Phillip Phillips Is Older, Wiser + Sadder 14 Years After Idol

Phillip Phillips may be the most underrated American Idol winner.

Until very recently, he was the last winner to notch an actual hit song. The Season 11 champion is now thriving as an independent artist, and he’s not relying on his catalog.

A new EP called Let’s Go Far Vol. 1 finds him staying true to who he is today, as a 35-year-old married man with two young children and a lot of doubts about how to approach a constantly changing music industry.

That’s all to say the five songs are authentic. In 2026, authenticity is gold.

• Phillip Phillips won American Idol Season 11 in 2012.
• His first two singles, “Home” and “Gone, Gone, Gone,” reached No. 1 on a Billboard chart, something no Idol winner to follow would do until Chayce Beckham a decade later.
• He and his wife have a son named Patch (b. 2019) and a daughter named Isla (b. 2025).

It’s been a second since he released new music, however, and there are reasons for it.

Now independent, Phillips tells Taste of Country he’s enjoying having time to create and release music for the right reasons, while understanding the financial risks and rewards more clearly.

He also struggled with self-doubt and similar mental health issues. His fans are better for it.

Not only did Phillips write several great new songs about his experiences, but he’s shown willingness to expand on what’s bothered him. This interview was shortened for clarity. Listen to the unedited conversation via the Taste of Country Nights On Demand podcast.

Evan Paul: Give me a secret from American Idol that you are surprised that no one has ever exposed or talked about.

Phillips: I never realized — because I never really watched the show, you know, when I went out for it — but people had tried out for years and it gets, it’s very serious for them.

And then the people that make it through, you start realizing that some of these people were scouted. And so they were all like, they were guaranteed they were going to make it to a certain level. I was like, “What?”

My mind was blown on that. I was like, “So you didn’t even try?” They’re like, no, no, they just saw me singing at a place and they said they’re going to get me in. And that was not the case for me.

But it’s very Hunger Games. People are, they want to win it. And I didn’t care. I didn’t care about winning. I just did it because my parents said, here’s some gas money. We think you could do it.

Give me the story behind “Homesick.”

My son was having his quiet time and so I had like an hour, and I went into the living room and that’s when I would have my own quiet time of trying to write music.

So I started working on this idea and it happened really quick, and I wrote the verse and the chorus. And then, and by that time it was time for him. He said, “Can I get up?” I was like, “Yeah, you can get up, dude. Sorry.”

That song’s just about missing the people you love and while also trying to do something I love as well, that I’ve fell in love with when I was 14.

It’s kind of that push and pull type thing of, I love music, but I really love my kids and I love my wife. So being gone for sometimes a couple of weeks, two or three weeks at a time, can be pretty rough. But you have to do something. You want to show your kids that you want to do something you love, and sometimes that takes sacrifice.

I also want to talk about the song “Boys & Dads.” I’ve got a little boy like you. He’s three. Was this song easy to write and record? 

Oh man, that song, … It’s very sad, but in a beautiful type way because you want to see your kid grow up, and it’s our job as a dad and as a parent to make them not need you as much as they get older, which sucks.

And so it’s like people are telling me all these things. It’s like, all right, just shut up. Don’t tell me those things. Let me enjoy the moment while he still holds my hand while we go to the grocery store.

He gets really excited and squeezes my neck when I get home from a trip or whatever. And so that song, it even it touches in on my own personal issues, personal things with my dad.

I let my son hear it and he likes it, too. And he just kind of smiles. I think he’s really good at feeling the song, if it’s emotional or not. So he’ll just kind of smile at me and kind of hold my hand for a second or whatever it is. And so yeah, I love that one.

Phillip Phillips – Let’s Go Far: Vol. 1 – EP

Do you hate hearing “You’re Gonna Miss This” [from Trace Adkins] because you just want to be able to miss it?

Give me a minute. I know, right? Yeah.

My wife and I are heavy in our emotions now because we have a little girl too now. She’s just a year old and it’s like, man, everything’s just moving fast.

One of the tracks is “My Dark Places.” What inspired that?

As musicians, we’re always in our head. We talk about — I don’t want to say we — but I feel like there’s quite a few of us that are like, we don’t like people to say things or you don’t have to say that we’re good or something, but inside you want to be told that, oh, that was really nice or really good.

Sure.

But you fight with your own demons of like, am I good enough to be doing this, making music? Am I good enough as a father or a husband or son or friend or brother? And so that song just kind of touches on all of that. It’s like, am I good enough?

I do love that song, but it kind of doesn’t feel very dark as far as music goes. It has this more of an upbeat-ish kind of tempo to it. And I always think that’s an interesting thing to do with music.

Is it hard for you to write songs that deep like that?

No, it’s easier to write. So it’s hard for me to write happy songs. I’m like a sad individual in my head. And so it’s always easy to write the sadder stuff, but the happier songs I always need help with.

How dark would you say it got to inspire that song?

So my wife’s a therapist. She and I’ll have these deep discussions of each other, of like what we’re going through at the time, you know, what she goes through at her job, what I go through.

And, you know, especially I’ve been doing this now for what, since 2012, however long that’s been. Is that 14 years? Whatever. I don’t know. And, you know, a long time, you know, and then you see the music industry’s changing and then maybe I’m not selling tickets or anything like I used to, or for a certain show, or maybe streams aren’t as good as this person.

And maybe I’m like, I wrote a — all these songs came pretty quick and several other ones that are going to come out. But then I’m like, oh man, I’m on a roll right now. I’m really feeling good about writing music.

And then all of a sudden, a week goes by, two weeks go by, three weeks goes by and you can’t finish a song. You’re like, what the heck am I? Am I even good? I just need to stop. I’m not good enough. Or you might have a moment with being a dad to where you’re like, oh, I didn’t handle that situation the best I could.

Get in your head of like, I’m just a piece of crap or whatever. And the struggles that we all go through as individuals. So yeah, it’s a constant everyday thing that you always try to find the good in each day.

And being from Leesburg, Ga., whose face was always around town growing up, like on signs and stuff?

Yeah, it was Luke (Bryan). Yeah, Luke was the star child.

And do you get any love now?

I think I’m loved for sure, because I still live there basically. So I think everyone likes me better. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, but yeah, we have our names on the sign for the city and …

I think Luke’s number one, unfortunately. And then it’s like Buster Posey, who’s a good friend of mine. And then it’s like me or whatever. But I’ll take it.

Those guys are incredibly talented in what they do. And I’m just, I’m trying to get there. Maybe I’ll be the first on— maybe I’ll get above him on the sign one day. We’ll see.