Dan Wilson: Awesomeness Fatigue

Jun 10, 2025

This week, the legendary Dan Wilson joins Dadville from "the Minneapolis of California." You surely know Dan from the many, many, many hits he's written for The Chicks, Adele, Chris Stapleton, and dozens of others. Oh yeah, he's also behind one of the biggest hits of the '90s, "Closing Time." We unpack Dan's incredible career, from his time in Trip Shakespeare and Semisonic to his ridiculously long list of songwriting and production credits, and his new instrumental piano album, 'Goodnight, Los Angeles.'

Plus, discover what his 17-year-old jazz bass self would think of it all ("What happened to the bass?") and why parenthood is the ultimate "helpful constraint."

Subscribe and Become a Citizen of Dadville!

Apple / Spotify / Overcast / YouTube

Hey everybody! I've got a new single,"Barbara", that I am really excited to put out. So many fun things about this song. One day I woke up and thought I wanna write a song with a ton of funny references to great songs and put it over a Bill Withers-y funk groove...and BOOM...“Barbara” was born!

I wrote this with Ian Fitchuk (Beyoncé, Leon Bridges, Maggie Rogers, Kacey Musgraves, Joy Olodokun, Chris Stapleton, Stephen Sanchez, Noah Kahan, Pink) and singer/song-writer, Neal Carpenter.

We had the absolute best time writing 'Barbara'. We wrote it at Ian's studio and he had every instrument set up. I was sitting on drums, Neal on guitar, and Ian on keys and literally jamming this song into existence. I think every line that we laughed at we kept. It was one of my favorite songwriting days ever.

On the recording, my dear friend Dustin Ransom (Chely Wright, Matt Wertz, Jon McLaughlin, Brett Eldredge, Ryan Bingham, Richard Marx, Jars of Clay, Matt Maher, Andrew Belle, Ben Rector) played literally everything you hear other than my singing. It was so fun recording it and I hope you all have fun listening to it.

There’s something about how simple the chord progression and chorus melody is that always drew me in. It’s just one of those songs that’s not just fun and easy to sing, but I think is really fun and easy to listen to also!” -Dave