Speaker 1: Welcome to Inside the Studio presented by I Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: I'm your host Joe Leave. When Craig Morgan, the guest
Speaker 1: on this episode of the home edition of the show,
Speaker 1: says he wants to make music that lets people know
Speaker 1: there's sun in the future, he's not really talking about
Speaker 1: the weather, or at least not the weather outside our heads.
Speaker 1: You know, we started the home edition of Inside the
Speaker 1: Studio to let you know how the pandemic has impacted
Speaker 1: the lives of artists, how it's affecting the way they
Speaker 1: make music. But Craig Morgan has a bigger story to tell.
Speaker 1: He talked with our Quarantine correspondent Jordan Runtog about wondering
Speaker 1: if he could even get up on stage and perform
Speaker 1: music anymore after suffering a personal tragedy four years ago.
Speaker 1: He thought about re enlisting in the arm me or
Speaker 1: becoming a policeman. Instead, he's stuck with writing and singing
Speaker 1: songs and concentrated on positive music that he really felt
Speaker 1: people needed to hear right now. It's a moving conversation
Speaker 1: and if you enjoy this episode, be sure to check
Speaker 1: out the I Heart Radio podcast that Jordan's hosts. It's
Speaker 1: called Rivals Music's greatest Feuds, and it's available wherever you
Speaker 1: get your podcasts. Hello everybody, my name is Jordan run Tug,
Speaker 1: but enough about me. My guest today. Served in the
Speaker 1: SWO and First Airborne Divisions before making his mark on
Speaker 1: the country music world. So it's early two thousand's. He
Speaker 1: scored hits like That's what I Love About Sunday and
Speaker 1: Redneck Yacht Club. In May, he released God Family Country,
Speaker 1: his first album of new material since the death of
Speaker 1: his son. He addresses the loss on the standout track
Speaker 1: The Father, My Son and the Holy Ghost, which is
Speaker 1: top download charts and inspired faith in an untold old
Speaker 1: number of listeners. I'm happy to welcome Craig Morgan. Thank
Speaker 1: you you hear the rain in the background. Oh, I
Speaker 1: bet you the plants needed out there? Is it hot? Yes,
Speaker 1: it is hot, so it's uh much needed rain. So
Speaker 1: I wanted to check on you. First of all, I
Speaker 1: saw you had a bit of an accident recently with
Speaker 1: a machete. How are you doing. I'm good, it's healed up.
Speaker 1: I've already started running again. I'm a big runner and biker. So, uh,
Speaker 1: that was the worst part of that. Knowing that I
Speaker 1: wasn't gonna be able to ride my bike or run
Speaker 1: for a few weeks. Uh, but I'm I'm I'm fine.
Speaker 1: I'm healed up and uh running and getting back in shape.
Speaker 1: I'm actually headed back to Alaska, uh here pretty quick
Speaker 1: to go back up there again for a couple more weeks.
Speaker 1: Oh well, what were you doing up there? I have
Speaker 1: a property, a place up there, cabin off grid. It's
Speaker 1: about about three and a half hours from Anchorage, about
Speaker 1: forty five minutes from the nearest town, about nine miles
Speaker 1: from the nearest road. That's some training for the Idea Ride.
Speaker 1: That sounds amazing. Uh, training for the Iron Dogs, similar
Speaker 1: to the Idea Rod, but they do it on snow machine.
Speaker 1: So so we get out there as much as we can,
Speaker 1: and and mainly just to go up there and enjoy
Speaker 1: our place in the piece. I mean, why not, it's
Speaker 1: the best time for it. Oh my gosh, I I
Speaker 1: have so many things to ask you, first and foremost, God,
Speaker 1: family and country. Your first album in a number of years.
Speaker 1: What's the story you wanted to tell on this album?
Speaker 1: I don't know, if I really I gotta be honest,
Speaker 1: I don't know if there was a story I just
Speaker 1: try to record great music right and sing songs that
Speaker 1: I think people want to hear. I will say in
Speaker 1: this case, I felt like all of this music with
Speaker 1: stuff that we need to hear. Uh. These are very
Speaker 1: uh upsetting, troublesome, aggravating, angering times that we are dealing
Speaker 1: with a lot brought on by the the introduction of COVID.
Speaker 1: So I think it's important that we know that there
Speaker 1: is sun in the future, there's light out there and
Speaker 1: and I think these songs kind of portray that. Hence
Speaker 1: the name God Family and Country. There is a song
Speaker 1: on there called God Family and Country. It's an actually
Speaker 1: an older song, but but I just wanted to have
Speaker 1: some positive music, even though there might be some maybe
Speaker 1: some dark undertones, like in on the song going Out
Speaker 1: like This. You know, the music might lead you to
Speaker 1: believe it's a little bit uh dark, but it's really
Speaker 1: a positive song talking about making up and not giving up.
Speaker 1: So there's a lot of that. And then of course
Speaker 1: we have the hits on there that we rerecorded, some
Speaker 1: of the stuff that people are familiar with that I
Speaker 1: felt like to have a have a positive message. I mean,
Speaker 1: one of the standout tracks on the album is your
Speaker 1: version of Gavin to Grass Soldier just incredible song. You
Speaker 1: were in the armed forces for seventeen years. What is
Speaker 1: it about Gavin song that really captures the spirit of
Speaker 1: the men and women who serve well. I feel like
Speaker 1: every line in that song is a stand a long
Speaker 1: line that is descriptive of the moral character of a
Speaker 1: service member. I mean, it's just so descriptive of the
Speaker 1: way I feel that the military personnel are. I mean,
Speaker 1: they have such a such a sense of gratitude for
Speaker 1: the most part. Now I can't I can't speak on
Speaker 1: behalf of every service member, but I can honestly speak
Speaker 1: on every service member that I know, and I've met
Speaker 1: a bunch, and they all tend to have this sense
Speaker 1: of pride and humility which is really difficult to balance,
Speaker 1: and they do it better than any other entity in
Speaker 1: the in the world, I believe. And and again, that song, truly,
Speaker 1: I feel like, represents the kind of people that service
Speaker 1: members are, the people that are willing to put themselves
Speaker 1: in harm's way. You know, I'll be the pain. I'll
Speaker 1: take your pain. You know, I'll find I'll find the
Speaker 1: things you need. Uh. And that's what they are, their
Speaker 1: service people speaking of service people. Tell me about sipping
Speaker 1: on the Simple life. Your co writers are to airborne rangers, Yeah,
Speaker 1: just service people. You're right to everyone rangers the mike
Speaker 1: and I wrote that with him in Washington, d C.
Speaker 1: One night, after a few bottles of wine and literally
Speaker 1: sipping on the simple life. You know, it's again another
Speaker 1: positive song talking about even though these are difficult times,
Speaker 1: I've been to places where the difficulties that we're experiencing
Speaker 1: now are of no comparison to the difficulties we have
Speaker 1: Christians being slaughtered all over the world as we speak,
Speaker 1: the kind of stuff that they're experiencing. We truly have
Speaker 1: a great life in this country, and I think it's
Speaker 1: important that we appreciate it. And this song talks about
Speaker 1: the simple life and how to enjoy it. How did
Speaker 1: you first link up with Justin and Andrew? I mean,
Speaker 1: it's it's so incredible. How did that all go down?
Speaker 1: Did you start writing a song with him? After? What
Speaker 1: was it a us O Gala? It wasn't us oh galla.
Speaker 1: We were in Washington, d C. We finished it up
Speaker 1: and and one of them actually approached me. Justin said, hey,
Speaker 1: we want to write a song with you. We got
Speaker 1: a great idea, and I kind of laughed and I said, well,
Speaker 1: it don't work that way, but that's cool. I said,
Speaker 1: I'm honored. I'm kind of honored, but you know, it
Speaker 1: really don't work that way. And he's, no, you gotta
Speaker 1: write with us, and no, I don't. He goes, no,
Speaker 1: you do. You're airborne where airborne? You know we gotta
Speaker 1: you gotta write with us. And I'm like, now, so
Speaker 1: does that happen often to you, Like people coming up
Speaker 1: to you and being like, hey, we gotta write with you.
Speaker 1: People say it, but generally not as insisted. I didn't
Speaker 1: say forceful. I said it's insistent, but you know what
Speaker 1: I thought about it. And we didn't have anything going
Speaker 1: on the next day, we were leaving early to get
Speaker 1: on a plane, so I thought I got nothing to lose.
Speaker 1: And they were their service members and we do share that,
Speaker 1: and I thought, well, you know, I'm not going to
Speaker 1: be an ass and not sit down with them. At
Speaker 1: least want to enjoy their company. And we did. We
Speaker 1: had a blast. I wouldn't say we've become like super
Speaker 1: tight friends or nothing, but we stay in touch. I've
Speaker 1: done a few things with Justin since doing some more
Speaker 1: things with him and for the military where he's involved. Uh,
Speaker 1: and Andrew, if he weren't in Germany, we're probably doing
Speaker 1: more with him right now. So I look forward to
Speaker 1: when he gets home and we get to spend more
Speaker 1: time together. I've made friends because of that song. Oh
Speaker 1: that's awesome, and yeah, that's quite a reason to get
Speaker 1: into music making friends. Yeah. Justin says that they had
Speaker 1: the majority of it written, but as I recall, they
Speaker 1: didn't even have a really good idea. Mike and I
Speaker 1: sit down and really helped him out. That's the case.
Speaker 1: He watches, say we cut that part out now, I
Speaker 1: leave it there. I pick on him all the time. Oh,
Speaker 1: incredible series of songs in there, of course stand out
Speaker 1: for me one of my favorites. And I know other
Speaker 1: people have said this too, and I understand if it's
Speaker 1: difficulty to talk about, but I wanted to ask you
Speaker 1: about the Father, My Son and the Holy Ghost song
Speaker 1: written for your son, Jerry. How did that song come
Speaker 1: to be? It sounds like it was divine intervention in
Speaker 1: a way. It was in fact divine intervention. It was
Speaker 1: a god thing. I tell people that all the time.
Speaker 1: I think I'm a decent writer, but I wouldn't consider
Speaker 1: myself a Harley Allen or any of the great Dean
Speaker 1: Dylan's or nothing. But this was very much the caliber
Speaker 1: of that. I would say, even greater than anything, but
Speaker 1: not because of me, but because of God. It was
Speaker 1: a difficult song to write. It took me about four hours,
Speaker 1: which in that in and of itself, is not normal.
Speaker 1: It normally takes sometimes days to write a song of
Speaker 1: that caliber. Again, I attribute that to God and his intervention.
Speaker 1: I was just the vessel. I held the pen and
Speaker 1: cried the tears and heard while He put those words
Speaker 1: out there for me. And I quite honestly, when I
Speaker 1: wrote it, I didn't think it would ever be something
Speaker 1: that I would ever sing in public. But I also
Speaker 1: appreciate that God did that, and it's important that I
Speaker 1: do sing it because the response has been overwhelming, and
Speaker 1: seeing it now hindsight, I now see why he did it.
Speaker 1: Because this song has helped so many other people. I
Speaker 1: wish I could tell you that it's helped me, but
Speaker 1: it doesn't help me to sing this. In fact, it
Speaker 1: hurts every time I sing it. But that's okay. That's
Speaker 1: the cross that I must bear, and I do it
Speaker 1: because I know that it does help other people, and
Speaker 1: I think it's important that we do that as a society.
Speaker 1: You know, in our human race, we've kind of gotten
Speaker 1: away from that. We've kind of gotten away from caring
Speaker 1: about other people and kind of thinking focusing more on
Speaker 1: ourselves and how we feel. You know, you see it
Speaker 1: on all the social media platforms. I don't like this.
Speaker 1: I don't like that instead of thinking about how we're
Speaker 1: impacting other people's lives. And I think it's important that
Speaker 1: we do that, and this song does. That's incredible song.
Speaker 1: As you said, it means so much to so many people.
Speaker 1: Has there been anything that a fan has said to
Speaker 1: you that's it's really stuck with you and and and
Speaker 1: been particularly meaningful in sponsor the song, Oh gosh, numerous
Speaker 1: numerous stories. The one thing that I noticed when people
Speaker 1: would Facebook me, send me on Facebook message, or send
Speaker 1: me on Instagram message or whatever, however I get these
Speaker 1: messages through all of the platforms, they said that. I
Speaker 1: love how most of them start out with I know
Speaker 1: you will probably never read this, but and they tell
Speaker 1: me their story. And after reading a few of them,
Speaker 1: I was adam about ensuring that people knew that I
Speaker 1: do read every one of those. I read them everyone myself.
Speaker 1: In fact, on a plane coming home from somewhere, I
Speaker 1: was with my wife and I was reading them, and
Speaker 1: my wife said, what's wrong? And I said, nothing wrong.
Speaker 1: She said, you got tears running down your face. I
Speaker 1: said nothing, and I sure enough did. I had been
Speaker 1: reading those and my wife said, why do you do that.
Speaker 1: I said, because they told me they wanted to tell somebody,
Speaker 1: and I think it's important that I hear it. Uh,
Speaker 1: And they know that I read them. I might not respond.
Speaker 1: In fact, I don't respond to most of them, because
Speaker 1: that entails a long conversation usually, and I just don't
Speaker 1: have the heart, the hurt, the pain, it's a lot
Speaker 1: more so. But I do read them all, and I
Speaker 1: bear their pain and I share it. And that's something
Speaker 1: that we don't like. Parents that have lost the child
Speaker 1: say that, you know, we're part of a group of
Speaker 1: people that we don't want to be a part of,
Speaker 1: but we are so. But I do read them all,
Speaker 1: and and there have been a lot of very impacting stories.
Speaker 1: The one that has hung with me today still, and
Speaker 1: it was early on in the life of the song.
Speaker 1: In fact, I think it was after the Kelly arcs
Speaker 1: and airing, and that was like the second or third
Speaker 1: time that it became the most downloaded song of all
Speaker 1: genres on there. But a man said something. He said
Speaker 1: he was taking his daughter's school and said, I've never
Speaker 1: lost a child. I can't imagine what that pain must be.
Speaker 1: Never heard of, you didn't know your music. Was listening
Speaker 1: to the airing of Kelly Clarkson and I heard this
Speaker 1: song and it made me pull over to the side
Speaker 1: of the road and cry, thinking about my daughter, who
Speaker 1: I had just dropped off at school. And I thought, man,
Speaker 1: this song is impacting someone who can't even relate to
Speaker 1: what the song was truly about. And and he told
Speaker 1: me went on to say that he had gotten out
Speaker 1: of church and gotten away from him, but he prayed
Speaker 1: this song caused him to think that way. And I
Speaker 1: think that's exactly why I did it. That's what God
Speaker 1: wanted to happen, and it did happen, and if I don't,
Speaker 1: And it's numerous stories like that, but that one really
Speaker 1: stuck with me because it made me realize that it's
Speaker 1: not about me. It's not about my hurt, my cross,
Speaker 1: my pain, and maybe not even his it's what God
Speaker 1: intended and to hear him say that, and how it
Speaker 1: caused him to praying and he's thinking about that and
Speaker 1: his daughter. And I mean, that's that's what music does,
Speaker 1: and that's what we as entertainers and singers and songwriters,
Speaker 1: that's what we really should be striving for, is to
Speaker 1: have that kind of an impact and less about trying
Speaker 1: to have a number one song on country radio, which
Speaker 1: is important. I don't undervalue that at all, but I
Speaker 1: think we should focus more on trying to do again,
Speaker 1: do something good with what Earth Collins gives. Was there
Speaker 1: ever a moment when you considered stepping back from music
Speaker 1: and maybe not not doing it anymore in the midst
Speaker 1: of all this, or did you always know music was
Speaker 1: always that was gonna be your north star? Oh? I'm
Speaker 1: still not sure really, No, no, no, I mean you know,
Speaker 1: when I first left the military and started pursuing the music,
Speaker 1: there was about three or four years that I had
Speaker 1: songs that were hits on the radio. I mean almost
Speaker 1: Home was a huge hit, And even then I was
Speaker 1: unsure if this was what I was intended to do
Speaker 1: or what I really thought I should be doing. So
Speaker 1: to speak, it wasn't until about two thousand and eight,
Speaker 1: when I was made a member of the Grand Old
Speaker 1: Lobry that I felt like, this is what I'm supposed
Speaker 1: to do, and I've made my mark and I'm here
Speaker 1: to stay. It's a pretty good sign being made a member,
Speaker 1: but it took something so huge for someone like myself
Speaker 1: to accept it. I kept saying, you know, maybe I
Speaker 1: should go back in the army, maybe I should be
Speaker 1: a policeman, maybe I should do this. This isn't really
Speaker 1: you know, I didn't. I wasn't sure. But then fast
Speaker 1: forward to two thousand sixteen, when when our son died,
Speaker 1: I really considered not going back at all. I didn't
Speaker 1: know if I just didn't know if I had the
Speaker 1: ability to do it. I didn't know if I could
Speaker 1: get on stage and sing without being emotional. And I'm
Speaker 1: a man's man, and I, you know, if all I'm
Speaker 1: gonna end up fighting with somebody, you know, or whatever.
Speaker 1: There's lots of thoughts that ran through my mind, and
Speaker 1: I really was contemplating whether or not I should even
Speaker 1: get back. And after you know, taking some time off
Speaker 1: and looking at it, I realized my son would want
Speaker 1: me to do this. He loved me doing this, and
Speaker 1: I knew that he would want me to do this,
Speaker 1: especially if it meant by doing this, I'm able to
Speaker 1: do more for other people. And that is the reality.
Speaker 1: If I weren't doing this, we couldn't do the things
Speaker 1: that we're doing in our in our life outside of
Speaker 1: the music. Yeah, and as you said, your music itself
Speaker 1: helped so many people. And I want to talk to
Speaker 1: you about a song it didn't make the album, but
Speaker 1: you shared it on social media recently, the Mask, which
Speaker 1: you you dedicated to the frontline workers. And it's funny
Speaker 1: the title seems like it was inspired by the pandemic,
Speaker 1: but you had that one around for a while, right. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we actually we actually wrote this song before the pandemic.
Speaker 1: Had nothing to do with the physical mask you where
Speaker 1: I was talking about the mass that we all put
Speaker 1: on to sometimes get through our day. In particular, I
Speaker 1: was particularly thinking about soldiers at the time, and law
Speaker 1: enforcement officers and whoever, people that go out and put
Speaker 1: themselves in harm's way or sometimes that to put on
Speaker 1: a brave front. That was the mass that I was
Speaker 1: referring to, and it did not make the album cut
Speaker 1: for whatever reason. And I think a lot of that,
Speaker 1: because when we're working on the album, I just felt
Speaker 1: like it didn't kind of fit in, and I'm not
Speaker 1: sure that I had it tweaked to the sweetness that
Speaker 1: it is now. I think there was a few things
Speaker 1: that I did after the fact, after the album came out,
Speaker 1: and I felt like this was a strong song, especially
Speaker 1: in light of all that was going on with our
Speaker 1: frontline warriors out there are doctors, nurses, e m t s,
Speaker 1: and law enforcement, of all these people out there who
Speaker 1: were taking a chance on getting this virus but still
Speaker 1: doing their jobs. And so then we have not only
Speaker 1: the invisible mask that they put on, but the actual
Speaker 1: physical mask that they were wearing. And so we released
Speaker 1: it out as an individual single for people, with a
Speaker 1: portion of the proceeds going to help our frontline people.
Speaker 1: Great track, and your album also revisits five songs from
Speaker 1: earlier in your career. Um, what was it like revisiting
Speaker 1: some of those? Had the meetings changed for songs like
Speaker 1: you know, that's what about Sunday? Or a Lot of
Speaker 1: Man and that Little Boy? Oh yeah, for sure, a
Speaker 1: Lot of Man. That Little Boy was a song that
Speaker 1: I had not even listened to or thought about. For
Speaker 1: a long time and now that song as as as
Speaker 1: compounded emotionally for me based on everything that's happened in
Speaker 1: my life. And that little man that I wrote that
Speaker 1: song about has grown up. That was my firstborn son,
Speaker 1: who is now right, yeah, so he's a lot older,
Speaker 1: he's a grown young man. So it really allowed me
Speaker 1: to reminisce about that time in our life. That song
Speaker 1: did for me, And it's a great song. I thought,
Speaker 1: it's I just really loved what that song said, and
Speaker 1: it's a positive message, and I think we need to
Speaker 1: be teaching our children these same messages today and for
Speaker 1: me upcoming grandchildren, you know, we need to be instilling.
Speaker 1: And because I had a dear friend, you know, you say,
Speaker 1: we're not raising boys, we're training future young men. And
Speaker 1: same with our daughters. You know, we're not training daughters.
Speaker 1: Were raising future young women. This is the future of
Speaker 1: our world. So we need to be teaching them the
Speaker 1: right things, great ethics and kindness and love and those
Speaker 1: things that we should be doing. But anyway, so that's
Speaker 1: what that song kind of was for me. That's what
Speaker 1: I love about. Sonny was such a huge hit, still
Speaker 1: a big hit, still played a lot, and that song
Speaker 1: still holds everything that it held for me the day
Speaker 1: that we recorded. It still holds true for me today.
Speaker 1: I still get the same images in my mind. That's
Speaker 1: good to hear. What was it? Was it hard to
Speaker 1: choose what songs you were gonna revisit for this? I mean,
Speaker 1: you've got so many? Is it hard to pick the five?
Speaker 1: It was? Uh? And I will say that process involved
Speaker 1: more than just myself. We collectively, between myself management label,
Speaker 1: everybody kind of pitched in there two cents worth, and
Speaker 1: the songs that received the most attention were the songs
Speaker 1: that ended up getting recorded done by committee. That's a
Speaker 1: good way to do it. Lots of people's inut I
Speaker 1: see you you're in lockdown now. I'm glad to hear
Speaker 1: you've been. You've been going up to Alaska bit. But
Speaker 1: I see people reacting the lockdown in so many different ways.
Speaker 1: You've got some people who are are doing every home
Speaker 1: improvement thing they possibly can and are bacon bread and
Speaker 1: they're teaching themselves to make all sorts of stuff. And
Speaker 1: then you've got the people that are just really having
Speaker 1: a hard time getting motivated and feeling really kind of like,
Speaker 1: oh I got another day. How have you been feeling.
Speaker 1: You've been feeling really productive or the other the other way?
Speaker 1: You covered both. I cover the gamut. They're literally days
Speaker 1: I wake up and go I just don't want sh
Speaker 1: It's got to be over soon. I don't want to
Speaker 1: do nothing. I'm gonna light here. I'm not a video gamer,
Speaker 1: but like I might put a game on and play
Speaker 1: for like four hours and just numb my brain to
Speaker 1: nothing mush, you know. But then the next day I
Speaker 1: go out and I'll be able to set up stairs
Speaker 1: and I go bushog. I spent yesterday. I was on
Speaker 1: a tractor pulling a bushog cutting brush for nine hours.
Speaker 1: That's all I did for nine hours. I burned from
Speaker 1: the sun. How are you awake right now? Yeah? So
Speaker 1: I cover the gamut so I can relate to what
Speaker 1: anyone out there might be going through. I'm very fortunate.
Speaker 1: We have a lot of property, so I can get
Speaker 1: out and and go run. I can run my six
Speaker 1: or eight ten miles and not not have to worry
Speaker 1: about being around a bunch of people. But I'm also
Speaker 1: out there on all that property, and it's sometimes just
Speaker 1: me and my wife, you know, And I love her
Speaker 1: more than the air I breathe, but after a few
Speaker 1: days upset. Uh. And I'm sure I get on her nerves,
Speaker 1: her nerves worse than she gets online. But I'm taken up.
Speaker 1: I started doing some painting. Yeah. Uh, you know, you
Speaker 1: just gotta do things. I'm a big believer in a
Speaker 1: body in motion stays in motion, a body at rest
Speaker 1: stays at rest. So and I believe the same thing
Speaker 1: about our minds. We gotta stay active, you know, play
Speaker 1: word games. Even if you just walk, walk outside, walk
Speaker 1: around the house, do something. You can't just sit on
Speaker 1: your button expected to not get any bigger. Are you
Speaker 1: working on new music? Now? What have you? Have you
Speaker 1: been writing a little bit? I haven't written as much
Speaker 1: as a lot of guys. I'm not crazy about the
Speaker 1: zoom writing sessions. I write off of energy, and I'm
Speaker 1: a very energetic person, even for the ballad stuff. I
Speaker 1: require that. So it's a little more difficult for me
Speaker 1: to write the way a lot of people are having
Speaker 1: to write right now. So I'm only writing with a
Speaker 1: very few select people well who I know. We're quarantining
Speaker 1: so that we feel comfortable enough to at least get
Speaker 1: in the same room, even though we may not be
Speaker 1: you know, right across from each other, a high five
Speaker 1: and hugging like we normally would. At least we can
Speaker 1: see each other and feel the energy and use that
Speaker 1: energy to write. I used superstitious about writing. It all is.
Speaker 1: You're like an instrument you always play, or a place
Speaker 1: you always like to work, or a certain time of
Speaker 1: day or anything like that. Now I believe you right
Speaker 1: when you I'm fortunate because of the success that we
Speaker 1: have had in writing and with our career that I
Speaker 1: try to write when I want to write and when
Speaker 1: I feel like writing. I've been the guy who in
Speaker 1: the past wrote every day, five days a week. I
Speaker 1: went into offices in Nashville. We would sit down, we
Speaker 1: would write, sometimes write two songs, go home. It was
Speaker 1: a job. I'm fortunate enough now that I write when
Speaker 1: I want to write, if I feel like right. And
Speaker 1: I like that because I feel like I write better.
Speaker 1: I write less, but I write better, and I feel
Speaker 1: like I'm creating better quality material now doing it when
Speaker 1: I want to do it and when I felt driven
Speaker 1: to do it. And that's what's what happens a lot
Speaker 1: of songwriters. When we are writing good, we all call
Speaker 1: each other in man, I wrote a hit and they
Speaker 1: go funny, I did too. Must be something in the air,
Speaker 1: And that's the way it happens, you know. It's just
Speaker 1: like when you When I feel pressured or pushed to write,
Speaker 1: I will write and no instruments, no craziness. People that
Speaker 1: write with me say that I paced a lot. I'll
Speaker 1: go in and out of the room. I can literally
Speaker 1: write two songs with two different people at the same time.
Speaker 1: I'll go from one room to the other. A lot
Speaker 1: of that has to do with my O, C D
Speaker 1: and my A D D S songs at once. I've
Speaker 1: I've never even heard of that. Wow. And you can
Speaker 1: keep the melodie straight and all the harmonies and everything on.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, completely. It's like youan of those people that
Speaker 1: can like write with both hands at the same time
Speaker 1: or something like that too. That's no, I can't do that,
Speaker 1: but but I think I can multitask kinda when it
Speaker 1: comes to writing. I'm able to do that. I'm not
Speaker 1: sayings good, I'm just saying it happens. You mentioned painting.
Speaker 1: What have you been painting? You know? We have a
Speaker 1: family business called the Gallery at Morgan Farms. It's a
Speaker 1: gallery and we sell art most of the artist would
Speaker 1: stuff that I make. I've created bowls from knots of logs,
Speaker 1: and chacutie boards out of a old hundred year old
Speaker 1: barnwood and different things like that. We also sell. Some
Speaker 1: paintings differ from different things different people. So I just
Speaker 1: decided to stided one day I had these three old
Speaker 1: saws I was gonna paint on the sauce. I paint
Speaker 1: a landscape of an old building with some mountains behind it.
Speaker 1: I was thinking about Alaska. I'm a big fan of
Speaker 1: Bob Ross. Now, yeah, joy a painting. Oh man, hey
Speaker 1: slapped that brush. That's the most exciting part. Whenever I
Speaker 1: need to chill out at the end of the day,
Speaker 1: I throw on the joy painting and just watch him,
Speaker 1: like get his painting knife out and make a mountain.
Speaker 1: Though it's great, dude, I just watching him. It's like
Speaker 1: it's like doing ascid. I've never done acid, but people
Speaker 1: tell me what it does, and I get the same
Speaker 1: effect from Bob Ross, like, oh, it's just it's the best.
Speaker 1: I totally agree with you. Oh man, Now you make
Speaker 1: me want to go and put them on and try
Speaker 1: an and painting. I've never tried that but oh so,
Speaker 1: I guess is there a silver lining of of of
Speaker 1: quarantine for you? It sounds like this might be it. Well,
Speaker 1: the first couple of months it was kind of like
Speaker 1: a forced vacation, which is kind of nice, you know,
Speaker 1: doing things that I got, Like you said at the
Speaker 1: beginning of this, the chores. I got everything done on
Speaker 1: our farm that I've been putting off for two years. Literally,
Speaker 1: I'm not kidding. I work. We have gotten everything done,
Speaker 1: and then after I finished, everything is like, what do
Speaker 1: we do now? So I would go to my place
Speaker 1: in Alaska and spend two or three weeks up there.
Speaker 1: Uh so we just been kind of working and fittland.
Speaker 1: But it's like, now I'm starting to get angry because
Speaker 1: I'm ready to go to do something else. I'm tired
Speaker 1: of doing chores, and my my wife's chore list doesn't stop.
Speaker 1: I mean, every time i think I've got a break
Speaker 1: and I'm gonna be able to relax a little bit,
Speaker 1: she has a list of new list of crap for
Speaker 1: me to do. So I think it's good it has
Speaker 1: caused us to think about other things. We've focused more
Speaker 1: we do this Friday's at four livestream on Facebook it's
Speaker 1: caused us to get more creative. When you think of
Speaker 1: generating sources of revenue within the industry, we've had to
Speaker 1: think about that. We are doing shows. We have some
Speaker 1: shows that are coming up. But since we're talking and
Speaker 1: we're gonna talk about it on my Fridays at four
Speaker 1: as well, we're gonna be extremely pressing on our promoters
Speaker 1: and everyone involved to try to ensure that people are
Speaker 1: adhering to the social distancing requirements that are put forth
Speaker 1: in areas that you need to wear a mask, wear
Speaker 1: a mask. Look, whether they work or not, I don't
Speaker 1: really know. There's so much damn information out there. Who
Speaker 1: knows what to believe. But what I will say and
Speaker 1: what I tell my people what I adhere to is
Speaker 1: if it makes someone else feel more comfortable, if I
Speaker 1: think it don't work, if it makes that older lady
Speaker 1: feel more comfortable about being around me, then I'm gonna
Speaker 1: I'm gonna wear it for that time. Having said that,
Speaker 1: I try to separate myself from people as much as
Speaker 1: I can, so I don't have to wear it just
Speaker 1: because I don't like the way it feels. But we're gonna,
Speaker 1: you know, do everything that we can to ensure that
Speaker 1: we're at least doing our part. I can't make people
Speaker 1: out there do everything that we're gonna be doing, but
Speaker 1: we hope that they're gonna at least adhere to the
Speaker 1: requirements that the show is asking of them so that
Speaker 1: we can do the shows. Otherwise we won't be able
Speaker 1: to do shows at all, you know, and there are
Speaker 1: people doing shows and they're doing these things and it's working.
Speaker 1: We're gonna ask that when we do our a few
Speaker 1: little shows and we're not doing a bunch. We canceled
Speaker 1: a lot of stuff from motors, canceled a lot of stuff.
Speaker 1: In fact, it's canceling daily. We had three or four
Speaker 1: shows left and I don't know if they're going to happen,
Speaker 1: but the ones that do happen, we're going to do
Speaker 1: our part, and we're gonna ask people to do their part,
Speaker 1: and if they don't do their part, then they might
Speaker 1: be asked to not be there. I don't know. We'll
Speaker 1: see what happens. Who knows. If you want to hear
Speaker 1: live music and you don't want to watch it on
Speaker 1: a damn movie screen, I mean I can do that.
Speaker 1: We could go make a video and film ourselves and
Speaker 1: then put it up on a video screen. But I
Speaker 1: would rather stand up on the stage and perform and
Speaker 1: yell and scream and answer questions and stuff. But we
Speaker 1: can only do that if the fans are doing what
Speaker 1: they're asked to do so and and then ain't fun.
Speaker 1: It ain't. It's not back to where we were, And
Speaker 1: I think we will get there. Someday. We will be
Speaker 1: back to where we were. If you could snap your
Speaker 1: fingers and everything go back to normal. Pandemics over, Lockdown's over,
Speaker 1: Everything's back to the way it was. What would be
Speaker 1: the first thing that you would do show? Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: that would be the first thing probably. I mean the
Speaker 1: other stuff I kind of do anyway. I'll be honest.
Speaker 1: There's aside from wearing a mask when we go in
Speaker 1: the grocery store, or you know, not being around people
Speaker 1: that much. My friends, you know, we don't get to
Speaker 1: see them as much. We do that, but some of
Speaker 1: our friends we do. The guys that we know are quarantine.
Speaker 1: If I know they've been in their house, are not
Speaker 1: being out doing stupid stuff for fourteen days, and I
Speaker 1: see them, well, you know, we visit. You know, I'm
Speaker 1: not looking on their faces. I licked my wife's face.
Speaker 1: I kiss her face, so I ain't If she gets it,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna get it, and it is what it is.
Speaker 1: I can't change that unless she gets it and I
Speaker 1: know about it and I don't have it, and then
Speaker 1: she's going to sleep in different bedroom and for a while. No,
Speaker 1: I'll be with her. I mean, you know she that's
Speaker 1: part of it, you know, you know. But but the
Speaker 1: other people and the other things, Yeah, I would definitely.
Speaker 1: We would go do a big freaking show and let
Speaker 1: everybody stand there and toast America. You know, got crowdsurfing,
Speaker 1: oh for sure, not having to worry about it. Craig Morgan,
Speaker 1: thank you so much for your time of to day.
Speaker 1: It's been such a pleasure than Huke. Thank you all
Speaker 1: very much. We hope you enjoyed this episode of Inside
Speaker 1: the Studio Home Edition, a production of I Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: For more episodes of Inside the Studio and other shows
Speaker 1: from I heart Radio, check out the I heart Radio app,
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.