Shoals with southern rock from Macon and outlaw country from Austin. These songs percolate with new sounds, like the bluesy Rhodes organ that kicks off the title track and the Lone Star harmonica that weaves throughout her bluesy cover of Paul Simon’s “Tenderness.” 

She cites Sly Stone and Linda Ronstadt’s Motown covers as specific influences, but the old styles sound fresh and current because her personality and charisma come through in every note. Especially on some of the darker tunes, Nenni found strength in her heroes. With its piercing blasts of Stax horns and weeping pedal steel, “What Have I Done Wrong” pleads for empathy and patience: “Please believe I’m trying,” she sings. “I’m faulty by design.” In addition to some of her most incisive lyrics, the song also features one of her most powerful, soulful vocal performances. “I wasn’t trying to sing like Aretha—who could possibly do that?!—but I was thinking of her and her power and her confidence. I’ve heard so many songs that have lifted me out of something and made me feel like I’m not alone.”

Drawing from a lifetime of experiences, Nenni wrote these songs in isolation, usually during lonely winter months. Alone with her thoughts, she found perspective devising lyrics and melodies. “That’s when all those dark things come to the surface, but I can put it all down on paper. I process life by writing songs.” On the rambling, rousing “Livin’ in Shame,” with its crackling guitar licks, she examines her own relationship with her body. Nenni notes that the song shares a title with a 1969 hit by the Supremes, but she tweaks the phrase to show how unkind we can be to ourselves. “We are so hard on our bodies. Back in middle school I wore a back brace. It was particularly challenging at that age as our bodies are changing, and it largely changed the relationship I had with my body and confidence. It’s such an insecure time for anyone, again, not just women. I still struggle with how I speak to myself and my body as a result of my experience and I see so many others struggling with the same. We should all be nicer to ourselves, but of course, that’s easier said than done.” 

To record these songs, Nenni drove down I-40 from Nashville to Memphis, where she worked with producer John James Tourville (the Deslondes) and Matt Ross-Spang. They worked together on 2024’s Drive & Cry, but the setting—Ross-Spang’s new Southern Grooves studio—was different. “Matt’s place is incredible. He put so much time and care into it, and the building it’s in—Crosstown Concourse—is a wonderful community based around art and education and food and culture. It’s a special spot.” Recording in the home of the blues—and the home of soul and the home of rock & roll—Nenni let some of those local influences seep into the music, especially the Stax fanfares on “Talk to Me” and “Yes It Hurt.” “Initially we weren’t going to do horns, but John James gently brought up how horns could make a few songs really pop. That’s always the fun part about recording: You walk in with a song you think is going to sound one way, but it turns into something different because the musicians come from different places and have different interests.” 

One of the most important crew members at Southern Grooves was Edna herself, who provided comfort during the writing as well as the recording process. “She loved laying outside the echo chamber,” Nenni says with a laugh Edna is also the subject of “Home with My Dog,” a catchy ode to staying in rather than going out. “When I was in my early twenties, I was always going out to see live music, hanging out, popping up onstage. Now that I’m older and on the road more, I just want to stay home with Edna. She doesn’t do that thing where she’s looking past you to see if there’s someone else she needs to meet.” 

Making Movin’ Shoes was a process of discovery for Nenni. Musically she found all new ways to combine the disparate artists she loves so much, and lyrically she found all new ways to relate to herself and to others. “We should at all times acknowledge and accept the fact that we’re imperfect people,” she explains. “We all make mistakes and we should all rethink the way we go about things. I am flawed. Everyone around me is flawed. But that’s not a bad thing. It just means we’re all human. This album is about making mistakes and learning from them. I’m always trying to put that into my songs.”