Speaker 1: Hey guys, it's Granger Smith. This is the Granger Smith Podcast,
Speaker 1: Episode four. I wanted to change pace a little bit today.
Speaker 1: I wanted to give you a different perspective, something that
Speaker 1: I'm deathly afraid of on the road. What could that be? Here?
Speaker 1: It is on episode four. Today brings me to the
Speaker 1: Missouri State Fair. We're in Sedalia, Missouri. Beautiful, warm blue
Speaker 1: sky day here in Missouri. This fair has been around
Speaker 1: since nineteen oh one, and so it's got a lot
Speaker 1: of traditions. It's got a huge grandstand, Old school Fair.
Speaker 1: Should be a really good day and a really good concert.
Speaker 1: Chris Lane is playing the show with us tonight. Love
Speaker 1: Chris Lane and his band and crewer. We get along
Speaker 1: really well, and so that just about sets the scene. Here.
Speaker 1: I am the back of my bus Wildflower, looking out
Speaker 1: the window doing another podcast, and this one is going
Speaker 1: to be interesting, a fun one. This is my greatest
Speaker 1: fear on the road. It's something I'll do whatever I
Speaker 1: can to avoid it. It is the one thing that
Speaker 1: could completely shut me down. It's the one thing that
Speaker 1: stops me from playing a show. It's happened to me
Speaker 1: a few times. I'll tell those stories. It's getting injured
Speaker 1: on episode four. I want to give a shout out
Speaker 1: to State Fair Community College Roadrunners. It's a baseball team,
Speaker 1: really good guys. I met them this morning at the gym.
Speaker 1: We got to work out together. There's about four or
Speaker 1: five six of us that work out every single day religiously.
Speaker 1: It's very important to me. Eating right on the road,
Speaker 1: staying in shape. These are all things that are very
Speaker 1: important to me because they affect my ability to be
Speaker 1: on my a game, to work my best on stage,
Speaker 1: to have the best brain power, to write songs during
Speaker 1: the day. I write songs only on tour on the road,
Speaker 1: and I can't waste any of those days because I'm
Speaker 1: too tired or too sore, or sick or have strep
Speaker 1: throat or allergies. I need to do everything I can
Speaker 1: to avoid all those problems. I can't afford to not
Speaker 1: be at my best every day. Right, I only have
Speaker 1: a decade left MAX of touring, I hope if I'm
Speaker 1: lucky and I need to, I need to use those
Speaker 1: ten years to the very best of my ability. Not
Speaker 1: I was sick most of my music career, or I'd
Speaker 1: struggled with allergies every day, or I was constantly sore,
Speaker 1: So how could I prevent those things from happening? Well,
Speaker 1: it's having some kind of regiment, kind of routine on
Speaker 1: the road, and it's definitely not sleeping. I don't get
Speaker 1: much of that. I get five or six hours, and
Speaker 1: out of those five or six hours, I'm tossing and turning,
Speaker 1: bouncing down the interstate going eighty miles an hour. So
Speaker 1: why am I so fearful of these things? Why am
Speaker 1: I so mindful of these things? Because I've been on
Speaker 1: the downside of it, yes, many times, or at least
Speaker 1: a handful of times. So let me talk about that.
Speaker 1: We'll just finished soundcheck here at the Missouri State Fair,
Speaker 1: and the stage is positioned facing the grand stand, and
Speaker 1: the grandstand is for a dirt track, so the stage
Speaker 1: is right behind the track and that's where the people
Speaker 1: stand on the track. We play a lot of dirt
Speaker 1: track shows that are dog racing, horse racing, car racing
Speaker 1: as today, but it's fun. Can you imagine a better
Speaker 1: place for country music than a hundred year old fair
Speaker 1: with a band playing over a dirt track into the grandstands.
Speaker 1: That's country and country music has definitely gotten the best
Speaker 1: of me. A few times, and that's when I've gotten
Speaker 1: hurt on the stage. And it sounds crazy, but it's
Speaker 1: starting to add up for me, and these stories are
Speaker 1: worth telling. They were horrible, all of them at the time,
Speaker 1: but they make really good podcast material. The first time
Speaker 1: this happened was in twenty thirteen College Station Texas a
Speaker 1: venue called Hurricane Harry's let me set the scene for you.
Speaker 1: Anytime we go back to play College Station Texas, it's
Speaker 1: like a hometown show for me. So I feel like
Speaker 1: I got to be at my best, better than my best.
Speaker 1: I feel like I have to convince all these people,
Speaker 1: look how far I've come, You're not going to believe
Speaker 1: the kind of show I could do now. So I'm
Speaker 1: over the top, super dynamic, over engaging. I want to
Speaker 1: put on the best show I can. One of the
Speaker 1: reasons I remember that night is because that was the
Speaker 1: first time I met Johnny Manziel remember him for the
Speaker 1: redshirt freshman Johnny Manziel Manzell trying to spit out of
Speaker 1: traffic there nearly caught from behind, makes the bow a
Speaker 1: highlight kind of touchdown. So he's standing side stage watching
Speaker 1: the show along with several other of the football players
Speaker 1: and as if I needed any more reason to go
Speaker 1: all out, there's that. So it's a great turnout. The
Speaker 1: crowd is rocking. At the very end of the show,
Speaker 1: I come out as Earl Dibbles Junior. If you haven't
Speaker 1: seen that or don't know about that, that's another episode,
Speaker 1: another podcast for another time, but it's essentially the encore
Speaker 1: of the show. I come out overalls on. It's the
Speaker 1: ultra redneck Earl Dibbles Junior. He plays the song at
Speaker 1: the very end, I feel like I need to get
Speaker 1: down off the stage and give some high fives, shake
Speaker 1: some hands. I mean, the people are crazy and I
Speaker 1: want to I want to get down amongst them and
Speaker 1: fill that energy. So I jump off the stage. I
Speaker 1: start on the right, work, I work down left. I'm
Speaker 1: slapping hands, you know, fist bump and feeling like a
Speaker 1: rock star. And when I get to the end, I
Speaker 1: need to make a left turn and there's some stairs
Speaker 1: there right via our monitor console. I need to go
Speaker 1: up those stairs and go back and finish the last
Speaker 1: little piece of the song. So when I get to
Speaker 1: the stairs, I give my last little fist bump on
Speaker 1: the right and I take a left and I'm sprinting
Speaker 1: up these stairs, and without looking, I don't notice if
Speaker 1: there is a speaker hanging low, a giant speaker. It's
Speaker 1: one of the main speakers of the PA. All I
Speaker 1: really know after that is I hit that speaker right
Speaker 1: dead center my forehead and it felt like I got
Speaker 1: hit by a truck, which is probably similar impact. But
Speaker 1: you know, you get that, you know when you hit
Speaker 1: your head so hard and you taste metallic in your mouth.
Speaker 1: So I get that weird metallic taste. And of course
Speaker 1: I'm seeing stars and dizzy and a little bit a
Speaker 1: little bit lightheaded. But all that being said, I've got
Speaker 1: a show to play. The crowd's still amped up, so
Speaker 1: I shake it off. I'm not one to get embarrassed
Speaker 1: that easy, so I go back like it's, you know,
Speaker 1: no big deal. But as I run to the center
Speaker 1: of the stage and turn to face the crowd, instead
Speaker 1: of being all jazzed up and excited like they have been,
Speaker 1: now there's a different look amongst the crowd, and it's
Speaker 1: this look of horror. There's wide eyes, jaws dropped, and
Speaker 1: I'm like, man, what is going on? What happened to
Speaker 1: change the crowd so drastically and that's when I started
Speaker 1: filling drips down the tip of my nose, down, off
Speaker 1: my mouth, off my chin, and it's blood. I'm just
Speaker 1: gushing blood. My face is completely covered in blood. I
Speaker 1: hit ripped a gash in my forehead. I hit the
Speaker 1: speaker right on the edge of it, on the corner
Speaker 1: that the sharp edge of it, and it just blunt trauma,
Speaker 1: split open the skin on the on the front of
Speaker 1: my forehead. And you know, your forehead bleeds like crazy
Speaker 1: when you cut it, so it was just uncontrollable blood.
Speaker 1: I look over to the right and there's Johnny Manzel
Speaker 1: and my brother and my sound engineer, and all of
Speaker 1: them are saying they're holding towels right, and they're saying,
Speaker 1: come on, get off the stage. Quit playing. So I,
Speaker 1: you know, put my hand in the air, do a
Speaker 1: little bow. Make sure that I got a picture of that,
Speaker 1: which I do. I love the picture that I got
Speaker 1: from that moment. And then I ran off the stage.
Speaker 1: I remember asking some of the players, I said, you
Speaker 1: guys are football players, I'm sure you'd deal with this
Speaker 1: all the time, and they were like, not like that, man,
Speaker 1: your head is ripped open. I mean it was about
Speaker 1: a four inch wide at about half an inch a
Speaker 1: width of just open flesh on my forehead. What's crazy
Speaker 1: is there happened to be an EMT in the crowd,
Speaker 1: and he had the foresight to make it backstage and
Speaker 1: get into the green room where I was, and he
Speaker 1: had he had a little kit with him and he
Speaker 1: had some butterfly bandages, which is exactly what I need
Speaker 1: because a normal band aid wouldn't hold that skin together.
Speaker 1: So we cleaned it up, put some alcohol on it,
Speaker 1: and then he used those butterfly bandages on the top
Speaker 1: and the bottom to hold it down. And I hate
Speaker 1: going to the emergency room, mostly because it it's so expensive.
Speaker 1: You know, for no reason, they're just going to do
Speaker 1: a little work on you, give you a few pain pills,
Speaker 1: and then charge at four thousand dollars whatever they do.
Speaker 1: But everyone said, man, you gotta go get stitches. So
Speaker 1: I kept those bandages on. I went back down to
Speaker 1: the merchandise table, did my meet and greet autographs, met
Speaker 1: the people that wanted to hang out that night. So
Speaker 1: after about an hour, my brother and I headed to
Speaker 1: the emergency room and they put in eight stitches. The
Speaker 1: best part of the story is I didn't miss a show.
Speaker 1: I didn't even miss that show. I just had to
Speaker 1: leave a little bit earlier than I wanted to. And
Speaker 1: it gives a story to tell, and it was a
Speaker 1: really cool picture that I have on my phone. It
Speaker 1: probably scared a few people in the crowd, and ultimately
Speaker 1: I learned a good lesson. And to this day, when
Speaker 1: I'm running on the stage, especially upstairs, I always look
Speaker 1: up and make sure there's no speaker's at forehead level.
Speaker 1: You know, I do this podcast whether I had a
Speaker 1: sponsor or not, and maybe one day I will, but
Speaker 1: right now I have an unofficial official sponsor, and that's
Speaker 1: EEE Energy. Another reason they're my sponsors because it's my drink.
Speaker 1: Me and my brothers, Parker and Tyler created this drink
Speaker 1: about two years ago, and I love it. We went
Speaker 1: through every recipe, we did all the taste testing to
Speaker 1: make it exactly like we wanted it. We did all
Speaker 1: the design, all the graphics to make a drink that
Speaker 1: really represented us and our fans. Now right now, we're
Speaker 1: in a lot of small businesses around the country. A
Speaker 1: lot of them are gun stores, outdoor shops, sporting goods stores,
Speaker 1: and a lot of them are family run small businesses,
Speaker 1: which really helped support our American made mentality, which you
Speaker 1: know we're all about that. So if somebody's selling Eeee
Speaker 1: Energy in your town, go help them out, Go help
Speaker 1: us out. Go Toyee Energy dot com for more details.
Speaker 1: Back here at the Missouri State Fair, I just talked
Speaker 1: to Chris Lane, who's playing the show with us tonight,
Speaker 1: and I'm gonna bring him on stage later. And guess
Speaker 1: what song we just talked about singing together? Oh, an
Speaker 1: old nineties classic, my good old Sammy Kershaw Sheeto, No,
Speaker 1: She's beautiful, Sun No, She's beautiful, sheet No, She's beautiful.
Speaker 1: Little time and time after So after these stitches in
Speaker 1: College Station, Texas injury, it took me less than a
Speaker 1: year before I was hurt again. This time was a
Speaker 1: lot worse. This time I actually had to miss some shows.
Speaker 1: Here's what happened September fifth, twenty thirteen. I remember the
Speaker 1: day partly because it was the day after my birthday,
Speaker 1: and partly because it was one of the stupidest things
Speaker 1: I've done in my music career. We were in Illinois
Speaker 1: on tour and we were parked before a show. My
Speaker 1: sound guy Blake was having girl problems at the time,
Speaker 1: and he was just in he was in a bad mood.
Speaker 1: He was shuffling around, he was mumbling to himself, and
Speaker 1: that kind of thing is contagious. So I'm trying to
Speaker 1: lighten the mood. And I say, Blake, if you don't
Speaker 1: get in a better mood quick, and I'm gonna tie
Speaker 1: you up with tape and throw you in the trailer
Speaker 1: so no one has to deal with you. So he
Speaker 1: mumbles a few things under his breath, and I'm trying
Speaker 1: to be funny, and so I storm off the bus,
Speaker 1: I go to the trailer, I get a big roll
Speaker 1: of tape, start stringing it out, come back on the
Speaker 1: bus and I'm, you know, unwrapping this roll of tape,
Speaker 1: and Blake is mad, he's mad at me, and I'm
Speaker 1: laughing and I and everyone else is there, the rest
Speaker 1: of the band, and so I'm, you know, trying to
Speaker 1: get a few giggles, trying to get a few laughs.
Speaker 1: And I blew up this tape and I'm I'm going
Speaker 1: for I'm I'm gonna start wrapping him up and he
Speaker 1: slaps my hands down, jumps on my back. Now, this
Speaker 1: dude's from East Texas, right, he's pretty scrappy. He jumps
Speaker 1: on my back and immediately puts me in a choke hold. Well,
Speaker 1: this goes from this is really funny to oh shit,
Speaker 1: I can I'm not gonna let this guy choke me
Speaker 1: out because he's he's trying to choke me out. He
Speaker 1: wants me to pass out on the floor of the bus,
Speaker 1: and I'm thinking, hell no, He's not gonna make me
Speaker 1: pass out in embarrassment in front of my band. So
Speaker 1: I'm fighting back and I'm I'm all coiled up, and
Speaker 1: so he has to squeeze tighter and tighter until finally
Speaker 1: I get him off of me and we go face
Speaker 1: to face. Right but when we go face to face,
Speaker 1: at that time, I realized something really wrong happened to
Speaker 1: my throat. The way that he didn't have me in
Speaker 1: a headlock in his elb, in his bicep. He had
Speaker 1: it right on his forearm. And he looked at me
Speaker 1: and he said, you out of breath, And I said no,
Speaker 1: But when I said no, it came out no. I
Speaker 1: had no voice, and I was trying to play it off,
Speaker 1: but I knew something was really wrong with my throat.
Speaker 1: And as the day goes on, my neck is swelling
Speaker 1: on the inside. I could feel it, and I could
Speaker 1: still moderately talk, and I could still sing in lower tones,
Speaker 1: but I had no upper register at all. So I
Speaker 1: go ahead and play the show, and I avoided any
Speaker 1: kind of high choruses. I kind of just sang the
Speaker 1: lower parts of every song and got through it, and
Speaker 1: I went to sleep that night. The bus fires up.
Speaker 1: We rolled to Chicago, Illinois. I wake up in Chicago,
Speaker 1: normal day, parked outside of the venue about seven am.
Speaker 1: Opened my eyes and I talk and nothing comes out.
Speaker 1: I have zero voice. Nothing a little bit of gravel,
Speaker 1: a little bit of whisper, but nothing audible. No words
Speaker 1: are capable of coming out of my mouth. And I've
Speaker 1: never experienced losing a voice before. I've never even had laryngitis.
Speaker 1: So I'm freaking out. I'm like Superman with Kryptonite all
Speaker 1: over him. I can't fight. I have no power. The
Speaker 1: only thing I have on tour is my voice, and
Speaker 1: it's gone. I text my tour manager, Chris, I said, hey,
Speaker 1: we have a big problem. I don't have a voice,
Speaker 1: and he doesn't understand. Nobody could really understand that there's
Speaker 1: gonna be no show tonight. In Chicago. We've never played
Speaker 1: Chicago yet and we're gonna have to cancel, and they
Speaker 1: think you have some coffee relax. We have what eight
Speaker 1: hours before we need to play a show. It'll be
Speaker 1: back and I'm thinking, somebody call it doctor. I can't talk.
Speaker 1: Made an appointment with a ear nose and throat doctor
Speaker 1: in Chicago. She sticks this camera down the back of
Speaker 1: my throat to check out my vocal cords. Come to
Speaker 1: find out, I have a burst blood vessel on my
Speaker 1: vocal cord. This happened during the choking. So there's absolutely
Speaker 1: nothing I could do about it besides rest. And that's
Speaker 1: really tough on me because I'm the kind of guy
Speaker 1: that you give me some kind of rehab program, give
Speaker 1: me some kind of stretching exercise, give me a new
Speaker 1: diet plan, and let me fix this. So hearing that
Speaker 1: there's absolutely nothing I could do but rest is the
Speaker 1: worst news for me, because a we need to call
Speaker 1: the venue and cancel the show tonight in Chicago with
Speaker 1: people that I've never even met before, and then we
Speaker 1: need to cancel tomorrow in Louisville, we need to cancel
Speaker 1: the next day. In Grand Rapids, Michigan, et cetera, et cetera.
Speaker 1: There's two weeks of tours when we're supposed to play
Speaker 1: every day. I have to go back to Texas and rest.
Speaker 1: This is the lowest moment of my career at the time.
Speaker 1: Keep in mind, I have I've never played any of
Speaker 1: these cities at the time. So these aren't fans that
Speaker 1: are you know that we've grown the market for years
Speaker 1: and years and they love me and they're used to me.
Speaker 1: These are brand new fans that don't know anything about me.
Speaker 1: They're taking a chance by buying a ticket. A lot
Speaker 1: of these shows were either sold out or almost sold out,
Speaker 1: and so we've got to refund all these tickets and
Speaker 1: I have to rebuild trust with these people. This is
Speaker 1: driving me crazy. It's really hard on me. I needed
Speaker 1: to wait about six weeks for the vocal Cords to
Speaker 1: completely heal. I took a chance. I wanted it to
Speaker 1: be well in six days. That's me and I was
Speaker 1: being realistic too. I was doing a lot of research.
Speaker 1: I revisited a doctor back in Texas and I needed
Speaker 1: to I needed to be back up and running in
Speaker 1: six days because I needed to play a show in Texas.
Speaker 1: So after a few days I started doing these vocal exercises.
Speaker 1: I learned a lot about warming up the vocals. I
Speaker 1: did play that show in Texas just saying kind of
Speaker 1: lower register stuff. I never pushed anything. I limited my
Speaker 1: talking during the day. And you know, what started as
Speaker 1: the lowest moment of my musical career ended up being
Speaker 1: something that I learned a lot from. I still remember
Speaker 1: it like it was yesterday. I still do everything I
Speaker 1: can to avoid injuries and not having my voice warmed up.
Speaker 1: And then you ask, well, what happened to Blake. Blake
Speaker 1: is actually still with me, and I don't blame him
Speaker 1: at all because I went and got tape. I was
Speaker 1: gonna tape him up and hang him up in the trailer.
Speaker 1: I mean, people are like, how did you let an
Speaker 1: employee of yours do that to you. I'm a brother,
Speaker 1: I have two brothers. I definitely egged him on, and
Speaker 1: so it's my fault. I take the blame for it.
Speaker 1: I learned a lot from it. But unfortunately, that wasn't
Speaker 1: the worst injury yet, and that wasn't the last time
Speaker 1: I had to cancel shows. I'll tell you about that.
Speaker 1: I am the midnight I'm the only heart throw them
Speaker 1: on the surgeon souls. I am the ways he said,
Speaker 1: up you drink insteatic going home. I'm win to the
Speaker 1: other stock. I'm win the dreamer's drag. I am a
Speaker 1: little bit of home. When you need another day well
Speaker 1: to night, it's a matter time. I am the midnight.
Speaker 1: That's been a interesting day in Missouri so far. We
Speaker 1: had a production meeting with the abandoned crew and something
Speaker 1: that never happens happened. My seven year veteran monitor engineer,
Speaker 1: Frank resigned today. I know it's crazy. I'm still kind
Speaker 1: of soaking it in, but you know, the road being
Speaker 1: on tour. I don't want to compare it to deployed
Speaker 1: soldiers because it's we're much less noble of a cause
Speaker 1: than that. But essentially, we're gone so much from a
Speaker 1: regular life that sometimes you lose who you are. And
Speaker 1: Frank kind of poured out his heart. He stood up
Speaker 1: and he has You know, I love Frank. I've known
Speaker 1: him for a long time. I consider him a huge friend,
Speaker 1: and he has a lot of character to be able
Speaker 1: to stand up in front of all of us and say, guys,
Speaker 1: this job isn't for me anymore. I need to be home.
Speaker 1: I need to find myself. I need to find what
Speaker 1: makes me happy again, because the road man, it's a
Speaker 1: it's a bitch, could it could. The monotony could kill
Speaker 1: you if you're not careful. It's an evil sorcery. We're
Speaker 1: we're very, very blessed to do what we do, but
Speaker 1: if you get sucked into that monotony, it's quicksand to
Speaker 1: put it in perspective. Right now, recording this podcast is
Speaker 1: mid August. The buses have not been home since March.
Speaker 1: That's six months gone. And I care. I told Frank,
Speaker 1: I care more about him being happy then I care
Speaker 1: about him being my monitor engineer. And I really really
Speaker 1: want him to be my monitor engineer. If that makes
Speaker 1: sense anyway, That's our life and we'll move on and
Speaker 1: Frank will move on and we will remain friends. Frank
Speaker 1: has been there for me a lot in every show,
Speaker 1: and he was a part of this next story. Actually,
Speaker 1: he was a part of Waco Texas twenty fifteen and
Speaker 1: I completely dislocated my shoulder on stage. So let me
Speaker 1: set the stage. It's the Heart of Texas Fair, Waco, Texas,
Speaker 1: and it's the very end of the show, exactly like
Speaker 1: the scenario of the forehead stitches in college station. I'm
Speaker 1: out slapping hands in high five and fist bumping, doing
Speaker 1: some autographs to the front row. There's a group of
Speaker 1: really crazy fans over to me on my stage left
Speaker 1: and I'm trying to get to them, and this guy
Speaker 1: has this hat that he wants me to autograph. He's
Speaker 1: holding a sharpie pin and a hat. And I remember
Speaker 1: this guy because I've been watching him for an hour
Speaker 1: and a half. He's a great fan. I need to
Speaker 1: get to him. He's just a little bit out of
Speaker 1: arms reach, and so I step out onto this speaker
Speaker 1: and I reach for him. As I'm reaching, the speaker
Speaker 1: starts wobbling, and I think, oh, this is gonna tumble
Speaker 1: and I'm gonna drop this whole speaker into the crowd,
Speaker 1: and I'm going with it, so instinctively, I reach back
Speaker 1: with my left hand and I grabbed the stage truss
Speaker 1: and the speaker goes forward. I gripped the stage trust
Speaker 1: to support myself and I stopped myself, but it ripped
Speaker 1: my shoulder out of socket, and you know, you know
Speaker 1: when you dis look at your shoulder and the entire
Speaker 1: ball comes out of the socket and it's just this
Speaker 1: horrible deformity on your shoulder, and it hurts like hell.
Speaker 1: I don't think anybody noticed. I don't think the crowd
Speaker 1: noticed it all. And I turned to walk off the
Speaker 1: stage and there's Chris Lee and my tour manager, and
Speaker 1: he's like, hey, you know, great show. He has no idea,
Speaker 1: and I go, Dude, my shoulder and he looks over
Speaker 1: and he goes, whoa, I go, you got to help
Speaker 1: me pop it back in. So he starts, you know,
Speaker 1: he positions himself underneath my arm and he's jacking it up,
Speaker 1: you know, trying to trying to lock that shoulder back
Speaker 1: in with no luck. So we go all the way
Speaker 1: to the bus. It's hurting like kew. So I popped
Speaker 1: some IV prof in and start taking some whiskey shots,
Speaker 1: one by one, anything to numb this pain. Chris meanwhile
Speaker 1: runs outside. There's always EMTs at our show, so he
Speaker 1: goes and finds these EMTs. He goes, hey, guys, come
Speaker 1: here quick. We need to pop his shoulder back in socket.
Speaker 1: Because I know now, the longer your shoulder stays out
Speaker 1: of socket, the longer recovery you're going to have. So
Speaker 1: you want to get it in quick. So he goes
Speaker 1: to the EMTs and they're like, hey, he has to
Speaker 1: come to the ambulance and we could fix it. And
Speaker 1: so Chris runs back on you need to go to
Speaker 1: the ambulance to fix it, and I said, hell, no,
Speaker 1: I'm not getting on that ambulance. What's that like thirty
Speaker 1: five hundred bucks? No way, I said, tell him to
Speaker 1: come up here. He goes back down, Granger can't come
Speaker 1: and they say, I'm sorry legally, and I totally get it.
Speaker 1: You know, if they messed something up even worse than
Speaker 1: I could sue him. And you know, that's the world
Speaker 1: we live in, so it's not their fault. And I
Speaker 1: get it. And so here I am on the bus
Speaker 1: and I still have this dislocated shoulder. Meanwhile the whole
Speaker 1: band is with me and we're running out of whiskey. Now,
Speaker 1: I just went and referenced this because we have a
Speaker 1: little show that we've made, we make on the road
Speaker 1: called EEE TV, and this is one of the episodes.
Speaker 1: We got all this on tape. This is all films,
Speaker 1: So I just I just went and watched it and
Speaker 1: it's gross seeing that lumpy shoulder. So what happened was
Speaker 1: my drummer's mother's boyfriend. You following me. He's a fireman
Speaker 1: and he comes on the bus and he goes, man,
Speaker 1: I know exactly how to do this. So he kind
Speaker 1: of positions himself, puts his arm under mine and starts
Speaker 1: putting pressure upward. It doesn't work. It doesn't work, he says, man,
Speaker 1: I know this is this is how to do it.
Speaker 1: I've done it before. Meanwhile, I take another shot of whiskey,
Speaker 1: does it one more time and then pop there it
Speaker 1: goes back into the socket. It's funny now, but you know,
Speaker 1: maybe the whiskey is what loosened up the liquaments and
Speaker 1: finally made it happen. But that was a crazy day.
Speaker 1: No ambulance ride, no hospital, and guess what I played
Speaker 1: the next day? So I did not have to cancel
Speaker 1: a single show. But that was coming. That's actually this
Speaker 1: next story. This next story is the worst injury I've
Speaker 1: ever had on stage. I did have to cancel shows.
Speaker 1: It's also super embarrassing. But here we go. Well, the
Speaker 1: sun has gone down in Missouri on kind of a
Speaker 1: strange day. It's not awkward with Frank if I've talked
Speaker 1: to him many times. This is the kind of guy
Speaker 1: that he is. He's going to work with us until
Speaker 1: we find a new guy. He's even going to train
Speaker 1: the new guy. So he's a good dude. Frank was
Speaker 1: not at the show where this next injury happened, and
Speaker 1: if he was, he probably would have stopped it. Actually,
Speaker 1: I guarantee you he would have prevented it. The reason
Speaker 1: he wasn't there was because it was an acoustic show
Speaker 1: in New Jersey. So it was me, Dusty, Todd, Chris,
Speaker 1: and a couple people from the record label, Brittany and
Speaker 1: John Loba. So I'd like to defend us a little
Speaker 1: bit by saying that we don't set the stage on
Speaker 1: these kind of shows. We leave it to the local crew.
Speaker 1: So they put out the mic stands, the microphones, cables, monitors,
Speaker 1: all that kind of stuff. So on this particular show,
Speaker 1: the monitors, the wedges, we're up at the very front
Speaker 1: of the stage, right on the edge. Now, we normally
Speaker 1: like to have those back a couple of feet to
Speaker 1: get some cushion, just so you know. That's how the
Speaker 1: stage is set. So here we are playing the show,
Speaker 1: sold out crowd, amazing crowd in New Jersey. On my
Speaker 1: left is Dusty playing a small drum kit on my right,
Speaker 1: Todd playing acoustic guitar. Here I am in the middle
Speaker 1: and guess what I'm singing? An earl dibbles song, which
Speaker 1: seems to be the curse of these kind of injuries. Now,
Speaker 1: what happens next is something I'll remember for a long
Speaker 1: long time. Country music singer Grangers Smith powered through a
Speaker 1: performance after falling from stage in New Jersey Friday, but
Speaker 1: was later hospitalized. A spokeswoman for Smith declared in a statement.
Speaker 1: Smith shared on Twitter that he had fallen while performing
Speaker 1: at the Starlin Ballroom in Saraville on Friday night. The
Speaker 1: country star said he took a pretty hard spill but
Speaker 1: hopes to be out of the hospital soon to head
Speaker 1: home to his family in Texas. Shows this weekend in
Speaker 1: North Carolina and Texas were canceled. There's a lot of
Speaker 1: videos on YouTube because a lot of people had their
Speaker 1: phones up. So I found one of the fall and
Speaker 1: it is painful to watch. I watched it one time
Speaker 1: when it happened. I watched it in the hospital on
Speaker 1: my phone, but I have not seen a video until now.
Speaker 1: When I had to download it for this podcast. I
Speaker 1: put my foot up on a monitor that was on
Speaker 1: the edge of the stage, and as I shifted my
Speaker 1: weight forward a little bit, the monitor flipped off. I
Speaker 1: went with it fell on top of the barricade. The
Speaker 1: metal barricade completely separated two ribs in my back and
Speaker 1: punctured a lung. Here's the video. So I'm down now,
Speaker 1: but I'm about to get back up, and you'll hear
Speaker 1: the cheers for that. The security guy comes running at
Speaker 1: me to help, and I remember thinking, well, the show
Speaker 1: can't end like this. I gotta get up. I gotta
Speaker 1: finish the show. So I stand up. I could tell
Speaker 1: something's really wrong. I could feel the crunching in my chest.
Speaker 1: The only thing I could say was it must have
Speaker 1: been a city boy that put that up there, make
Speaker 1: a joke out of an awkward situation. I think I
Speaker 1: got that from my dad. And notice the band never
Speaker 1: stops playing. I always told the guys if something bad happens,
Speaker 1: never ever stopped playing. But at this point, I'm just
Speaker 1: trying to get my breath. That's why I'm not singing
Speaker 1: or singing anything. Enough of that video, so I finished
Speaker 1: that song and then I sing Back Road song. I
Speaker 1: say sing, but I mainly had the crowd sing it
Speaker 1: for me because I could not catch my breath. I
Speaker 1: never punctured along before until then, but I definitely knew
Speaker 1: that's what happened, because I could feel the crunching of
Speaker 1: the broken ribs, and I could feel that I just
Speaker 1: had I had no lung capacity. Once again, Chris, my
Speaker 1: tour manager, is there and he's on the side of
Speaker 1: the stage and he looks at me and he mouths,
Speaker 1: are you okay? And I'm mouthed back no, But I
Speaker 1: gotta keep playing. I gotta finish back Road song. Sold
Speaker 1: out crowd, they got to hear it. So I finished
Speaker 1: the song. I go straight for Chris, straight down the stairs,
Speaker 1: and I said, dude, I broke ribs and something is
Speaker 1: wrong with my lungs. He says, okay, let's go to
Speaker 1: the hospital. So luckily, I wanted to stop by the
Speaker 1: bush real quick and change clothes, put on some sweatpants,
Speaker 1: some tennis shoes, something comfortable, get off my jeans, my boots.
Speaker 1: That was a really good decision that would pay off later.
Speaker 1: But we get in the get of the car. We
Speaker 1: had to the emergency room. Some fans, some sweetheart fans
Speaker 1: from New Jersey follow us there to theurgency room. And
Speaker 1: so when I get out and I'm kind of walking
Speaker 1: and waddling, They're like, get well, Granger. So those fans
Speaker 1: in New Jersey are amazing. Get into the emergency room.
Speaker 1: By this by this time, I wasn't taking whiskey shots
Speaker 1: like I did with the shoulder, So by this time,
Speaker 1: the pain is crazy. It's the worst pain I've ever
Speaker 1: had breaking these ribs. So I'm about to throw up,
Speaker 1: like I'm getting nauseated. So they gave me some medicine.
Speaker 1: That's the first thing I had, and then they gave
Speaker 1: me some morphine, which is which was a lifesaver at
Speaker 1: the time. I could feel that morphine starting in my
Speaker 1: toes and moving up to my face and instantly felt
Speaker 1: numb and better. So they go they do the x rays.
Speaker 1: Hours are going by. You know how emergency rooms are.
Speaker 1: Hours are going by is we're waiting, waiting, waiting, waiting. Finally,
Speaker 1: I think about three hours have gone by. It's about
Speaker 1: two o'clock in the morning. The doctor comes back and says,
Speaker 1: we got the x rays back. You did break two
Speaker 1: ribs in your back, but you have a new moo thorax,
Speaker 1: a hole in your lungs and there's air escaping into
Speaker 1: your chest cavity. So we have to call the ambulance
Speaker 1: and we have to transport you to the trauma hospital
Speaker 1: because if it's if it's too bad, you know, they
Speaker 1: have to put the tube in to relieve the pressure
Speaker 1: so that your chest cavity doesn't get too much air.
Speaker 1: So I'm like, all right, well, the knight's not over yet,
Speaker 1: so we go get in the ambulance. They come right away.
Speaker 1: They throw this you know, neck brace on me because
Speaker 1: they got to take all the precautions about just in
Speaker 1: case there's any kind of spinal injury. Chris is with me,
Speaker 1: you know, that's he's a good tour manager. He stuck
Speaker 1: with me to the end. We head to the trauma
Speaker 1: hospital and this is when it gets a little weird.
Speaker 1: Follow me on this the most embarrassing moment of my life.
Speaker 1: And the ambailance the guy says, okay, just to kind
Speaker 1: of walk you through what's gonna happen. We're gonna take
Speaker 1: you out. We're going to will you into the trauma hospital.
Speaker 1: There's gonna be a team of doctors. They're already prepped,
Speaker 1: they already know exactly what's happening. They're gonna ask a
Speaker 1: bunch of questions, they're gonna put you on a table,
Speaker 1: they're gonna do a couple of tests. Blah blah blah.
Speaker 1: Got it. Keep in mind, morphine is still saving my
Speaker 1: life right now. If I was completely sober, this would
Speaker 1: be really bad. But they wheel me out just like
Speaker 1: you said. There's the doctors. They're firing off these questions.
Speaker 1: You know, what's your name, what were you doing? How
Speaker 1: did this happen? What today's date? They're testing for any
Speaker 1: kind of brain injury or spinal injury. And then they
Speaker 1: start cutting my clothes off, boxers and everything, completely naked,
Speaker 1: which thank god I didn't have boots and jeans on right,
Speaker 1: So there I am naked, is the day I was
Speaker 1: born into this world with about twenty doctors, male and female.
Speaker 1: They're flipping me over, They're sticking things in places and
Speaker 1: trying to figure out if I have more injuries, and
Speaker 1: trying to figure out how much air has escaped into
Speaker 1: my chest cavity. To finally they get me stable and
Speaker 1: they put a sheet over me and they wheel me
Speaker 1: out into the hall. And as they wheel me out
Speaker 1: to the hall, I hear a group of doctors in
Speaker 1: the other room listening to if the boot fits on
Speaker 1: the computer. So there's these people that just saw me
Speaker 1: completely naked. Now they're listening to my current single. That's
Speaker 1: something huh. So by now it's morning. Chris is still
Speaker 1: with me. Brittany, my amazing East Coast radio rep, is
Speaker 1: with me. They stayed with me all night to make
Speaker 1: sure I was okay. Amber of course, at home, my
Speaker 1: wife is kind of freaking out because we've given her
Speaker 1: a little bit of information here and there, and she's
Speaker 1: wishing she could be there. She's actually scrambling maybe she's
Speaker 1: going to get on a flight and come see me
Speaker 1: in New Jersey. About noon the next day, five doctors
Speaker 1: come into my room and they said, we've got you
Speaker 1: completely stable, and we think it's okay to send you home.
Speaker 1: And I was like, well home is Texas and they said, oh, well, no,
Speaker 1: you can't fly, and I said, you're damn right, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna fly. So they checked me out. They weren't happy
Speaker 1: about it, but they checked me out and I went
Speaker 1: straight to the airport and bought a flight to Austin, Texas.
Speaker 1: Worst flight of my life, no doubt. Paying medicine was
Speaker 1: the only thing that really got me through it. But
Speaker 1: I made it home reluctantly. I canceled ten shows. It
Speaker 1: was the month of December, so it was our slowest
Speaker 1: month of the year already. Luckily we're going into the holidays.
Speaker 1: But what happened during this recovery was amazing to me.
Speaker 1: I learned so much during the six weeks I was
Speaker 1: on that couch about diet, about cold water therapy, so
Speaker 1: many things that I could talk about in a whole
Speaker 1: other podcast. And I healed stronger than I will as before.
Speaker 1: I believe that, and now I'll do anything to prevent
Speaker 1: me from ever missing a show again. Thank y'all for
Speaker 1: listening to episode four. It happensack that out of the
Speaker 1: blue scating the few lash. Yeah. When it happens like that,
Speaker 1: nothing to moons turns right into you, Julie. So you
Speaker 1: can do just to keep her around till the moon
Speaker 1: goes down in her back at your house. One thing
Speaker 1: is to another, you loving each other when looking you
Speaker 1: never lived back. It happens like that. This podcast is
Speaker 1: brought to you by EEEE Energy. Come find us on
Speaker 1: tour Grangersmith dot com, Forward Slash Tour. See you down
Speaker 1: the road,