Speaker 1: This is How Men Think with Brooks Like and Gavin
Speaker 1: to grab and I heard radio podcast. Welcome to How
Speaker 1: Men Think Podcast. My name is Brooks Like. Coming to
Speaker 1: you live. Yes we are. We are in Las Vegas.
Speaker 1: That's where our whole budget went. We haven't been paid
Speaker 1: for this show. Yeah that's right. I spent the whole
Speaker 1: budget on this sweet here in planet Hollywood. It is sweet.
Speaker 1: It is sweet. Is my buddy Mr Gavin to be here? Baby? Yeah?
Speaker 1: Come on, this is your town, This is my town.
Speaker 1: You everywhere we walk, everybody's like Covin Kevin. No, they're saying, Gavin,
Speaker 1: get out of the way. Hey Brooks, what are you doing?
Speaker 1: But you have a place here. Yeah, I've actually my
Speaker 1: my thoughts on this town have changed just listening to
Speaker 1: you talk about it, because you come here and you
Speaker 1: think it's got such a connotation of entertainment and industry,
Speaker 1: that kind of stuff, um, wildlife. But you actually find
Speaker 1: a different meaning in this town. Um, you have a
Speaker 1: place here and come here, and then so I change
Speaker 1: your mind a little bit. You know what they call
Speaker 1: that what manipulation? I call that friendship? You call it that.
Speaker 1: Some would say you are the modern day Elvis is that?
Speaker 1: What is that what they call you? Gav? I gonna
Speaker 1: start calling you that from now and for sure you
Speaker 1: can sing? No, no, you can. You've practiced in an
Speaker 1: Elvis voice. These hips fly? What about Sinatra? Can you
Speaker 1: sing Sinatra? Can you sing it tonight? Yes? Are we
Speaker 1: gonna do karaoke tonight? No? Yes, let's do it. No.
Speaker 1: I told you I'm not doing karaoke with a rock star.
Speaker 1: It doesn't make sense. You are a rock star. So
Speaker 1: we got Rick and Dmitri here with us. Dmitri, you
Speaker 1: are a rock star yourself, not to the legitimate sense
Speaker 1: that Gavin is. I'm not gonna like follow him on stage.
Speaker 1: Do you want to do Islands in the Stream. I'll
Speaker 1: do Islands in the Stream? I guess we're doing karaoke? Yeah, alright,
Speaker 1: in case you guys can making me a butter cup.
Speaker 1: You guys can't hear Gavin right now. He's eating peanut
Speaker 1: butter cups, not talking into his mic peanut butter cups.
Speaker 1: Those are the bad reviews we get on Apple on iTunes,
Speaker 1: as were like, we can't hear the one guy, Gavin.
Speaker 1: Haven't heard all these marble mouth recordings right now? Hitting
Speaker 1: the top oh man, we are in Vegas, just modernizing
Speaker 1: our podcast. Yeah. I love it that we're in Vegas.
Speaker 1: And it's kind of funny because, like Rick, I think
Speaker 1: didn't get the memo that we were coming to Vegas.
Speaker 1: Because he's got pants on, he's got a T shirt,
Speaker 1: he's got like a Chanel's sweater. I'm a little chilly.
Speaker 1: I mean I planned ahead. I knew everything was going
Speaker 1: to be in air condishing where we were going. Are
Speaker 1: you going to like after this? Is that why you
Speaker 1: have a nice sweater? A couple of yes, you do
Speaker 1: look you do look trendy though, Rick, thank you. I
Speaker 1: want to say all you guys looked tan too to
Speaker 1: meet the other. To me, I think I'm just I'm
Speaker 1: just Greek. I'm just naturally this color. You're from Canada.
Speaker 1: You I don't know what you're hurt. You're like my pastiness.
Speaker 1: You're from You're from New York. I look like a
Speaker 1: bottle of Elmer's glue. You put on an orange hat.
Speaker 1: You look exactly like. Let's get an orange hat. He's
Speaker 1: got a blue one on right now. If he eats
Speaker 1: any more of those beauty is. If I go to
Speaker 1: the pool, everyone around me gets more tanned. There you go.
Speaker 1: You're you're so kind. You're the type of person by
Speaker 1: the pool that like moms would come over and apply
Speaker 1: sunscreen to you because they would feel badly because like
Speaker 1: he is going to burn that man soul has left
Speaker 1: his body. Oh buddy, you're too hard on yourself. I
Speaker 1: heard a rumor though, gav uh Well, Rick and Dmitri
Speaker 1: and I and Ryan, we all heard a rumor. Did
Speaker 1: you're not staying at the hotel with us? I'm not
Speaker 1: because I have a house here. Oh I heard that rumor,
Speaker 1: but I was I thought it was false because I
Speaker 1: haven't been invited. You're you're didn't know. I mean, it's
Speaker 1: not like a house house. It's like you know, it's
Speaker 1: like a hotel room that I keep here at another hotel,
Speaker 1: a different one from where you guys are. Intentionally, it's weird.
Speaker 1: The address is called MGM grand Is it there is
Speaker 1: in one of the casinos? No? No, yeah, yeah, you
Speaker 1: know it damn well should be? Do you have a
Speaker 1: driveway I live in Ah? You know, it's like a hotel.
Speaker 1: And because I I don't. You don't like too good,
Speaker 1: you don't like clean, worse landscaping. I don't like to.
Speaker 1: I don't like doing that kind of work. You like
Speaker 1: turn key, I like turn key, gotcha? I like room service.
Speaker 1: You know, listen, I could cook for me and nearly
Speaker 1: kill myself and everyone who lives in my building because
Speaker 1: I'll burn the place down. Or I could, you know,
Speaker 1: take out or go to a restaurant or whatever like that.
Speaker 1: You know, I like to like I like hotel living.
Speaker 1: Hotel living is nice, but is there is there like
Speaker 1: a little you know, cocktail get together at your place
Speaker 1: before we go out or something. If you bring over
Speaker 1: some cocktails that idea. Well we might as well just
Speaker 1: stay in the casino, but we have to bring our
Speaker 1: own cocktails. I don't think you're gonna be overwhelmed with
Speaker 1: my place. It's a very simple. It's just a gesture.
Speaker 1: It's the gesture. You guys are welcome to come over
Speaker 1: and clean my house. See it's the gesture. Alright. He's
Speaker 1: downplaying it. He's like, I have a small room and
Speaker 1: I bet you he lives next to copperfield and a
Speaker 1: spread spread with lions and fire, and you name it.
Speaker 1: You're driving the gate and fire goes off, Big model, man,
Speaker 1: you should have done something else for a living. His
Speaker 1: doorbell is like Donka Chane or whatever. That song is
Speaker 1: Gavin's home and greets you at Gavin's house. He's right
Speaker 1: back here. Yeah, it's not even a door. You press
Speaker 1: the button and Wayne Newton starts singing live. You guys
Speaker 1: are looking fresh today after I have a little little,
Speaker 1: you know, a little slow today. But hey, that's all right.
Speaker 1: I had a great time last night and I'm excited.
Speaker 1: How much coffee did you have? I had like fourteen cups.
Speaker 1: I think didn't help. Right now, we're at the I
Speaker 1: Heart Radio Festival. So we watched some mats last night.
Speaker 1: We watched some music. We had a great time. Watch
Speaker 1: Whodi and the Blowfish. That was fun. Here's the problem
Speaker 1: with that. I was like, I'm kind of excited to
Speaker 1: see who do you in the Blowfish? And Brooks was
Speaker 1: like me too, and I was like, yeah, there's something
Speaker 1: nostalgic about it. He's like absolutely. I was like, man,
Speaker 1: it reminds me of that a summer during college. He goes, oh,
Speaker 1: I was in the sixth grade, and I was like,
Speaker 1: you know what, it might even it might it might
Speaker 1: have even been grade four, but man, there, Darius crushed
Speaker 1: it last night. He was awesome. Yeah. So we also
Speaker 1: have another very esteemed guest on this show. Yes we do, Yes,
Speaker 1: we do. Real well before we let you introduce him.
Speaker 1: This is a friend of the show and and he
Speaker 1: is an athlete turned music superstar. That's right. Gives me hope.
Speaker 1: I'm really excited to ask this. Okay, that's you know
Speaker 1: you're going to be a supert. I'm in a pivotal
Speaker 1: I heard you singing hold my hand last night. You're
Speaker 1: not not that's not happening. Well maybe, Um, he has
Speaker 1: five number one hits and he's only put out five songs.
Speaker 1: And he's only put out five songs. But I'll let
Speaker 1: you introduce this big hands. Yes I will, Yes, I will. Alright, guys,
Speaker 1: So I've been known this guy for a number of years.
Speaker 1: Number of years you met, you know, kind of by happenstance,
Speaker 1: became buddies, and uh, since then, he's become a big
Speaker 1: superstar in the country world. But I think not just
Speaker 1: a country world. Soon, I think it'll be bigger than
Speaker 1: only the country world. Very very talented and awesome guy,
Speaker 1: My good friend Mr Brett Young. Ye give it up, Thandy.
Speaker 1: We didn't meet by happenstance. I stalked you. It's safe,
Speaker 1: my fan girl, do you real hard for a real
Speaker 1: long time. So let's get into this. I haven't heard
Speaker 1: I've heard that you were you were a big fan
Speaker 1: of his music, but I heard you guys had a
Speaker 1: really interesting meeting, like just a happened chance. Yeah we
Speaker 1: did what He played the Greek theater, yeah, in Los Angeles,
Speaker 1: and uh, I had brought like my cousins and stuff,
Speaker 1: and and Gavin does something like I don't want to
Speaker 1: call you out for this, but you do something that
Speaker 1: I think is pretty cool, Like when you can slip
Speaker 1: out and listen to your openers, you do like you'll go,
Speaker 1: you'll go find a pocket where you feel like it's
Speaker 1: a good idea to go out there. And you and
Speaker 1: you were doing that, uh that night, And who's the
Speaker 1: ukulearly guy from Hawaii Jake something? Oh, I think I
Speaker 1: know who you're talking about. Think my wife Liv's fantastic.
Speaker 1: But Gavin's nuck out to like listen to this dude play.
Speaker 1: And I'm walking in with my two younger female cousins
Speaker 1: and I was like, oh, I gotta you gotta meet Gavin. Meanwhile,
Speaker 1: I haven't met you. And I walked them over and
Speaker 1: I give them the moment and I'm walking away going
Speaker 1: like I've worn out three of his records. How did
Speaker 1: I just give away this moment? I'm the bigger fan.
Speaker 1: So fast forward end of the night. It was a
Speaker 1: great show. And uh, I was living in l A.
Speaker 1: We were at Mels Diner on sunset three am, like
Speaker 1: you do, and this guy comes walking down Sunset. I
Speaker 1: think he would just left, but out the front door
Speaker 1: and you're walking down Sunset and I just flagged you
Speaker 1: down and I was like, but I probably it was
Speaker 1: probably like pretty obnoxious because I think I yelled at
Speaker 1: you and said I quit my job to pursue music
Speaker 1: because of you. Did you? Did you really say? It
Speaker 1: was something along the yah. He was like on a
Speaker 1: phone call too, and he was like, I'm gonna have
Speaker 1: to call you back. Knowing Gavin, now, I'm surprised he
Speaker 1: didn't like come at me feeling threatened, like ready to
Speaker 1: throw blows because I'm screaming at at three o'clock in
Speaker 1: the morning in l A. He probably thought the money,
Speaker 1: let me let me get it, let me hold a dollar.
Speaker 1: But uh, but yeah, he got off the phone, and
Speaker 1: he actually I said, I'm about to make my first EP,
Speaker 1: and he just lit right into twenty minutes of advice
Speaker 1: and and twenty minutes he didn't have to give me
Speaker 1: at three o'clock in the morning. And if you couldn't
Speaker 1: be more of a fan than you already were, uh,
Speaker 1: and I think it just turned into you know, next
Speaker 1: thing I know, I'm out in Hawaii to see you
Speaker 1: two and Green Day and Pearl Jam at the Aloha Bowl.
Speaker 1: And it turns out he's playing. Gavin's playing uh the
Speaker 1: Waikiki show the same weekend, So I actually snuck into
Speaker 1: his sound check, and next thing you know, we're running
Speaker 1: into each other at his show. He's not good at
Speaker 1: sneaking in because because he's in board shorts with my
Speaker 1: shirt off at noon, sitting in the front row sound check.
Speaker 1: We made it, by the way to get kicked out
Speaker 1: of that. But sitting next to this guy, I feel
Speaker 1: like it's like a father's sun shot. He's so much
Speaker 1: bigger than me. I'm just sitting on this guy like
Speaker 1: feet are dangling off the couch except your bald But
Speaker 1: he's sorry, come on, don't put yourself in the dangling
Speaker 1: feet category. They're touching the ground a whole different ground.
Speaker 1: So hold on, you said, you said you quit your job.
Speaker 1: This is good. It was a really good job. I was.
Speaker 1: I was. I was waiting tables at the restaurant in
Speaker 1: the Hyatt in Century City, so I was really on
Speaker 1: my way. But before that, you were. The height served
Speaker 1: you very well in baseball. Yeah, Baseball was um, it
Speaker 1: was something I thought. I'm not even thought. We were
Speaker 1: sure that was going to be my life from the
Speaker 1: time you're a kid. Yeah, I think. You know, baseball, basketball,
Speaker 1: and football were part of the story all the way
Speaker 1: up until high school. But when you started getting to
Speaker 1: that level where you you were competitive at all of them,
Speaker 1: you have to pick which one that might be a
Speaker 1: future in a financial future, and it was definitely baseball.
Speaker 1: And I don't I love baseball, but of the three,
Speaker 1: it was probably my my second favorite. I like basketball more,
Speaker 1: but I was throwing ninety miles an hour in high school,
Speaker 1: so on a team that was ranked seventeen in the country,
Speaker 1: so that would just it just seemed like that was
Speaker 1: the obvious thing. And then we got called by the
Speaker 1: Twin and the Devil Rays. They're now the Rays and
Speaker 1: they're allowed to call high school students. It's a little different,
Speaker 1: the rules different than it's also different than college baseball
Speaker 1: that you can't there's a lot of rules that protect
Speaker 1: how much conversation you're allowed to have pre draft and
Speaker 1: if you're coming out of college. But in high school,
Speaker 1: it's like you're kind of protecting the franchise from wasting
Speaker 1: a high round pick on a guy that wants to
Speaker 1: go to college, because then you you'll waste your pick
Speaker 1: and he'll choose college and you just lost that pick.
Speaker 1: So I had had multiple conversations with the Twins and
Speaker 1: the Devil Rays, and it just never felt like enough
Speaker 1: money to forego an education. Joke was on me though,
Speaker 1: because that I didn't finish my education. I hurt my
Speaker 1: elbow and never went pro after that hat that surgery,
Speaker 1: But how old is that? That was my So I
Speaker 1: hurt my I had transferred, I started oldness and I
Speaker 1: had transferred at the time to Fresno State in Central California.
Speaker 1: Just want to get back to Cali And it was
Speaker 1: opening night my junior year. But because I had used
Speaker 1: a transfer red shirt, I couldn't medical red shirt because
Speaker 1: we didn't like put in for it. Soon enough because
Speaker 1: we thought i'd be back, so I missed my junior
Speaker 1: and senior year. So at that point it was like, dang,
Speaker 1: so your your whole life. You're thinking because like as
Speaker 1: a professional athlete, I know what you grow up with
Speaker 1: and you want to be it. It's the only thing
Speaker 1: on your mind. You're thinking, I'm going to be a
Speaker 1: picture in the majors and your family is probably thinking
Speaker 1: the same thing too, And then you have it. Was it,
Speaker 1: Tommy John, Tommy John, and it completely alters the course
Speaker 1: of your life. And then listeners don't all know what
Speaker 1: Tommy Tommy John surgery is replacing the owner collateral ligament
Speaker 1: in the elbow with the Palmyra's longest tendant in the
Speaker 1: forearm that connects to skin instead of muscle, which means
Speaker 1: it doesn't really do anything, and people don't have it.
Speaker 1: That's some member women. Can you please give us some
Speaker 1: details instead of just answering an answer, Come on, just
Speaker 1: say Tommy John, honestly, it honestly is the ligament that
Speaker 1: connects your forearm to your upper arm. It's a big,
Speaker 1: big issue for pictures especially, It's a massive issue for pictures.
Speaker 1: So then after that, did you kind of give up
Speaker 1: hope of baseball or do you still try because I'm
Speaker 1: trying to figure out how you got from that to
Speaker 1: now being a massive country music star because I'm looking
Speaker 1: for a second career here by the way, quite a fallback,
Speaker 1: you know, no more baseball, all right, I'll just be
Speaker 1: a music superstar. Did you have? Was music in you
Speaker 1: as a kid? Like all through this year? So my
Speaker 1: dad's a pastor. I grew up in the church. You know.
Speaker 1: I think there's like every school is different because every
Speaker 1: community is different, and the whole thing, like there's always
Speaker 1: like a thing that all the guys do. And at
Speaker 1: my school there were two, but none of them were
Speaker 1: like sports was like like third. It was like a
Speaker 1: tertiary thing. It was like, uh, the surf team. It
Speaker 1: was really good. And everybody learned guitar so they could
Speaker 1: play worship songs. Wow, and uh. I got thrown into
Speaker 1: leading worship in high school way before I ever thought
Speaker 1: I would pursue it as anything else than leading worship.
Speaker 1: So um, I played guitar and sang just thinking I
Speaker 1: was like kind of serving the church in the high
Speaker 1: school and the whole thing. And then I went to
Speaker 1: college to play baseball and I didn't even my freshman
Speaker 1: year when I went to Old Miss, I did not
Speaker 1: bring my guitar with me to college. I said, if
Speaker 1: I'm if I'm doing this, I'll turn down the twins
Speaker 1: and the Devil raising the whole thing. I'm gonna commit
Speaker 1: to do one baseball. I'm gonna I got three years
Speaker 1: to get more money and make this a thing. And
Speaker 1: so and then and then I left Old Miss after
Speaker 1: my freshman year because I was like, I want to
Speaker 1: be back at the beach. And when I came back
Speaker 1: to the beach, I brought my guitar with me and
Speaker 1: I started playing again. And then I hurt myself. And uh,
Speaker 1: the kind of the kind of the Gavin story where
Speaker 1: you where you came in for me was when I
Speaker 1: hurt myself. I started just playing guitar, no singing, and
Speaker 1: I was learning a butt like all the Dave Matthews records,
Speaker 1: Dave Dave, like Dave has his own way of playing
Speaker 1: like chords and like he self taught himself. Like if
Speaker 1: you watch him play Satellite, his hand is spread out
Speaker 1: all the way across the fret board and he's playing
Speaker 1: an e that takes up two friends, like he has
Speaker 1: the voicings he has on the guitar, and it's like,
Speaker 1: so I was like, well, for dexterity and stuff, I'll
Speaker 1: just learn the way he plays everything. I don't care
Speaker 1: that it's wrong or right. I'm gonna like learn to
Speaker 1: do difficult things. And in the middle of that, I
Speaker 1: heard Chariot the whole record for the first time. I
Speaker 1: was watching One Tree Hill and I heard I Don't
Speaker 1: Want to Be and and I went, I went, well,
Speaker 1: that's cool. And then I went and bought the record
Speaker 1: and then I wore it out three times, and then
Speaker 1: Chariot strip came out and I just, uh, what what?
Speaker 1: What was that? Like? What? What was cool? What intrigue?
Speaker 1: Because you probably heard a lot of songs at that time,
Speaker 1: but why did that one stick and resonate with you? Gavin?
Speaker 1: Gavin's riding is is different than anybody's I've ever heard.
Speaker 1: He has a way of saying something that um very
Speaker 1: like a very common concept in a way that nobody's
Speaker 1: ever said it before. So you can relate because you've
Speaker 1: been through it, but you've never heard it said that way. Um.
Speaker 1: It's something that I fight to do as a songwriter
Speaker 1: all the time. Is like like it's it's in the
Speaker 1: same way that we're not going to like recreate a
Speaker 1: chord progression or write a new chord. We're not going
Speaker 1: to do that. We're not going to come up with
Speaker 1: a concept that's touching the people that hasn't been talked
Speaker 1: about before. But can we say it different? Can we
Speaker 1: come at it from a different angle? And so I
Speaker 1: remember listening to that going like like this is making
Speaker 1: me feel something, and I'm not even quite sure why,
Speaker 1: Like I want to meet this guy and talk to
Speaker 1: him about like what his experience was within this that
Speaker 1: made him say it this way, because it's still making
Speaker 1: me feel something. But like I remember, like years later,
Speaker 1: You've got to tell me the story about Chariot and
Speaker 1: going back home to visit and you're sitting in that
Speaker 1: church when you had that idea for that song, Like
Speaker 1: I would have never known that was it, But without
Speaker 1: knowing that was it, I was still feeling something. I
Speaker 1: was still connecting to it, and I just thought that
Speaker 1: was like that that was what made me want to
Speaker 1: write my own songs, because I think like the beauty
Speaker 1: of music is making other people feel connected to your story.
Speaker 1: And if you just keep telling the same story, everybody's
Speaker 1: been telling like it just becomes white noise, you know,
Speaker 1: And so it was it was fresh and different. Mhm.
Speaker 1: Thanks for the compliment, man, How does that feel to
Speaker 1: hear him? Is that for me? Is that like an
Speaker 1: ultimate compliment as an artist when somebody describes your music
Speaker 1: like that, it's the ultimate compliment. Um. You know, when
Speaker 1: you're right when you When you're an artist, it's one thing.
Speaker 1: When you're a writer, it's a it's another thing. So UM,
Speaker 1: artists are more their their performers, their interpreters, you know,
Speaker 1: like like actors. UM. Writers are creators UM more so
Speaker 1: than than necessarily performers or interpreters. And so that when
Speaker 1: you're a creator and and someone who is also a
Speaker 1: creator is listening to your stuff and and and um
Speaker 1: thinking about it and honoring the way that you are
Speaker 1: creating and and impressed with the way you're creating or
Speaker 1: saying hey, I like what they're doing, then it's a
Speaker 1: different thing than UM. And artists simply covering a song,
Speaker 1: but they're if they're covering it as a writer, going
Speaker 1: I do this song because as a writer, I connect
Speaker 1: with this thing. You know, It's different, it's a different
Speaker 1: type of thing. Um, it would be it would be
Speaker 1: like if Tarantino recreated someone else's film. You know, it's
Speaker 1: it's almost seems like the ultimate compliment. It's the ultimate
Speaker 1: compliment as a songwriters, the ultimate compliment really and uh,
Speaker 1: because when you you know, when you commit to any craft, um,
Speaker 1: it's not it's not a hobby, you know, it's it's
Speaker 1: really your life. You know, you go to bed thinking
Speaker 1: about what you're and you dream about music. I do,
Speaker 1: and then, um, I dream songs. And when I remember
Speaker 1: my dreams, it's music. I hear music and um, and
Speaker 1: I'll wake up and I'll hear music. Um. And so
Speaker 1: it's really just forget to turn off the radio person. Actually, yeah,
Speaker 1: music music always. I'll wake up with the fears, like
Speaker 1: I'll have music dreams where I feel like I blew
Speaker 1: a show but I'm singing a song that I've never
Speaker 1: heard before in my life. And yeah, and then maybe
Speaker 1: it's a song idea or maybe it's like maybe you
Speaker 1: don't ever do this, but I dream dream of music too, Yeah,
Speaker 1: which is an amazing thing. And so that that's more
Speaker 1: proof that that's your, in my opinion, your true destiny.
Speaker 1: You know, if you're dreaming song. You're dreaming music, that's
Speaker 1: your that's your destiny, you know. Um. I mean, if
Speaker 1: that's what's the majority of those those fantasies, those dreams,
Speaker 1: I feel like that's your heart speaking to your to you,
Speaker 1: you know, and that's your that's your that's your fate,
Speaker 1: you know constantly, you know, knocking on your door saying
Speaker 1: this is you know, this is the path. Um. That's
Speaker 1: a beautiful thing that was in your family too, that
Speaker 1: like that, that didn't start with you. I remember sitting
Speaker 1: in the in the in the that coffee shop in
Speaker 1: Honolulu with your mom and dad, and you and your
Speaker 1: dad were going back and forth about like old soul
Speaker 1: R and B songs, and they started singing their favorite
Speaker 1: songs capella and the coffee shop, back and forth at
Speaker 1: each other. We got kicked out. We did. We were
Speaker 1: too out. We did just playing. We didn't show. We
Speaker 1: got kicked out of a coffe shop the next morning
Speaker 1: because they were singing a cappella. Because you guys, when
Speaker 1: your dad talking music got so passionate about music, you
Speaker 1: went back. You were going back forty fifty years of music,
Speaker 1: singing verse chorus at a time, and I was like, oh, man,
Speaker 1: I mean, I didn't even I didn't. I'm jealous of
Speaker 1: that upbringing because my parents loved music and they brought
Speaker 1: me up on R and B. But like it was
Speaker 1: in your blood, man, you didn't You didn't even have choice. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I didn't really have a choice. There was so much
Speaker 1: music in the house growing up, you know. And uh
Speaker 1: it's interesting when my dad sings. It's funny. I don't
Speaker 1: know if you noticed it or not, but when my
Speaker 1: dad sings, he cries. His eyes war and uh so,
Speaker 1: and he had always been that way. And one day,
Speaker 1: a handful of years ago, I said, Dad, why do
Speaker 1: you Why do you cry when he's saying is it um?
Speaker 1: Is it because of however the however you're getting the
Speaker 1: notes out. It's making your eyes water less, having this
Speaker 1: a physical effect that you can't help. Or is it emotional?
Speaker 1: He said, it's emotional for me, probably everything. Every time
Speaker 1: I saying I weep, I just get so emotional. You know.
Speaker 1: I love you. I love listening to you guys talk
Speaker 1: about music. I want to get more into this, more
Speaker 1: into your story. Brett. We gotta take a quick break
Speaker 1: and then we'll dive more into that backro break we
Speaker 1: have Mr Brett Young in the house. This guy, this
Speaker 1: guy is inspiring, really inspiring for me because I'm in
Speaker 1: a big transition point of my life, and so I
Speaker 1: want to get your story. I want to learn from
Speaker 1: you how you switch. You're gonna be a pro athlete.
Speaker 1: Then you switched to like playing guitar again just because
Speaker 1: you wanted to. You said, work on dexterity and just
Speaker 1: a little different change in your life. At what point
Speaker 1: did it come to like, Okay, now I want to
Speaker 1: write music to make this a career or did you
Speaker 1: just want to write music to express yourself. Like I mentioned,
Speaker 1: you talked about I need to make more money in baseball.
Speaker 1: I want to get in a better position to make
Speaker 1: more money in baseball. Did you approach music like that
Speaker 1: or is it just like I want to do this
Speaker 1: to express myself. Yeah, I think I think with baseball,
Speaker 1: it wasn't that I want to make more money. It
Speaker 1: was just that I saw the value in a college education,
Speaker 1: and it was like, there is a there is a
Speaker 1: a number that you would have to offer me to
Speaker 1: make me see the value in skipping college education, um
Speaker 1: and so and so That's what it was. And then
Speaker 1: once I made that decision. It was like, Okay, you
Speaker 1: have three years because in base in college baseball, if
Speaker 1: you played D one, you're not draft eligible again until
Speaker 1: your junior year. So you have three years now to
Speaker 1: become the best that you can be before your draft
Speaker 1: years stocks high draft. So and so that was it.
Speaker 1: And with music, I mean I wanted to write songs.
Speaker 1: When I heard Chariot, I mean, that was it, right,
Speaker 1: But I still didn't know that I wanted to pursue
Speaker 1: it as a career. I just knew that, you know,
Speaker 1: it's a strange thing, like I don't know if all
Speaker 1: baseball players think of baseball like this, but as a pitcher,
Speaker 1: it was a creative outlet for me because you like
Speaker 1: study hitters and you like learn what pictures to throw
Speaker 1: and what counts, and and that the part of my
Speaker 1: mind that we were talking about that like wakes me
Speaker 1: up thinking about music at the time, would wake me
Speaker 1: up thinking about three two counts against a left handed hitter.
Speaker 1: I mean like that. And I didn't know that was
Speaker 1: a creative outlet for me until I lost it and
Speaker 1: didn't have it anymore, and I didn't have a creative
Speaker 1: outlet and so powerful it sounds weird. I mean, it
Speaker 1: sounds like baseball doesn't sound like it would be a
Speaker 1: creative thing. It's definitely a physical outlet um. But when
Speaker 1: I heard Chariot and started writing, I was not writing
Speaker 1: thinking I'm gonna be a songwriter artist. It just made
Speaker 1: me want to write things down, and I immediately realized
Speaker 1: whether I liked the song or not, it was a
Speaker 1: creative outlet for me, and it was like filling that
Speaker 1: void that baseball took away. And so how cool is amazing?
Speaker 1: When I met Gavin, I had written six songs. He
Speaker 1: gave me advice and we cut all of the six
Speaker 1: songs I had written was my first DP. We actually
Speaker 1: dropped one off because we used it for it. The
Speaker 1: one that we dropped ended up being used on Kim
Speaker 1: and Courtney take New York. When you said so I
Speaker 1: got a placement on a TV show with the one
Speaker 1: of the six that we didn't put on the EP.
Speaker 1: And when you say we cut you and Gavin, no, no, no.
Speaker 1: Gavin gave me all the advice, but the best advice
Speaker 1: you gave me. You gave me a ton of great advice.
Speaker 1: But you said, do you have a good microphone? I
Speaker 1: was like, I don't know what it is. And you said,
Speaker 1: even if you have to rent it, make sure it
Speaker 1: is the right microphone for your voice and people can
Speaker 1: hear your voice. You had never heard my voice before.
Speaker 1: But um you said that. We ended up going out
Speaker 1: and like renting the annoyman Ate seven and then and
Speaker 1: then I'm gonna closet in a second bedroom closet, door shut,
Speaker 1: holding the U eight seven with a down comforter over
Speaker 1: my head as a as a dampening shield, Like that's
Speaker 1: how we cut it. And I still listen back and
Speaker 1: I'm like, the best sounding thing on this record is
Speaker 1: the vocal quality. That is. But a guy on like
Speaker 1: a massive stage where you are today to know that
Speaker 1: you started in a closet with a down comfort over
Speaker 1: your head with rental so that in the summer, that
Speaker 1: nobody will ever hear that music. By the way, I
Speaker 1: love that man, But but that I think that's a
Speaker 1: that's another representation of what it takes to make dreams
Speaker 1: come true. It takes it takes lack of of comfort,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. You're not going to always
Speaker 1: walk into the studio of your dreams. You get to
Speaker 1: cut your record, you know you're gonna be in a closet.
Speaker 1: We're in a blanket over your head to dampen the
Speaker 1: sound singing into a microphone that smells like somebody else's breath.
Speaker 1: Who would rent it before you? You know what I mean?
Speaker 1: You know what I mean? And and it's you know,
Speaker 1: and you're told, look, we got we got four hours.
Speaker 1: We only have a budget for four hours with this engineer,
Speaker 1: So like, make it happen. Or you said something to
Speaker 1: me and you just kind of touched on it, and
Speaker 1: I don't want to get it wrong, but it was
Speaker 1: something along the lines of and this was part of
Speaker 1: that first conversation we talked. It was like if you've
Speaker 1: never been hungry, you've never wanted it enough, or something
Speaker 1: along those lines, and it always stuck with me. And
Speaker 1: what's funny is it applies all the time in different ways,
Speaker 1: like if you if you've never been hungry, like if
Speaker 1: you've never been the starving artist, then you've never fought
Speaker 1: hard enough for it. But also like if you've never
Speaker 1: wanted it that bad being hungry, how healthy it is
Speaker 1: to be hungry for it? You know, it's okay to suffer.
Speaker 1: If you, if you, if you, if you're suffering, you
Speaker 1: have something to draw from, you know. And you get
Speaker 1: a lot of these people coming up, and they all
Speaker 1: want to be superstars, and you know a lot of
Speaker 1: their family members might have the money to help them
Speaker 1: out and stuff like that, you know, and the you know,
Speaker 1: the winlow spend all the money on their kids to
Speaker 1: get him in, to get him in the studio. But
Speaker 1: the kids don't want it bad enough because they don't
Speaker 1: need it. They never struggled. There's a sense of entitlement
Speaker 1: that comes with that. And this requires hard work. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and I think I think all those things that you
Speaker 1: want to help people with, things like you know, when
Speaker 1: you who we spoke you and I one time we
Speaker 1: were talking about just being hard to make a truck payment,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean, to pay for your pickup,
Speaker 1: and you know, yeah, it would be nice if someone
Speaker 1: just said, hey, man, here's the extra few hundred bucks
Speaker 1: this month, and here's an extra few hundred for the
Speaker 1: next next month and next month. Yeah, thanks for the help.
Speaker 1: But at the same time, that help is going to
Speaker 1: take away a bit of a little bit of that
Speaker 1: desperation that drive required to get to the next level.
Speaker 1: You know. Sometimes the broken ladder is a good one
Speaker 1: because it will teach you how to get that much
Speaker 1: stronger to skip arong, you know. So, so that's that
Speaker 1: is also necessary in my opinion. Well yeah, and that
Speaker 1: that truck payment is the thing that puts you in
Speaker 1: the position to have to take that cover gig that
Speaker 1: you probably don't want, like I did. I mean you did.
Speaker 1: You did it in New York. I did in l A.
Speaker 1: I played other people's songs for people that didn't care
Speaker 1: for a really long time. Um, but that's because I
Speaker 1: had a truck payment, not because that's where my my
Speaker 1: heart and soul was, but because I was getting to
Speaker 1: do something I loved for people that didn't care, and
Speaker 1: that still felt better than taking a job that was
Speaker 1: gonna suck my soul. Yeah, I agree. Now I got
Speaker 1: a question, So I got a question gave what was
Speaker 1: it about? Because I'm sure other people have approached you,
Speaker 1: right and being like, oh, can I ask you? I
Speaker 1: want to be a songwriter? It what was it that that?
Speaker 1: Because you obviously give a lot of advice and took
Speaker 1: some time, and you're obviously you're a nice guy, but
Speaker 1: it sounds like you went above and beyond with Brett. Now,
Speaker 1: what was it about did you recognize something? I thought
Speaker 1: he was sincere. You know, Brett was sincere. He you
Speaker 1: know when you when you meet Brett, when you hang
Speaker 1: with Brett, I think you can tell when Brett approaches
Speaker 1: you that it's it's from It's always a respectable place, sorry,
Speaker 1: a respectful place. And he has a humble uh demeanor
Speaker 1: about him. You know, he is confidence, but he has
Speaker 1: a nice humble demeanor and respectful demeanor. He's a likable guy,
Speaker 1: you know. And so when he when he engaged me,
Speaker 1: I believed him and I saw myself in him. Of
Speaker 1: I know the position he's in. He wants, he has
Speaker 1: a dream, he has a goal. He's asking questions in
Speaker 1: a respectful way. That that I felt like if I
Speaker 1: had an opportunity to meet somebody, um, I would have
Speaker 1: done a similar type of thing or said similar types
Speaker 1: of things, you know. And it sounded when he when
Speaker 1: he asked me these questions, they sounded like they're coming
Speaker 1: from a real place. They weren't just It wasn't just
Speaker 1: a little quiz and an interview. It was someone who
Speaker 1: was who had a goal and had a dream and
Speaker 1: wanted real insight into how how how do I get there,
Speaker 1: you know. Um. And so that's where I liked about it.
Speaker 1: It wasn't just somebody being cozy. Hey, bro, so what's
Speaker 1: it like on the first you know, with the U
Speaker 1: and the uh you know what I'm saying. Bro, You know,
Speaker 1: it wasn't like that. You know, It's a different thing.
Speaker 1: And I really I believed him when he So if
Speaker 1: he had come up and said, hey, I bet you
Speaker 1: get a lot of girls playing music, then you would
Speaker 1: have been like, yeah, thanks buddy, Yeah exactly exactly. But
Speaker 1: maybe if I hadn't yelled at him obnoxiously, it wouldn't
Speaker 1: worked either. That was the gold moment. Brett. Maybe you
Speaker 1: knew him better. Maybe you're like, hey, yeah, if you
Speaker 1: want to get a steak, and he's like yes, Like okay,
Speaker 1: just answer anything you want if you're kicking up a steak. Well,
Speaker 1: you know, it's funny. It's funny because when he first
Speaker 1: called called to me on the street, I was like,
Speaker 1: oh no, I'm about to get like harassed, heckled whatever,
Speaker 1: you know, And because I was out for a walk.
Speaker 1: I was just going for a walking. It was the
Speaker 1: middle of the night, I was alone. And then you
Speaker 1: look at he's enormous, and you're like, exactly your spread,
Speaker 1: exactly exactly. He was sitting down and still the the
Speaker 1: giant table looked like an airplane tray in front of vent,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. I was like, oh man,
Speaker 1: what's this guy? What's this guy? One? I was like,
Speaker 1: it's kind of big, damn. So I was like, you're
Speaker 1: looking for improvised weapon. I swear, knowing what I know
Speaker 1: about you, now, I can picture the way you got
Speaker 1: off your phone call. You were like ready just in
Speaker 1: case I was going to get aggressive. Never know where
Speaker 1: you put your phone away, like preparing yourself for something terrible.
Speaker 1: He just cracks a chair over your head. You're like,
Speaker 1: I just want to ask a tell me about Hey, Bret,
Speaker 1: Bret Brett. I had a quick question. Is there was
Speaker 1: there a period after when you realized baseball was sort
Speaker 1: of coming to an end that you went down kind
Speaker 1: of a a dark place or dark path, absolutely not
Speaker 1: knowing that your singing career would take off. Yeah. Absolutely no,
Speaker 1: before I even found Chariot, before I even saw that
Speaker 1: as some sort of path or outlet for me. Um,
Speaker 1: this is totally full circle because tomorrow I'm actually playing
Speaker 1: a show at a casino in Fresno, and at the
Speaker 1: time I was at Fresno State and the last turn
Speaker 1: off before you get this casino was a lookout over
Speaker 1: It's called Militant Lake and Fresno. And when the injury happened,
Speaker 1: it was it was full blown depression. Yeah, I hadn't
Speaker 1: had no drive at all. I didn't want to do anything,
Speaker 1: but I still wanted to listen to music. And UM,
Speaker 1: that first weekend after I found out I had to
Speaker 1: have surgery, which was the weekend before I had surgery. UM,
Speaker 1: Dave matthews Man was playing three nights in a row
Speaker 1: at it was called Concorde Pavilion in Northern and we
Speaker 1: went to all three and then I came back and
Speaker 1: that whole week, every night we would drive up parking
Speaker 1: that lookout and we're bringing like, you know, a case
Speaker 1: of beer, and they'll be like four of us with guitars,
Speaker 1: all terrible guitar players were just designated driver. Of course, yeah,
Speaker 1: of course, what what what case of beer lasts for
Speaker 1: four guys? Of course, it's only for three guys exactly,
Speaker 1: so two guys to designated and we would literally just
Speaker 1: try to dissect what is Dave doing here? This doesn't
Speaker 1: make sense. And we were trying to learn how to
Speaker 1: play guitar, and it was the only when I was
Speaker 1: sitting there by the leg playing guitar, trying to learn
Speaker 1: Dave Matthew songs, the only time I wasn't feeling depressed
Speaker 1: about baseball. So that was already happening. And then I
Speaker 1: went back to l A to have my surgery, thinking
Speaker 1: I'd come back and play my senior m HM. And
Speaker 1: through the rehab processes, like the beginning was going really well,
Speaker 1: and so the depression was leaving a little bit, and
Speaker 1: I'm like, I'm gonna press my senior year. This is great,
Speaker 1: and then uh, I got basically tendonitis and attendant that
Speaker 1: wasn't designed to be in an elbow was designed to
Speaker 1: be in a forearm, and that's a weird thing. And
Speaker 1: so I had broke through all the scar too a
Speaker 1: shoe and I could straighten my arm out and I
Speaker 1: could throw. But once I got up on a mound
Speaker 1: throwing downhill, I was feeling like this pain that felt
Speaker 1: like the injury. But there then the m riot again
Speaker 1: and they're like, no, it's actually totally healthy. You just
Speaker 1: have a little bit of information or tendonitis in the
Speaker 1: tendon um, in this whole thing, and I just sunk
Speaker 1: right back into it. And it got the worst when
Speaker 1: season came around and I was still at like sevent
Speaker 1: and they're like, if this doesn't clear up, you won't
Speaker 1: pitch your senior either, and I just went, you know,
Speaker 1: I think God gives you open and closed doors, you know.
Speaker 1: And at baseball, I had been beating my head against
Speaker 1: that door for a long time. List didn't work out.
Speaker 1: It was all these didn't work out stories, and again
Speaker 1: here's another one, and I finally went, you know what,
Speaker 1: I don't want to fight the fight of my life
Speaker 1: to maybe get healthy in time for playoffs that we
Speaker 1: might not make senior year. Like I think this is
Speaker 1: it's a very clear picture for me. And so I
Speaker 1: was when I had to make that decision, I was
Speaker 1: down and out. And that's when I heard Chariot. So
Speaker 1: you know what, nine months before, it was let's learn
Speaker 1: a Dave matthews Man's song, and I'm depressed because I
Speaker 1: hurt my arm, and then nine months later it's I
Speaker 1: think I'm gonna walk away from the sport. And then
Speaker 1: I heard that and it was Chariot, and I was like,
Speaker 1: I want to write my own music. I don't want
Speaker 1: to just play on people's music. It was part of
Speaker 1: you relieved to obviously you didn't want it and you
Speaker 1: were fighting for baseboll continue. It was part of you
Speaker 1: relieved when you finally made that decision. You said, and
Speaker 1: you and you heard Jerry and he said, I found
Speaker 1: a new path. You know, I could move on and
Speaker 1: I'm not struggling with the baseball thing because yeah, but
Speaker 1: also way more scared, because like baseball was something that
Speaker 1: I mean, I I turned down money out of high school.
Speaker 1: I could have bought a house, an eighteen year old
Speaker 1: owning a home, and now I'm a twenty to almost
Speaker 1: one year old a month before twenty second birthday, going
Speaker 1: I'm gonna chase down something even less predictable at two
Speaker 1: years old and start over. Um it was it was, yeah,
Speaker 1: I didn't. It didn't make any sense to me at all.
Speaker 1: But all I knew was like I I don't have
Speaker 1: the capacity to sit behind a desk Monday through Friday
Speaker 1: nine to five. And no I don't have it. No
Speaker 1: I can't be good at it. I could be good
Speaker 1: at it for like two hours a day. I want
Speaker 1: to do it, and I want to do it, but
Speaker 1: I can't. Like I can't what they call it working
Speaker 1: for the man. I can't work for the man. I can't.
Speaker 1: I just can't. It's my attention span. I can't do it.
Speaker 1: I have to do something. If I don't care, I can't.
Speaker 1: That's why I can't read. There's not There's never been
Speaker 1: a book in the history of the world. That's why
Speaker 1: you guys are buddies that you finished. Even if the
Speaker 1: book is amazing, every single one has a dead spot.
Speaker 1: And that's when I put it down and never pick
Speaker 1: it up. You know, it's funny about reading. When I
Speaker 1: read every word, says Ambien, I'm gonna say something that's
Speaker 1: gonna make me sounds right sleep, I go, I'm gonna agree.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna agree with you right now. If the book
Speaker 1: was good enough, they'll make it a movie. There go, there,
Speaker 1: you go. Okay, in the world the time to kill unforgiven.
Speaker 1: I am a wait for the movie guy myself. And
Speaker 1: that's why when I was in elementary school and we
Speaker 1: had to do book reports, I would pick a choose
Speaker 1: your own adventure that the teacher. I knew the teacher
Speaker 1: had read, so I didn't have to read the book.
Speaker 1: I just make it up. You know what I want
Speaker 1: to touch on on your story there that I that
Speaker 1: I absolutely loved and I resonate when I heard you
Speaker 1: say it. I resonate personally with it is that sometimes
Speaker 1: the gifts in our life are completely disguised as trauma
Speaker 1: or what we think is the worst possible thing that
Speaker 1: could happen to us. Like that injury that you experienced,
Speaker 1: you might not be. You wouldn't be Let's be honest,
Speaker 1: you probably wouldn't be a country music store where you
Speaker 1: are today, even have met your wife, Like all of
Speaker 1: this stuff might not have happened if that injury didn't occur,
Speaker 1: which you thought was drove you into depression, you know,
Speaker 1: like I wouldn't have I wouldn't have met all of
Speaker 1: you guys in this room had I not been released
Speaker 1: from the l A Kings. You're very lucky and that
Speaker 1: you have met us what those days, buddy, I will
Speaker 1: say it's a gift, but it is it is for me,
Speaker 1: Like I think of how my life has been blest
Speaker 1: from what I deemed to be possibly the worst news
Speaker 1: that I'd ever received, and how yours is the same
Speaker 1: To hear that from you is amazing. I think about
Speaker 1: our listeners. Oh there anybody else that's received news that
Speaker 1: they think is just terrible. That's it could be the
Speaker 1: biggest gift that you received. Could be absolutely correct. It
Speaker 1: was for me, absolutely and you you know. The other
Speaker 1: thing I really like about about what you guys are
Speaker 1: saying and something that Brett said about being sort of
Speaker 1: you know, forced out of the sport or how God
Speaker 1: you know, opens and closes doors. Um, the beauty is, yes,
Speaker 1: you left a sport that is really designed for youth,
Speaker 1: but now you're now you're playing the ultimate lifetime sport,
Speaker 1: which is music. Which is I mean Willie Nelson is
Speaker 1: still on tour, you know what I mean? You your
Speaker 1: longevity is a completely different word in music than it
Speaker 1: isn't sports. You can you control your legacy. You decide
Speaker 1: how long you're relevant. In baseball, when your body shuts down,
Speaker 1: you're just not even before that, somebody else makes a decision, right,
Speaker 1: my body didn't. God made a decision for me. Two
Speaker 1: years old. God, God finally took my elbow away. And
Speaker 1: I'm a picture. I mean, it's it's there, you know.
Speaker 1: I guess there's a few things that you could lose
Speaker 1: your voice. But even then you don't have to stop
Speaker 1: being a songwriter. I mean, there are so many like you.
Speaker 1: You can live out your legacy as long as as
Speaker 1: a musician. Beethoven lost his hearing incredibly. So you've made
Speaker 1: this transition from sport, you've started write songs. You know
Speaker 1: you want to continue to write songs. Now what comes where?
Speaker 1: What's the next break where you now become what is it?
Speaker 1: What's your first single? You've had five number one singles?
Speaker 1: Take us through the now the professional journey. So Gavin
Speaker 1: said this earlier today, but like it's it's ten years
Speaker 1: plus that we've known each other, which means like that EP,
Speaker 1: that's why that doesn't live anywhere anymore. Like that that
Speaker 1: was like that was that was me testing the waters um.
Speaker 1: I then went into the bar and restaurant gig scene
Speaker 1: for ten years in Orange County in l a um
Speaker 1: and I never got I mean, I love to tell
Speaker 1: this story. I never got a meeting. I was playing
Speaker 1: four to five nights a week for ten years, making
Speaker 1: a living and never got a meeting. And finally, you know,
Speaker 1: I was thirty one, almost thirty two, I had met
Speaker 1: an investor that wanted to work with me, but he
Speaker 1: was out of Atlanta and he had connections in Nashville,
Speaker 1: and I finally just went, all right, I'm out. And
Speaker 1: at the time, my wife and I had been together
Speaker 1: for six years and had broken up, and so I
Speaker 1: was like, I'm going, I'm just gonna go, and I
Speaker 1: was chasing down the songwriting side of things. Wait a second,
Speaker 1: So that's even an other interesting thing of being a
Speaker 1: bad thing turning into a good thing. You and your
Speaker 1: wife had broken up at the time. Now, if you
Speaker 1: were still together, you might not have packed up your
Speaker 1: things and headed to Nashville. Yeah, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: Like I was lastie. I mean, she knew, she knew
Speaker 1: she wasn't ready for what I wanted, and that it
Speaker 1: would be good for me to go there. Like she
Speaker 1: even even in us breaking up, she was trying to
Speaker 1: take care of me. Now, were you married or dating
Speaker 1: at the time? Dating? We had dated for six years
Speaker 1: and and Nashville broke us up. Um, and it was
Speaker 1: I mean, we we got I mean, I know that
Speaker 1: wasn't the question. We got back together two years later
Speaker 1: by accident. We're married with the baby on the way.
Speaker 1: Our Stories eleven years, our stories as long as me
Speaker 1: and Gavin's eleven years. Imagine what our baby would look
Speaker 1: like you and me, bro Dude, I hope it looked
Speaker 1: like brat, what a baby are you? Are you offended
Speaker 1: if I don't want to imagine that? So then what
Speaker 1: was the first hit single that really put you on
Speaker 1: the map? So that I didn't have an opinion about
Speaker 1: the first single, I just knew that as a new artist,
Speaker 1: I was watching what everybody was doing, and I knew
Speaker 1: that I was being given an opportunity later in life.
Speaker 1: I just wanted to make sure, like I'm I would
Speaker 1: if left to my own devices, give me a bottle
Speaker 1: of whiskey, guitar and I right ballads and love songs
Speaker 1: and breakup songs all day every day. That's who I
Speaker 1: am as an artist. But I knew that wasn't the
Speaker 1: right way to introduce myself to the world. And I
Speaker 1: only had three up tempo tempo songs in the first record,
Speaker 1: and one of them I had written about my mom
Speaker 1: and dad and their relationship, and so I went, well,
Speaker 1: I still want I still want to mean it and
Speaker 1: have it be important to me. So we went with
Speaker 1: Sleep Without You, because um My senior year in high school. Um,
Speaker 1: my curfew was always ten except four on game days
Speaker 1: basketball season game days because the game would end around ten,
Speaker 1: I was allowed to go eat with the with the
Speaker 1: team before, so I had twelve on Friday game days.
Speaker 1: We played every Tuesday and Friday. And uh, this one weekend,
Speaker 1: my dad's like, a he's a pastor, he's early to
Speaker 1: bed guy. Um, and this one week and my mom
Speaker 1: was away on a women's retreat with the church. And
Speaker 1: I came in Friday at curfew at twelve, and my
Speaker 1: dad's like, and he's sitting up at midnight when I
Speaker 1: walk in watching Sports Center. If you know sports that's
Speaker 1: an hour program, so if you're watching at midnight. And
Speaker 1: I walked in, I said, Dad, what are you doing?
Speaker 1: And he's like, it's just still hard to sleep in
Speaker 1: our bed when mom's not here. And that stuck with me.
Speaker 1: I wasn't writing songs yet. I was eighteen. I mean,
Speaker 1: it was a long time ago. And uh, it was
Speaker 1: a title that I wrote down. You know, it was
Speaker 1: this title that woke me up. You know we're talking
Speaker 1: about me. I woke up, wrote it down, and went
Speaker 1: back to sleep, and then I got home with a
Speaker 1: couple of guys and we wrote this song about like
Speaker 1: years later, like how this is our bed together, so
Speaker 1: when you're not here, it's hard for me to go
Speaker 1: to sleep. I'm living it now. When I wrote it,
Speaker 1: I wasn't living it. I live it now. It's it's
Speaker 1: really bus art and I have my wife next to me. Um.
Speaker 1: But when I was picking a single, I knew I
Speaker 1: wanted up tempo and that was the only one that
Speaker 1: was that personal to me, and so that's why we
Speaker 1: picked it. I love that authenticity. Man, Yeah, kudos to you.
Speaker 1: Thanks good guess that's awesome. I love hearing like musical
Speaker 1: journeys like this was not a part of my life
Speaker 1: as an athlete. Now hearing this, it's a beautiful art.
Speaker 1: It's I learned through you, I learned through your friends,
Speaker 1: people that come on the show. It's an absolutely beautiful craft.
Speaker 1: I know that it's coming across in this conversation like
Speaker 1: I'm anywhere near like I live music anywhere near as
Speaker 1: much as Gavin. I've never met anybody that lives music
Speaker 1: more than Gavin. To grow literally, I'm not just saying
Speaker 1: that to like like fluff you up. I will if
Speaker 1: you need me to do. We'll talk about no. But
Speaker 1: but but I'm I'm being serious. It takes me back
Speaker 1: to Hawaii, not just like a coffee shop thing. But
Speaker 1: I remember we were walking through that international marketplace in
Speaker 1: Honolulu on that trip and you were like you walk
Speaker 1: through and you like touched and awning as we were
Speaker 1: walking through, but you like, we're walking ahead by yourself,
Speaker 1: and I was like, and then you did it again,
Speaker 1: but you put both hands up. And I didn't know
Speaker 1: you well at all at the time, and I was like,
Speaker 1: like this guy us and I walked up and I
Speaker 1: asked you. I remember asking you. We were about to
Speaker 1: walk into a little bar with your band, me, you
Speaker 1: and Liver, and I walked up to you and I
Speaker 1: was like, were you measuring something? And you were like what?
Speaker 1: And I explained this whole what I was talking about,
Speaker 1: Like you you had your hands and you were like,
Speaker 1: oh no, I don't know what I was doing. But
Speaker 1: I had a song idea, you said to me just
Speaker 1: coming out through you were you were having like song
Speaker 1: ideas as we were all walking together to go to
Speaker 1: a bar and hang out. And I remember thinking like,
Speaker 1: I'm bad at this. Well, no ideas like that that
Speaker 1: often this is crazy, but that song Awning never came out,
Speaker 1: so it was Cannopy's Oh man, I love this gets
Speaker 1: you in your head. You know the music you can't
Speaker 1: shut it off. I'm there comes out of your body
Speaker 1: and you know, people be talking to you and you
Speaker 1: just you go somewhere else, you know. Yeah, well that's
Speaker 1: that's right. Can you imagine how people you have to
Speaker 1: give a songwriting credit to if you let them know
Speaker 1: that something they said out loud you wrote down and
Speaker 1: wrote the song. That's amazing. Hold on your right. I'm
Speaker 1: gonna get I'm gonna get a transcript of all our
Speaker 1: podcasts and see if like one line ends up in
Speaker 1: one of your songs, and then I'm getting royalty. I
Speaker 1: just put sorry. Brooks is like, does this song on
Speaker 1: the ice have anything to do with my hot? So
Speaker 1: you had one hit single? Then when did the second
Speaker 1: one come out? When did the next number one come? Uh? Next?
Speaker 1: This gig is easy, Hey, that baseball gig is easy.
Speaker 1: Let me ask you a question, just because from from
Speaker 1: the artists perspective of something, when you had your first hit,
Speaker 1: were you feeling cool now I'll have another hit? Great?
Speaker 1: Let me ride the wave or were you thinking, no,
Speaker 1: terrified more responsibility? Yes wa wa yeah because one hit
Speaker 1: wonder is nobody wants that. Uh you know, like I'm
Speaker 1: not going to name a name, but you and I
Speaker 1: went and had like a late night breakfast with somebody
Speaker 1: in l A that I'm a big fan of. But
Speaker 1: they were one and done. You know who I'm talking about. Like,
Speaker 1: it doesn't lessen your talent or but like if you
Speaker 1: get put in that category, you are done. Damn Like
Speaker 1: you're it's almost as bad as sophomore slump on the
Speaker 1: second record. It's like everybody said, you, so you got
Speaker 1: one under your belt. You feel uncomfortable now. I was like,
Speaker 1: absolutely not. I wrote three d songs from my second record.
Speaker 1: I brought writers on every single run we did. They
Speaker 1: were I had riders on the bus for all fifty
Speaker 1: three Lady Annabellum date. When while my first record was
Speaker 1: out there, it was not it was pedal to the metal,
Speaker 1: let's go, I love this. This is this is the
Speaker 1: kind of hustle honestly that people don't get to see.
Speaker 1: They see your success, but they don't see this. But
Speaker 1: but also it's I think the nineteen year old kid
Speaker 1: that's entitled that's given a record deal too young, or
Speaker 1: took the wrong record deal and spent the money. They're
Speaker 1: sleeping on somebody's couch with no bills, no over Like
Speaker 1: I mean, I had a I had a life to
Speaker 1: afford when I like almost and you have this story
Speaker 1: you turned down record deals like it has to be
Speaker 1: right for you in your life at the time. And
Speaker 1: these kids that have no skin in the game, had
Speaker 1: no bills and nothing to take care of. It's easy
Speaker 1: to piss it away. So for me, it's like, I
Speaker 1: know that I started this late. I know I'm very
Speaker 1: blessed to have it. I know it could go away
Speaker 1: at any time. It's my job to keep it here
Speaker 1: longevity as long as I can. So it's it's you know,
Speaker 1: as an athlete, you understand this. You get out what
Speaker 1: you put in. Yeah, and I think athletes are successful
Speaker 1: in music because of that that work ethic. You have it,
Speaker 1: you never turn it off. It's but that's that's that
Speaker 1: just doesn't telling me I have a chance a million.
Speaker 1: That's what I took from that. Yeah, man, we've ever
Speaker 1: done right there. It's a good title to Yeah, I
Speaker 1: gotta Eastern. If one of these microphones go missing, don't
Speaker 1: worry about it and the comforter practice. Right before we
Speaker 1: say goodbye to you, we got to send a massive
Speaker 1: shout out to Planet Hollywood absolutely for this great, great
Speaker 1: great We've had a ball and the food has been delicious,
Speaker 1: amazing food. They hooked us up. Got a great place,
Speaker 1: nice couch, even enough room for all this fantastic circular
Speaker 1: couch works well for the podcast. I think we'll have
Speaker 1: to come back to podcasts here again. Also shake Shack.
Speaker 1: We had shake Shack last night. That was fun. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we went there after the concert. So shout out to
Speaker 1: Shape And if you are looking for a shake Shack location,
Speaker 1: go to shake shack dot com or the shack app.
Speaker 1: Did you know that you find yourself a shake Shack
Speaker 1: wherever you go. So thank you Plan in Hollywood, Thank
Speaker 1: you shake Shack. Uh Brett, I love your story, dude,
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for coming to share with. Where
Speaker 1: can people find you? Where can you have a new
Speaker 1: album coming out? Where? Obviously on iTunes everything We actually
Speaker 1: we actually did just put out a new acoustic project,
Speaker 1: uh that Gavin sang on with our song Chapters played
Speaker 1: and sang and it's such a special song. Um and
Speaker 1: uh there's some new stuff that you'll be hearing about
Speaker 1: kind of soon. We might kind of break the album
Speaker 1: cycle for a minute to put out I've written a
Speaker 1: song about my daughter that I'm really proud of, and
Speaker 1: we might we might put that out early just to
Speaker 1: to give people more content. But great, I will always
Speaker 1: be putting things out. And then online do you engage
Speaker 1: with people online? Bretton music dot com and all the
Speaker 1: socials are outbrighting music and yes, absolutely, I'm very active
Speaker 1: on socials. My wife, Taylor Mills Young is also she's
Speaker 1: better than me, so if you want to go check
Speaker 1: her out too. She's always uh, she's better at talking
Speaker 1: about what I'm doing than I am, so you can
Speaker 1: get even more content from her socials. But yeah, we're
Speaker 1: we're active and we want to be connected to the community. Awesome.
Speaker 1: And then baby on the way for you guys. We're
Speaker 1: about three weeks away first beautiful little girl. So we're
Speaker 1: so excited. Well, we should get you out of here
Speaker 1: so you can catch that plane and head back home.
Speaker 1: Thank you, look after that, lady, Thank you guys for
Speaker 1: having me. This is a this is a blast. I
Speaker 1: hope I hope like that. People don't listen to us
Speaker 1: and then think that like this is actually how men think.
Speaker 1: I'm just I'm just kidding. We're the best. Thank you
Speaker 1: having an egg sandwich and let's take a break. Thank
Speaker 1: you Buddy so much for sharing your story, for coming
Speaker 1: in a friend of the show. Thanks Gavin for hooking
Speaker 1: this up, and thank you everybody for listening Brett stories.
Speaker 1: Incredible people out there listening. Um I say this all
Speaker 1: the time. Everything is an opportunity and that's how you
Speaker 1: worked at that injury and you've taken it and created
Speaker 1: an amazing life. So uh, that's it for today until
Speaker 1: next week. Take care of one another, love one another,
Speaker 1: and we'll see you back here on How Men Thinks.
Speaker 1: Great job man, Thanks