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Speaker 1: I Welcome to episode eight seven Bobby Cast. Thanks to

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Speaker 1: Express Prose for sponsoring this. Our guest is Marcus Hammond.

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Speaker 1: Who your songwriter? You are artist, author, a playwright, Like

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Speaker 1: a lot of things confused until I started digging, I

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Speaker 1: was like, wow, because what I had known you for

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Speaker 1: and we're just kind of broad stroke. This at the

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Speaker 1: beginning was like blessed the Broken Road, working with the

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Speaker 1: Dixie Chicks, and I think that's probably what most people know,

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Speaker 1: most people for their biggest, humongous But then once I

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Speaker 1: started go, wow, this dude wrote plays. Yeah, yeah, I

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Speaker 1: did a bunch of that for about the last ten

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Speaker 1: twelve years. And it is funny because sometimes, uh, I

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Speaker 1: find you know, it's sort of scary as you get

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Speaker 1: older in the business and in instead of people saying like, hey,

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Speaker 1: have you written something great? You know, have you written

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Speaker 1: a new song that you're really are you working with

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Speaker 1: anybody you really love? They go, hey, do you have

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Speaker 1: any new plays? And I'm believe it or not in Nashville,

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Speaker 1: that's not good news. But yeah, I started. I did

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Speaker 1: start writing after after doing records. I did a couple

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Speaker 1: of records, you know, I did a record on Columbia

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Speaker 1: and then I did a rock record out of London.

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Speaker 1: So when you say records, like you actually pursued a

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Speaker 1: deal like and not a deal, you actually had a

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Speaker 1: deal like you're gonna be an artist. No, I mean

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Speaker 1: the only reason I was here was that I didn't

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Speaker 1: come here to write songs for anybody, and um I

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Speaker 1: wanted to. I had, you know, I had like five

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Speaker 1: record deals signed, you know, five what they used to

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Speaker 1: call development deals. And in the in the back in

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Speaker 1: the day, as they say, in the late eighties and

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Speaker 1: into the nineties, of course, the whole industry was different,

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Speaker 1: was much larger. The wave of the nineties was you know,

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Speaker 1: there was like it was as you know, I'm as huge.

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Speaker 1: I mean, you know at one time they like twenty

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Speaker 1: seven labels in town. So you come to town to

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Speaker 1: be an artist? Yeah, and from well I was. I

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Speaker 1: was born in d C. My dad, uh was a

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Speaker 1: foreign service He was in the Foreign Service. He worked

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Speaker 1: for called Agency for International Development, so it was the

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Speaker 1: economic development side of the US government, on the Embassy

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Speaker 1: State Department rather and so we you know, I had

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Speaker 1: a crazy upbring. I was. We lived in Tanzania when

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Speaker 1: I was a little moved to Nigeria when I was

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Speaker 1: eleven and twelve. We were in the Philippines right when

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Speaker 1: the marquess Is came into power and Ferdinand Marcus came

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Speaker 1: into power in seventy two or three. Anyway, we're there

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Speaker 1: three years and then we went During the Carter administration,

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Speaker 1: my dad switched from man i d. He was a

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Speaker 1: political appointment and he headed up the Joint Economic Commission

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Speaker 1: between the U S and Saudi Arabia. So we went

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Speaker 1: to live in the most sort of conservative and by

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Speaker 1: that I mean Islamics conservative part the capital of Saudi Arabia,

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Speaker 1: Riad And I was sixteen, I was sixteen and then

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Speaker 1: uh I. In fact, my oldest sister have three sisters.

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Speaker 1: My oldest sister went on to Colgate University in Upstate,

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Speaker 1: New York, and then they didn't want both of us

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Speaker 1: to go and and I was a tenth grader. And

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Speaker 1: in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, they don't allow expatriot

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Speaker 1: Americans to go to school. They didn't in the seventies. Anyway,

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Speaker 1: they don't allow you to go to school there. What

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Speaker 1: what ex patriot Americans? But well X an ex patriot,

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Speaker 1: but X patriot be somebody from another country living in

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Speaker 1: your country, and in this case Americans. You know, there

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Speaker 1: was of course there were you know, people from everywhere.

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Speaker 1: You know, Saudi Arabia during that time had all this wealth,

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Speaker 1: and you know, they were bringing groups like like j

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Speaker 1: Core to join Economic Commission. My dad had it up

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Speaker 1: where we were bringing in American know how and an

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Speaker 1: education and you know, really helping out with building you know, highways,

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Speaker 1: and the Saudis were you know, trying to use their

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Speaker 1: wealth to to create development. So that was Dad's area.

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Speaker 1: I mean, he'd previously been in what we used to

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Speaker 1: call the third World. Now they don't anymore, they called

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Speaker 1: the developing world. I wonder, as a sixteen year old

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Speaker 1: living in Saudi Arabia, it's gonna be so much different

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Speaker 1: than a sixteen year living in the States where your

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Speaker 1: driver's license and yeah, you couldn't drive. Yeah, there was

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Speaker 1: none of that. Mr. Women couldn't drive. I mean in

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Speaker 1: the seventies, like just recently, just in fact, I believe

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Speaker 1: it was last week. Actually amazingly, the Saudis um finally

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Speaker 1: overturned their law and women can drive. But at that

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Speaker 1: time women could not drive. And I remember there was

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Speaker 1: one woman from the French embassy and she was a

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Speaker 1: really interesting woman and friends with my mom and dad.

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Speaker 1: And she was like, I don't care. You know, I

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Speaker 1: am going to I'm going to drive almost okay whatever.

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Speaker 1: Like I told you before, John, you can say whatever

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Speaker 1: you want. Yeah, I'll probably be a little different than him,

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Speaker 1: but yeah, I know. She So she drove and and

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Speaker 1: and she was you know, uh, she was arrested, picked

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Speaker 1: up and they arrested her even though she was working

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Speaker 1: for the French solutely and they got she was out

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Speaker 1: of the country like twenty four hours. I mean, you know,

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Speaker 1: you don't you do not fool around with stuff like that.

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Speaker 1: That is like bye bye French lady. And I admired her.

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Speaker 1: There's no protection, Like, there's no even though she's there

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Speaker 1: and she's supposedly and France. Well there there's the protection

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Speaker 1: that she didn't end up in jail. You know, they

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Speaker 1: they the embassy was able to get in there and

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Speaker 1: say okay, like diplomatic immunity, yeah, that didn't happen. Well,

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Speaker 1: the only again, like I say, the diplomatic immunity aspect

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Speaker 1: of that is she didn't have to you know, sit

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Speaker 1: in a in a Saudi prison. Well, I I you know,

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Speaker 1: I don't know, this was a lot of years ago,

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Speaker 1: but I remember that I would imagine that's diplomatic privileges.

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Speaker 1: You get to leave and not come back, you know. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: so you're sixteen year old seeing this. Is it normal

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Speaker 1: to you or is it like whoa, this is scary

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Speaker 1: to me? Yeah. No, it's normal in the sense that

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Speaker 1: it's normal, and that I every two years. I remember

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Speaker 1: leaving two or three years, you know, you have a

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Speaker 1: post and then you'd go to another country, you know,

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Speaker 1: And that was just our life until I was seventeen.

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Speaker 1: And actually I didn't stay the full two years in

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Speaker 1: Saudi Um. The first year I tried to take courses

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Speaker 1: at school at home because we didn't want to lose

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Speaker 1: two kids of the four, you know, like jan flew

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Speaker 1: back to America and you know, we didn't have cell

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Speaker 1: phones and back in those days, like you, that's a

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Speaker 1: big separation. She was going to college anyway, but they

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Speaker 1: didn't want a sixteen year old. Like the kind of

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Speaker 1: families that I grew up with a lot more European,

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Speaker 1: and it was not odd at all to send your

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Speaker 1: kid off to boarding school, you know, at an early age.

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Speaker 1: Kind of a Harry Potter World, right, Americans, you know,

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Speaker 1: we don't do that. We don't really do that that much.

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Speaker 1: I mean some do in New England, you know, you

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Speaker 1: have the andover choked grouten kind of schools. But that

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Speaker 1: wasn't I mean, my parents from Midwestern like, they were clannished,

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Speaker 1: they were huggers, they were like love, you know, so

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Speaker 1: all about family. So we finally decided after taking some

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Speaker 1: courses from the Universe. University of Nebraska had these courses.

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Speaker 1: They'd send it to folks who were in these kinds

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Speaker 1: of posts around the world, you know, And I took

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Speaker 1: them and they were just by road kind of memory stuff,

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Speaker 1: and so there was nothing to it. So I had

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Speaker 1: to choose the school. And the next year I went

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Speaker 1: to Italy, and so I did go to boarding school.

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Speaker 1: When I was sixteen turning seventeen, I went to Notre

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Speaker 1: Dame International, which is a private school run by the

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Speaker 1: same folks that run Notre Dame University. And even though

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Speaker 1: when I'm not Catholic, I went to that school. Is

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Speaker 1: a big, beautiful school and it's only ten minutes out

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Speaker 1: of side of downtown Rome and um, and so I

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Speaker 1: spent that you know that that two semesters in it

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Speaker 1: in Italy. Talked me through this then, just run me

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Speaker 1: through all the countries that you remember living in up

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Speaker 1: until you're eighteen years old. So yeah, so it was

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Speaker 1: just it was, you know, the US and then Saudia.

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Speaker 1: Well I think we moved to Tanzania when I was three.

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Speaker 1: Do you remember the U S And at three? I

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Speaker 1: had no memories? At three, No, I don't really remember it.

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Speaker 1: I mean I like to think, you know, because they

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Speaker 1: say it's like a sign of intelligence if you remember

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Speaker 1: things early. So I've tried, you know, you try to

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Speaker 1: dredge it up, like it's like, I bare that's the case,

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Speaker 1: unless there's trauma. Yeah, maybe that's it. At three, you moved.

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Speaker 1: Walk me through it from Yeah. So we lived for

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Speaker 1: a couple of years in Tanzania. Then we came home

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Speaker 1: to the Maryland area of the d C. You know,

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Speaker 1: I always everything Virginia, Maryland. Every says d C. But

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Speaker 1: we're living in Maryland. And then when I was twelve,

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Speaker 1: we left for the Philippines and then we lived but

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Speaker 1: we lived there more than two years, and uh, then

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Speaker 1: we came back for a summer and my dad got

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Speaker 1: this big post, this really exciting post in Saudi because

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Speaker 1: he had to leave the Department State Department. This was

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Speaker 1: all under the auspices of the Department of Treasury, and

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Speaker 1: it was a straight you know, it was a diplomat.

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Speaker 1: I mean, it was a um an appointment, you know,

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Speaker 1: from from President Carter, you know, so it was He's

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Speaker 1: a Democrat and he had worked under primarily Republican administration,

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Speaker 1: so this is kind of a big deal. And of course,

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Speaker 1: you know, at that time, President Carter was all about

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Speaker 1: if you remember Camp David Accords and manach and began

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Speaker 1: an onword sadad, and he was trying to create this

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Speaker 1: kind of you know, reproachment or whatever between in the

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Speaker 1: Middle East. He was trying to bring Middle East peace

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Speaker 1: and our friends then and really now are the Saudis,

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Speaker 1: you know, and so Dad, you know, that was a

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Speaker 1: big job and it was a big chance. But I

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Speaker 1: mean it was a wild place to be because you know,

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Speaker 1: it's it's not fun time. It's not like a party

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Speaker 1: in riads out here. Maybe now man I we you know,

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Speaker 1: we lived in you know, you'd be in your we'd

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Speaker 1: have you know, on a compound with really super high walls.

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Speaker 1: I mean, I remember growing up. You know, some of

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Speaker 1: the places we lived we had guys, you know, we'd

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Speaker 1: have a guy a guard at the gate with a gun,

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Speaker 1: you know, and we always lived in big compounds, you know.

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Speaker 1: But that was this my childhood. I mean, that's just

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Speaker 1: all That's what it was like. So how in the

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Speaker 1: world do you want to be an American music artists

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Speaker 1: and country? That was always fun when I had a deal,

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Speaker 1: Like when I was in Columbia, I'd go to the

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Speaker 1: radio stations and they'd be like and they'd start in

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Speaker 1: about you know, your up your upbringing, and and folks

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Speaker 1: would look at you like like what you know, what

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Speaker 1: the heck are you what? You know? It's as a

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Speaker 1: as a joke, it's I used to say, Yeah, it's

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Speaker 1: you know, sort of the the perfect upbringing for a

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Speaker 1: country artist. You know, Um, it gets worse, you know.

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Speaker 1: I went to school in New England, and originally, like

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Speaker 1: when I started out in school, I wanted to study

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Speaker 1: Arabic and be it like an Islamic Islamic studies major that,

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Speaker 1: you know, And I actually ended up political so I

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Speaker 1: finished college and and it was a political science, you know,

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Speaker 1: with a with an emphasis at Islamic studies, so you

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Speaker 1: don't ever. So I actually got called in by the

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Speaker 1: record company. I was at Sony and the record president

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Speaker 1: called me. And after one of these interviews with I

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Speaker 1: don't know, the Chicago troupe, so there's some big interview

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Speaker 1: and the and the guy had got kind of in

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Speaker 1: depth about things, he started to read my bio you like,

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Speaker 1: really look at it. And I remember the guy and

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Speaker 1: the record president is saying, listen, you know, let's not

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Speaker 1: talk about any of that. Like it's not helping you

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Speaker 1: at radio at all. Like that's not helping you at

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Speaker 1: country radio. That's right, that's not helping you. I think,

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Speaker 1: you know, like when I was on Columbia, I think

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Speaker 1: the entire state of Texas never played a song of mine.

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Speaker 1: And which is funny in a way because actually a

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Speaker 1: family like from Texas like I have, I have kind

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Speaker 1: of a weird connection. I have roots in Texas. But

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Speaker 1: it meant you know, it meant nothing. I mean, I'm

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Speaker 1: sure there were other problems, and why because of one

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Speaker 1: you're upbringing to your education. Why do you think they were,

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Speaker 1: for lack of a better term, black balling you from radio.

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Speaker 1: I think I was. I think it's it's funny now

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Speaker 1: it's ironic now given um what again, these are all

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Speaker 1: relative terms to what people talk about, what's country and

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Speaker 1: what's not. I mean, you know, I got I got

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Speaker 1: to Nashville in eighties six, and I mean this this

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Speaker 1: the discussion we have today about broke county, broke country

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Speaker 1: versus pop country, versus judicial versus what I'm listen, that's

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Speaker 1: been going on NonStop since. I mean, I've seen generations

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Speaker 1: of these ideas people battling and talking about. So it's

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Speaker 1: common that people are fighting about what's country. Yeah, we

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Speaker 1: are more obsessed. I mean, I'm trying to think. The

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Speaker 1: closest thing I've ever seeing to our obsession with what

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Speaker 1: our identity is is like jazz, you know, you like

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Speaker 1: sometimes you talk to jazz guys and that you'll say, oh,

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Speaker 1: you know, I really like Jamie Column or something, and

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Speaker 1: they look at you like you you just spat on

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Speaker 1: their you know, their mom or something. I mean, people

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Speaker 1: get really wired about their identities in different in different genres,

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Speaker 1: but weird, weird in the country. I mean it's kind

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Speaker 1: of charming in a in a in a way, we're

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Speaker 1: just obsessed with it. You know, people are always people

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Speaker 1: talk about it all the time. It's funny to bring

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Speaker 1: up the jazz comparison too, because for me and I'm

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Speaker 1: not a huge fan of dance music, but dance, trance, house,

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Speaker 1: dark trance, they do the same thing in their world.

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Speaker 1: They fight about and it's a very small difference between

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Speaker 1: one and the other. But to them it's the world,

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Speaker 1: at least to those who have an opinion or those

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Speaker 1: who want to have a big boys, it's like here,

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Speaker 1: if I have to hear what's country and what isn't again,

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Speaker 1: people fight me about it. Well, and I got this

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Speaker 1: thing too. I got a bound to pick because I

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Speaker 1: live in kind of multiple camp you know. I mean,

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Speaker 1: I like, I'm a guitar player, and I played on

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Speaker 1: records on my stuff. I'm a piano player. I'm really

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Speaker 1: a roots based guy, and I played banjo. I love

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Speaker 1: to play banjo. I love mandolin. Um, I don't do tracks.

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Speaker 1: I don't know how. I wish I did, I don't

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Speaker 1: know how. And so and I'm kind of too old

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Speaker 1: a dog to, you know, to teach a new trick.

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Speaker 1: And I remember being told to your earlier question. I

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Speaker 1: think it was the perception was, well, he's not really

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Speaker 1: country enough, and that's you know, that's kind of the

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Speaker 1: at the end of the day that when I look

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Speaker 1: back and I think, well, you know, I had a

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Speaker 1: number of songs on that record that went on to

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Speaker 1: be one of them went on to the song of

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Speaker 1: the year in country. You're talking about Blessed Broken Road.

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Speaker 1: I mean it was the first piano recording of it. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: this is cut. Yeah, long lost Dream? Let me too?

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Speaker 1: You that? So did you put this out as a single?

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Speaker 1: Where were you when I needed I've been slamming it.

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Speaker 1: I would have been yelling at my own people. I

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Speaker 1: got it, So you cut the song? Now we cut it.

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Speaker 1: I'll tell you. It was just the usual thing. Look,

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Speaker 1: I went in there's a there's a saying in Nashville.

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Speaker 1: Or maybe maybe I made it up. I don't know

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Speaker 1: if if it's good, it's probably something I heard, but

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Speaker 1: it was. You know, you get a record deal when

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Speaker 1: you're when your friends become record presents, and I had,

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Speaker 1: you know, I just kept signing. Record deal was my

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Speaker 1: first record deal was on Mary Tyler Moore Records, And

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Speaker 1: that's correct. And I was two weeks or two weeks

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Speaker 1: away from my first single being released and the company imploded.

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Speaker 1: But you gotta we gotta take a step back. Mary

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Speaker 1: Tyler Moore record like you're gonna make it after all? Right,

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Speaker 1: So there wasn't Mary Tyler Moore Records. Did she own it? Well,

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Speaker 1: her corporation did. And they had great stuf off. I

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Speaker 1: mean they had let me think now, they had Judy

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Speaker 1: Rodman who had been who had been um maybe was

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Speaker 1: the reigning and female vocalists of the year in country.

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Speaker 1: They had Paul Overstreet who subsequently went on, you know,

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Speaker 1: not only be one of the greatest writers in national history,

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Speaker 1: but also had a you know, really uh significant artist's career.

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Speaker 1: They had um gosh, they owned the publishing on Radney

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Speaker 1: Foster and Bill Lloyd's what became the Faster and Louder,

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Speaker 1: that famous record. The the receptionist was Tricia Yearwood. And no,

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Speaker 1: I'm not kidding, and that I remember, you know, she

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Speaker 1: was so great and you know, she was really nice

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Speaker 1: and beautiful. And then somebody said to me this is

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Speaker 1: you know, they said, well, you you know you ought

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Speaker 1: to hear you ought to hear her sing the receptionist,

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Speaker 1: I'm not kidding where you were signed. That's correct, yes,

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Speaker 1: and that's right. And the and I may tell you

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Speaker 1: how I got signed to because I had already you know,

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Speaker 1: I've gotten into town and I had my first single,

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Speaker 1: my first cuts. My first single was a song by

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Speaker 1: Michael Martin Murphy called Pilgrims on the Way and that

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Speaker 1: went to I don't know, it didn't go that high,

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Speaker 1: but it broke the top forty and and partly because

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Speaker 1: of that, and then I got signed. But the way

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Speaker 1: I got signed is the other guy that there was,

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Speaker 1: the guy that was ahead of an r MTM Records

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Speaker 1: MTMS what was called was a guy named Tommy West

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Speaker 1: who produced Bill Crochy who you know that was more

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Speaker 1: like the sound that I had, bad bad was listening

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Speaker 1: bad badly? Roy Brown, Uh, you don't um to read

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Speaker 1: your mind? What a oh my god? Yeah yeah, So

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Speaker 1: I mean like, and that was your sound? You feel

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Speaker 1: like that was more was definitely more my sound. In fact,

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Speaker 1: that was you know the I know that was the

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Speaker 1: rap on me. When I had a country deal was like, man,

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Speaker 1: he sees like a folk rock sort of you know,

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Speaker 1: I don't know, I don't know what they thought, but

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Speaker 1: I get it. I to get it. I get it

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Speaker 1: in a way. But for Tommy, I literally had to

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Speaker 1: stand there I didn't play in a club. I mean

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Speaker 1: I was playing in clubs. But I remember to audition

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Speaker 1: for Tommy West and he he had a room and

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Speaker 1: I just came into his looking room and he sat

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Speaker 1: on a couch and he just said, you know, He's like,

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Speaker 1: go ahead, and I played ten songs. I like, played

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Speaker 1: an album. I just stood there right in front of

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Speaker 1: just played an album. And he's watching you watching because

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Speaker 1: you hear like the people that auditioned for SNL and

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Speaker 1: they're up on stage and there are three people watching

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Speaker 1: and they don't really make a lot of movement. That's

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Speaker 1: what it was like. Yeah, it was poker facing and

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Speaker 1: he just sat there and you know, and I'm not

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Speaker 1: saying it was creepy, because I really admire him, and

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Speaker 1: he was and and look he got he listened to

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Speaker 1: the whole thing. He goes, okay, let's do it. Let's

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Speaker 1: do it. And you know, in a way we started

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Speaker 1: to go And then it just happens that the timing

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Speaker 1: of all this was I got married right about that

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Speaker 1: same time to be cut and and the thing was

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Speaker 1: at the also at the same time that it was

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Speaker 1: so to the end of the run of Pilgrims On

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Speaker 1: the Way. So I remember on my honeymoon the first

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Speaker 1: time and the only time I ever heard Pilgrims on

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Speaker 1: the Way on the radio. We were down at like

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Speaker 1: you know, destoned of course, you know, because we don't

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Speaker 1: have any money, so were like destin and we're out

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Speaker 1: on the beach and the loud speakers and they're playing

364
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Speaker 1: that Pilgrims on the Way, which was a percent or two.

365
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Speaker 1: It was, you know, it was like some weird and

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Speaker 1: I was a piano and it was like the eighties,

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Speaker 1: so I had to have a saxophone on it. I mean,

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Speaker 1: it was really weird song. And when it was like

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Speaker 1: my breakthrough, that was it seemed like I thought then

370
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Speaker 1: I thought, that's it, you know, oh my god, and

371
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Speaker 1: it sounded more like a Hornsby song. And if you

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Speaker 1: listen to it now, if you ever check that out.

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Speaker 1: Um anyway, So that was and I remember right the

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Speaker 1: day I got back from my honeymoon, I went to

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Speaker 1: Mary Tyler Moore, which is where Paul Worley studios now

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Speaker 1: that building and uh and used to the old chapel building.

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Speaker 1: And I went over there and I walked in the

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Speaker 1: door and they said, um, there's been illegal like there

379
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Speaker 1: was a big premise. I think there was a criminal

380
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Speaker 1: I think there was I don't want to go into

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Speaker 1: because I don't know the specifics, but they Marry Tyler

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Speaker 1: and Company pulled the plug on it. And so in

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Speaker 1: a way, it's one of the saddest things for for

384
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Speaker 1: a lot of people because they got out just when

385
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Speaker 1: the wave hit, like one of these one of the

386
00:19:19,480 --> 00:19:22,680
Speaker 1: worst business moves ever when you think about you know nine,

387
00:19:24,320 --> 00:19:26,800
Speaker 1: you've got something, and they really had something going on.

388
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Speaker 1: I mean, there was an article in the Tennessee and

389
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Speaker 1: a few months ago talking about the guys that ran

390
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Speaker 1: that company, Henry Hurt and Tommy West and others, and

391
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Speaker 1: they're saying, man that you know, it was a stacked

392
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Speaker 1: independent label, and they um, they pulled the plug. So

393
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Speaker 1: you're on it. And when you did Broken Road, that

394
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Speaker 1: was on ANTM. Now so Broken Run comes, you know, Yes,

395
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Speaker 1: I mean, listen, my situation is was so bad. It's

396
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Speaker 1: funny that. I mean, I kept getting signed. I mean

397
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Speaker 1: I got signed Timmy Blass, Sigmy Joe Galani signed me.

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Speaker 1: Um U. I don't know. There was another label, an

399
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Speaker 1: e M I label that signed me to a kind

400
00:20:03,840 --> 00:20:06,840
Speaker 1: of a rock deal. Uh, Joe Glani was gonna move

401
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Speaker 1: me at one point. At one point it was set

402
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Speaker 1: up that I was going to work with the folks

403
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Speaker 1: from Mellancamps in Indiana. It sounds like people were wanting

404
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Speaker 1: to shift you over to a bit of that sound. Yeah,

405
00:20:18,760 --> 00:20:21,199
Speaker 1: they're putting you with Mellancamp and they had well, I

406
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Speaker 1: thought that was gonna be great. And then um, when

407
00:20:23,400 --> 00:20:25,560
Speaker 1: Glanni it was right when Glanni got moved over to

408
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Speaker 1: New York to take over everything for our say, and

409
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Speaker 1: then actually Josh Leo took over and he dropped me,

410
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Speaker 1: and but Glani at one point from New York was

411
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Speaker 1: going to move me to Indiana and let me do.

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Speaker 1: There was a song I had that became an Alabama cut,

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Speaker 1: but it was called the Cheap Seats. Yeah, so that

414
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Speaker 1: was a big I had a band called the Pretty

415
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Speaker 1: Red Wing and I was I mean, my my big

416
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Speaker 1: thing was I played live, I played on album like

417
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Speaker 1: I know that song it was a single, it was.

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Speaker 1: It didn't go number one or anything like that, but

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Speaker 1: it went and you know, for years they played it.

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Speaker 1: It was a big song in baseball because it's about

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Speaker 1: minor league. That's that's that was such a big baseball

422
00:20:59,119 --> 00:21:01,200
Speaker 1: in seven inning st atch in a lot of places.

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Speaker 1: For for quite a while, that was the song. I

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Speaker 1: mean then you know, Fogerty has you know, center field,

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00:21:07,400 --> 00:21:11,320
Speaker 1: but a lot of places to be like the cheap seat. Yeah. God.

426
00:21:11,640 --> 00:21:13,439
Speaker 1: And we used to play that in my band and

427
00:21:13,480 --> 00:21:15,240
Speaker 1: we'd play the fire out of you know, we'd rock

428
00:21:15,280 --> 00:21:18,639
Speaker 1: it real hard. Um. And I really thankful that Alabama

429
00:21:18,680 --> 00:21:20,560
Speaker 1: did it because it was a significant break for me

430
00:21:21,080 --> 00:21:23,760
Speaker 1: in what way. Well, for one thing, it was actually

431
00:21:24,000 --> 00:21:26,119
Speaker 1: unequivocably even though it to me it was kind of

432
00:21:26,119 --> 00:21:29,200
Speaker 1: like a folky thing, but really it was a country

433
00:21:29,200 --> 00:21:32,000
Speaker 1: song by alab you know. And if it's one thing,

434
00:21:32,359 --> 00:21:35,200
Speaker 1: you know, if you get uh, Michael Martin Murphy, for example,

435
00:21:35,600 --> 00:21:38,000
Speaker 1: walk the line is his whole career. Now he just

436
00:21:38,040 --> 00:21:41,280
Speaker 1: cowboy songs, right, cowboy poetry and all that, but he

437
00:21:41,320 --> 00:21:43,720
Speaker 1: was also a pop pop singer. And one of the

438
00:21:43,720 --> 00:21:45,800
Speaker 1: first songs that I ever learned as a guitar player

439
00:21:45,800 --> 00:21:48,639
Speaker 1: was drawn Hima's Cadillac. And that's not really a country

440
00:21:48,680 --> 00:21:51,200
Speaker 1: song that really belongs more to the folk rock field.

441
00:21:51,560 --> 00:21:53,439
Speaker 1: But then he had a country career, so he was

442
00:21:53,480 --> 00:21:55,680
Speaker 1: like walking that line, same line that I would walk,

443
00:21:56,080 --> 00:22:01,640
Speaker 1: only unsuccessfully. Alabama's Alabama. They are like that it gets

444
00:22:01,680 --> 00:22:03,880
Speaker 1: nor more country than Alabama. They get whatever they sing

445
00:22:03,920 --> 00:22:06,480
Speaker 1: is now the country is on. Well yeah, now it's

446
00:22:06,520 --> 00:22:10,719
Speaker 1: like it's like so country, you know, it's it truly

447
00:22:10,800 --> 00:22:14,399
Speaker 1: feels almost like another time songs like hot Cotton, you know,

448
00:22:14,440 --> 00:22:18,120
Speaker 1: like that's amazing stuff. So that was for me, that

449
00:22:18,200 --> 00:22:20,360
Speaker 1: was a little bit. I mean, that's not the breakthrough.

450
00:22:20,440 --> 00:22:25,200
Speaker 1: The breakthrough for me was why not not only love that? That?

451
00:22:25,200 --> 00:22:27,520
Speaker 1: That's where why I got to stand town. Let me

452
00:22:27,600 --> 00:22:29,400
Speaker 1: do it commercially. I don't even stop you, but Mike's

453
00:22:29,400 --> 00:22:31,760
Speaker 1: holding a commercial affair. Let me talk about Express pros.

454
00:22:31,800 --> 00:22:34,360
Speaker 1: So for just one corporate job, only four to six

455
00:22:34,400 --> 00:22:37,080
Speaker 1: people will get an interview for every two hundred fifty

456
00:22:37,119 --> 00:22:40,280
Speaker 1: resumes received. Those aren't good odds you're talking about. I mean,

457
00:22:40,359 --> 00:22:42,919
Speaker 1: your shot of even getting an interview aren't good, much

458
00:22:42,960 --> 00:22:44,800
Speaker 1: less get in the job. The fact is you need

459
00:22:44,840 --> 00:22:47,800
Speaker 1: a real person advocating to a real employer that this

460
00:22:47,880 --> 00:22:49,240
Speaker 1: is a real job, and you're a real person, you

461
00:22:49,240 --> 00:22:51,960
Speaker 1: do a really good job. Right. That's where Express Employment

462
00:22:51,960 --> 00:22:55,520
Speaker 1: Professionals comes in. Express is your local resource to help

463
00:22:55,600 --> 00:22:58,480
Speaker 1: you get a new job. Express is more than Oh

464
00:22:58,560 --> 00:23:00,440
Speaker 1: the dog jump right in the middle of my Express

465
00:23:01,320 --> 00:23:04,359
Speaker 1: A little spot here, Dusty. Express has more than eighteen

466
00:23:04,400 --> 00:23:06,720
Speaker 1: thousand jobs that need to be filled right now. Find

467
00:23:06,720 --> 00:23:09,399
Speaker 1: your nearest office at Express pros dot com and Express

468
00:23:09,520 --> 00:23:12,320
Speaker 1: never charges a job secret to help find employment. Your

469
00:23:12,359 --> 00:23:15,440
Speaker 1: locally owned Express office can help you connect with jobs

470
00:23:15,480 --> 00:23:17,879
Speaker 1: in the community. Express pros dot com. How do you

471
00:23:17,920 --> 00:23:20,159
Speaker 1: find jobs? If you're looking for a manufacturing job, accounting job,

472
00:23:20,200 --> 00:23:24,080
Speaker 1: customer service, sales distribution, I keep going on you name it.

473
00:23:24,400 --> 00:23:27,119
Speaker 1: Visit the nearest Express office today and speak with hiring

474
00:23:27,119 --> 00:23:30,959
Speaker 1: professionals connected to the available jobs in your community. Need

475
00:23:31,000 --> 00:23:34,600
Speaker 1: a job, Visit Express pros dot com today to find

476
00:23:34,600 --> 00:23:37,280
Speaker 1: the location nearest to you. Okay, So you're talking about

477
00:23:37,280 --> 00:23:39,080
Speaker 1: the wine on As song. Yeah all right, So tell

478
00:23:39,119 --> 00:23:43,159
Speaker 1: me about that and why that's your big break. Um, well,

479
00:23:44,280 --> 00:23:47,000
Speaker 1: it's my big break because it went it went number one,

480
00:23:47,160 --> 00:23:49,439
Speaker 1: and um it didn't go number one on Billboard. But

481
00:23:49,880 --> 00:23:52,840
Speaker 1: back in the day, you know, build b my er

482
00:23:52,880 --> 00:23:54,680
Speaker 1: Ask would throw you a party and give you a

483
00:23:55,119 --> 00:23:57,560
Speaker 1: one of those cups. You get a cup if it

484
00:23:57,640 --> 00:24:00,000
Speaker 1: was on number one on either UR and R or

485
00:24:00,400 --> 00:24:03,120
Speaker 1: Billboard records. Yetta, Yetta, take a step back for a second.

486
00:24:03,440 --> 00:24:05,600
Speaker 1: So now you're writing these songs and getting breaks, but

487
00:24:06,200 --> 00:24:09,920
Speaker 1: are you done pursuing the artist? No? No, no, gosh no, no,

488
00:24:10,160 --> 00:24:13,080
Speaker 1: the whole time I'm and in fact I got one.

489
00:24:13,440 --> 00:24:17,919
Speaker 1: So going back when MTM imploded, my publishing deal was

490
00:24:17,960 --> 00:24:20,640
Speaker 1: then tied in. I'd come from a different group, nineteen

491
00:24:22,200 --> 00:24:26,239
Speaker 1: Avenue or Lorenz Creative Services, which is its own wild thing,

492
00:24:26,280 --> 00:24:28,879
Speaker 1: because that's kind of where Randy Travis broke out with it.

493
00:24:30,080 --> 00:24:32,720
Speaker 1: You know, arguably the record which kicked off the wave,

494
00:24:32,880 --> 00:24:36,160
Speaker 1: the you know, the new Traditionalist movement was a lot

495
00:24:36,200 --> 00:24:38,800
Speaker 1: of people have pointed to the album Storms of Life

496
00:24:38,840 --> 00:24:42,000
Speaker 1: by Randy Travis and it comes at the same time

497
00:24:42,040 --> 00:24:44,640
Speaker 1: as Steve Earle and Love It and Nancy Griffith and

498
00:24:44,680 --> 00:24:47,240
Speaker 1: this thing Dwight Yoakum. They call it the New Traditionalist movement.

499
00:24:47,560 --> 00:24:49,479
Speaker 1: So I came to town right when that was happening.

500
00:24:49,520 --> 00:24:52,399
Speaker 1: The company that signed me, this is just before the

501
00:24:52,520 --> 00:24:57,639
Speaker 1: MTM thing, was a primarily Christian organization called Lorenz Creative

502
00:24:57,640 --> 00:25:00,800
Speaker 1: Services and had thing called nineteen nineteen Reproductions. I think

503
00:25:00,800 --> 00:25:04,239
Speaker 1: it was so Charlie Monks running the Countryside and he

504
00:25:04,400 --> 00:25:07,720
Speaker 1: is the manager of at that time Randy Travis when

505
00:25:07,720 --> 00:25:10,600
Speaker 1: that record goes down. So that was happening right where

506
00:25:10,680 --> 00:25:13,439
Speaker 1: I get signed and when I when I first come

507
00:25:13,480 --> 00:25:16,440
Speaker 1: to Nashville, so I get this massive education on a

508
00:25:16,560 --> 00:25:21,520
Speaker 1: not just country but like serious roots kind of and

509
00:25:21,520 --> 00:25:24,120
Speaker 1: and really I looked to it like, hey, man, if

510
00:25:24,359 --> 00:25:27,200
Speaker 1: I love it, Nancy Griffith and Steve Earle have deals.

511
00:25:27,600 --> 00:25:30,280
Speaker 1: Someday I could have a deal because I live somewhere

512
00:25:30,720 --> 00:25:34,840
Speaker 1: somewhere in that land. I'm yeah, was there you mentioned

513
00:25:34,920 --> 00:25:37,800
Speaker 1: Randy Travis being the launching point because that record was

514
00:25:37,880 --> 00:25:40,040
Speaker 1: so big you kind of put that sound out. Now,

515
00:25:40,080 --> 00:25:41,840
Speaker 1: he probably wasn't the first to do it, but his

516
00:25:42,000 --> 00:25:43,840
Speaker 1: was so big that it made the movement happen, the

517
00:25:43,880 --> 00:25:46,280
Speaker 1: success of it, I think. So was there an argument

518
00:25:46,280 --> 00:25:49,359
Speaker 1: it's okay, this isn't country, Like was that was Randy Travis?

519
00:25:49,440 --> 00:25:51,800
Speaker 1: It was the other way around, So okay, Yeah, so

520
00:25:51,840 --> 00:25:53,320
Speaker 1: it's it's you know what it's like, I'll give you

521
00:25:53,320 --> 00:25:57,400
Speaker 1: the to me, I'll give you an analogy. Um, Nirvana,

522
00:25:57,520 --> 00:25:59,199
Speaker 1: I know this is really weird, like what you know,

523
00:25:59,200 --> 00:26:01,600
Speaker 1: how is this in ans? But like there were a

524
00:26:01,800 --> 00:26:07,760
Speaker 1: lot of you know, hair bands and spandex and and exactly,

525
00:26:07,800 --> 00:26:12,720
Speaker 1: and then Cobain and like to me to me overnight

526
00:26:12,840 --> 00:26:15,920
Speaker 1: for people go like, well, what hell, well, that's rock

527
00:26:16,040 --> 00:26:18,440
Speaker 1: listen that guy that's like like that's the end of

528
00:26:18,480 --> 00:26:20,840
Speaker 1: the world. I mean he's rocking like and sure enough

529
00:26:21,520 --> 00:26:24,120
Speaker 1: he killed I mean like he he had that thing

530
00:26:24,280 --> 00:26:26,359
Speaker 1: and the grunge thing comes and you just go, mother

531
00:26:26,440 --> 00:26:31,160
Speaker 1: of God, what okay? You know, So Randy Travis did

532
00:26:31,200 --> 00:26:37,880
Speaker 1: that to or showed you what country really would bones

533
00:26:38,240 --> 00:26:41,919
Speaker 1: uming things. I remember going like exhuming, but yeah, not

534
00:26:41,960 --> 00:26:43,720
Speaker 1: only that, but then you've got you know, then you've

535
00:26:43,760 --> 00:26:46,879
Speaker 1: got buck Owen's would span you know, like with leather

536
00:26:47,000 --> 00:26:51,399
Speaker 1: pants and and punk sensibility, Dwight Yoakum which was guitars

537
00:26:51,520 --> 00:26:53,760
Speaker 1: cattle it, and then you have Love at the five

538
00:26:53,800 --> 00:26:56,199
Speaker 1: and dime. Nasy Griffith wrote it, but Kathy Mattea, you know,

539
00:26:56,280 --> 00:26:58,639
Speaker 1: so that's happening. And then Steve Earl sounds kind of

540
00:26:58,680 --> 00:27:02,359
Speaker 1: like like Springsteen. You grew up in a holler, so

541
00:27:02,560 --> 00:27:06,120
Speaker 1: I don't know. It was so great and intense and

542
00:27:06,320 --> 00:27:08,720
Speaker 1: like when I tell young writers, you know, if you'd

543
00:27:08,760 --> 00:27:12,359
Speaker 1: been here in like right then on the wave it

544
00:27:12,480 --> 00:27:16,679
Speaker 1: this is pre garth by the way, Like it was unbelievable.

545
00:27:16,800 --> 00:27:19,600
Speaker 1: It was so exciting because you really felt like like

546
00:27:19,640 --> 00:27:22,080
Speaker 1: the music coming out of Nashville that time, I mean

547
00:27:22,200 --> 00:27:26,600
Speaker 1: everybody was fired up. You talk about Dwight Yoakom. For me,

548
00:27:26,880 --> 00:27:29,920
Speaker 1: I loved Yokom, still loved k I remember watching music

549
00:27:29,960 --> 00:27:32,800
Speaker 1: videos being like, I don't even know, Like I was

550
00:27:32,880 --> 00:27:35,080
Speaker 1: raised with the country music part of my life with

551
00:27:35,119 --> 00:27:39,080
Speaker 1: my grandma, and it was an old school country from Arkansas, Kansas.

552
00:27:39,240 --> 00:27:43,919
Speaker 1: So anybody so first of all, Johnny Cash was Johnny Cash. Uh.

553
00:27:44,320 --> 00:27:48,199
Speaker 1: Anybody with an Arkansas pedigree was the biggest to us.

554
00:27:49,160 --> 00:27:53,680
Speaker 1: And so I would see do I Yoko my TV?

555
00:27:54,680 --> 00:27:58,040
Speaker 1: And like, what is happening? Like it's a rock star

556
00:27:58,160 --> 00:28:02,800
Speaker 1: with the cowboy hat who's dancing? Like yeah, none of

557
00:28:02,800 --> 00:28:05,120
Speaker 1: the things matched and that's what made it so cool.

558
00:28:05,240 --> 00:28:07,479
Speaker 1: And then the guitar playing like the electric you know

559
00:28:07,520 --> 00:28:10,880
Speaker 1: that What was it as to why Yokam was happening?

560
00:28:11,200 --> 00:28:14,600
Speaker 1: What did the industry think of him? Um? I think

561
00:28:14,640 --> 00:28:20,280
Speaker 1: that they were, you know, I think they embraced you know,

562
00:28:20,760 --> 00:28:23,480
Speaker 1: in the early in the late eighties and early nineties.

563
00:28:23,560 --> 00:28:27,000
Speaker 1: One of the things that was so you know, particularly

564
00:28:27,040 --> 00:28:32,119
Speaker 1: before deregulation, and um, I think what happened in Nashville

565
00:28:32,160 --> 00:28:35,200
Speaker 1: the I think what people will write about the explosion

566
00:28:35,400 --> 00:28:38,000
Speaker 1: that was Nashville and particularly in the I mean the

567
00:28:38,080 --> 00:28:40,320
Speaker 1: nineties in a way if you look at it broadly speaking,

568
00:28:41,080 --> 00:28:44,160
Speaker 1: when you know it goes from in the mid eighties,

569
00:28:44,200 --> 00:28:47,400
Speaker 1: the perception of countries. I think it's about the size

570
00:28:47,400 --> 00:28:49,680
Speaker 1: of I don't know, jazz again, would I go back

571
00:28:49,720 --> 00:28:52,880
Speaker 1: to like, you know, some more niche kind of thing, right,

572
00:28:53,320 --> 00:28:56,959
Speaker 1: and then you know, country music it's just taken over

573
00:28:57,040 --> 00:29:00,959
Speaker 1: the world, right. And I think when thing like that happens,

574
00:29:01,000 --> 00:29:03,840
Speaker 1: it's almost like a religious movement. It requires a car

575
00:29:04,360 --> 00:29:08,200
Speaker 1: some charismatic elements after then explode and then it creates waves,

576
00:29:08,200 --> 00:29:12,960
Speaker 1: and then concentric waves and more waves, and eventually you

577
00:29:13,080 --> 00:29:16,360
Speaker 1: have the you know, things slowed down and and a

578
00:29:16,360 --> 00:29:19,240
Speaker 1: lot of things that are beautiful about a movement change

579
00:29:19,280 --> 00:29:22,040
Speaker 1: and then gets you know, structured and stratified. But I

580
00:29:22,080 --> 00:29:24,160
Speaker 1: think what happened was that people were allowed to be

581
00:29:24,200 --> 00:29:28,360
Speaker 1: many things that the diversity of country music if you look,

582
00:29:28,600 --> 00:29:32,240
Speaker 1: you know, into the early nineties, is extraordinary because you

583
00:29:32,360 --> 00:29:35,239
Speaker 1: have Yes, Randy Travis, you have Verned Gosden, you know,

584
00:29:35,280 --> 00:29:39,120
Speaker 1: like you want to talk about you know, damn country,

585
00:29:39,200 --> 00:29:41,640
Speaker 1: you know, like wow, But then you'd have. You know,

586
00:29:41,800 --> 00:29:44,120
Speaker 1: you'd have Vince Skill coming up, and you know, and

587
00:29:44,160 --> 00:29:46,880
Speaker 1: then the new Grass Revival and there are things that

588
00:29:46,920 --> 00:29:49,400
Speaker 1: were percolating from a blue grass standpoint that were really

589
00:29:49,400 --> 00:29:52,960
Speaker 1: getting really and we're really creative and moving. Then the

590
00:29:53,000 --> 00:29:55,920
Speaker 1: emergence of the mega stars, the rock stars led by

591
00:29:56,120 --> 00:29:58,720
Speaker 1: you know, Garth, who I don't know outsells the Beatles

592
00:29:58,720 --> 00:30:01,280
Speaker 1: in eight years or whatever. Know it's will that ever,

593
00:30:01,360 --> 00:30:03,560
Speaker 1: anything like that ever happened again in country music. I

594
00:30:03,560 --> 00:30:06,720
Speaker 1: don't know how it'll. It'll take a massive paradigm shift.

595
00:30:07,800 --> 00:30:10,280
Speaker 1: But you know, you think about all of that, and

596
00:30:10,280 --> 00:30:13,160
Speaker 1: then the folkies, you had how catch him, You had

597
00:30:13,200 --> 00:30:16,480
Speaker 1: Mary Chapin Carpenter winning you know female Vocus of the

598
00:30:16,520 --> 00:30:19,479
Speaker 1: Year of ninety three or whatever it was. You had, uh,

599
00:30:19,720 --> 00:30:23,000
Speaker 1: you know, all of these things lived and they lived

600
00:30:23,080 --> 00:30:28,600
Speaker 1: together and they profited together. So and pop country then

601
00:30:28,600 --> 00:30:31,400
Speaker 1: emerged too in a different way Shania Twain. You know,

602
00:30:31,400 --> 00:30:33,680
Speaker 1: like that's like what happened with that, Like when it

603
00:30:33,680 --> 00:30:36,400
Speaker 1: would take over, it would take over, and as the

604
00:30:36,520 --> 00:30:39,440
Speaker 1: water rose, all the ships went up with it. That's yeah.

605
00:30:39,480 --> 00:30:41,760
Speaker 1: I mean I think it was like the big big boat,

606
00:30:41,800 --> 00:30:43,760
Speaker 1: as they say, you know, it could carry a lot

607
00:30:43,840 --> 00:30:47,440
Speaker 1: of things, and it really to me, it doesn't change

608
00:30:47,520 --> 00:30:50,840
Speaker 1: until the Chicks, when the when the you know, when

609
00:30:50,840 --> 00:30:53,360
Speaker 1: the when it all goes down with the President and

610
00:30:53,440 --> 00:30:56,000
Speaker 1: the Chicks. To me, that was the beginning of the

611
00:30:56,240 --> 00:30:59,000
Speaker 1: of a of a kind of a It was sort

612
00:30:59,040 --> 00:31:03,080
Speaker 1: of to me where we began to stop allowing things

613
00:31:03,080 --> 00:31:07,160
Speaker 1: to sort of expand and remain extraordinarily vital and diverse,

614
00:31:07,200 --> 00:31:10,680
Speaker 1: which is healthy. It's like a democracy. It's like, it's

615
00:31:10,720 --> 00:31:12,840
Speaker 1: really better when we have a lot of ideas from

616
00:31:12,880 --> 00:31:15,960
Speaker 1: a multiplicity of this is I mean, this is just

617
00:31:16,040 --> 00:31:19,080
Speaker 1: my I'm just I'm just talking off the cuff, you know,

618
00:31:19,120 --> 00:31:23,960
Speaker 1: on trying to to make music theory or music popular

619
00:31:24,040 --> 00:31:28,320
Speaker 1: music theory coincide with some ideas about culture and politics.

620
00:31:28,360 --> 00:31:31,120
Speaker 1: But I think you know, the many is is more

621
00:31:31,160 --> 00:31:34,320
Speaker 1: powerful than the dominant few. Do you feel like now

622
00:31:34,360 --> 00:31:38,560
Speaker 1: with the landscape and you have artists not even sonically

623
00:31:39,920 --> 00:31:48,200
Speaker 1: but philosophically that have the brothers Marin Although they do

624
00:31:48,360 --> 00:31:53,040
Speaker 1: sound slightly different than what's considered traditional, they aren't in

625
00:31:53,080 --> 00:31:56,080
Speaker 1: that hey, we just fall into the mold and believe

626
00:31:56,080 --> 00:31:59,120
Speaker 1: what everybody in countries starting to believe. Do you feel

627
00:31:59,120 --> 00:32:02,360
Speaker 1: like that type of thing is what it was happening

628
00:32:02,400 --> 00:32:04,720
Speaker 1: back then too. He started to see it again a

629
00:32:04,800 --> 00:32:08,560
Speaker 1: bit with some of these again, as you're describing all

630
00:32:08,640 --> 00:32:12,400
Speaker 1: these people in this multicultural movement. Yeah, and I'm right

631
00:32:12,440 --> 00:32:14,800
Speaker 1: in the middle of it here. I'm starting to finally

632
00:32:14,840 --> 00:32:19,080
Speaker 1: see it again with people having voices and ideas and

633
00:32:19,120 --> 00:32:23,720
Speaker 1: differences and staying the same but being different, because it

634
00:32:23,800 --> 00:32:28,880
Speaker 1: sounds like as you're describing events and as you're describing people,

635
00:32:28,960 --> 00:32:31,520
Speaker 1: like we talked about Dwight Yoakum, he wasn't. I mean,

636
00:32:31,600 --> 00:32:35,520
Speaker 1: he's started California. Yeah. But when I was an artist,

637
00:32:35,600 --> 00:32:38,840
Speaker 1: I met by Collens, you know, and and he was

638
00:32:38,880 --> 00:32:41,200
Speaker 1: really nice to me. Um, you know, he played my

639
00:32:41,240 --> 00:32:45,440
Speaker 1: record and he was just you know, he and anyway,

640
00:32:45,440 --> 00:32:47,160
Speaker 1: I did a little bit of, you know, research on

641
00:32:47,360 --> 00:32:49,320
Speaker 1: just because I didn't grow up listening to about Ohens

642
00:32:49,320 --> 00:32:51,080
Speaker 1: a man, I didn't. I mean I wish when I

643
00:32:51,120 --> 00:32:52,800
Speaker 1: was that, believe me, when I was at a country radio,

644
00:32:52,800 --> 00:32:55,360
Speaker 1: I wish I had all kinds of records in my background,

645
00:32:55,400 --> 00:32:58,240
Speaker 1: But you know, it wasn't. The only country stuff that

646
00:32:58,320 --> 00:33:03,120
Speaker 1: I really heard growing up. Was my dad loved Johnny Cash,

647
00:33:03,240 --> 00:33:04,840
Speaker 1: and I know that there's a period of time when

648
00:33:04,880 --> 00:33:07,160
Speaker 1: he wasn't considered country, and there was all that going on,

649
00:33:07,640 --> 00:33:10,160
Speaker 1: which is again you talk about the cycles and now

650
00:33:10,280 --> 00:33:15,640
Speaker 1: you saw like again with me and my grandma, it

651
00:33:15,720 --> 00:33:18,400
Speaker 1: was the gospel stuff too. It was Johnny, but I

652
00:33:18,440 --> 00:33:20,720
Speaker 1: remember her telling me that she went to see a

653
00:33:20,800 --> 00:33:23,080
Speaker 1: cash show and he played a lot in Arkansas, especially early,

654
00:33:23,400 --> 00:33:25,960
Speaker 1: and there are people pickinging out front because this wasn't

655
00:33:26,000 --> 00:33:29,160
Speaker 1: that's not country, and like the person that we hold

656
00:33:29,800 --> 00:33:34,400
Speaker 1: as the most screw yes is wasn't. They were so

657
00:33:34,440 --> 00:33:36,880
Speaker 1: angry that that wasn't a country music show? So why

658
00:33:36,880 --> 00:33:39,680
Speaker 1: are you calling the country music show? Like? That's the

659
00:33:39,720 --> 00:33:42,080
Speaker 1: same thing when I say, brothers, everything is a cycle.

660
00:33:42,200 --> 00:33:44,959
Speaker 1: Everything's how we are. That's literally, that's just we like

661
00:33:45,000 --> 00:33:47,120
Speaker 1: we're like eating or young or something, you know, like

662
00:33:47,120 --> 00:33:50,640
Speaker 1: we're really we're funny. It's funny. It's vibrant and powerful

663
00:33:50,840 --> 00:33:52,920
Speaker 1: and funny and then kind of sad sometimes all the

664
00:33:53,240 --> 00:33:54,680
Speaker 1: like I did a show. I won't say who was

665
00:33:54,720 --> 00:33:58,120
Speaker 1: the other night, but I did a show and you know, um,

666
00:33:58,160 --> 00:34:01,080
Speaker 1: I mean ironically when I play now, I sound like

667
00:34:01,800 --> 00:34:07,720
Speaker 1: I think people think I'm as you know, I've literally

668
00:34:07,720 --> 00:34:09,520
Speaker 1: had people come up to me and say, hey man,

669
00:34:09,560 --> 00:34:11,719
Speaker 1: thanks a lot for keeping a country thank you. And

670
00:34:11,760 --> 00:34:13,960
Speaker 1: I think that's you know, because I play Cowboy, Take

671
00:34:14,000 --> 00:34:16,400
Speaker 1: Me Away, and then the way I play Born to

672
00:34:16,480 --> 00:34:19,880
Speaker 1: Fly and stuff like that, you know, now that's really

673
00:34:19,960 --> 00:34:23,279
Speaker 1: country sounding. And then um, and then I always had

674
00:34:23,280 --> 00:34:26,000
Speaker 1: a gospel thing in me anyway. That's just that that

675
00:34:26,120 --> 00:34:28,560
Speaker 1: actually helped me stay in Nashville because you know, that

676
00:34:28,640 --> 00:34:30,880
Speaker 1: was sort of genuine. I did grow up singing in church,

677
00:34:31,239 --> 00:34:33,160
Speaker 1: even though it wasn't evangelical or this or that. But

678
00:34:33,200 --> 00:34:35,239
Speaker 1: I mean, like I still I sang in church my

679
00:34:35,280 --> 00:34:38,680
Speaker 1: whole life, and I like to sing in churches to this.

680
00:34:38,800 --> 00:34:41,040
Speaker 1: You know, it's a big part of my life too. Um.

681
00:34:41,080 --> 00:34:42,799
Speaker 1: Even that though was sort of on the wrong side

682
00:34:42,800 --> 00:34:46,600
Speaker 1: of it culturally, but nonetheless I did have that. Um.

683
00:34:47,520 --> 00:34:50,560
Speaker 1: But oh God, whilst the trying of thought, I got

684
00:34:50,600 --> 00:34:53,160
Speaker 1: thinking about the gospel and you were playing with somebody,

685
00:34:53,960 --> 00:34:58,280
Speaker 1: and I think this person you being country, you sounding country,

686
00:34:58,520 --> 00:35:00,879
Speaker 1: that was your thing that people are like, hey, yeah, yeah,

687
00:35:00,960 --> 00:35:02,880
Speaker 1: that's right, I do remember now. Yet so I'm playing

688
00:35:02,880 --> 00:35:04,680
Speaker 1: with this guy, we're like we're down in like a

689
00:35:05,760 --> 00:35:08,239
Speaker 1: like it was during one of the like a cmf

690
00:35:08,360 --> 00:35:12,520
Speaker 1: cmafest thing. And I play so many writers things now

691
00:35:12,520 --> 00:35:14,319
Speaker 1: that I can't even remember while, but I remember this

692
00:35:14,440 --> 00:35:17,600
Speaker 1: night because it was recent. Um it's like truth, I

693
00:35:17,600 --> 00:35:19,560
Speaker 1: don't know three or four months ago. In anyway, this

694
00:35:19,600 --> 00:35:25,200
Speaker 1: particular writer is very successful writer, and he's very country.

695
00:35:25,400 --> 00:35:27,480
Speaker 1: And he got up there and he said, and he

696
00:35:27,520 --> 00:35:30,120
Speaker 1: says to the audience and audience he's like, I'm just

697
00:35:30,200 --> 00:35:31,960
Speaker 1: glad he said that, says, I tell you what, I'm

698
00:35:32,000 --> 00:35:35,160
Speaker 1: not gonna play any goddamn Sam Hunt record. He says,

699
00:35:35,200 --> 00:35:37,440
Speaker 1: I'd like anything, as long as not a goddamn in

700
00:35:37,520 --> 00:35:41,840
Speaker 1: pardon me for like Sam Hunt. And I'm like, I'm thinking,

701
00:35:42,560 --> 00:35:45,960
Speaker 1: what the hell do you care? First of all, Sam

702
00:35:46,080 --> 00:35:50,240
Speaker 1: Hunt is unless unless you're just deaf, dumb and blind

703
00:35:50,400 --> 00:35:54,000
Speaker 1: like that guy has lots of talent. I'm honestly, I

704
00:35:54,040 --> 00:35:57,640
Speaker 1: mean I can't. I can't write that stuff. I mean

705
00:35:57,960 --> 00:35:59,640
Speaker 1: i'd like to. I mean, I'd love to sit in

706
00:35:59,640 --> 00:36:01,160
Speaker 1: the room with I've heard, by the way, from other

707
00:36:01,200 --> 00:36:04,360
Speaker 1: writers that he's just an outstanding writer. And he's and

708
00:36:04,400 --> 00:36:06,600
Speaker 1: he's even kind of old school, meaning he doesn't everything

709
00:36:06,600 --> 00:36:08,359
Speaker 1: doesn't have to be done in two hours. Oh he's

710
00:36:08,440 --> 00:36:14,279
Speaker 1: notoriously slow on purpose. Yeah, we'll see. That's the generation. Look,

711
00:36:14,320 --> 00:36:17,359
Speaker 1: I came up in the generation where you know, you

712
00:36:17,080 --> 00:36:19,040
Speaker 1: you would sit around and talk about where to put

713
00:36:19,040 --> 00:36:21,600
Speaker 1: a comma so that the page would look right, you know,

714
00:36:21,640 --> 00:36:24,440
Speaker 1: like it wasn't. So there's there's so many things that

715
00:36:24,480 --> 00:36:29,480
Speaker 1: have changed, But the larger point for me was, Okay,

716
00:36:29,880 --> 00:36:32,640
Speaker 1: let's talk authenticity. If you if everybody wants to talk

717
00:36:32,680 --> 00:36:36,040
Speaker 1: about authenticity, let's take a moment and just step back

718
00:36:36,080 --> 00:36:39,960
Speaker 1: for a second. Imagine you grow up in your you

719
00:36:40,080 --> 00:36:43,800
Speaker 1: grow up in America, in your in in the nineties,

720
00:36:43,920 --> 00:36:47,319
Speaker 1: your teens, your early teens are in the nineties. Let's

721
00:36:47,400 --> 00:36:50,120
Speaker 1: just imagined that. And so that was that's like almost

722
00:36:50,200 --> 00:36:53,160
Speaker 1: everybody that were who's sort of listening to all of this.

723
00:36:54,280 --> 00:36:56,279
Speaker 1: If you grow up at that time and you fall

724
00:36:56,320 --> 00:36:58,719
Speaker 1: in love with some country acts, and why wouldn't you?

725
00:36:58,800 --> 00:37:05,320
Speaker 1: They were it was amazing time, right, and amazing writing community, vibrant, vibrant, vibrant.

726
00:37:05,680 --> 00:37:09,040
Speaker 1: But you live in America, so what's even you know.

727
00:37:09,200 --> 00:37:12,480
Speaker 1: The the other thing that's incredible and emerging and and

728
00:37:12,560 --> 00:37:16,239
Speaker 1: really muscular is urban music and rap. Right, So as

729
00:37:16,239 --> 00:37:18,480
Speaker 1: you move into the early two thousands, if you're not

730
00:37:18,520 --> 00:37:22,239
Speaker 1: listening to rap at all and mixed in with your

731
00:37:22,280 --> 00:37:25,719
Speaker 1: gumbo that has some country acts, right, then I just

732
00:37:25,760 --> 00:37:27,960
Speaker 1: don't know what country you're in, because that's how it is,

733
00:37:28,160 --> 00:37:30,680
Speaker 1: That's what it was. I mean, you aren't going home

734
00:37:30,680 --> 00:37:33,360
Speaker 1: to Mary maybe RFD and sitting and just only listening

735
00:37:33,400 --> 00:37:36,440
Speaker 1: to a few little records and you're not gonna know

736
00:37:36,560 --> 00:37:41,239
Speaker 1: that's that's not culture. So of course, Sam, like a

737
00:37:41,280 --> 00:37:44,080
Speaker 1: lot of people you know, like including my son, who

738
00:37:44,080 --> 00:37:48,560
Speaker 1: has this real pop country sound, as artists, they naturally

739
00:37:49,080 --> 00:37:54,600
Speaker 1: integrated these sounds, and that is by definition, honest to me.

740
00:37:54,719 --> 00:37:58,680
Speaker 1: That's always been my biggest argument is it's no one

741
00:37:58,960 --> 00:38:02,319
Speaker 1: kicking at country regoing I'm going to change it. It's

742
00:38:02,360 --> 00:38:07,280
Speaker 1: everyone using the tools they've grown up with. And again,

743
00:38:07,360 --> 00:38:08,680
Speaker 1: I was born in the eighties, so I was in

744
00:38:08,840 --> 00:38:11,960
Speaker 1: nineties teenage kid. And it was also when Napster happened,

745
00:38:12,320 --> 00:38:14,080
Speaker 1: and I then realized I could have every song that

746
00:38:14,080 --> 00:38:15,560
Speaker 1: started with L. All I had to do was hit

747
00:38:15,600 --> 00:38:18,239
Speaker 1: it and and I had every kind of no. I

748
00:38:18,280 --> 00:38:21,160
Speaker 1: grew up in Arkansas, so if it wasn't Glenn Campbell

749
00:38:21,280 --> 00:38:23,840
Speaker 1: or Andy Grafs Gospel Records, or Johnny Cash or Ray Charles,

750
00:38:24,200 --> 00:38:26,840
Speaker 1: then it started to be mcgrawl and Garth. Then it

751
00:38:26,920 --> 00:38:29,440
Speaker 1: started to be Nirvana and Pearl Jam. Then it was

752
00:38:29,520 --> 00:38:34,120
Speaker 1: hip hop, and so at my core I'm a country

753
00:38:34,200 --> 00:38:36,320
Speaker 1: music fan. But if I acted like I wasn't a

754
00:38:36,400 --> 00:38:39,680
Speaker 1: hip hop guy or an alternative guy, it would be

755
00:38:39,719 --> 00:38:42,759
Speaker 1: a lie. You be, we want and to your point

756
00:38:42,760 --> 00:38:45,759
Speaker 1: of authenticity, do we want people lying? Isn't that the

757
00:38:45,800 --> 00:38:49,000
Speaker 1: purpose of this entire format is that it's supposed to

758
00:38:49,000 --> 00:38:52,120
Speaker 1: be real. And if you look with the people Sam

759
00:38:52,160 --> 00:38:56,040
Speaker 1: reach like there's a reason that he sells out amphitheaters

760
00:38:56,520 --> 00:39:00,880
Speaker 1: every single time instantly because he's actually reaching human. Yeah,

761
00:39:01,080 --> 00:39:02,320
Speaker 1: and isn't at the point and here's the thing of

762
00:39:02,360 --> 00:39:04,319
Speaker 1: twenty years, people are gonna go a man, I wish

763
00:39:04,360 --> 00:39:06,480
Speaker 1: it was like the little Sam Hunt days. Yeah, It'll

764
00:39:06,520 --> 00:39:09,359
Speaker 1: be like, boy that was country, that was country back then.

765
00:39:09,960 --> 00:39:13,440
Speaker 1: This guy over here with the bike horn. You know

766
00:39:13,920 --> 00:39:17,560
Speaker 1: this is not country. So look I make i'd be.

767
00:39:17,640 --> 00:39:19,560
Speaker 1: At the same time, I gotta say it's I'm not

768
00:39:19,600 --> 00:39:21,239
Speaker 1: talking about both sides of my mouth. But you know,

769
00:39:21,280 --> 00:39:24,840
Speaker 1: like as a musician, I mean like when I do demos,

770
00:39:24,880 --> 00:39:26,600
Speaker 1: now I get a couple other guys like me who

771
00:39:26,600 --> 00:39:29,760
Speaker 1: play a bunch of instruments. There's no money for demos anymore.

772
00:39:30,239 --> 00:39:31,719
Speaker 1: You know. People don't do like they used to. It

773
00:39:31,800 --> 00:39:33,239
Speaker 1: was like you know, he used to it was every

774
00:39:33,320 --> 00:39:35,400
Speaker 1: every six weeks we just do a big old session

775
00:39:35,440 --> 00:39:37,560
Speaker 1: and just put it on the card, and everybody was

776
00:39:37,960 --> 00:39:40,040
Speaker 1: those days are not that's not where we're at right now.

777
00:39:41,280 --> 00:39:45,840
Speaker 1: But because I mean, I'm really a roots guy, I

778
00:39:45,880 --> 00:39:48,240
Speaker 1: really am, you know, and I mean what I really

779
00:39:48,280 --> 00:39:52,080
Speaker 1: love to listen to is still I mean, I still

780
00:39:52,120 --> 00:39:56,040
Speaker 1: love a Patty Loveless record like crazy, you know. I

781
00:39:56,120 --> 00:40:00,560
Speaker 1: still love New Grass Revival, I still love you know,

782
00:40:01,120 --> 00:40:05,040
Speaker 1: I love Jimmy Webb's song sung by Glenn Campbell because

783
00:40:05,880 --> 00:40:09,000
Speaker 1: I'm I'm a piano player and I just the harmonic

784
00:40:09,560 --> 00:40:13,480
Speaker 1: ideas and those songs that really was as much as

785
00:40:13,520 --> 00:40:15,920
Speaker 1: anything that kind of brought me to the genre. I love,

786
00:40:17,000 --> 00:40:19,080
Speaker 1: you know, the way you know, the people that are

787
00:40:19,080 --> 00:40:23,520
Speaker 1: really who play acoustic guitar beautifully. I try, you know,

788
00:40:23,560 --> 00:40:26,640
Speaker 1: my whole life. I'm always trying to stretch as a musician,

789
00:40:26,680 --> 00:40:30,120
Speaker 1: but I don't really I don't really dig a lot

790
00:40:30,160 --> 00:40:33,200
Speaker 1: of digital information in terms of my aesthetic, in terms

791
00:40:33,200 --> 00:40:35,399
Speaker 1: of you know, I'm I'm an old dog, if you will,

792
00:40:35,600 --> 00:40:40,200
Speaker 1: and happily so. At the same time, I really feel

793
00:40:40,400 --> 00:40:42,640
Speaker 1: like as long as I've been in this industry, I've

794
00:40:42,680 --> 00:40:46,080
Speaker 1: been hearing this stick since the day I got here,

795
00:40:46,560 --> 00:40:49,359
Speaker 1: and I'm tired of damn, honest to god, I mean,

796
00:40:49,600 --> 00:40:55,120
Speaker 1: I'm sick of people. You know. It's just it's so

797
00:40:55,840 --> 00:40:59,840
Speaker 1: it's so nonproductive, you know, because yes, thank God for

798
00:41:00,080 --> 00:41:04,400
Speaker 1: Zach Brown and you know, and and the earthy whatever,

799
00:41:04,480 --> 00:41:07,080
Speaker 1: the roots side of things that still and I definitely

800
00:41:07,480 --> 00:41:09,839
Speaker 1: hope that it makes a comeback also because if it does,

801
00:41:09,920 --> 00:41:11,920
Speaker 1: I might have a job as I get older, you know,

802
00:41:12,560 --> 00:41:14,600
Speaker 1: you know, because more and more I find the stuff

803
00:41:14,640 --> 00:41:17,319
Speaker 1: that I'm doing. It. Yeah, it just sounds like it's

804
00:41:17,760 --> 00:41:21,400
Speaker 1: hopelessly in another world. But these things do tend to

805
00:41:21,400 --> 00:41:23,719
Speaker 1: work in cycles. And the song is at the end

806
00:41:23,760 --> 00:41:26,880
Speaker 1: of the day, it is the king, the queen, it is,

807
00:41:26,960 --> 00:41:30,680
Speaker 1: you know, the court. Eventually everything does return to the song.

808
00:41:30,760 --> 00:41:35,680
Speaker 1: I know that. And eventually everyone has to be able

809
00:41:35,719 --> 00:41:38,680
Speaker 1: to play such a song like that somewhere with a

810
00:41:38,680 --> 00:41:41,799
Speaker 1: guitar or a piano in a room. And that's the

811
00:41:41,840 --> 00:41:45,239
Speaker 1: classic thing. And that and most songwriters and artists, you know,

812
00:41:45,360 --> 00:41:47,600
Speaker 1: that's really what they want. They want to have a

813
00:41:47,640 --> 00:41:52,120
Speaker 1: song that you can play and it just immediately is

814
00:41:52,160 --> 00:41:54,839
Speaker 1: transformative that you know, that's what they refer to as

815
00:41:54,880 --> 00:41:58,120
Speaker 1: a copyright and it's not just money, you know, it isn't.

816
00:41:58,920 --> 00:42:01,480
Speaker 1: It isn't. I'm not not the same, you know, pure

817
00:42:01,480 --> 00:42:03,960
Speaker 1: as a driven snow or anything. But for those of

818
00:42:04,040 --> 00:42:07,360
Speaker 1: us who are crazy songwriter musician types, we are. We

819
00:42:07,440 --> 00:42:12,640
Speaker 1: are like like odd religious devotees and and pilgrim souls.

820
00:42:12,640 --> 00:42:14,239
Speaker 1: I mean, we really are. You know, It's it's a

821
00:42:14,280 --> 00:42:17,200
Speaker 1: strange bunch. You know. I think you might be the

822
00:42:17,239 --> 00:42:23,279
Speaker 1: smartest person I've ever talked to. I'm sure. I'm like,

823
00:42:23,320 --> 00:42:26,040
Speaker 1: I'm I'm listening and I'm understanding everything you're saying, and

824
00:42:26,040 --> 00:42:29,600
Speaker 1: I'm just like wow, And it's crazy that, you know,

825
00:42:29,640 --> 00:42:30,920
Speaker 1: there have been a couple of people I brought in

826
00:42:31,200 --> 00:42:34,440
Speaker 1: you talked to and you go, okay, there it's a

827
00:42:34,520 --> 00:42:36,680
Speaker 1: familiar level level they're thinking out with me. Not that

828
00:42:36,719 --> 00:42:40,160
Speaker 1: I'm right, but it's a familiar level and you're talking

829
00:42:40,239 --> 00:42:44,480
Speaker 1: on a familiar level that I thinking, but so much smarter.

830
00:42:44,800 --> 00:42:46,000
Speaker 1: Like I want to go back and listen to this,

831
00:42:46,080 --> 00:42:47,440
Speaker 1: go this is watched the same next time I get

832
00:42:47,480 --> 00:42:49,879
Speaker 1: to argue because I have the same like to me,

833
00:42:51,160 --> 00:42:56,400
Speaker 1: there's room for everything. Is there's room for everything, and

834
00:42:56,480 --> 00:42:59,680
Speaker 1: there's no definition inside of art. As soon as you

835
00:42:59,680 --> 00:43:03,400
Speaker 1: start to put walls around art, then it's not what

836
00:43:03,520 --> 00:43:06,239
Speaker 1: you wanted to know. And what do you want out

837
00:43:06,239 --> 00:43:09,080
Speaker 1: of people? You know, you say you want artists, you

838
00:43:09,120 --> 00:43:12,560
Speaker 1: say you even know what that means. And then you

839
00:43:12,560 --> 00:43:14,719
Speaker 1: you know the nature of those kinds of people is

840
00:43:14,760 --> 00:43:18,319
Speaker 1: they're sort of explosive. They they move in directions, they

841
00:43:18,360 --> 00:43:20,440
Speaker 1: go to the river, moves in a way that you

842
00:43:20,680 --> 00:43:22,880
Speaker 1: didn't see it coming. You know. I'm like, that's what

843
00:43:23,000 --> 00:43:25,960
Speaker 1: that looks like. And like my son, for example, is

844
00:43:26,239 --> 00:43:30,720
Speaker 1: so Levi is you know, making his way in music

845
00:43:30,840 --> 00:43:33,560
Speaker 1: right now, and his sound is more pop country, but

846
00:43:33,600 --> 00:43:35,560
Speaker 1: then he has two or three different gears and I'm

847
00:43:35,560 --> 00:43:37,440
Speaker 1: always telling him maybe he gets sick of hearing it.

848
00:43:37,480 --> 00:43:39,319
Speaker 1: We just literally got off the road from two weeks

849
00:43:39,360 --> 00:43:41,360
Speaker 1: together and we shared a room, which I'll tell you what.

850
00:43:42,000 --> 00:43:44,319
Speaker 1: That's something, you know, because he's twenty six and got

851
00:43:44,480 --> 00:43:47,320
Speaker 1: a poor guy. You know, we're in like Amsterdam, he's

852
00:43:47,320 --> 00:43:49,160
Speaker 1: he's sharing a room with his dad. Think about that

853
00:43:49,200 --> 00:43:52,840
Speaker 1: for a moment, just let that settle in. But we

854
00:43:52,920 --> 00:43:54,279
Speaker 1: had a great time, you know, and we're out and

855
00:43:54,280 --> 00:43:56,520
Speaker 1: we're playing with a lot of people and and uh,

856
00:43:56,600 --> 00:43:58,360
Speaker 1: you know, we're doing you know, a country week in

857
00:43:58,400 --> 00:44:00,560
Speaker 1: the UK, and and I've been playing in and out

858
00:44:00,600 --> 00:44:02,279
Speaker 1: of the UK for years. I mean that it's just

859
00:44:02,640 --> 00:44:05,319
Speaker 1: give a following there. I wouldn't say I have a

860
00:44:05,400 --> 00:44:09,600
Speaker 1: following um in the UK. I mean that when I

861
00:44:09,640 --> 00:44:12,640
Speaker 1: was on Columbia the one great tour, I had one

862
00:44:13,760 --> 00:44:17,720
Speaker 1: just unforgettable tour well, and then I was signed my

863
00:44:17,480 --> 00:44:19,680
Speaker 1: my rock deal was was out of London, So I

864
00:44:19,680 --> 00:44:24,000
Speaker 1: guess I have all kinds of UK connections. But um,

865
00:44:24,040 --> 00:44:26,560
Speaker 1: I got to open for Alison Kraus and Union Station

866
00:44:27,360 --> 00:44:31,640
Speaker 1: and they did like the Royal you know, um, oh

867
00:44:31,840 --> 00:44:36,439
Speaker 1: what's right there in the Times, the Thames, the Royal

868
00:44:36,520 --> 00:44:38,640
Speaker 1: Festival Hall or whatever. When we did like Ulster Hall,

869
00:44:38,680 --> 00:44:42,600
Speaker 1: in the Gaiety Theater and double like the best places,

870
00:44:43,120 --> 00:44:45,160
Speaker 1: and I could take one musician with me. I was

871
00:44:45,200 --> 00:44:48,080
Speaker 1: allowed one side man. I took Darryl Scott, who I

872
00:44:48,080 --> 00:44:50,080
Speaker 1: had just met, and we septs to be k He's

873
00:44:50,120 --> 00:44:51,520
Speaker 1: one of my best friends in the world. It's like

874
00:44:51,520 --> 00:44:53,960
Speaker 1: a brother to me and he's my longest to this day,

875
00:44:54,040 --> 00:44:57,160
Speaker 1: longest running co writer. Do you know Darryl at I don't,

876
00:44:57,560 --> 00:44:59,120
Speaker 1: Oh you know, do you know who he is? Though

877
00:44:59,239 --> 00:45:01,399
Speaker 1: I know who he is? People talking about him. Yeah,

878
00:45:01,480 --> 00:45:03,480
Speaker 1: I've never met him. Yeah, well, he's one of the

879
00:45:03,520 --> 00:45:06,440
Speaker 1: best ever. And he's taught me more about what is

880
00:45:06,520 --> 00:45:09,360
Speaker 1: country what isn't than probably anybody, because I don't know

881
00:45:09,400 --> 00:45:13,160
Speaker 1: anybody who knows country music the history of it more.

882
00:45:13,280 --> 00:45:15,960
Speaker 1: And can do you know, you can do anything, you know.

883
00:45:16,000 --> 00:45:18,960
Speaker 1: It's a guy can play literally everything. But anyway, he's

884
00:45:19,000 --> 00:45:21,799
Speaker 1: my sideman, you know. Uh. And we would go into

885
00:45:21,800 --> 00:45:24,560
Speaker 1: these places and and I would do my forty minutes

886
00:45:25,880 --> 00:45:29,359
Speaker 1: and with Darryll, you know, and then we would sit

887
00:45:29,560 --> 00:45:32,840
Speaker 1: and we would watch this greatest, you know, one of

888
00:45:32,840 --> 00:45:37,239
Speaker 1: the greatest of all American musical forms, you know, like

889
00:45:38,040 --> 00:45:42,239
Speaker 1: just her, you know, just Alison, you know, and then

890
00:45:42,400 --> 00:45:45,480
Speaker 1: to Minsky and you know the band, you know, Jerry Douglas.

891
00:45:45,640 --> 00:45:47,759
Speaker 1: And we literally would sit night after night and then

892
00:45:47,840 --> 00:45:49,480
Speaker 1: we then we'd get in our car because they had

893
00:45:49,480 --> 00:45:50,719
Speaker 1: a bus we had to follow on a car. We

894
00:45:50,800 --> 00:45:53,080
Speaker 1: drive in through Ireland, you can imagine. And it was

895
00:45:53,239 --> 00:45:55,160
Speaker 1: it was just as romantic as it should be. It

896
00:45:55,239 --> 00:45:59,200
Speaker 1: was a great thing. It was extraordinary, you know, And

897
00:45:59,239 --> 00:46:01,160
Speaker 1: that was like the greyest thing I ever got to do.

898
00:46:01,239 --> 00:46:03,839
Speaker 1: And I remember I even when I flew back from

899
00:46:03,880 --> 00:46:06,640
Speaker 1: the UK um I literally had to get off the

900
00:46:06,680 --> 00:46:08,960
Speaker 1: plane and went right to playing like a holiday in

901
00:46:09,760 --> 00:46:11,400
Speaker 1: you know, on my radio tour. And I think I

902
00:46:11,400 --> 00:46:14,799
Speaker 1: got drunk, you know, and and like the record President game,

903
00:46:14,800 --> 00:46:17,200
Speaker 1: and like he got drunk too, and and I felt

904
00:46:17,239 --> 00:46:18,919
Speaker 1: sick the next day, and I thought, oh my god,

905
00:46:19,040 --> 00:46:22,640
Speaker 1: you know, I mean, it's kind of a great thing

906
00:46:22,680 --> 00:46:24,319
Speaker 1: to do. It's a great American thing to do. But

907
00:46:24,360 --> 00:46:26,520
Speaker 1: now my son, you know, like our son, not mine,

908
00:46:26,560 --> 00:46:29,439
Speaker 1: but our son, aren't We have three sons. The oldest boy,

909
00:46:29,560 --> 00:46:34,479
Speaker 1: Levi's out there and he's already had like great sort

910
00:46:34,480 --> 00:46:37,440
Speaker 1: of ups and downs and and uh, and he is

911
00:46:37,640 --> 00:46:40,200
Speaker 1: teaching me about a new paradigm which is occurring. And

912
00:46:40,400 --> 00:46:43,120
Speaker 1: you know, there's always a new paradise, something's always coming,

913
00:46:43,160 --> 00:46:47,040
Speaker 1: of course. And it was interesting because this past year

914
00:46:47,520 --> 00:46:50,200
Speaker 1: I helped co produce a movie called The Last Songwriter.

915
00:46:51,200 --> 00:46:54,920
Speaker 1: And in this movie, with the directors director Mark Barsor Elliott,

916
00:46:55,640 --> 00:46:59,480
Speaker 1: we looked at what has happened with streaming and the

917
00:47:00,200 --> 00:47:04,279
Speaker 1: like severe attrition in the songwriting community in Nashville, like

918
00:47:04,360 --> 00:47:08,319
Speaker 1: the Wall Street Journal says, of our uh, making a

919
00:47:08,360 --> 00:47:11,160
Speaker 1: living population is lost. You know, there's only like it

920
00:47:11,200 --> 00:47:14,680
Speaker 1: went from four thousand or four d eight years and so,

921
00:47:15,280 --> 00:47:17,440
Speaker 1: and my job and it was to score it, but

922
00:47:17,520 --> 00:47:19,799
Speaker 1: also my job is to pick songwriters to talk about

923
00:47:19,840 --> 00:47:21,680
Speaker 1: it and to talk about what, you know, like what

924
00:47:21,800 --> 00:47:24,439
Speaker 1: the art form is really like. So we got some

925
00:47:24,680 --> 00:47:28,320
Speaker 1: major stars. Garth Brooks was agreed to do it. Jason Isabel,

926
00:47:28,520 --> 00:47:30,640
Speaker 1: you know who's just extraordinary he did at Emma Lou

927
00:47:30,680 --> 00:47:34,760
Speaker 1: Harris and then the the and yet the main event

928
00:47:34,800 --> 00:47:38,520
Speaker 1: in a way is I picked Matresa Berg, Tony Rata,

929
00:47:38,640 --> 00:47:41,960
Speaker 1: Tom Douglas down Shamblin to be this sort of internal

930
00:47:42,000 --> 00:47:44,359
Speaker 1: dialogue in the movie. It's just an hour long movie

931
00:47:44,360 --> 00:47:47,600
Speaker 1: and it it premiered at the Nashville Film Festival and

932
00:47:47,719 --> 00:47:50,439
Speaker 1: got in a you know, like Appreciation Award or whatever

933
00:47:51,080 --> 00:47:55,840
Speaker 1: whatever they have there. And it's a beautiful movie, um,

934
00:47:55,920 --> 00:47:57,640
Speaker 1: but a lot of what it says in it, you know,

935
00:47:57,640 --> 00:48:00,720
Speaker 1: it's sort of talking about streaming, so you know, streaming

936
00:48:00,719 --> 00:48:04,960
Speaker 1: comes along, and it doesn't really include writers and publishers

937
00:48:04,960 --> 00:48:07,600
Speaker 1: as we know, and the deals are really made the

938
00:48:08,960 --> 00:48:11,040
Speaker 1: with the people that own the sound recording, which is

939
00:48:11,120 --> 00:48:13,160
Speaker 1: usually the record company unless you're Taylor Swift or your

940
00:48:13,200 --> 00:48:15,160
Speaker 1: Kanye or whatever, and you own your own sound recording.

941
00:48:15,880 --> 00:48:18,680
Speaker 1: And so we know the reality and the course the

942
00:48:19,200 --> 00:48:22,840
Speaker 1: growth of streaming is off is off the chart, and

943
00:48:23,320 --> 00:48:27,240
Speaker 1: so consequently, you know, Lomana tone Poll is a songwriter.

944
00:48:28,040 --> 00:48:31,200
Speaker 1: So that's all true, Like that's all just happening. And

945
00:48:31,920 --> 00:48:35,480
Speaker 1: in the midst of that, I see my son Um.

946
00:48:35,640 --> 00:48:38,080
Speaker 1: He's on you know, Big Machine, and they have a

947
00:48:38,080 --> 00:48:41,239
Speaker 1: really amicable parting of the ways. And he's got this

948
00:48:41,280 --> 00:48:44,319
Speaker 1: great management company, Iconic, which is really a label, and

949
00:48:44,360 --> 00:48:48,759
Speaker 1: they just start putting out you know, songs, singles as

950
00:48:48,800 --> 00:48:53,120
Speaker 1: streaming singles, and he kind of has showed me that

951
00:48:53,320 --> 00:48:55,480
Speaker 1: how great really streaming is in a lot of ways,

952
00:48:55,520 --> 00:48:59,160
Speaker 1: and it's it's entire it's really bringing about this kind

953
00:48:59,160 --> 00:49:03,200
Speaker 1: of democratization of the form because people who aren't just

954
00:49:03,280 --> 00:49:06,040
Speaker 1: the four or five labels that's all that's left now, right,

955
00:49:06,640 --> 00:49:09,600
Speaker 1: who get their little corporate push. You've got people like

956
00:49:09,680 --> 00:49:11,760
Speaker 1: you know, he's got the first song that Don't Waste Tonight.

957
00:49:11,800 --> 00:49:13,920
Speaker 1: You know, he's got you get two million streams from

958
00:49:13,920 --> 00:49:18,040
Speaker 1: somebody that nobody knows and next single, the song called Stupid.

959
00:49:18,120 --> 00:49:20,320
Speaker 1: In a week, it was like a hundred and something thousand,

960
00:49:20,840 --> 00:49:24,720
Speaker 1: and he's explaining to me, you know, Dad, this is great.

961
00:49:25,080 --> 00:49:27,759
Speaker 1: Do you see that it's great. And what I'm realizing

962
00:49:27,880 --> 00:49:32,760
Speaker 1: is that it is great. It's great. The problem isn't streaming.

963
00:49:33,440 --> 00:49:35,480
Speaker 1: I mean, yes, it would be wonderful if the folks

964
00:49:35,520 --> 00:49:38,880
Speaker 1: that created the form, the Pandora's, the apples, the Spotify's,

965
00:49:39,480 --> 00:49:42,640
Speaker 1: if they had just gone like, well, you know, it's

966
00:49:42,680 --> 00:49:45,480
Speaker 1: just morally wrong to to cut out. But the thing

967
00:49:45,560 --> 00:49:49,040
Speaker 1: is that because the nature of the laws that govern

968
00:49:49,360 --> 00:49:54,040
Speaker 1: intellectual property in America, we are held under compulsory licenses,

969
00:49:54,080 --> 00:49:57,920
Speaker 1: which means that we can't negotiate in this you know,

970
00:49:58,600 --> 00:50:02,680
Speaker 1: in this society, this capital society, we cannot negotiate for

971
00:50:02,800 --> 00:50:07,000
Speaker 1: you know, for our worth in business, songwriters. So we're

972
00:50:07,040 --> 00:50:12,240
Speaker 1: we're screwed unless Congress has to go ahead and say, hey,

973
00:50:12,560 --> 00:50:16,320
Speaker 1: these are laws, there are kick. This digital revolution is

974
00:50:16,400 --> 00:50:19,600
Speaker 1: upon us. Music is being played more than ever. Let's

975
00:50:19,640 --> 00:50:22,040
Speaker 1: find some way to you know, to in a fair

976
00:50:22,080 --> 00:50:26,200
Speaker 1: way to monetize it. And before we lose this one

977
00:50:26,239 --> 00:50:29,680
Speaker 1: of you know, one of America's greatest assets is it's songwriters.

978
00:50:30,520 --> 00:50:32,960
Speaker 1: But it's really been interesting with LEVI because I've you know,

979
00:50:33,120 --> 00:50:35,000
Speaker 1: when I was doing the movie, I kept thinking, you, oh,

980
00:50:35,160 --> 00:50:38,960
Speaker 1: you know, streaming bad evil, you know, And I've come

981
00:50:39,000 --> 00:50:42,279
Speaker 1: to realize it. Really, that's not where the fight is.

982
00:50:42,840 --> 00:50:46,520
Speaker 1: The fight needs to be fought in laws need to change.

983
00:50:47,360 --> 00:50:52,680
Speaker 1: But but streaming itself is just you know, who doesn't

984
00:50:52,719 --> 00:50:55,240
Speaker 1: want to have access to all these songs? I've always

985
00:50:55,239 --> 00:50:58,520
Speaker 1: felt with streaming and right now it's the wild West

986
00:50:58,560 --> 00:51:02,000
Speaker 1: as far as laws, meaning no one's breaking it. There

987
00:51:02,080 --> 00:51:06,480
Speaker 1: just aren't them yet. And just like the wild Wit,

988
00:51:06,640 --> 00:51:11,840
Speaker 1: eventually there's there'll be a sheriff it comes into town

989
00:51:11,960 --> 00:51:16,200
Speaker 1: that actually regulates what's happening in the town. And until

990
00:51:16,239 --> 00:51:18,520
Speaker 1: then you a lot of people running crazy. There are

991
00:51:18,560 --> 00:51:22,279
Speaker 1: no the rules are so old school. Yeah that they're

992
00:51:22,360 --> 00:51:24,880
Speaker 1: not they're not real time. They're not real time. But

993
00:51:25,000 --> 00:51:27,800
Speaker 1: what's happening with with a lot of my friends and songwriters,

994
00:51:28,239 --> 00:51:32,480
Speaker 1: A lot of my friends will testify and talk to Yeah,

995
00:51:32,520 --> 00:51:34,720
Speaker 1: and when you're now new friends and now another friend

996
00:51:34,760 --> 00:51:36,400
Speaker 1: that goes up. We go up to N S. We

997
00:51:36,440 --> 00:51:38,000
Speaker 1: do the N S A I thing and you know,

998
00:51:38,120 --> 00:51:41,320
Speaker 1: thank God for Bart and Krista and and those folks.

999
00:51:41,320 --> 00:51:43,080
Speaker 1: You know, it's funny when you do them because you

1000
00:51:43,280 --> 00:51:46,240
Speaker 1: realize that you're really there to play a couple of songs,

1001
00:51:46,280 --> 00:51:49,799
Speaker 1: and you know it's something's gonna have to happen, and

1002
00:51:49,840 --> 00:51:52,160
Speaker 1: I don't know, Uh, I just don't know when I

1003
00:51:52,160 --> 00:51:54,080
Speaker 1: believe it will. I mean, I know that it will happen,

1004
00:51:54,120 --> 00:51:56,880
Speaker 1: but I know that the laws will change eventually. I

1005
00:51:56,960 --> 00:51:59,520
Speaker 1: just hope they do, you know, before too long. But

1006
00:52:00,000 --> 00:52:01,600
Speaker 1: and a lot of that is because I feel for

1007
00:52:01,719 --> 00:52:05,680
Speaker 1: younger songwriters that you know, it's just it's really good

1008
00:52:05,719 --> 00:52:07,160
Speaker 1: to be able to make a little bit of money.

1009
00:52:07,160 --> 00:52:10,040
Speaker 1: You're not talking baseball money here. We're not talking about hey,

1010
00:52:10,080 --> 00:52:13,640
Speaker 1: you know, let's you know, like we're talking about just

1011
00:52:13,920 --> 00:52:17,319
Speaker 1: make enough money that you can do what it is

1012
00:52:17,360 --> 00:52:19,600
Speaker 1: that God meant you to do, which is to write

1013
00:52:20,440 --> 00:52:25,000
Speaker 1: this poetry, to try and become Jimmy Webb, to try

1014
00:52:25,800 --> 00:52:28,880
Speaker 1: try and write Galveston. That's what you want to do.

1015
00:52:29,320 --> 00:52:31,319
Speaker 1: You want to write American Pie. I mean, you want

1016
00:52:31,320 --> 00:52:34,560
Speaker 1: to write fire and Ring, you want to write damn

1017
00:52:34,560 --> 00:52:37,200
Speaker 1: You're anything Carol King wrote. You know, like, that's what

1018
00:52:37,280 --> 00:52:39,440
Speaker 1: you want to do. And and but to do that,

1019
00:52:39,480 --> 00:52:42,080
Speaker 1: you've got to be able to apply your trade all

1020
00:52:42,080 --> 00:52:45,320
Speaker 1: the time. And it it, you know, will will great

1021
00:52:45,320 --> 00:52:48,799
Speaker 1: writers emerge that One of the interesting statistics that we found,

1022
00:52:48,840 --> 00:52:52,600
Speaker 1: I mean this is is that even though less people

1023
00:52:52,640 --> 00:52:56,200
Speaker 1: are making a living, at songwriting that it's still kind

1024
00:52:56,200 --> 00:52:58,920
Speaker 1: of like the same general number of songwriters are floating

1025
00:52:58,920 --> 00:53:05,640
Speaker 1: around this town. So the true hearts, the real believers,

1026
00:53:06,080 --> 00:53:08,960
Speaker 1: they're all out there. They're all out there. And frankly,

1027
00:53:09,000 --> 00:53:12,000
Speaker 1: if streaming gives people a chance to be unique and exciting,

1028
00:53:12,640 --> 00:53:16,120
Speaker 1: and you know, maybe John Marcus the gate keeper, you know,

1029
00:53:16,640 --> 00:53:19,400
Speaker 1: if he is, he's he's pretty groovy as far as

1030
00:53:19,440 --> 00:53:21,400
Speaker 1: I can tell, you know, I mean, I know, at

1031
00:53:21,480 --> 00:53:24,080
Speaker 1: least maybe I'm speaking as a father, as a dad,

1032
00:53:24,320 --> 00:53:25,880
Speaker 1: you know, like he's been good. You know, he he

1033
00:53:25,920 --> 00:53:29,120
Speaker 1: digs leavey stuff, and and it's not just the it's

1034
00:53:29,160 --> 00:53:32,520
Speaker 1: its own thing, right, And I just think you have

1035
00:53:32,600 --> 00:53:34,759
Speaker 1: to be thankful for folks like that too, that are

1036
00:53:34,800 --> 00:53:36,600
Speaker 1: you know, that want to hear something new, that are

1037
00:53:36,640 --> 00:53:39,279
Speaker 1: willing to take some chances. You know, I think you're

1038
00:53:39,280 --> 00:53:45,280
Speaker 1: speaking as a dad. Okay, really, okay's got their own opinion.

1039
00:53:45,880 --> 00:53:59,879
Speaker 1: Um here's there because I like LEVI yeah, I feel

1040
00:53:59,920 --> 00:54:01,680
Speaker 1: like this has been a college course and now I

1041
00:54:01,719 --> 00:54:03,480
Speaker 1: want to shift it a second. I want to here's

1042
00:54:03,560 --> 00:54:06,600
Speaker 1: my here's my theory on streaming and why it's all

1043
00:54:06,680 --> 00:54:09,000
Speaker 1: something's also gonna happen to it because it's becoming out

1044
00:54:09,000 --> 00:54:12,319
Speaker 1: of control to where these streams are so inflated, to

1045
00:54:12,360 --> 00:54:14,520
Speaker 1: where if somebody's gotta have friends that have songs have

1046
00:54:14,520 --> 00:54:17,840
Speaker 1: been stream ten million times, yea, they can't sell it

1047
00:54:17,880 --> 00:54:20,239
Speaker 1: a bar. You're gonna tell me ten million people have

1048
00:54:20,400 --> 00:54:23,439
Speaker 1: listened to this song, but you can't get to people

1049
00:54:23,440 --> 00:54:25,359
Speaker 1: to buy tickets. But I can tell but I can

1050
00:54:25,360 --> 00:54:27,080
Speaker 1: show you the opposite side of that, the other side

1051
00:54:27,080 --> 00:54:29,040
Speaker 1: to that. And again, I'm again it sounds like I'm

1052
00:54:29,040 --> 00:54:31,160
Speaker 1: just sitting around your pitching my son, But I mean,

1053
00:54:31,160 --> 00:54:34,480
Speaker 1: I just I'm telling you, like he goes out and

1054
00:54:34,520 --> 00:54:37,920
Speaker 1: he plays, He's three days away from going out with

1055
00:54:38,000 --> 00:54:40,640
Speaker 1: eighteen Days with l a young band, and he gets

1056
00:54:40,680 --> 00:54:43,120
Speaker 1: goes out with you know, I mean, you know, Kip

1057
00:54:43,160 --> 00:54:45,359
Speaker 1: takes him out, and Dan and Shaye take him out,

1058
00:54:45,360 --> 00:54:48,560
Speaker 1: and Kelsey takes him out, and he goes to Chicago

1059
00:54:48,680 --> 00:54:52,319
Speaker 1: and he hard tickets clubs. Now he's put almost two

1060
00:54:52,360 --> 00:54:56,120
Speaker 1: years in and he's got followings in pockets, and I

1061
00:54:56,200 --> 00:54:58,440
Speaker 1: even know, I couldn't believe it. I'm in London right

1062
00:54:58,960 --> 00:55:02,399
Speaker 1: with my kid in the same room. What we're going

1063
00:55:02,440 --> 00:55:04,680
Speaker 1: to do in shows, right, And I'm playing the show

1064
00:55:04,719 --> 00:55:06,839
Speaker 1: and I'm watching the audience and he's up there, you know,

1065
00:55:07,600 --> 00:55:10,840
Speaker 1: and he's singing, uh, what's the first one? Um, not

1066
00:55:11,040 --> 00:55:14,160
Speaker 1: stupid the uh, don't waste the night, don't wasten night,

1067
00:55:14,320 --> 00:55:16,880
Speaker 1: Come on, come over. I'm looking at the audience and

1068
00:55:16,920 --> 00:55:21,279
Speaker 1: they're singing it, and I'm thinking, well, okay, I mean,

1069
00:55:22,960 --> 00:55:25,480
Speaker 1: you know, that's that's trippy to me. You know, let

1070
00:55:25,480 --> 00:55:27,359
Speaker 1: me not be a dad for a second and talk

1071
00:55:27,440 --> 00:55:29,160
Speaker 1: on the other side. And I do believe that it's

1072
00:55:29,160 --> 00:55:33,359
Speaker 1: reaching more people than anything since Napster. It's we're back

1073
00:55:33,400 --> 00:55:36,239
Speaker 1: to that where people. First of all we need is

1074
00:55:36,239 --> 00:55:39,600
Speaker 1: people to pay for the premium services. That's a thing.

1075
00:55:40,360 --> 00:55:45,200
Speaker 1: So that will in the end trickle down to the

1076
00:55:45,239 --> 00:55:47,880
Speaker 1: songwriters at least for a bit until we're able to

1077
00:55:48,040 --> 00:55:51,080
Speaker 1: change the laws. But paying for the premium services is

1078
00:55:51,120 --> 00:55:53,360
Speaker 1: actually a big deal, So we need more people to

1079
00:55:53,360 --> 00:55:55,560
Speaker 1: buy the premium services. I don't care if it's Spotify,

1080
00:55:55,760 --> 00:56:02,480
Speaker 1: Apple Music. I heart radio, Spotify with it's no commercials, Pandora.

1081
00:56:02,640 --> 00:56:05,799
Speaker 1: You know, everybody now is doing on demand music, and

1082
00:56:05,880 --> 00:56:08,920
Speaker 1: there's no doubt that people are hearing these songs and

1083
00:56:09,000 --> 00:56:10,799
Speaker 1: if someone's coming to town, they're able to check them

1084
00:56:10,840 --> 00:56:13,080
Speaker 1: out easily because they have access on their phone to

1085
00:56:14,760 --> 00:56:17,160
Speaker 1: um or. People can develop a fan basis too, with

1086
00:56:17,200 --> 00:56:20,000
Speaker 1: social media also a big part of this. I'll give

1087
00:56:20,040 --> 00:56:21,960
Speaker 1: you an example. I took Laura Lane out and she

1088
00:56:22,040 --> 00:56:26,680
Speaker 1: opened for us for ten shows from my band UH

1089
00:56:26,800 --> 00:56:30,480
Speaker 1: and Lauren was like, I'm fifty million strange and I'm

1090
00:56:30,520 --> 00:56:32,640
Speaker 1: opening for you, And I'm like, you're right, that's crazy

1091
00:56:32,680 --> 00:56:36,880
Speaker 1: because you're so much better than I know. And it

1092
00:56:37,080 --> 00:56:40,359
Speaker 1: is reaching the mass more so. But what's happening is

1093
00:56:40,560 --> 00:56:43,879
Speaker 1: people are seeing these inflated numbers and going that's not real.

1094
00:56:43,920 --> 00:56:46,879
Speaker 1: So it's ruining it for everyone. And so when someone

1095
00:56:46,920 --> 00:56:48,680
Speaker 1: comes up and they go, now, I'll just give you

1096
00:56:48,800 --> 00:56:52,920
Speaker 1: a normal conversation inside of because for me, everything is

1097
00:56:53,000 --> 00:56:56,440
Speaker 1: digital like that the days of transmitters going into cars.

1098
00:56:56,880 --> 00:56:59,680
Speaker 1: There's probably three to five years of that being really strong,

1099
00:56:59,800 --> 00:57:01,560
Speaker 1: and that's going to start go away. So I've already

1100
00:57:01,600 --> 00:57:04,560
Speaker 1: shifted how I do my job. I'm playing to the phone.

1101
00:57:04,800 --> 00:57:07,480
Speaker 1: Like everything I do place to the phone, because everybody's

1102
00:57:07,520 --> 00:57:10,080
Speaker 1: got there's all the time I do my radio show,

1103
00:57:10,120 --> 00:57:12,080
Speaker 1: and I got three to five years of really strong

1104
00:57:12,160 --> 00:57:14,120
Speaker 1: that really strong, especially in country, which is a couple

1105
00:57:14,120 --> 00:57:17,080
Speaker 1: of years behind. But I'm playing to the phone already

1106
00:57:17,440 --> 00:57:20,200
Speaker 1: I have five million that listen on normal radio and

1107
00:57:20,200 --> 00:57:22,760
Speaker 1: another five million that download my podcast. So I'm looking

1108
00:57:22,800 --> 00:57:25,800
Speaker 1: at pretty much at split and who's taking my content.

1109
00:57:26,880 --> 00:57:28,880
Speaker 1: But I can tell you sitting in these meeting from

1110
00:57:28,920 --> 00:57:30,320
Speaker 1: people come and go, I have this artist and he's

1111
00:57:30,360 --> 00:57:32,440
Speaker 1: got three million streams, and I go, somebody just playlist?

1112
00:57:32,440 --> 00:57:35,560
Speaker 1: Did you? And they're not showing us the algorithm and

1113
00:57:35,560 --> 00:57:37,960
Speaker 1: how these things are getting tracked, Like, let's have a

1114
00:57:38,000 --> 00:57:41,800
Speaker 1: little bit of transparency here on. At least with sound scan,

1115
00:57:41,920 --> 00:57:44,240
Speaker 1: when albums were bought, there was some transparency, and know

1116
00:57:44,280 --> 00:57:46,360
Speaker 1: when this many records came from this store, it was deep.

1117
00:57:46,840 --> 00:57:49,080
Speaker 1: There's not that in the digital landscape. So it makes

1118
00:57:49,120 --> 00:57:51,400
Speaker 1: everyone seemed full of crap because you have people that

1119
00:57:51,440 --> 00:57:55,120
Speaker 1: are just putting songs on playlists and nobody knows it.

1120
00:57:55,160 --> 00:57:57,160
Speaker 1: And because you bought the guy at dinner or took,

1121
00:57:57,320 --> 00:57:59,520
Speaker 1: you know, took a nap at his house, you all

1122
00:57:59,560 --> 00:58:02,160
Speaker 1: of a sudden get playlisted. And it doesn't happen with everybody,

1123
00:58:02,200 --> 00:58:05,640
Speaker 1: but it is happening like that. But at the same time,

1124
00:58:06,160 --> 00:58:11,080
Speaker 1: radio has its problems, streaming has its problems. Everywhere has

1125
00:58:11,120 --> 00:58:14,720
Speaker 1: a weakness, Satellite has its weakness. Higher end they don't

1126
00:58:14,720 --> 00:58:17,880
Speaker 1: know how people are listening either, much smaller audience. Everybody's

1127
00:58:17,880 --> 00:58:20,160
Speaker 1: got its weakness, but everybody has its strength too, And

1128
00:58:20,200 --> 00:58:21,600
Speaker 1: so I could sit here and I often do it,

1129
00:58:21,680 --> 00:58:23,480
Speaker 1: pick radio apart, and boy do I get in trouble

1130
00:58:23,520 --> 00:58:26,360
Speaker 1: for that, because I mean, that's who pays me when

1131
00:58:26,400 --> 00:58:28,080
Speaker 1: I go on the radio and talk about how radio

1132
00:58:28,200 --> 00:58:31,120
Speaker 1: is failing me. It's dying how and not even that

1133
00:58:31,200 --> 00:58:35,320
Speaker 1: it's done. It's shifting, its shifting. But I go, hey,

1134
00:58:35,320 --> 00:58:38,560
Speaker 1: why aren't we working on some of these new initiatives

1135
00:58:38,560 --> 00:58:41,200
Speaker 1: that we know? Regardless, I yell at my own people,

1136
00:58:41,440 --> 00:58:43,640
Speaker 1: and I get in trouble, so I feel safe and

1137
00:58:43,720 --> 00:58:46,080
Speaker 1: yelling at everybody else too. I did tell everybody, but

1138
00:58:46,160 --> 00:58:49,080
Speaker 1: I think that's my When it comes to streaming, that's

1139
00:58:49,080 --> 00:58:51,920
Speaker 1: the issue. These inflated numbers are making everyone look at

1140
00:58:51,960 --> 00:58:54,040
Speaker 1: and go, well, this is absurd. None of it's true

1141
00:58:54,040 --> 00:58:56,680
Speaker 1: because you can buy You can buy ten thousand streams

1142
00:58:56,720 --> 00:58:58,880
Speaker 1: very easily, and people are doing it. Labels are buying

1143
00:58:58,920 --> 00:59:03,640
Speaker 1: streams like crazy. And it's like YouTube views. You can

1144
00:59:03,680 --> 00:59:07,320
Speaker 1: buy YouTube views, no problem, that still happens, but that

1145
00:59:07,360 --> 00:59:09,439
Speaker 1: was a two years ago. A thing really where you're

1146
00:59:09,440 --> 00:59:13,160
Speaker 1: buying YouTube views now people are buying streaming numbers as well. Right,

1147
00:59:13,440 --> 00:59:15,680
Speaker 1: so I'm gonna pay and I'm gonna get fifty streams

1148
00:59:15,720 --> 00:59:17,480
Speaker 1: and I'm gonna look that much cooler. Okay, Well, you

1149
00:59:17,480 --> 00:59:18,960
Speaker 1: pay ten thousand dollars, all of a sudden you got

1150
00:59:18,960 --> 00:59:21,360
Speaker 1: a million streams, and it helps you go, well, I

1151
00:59:21,360 --> 00:59:22,919
Speaker 1: got now I got a million streams. This guy should

1152
00:59:22,960 --> 00:59:25,520
Speaker 1: come play here. Too many people are doing that. The

1153
00:59:25,560 --> 00:59:28,200
Speaker 1: oversaturation of the person with ten million streams is happening,

1154
00:59:28,480 --> 00:59:30,320
Speaker 1: and people are starting to roll their eyes at it. Yeah,

1155
00:59:30,680 --> 00:59:32,600
Speaker 1: does all that make sense? It does make sense, I

1156
00:59:33,040 --> 00:59:36,440
Speaker 1: mean it does. And yet I'm I have to admit,

1157
00:59:36,480 --> 00:59:41,080
Speaker 1: I mean I'm not. I don't feel like you know,

1158
00:59:41,120 --> 00:59:44,520
Speaker 1: I'm in my fifties and I think I resemble my

1159
00:59:44,520 --> 00:59:46,440
Speaker 1: own generation. You know, a lot of this stuff is

1160
00:59:46,520 --> 00:59:50,280
Speaker 1: kind of it's like mystifying to me. What's not mystifying

1161
00:59:50,360 --> 00:59:53,920
Speaker 1: is the idea once something starts to take streaming, and

1162
00:59:53,960 --> 00:59:57,120
Speaker 1: it's always it's funny because it's always happened. Something will

1163
00:59:57,120 --> 00:59:58,919
Speaker 1: take and then you find some way to pay for it.

1164
00:59:59,080 --> 01:00:01,080
Speaker 1: But I have to say that I think that where

1165
01:00:01,080 --> 01:00:04,240
Speaker 1: the rubber meets the road a little bit is any

1166
01:00:04,320 --> 01:00:07,720
Speaker 1: form of if you get any kind of saturation or

1167
01:00:07,760 --> 01:00:09,480
Speaker 1: any kind of that may not be the I don't

1168
01:00:09,480 --> 01:00:11,920
Speaker 1: even know if I know the term the terms any

1169
01:00:12,000 --> 01:00:17,919
Speaker 1: traction and you and if you play live, if they're

1170
01:00:18,040 --> 01:00:21,840
Speaker 1: if you notice a relationship, if there relays a relationship

1171
01:00:21,880 --> 01:00:26,960
Speaker 1: between being a really vital live musician where you go

1172
01:00:27,240 --> 01:00:30,040
Speaker 1: and you know you're you're really building something, you have

1173
01:00:30,160 --> 01:00:33,200
Speaker 1: a sound, then I think you've at least got some

1174
01:00:33,280 --> 01:00:36,400
Speaker 1: building blocks to work with in this very strange time,

1175
01:00:36,440 --> 01:00:40,080
Speaker 1: which it feels like an interim time to me, it's

1176
01:00:40,120 --> 01:00:43,800
Speaker 1: an it's a niche time. This this is what I'm seeing,

1177
01:00:43,880 --> 01:00:46,720
Speaker 1: is I can for me, technology is huge and getting

1178
01:00:46,720 --> 01:00:48,520
Speaker 1: all my messages out. See now you seem like the

1179
01:00:48,560 --> 01:00:52,439
Speaker 1: smartest guy I've ever met. But I have to eat,

1180
01:00:52,880 --> 01:00:54,760
Speaker 1: so I have to pay the bills. So I've got

1181
01:00:54,760 --> 01:00:56,960
Speaker 1: to figure out how to use all of these areas

1182
01:00:57,040 --> 01:00:59,120
Speaker 1: and you get my message out whatever it is. Everybody

1183
01:00:59,120 --> 01:01:00,840
Speaker 1: has a message, So I've got to learn how to

1184
01:01:00,920 --> 01:01:02,600
Speaker 1: use my Twitter in the in the correct way, my

1185
01:01:02,640 --> 01:01:04,960
Speaker 1: Instagram in the right way, what music I put up,

1186
01:01:05,160 --> 01:01:08,120
Speaker 1: what music I promote to put So there are all

1187
01:01:08,200 --> 01:01:11,400
Speaker 1: these things, and what I've determined is that we're becoming

1188
01:01:12,000 --> 01:01:17,400
Speaker 1: a niche celebrity society, meaning the days of just having

1189
01:01:17,440 --> 01:01:21,320
Speaker 1: three channels and Mash gets twenty million viewers is over.

1190
01:01:21,560 --> 01:01:22,760
Speaker 1: By the way, I wasn't even I don't even know

1191
01:01:22,760 --> 01:01:24,080
Speaker 1: how's a live one match was on. But that's my

1192
01:01:24,120 --> 01:01:27,440
Speaker 1: example of everybody watched the finale and match. There's a

1193
01:01:27,480 --> 01:01:32,919
Speaker 1: reason it has the record. So there are so many

1194
01:01:32,960 --> 01:01:35,280
Speaker 1: options out there. It's like a high It's like the

1195
01:01:35,280 --> 01:01:39,439
Speaker 1: interstate and all these cars are going by, and so

1196
01:01:39,920 --> 01:01:42,080
Speaker 1: you gotta quickly catch one because there comes another, here

1197
01:01:42,120 --> 01:01:45,000
Speaker 1: comes another. If you build your niche and you find

1198
01:01:45,080 --> 01:01:49,160
Speaker 1: your small audience and you super serve the crap out

1199
01:01:49,160 --> 01:01:51,840
Speaker 1: of them, that's where the success is going to start

1200
01:01:51,840 --> 01:01:53,640
Speaker 1: coming from. Because there are a thousand different things to do.

1201
01:01:53,760 --> 01:01:55,439
Speaker 1: That's why people are putting out songs so quick, because

1202
01:01:55,440 --> 01:01:56,440
Speaker 1: it goes from one of the other one or the

1203
01:01:56,480 --> 01:01:58,920
Speaker 1: other one or the other. If you find your little

1204
01:01:58,960 --> 01:02:02,280
Speaker 1: group of people in you serve them. It's Thanksgiving dinner

1205
01:02:02,320 --> 01:02:05,120
Speaker 1: to them every single night. You give them cranberry sauce

1206
01:02:05,280 --> 01:02:08,480
Speaker 1: and turkey, and you serve them like crazy, and you

1207
01:02:08,520 --> 01:02:11,480
Speaker 1: build that niche out instead of throwing the big blanket

1208
01:02:11,560 --> 01:02:14,000
Speaker 1: up and hoping you catch as many as possible. That's

1209
01:02:14,040 --> 01:02:18,680
Speaker 1: not working anymore. It's about zeroing in and spreading instead

1210
01:02:18,680 --> 01:02:22,919
Speaker 1: of going hey, everyone, I hope you like me. Boom.

1211
01:02:22,960 --> 01:02:26,440
Speaker 1: And I've seen the change happen even in my dam

1212
01:02:26,440 --> 01:02:28,480
Speaker 1: I mean I started as a teenager in the late

1213
01:02:28,560 --> 01:02:32,440
Speaker 1: nineties doing radio. It's changed dramatically since then. When you

1214
01:02:32,440 --> 01:02:36,520
Speaker 1: would just put out a record and go, everybody love it,

1215
01:02:36,800 --> 01:02:38,960
Speaker 1: that's just not what happens. Even in country music now

1216
01:02:38,960 --> 01:02:41,720
Speaker 1: it's not. It's starting to be niche on the major

1217
01:02:42,240 --> 01:02:45,120
Speaker 1: side of things, even with how you know, I want

1218
01:02:45,120 --> 01:02:48,520
Speaker 1: to hear traditional country. We have radio stations that are

1219
01:02:48,560 --> 01:02:52,000
Speaker 1: now breaking apart inside our format. Yeah, which they always

1220
01:02:52,080 --> 01:02:55,000
Speaker 1: used to talk about remember the nineties. In the late nineties,

1221
01:02:55,000 --> 01:02:58,960
Speaker 1: people started talking that. Now they do it because so

1222
01:02:59,000 --> 01:03:01,680
Speaker 1: it's a very niche. If you super serve your small group,

1223
01:03:01,840 --> 01:03:04,480
Speaker 1: that small group gets a little bit, bigger gets. This

1224
01:03:04,480 --> 01:03:07,560
Speaker 1: podcast started with one thousand people listening. It's like a million.

1225
01:03:07,640 --> 01:03:09,200
Speaker 1: I never thought any able to listen to this crap.

1226
01:03:09,960 --> 01:03:11,760
Speaker 1: I love it. I'm I'm counting. This is a big

1227
01:03:11,800 --> 01:03:14,080
Speaker 1: I'm counting on my career. Pick up. Sure you can

1228
01:03:14,760 --> 01:03:16,360
Speaker 1: we talk about hard tickets. You'll be able to go

1229
01:03:16,440 --> 01:03:19,440
Speaker 1: anywhere and just talk but yeah, this has turned into

1230
01:03:19,440 --> 01:03:21,840
Speaker 1: an entire music theory. You have wrote so many so

1231
01:03:21,960 --> 01:03:26,440
Speaker 1: we didn't even get the song. Let's we have like

1232
01:03:26,520 --> 01:03:29,000
Speaker 1: a few minutes, let's talk some stuff here because and

1233
01:03:29,040 --> 01:03:31,880
Speaker 1: let's just get right down to it, because I feel

1234
01:03:31,920 --> 01:03:34,000
Speaker 1: like I just got a degree from Home University all

1235
01:03:34,080 --> 01:03:36,480
Speaker 1: right now. I feel like I just learned something, although

1236
01:03:37,240 --> 01:03:39,640
Speaker 1: it's so hard for me to follow. And again, I

1237
01:03:39,760 --> 01:03:41,840
Speaker 1: see you. I'm seeing a lot of what you're talking

1238
01:03:41,880 --> 01:03:44,760
Speaker 1: about really through kind of through my son's eyes. And

1239
01:03:44,880 --> 01:03:48,720
Speaker 1: I know Fletcher Fosters manager and like, um, we're really

1240
01:03:49,000 --> 01:03:52,960
Speaker 1: you know, really close family friends and um and then

1241
01:03:53,080 --> 01:03:55,120
Speaker 1: and you know, and we and and actually the guy

1242
01:03:55,160 --> 01:03:58,400
Speaker 1: that you know helps finance Iconic is lair back within me.

1243
01:03:58,840 --> 01:04:00,800
Speaker 1: And I love to talk to him, you know, because

1244
01:04:00,640 --> 01:04:03,160
Speaker 1: they you know, and they care. They care about their Yes,

1245
01:04:03,200 --> 01:04:05,120
Speaker 1: they care about their artists. Is only you know, three

1246
01:04:05,160 --> 01:04:08,440
Speaker 1: of them, but they and they're thinking about this stuff

1247
01:04:08,480 --> 01:04:12,240
Speaker 1: all the time, you know. Um, and then it's just

1248
01:04:12,320 --> 01:04:15,160
Speaker 1: very it's an extraordinary time. And again, as a dad,

1249
01:04:15,200 --> 01:04:18,040
Speaker 1: you know, it's not just that I have a I

1250
01:04:18,040 --> 01:04:19,640
Speaker 1: have two dogs in the game, if you would, you know,

1251
01:04:19,640 --> 01:04:24,960
Speaker 1: like I'm trying to kind of stay vital or involved

1252
01:04:24,960 --> 01:04:27,440
Speaker 1: in the business. Vital is a separate issue, by the way,

1253
01:04:27,480 --> 01:04:30,280
Speaker 1: in my opinion, you know. But the other thing I'm

1254
01:04:30,280 --> 01:04:33,440
Speaker 1: trying to do is I'm also watching you know, my

1255
01:04:33,560 --> 01:04:36,720
Speaker 1: son and who I you know, make music with sometimes,

1256
01:04:36,720 --> 01:04:39,120
Speaker 1: but also you know who I just love and he's

1257
01:04:39,160 --> 01:04:41,840
Speaker 1: trying to you know, I see him going into these waters,

1258
01:04:41,880 --> 01:04:45,000
Speaker 1: the very thing that you're talking about, and I'm excited

1259
01:04:45,000 --> 01:04:47,960
Speaker 1: for him. But sometimes I also feel like, oh gosh,

1260
01:04:48,160 --> 01:04:50,280
Speaker 1: it's so tough for artists today. I mean, I think

1261
01:04:50,280 --> 01:04:52,120
Speaker 1: when I was an artist in the nineties, like when

1262
01:04:52,120 --> 01:04:54,720
Speaker 1: I had a couple of record deals I had, and

1263
01:04:54,760 --> 01:04:56,480
Speaker 1: you know, you would think about, oh wow, I get

1264
01:04:56,480 --> 01:04:58,720
Speaker 1: to do an interview. That six great, and I'm gonna

1265
01:04:58,880 --> 01:05:01,080
Speaker 1: you know, I'll reach a lot of people. And I

1266
01:05:01,560 --> 01:05:04,240
Speaker 1: see artists today and you know, if they don't do

1267
01:05:05,160 --> 01:05:08,520
Speaker 1: three four selfies a day and and do you know,

1268
01:05:08,600 --> 01:05:12,360
Speaker 1: you're you're you know, Twitter feeds and all this other stuff.

1269
01:05:13,320 --> 01:05:15,680
Speaker 1: You know, you're you're trained to do that, and of

1270
01:05:15,680 --> 01:05:17,880
Speaker 1: course it makes perfect sense you you kind of have

1271
01:05:17,960 --> 01:05:20,080
Speaker 1: to do that. But think about the generation before you

1272
01:05:20,080 --> 01:05:22,440
Speaker 1: They said that about you, like, I can't believe what

1273
01:05:22,440 --> 01:05:25,080
Speaker 1: they have to do now. Again, we talked about cycles

1274
01:05:25,560 --> 01:05:28,600
Speaker 1: that people were saying the same thing about from the sixties.

1275
01:05:28,880 --> 01:05:30,840
Speaker 1: I really didn't we really didn't have to do anything

1276
01:05:30,880 --> 01:05:33,000
Speaker 1: too much during the day. I'm like, I just think

1277
01:05:33,040 --> 01:05:34,680
Speaker 1: you have to be on a you gotta be on

1278
01:05:34,680 --> 01:05:39,000
Speaker 1: your phone. It's just you know, if to compete. And

1279
01:05:39,000 --> 01:05:40,600
Speaker 1: and then the Twitter thing, you know, you're like, we

1280
01:05:40,680 --> 01:05:44,080
Speaker 1: got a president who's commenting seven eight times a day.

1281
01:05:44,320 --> 01:05:46,800
Speaker 1: I don't even have Twitter, you know, Like I had

1282
01:05:46,880 --> 01:05:49,920
Speaker 1: Twitter briefly, and I was like, I can't believe I'm

1283
01:05:49,960 --> 01:05:53,000
Speaker 1: commenting on my own life. I can't believe it. Like

1284
01:05:53,120 --> 01:05:58,440
Speaker 1: that's something is separate from President Trump, because I just

1285
01:05:58,800 --> 01:06:03,480
Speaker 1: talking about me in that way. I just I find

1286
01:06:03,480 --> 01:06:08,640
Speaker 1: it that's a separate issue. But the the this generation

1287
01:06:08,720 --> 01:06:12,480
Speaker 1: that is filming itself and commenting on itself as they

1288
01:06:12,520 --> 01:06:14,800
Speaker 1: live their lives, you know. And I've done, you know,

1289
01:06:14,800 --> 01:06:17,160
Speaker 1: and I was just just two. I did two weeks

1290
01:06:17,160 --> 01:06:18,960
Speaker 1: in Europe with a c m A right into the

1291
01:06:18,960 --> 01:06:24,880
Speaker 1: Songwriter series, and I've you know, I've took pictures and

1292
01:06:25,040 --> 01:06:28,360
Speaker 1: you know, Stockholm and you know, two funky places and

1293
01:06:28,400 --> 01:06:31,560
Speaker 1: sculptures and and uh and Leavi. You know, like we

1294
01:06:31,560 --> 01:06:33,760
Speaker 1: would be we'd be at summer and he'd go, Dad, Okay,

1295
01:06:34,280 --> 01:06:36,080
Speaker 1: you know, take a picture. It's I gotta do a

1296
01:06:36,080 --> 01:06:38,440
Speaker 1: shot for you know, get this out. And I'd be like, okay.

1297
01:06:38,480 --> 01:06:40,400
Speaker 1: So then I'm the cameraman, you know, so I'm like

1298
01:06:40,440 --> 01:06:41,680
Speaker 1: part of the team. All of a sudden, I'm like

1299
01:06:41,720 --> 01:06:43,440
Speaker 1: doing the shot and then we're checking out and he's

1300
01:06:43,480 --> 01:06:45,080
Speaker 1: like I like that when I'm like, okay, we'll use

1301
01:06:45,120 --> 01:06:47,600
Speaker 1: that one, and I'm thinking wow. So so that's sort

1302
01:06:47,640 --> 01:06:49,720
Speaker 1: of the amicable, positive way of looking at But the

1303
01:06:49,760 --> 01:06:52,120
Speaker 1: other side, it's just the pressure for these young people,

1304
01:06:52,240 --> 01:06:56,520
Speaker 1: you know, like, oh my god, it's trained. It's it's

1305
01:06:56,560 --> 01:06:59,880
Speaker 1: the only thing that I know. Yeah. So to me,

1306
01:07:00,400 --> 01:07:02,440
Speaker 1: it's like if I never had a television, what I

1307
01:07:02,480 --> 01:07:06,040
Speaker 1: missed television. I've never not known that I had to

1308
01:07:06,080 --> 01:07:10,680
Speaker 1: digitally be on the forefront. Yeah, that's always been a constant.

1309
01:07:11,200 --> 01:07:14,640
Speaker 1: So to me, it's not weird. Yeah. Yeah. Well, and

1310
01:07:14,680 --> 01:07:16,360
Speaker 1: I hear what you're saying, and I mean and I

1311
01:07:16,400 --> 01:07:18,880
Speaker 1: get it, and I know, I don't think leeve I

1312
01:07:18,920 --> 01:07:21,480
Speaker 1: think it's weird, you know. And and and it's funny too,

1313
01:07:21,480 --> 01:07:24,080
Speaker 1: because there's a kind of a there's a fellowship too

1314
01:07:24,160 --> 01:07:27,320
Speaker 1: within there, like the way that you like other people's things,

1315
01:07:27,360 --> 01:07:31,040
Speaker 1: you know, And I do have Facebook, and I'm you know,

1316
01:07:32,000 --> 01:07:35,440
Speaker 1: I definitely liked. I mean, I want to like if

1317
01:07:35,480 --> 01:07:37,520
Speaker 1: I'll see something, you know, people who put out a

1318
01:07:37,560 --> 01:07:40,000
Speaker 1: record or they've done something, or they're playing and their

1319
01:07:40,120 --> 01:07:44,600
Speaker 1: picture or their their dog or somebody. You know. I

1320
01:07:44,720 --> 01:07:46,040
Speaker 1: you know, I'm enough a part of it. I'm not

1321
01:07:46,200 --> 01:07:48,760
Speaker 1: completely out of it, but I'm I feel a little

1322
01:07:48,800 --> 01:07:53,080
Speaker 1: bit out of it. You know, you feel generationally a

1323
01:07:53,120 --> 01:07:56,240
Speaker 1: little bit out of it. I think at some point

1324
01:07:56,320 --> 01:07:58,560
Speaker 1: we all should start to feel generationally a little bit

1325
01:07:58,560 --> 01:08:01,120
Speaker 1: out of it. That's probably an actual, isn't it. It is?

1326
01:08:01,280 --> 01:08:04,000
Speaker 1: It is because I remember, like with my mom and dad,

1327
01:08:04,040 --> 01:08:06,600
Speaker 1: you know that when they would listen to my music,

1328
01:08:06,840 --> 01:08:09,440
Speaker 1: and they were huge fans and they were so supportive,

1329
01:08:09,440 --> 01:08:12,200
Speaker 1: and when they could travel, they came to everything, you know,

1330
01:08:12,720 --> 01:08:15,200
Speaker 1: and they love music so much, and they've made music,

1331
01:08:15,280 --> 01:08:17,840
Speaker 1: you know, and and but they you know, what they

1332
01:08:17,840 --> 01:08:21,840
Speaker 1: like was the ballads. And I could play Born Fly,

1333
01:08:22,000 --> 01:08:24,320
Speaker 1: Ready to Run or you know or whatever, and and

1334
01:08:24,360 --> 01:08:27,360
Speaker 1: they would go, that's cool, you know, like yeah, that's yeah, yeah,

1335
01:08:27,360 --> 01:08:29,040
Speaker 1: And I could tell they were like kind of getting it.

1336
01:08:29,360 --> 01:08:31,200
Speaker 1: And then you'd sit down at the piano, and if

1337
01:08:31,240 --> 01:08:33,240
Speaker 1: I get the piano and I'd played Blessed the Broken

1338
01:08:33,320 --> 01:08:36,960
Speaker 1: Road or um or over my Shoulder or something, you know,

1339
01:08:37,080 --> 01:08:42,679
Speaker 1: and they would go, yeah, that's it because they came

1340
01:08:42,760 --> 01:08:45,240
Speaker 1: from an age of ballads, you know, where the ballot,

1341
01:08:45,520 --> 01:08:48,200
Speaker 1: you know, and all the singers you'd have a song,

1342
01:08:48,479 --> 01:08:50,840
Speaker 1: and the song you'd have a song, and like you'd

1343
01:08:50,880 --> 01:08:53,800
Speaker 1: have a Burt backrock song for example, you know, well,

1344
01:08:53,880 --> 01:08:55,960
Speaker 1: I do know that's what I'm thinking of a Karen,

1345
01:08:57,000 --> 01:09:00,760
Speaker 1: But there's what's a good Burt Back correct song? Is

1346
01:09:00,760 --> 01:09:04,720
Speaker 1: he saying rain drops keep falling? But let's say that.

1347
01:09:04,800 --> 01:09:07,080
Speaker 1: Let's take that song, okay, rain drops keep falling on

1348
01:09:07,200 --> 01:09:12,839
Speaker 1: my head, and you'll have um ten different pop singers

1349
01:09:12,880 --> 01:09:15,920
Speaker 1: like Sinatral do a version, and then you know, Karen

1350
01:09:15,960 --> 01:09:18,839
Speaker 1: Carpenter will do version, and they do have you know whomever,

1351
01:09:19,320 --> 01:09:21,600
Speaker 1: and the songs you'd have songs like that. They just

1352
01:09:21,640 --> 01:09:24,840
Speaker 1: had this breadth and and I just think that was

1353
01:09:24,880 --> 01:09:27,120
Speaker 1: a generation that looked at you know, you might call

1354
01:09:27,160 --> 01:09:31,479
Speaker 1: it crooning or um and so certain kinds of things

1355
01:09:31,479 --> 01:09:35,400
Speaker 1: like rhythmic ideas that were real specific to a particular

1356
01:09:35,400 --> 01:09:38,360
Speaker 1: period of time that I think, my think for my

1357
01:09:38,400 --> 01:09:39,840
Speaker 1: folks a lot of that, which is sort of they

1358
01:09:39,880 --> 01:09:42,280
Speaker 1: just wouldn't catch it. I've never done this before. But

1359
01:09:42,320 --> 01:09:44,920
Speaker 1: what I want to do in a few months I

1360
01:09:44,920 --> 01:09:47,439
Speaker 1: want to have I've never anything back again. I want

1361
01:09:47,439 --> 01:09:49,360
Speaker 1: to have you back, and I will have to come

1362
01:09:49,360 --> 01:09:52,000
Speaker 1: back because for me, this has been it. I never

1363
01:09:52,040 --> 01:09:55,800
Speaker 1: know where he was going, but I feel like philosophically,

1364
01:09:55,880 --> 01:09:58,040
Speaker 1: we've talked about a lot of things. Yeah, I just

1365
01:09:58,040 --> 01:09:59,559
Speaker 1: want to run these songs real quick and we'll get

1366
01:09:59,560 --> 01:10:01,280
Speaker 1: to all this at a later points. So you wrote,

1367
01:10:01,560 --> 01:10:06,200
Speaker 1: first of all, you put out Bless the Broken Road yourself. Yeah,

1368
01:10:06,280 --> 01:10:07,519
Speaker 1: well I didn't put it out. I put it out

1369
01:10:07,520 --> 01:10:09,360
Speaker 1: on an album and that album also had one of

1370
01:10:09,400 --> 01:10:11,360
Speaker 1: these days, which but you put the album out. I

1371
01:10:11,360 --> 01:10:14,240
Speaker 1: mean it was out there people, Yeah, they could consume it.

1372
01:10:14,600 --> 01:10:24,240
Speaker 1: How did the flats get it? I just to this day.

1373
01:10:24,240 --> 01:10:26,519
Speaker 1: I mean that that and the song moving On or

1374
01:10:27,000 --> 01:10:30,280
Speaker 1: like two of my absolute favorite. The simplicity of the

1375
01:10:30,320 --> 01:10:32,600
Speaker 1: way they did that song, it was just killed me.

1376
01:10:33,120 --> 01:10:34,800
Speaker 1: You know a lot of people did the song. You know,

1377
01:10:34,840 --> 01:10:38,519
Speaker 1: Melody Crittenden did it on her asylum and she actually

1378
01:10:38,560 --> 01:10:40,559
Speaker 1: put out as a single. And I died in the

1379
01:10:40,600 --> 01:10:42,200
Speaker 1: forties and I thought that was the end of it.

1380
01:10:42,240 --> 01:10:44,720
Speaker 1: And Jeff Hannah and I, you know, well, you keep

1381
01:10:44,720 --> 01:10:47,559
Speaker 1: pitching it. It got pitched by a lot of people.

1382
01:10:47,600 --> 01:10:50,479
Speaker 1: Tracy Gershawn and a woman be the name of Michelle

1383
01:10:50,479 --> 01:10:53,160
Speaker 1: Berlin at BMG kept put pitching it and and then

1384
01:10:53,240 --> 01:10:55,160
Speaker 1: Jeff and I would pitch the song all the time

1385
01:10:55,160 --> 01:10:57,800
Speaker 1: to different people, and I think, I think, you know,

1386
01:10:58,120 --> 01:11:00,000
Speaker 1: Brooks and Donne took a stab at it. I believe

1387
01:11:00,040 --> 01:11:02,160
Speaker 1: one own it took a look at it. A lot

1388
01:11:02,160 --> 01:11:04,559
Speaker 1: of people looked at it. And the you know, in

1389
01:11:04,760 --> 01:11:07,920
Speaker 1: early on, I used to write a lot with Flats,

1390
01:11:08,200 --> 01:11:10,600
Speaker 1: the guys when their first three records, you know, and

1391
01:11:10,640 --> 01:11:13,760
Speaker 1: I had a number of songs on their albums um

1392
01:11:13,800 --> 01:11:15,519
Speaker 1: and they used to always say to me, Okay, we

1393
01:11:15,600 --> 01:11:17,240
Speaker 1: love that Blessed the Broken Road, because the thing about

1394
01:11:17,240 --> 01:11:19,360
Speaker 1: Blessed the Broken Road is it. And this is when

1395
01:11:19,360 --> 01:11:21,960
Speaker 1: I suddenly realized that it was it was going to

1396
01:11:22,040 --> 01:11:24,720
Speaker 1: have a life of its own. Was that, you know,

1397
01:11:24,800 --> 01:11:29,519
Speaker 1: my wife's a minister, okay, and then and I, you know,

1398
01:11:29,880 --> 01:11:31,880
Speaker 1: and pretty well known, and she does lots of really

1399
01:11:31,880 --> 01:11:34,920
Speaker 1: interesting stuff. She's the founder of Thistle Farms, and and

1400
01:11:35,240 --> 01:11:36,960
Speaker 1: she actually does more touring than any of us now

1401
01:11:37,000 --> 01:11:39,639
Speaker 1: by the way, she's far more involved, she's going far

1402
01:11:39,640 --> 01:11:43,080
Speaker 1: more national than anyone in the family. But um, you know,

1403
01:11:43,120 --> 01:11:44,960
Speaker 1: for years and years I was I was playing weddings.

1404
01:11:45,200 --> 01:11:47,680
Speaker 1: I realized, I mean, she would do weddings, but I was.

1405
01:11:47,800 --> 01:11:49,559
Speaker 1: I can't tell you how many weddings I was doing.

1406
01:11:49,920 --> 01:11:52,840
Speaker 1: And I got an award in the mail for like

1407
01:11:52,960 --> 01:11:57,000
Speaker 1: sheet Music Song of the Year, and I realized that

1408
01:11:57,280 --> 01:12:00,080
Speaker 1: we hadn't without meaning to we pop. We dropped it

1409
01:12:00,120 --> 01:12:04,400
Speaker 1: into a nerve people getting married later and you're going

1410
01:12:04,439 --> 01:12:06,880
Speaker 1: through a second marriage, third marriage, you know, or even

1411
01:12:07,120 --> 01:12:09,800
Speaker 1: you know, I got married. I was twenty seven years old,

1412
01:12:10,000 --> 01:12:13,640
Speaker 1: you know, I'd had relationships, She'd had relationships, you know,

1413
01:12:14,120 --> 01:12:18,960
Speaker 1: and reclaiming love what that is is is something of

1414
01:12:19,000 --> 01:12:21,840
Speaker 1: our time. It's different. It's not what my parents are,

1415
01:12:21,880 --> 01:12:24,479
Speaker 1: you know, as we all know folks, would you know,

1416
01:12:24,520 --> 01:12:26,600
Speaker 1: get married out of high school, certainly get married right

1417
01:12:26,640 --> 01:12:30,120
Speaker 1: out of college, and and that I didn't mean to

1418
01:12:30,160 --> 01:12:35,120
Speaker 1: write that song in that sense, but I realized, oh damn,

1419
01:12:35,400 --> 01:12:39,360
Speaker 1: we've really hit a vein, you know. Um, and the

1420
01:12:39,720 --> 01:12:43,840
Speaker 1: that song kept getting pitched. And my understanding is the

1421
01:12:43,960 --> 01:12:47,519
Speaker 1: Flats Guys on their last record with the Management production

1422
01:12:47,520 --> 01:12:50,240
Speaker 1: team that they had. They did an album called Feels

1423
01:12:50,280 --> 01:12:53,160
Speaker 1: Like Today, which I believe, I don't know if it's not,

1424
01:12:53,200 --> 01:12:56,360
Speaker 1: it's close. It's probably now there biggest selling record. I

1425
01:12:56,400 --> 01:12:59,920
Speaker 1: would think they were. The first song went out a

1426
01:13:00,040 --> 01:13:04,320
Speaker 1: fantastics on Fields Like Today that whatever. But and that

1427
01:13:04,360 --> 01:13:07,280
Speaker 1: song didn't go like number one or top five even

1428
01:13:07,280 --> 01:13:10,200
Speaker 1: and it was considered a massive, you know, setback. And

1429
01:13:10,280 --> 01:13:12,960
Speaker 1: I understand um because I was out of the country

1430
01:13:13,000 --> 01:13:15,800
Speaker 1: at the time that summer that that that the label

1431
01:13:15,880 --> 01:13:18,000
Speaker 1: was thinking of maybe trash and the record. That's what

1432
01:13:18,040 --> 01:13:19,600
Speaker 1: I've been told. I don't know if that's true. It

1433
01:13:19,640 --> 01:13:22,400
Speaker 1: might be apocryphal. I'm not sure. And I believe the

1434
01:13:22,479 --> 01:13:26,000
Speaker 1: label said, let's let's cut two more songs, Let's try that,

1435
01:13:26,240 --> 01:13:28,200
Speaker 1: Let's try that Blessed the Broken Road. You guys said

1436
01:13:28,240 --> 01:13:30,160
Speaker 1: you like oh, because they used always say, oh man,

1437
01:13:30,160 --> 01:13:31,920
Speaker 1: we're gonna do that song. And they would never do

1438
01:13:32,000 --> 01:13:33,880
Speaker 1: that song. And I would, you know, I'd be like,

1439
01:13:33,920 --> 01:13:35,840
Speaker 1: come on, guys, you know, and they would never do

1440
01:13:35,880 --> 01:13:38,400
Speaker 1: the song. And I remember I got back revisiting my

1441
01:13:38,439 --> 01:13:41,599
Speaker 1: family was living in uh my parents at that time

1442
01:13:41,640 --> 01:13:43,599
Speaker 1: living in Botswana where they worked for a long time,

1443
01:13:43,600 --> 01:13:46,080
Speaker 1: and so we remember getting back, and I remember Michelle

1444
01:13:46,120 --> 01:13:48,400
Speaker 1: Berlin running out of the doors of BMG and she says,

1445
01:13:48,640 --> 01:13:50,639
Speaker 1: they did it. And I'm like, they did what? Who's

1446
01:13:50,680 --> 01:13:53,439
Speaker 1: they and what do they do? She said, they did it,

1447
01:13:53,640 --> 01:13:55,519
Speaker 1: and they're gonna put it out as a single, and

1448
01:13:55,520 --> 01:13:57,799
Speaker 1: I'm like, what. Blessed the Broken Road? And I remember

1449
01:13:57,800 --> 01:13:59,479
Speaker 1: the first time I heard it. I mean I literally

1450
01:13:59,479 --> 01:14:01,240
Speaker 1: hair went up my arms, you know, and you don't

1451
01:14:01,840 --> 01:14:04,240
Speaker 1: you don't always feel that at all, but it was

1452
01:14:04,320 --> 01:14:08,519
Speaker 1: so pure and beautiful. It just was outstanding. But that's,

1453
01:14:08,720 --> 01:14:11,320
Speaker 1: you know, that's the story that I heard about it.

1454
01:14:13,080 --> 01:14:24,760
Speaker 1: So the Dixie Chicks to that one? How about this one?

1455
01:14:25,120 --> 01:14:27,040
Speaker 1: How did you get with the chicks? As you called them,

1456
01:14:27,040 --> 01:14:29,760
Speaker 1: I wouldn't call chicks the chicks the Dixie Chicks. They

1457
01:14:29,880 --> 01:14:32,400
Speaker 1: I mean, I was I was kind of being let go.

1458
01:14:32,800 --> 01:14:36,080
Speaker 1: I was being let go by Sony and then they

1459
01:14:36,080 --> 01:14:38,559
Speaker 1: were coming in. So one of my guys, I have

1460
01:14:38,600 --> 01:14:41,400
Speaker 1: to two guys that during that period of my life,

1461
01:14:41,400 --> 01:14:43,080
Speaker 1: I had two guys that were really my champions, one

1462
01:14:43,120 --> 01:14:46,000
Speaker 1: with Scott Simon and the other was Paul Whorley. So

1463
01:14:46,160 --> 01:14:49,920
Speaker 1: one time Scott and Paul ran Sony and that's when

1464
01:14:49,960 --> 01:14:52,639
Speaker 1: I got signed. They you know, when my friends became

1465
01:14:52,720 --> 01:14:55,760
Speaker 1: record president. So Scott was a great publisher. Of course

1466
01:14:55,760 --> 01:14:58,759
Speaker 1: he subsequently was a great manager, has is a manager RPM,

1467
01:14:58,800 --> 01:15:01,679
Speaker 1: you know, Tim mcgrawn, um. And then of course Paul

1468
01:15:01,680 --> 01:15:04,800
Speaker 1: really is one of the greatest producers that ever worked

1469
01:15:04,800 --> 01:15:08,439
Speaker 1: in this town. And while I was being flushed out,

1470
01:15:08,760 --> 01:15:10,640
Speaker 1: they had moved on and someone else had come in

1471
01:15:10,640 --> 01:15:13,800
Speaker 1: to take over Sony. But they're still my friends. And

1472
01:15:13,960 --> 01:15:18,400
Speaker 1: so when the Chicks, the Dixie Chicks got signed, um,

1473
01:15:18,880 --> 01:15:22,719
Speaker 1: they that's really how I got set up to write

1474
01:15:22,760 --> 01:15:25,719
Speaker 1: with them, because the Dixie Chicks told me they knew

1475
01:15:25,760 --> 01:15:29,960
Speaker 1: my record, which although it didn't sell very well, um

1476
01:15:30,000 --> 01:15:32,519
Speaker 1: it did. We did a weird campaign where instead of

1477
01:15:32,560 --> 01:15:34,519
Speaker 1: putting a single out and then following it with press,

1478
01:15:34,800 --> 01:15:36,920
Speaker 1: we did six months of press, giving the album to

1479
01:15:37,040 --> 01:15:40,720
Speaker 1: people and then we did so it was really kind

1480
01:15:40,720 --> 01:15:43,080
Speaker 1: of an ask backwards kind of approach. But what it

1481
01:15:43,120 --> 01:15:44,880
Speaker 1: did do is it was like it got me a

1482
01:15:44,920 --> 01:15:47,439
Speaker 1: lot of publicity and promotion for the songs, many of

1483
01:15:47,439 --> 01:15:51,280
Speaker 1: which subsequently went on to get cut and um. And

1484
01:15:51,360 --> 01:15:53,040
Speaker 1: so I really look at it like it was like

1485
01:15:53,080 --> 01:15:55,240
Speaker 1: the most expensive publishing demo ever, you know, in a

1486
01:15:55,280 --> 01:15:57,800
Speaker 1: weird way, because That's why I got I got to

1487
01:15:57,840 --> 01:15:59,680
Speaker 1: play with them, because if you listen to songs, some

1488
01:15:59,720 --> 01:16:01,679
Speaker 1: of the songs on the record all in good time

1489
01:16:02,479 --> 01:16:08,599
Speaker 1: um their real roots, banjo grooves, folk meets soul meets

1490
01:16:08,680 --> 01:16:12,559
Speaker 1: you know, and that really is what the Dixie Chicks did,

1491
01:16:12,600 --> 01:16:15,559
Speaker 1: only they did it much better and in a way

1492
01:16:15,600 --> 01:16:18,439
Speaker 1: that was about to be eaten up by the country,

1493
01:16:18,439 --> 01:16:20,200
Speaker 1: and nobody saw it coming like I never caught a

1494
01:16:20,200 --> 01:16:23,240
Speaker 1: way before. And the first time I wrote with them,

1495
01:16:23,280 --> 01:16:25,680
Speaker 1: I wrote with Marty and I met her at Fido's

1496
01:16:25,840 --> 01:16:28,240
Speaker 1: in the village and she had a few hours in

1497
01:16:28,320 --> 01:16:30,200
Speaker 1: their back and their first single was out the cost

1498
01:16:30,240 --> 01:16:33,599
Speaker 1: of song of I Can love You Better than that

1499
01:16:34,120 --> 01:16:37,960
Speaker 1: I can love you Baby, I love you better. And

1500
01:16:38,040 --> 01:16:39,800
Speaker 1: that was when I and I. The thing is, I

1501
01:16:39,920 --> 01:16:42,880
Speaker 1: knew the dix Chicks because my cousin was a comptroller

1502
01:16:42,920 --> 01:16:45,720
Speaker 1: and Irvine and she had used to hire them when

1503
01:16:45,760 --> 01:16:47,519
Speaker 1: they were more of a writer's in the sky, you know,

1504
01:16:47,680 --> 01:16:50,120
Speaker 1: frills and cowboy hats, and they had that other singer,

1505
01:16:50,400 --> 01:16:53,200
Speaker 1: So I actually knew who they were, right And when

1506
01:16:53,200 --> 01:16:55,559
Speaker 1: I wrote with Marty, we were the first time we wrote,

1507
01:16:55,600 --> 01:16:57,760
Speaker 1: we wrote ready to run the first day, and I

1508
01:16:57,840 --> 01:16:59,559
Speaker 1: by the way. I eventually wrote with all of them,

1509
01:16:59,560 --> 01:17:03,160
Speaker 1: but Marty and I wrote many songs they only recorded too.

1510
01:17:03,520 --> 01:17:06,040
Speaker 1: But I wrote a lot of songs with her and

1511
01:17:06,360 --> 01:17:08,960
Speaker 1: uh and play it on the record. I played guitar

1512
01:17:09,000 --> 01:17:13,240
Speaker 1: and Ready to Run like that. It's a fine guitar

1513
01:17:13,240 --> 01:17:15,680
Speaker 1: playing up. I do say so myself. I wish I

1514
01:17:15,720 --> 01:17:17,400
Speaker 1: could say I played the band on that because that's

1515
01:17:17,439 --> 01:17:23,760
Speaker 1: a really killing Now from and this is a we'll

1516
01:17:23,800 --> 01:17:25,360
Speaker 1: do another hour in a few months. What's you come

1517
01:17:25,360 --> 01:17:28,200
Speaker 1: back over to the house if you don't mind something. Um,

1518
01:17:28,240 --> 01:17:31,479
Speaker 1: what we've learned from this is if you go hang

1519
01:17:31,560 --> 01:17:35,599
Speaker 1: out with enough satellite streaming a radio people and take

1520
01:17:35,680 --> 01:17:38,479
Speaker 1: them wine and give them massages, they'll play your songs.

1521
01:17:39,560 --> 01:17:41,720
Speaker 1: And that's running all And that's what you taught us. Yeah,

1522
01:17:41,760 --> 01:17:45,120
Speaker 1: that's yeah, but that's you know what that's been happening.

1523
01:17:45,120 --> 01:17:49,320
Speaker 1: It's like you know, they just they still do it

1524
01:17:49,400 --> 01:17:53,080
Speaker 1: just has to be. It's just different. Everything, everything's always

1525
01:17:53,520 --> 01:17:56,679
Speaker 1: there's always a thing. I really appreciate the time. Yeah,

1526
01:17:56,720 --> 01:18:00,720
Speaker 1: thank you, Bobby, thank you, congratulations on everything and um

1527
01:18:00,720 --> 01:18:03,920
Speaker 1: that you've done. And it's sometime when we do if

1528
01:18:03,960 --> 01:18:06,200
Speaker 1: we do get to talk again, I want to ask

1529
01:18:06,240 --> 01:18:08,639
Speaker 1: you some questions. I think that'd be a fantastic because

1530
01:18:08,640 --> 01:18:09,800
Speaker 1: I want to the answer. I want sign you're a

1531
01:18:09,800 --> 01:18:12,000
Speaker 1: smart as you. But I love to answer questions that way.

1532
01:18:12,000 --> 01:18:14,639
Speaker 1: I don't I don't even think of the question you're

1533
01:18:14,880 --> 01:18:17,040
Speaker 1: you're good though. Yeah, next time we'll do that. That's

1534
01:18:17,080 --> 01:18:19,400
Speaker 1: been interesting. Let me interview you a little bit. I

1535
01:18:19,479 --> 01:18:20,960
Speaker 1: just got a couple of things that I was doing

1536
01:18:20,960 --> 01:18:23,920
Speaker 1: some reading about you, and you've got some pretty there's

1537
01:18:23,960 --> 01:18:26,120
Speaker 1: some pretty interesting stuff. I just want to ask some questions.

1538
01:18:26,120 --> 01:18:29,280
Speaker 1: But I think that's that's fair. All right, Hey, thank

1539
01:18:29,280 --> 01:18:32,120
Speaker 1: you very much, thank you. There there is wow. I

1540
01:18:32,160 --> 01:18:35,280
Speaker 1: look at this guy here episode eighty seven. That is

1541
01:18:35,320 --> 01:18:37,800
Speaker 1: Marcus Humming And uh, I just flew in from Europe

1542
01:18:37,840 --> 01:18:39,840
Speaker 1: and hopped off planned and came over to the house.

1543
01:18:39,880 --> 01:18:42,200
Speaker 1: So uh LEVI for us in the shout out, buddy,

1544
01:18:42,200 --> 01:18:44,759
Speaker 1: I'll see around. We'll see you guys next time. About