WEBVTT - John Rich: Holding On To Your Hat & Your Values

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<v Speaker 1>The first line of the song, better get your attention,

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<v Speaker 1>I mean, right out of the gate, you better say

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<v Speaker 1>something bank, gotcha. You're never truly free until you can

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<v Speaker 1>say no. If I had a record deal that song

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<v Speaker 1>does not get hurt. When everything is out out of

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<v Speaker 1>your control, find the one thing you can still control,

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<v Speaker 1>and control it well.

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<v Speaker 2>I'm raving an arroyo. Welcome to Arroyo Grande, where we

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<v Speaker 2>dive into the wild currents of this culture and talk

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<v Speaker 2>to some of the most incredible culture makers and thought

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<v Speaker 2>leaders anywhere. I'm so glad to hear Country superstar John

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<v Speaker 2>Rich is my guest today. And for anyone who is lost,

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<v Speaker 2>or you've hit a dead end, or just feeling rejected,

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<v Speaker 2>does Jean Rich have some advice for you? Powerful stuff?

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<v Speaker 2>Stay tuned for that. First a little free flow. I

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<v Speaker 2>was getting on a plane the other day and they're

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<v Speaker 2>coming down the aisle was a couple. The woman had pajamas,

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<v Speaker 2>her hair in some kind of bag, and slippers and

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<v Speaker 2>the man with her sported pajama bottoms, a T shirt

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<v Speaker 2>and flip flops. Now bear in mind these people probably

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<v Speaker 2>paid four hundred and fifty bucks between them to fly,

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<v Speaker 2>but they went out of the house into the car

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<v Speaker 2>and through tsay in their sleepwear. Couldn't they at least

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<v Speaker 2>put jeans on? As I watched them come down the

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<v Speaker 2>aisle at me, I thought, here in shambling stark relief

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<v Speaker 2>is American manners in one image, I should have snapped

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<v Speaker 2>a picture slobs at home, slobs in the world. Surveys differ,

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<v Speaker 2>but it's estimated that Americans spend roughly fifteen one hundred

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<v Speaker 2>dollars a year on clothing. Did they have to blow

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<v Speaker 2>it all on pajamas and flip flops to cop and

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<v Speaker 2>distort Dolly Parton's line, I guess it's expensive to look

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<v Speaker 2>that horrible. It's hard to believe that there was a

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<v Speaker 2>time when Americans didn't leave the house without a hab

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<v Speaker 2>on their heads and women actually wore gloves. I hate

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<v Speaker 2>the fact that Americans have abandoned all sense of self

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<v Speaker 2>respect and insist on advertising it to the rest of us.

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<v Speaker 2>Try dressing up for a change, you might feel good

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<v Speaker 2>about yourself. Look, I've made it a habit in recent

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<v Speaker 2>days to wear a hat when I go out. I'll

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<v Speaker 2>tell you why in a minute, but I think it's

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<v Speaker 2>a good idea. It's one of the reasons I love

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<v Speaker 2>going to Texas and Nashville. People still wear hats, nice hats.

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<v Speaker 2>It bespeaks self respect. Gentlemen. Every man in America once

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<v Speaker 2>wore a hat. It was principally to shield them from

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<v Speaker 2>the sun as they walked about. If I guess there

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<v Speaker 2>was any one thing that killed hat wearing or ran

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<v Speaker 2>over it, it was probably the car. The low ceilings

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<v Speaker 2>of cars made hat wearing difficult, and since you weren't

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<v Speaker 2>walking around outside too much, you didn't really need a hat,

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<v Speaker 2>so they fell out of fashion. But I think we

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<v Speaker 2>need to revive hat wearing, and not just baseball cap apps, Stetson's, dobs, Borsolinos,

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<v Speaker 2>and Mazers. Elegant hats with brims. You know why, because

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<v Speaker 2>you can't wear a fedora with pajamas. As the fish

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<v Speaker 2>rots from the head down, the clothing improves in the

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<v Speaker 2>same order. The hat kind of dictates the rest of

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<v Speaker 2>the outfit. You'll notice at the end of each show,

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<v Speaker 2>I put a hat on as a head outside. That,

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<v Speaker 2>by the way, is good manners. Unless you're a lady.

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<v Speaker 2>You should never wear hats indoors. There for outdoor use.

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<v Speaker 2>And all you guys eating with your baseball caps on

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<v Speaker 2>take them off. It's a sign of respect the dinner table. Rather,

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<v Speaker 2>it is not your personal ballgame. Wearing a hat could

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<v Speaker 2>be a corrective for the sartorial sins all around us.

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<v Speaker 2>It's a sign of respect and dignity. People look at

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<v Speaker 2>you differently. Strangers will compliment you. I promise when you

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<v Speaker 2>wear a hat, you know why, because elegance is a rarity,

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<v Speaker 2>and I think we need self respect in the way

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<v Speaker 2>we carry ourselves dress because that leads to better behavior

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<v Speaker 2>in public. Think about wearing a hat as a start

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<v Speaker 2>show the world you are a human being and not

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<v Speaker 2>a slumber party escape. Now let's go into the deep

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<v Speaker 2>for our conversation with a man who is leading the

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<v Speaker 2>way on the hat front. John Rich is a multi

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<v Speaker 2>platinum country artist half of the country duo Big and Rich.

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<v Speaker 2>John has penned some of the best known country songs

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<v Speaker 2>not only for himself but for other artists. He also

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<v Speaker 2>discusses here the setbacks he faced, how he recovered and

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<v Speaker 2>found his groove, the faith that animates him, and the

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<v Speaker 2>terrible day he was caught in the crossfire of the

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<v Speaker 2>Mandalay based shooters attack on a festival he was headlining.

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<v Speaker 2>Here's John Rich John, Thank you so much for inviting

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<v Speaker 2>me to your town. It's nice to being here.

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<v Speaker 1>Welcome to Music City.

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<v Speaker 2>Well, I knew you'd have the hat, so I brought

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<v Speaker 2>my hat at and put it on link. I'm going

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<v Speaker 2>to build up to the hat. Tell me about your father, Jim,

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<v Speaker 2>who was a pastor, but he spread the gospel in

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<v Speaker 2>an interesting way. I read he had always had a

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<v Speaker 2>guitar with him. Yeah, tell me how that marked you,

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<v Speaker 2>what you learned from him.

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<v Speaker 1>Yeah, he's a singer songwriter. Actually went to college on

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<v Speaker 1>a vocal scholarship. You know, he's a real singer. And

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<v Speaker 1>at nineteen he said, I was called to go preach

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<v Speaker 1>at nineteen and so he said, So that's why I

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<v Speaker 1>started doing. He started on college campuses where he was

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<v Speaker 1>going to school, and then when he got out of there,

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<v Speaker 1>he started going. He went to the Democrat National Convention

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<v Speaker 1>right after that, and then he started going to places

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<v Speaker 1>like Marty Grass, the Indianapolis five hundred, all kinds of

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<v Speaker 1>major events around the US. And he would go out

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<v Speaker 1>in the streets and take his guitar and take a

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<v Speaker 1>speaker and on a client's cart, stand it next to

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<v Speaker 1>him and start singing. And I asked him why. I mean,

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<v Speaker 1>I understand the point of why you're doing that. What

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<v Speaker 1>a great thing to do. But man, you're such a

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<v Speaker 1>charismatic guy, You're such a great minister. You could have

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<v Speaker 1>been preaching at a massive church and where he goes, Yeah,

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<v Speaker 1>because the people I was told to preach to will

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<v Speaker 1>never walk into one of those churches. The people I

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<v Speaker 1>was told to preach to, so prisons, Yeah, Marty Grass

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<v Speaker 1>like go where the people are who are never never

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<v Speaker 1>going to walk in the front door of a church building.

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<v Speaker 1>They're the ones that need to hear what I have

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<v Speaker 1>to see.

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<v Speaker 2>You feel that calling on your life? Now? I think

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<v Speaker 2>you're it in your music now, John.

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<v Speaker 1>Yeah, I think to a large degree. You know, an

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<v Speaker 1>audience that I've been able to build up with his

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<v Speaker 1>help since the mid nineties with the band Lone Storing,

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<v Speaker 1>then Big and Rich and then solo and combinations of

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<v Speaker 1>those things. You know, they get used to hearing you

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<v Speaker 1>singing hit country songs and they go, I love you music,

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<v Speaker 1>I love you music. I love your music. Well, now

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<v Speaker 1>when they come up to me, they go, I love

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<v Speaker 1>what you stand for. Uh, I like your music. I

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<v Speaker 1>really love what you stand for. So I guess with

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<v Speaker 1>the skill set and audience I've built over all these years,

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<v Speaker 1>I'm now able to write songs that mean something other

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<v Speaker 1>than just a check or an award or a plaque

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<v Speaker 1>on the wall, like you can put into gear. A

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<v Speaker 1>piece of music that in three minutes can communicate more

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<v Speaker 1>to people, get them to think more, think more deeply

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<v Speaker 1>than if you talk to them for three weeks than

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<v Speaker 1>any speech anybody could ever get. You're a musician, you

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<v Speaker 1>know the power of music. It disarms people, It opens

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<v Speaker 1>up a different part of their mind. I believe a

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<v Speaker 1>different part of their spirit as well. So they're so

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<v Speaker 1>and when they hear something that's real, that's truth, and

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<v Speaker 1>it's wrapped in music. It's a really powerful thing.

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<v Speaker 2>And the guitar. You all, you and your father shared

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<v Speaker 2>guitar lessons when yeah young.

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<v Speaker 1>Yeah, that's how I learned how to play my dad.

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<v Speaker 1>You know, you don't get real rich preaching and Marty Grass.

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<v Speaker 2>I mean you get reach in different ways John rich Well, of.

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<v Speaker 1>Course, absolutely, but not monetarily. And so he had a

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<v Speaker 1>lot of different jobs. My dad slapped hogs at a

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<v Speaker 1>barn on the weekends. He was the night watchman at

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<v Speaker 1>Amberland National Bank, where I'm from, he sold cars and

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<v Speaker 1>he gave guitar lessons. And so when I was a

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<v Speaker 1>little kid, probably five, my dad goes, he's walking out

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<v Speaker 1>the door and he goes, you want to go with

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<v Speaker 1>me to the music store and do guitar lessons. I

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<v Speaker 1>was like, yeah, let's go. You know, I'll get to

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<v Speaker 1>go with dad.

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<v Speaker 2>Wow.

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<v Speaker 1>And so I go in there and there's this whole

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<v Speaker 1>like semicircle of adults that got their guitars out. He

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<v Speaker 1>pulls up a little chair for me, golees here, just

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<v Speaker 1>sit right behind me and hands me like a little

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<v Speaker 1>cheapy guitar. Just follow along, follow along. Well, after a

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<v Speaker 1>few weeks of tagging along, I'm sitting at the house

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<v Speaker 1>playing better than the adults were playing. And he went,

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<v Speaker 1>he picked that up pretty fast, didn't you? Aon went?

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<v Speaker 1>I said, it's really fun, you know. And so then

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<v Speaker 1>he said, you want to sit behind me in the

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<v Speaker 1>poolpit sometimes when I go preach at these places and

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<v Speaker 1>back me up. I said, yeah. So that's where I

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<v Speaker 1>got into playing the guitar, was wanting to play with

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<v Speaker 1>my dad.

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<v Speaker 2>What did your dad teach you about spiritual warfare and

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<v Speaker 2>the power of music and the gospel to counter evil.

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<v Speaker 1>My dad priests alon on that still does that Basically,

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<v Speaker 1>everything you see happening in the flesh has already happened

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<v Speaker 1>in the spiritual side. It plays out down here amongst

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<v Speaker 1>all of us, and that it's always really important to

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<v Speaker 1>remember that when you meet an individual that seems vile, well,

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<v Speaker 1>that seems violent, angry, way out of whack. He said,

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<v Speaker 1>look at that person and realize that is not how

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<v Speaker 1>they were born. They were not created to become that.

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<v Speaker 1>They started out as an innocent little baby. Okay, they

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<v Speaker 1>weren't like that. At some point in their life the

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<v Speaker 1>other side got a hold of them and ripped their

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<v Speaker 1>life to shreds. And this is how they are are now.

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<v Speaker 1>And you know, when you look at presidents, for instance,

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<v Speaker 1>my dad and I had a conversation about that before

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<v Speaker 1>this last election, and he says, well, if Trump wins,

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<v Speaker 1>it'll be an act of God, and if Trump loses,

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<v Speaker 1>it'll be an act of God.

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<v Speaker 2>I want to talk about your origin story. You leave home,

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<v Speaker 2>graduate high school, you go to Opry Land, right, why

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<v Speaker 2>Opry Lad, Why what had you gone there? And said Land,

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<v Speaker 2>I went as a kid multiple tire. You go, yes,

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<v Speaker 2>we love it.

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<v Speaker 1>Yeah, So Oppyland, for people that don't know, is a

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<v Speaker 1>big theme park in Nashville for a very long time

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<v Speaker 1>live country music, bluegrass, gospel, and they had roller coasters

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<v Speaker 1>and log rides and everything else. And so as I

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<v Speaker 1>was a senior in high school, a friend of mine says, uh,

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<v Speaker 1>oh look at this back when we had a newspapers, Oh,

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<v Speaker 1>look at this. Oppyland's having auditions. I went, oh, that's cool. Yeah,

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<v Speaker 1>been there one hundred times. He goes, you should audition

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<v Speaker 1>for that.

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<v Speaker 2>Huh.

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<v Speaker 1>I said, they're not going to hire me. He goes,

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<v Speaker 1>why not? I said, because you got to dance and

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<v Speaker 1>do all this stuff. I said. He goes, well, you know,

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<v Speaker 1>going to be a bunch of good looking girls there.

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<v Speaker 1>I said, well, no, that is true. That's a good point,

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<v Speaker 1>because you should just go down there. I'll go down

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<v Speaker 1>there with you. I said, okay, fine, So drove my

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<v Speaker 1>nineteen seventy one Dodge Dark Swinger, which I still own,

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<v Speaker 1>by the way, drove it down there and I auditioned.

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<v Speaker 2>And I got the call back with your guitar.

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<v Speaker 1>Just me and a guitar. That didn't make me dance

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<v Speaker 1>or anything. I just sang. Got the call back, came

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<v Speaker 1>back sang again, and they said, can you dance? And

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<v Speaker 1>I said I can two step. I'm from Texas. I

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<v Speaker 1>said I can do that, but that's about it. They go,

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<v Speaker 1>could you learn some stuff? I said maybe, I don't know.

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<v Speaker 1>They said, well, it doesn't matter, because you're hired. You're in.

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<v Speaker 1>So I knew halfway through my senior year I would

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<v Speaker 1>be working at Apeland. So that's the first time I

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<v Speaker 1>ever got real, a real check. I think it was

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<v Speaker 1>three hundred and thirty dollars a week to do Opuland,

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<v Speaker 1>which is where I met the guys that started the

0:11:46.840 --> 0:11:47.760
<v Speaker 1>band Lone Star.

0:11:47.720 --> 0:11:51.319
<v Speaker 2>Right Deep Dean Sean Sam Sam's how did you meet?

0:11:51.559 --> 0:11:53.880
<v Speaker 1>Well, he worked at Appyland what he had been there

0:11:53.920 --> 0:11:57.199
<v Speaker 1>several years, and I wound up on a show with

0:11:57.280 --> 0:11:59.679
<v Speaker 1>him and he heard how high I sang. I was

0:11:59.720 --> 0:12:03.080
<v Speaker 1>first tenor. I was really high, first tenor. And he said, hey,

0:12:03.080 --> 0:12:05.840
<v Speaker 1>we're putting a band together, a bunch of guys from Texas.

0:12:05.840 --> 0:12:08.760
<v Speaker 1>You're from Texas. He said, man, your voice is so high.

0:12:08.920 --> 0:12:11.160
<v Speaker 1>We need somebody that can hit those high notes. We're

0:12:11.160 --> 0:12:14.120
<v Speaker 1>going to covering modern day country music. Because at that

0:12:14.120 --> 0:12:15.719
<v Speaker 1>point he still had a lot of harmony. Rest his

0:12:15.800 --> 0:12:18.480
<v Speaker 1>heart in Alabama and all that. I said, that's cool.

0:12:18.520 --> 0:12:22.040
<v Speaker 1>He goes, you play bass, right, I said, I mean, yeah,

0:12:22.040 --> 0:12:23.600
<v Speaker 1>I can play a bass. I'm thinking, how hard can

0:12:23.640 --> 0:12:26.080
<v Speaker 1>it be? It's only got four strings? How how could

0:12:26.080 --> 0:12:28.600
<v Speaker 1>it be? The answer was no, I was not a

0:12:28.640 --> 0:12:31.920
<v Speaker 1>bass player. So he goes, great, learn these songs and

0:12:31.960 --> 0:12:34.920
<v Speaker 1>he hands me a cassette tape of the top twenty

0:12:34.960 --> 0:12:36.560
<v Speaker 1>I think the first twenty out of the top forty

0:12:36.559 --> 0:12:38.800
<v Speaker 1>country songs of that week. So we're we're going to

0:12:38.840 --> 0:12:41.440
<v Speaker 1>have a little get together this weekend. So I called

0:12:41.440 --> 0:12:43.880
<v Speaker 1>a friend of mine who was a pro bass player.

0:12:44.640 --> 0:12:46.319
<v Speaker 1>I said, can you show me how to play bass

0:12:46.360 --> 0:12:48.000
<v Speaker 1>on all these songs this week? And by the way,

0:12:48.040 --> 0:12:51.080
<v Speaker 1>can I borrow a bass and a cable and an amp?

0:12:51.520 --> 0:12:54.240
<v Speaker 1>He goes, sure, I can show you how to do it.

0:12:54.320 --> 0:12:56.280
<v Speaker 1>So he goes, here's the technique, and here's it. So

0:12:56.280 --> 0:12:58.640
<v Speaker 1>I spent eight nine hours a day leading up to

0:12:58.679 --> 0:13:01.640
<v Speaker 1>that little rehearsal with my thumb you're supposed to play it,

0:13:01.640 --> 0:13:04.840
<v Speaker 1>I play it like this now, doing this, trying to

0:13:04.840 --> 0:13:06.960
<v Speaker 1>find all the notes. And went to the rehearsal and

0:13:06.960 --> 0:13:09.959
<v Speaker 1>they said, okay, you can stay in the band because

0:13:09.960 --> 0:13:12.040
<v Speaker 1>you can sing higher than Richie McDonald, which was the

0:13:12.120 --> 0:13:14.120
<v Speaker 1>lead singer. But you got to get better at the base.

0:13:14.240 --> 0:13:16.360
<v Speaker 1>You can't stay in the band. I said, you got it.

0:13:16.640 --> 0:13:18.720
<v Speaker 1>And that's what really made me not go to college,

0:13:18.720 --> 0:13:20.400
<v Speaker 1>because the guys called up and said, hey, we got

0:13:20.440 --> 0:13:22.439
<v Speaker 1>a booking agent that can put us on a road

0:13:22.480 --> 0:13:25.400
<v Speaker 1>for about two hundred dates this year. I said, I'm

0:13:25.400 --> 0:13:28.080
<v Speaker 1>supposed to go to college. I said, I've got a

0:13:28.080 --> 0:13:31.720
<v Speaker 1>full ride scholarship to Belmont University on a vocal scholarship.

0:13:31.920 --> 0:13:34.160
<v Speaker 1>They go, well, you're gonna have to pick. And I

0:13:34.200 --> 0:13:36.280
<v Speaker 1>went to my dad and I said, I don't think

0:13:36.320 --> 0:13:38.000
<v Speaker 1>I'm going to go to college this year. He went,

0:13:38.120 --> 0:13:41.280
<v Speaker 1>do what I said? He said, what are you going

0:13:41.320 --> 0:13:42.679
<v Speaker 1>to do? Instead of that? I said, I'm going to

0:13:42.760 --> 0:13:46.120
<v Speaker 1>get in a van pulling a trailer with a bunch

0:13:46.120 --> 0:13:48.000
<v Speaker 1>of guys who are ten and fifteen years older than me,

0:13:48.040 --> 0:13:50.320
<v Speaker 1>and we're going to go play holiday in lounges, rodeos

0:13:50.320 --> 0:13:54.040
<v Speaker 1>and casinos. This is the dad who preaches at Marty Grass.

0:13:54.160 --> 0:13:55.840
<v Speaker 2>So this is this world.

0:13:57.200 --> 0:13:59.400
<v Speaker 1>But you have signs now. I can't even imagine the

0:13:59.440 --> 0:14:02.880
<v Speaker 1>pit in his that must have given him. But he said,

0:14:03.080 --> 0:14:05.760
<v Speaker 1>what's your ultimate goal? I said, MultiMate goal is I

0:14:05.800 --> 0:14:07.920
<v Speaker 1>want to write hit songs beyond country radio and play

0:14:07.920 --> 0:14:09.760
<v Speaker 1>the grand O Library. I don't know how going to

0:14:09.800 --> 0:14:12.520
<v Speaker 1>college is going to do that. He goes, it won't

0:14:13.000 --> 0:14:15.360
<v Speaker 1>I said, So he goes, that's what you think you

0:14:15.400 --> 0:14:17.600
<v Speaker 1>need to do. You're grown man. I was eighteen. You're

0:14:17.640 --> 0:14:20.040
<v Speaker 1>grown man. So that's what I did. I took off

0:14:20.040 --> 0:14:21.840
<v Speaker 1>on the road and never look back.

0:14:22.360 --> 0:14:24.160
<v Speaker 2>And you have a number one hit. Of course not

0:14:24.240 --> 0:14:25.040
<v Speaker 2>long thereafter.

0:14:27.160 --> 0:14:29.120
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, come crying to me hit number one? That's my

0:14:29.120 --> 0:14:29.800
<v Speaker 1>first number one?

0:14:29.840 --> 0:14:30.640
<v Speaker 2>How did that come to be?

0:14:31.720 --> 0:14:34.640
<v Speaker 1>So in Nashville, when you get a record deal back

0:14:34.680 --> 0:14:37.520
<v Speaker 1>then you would get a de facto publishing deal. Because

0:14:37.560 --> 0:14:39.760
<v Speaker 1>you have a record deal, you get a default publishing deal.

0:14:40.480 --> 0:14:45.040
<v Speaker 1>And when that happens, they'll take these greenhorn songwriters like

0:14:45.160 --> 0:14:48.520
<v Speaker 1>me and sit you in the room with Hall of famers,

0:14:48.560 --> 0:14:51.400
<v Speaker 1>I mean, like the greatest country songwriter minds that have

0:14:51.440 --> 0:14:53.880
<v Speaker 1>ever existed. And you're sitting in the room with them,

0:14:54.280 --> 0:14:56.040
<v Speaker 1>and they're trying to write songs to get on your

0:14:56.080 --> 0:14:58.480
<v Speaker 1>new record. That's the point. And they figured if one

0:14:58.480 --> 0:14:59.920
<v Speaker 1>of the guys in the band is a writer on

0:15:00.160 --> 0:15:02.280
<v Speaker 1>to he'll vouch for the song. We got a better show,

0:15:02.320 --> 0:15:04.400
<v Speaker 1>shoot into the album, right, So I got to sit

0:15:04.440 --> 0:15:07.800
<v Speaker 1>in the room with all these guys, and I guess

0:15:07.840 --> 0:15:11.760
<v Speaker 1>by just really watching them in Osmosis, I started getting

0:15:11.760 --> 0:15:14.360
<v Speaker 1>a lot better. And so Come Crying to Me was

0:15:14.400 --> 0:15:16.360
<v Speaker 1>actually a co write. It was a three way, right,

0:15:16.400 --> 0:15:19.760
<v Speaker 1>so it was me and two established songwriters, but it

0:15:19.840 --> 0:15:22.160
<v Speaker 1>was my title and I had the thing going. I

0:15:22.280 --> 0:15:24.080
<v Speaker 1>was always walking with an idea started and they go,

0:15:24.120 --> 0:15:25.960
<v Speaker 1>that's a really good idea, that's write that. Why not

0:15:26.040 --> 0:15:27.080
<v Speaker 1>being my first number one?

0:15:27.120 --> 0:15:30.240
<v Speaker 2>Wow? What did you learn from them that you didn't

0:15:30.280 --> 0:15:33.320
<v Speaker 2>know before sitting in that room because you always picked great.

0:15:33.560 --> 0:15:35.600
<v Speaker 2>I mean, when you're working with people at the top

0:15:35.640 --> 0:15:37.720
<v Speaker 2>of the game. I always tell my kids, you really

0:15:37.720 --> 0:15:39.640
<v Speaker 2>want to know how this works. Go find the best

0:15:39.640 --> 0:15:43.160
<v Speaker 2>people in this gameit next to them, clean their their

0:15:43.200 --> 0:15:45.560
<v Speaker 2>toilets or offices, do whatever you need to do to

0:15:45.600 --> 0:15:46.080
<v Speaker 2>be near them.

0:15:46.200 --> 0:15:48.120
<v Speaker 1>Yes, do not hang out with people that are at

0:15:48.120 --> 0:15:50.440
<v Speaker 1>your level. If you can keep from it. You know,

0:15:50.560 --> 0:15:52.360
<v Speaker 1>you can say all day, well, I'm really good compared

0:15:52.400 --> 0:15:54.200
<v Speaker 1>to this one, this one and that one and that one. Yeah,

0:15:54.200 --> 0:15:57.200
<v Speaker 1>but are you pretty good compared to Johnny Cash? Right? No,

0:15:57.440 --> 0:15:59.680
<v Speaker 1>and you never will, but you're pretty good compared to

0:15:59.720 --> 0:16:04.000
<v Speaker 1>George Jones. No, okay, then keep their faces on the

0:16:04.040 --> 0:16:06.240
<v Speaker 1>wall when you're writing, which is what I have at

0:16:06.240 --> 0:16:10.560
<v Speaker 1>my house. What you learn from pro country songwriters is

0:16:10.600 --> 0:16:12.200
<v Speaker 1>which is what I know now and how I do it.

0:16:12.200 --> 0:16:13.800
<v Speaker 1>And if you listen to my songs, you'll hear this

0:16:13.840 --> 0:16:16.720
<v Speaker 1>play out. The first line of the song better get

0:16:16.760 --> 0:16:18.720
<v Speaker 1>your attention. I mean, right out of the gate, you

0:16:18.760 --> 0:16:22.720
<v Speaker 1>better say something bang, gotcha. That way they'll hear the

0:16:22.720 --> 0:16:25.120
<v Speaker 1>second line and the third, and really you want every

0:16:25.160 --> 0:16:28.760
<v Speaker 1>line in the song to be a standalone thought. I'm

0:16:30.480 --> 0:16:35.240
<v Speaker 1>I'm a still picture songwriter. So some people saw all

0:16:35.280 --> 0:16:37.840
<v Speaker 1>different styles. But some people like to write, you know,

0:16:37.880 --> 0:16:41.400
<v Speaker 1>some chronological story and that's fine too. I love those songs.

0:16:41.480 --> 0:16:41.720
<v Speaker 2>Yeah.

0:16:41.800 --> 0:16:44.480
<v Speaker 1>For me, ninety percent of what I write would be

0:16:45.000 --> 0:16:48.160
<v Speaker 1>I'm sitting here with you. I take a mental picture

0:16:48.160 --> 0:16:51.200
<v Speaker 1>of this room, and I write what's happening in that room,

0:16:51.240 --> 0:16:53.080
<v Speaker 1>so you could literally watch the picture and listen to

0:16:53.120 --> 0:16:56.000
<v Speaker 1>the song and be in the picture. I write in pictures,

0:16:56.040 --> 0:16:57.960
<v Speaker 1>I try to put you in the spot, make you

0:16:58.000 --> 0:17:00.960
<v Speaker 1>smell it, feel it, taste it. I want you to

0:17:01.040 --> 0:17:04.200
<v Speaker 1>feel what's going on in this situation of the lyrics,

0:17:04.240 --> 0:17:07.480
<v Speaker 1>so almost voyeuristic to a degree. I've been able to

0:17:07.520 --> 0:17:11.680
<v Speaker 1>write songs for other people. Faith Hill said, I wish

0:17:11.720 --> 0:17:13.840
<v Speaker 1>you'd write me a song. Said, I'd love to write

0:17:13.840 --> 0:17:15.399
<v Speaker 1>your song. Faith, What do you want to sing about?

0:17:15.440 --> 0:17:17.080
<v Speaker 2>Mississippi? Being for Mississippi?

0:17:17.119 --> 0:17:20.400
<v Speaker 1>You know, you know my history? You did your homework? Well, yeah,

0:17:20.440 --> 0:17:23.440
<v Speaker 1>she says, I said, what do you want to sing about?

0:17:23.480 --> 0:17:26.159
<v Speaker 1>She goes, I don't know, write a song where it

0:17:26.160 --> 0:17:28.800
<v Speaker 1>would only make sense if I sang it. No other

0:17:28.840 --> 0:17:30.639
<v Speaker 1>girl singer could even sing it. What do you make

0:17:30.720 --> 0:17:34.160
<v Speaker 1>sense for them? I went, well, that's quite a homework assignment. Okay,

0:17:34.600 --> 0:17:37.000
<v Speaker 1>all right, let me think about it. So we're right

0:17:37.080 --> 0:17:39.320
<v Speaker 1>on tour with Tim McGraw at the time, and Faith

0:17:39.440 --> 0:17:41.560
<v Speaker 1>was out there. And during the day you see Faith

0:17:41.600 --> 0:17:44.080
<v Speaker 1>Hill back in the back parking lots by the tour buses,

0:17:44.080 --> 0:17:48.160
<v Speaker 1>flip flops, cut off jeans, ball cap, sipping a corona,

0:17:48.520 --> 0:17:50.439
<v Speaker 1>got her kids playing at a kiddie pool, I mean,

0:17:50.520 --> 0:17:54.560
<v Speaker 1>just mom. And then the concert hits and Faith comes

0:17:54.600 --> 0:17:56.800
<v Speaker 1>walking off the bus in an evening gown and diamond

0:17:56.840 --> 0:17:59.240
<v Speaker 1>earrings and her hair's all done and she's singing, It's

0:17:59.280 --> 0:18:01.600
<v Speaker 1>your love with him, growing kind of thirty thousand people

0:18:02.040 --> 0:18:03.960
<v Speaker 1>and five minutes later, she's right back in the parking

0:18:04.000 --> 0:18:06.800
<v Speaker 1>lot with her flip flops ball cap. I said, that's

0:18:06.800 --> 0:18:09.880
<v Speaker 1>what the fans don't know about Faith, because she had

0:18:09.880 --> 0:18:12.119
<v Speaker 1>been doing some Hollywood movies at that point, and a

0:18:12.119 --> 0:18:14.400
<v Speaker 1>lot of the fans said, oh, she's gone Hollywood. She's

0:18:14.440 --> 0:18:16.639
<v Speaker 1>forgot about where she came from. So I said, I'm

0:18:16.640 --> 0:18:19.040
<v Speaker 1>gonna write a song about where she comes from. So

0:18:19.080 --> 0:18:21.280
<v Speaker 1>the first line of the song, it's a long way

0:18:21.320 --> 0:18:24.600
<v Speaker 1>from Star, Mississippi, her hometown, to the big stage. I'm

0:18:24.600 --> 0:18:26.879
<v Speaker 1>singing on a night. So Martina can't sing that. She

0:18:27.000 --> 0:18:29.520
<v Speaker 1>and I can't sing that. Gretchen can't sing that, Riba

0:18:29.560 --> 0:18:31.920
<v Speaker 1>can't sing that because none of those people are from Star,

0:18:32.200 --> 0:18:34.680
<v Speaker 1>see what I mean. Yeah, So there's approaches that I've

0:18:34.720 --> 0:18:38.680
<v Speaker 1>taken to songs, all various approaches, but in general, it's

0:18:38.760 --> 0:18:39.640
<v Speaker 1>writing in pictures.

0:18:39.720 --> 0:18:42.320
<v Speaker 2>Gretchen Wilson. Then you write red neck woman Forgreting right,

0:18:42.359 --> 0:18:44.560
<v Speaker 2>Wilson after the fall?

0:18:44.640 --> 0:18:46.680
<v Speaker 1>That would know it was right before Faith. Faith came

0:18:46.760 --> 0:18:49.080
<v Speaker 1>to me because she heard you heard that one. She said,

0:18:49.160 --> 0:18:51.760
<v Speaker 1>I want a red neck woman for me. I need

0:18:51.800 --> 0:18:52.320
<v Speaker 1>my song.

0:18:53.280 --> 0:18:54.800
<v Speaker 2>I don't blame her, she's got a good ear.

0:18:55.240 --> 0:18:57.000
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, it was it was quite a challenge.

0:18:56.720 --> 0:18:59.040
<v Speaker 2>And I wouldn't take you back. What happened with Long Star?

0:18:59.480 --> 0:19:00.840
<v Speaker 2>They boot you out of the band?

0:19:01.000 --> 0:19:04.680
<v Speaker 1>Yes, they did? Why because I deserved it? Why because

0:19:04.720 --> 0:19:07.560
<v Speaker 1>I was a real ass and it's hard to deal with.

0:19:07.720 --> 0:19:11.000
<v Speaker 2>Man, Why were you so difficult? You're feeling your road?

0:19:11.040 --> 0:19:13.640
<v Speaker 2>You got number one hit right out the gate right? Yes?

0:19:14.280 --> 0:19:18.600
<v Speaker 1>And when you grow up? So I grew up in

0:19:18.640 --> 0:19:23.199
<v Speaker 1>a double wide trailer Emerald, Texas. We didn't miss meals,

0:19:23.280 --> 0:19:27.800
<v Speaker 1>but it wasn't any extra laying around, and a lot

0:19:27.880 --> 0:19:30.000
<v Speaker 1>of people around me had said not my dad, but

0:19:30.119 --> 0:19:33.760
<v Speaker 1>others were down on me, down on me all the time.

0:19:33.880 --> 0:19:37.320
<v Speaker 1>Growing up, I was very as you can imagine, headstrong kid.

0:19:38.880 --> 0:19:42.480
<v Speaker 1>And when I finally broke through and made it to

0:19:42.560 --> 0:19:44.840
<v Speaker 1>the other side and had started having real big success

0:19:44.960 --> 0:19:49.080
<v Speaker 1>like that, I took success like a hammer, and anybody

0:19:49.160 --> 0:19:51.199
<v Speaker 1>that had ever messed with me, I just whack them

0:19:51.240 --> 0:19:53.520
<v Speaker 1>in ahead with it. By the way I would talk,

0:19:53.640 --> 0:19:56.040
<v Speaker 1>the way I would live, the way what I would drive,

0:19:56.200 --> 0:19:59.280
<v Speaker 1>how I would present myself, what I would say in

0:19:59.359 --> 0:20:02.040
<v Speaker 1>a meeting, what I would say on a microphone. I mean,

0:20:02.280 --> 0:20:05.960
<v Speaker 1>just one hundred percent totally engrossed with my own arrogance

0:20:07.040 --> 0:20:09.639
<v Speaker 1>and so. At one point the band just said, you

0:20:09.720 --> 0:20:12.120
<v Speaker 1>know what, we've had just but enough of you. Think

0:20:12.119 --> 0:20:15.840
<v Speaker 1>it's time for you to go wow, which sucked because

0:20:15.880 --> 0:20:18.800
<v Speaker 1>the very next song they put out was Amazed Yeah,

0:20:18.960 --> 0:20:21.560
<v Speaker 1>one of their biggest songs in country. And I was

0:20:21.600 --> 0:20:23.600
<v Speaker 1>sitting at home in my little apartment that I no

0:20:23.680 --> 0:20:25.720
<v Speaker 1>longer could pay for because I just lost my income,

0:20:25.920 --> 0:20:28.440
<v Speaker 1>lost my record deal, and lost my what publishing deal

0:20:28.480 --> 0:20:30.720
<v Speaker 1>because by the fault you get the pub deal lost

0:20:30.800 --> 0:20:34.280
<v Speaker 1>them both lost. The management lost a business manager, lost

0:20:34.320 --> 0:20:36.840
<v Speaker 1>the shows on the road, lost all of it. Boom,

0:20:37.000 --> 0:20:38.880
<v Speaker 1>just like that in a phone call. So I'm sitting

0:20:38.880 --> 0:20:42.639
<v Speaker 1>at home watching my old band except the award for Amazed.

0:20:43.760 --> 0:20:46.119
<v Speaker 2>And so and you thought what when you watched it? Oh?

0:20:46.200 --> 0:20:53.239
<v Speaker 1>I was viciously upset at them initially and then started realizing, well,

0:20:53.280 --> 0:20:55.840
<v Speaker 1>I would have fired me too. I would have fired me.

0:20:56.440 --> 0:20:59.520
<v Speaker 1>I deserved being fired over that. So I thought, well,

0:20:59.560 --> 0:21:02.680
<v Speaker 1>now would have I do? Maybe I can get a

0:21:02.720 --> 0:21:05.359
<v Speaker 1>solo record deal. I got one, you got one. I

0:21:05.480 --> 0:21:07.760
<v Speaker 1>got one and it flopped, put out two songs and

0:21:07.840 --> 0:21:09.680
<v Speaker 1>neither one of them hit. So I lost that deal.

0:21:10.040 --> 0:21:12.280
<v Speaker 1>Now I'm a two time loser. I got kicked out

0:21:12.280 --> 0:21:15.080
<v Speaker 1>of a band, my solo deal failed, and in country music,

0:21:15.160 --> 0:21:17.520
<v Speaker 1>that's a big deal. If you can't hit your radio

0:21:17.640 --> 0:21:20.879
<v Speaker 1>goes now he tried, it didn't work. Next, I mean,

0:21:20.960 --> 0:21:24.160
<v Speaker 1>it is just like that. It was at that point

0:21:24.359 --> 0:21:26.960
<v Speaker 1>I got some really good advice from a couple of

0:21:27.000 --> 0:21:29.600
<v Speaker 1>the older songwriters, and they said, listen, when everything is

0:21:29.640 --> 0:21:32.800
<v Speaker 1>out out of your control, find the one thing you

0:21:32.880 --> 0:21:37.920
<v Speaker 1>can still control and control it well. They said, that

0:21:38.000 --> 0:21:41.359
<v Speaker 1>could be what you're eating, how many pushups did you

0:21:41.480 --> 0:21:45.159
<v Speaker 1>do today, whatever, Find what you can still control and

0:21:45.200 --> 0:21:47.200
<v Speaker 1>control it well. Well, for me, that was a pencil

0:21:47.280 --> 0:21:47.880
<v Speaker 1>and a piece.

0:21:47.680 --> 0:21:50.119
<v Speaker 2>Of paper, writing back to your core writing.

0:21:50.359 --> 0:21:52.399
<v Speaker 1>So in the course of about four or five years,

0:21:52.880 --> 0:21:57.399
<v Speaker 1>I wrote around seven to eight hundred songs because you

0:21:57.400 --> 0:22:00.360
<v Speaker 1>couldn't stop me from writing, and I write on every

0:22:00.400 --> 0:22:00.840
<v Speaker 1>single day.

0:22:00.880 --> 0:22:02.680
<v Speaker 2>All were making ends meet. What were you doing?

0:22:04.119 --> 0:22:05.960
<v Speaker 1>There was still a little bit of money coming in

0:22:06.040 --> 0:22:07.960
<v Speaker 1>from come crying to me and a couple of other things,

0:22:08.040 --> 0:22:09.760
<v Speaker 1>but that's about it. That's about it.

0:22:09.920 --> 0:22:10.159
<v Speaker 2>It was.

0:22:10.359 --> 0:22:13.520
<v Speaker 1>It was burning down then. And then I meet Big Kitty,

0:22:13.600 --> 0:22:16.080
<v Speaker 1>which I know you're gonna ask about, and he was

0:22:16.200 --> 0:22:18.520
<v Speaker 1>kind of the same thing where he was just writing

0:22:18.560 --> 0:22:22.359
<v Speaker 1>every single day and misunderstood by the industry. You know,

0:22:22.440 --> 0:22:26.480
<v Speaker 1>my anglic country music was ac DC was a banjo player.

0:22:27.560 --> 0:22:29.640
<v Speaker 1>That's what it sounded like. That's what I wanted to sound.

0:22:30.280 --> 0:22:30.440
<v Speaker 2>You know.

0:22:30.480 --> 0:22:32.720
<v Speaker 1>I wanted to do save orts, ride a cowboy, lone Star,

0:22:32.760 --> 0:22:35.480
<v Speaker 1>wanted to do mister Mom. They want to do love

0:22:35.600 --> 0:22:38.280
<v Speaker 1>songs and family songs. I wanted to do stuff that

0:22:38.359 --> 0:22:43.920
<v Speaker 1>make the college campus. Yea. So controlling what I could

0:22:44.040 --> 0:22:47.280
<v Speaker 1>control in that time period. None of those songs got

0:22:47.320 --> 0:22:49.879
<v Speaker 1>recorded in that span of time. But the second Big

0:22:50.000 --> 0:22:53.120
<v Speaker 1>and Rich and Gretchen hit al Dean also hit, which

0:22:53.119 --> 0:22:55.639
<v Speaker 1>I wrote four number ones on his first record, and

0:22:55.720 --> 0:22:58.280
<v Speaker 1>then the whole city starts coming to me and goes,

0:22:58.320 --> 0:22:59.960
<v Speaker 1>you got any more songs like these? I go, yeah,

0:23:00.119 --> 0:23:03.159
<v Speaker 1>here's nine hundred. Here you go, you're giving them. So

0:23:03.280 --> 0:23:06.080
<v Speaker 1>there was just a raid on my catalog where everybody

0:23:06.160 --> 0:23:07.959
<v Speaker 1>wanted to cut those kinds of songs, and so all

0:23:08.000 --> 0:23:10.040
<v Speaker 1>the stuff I've been stockpiling now is valuable.

0:23:10.160 --> 0:23:12.480
<v Speaker 2>So what's the lesson for people who find themselves in

0:23:12.560 --> 0:23:17.520
<v Speaker 2>those positions, those predicaments where God maybe hitting you across

0:23:17.680 --> 0:23:20.800
<v Speaker 2>the head was two by four? Yeah, just to reorient

0:23:20.960 --> 0:23:22.920
<v Speaker 2>you do what you can control.

0:23:23.760 --> 0:23:25.800
<v Speaker 1>Is that the lesson boil it down to the simplest

0:23:25.840 --> 0:23:27.960
<v Speaker 1>thing that you can still control. And it could, like

0:23:28.040 --> 0:23:30.000
<v Speaker 1>I said, it could be what you're eating every day.

0:23:30.440 --> 0:23:33.000
<v Speaker 1>It could be that you're going to call your mother

0:23:33.160 --> 0:23:35.639
<v Speaker 1>every day, it could be whatever it's going to be.

0:23:36.240 --> 0:23:38.320
<v Speaker 1>You go find a charity you're going to want to

0:23:38.359 --> 0:23:39.919
<v Speaker 1>go work with, and go do the best you can

0:23:40.000 --> 0:23:44.080
<v Speaker 1>at that you basically start rebuilding yourself. What you'll find

0:23:44.240 --> 0:23:46.920
<v Speaker 1>is when you get that next opportunity, which you will,

0:23:47.440 --> 0:23:50.119
<v Speaker 1>because opportunities continue to come for people that continue to

0:23:50.160 --> 0:23:52.879
<v Speaker 1>push right all that stuff that you screwed up, and

0:23:52.960 --> 0:23:56.159
<v Speaker 1>those first times come to bear again and you go,

0:23:56.320 --> 0:23:58.560
<v Speaker 1>oh yeah, not going to be that guy this time.

0:23:58.760 --> 0:24:00.840
<v Speaker 1>I'm going to be this guy. And that's a never

0:24:01.000 --> 0:24:01.719
<v Speaker 1>ending pass.

0:24:01.800 --> 0:24:03.520
<v Speaker 2>I love that story. I mean I read about this

0:24:03.720 --> 0:24:08.920
<v Speaker 2>that you're rebuilding, but you're also you're quietly and maybe

0:24:09.080 --> 0:24:12.920
<v Speaker 2>unbeknownst to you, rebuilding the future because in that, in

0:24:13.040 --> 0:24:17.639
<v Speaker 2>the panic, in the loss, in the hurt, you found

0:24:17.720 --> 0:24:18.520
<v Speaker 2>why you were here.

0:24:18.480 --> 0:24:22.520
<v Speaker 1>Well there's gone. When you're that upset and now you're

0:24:22.600 --> 0:24:25.680
<v Speaker 1>embarrassed in front of the whole industry and your money

0:24:25.840 --> 0:24:30.879
<v Speaker 1>is gone. Two ways to go, one drink, your face

0:24:31.000 --> 0:24:33.600
<v Speaker 1>off twenty four hours a day and wind back up

0:24:33.680 --> 0:24:36.080
<v Speaker 1>down on Broadway playing in a bar somewhere as the

0:24:36.160 --> 0:24:38.040
<v Speaker 1>guy who used to be in Lone Star. And that's

0:24:38.080 --> 0:24:39.680
<v Speaker 1>your claim to fame for the rest of your life.

0:24:40.600 --> 0:24:42.119
<v Speaker 2>A lot of people do they make that out of

0:24:42.160 --> 0:24:42.520
<v Speaker 2>that path?

0:24:42.560 --> 0:24:46.640
<v Speaker 1>Oh, a lot of them. The other is to drill

0:24:46.760 --> 0:24:49.040
<v Speaker 1>back down into what got you in the game of

0:24:49.080 --> 0:24:51.920
<v Speaker 1>the first place. What's your original goals? Go back to

0:24:52.320 --> 0:24:54.440
<v Speaker 1>piece of paper and a pencil. Cheapest thing in the world.

0:24:54.480 --> 0:24:55.159
<v Speaker 1>Everybody has that.

0:24:55.440 --> 0:24:59.320
<v Speaker 2>How did you and Big Kenny meet? How did you meet?

0:25:00.000 --> 0:25:01.920
<v Speaker 2>And why did the partnership work.

0:25:02.960 --> 0:25:06.720
<v Speaker 1>There was a girl that worked for Fender Guitars named

0:25:06.760 --> 0:25:11.919
<v Speaker 1>Cindy Simmons, and back then, Cindy's job she was an

0:25:11.960 --> 0:25:13.879
<v Speaker 1>artist rep. So her job was to find up and

0:25:13.920 --> 0:25:16.919
<v Speaker 1>coming singers that she thought might get a record deal

0:25:17.000 --> 0:25:19.119
<v Speaker 1>or might and get them early and say, oh, I

0:25:19.200 --> 0:25:22.080
<v Speaker 1>see you're playing that nothing to get your guitar, but

0:25:22.160 --> 0:25:24.879
<v Speaker 1>that's not a great guitar, and they go, that's all

0:25:24.880 --> 0:25:26.760
<v Speaker 1>I could afford. She goes, how about if I get

0:25:26.840 --> 0:25:28.720
<v Speaker 1>you a brand new Fender guitar and they go what

0:25:29.560 --> 0:25:31.560
<v Speaker 1>She'd go, here you go? And she tried to get

0:25:31.600 --> 0:25:33.640
<v Speaker 1>them to play fenders and then when they hopefully they'd

0:25:33.640 --> 0:25:35.720
<v Speaker 1>go hit almost like venture cap right. I can give

0:25:35.720 --> 0:25:37.400
<v Speaker 1>it to one hundred artists, three of them get deals

0:25:37.400 --> 0:25:39.800
<v Speaker 1>and they're playing fenders. So she had done that with

0:25:39.920 --> 0:25:41.560
<v Speaker 1>me and done that with Big Kenny, and we didn't

0:25:41.560 --> 0:25:43.880
<v Speaker 1>know each other. She knew the two of us separately

0:25:43.920 --> 0:25:46.520
<v Speaker 1>and had told him and told me about the other,

0:25:47.160 --> 0:25:49.320
<v Speaker 1>and hit me up one night and said, hey, Big

0:25:49.440 --> 0:25:53.800
<v Speaker 1>Kenny is playing a show down at Douglas Corner. I said, okay,

0:25:54.600 --> 0:25:56.119
<v Speaker 1>I'm going to be down here. Come on down here.

0:25:56.440 --> 0:25:58.320
<v Speaker 1>I want you to hear him. I said, can I

0:25:58.359 --> 0:26:02.000
<v Speaker 1>ask you a question? I said, is he big and fat?

0:26:02.160 --> 0:26:05.719
<v Speaker 1>Big and loud, big and tall. That's the dunnest thing

0:26:05.760 --> 0:26:09.320
<v Speaker 1>I've ever heard. Why is he called that? She goes,

0:26:09.480 --> 0:26:11.159
<v Speaker 1>just come see him and you'll it'll make sense when

0:26:11.160 --> 0:26:13.080
<v Speaker 1>you see a show. I said, okay, fine, So I

0:26:13.160 --> 0:26:15.720
<v Speaker 1>go down and sure enough, he walks out on stagers.

0:26:16.280 --> 0:26:18.679
<v Speaker 1>He is tall, he's about six y four, but all

0:26:18.720 --> 0:26:22.399
<v Speaker 1>his hair and he's going everybody. He's like Willie Walker,

0:26:22.560 --> 0:26:26.119
<v Speaker 1>and I was like, what is that. Hagrid didn't like

0:26:26.240 --> 0:26:29.960
<v Speaker 1>him at all. I'm like, that's a strange individual. I

0:26:30.040 --> 0:26:32.160
<v Speaker 1>wonder what he sings like. And then I hear about

0:26:32.200 --> 0:26:34.359
<v Speaker 1>sixty minutes of his set and I went, I don't

0:26:34.359 --> 0:26:35.560
<v Speaker 1>know what I just heard, but that was some of

0:26:35.640 --> 0:26:37.800
<v Speaker 1>the most creative things I've ever heard somebody.

0:26:37.960 --> 0:26:38.120
<v Speaker 2>Right.

0:26:38.920 --> 0:26:40.959
<v Speaker 1>So when it was over, walked up to him, Hey man,

0:26:41.000 --> 0:26:43.560
<v Speaker 1>I'm Johnny goes, oh, hey, I've heard about you, right,

0:26:44.359 --> 0:26:45.960
<v Speaker 1>and he goes Cindy says, we ought to write a

0:26:46.040 --> 0:26:47.960
<v Speaker 1>song because what are you doing tomorrow morning? I go,

0:26:48.560 --> 0:26:51.280
<v Speaker 1>I'm not doing anything. He goes, well, you want to

0:26:51.280 --> 0:26:52.720
<v Speaker 1>come over to my house and write a song, so

0:26:52.800 --> 0:26:54.959
<v Speaker 1>she'll leave us alone. Basically, I said, yeah, I'll come over.

0:26:55.400 --> 0:26:57.920
<v Speaker 1>We wrote that next day. That was October of ninety nine.

0:26:58.720 --> 0:27:01.560
<v Speaker 1>Next day, we wrote again, next day, next day, next day,

0:27:01.600 --> 0:27:04.280
<v Speaker 1>and we have written hundreds and hundreds of songs. And

0:27:04.400 --> 0:27:06.600
<v Speaker 1>as a joke, people started calling us big and rich.

0:27:06.920 --> 0:27:09.320
<v Speaker 1>We'd show up at somewhere late at night to come

0:27:09.359 --> 0:27:11.200
<v Speaker 1>hang out and go, oh look it's big and rich.

0:27:11.240 --> 0:27:11.480
<v Speaker 2>Ha ha.

0:27:12.680 --> 0:27:13.479
<v Speaker 1>That's where that came from.

0:27:13.520 --> 0:27:14.640
<v Speaker 2>That's where it came from. Yeah.

0:27:14.800 --> 0:27:18.560
<v Speaker 1>So Kenny is Kenny and are really polar opposites on

0:27:18.720 --> 0:27:23.680
<v Speaker 1>many many things, including creatively, and so what's interesting about

0:27:23.720 --> 0:27:26.040
<v Speaker 1>that is I'll come at you with a straight line,

0:27:26.119 --> 0:27:29.720
<v Speaker 1>and he's coming at you with flowers. So, like I said,

0:27:29.800 --> 0:27:31.520
<v Speaker 1>Kenny likes to smell the flowers and I like to

0:27:31.600 --> 0:27:34.919
<v Speaker 1>mow him down. But when you lock those two together,

0:27:35.320 --> 0:27:37.400
<v Speaker 1>what do you get, Raymond get? You get a three

0:27:37.520 --> 0:27:40.160
<v Speaker 1>sixty view at the whole song, at the whole subject

0:27:40.240 --> 0:27:42.760
<v Speaker 1>that you're writing, whether it's a love song, party song,

0:27:42.960 --> 0:27:46.360
<v Speaker 1>whatever song. So that that locking in of the two

0:27:46.520 --> 0:27:48.560
<v Speaker 1>opposites like that have really created something.

0:27:48.600 --> 0:27:51.159
<v Speaker 2>So I know it's hard to describe why partnership were

0:27:51.240 --> 0:27:54.200
<v Speaker 2>a creative partnership works. It's always hard. I mean I

0:27:54.320 --> 0:27:56.520
<v Speaker 2>remember talking to Jerry Lewis about why he and Dean

0:27:56.560 --> 0:27:59.720
<v Speaker 2>Martin worked right, and he knew but he didn't know.

0:28:00.320 --> 0:28:03.800
<v Speaker 2>M h, how would you why does this partnership work?

0:28:04.520 --> 0:28:06.879
<v Speaker 1>I would take that answer. I would say, you know,

0:28:07.040 --> 0:28:09.680
<v Speaker 1>but you don't know. One of the reasons that prop

0:28:09.880 --> 0:28:13.560
<v Speaker 1>Jerry said it was love. Well, okay, I would say

0:28:13.600 --> 0:28:16.359
<v Speaker 1>on between Kenny and I, it's mass respect for the

0:28:16.440 --> 0:28:22.640
<v Speaker 1>other person's competency and ability and creative energy. I don't

0:28:22.680 --> 0:28:24.680
<v Speaker 1>have what he has and he does not have what

0:28:24.800 --> 0:28:27.200
<v Speaker 1>I have, and we both know that. You know, It's

0:28:27.200 --> 0:28:29.280
<v Speaker 1>like in a relationship. If you're both the same, one

0:28:29.320 --> 0:28:32.480
<v Speaker 1>of you is irrelevant. That goes for marriage to That

0:28:32.640 --> 0:28:35.399
<v Speaker 1>is exactly right, you know, it's the opposite's a track. Well,

0:28:35.440 --> 0:28:37.879
<v Speaker 1>that's a real thing. I mean, you want to be

0:28:38.000 --> 0:28:40.120
<v Speaker 1>strong where they're not, and you want them strong where

0:28:40.120 --> 0:28:42.560
<v Speaker 1>you're not. And I think even though you know, we've

0:28:42.600 --> 0:28:45.800
<v Speaker 1>disagreed over the years strongly on a lot of different things,

0:28:46.000 --> 0:28:50.120
<v Speaker 1>like what we've disagreed on political things, We've disagreed on

0:28:50.240 --> 0:28:53.680
<v Speaker 1>musical things, business moves. You can imagine it's a duo.

0:28:53.880 --> 0:28:54.680
<v Speaker 2>Man, it's hard.

0:28:56.080 --> 0:28:59.280
<v Speaker 1>Both have to agree or it does not happen. Right,

0:28:59.560 --> 0:29:01.640
<v Speaker 1>And so if you had, you know, three people, or

0:29:01.720 --> 0:29:04.160
<v Speaker 1>it's a band like lone star, majority rules. There's no

0:29:04.280 --> 0:29:08.400
<v Speaker 1>majority in a duo, yeah, right, it's one in partnership. Yeah,

0:29:08.600 --> 0:29:11.520
<v Speaker 1>but throughout Now you're looking at twenty years since our

0:29:11.560 --> 0:29:14.200
<v Speaker 1>first record came out, came out in two thousand and four.

0:29:14.440 --> 0:29:14.880
<v Speaker 2>Amazing.

0:29:16.040 --> 0:29:18.520
<v Speaker 1>We're still on the road doing fifty sixty cities a year.

0:29:18.560 --> 0:29:22.200
<v Speaker 1>The crowds are, I would argue, maybe bigger than they

0:29:22.240 --> 0:29:24.720
<v Speaker 1>were back in the day. You know, all our original

0:29:24.760 --> 0:29:26.840
<v Speaker 1>fans are all still there and now it's their kids

0:29:26.880 --> 0:29:28.840
<v Speaker 1>are all coming out. You got college girls hanging out

0:29:28.880 --> 0:29:31.880
<v Speaker 1>with their moms going save of Ours right again, loving it,

0:29:32.520 --> 0:29:34.760
<v Speaker 1>and then the Patriot crowd from songs like Eighth of

0:29:34.840 --> 0:29:38.920
<v Speaker 1>November Right. It's just massive at our shows. So I

0:29:38.960 --> 0:29:41.720
<v Speaker 1>think we're a good example of how Americans ought to

0:29:41.800 --> 0:29:44.719
<v Speaker 1>try to be. Me and Big Kenny, are you get

0:29:44.760 --> 0:29:47.080
<v Speaker 1>your first record deal? You had to be worried about

0:29:47.120 --> 0:29:49.720
<v Speaker 1>that first record coming off of what you would.

0:29:49.560 --> 0:29:50.040
<v Speaker 2>Come off of.

0:29:50.880 --> 0:29:54.400
<v Speaker 1>Well, the whole music industry, except for one guy, said,

0:29:54.640 --> 0:29:57.440
<v Speaker 1>big and rich music is what is that? I mean,

0:29:57.600 --> 0:30:00.840
<v Speaker 1>is this a clown show? What are you guys trying

0:30:00.840 --> 0:30:02.520
<v Speaker 1>to do? I mean, first of all, John kicked out

0:30:02.560 --> 0:30:05.560
<v Speaker 1>a loan star, his solo deal totally failed. And what

0:30:05.800 --> 0:30:08.320
<v Speaker 1>is a Big Kenny? I mean really, And you've got

0:30:08.360 --> 0:30:11.880
<v Speaker 1>a big black, rapping cowboy cowboy Troy who at that

0:30:11.960 --> 0:30:16.440
<v Speaker 1>points working at foot locker in Dallas, Texas. They're like, guys,

0:30:16.520 --> 0:30:18.560
<v Speaker 1>it sounds like a lot of fun. Enjoy playing that

0:30:18.640 --> 0:30:22.360
<v Speaker 1>in the bars. That was everybody's answer except one guy

0:30:22.520 --> 0:30:26.560
<v Speaker 1>named Paul Whirley. And Paul Whirley is one of the

0:30:26.600 --> 0:30:30.880
<v Speaker 1>best record producers, guitar players it's ever been, highly creative guy.

0:30:31.000 --> 0:30:32.760
<v Speaker 1>He signed the Dixie chicks and a bunch of other

0:30:32.800 --> 0:30:35.880
<v Speaker 1>He was producer Martina McBride, and he heard about us

0:30:36.000 --> 0:30:38.080
<v Speaker 1>at a jam we were doing called the Music Mafia,

0:30:38.360 --> 0:30:40.600
<v Speaker 1>where Paul's daughter Ashley had started coming to these On

0:30:40.760 --> 0:30:44.040
<v Speaker 1>Music Mafia, seventy eighty people crammed into a room on

0:30:44.120 --> 0:30:46.840
<v Speaker 1>Tuesday nights, me and Kenny and other artists that we

0:30:46.920 --> 0:30:48.800
<v Speaker 1>knew that nobody had a record deal. We would jam

0:30:49.240 --> 0:30:53.400
<v Speaker 1>and Paul came down and saw that. He goes, you, guys,

0:30:53.480 --> 0:30:55.120
<v Speaker 1>want to come to my office tomorrow. I just became

0:30:55.200 --> 0:30:59.000
<v Speaker 1>the president of Warner Brothers Records last week. We went, yeah,

0:30:59.040 --> 0:31:00.560
<v Speaker 1>we'd love to come to your office. We're thinking we're

0:31:00.560 --> 0:31:02.920
<v Speaker 1>going to pitch him a song for somebody. We get

0:31:03.000 --> 0:31:04.640
<v Speaker 1>in his office, he goes, no, I want to talk

0:31:04.640 --> 0:31:08.040
<v Speaker 1>about Big and Rich. I think that's a thing. We

0:31:08.160 --> 0:31:10.240
<v Speaker 1>go to his office and he said, play me some

0:31:10.360 --> 0:31:12.760
<v Speaker 1>songs that you would play if you had your own record.

0:31:13.360 --> 0:31:15.280
<v Speaker 1>So we started playing those songs and he goes, he

0:31:15.320 --> 0:31:17.440
<v Speaker 1>slams his hand out on the table. He goes, boys,

0:31:17.480 --> 0:31:20.480
<v Speaker 1>I want to do this. Kenny goes, you want to

0:31:20.560 --> 0:31:22.880
<v Speaker 1>do what? He goes, I want to sign Big and

0:31:23.000 --> 0:31:25.000
<v Speaker 1>Rich to Warner Brothers Records. And I looked at Kenny,

0:31:25.040 --> 0:31:27.520
<v Speaker 1>I said, are you hearing this? He goes, are you

0:31:27.640 --> 0:31:29.240
<v Speaker 1>serious right now? And he goes, yeah, I want to

0:31:29.280 --> 0:31:31.160
<v Speaker 1>do it, And we went well, all right, and we

0:31:31.280 --> 0:31:33.640
<v Speaker 1>high fived, ho was it? And off to the races.

0:31:33.680 --> 0:31:37.560
<v Speaker 1>So he was short of him seeing that there was

0:31:37.640 --> 0:31:40.280
<v Speaker 1>something there. I doubt you'd have ever heard of us.

0:31:40.600 --> 0:31:42.800
<v Speaker 2>Horse of a different colors at first time? Right. They

0:31:42.920 --> 0:31:46.000
<v Speaker 2>fought you though on Oh they including some of your

0:31:46.040 --> 0:31:46.560
<v Speaker 2>biggest hit.

0:31:46.680 --> 0:31:50.680
<v Speaker 1>The industry hated that record. Why because it didn't sound

0:31:50.760 --> 0:31:53.400
<v Speaker 1>like anything that had ever happened. And Nashville goes through

0:31:53.440 --> 0:31:55.560
<v Speaker 1>these phases. I think it's in one right now. It

0:31:55.680 --> 0:31:58.360
<v Speaker 1>starts trying to break out where it sounds like they

0:31:58.400 --> 0:31:59.920
<v Speaker 1>all went to the school of redundant.

0:32:00.040 --> 0:32:02.760
<v Speaker 2>See school, you mean the truck I left my truck

0:32:02.840 --> 0:32:03.480
<v Speaker 2>running school.

0:32:03.680 --> 0:32:08.040
<v Speaker 1>I mean, same tempo, same court progressions, everybody looks the same,

0:32:08.560 --> 0:32:11.480
<v Speaker 1>the storylines are all the same. And it's kind of

0:32:11.560 --> 0:32:13.720
<v Speaker 1>gotten back into that. There's a few breakouts starting to

0:32:13.760 --> 0:32:15.720
<v Speaker 1>push out now. But at this point country music, that's

0:32:15.720 --> 0:32:18.760
<v Speaker 1>where it was at that point, and they said, you

0:32:18.840 --> 0:32:22.040
<v Speaker 1>don't fit on country radio. What are you even singing about?

0:32:22.160 --> 0:32:25.400
<v Speaker 1>I mean, really, you guys writ songs based off of

0:32:25.480 --> 0:32:28.240
<v Speaker 1>bumper stickers you saw, which is exactly what save worst

0:32:28.280 --> 0:32:30.720
<v Speaker 1>RD A Cowboy was, what, oh, he has a bumper sticker?

0:32:30.840 --> 0:32:32.040
<v Speaker 2>You saw a bumper sticker.

0:32:32.120 --> 0:32:34.880
<v Speaker 1>This friend of ours saw it, yeah, and said that'd

0:32:34.920 --> 0:32:35.560
<v Speaker 1>be a funny song.

0:32:35.680 --> 0:32:35.840
<v Speaker 2>Right.

0:32:35.880 --> 0:32:38.959
<v Speaker 1>We're like, yeah, it would be a funny song. Let

0:32:39.040 --> 0:32:40.520
<v Speaker 1>me go right, And it was a funny and it

0:32:40.640 --> 0:32:41.360
<v Speaker 1>is a funny song.

0:32:41.440 --> 0:32:43.920
<v Speaker 2>But they said, no, don't do it. They said this

0:32:43.960 --> 0:32:46.200
<v Speaker 2>wouldn't This is saying to trivialize you.

0:32:46.360 --> 0:32:49.520
<v Speaker 1>If you put this on the record, guys, nobody's going

0:32:49.600 --> 0:32:52.600
<v Speaker 1>to take you seriously. And we said, but yeah. When

0:32:52.600 --> 0:32:57.560
<v Speaker 1>we played at Music Mafia, people go nuts. They're like, okay,

0:32:57.640 --> 0:32:59.320
<v Speaker 1>we'll put it on the record. We'll just bury it

0:32:59.400 --> 0:33:01.400
<v Speaker 1>in the track out. We'll put it at track seven

0:33:01.520 --> 0:33:03.680
<v Speaker 1>or eight. It's not going to be a single though,

0:33:04.200 --> 0:33:05.760
<v Speaker 1>that's fine. Just let us put it on the record.

0:33:06.280 --> 0:33:08.040
<v Speaker 1>So we put the record out. A song called wild

0:33:08.080 --> 0:33:10.840
<v Speaker 1>West Show was our first single, and when that single

0:33:10.920 --> 0:33:13.400
<v Speaker 1>came out, the whole record became available, so fans started

0:33:13.400 --> 0:33:16.120
<v Speaker 1>buying a record. Next thing you know, radio stations are

0:33:16.160 --> 0:33:18.880
<v Speaker 1>getting hey, can you play track seven on the horse

0:33:18.920 --> 0:33:23.000
<v Speaker 1>of a different color record on Drive Time. On Friday, Wow,

0:33:23.360 --> 0:33:26.360
<v Speaker 1>a station in Florida played it one time. Phones exploded

0:33:26.560 --> 0:33:28.560
<v Speaker 1>and we went. The record label goes, well, I guess

0:33:28.600 --> 0:33:30.800
<v Speaker 1>it's going to be the single A single vout. Thank goodness,

0:33:30.880 --> 0:33:33.120
<v Speaker 1>because if we walked out and didn't play save Ors

0:33:33.200 --> 0:33:36.440
<v Speaker 1>RD a Cowboy, they'd be throwing stuff at us. You know,

0:33:36.800 --> 0:33:37.640
<v Speaker 1>how do you write?

0:33:37.920 --> 0:33:38.840
<v Speaker 2>And where do you write?

0:33:40.360 --> 0:33:44.000
<v Speaker 1>Well? I write for various You say, how.

0:33:43.960 --> 0:33:46.240
<v Speaker 2>Do I write? You know, I like to be in

0:33:46.320 --> 0:33:47.840
<v Speaker 2>my room. I like quiet. I don't like a lot

0:33:47.880 --> 0:33:51.000
<v Speaker 2>of noise when I write. But I'm not writing music right,

0:33:51.440 --> 0:33:53.080
<v Speaker 2>So where do you go? Do you have to be

0:33:53.160 --> 0:33:55.560
<v Speaker 2>in a place so you write wherever you are.

0:33:56.360 --> 0:33:58.520
<v Speaker 1>I sat next to Tom Petty one time in La

0:33:59.000 --> 0:34:02.200
<v Speaker 1>at the ASCAP Expo, which is a huge songwriters deal.

0:34:02.520 --> 0:34:05.200
<v Speaker 1>It was usher, Tom Petty and me. I'm the country

0:34:05.280 --> 0:34:08.640
<v Speaker 1>guy on the panel, and a lady asked Tom Petty

0:34:09.680 --> 0:34:13.600
<v Speaker 1>from the audience, mister Petty, how do you get your

0:34:13.640 --> 0:34:14.720
<v Speaker 1>ideas for your songs?

0:34:15.160 --> 0:34:17.880
<v Speaker 2>I didn't ask you that one. I know, bumper sticker.

0:34:18.000 --> 0:34:22.719
<v Speaker 1>He's leaning back in his chair. He goes, well, I

0:34:22.920 --> 0:34:25.279
<v Speaker 1>just stick my antenna there as far as it'll go

0:34:25.520 --> 0:34:29.400
<v Speaker 1>and wait for a song to drift across it. Then

0:34:29.440 --> 0:34:33.000
<v Speaker 1>he just stopped talking. The whole place went Okay, start laughing,

0:34:33.040 --> 0:34:35.120
<v Speaker 1>yay Tom. And I heard that answer, I went, that

0:34:35.280 --> 0:34:37.880
<v Speaker 1>is not far off from exactly how it is. I

0:34:37.960 --> 0:34:40.640
<v Speaker 1>don't know what it is in a songwriter's brain, but

0:34:41.520 --> 0:34:43.960
<v Speaker 1>you don't just walk around thinking about songs all the time.

0:34:44.200 --> 0:34:46.759
<v Speaker 1>But there is a spot that if you give me

0:34:46.800 --> 0:34:49.200
<v Speaker 1>three or four minutes, it's almost like you can turn

0:34:49.280 --> 0:34:51.680
<v Speaker 1>a key and it opens up. I always point to

0:34:51.760 --> 0:34:53.520
<v Speaker 1>this down in my head. It feels like they come

0:34:53.560 --> 0:34:55.200
<v Speaker 1>out of here for some reason, but all of a

0:34:55.239 --> 0:34:58.120
<v Speaker 1>sudden it opens up and you as a songwriter, I

0:34:58.280 --> 0:35:02.200
<v Speaker 1>will hear melodies, rhythms, lyrics, all kinds of stuff. It's

0:35:02.200 --> 0:35:04.879
<v Speaker 1>almost like a faucet. Turn it on and turn it off,

0:35:04.920 --> 0:35:06.840
<v Speaker 1>turn it on. Every now and then one will hit

0:35:06.920 --> 0:35:10.719
<v Speaker 1>me so hard that I wasn't in the frame of

0:35:10.800 --> 0:35:12.960
<v Speaker 1>mind to write a song, and it will literally just

0:35:13.400 --> 0:35:16.840
<v Speaker 1>come into my head like as loud as you can imagine.

0:35:16.920 --> 0:35:19.960
<v Speaker 1>And that doesn't happen very often. It happened with a

0:35:20.000 --> 0:35:23.279
<v Speaker 1>song called Revelation. That's when you grab a guitar off

0:35:23.280 --> 0:35:25.080
<v Speaker 1>the wall and tell everybody, Okay, I'm going off in

0:35:25.120 --> 0:35:28.600
<v Speaker 1>another room. I need an hour and get your pencil

0:35:28.600 --> 0:35:29.520
<v Speaker 1>out and you get to going out.

0:35:29.640 --> 0:35:31.719
<v Speaker 2>But you write Alonge, you like quiet when you write,

0:35:31.760 --> 0:35:32.799
<v Speaker 2>when you're working the song.

0:35:32.880 --> 0:35:35.320
<v Speaker 1>I'm working now, I gotta be by myself.

0:35:35.960 --> 0:35:37.120
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, yeah, what I figured.

0:35:37.200 --> 0:35:40.000
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, because you're you're wrestling with your own thoughts.

0:35:41.360 --> 0:35:44.759
<v Speaker 2>You know, is it harder writing for others when you

0:35:44.840 --> 0:35:47.520
<v Speaker 2>write woman or easier? I mean you're a for Taylor

0:35:47.600 --> 0:35:48.319
<v Speaker 2>Swift as well.

0:35:48.440 --> 0:35:52.200
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, easier writing for somebody else because you can see

0:35:52.239 --> 0:35:54.759
<v Speaker 1>the whole person. I think for you, you can't see me.

0:35:55.920 --> 0:35:57.279
<v Speaker 2>It's harder writing I can see you.

0:35:58.000 --> 0:35:59.320
<v Speaker 1>You want me to write a song about you and

0:35:59.400 --> 0:36:01.960
<v Speaker 1>about this podcast on I can do that for you

0:36:02.040 --> 0:36:03.839
<v Speaker 1>in about ten minutes. I can have you a song

0:36:04.000 --> 0:36:06.120
<v Speaker 1>ready to go, a new royal ground think so I

0:36:06.160 --> 0:36:08.040
<v Speaker 1>can see you, I can hear you. I know what

0:36:08.160 --> 0:36:09.960
<v Speaker 1>you're about. I know what the point of this is.

0:36:10.239 --> 0:36:12.319
<v Speaker 1>But if you're writing it from your own perspective, man,

0:36:12.400 --> 0:36:14.759
<v Speaker 1>that's a deep spot to go to because you're there's

0:36:14.840 --> 0:36:17.160
<v Speaker 1>nobody to bounce it off of and you're just you're

0:36:17.200 --> 0:36:20.080
<v Speaker 1>wrestling with your own thoughts. What am I feeling about

0:36:20.080 --> 0:36:21.640
<v Speaker 1>this subject that I need to get on the paper

0:36:21.680 --> 0:36:22.800
<v Speaker 1>as strongly as possible.

0:36:23.600 --> 0:36:26.120
<v Speaker 2>We'll return to John Rich in a second. When John

0:36:26.200 --> 0:36:29.320
<v Speaker 2>agreed to join us, it got me thinking about another

0:36:29.520 --> 0:36:33.319
<v Speaker 2>singer who stuck to his guns. This story has its

0:36:33.360 --> 0:36:36.319
<v Speaker 2>own lessons, and wait until you hear how it ends.

0:36:37.160 --> 0:36:41.319
<v Speaker 2>George Harvey loved ranching in his native Texas, but when

0:36:41.360 --> 0:36:43.960
<v Speaker 2>he joined the army, his whole life changed. In nineteen

0:36:44.040 --> 0:36:47.360
<v Speaker 2>seventy one, he was sent to a base in Hawaii

0:36:47.920 --> 0:36:50.880
<v Speaker 2>and an army general put together a country band to

0:36:51.080 --> 0:36:54.720
<v Speaker 2>entertain the troops. He cast George as the lead singer.

0:36:55.640 --> 0:36:58.439
<v Speaker 2>It was the first time he had ever sung country music,

0:36:58.560 --> 0:37:02.520
<v Speaker 2>and he thought it of suited him. In college, George

0:37:02.560 --> 0:37:05.759
<v Speaker 2>Harvey assembled his own band, Stony Ridge. They were called

0:37:06.239 --> 0:37:10.800
<v Speaker 2>and kept singing, and he had from the start dressed

0:37:11.120 --> 0:37:14.560
<v Speaker 2>like a cowboy on stage, complete with his hat and jeans,

0:37:14.960 --> 0:37:17.879
<v Speaker 2>at a time when it had fallen out of style. Well.

0:37:18.040 --> 0:37:21.400
<v Speaker 2>When George finally broke down and headed to Nashville, he

0:37:21.560 --> 0:37:25.560
<v Speaker 2>was signed by MCA Records, but there was a producer

0:37:25.680 --> 0:37:29.320
<v Speaker 2>there who had two demands for the singer. He needed

0:37:29.360 --> 0:37:33.840
<v Speaker 2>to change his name and lose the cowboy hat. George

0:37:34.280 --> 0:37:37.880
<v Speaker 2>had a fateful decision to make. Wait until you hear

0:37:37.920 --> 0:37:43.680
<v Speaker 2>how it ends, and this is how it ends. George Harvey,

0:37:43.840 --> 0:37:47.280
<v Speaker 2>after years of playing rodeos and honky tonks, had finally

0:37:47.400 --> 0:37:50.840
<v Speaker 2>made it to Nashville and he was signed by MCA Records.

0:37:51.239 --> 0:37:54.920
<v Speaker 2>But his producer wanted George to dress up, lose the

0:37:55.000 --> 0:37:58.040
<v Speaker 2>cowboy hat he had always worn on stage, and replace

0:37:58.120 --> 0:38:02.440
<v Speaker 2>his jeans with slacks. George would have none of it.

0:38:03.000 --> 0:38:05.360
<v Speaker 2>He was determined to keep his hat and his jeans.

0:38:05.840 --> 0:38:11.080
<v Speaker 2>His manager told the MCA executive, you don't understand where

0:38:11.120 --> 0:38:16.919
<v Speaker 2>he's from. That is dressing up. Georgia's decision inspired many

0:38:17.120 --> 0:38:21.759
<v Speaker 2>acts that would follow him. Alan Jackson, Garth Brooks, Toby Keith,

0:38:22.000 --> 0:38:26.800
<v Speaker 2>even Lady Wilson would don their stetson's on stage following

0:38:27.120 --> 0:38:30.879
<v Speaker 2>George's example. He was just a Texas boy being true

0:38:30.880 --> 0:38:34.360
<v Speaker 2>to his roots. But to these performers, the hat was

0:38:34.480 --> 0:38:40.719
<v Speaker 2>part of George's mystique. The MCA executive also suggested that

0:38:40.840 --> 0:38:46.279
<v Speaker 2>he change his name to Cain Cooper. Thank goodness for us,

0:38:46.640 --> 0:38:51.640
<v Speaker 2>George Harvey strait kept his birth name and write this down.

0:38:52.520 --> 0:38:55.759
<v Speaker 2>When you're true to who you are, others will inevitably

0:38:55.880 --> 0:38:59.160
<v Speaker 2>figure it out and follow your lead in time. George

0:38:59.200 --> 0:39:03.480
<v Speaker 2>Strait has had eighty six singles on the Billboard Country Charts,

0:39:03.840 --> 0:39:07.120
<v Speaker 2>and in twenty twenty four, he became the first artist

0:39:07.239 --> 0:39:10.680
<v Speaker 2>to hold the largest concert in the United States, breaking

0:39:10.840 --> 0:39:15.920
<v Speaker 2>all attendance records. And he's still wearing his hat. Now

0:39:16.040 --> 0:39:18.320
<v Speaker 2>you know how it ends. Here's the rest of my

0:39:18.480 --> 0:39:22.480
<v Speaker 2>conversation with John Rich, who is also wearing his hat.

0:39:23.480 --> 0:39:26.480
<v Speaker 2>Why have you gone more political in recent years? Is

0:39:26.520 --> 0:39:31.680
<v Speaker 2>that just where you feel God taking you, the times

0:39:31.840 --> 0:39:33.120
<v Speaker 2>taking you and your music.

0:39:34.680 --> 0:39:38.160
<v Speaker 1>I think after my two sons were born and started

0:39:38.200 --> 0:39:44.239
<v Speaker 1>to get old enough to realize dad is part of

0:39:44.320 --> 0:39:49.440
<v Speaker 1>this industry here, and they would watch me get upset

0:39:49.480 --> 0:39:52.839
<v Speaker 1>at the television screen like we all do, and say,

0:39:53.200 --> 0:39:55.040
<v Speaker 1>be talking to my wife about something going on in

0:39:55.120 --> 0:39:58.359
<v Speaker 1>the music industry that I didn't like. But then turn

0:39:58.480 --> 0:40:01.840
<v Speaker 1>right around, cowboy up, walk out the door, hit the

0:40:01.920 --> 0:40:04.520
<v Speaker 1>red carpet, go play Patty Cake with all these people

0:40:04.560 --> 0:40:08.200
<v Speaker 1>I was just yelling about is hypocritical. That's being a

0:40:08.280 --> 0:40:11.560
<v Speaker 1>hypocrite in front of your own two sons. And one

0:40:11.600 --> 0:40:13.239
<v Speaker 1>day that hit me really hard. I said, I am

0:40:13.280 --> 0:40:17.080
<v Speaker 1>being a hypocrite. Not only am I upset that they're

0:40:17.160 --> 0:40:19.560
<v Speaker 1>watching me do that, I'm upset that I'm watching me

0:40:19.680 --> 0:40:21.920
<v Speaker 1>do that. How long am I going to keep this up?

0:40:22.320 --> 0:40:24.600
<v Speaker 1>Because the record labels in the industries are telling me

0:40:24.680 --> 0:40:28.280
<v Speaker 1>at this point, do not do that interview with Raymond,

0:40:28.360 --> 0:40:31.240
<v Speaker 1>do not go on that network, Do not talk about

0:40:31.239 --> 0:40:34.120
<v Speaker 1>this on social media? No, no, no, no no. They

0:40:34.120 --> 0:40:37.880
<v Speaker 1>would have meetings about it. I'd make a comment something,

0:40:38.000 --> 0:40:39.800
<v Speaker 1>you know, something they didn't want me talking about, and

0:40:39.840 --> 0:40:42.680
<v Speaker 1>they'd have a full blown meeting with the press they're

0:40:42.760 --> 0:40:44.759
<v Speaker 1>press people at the record label and bring me in

0:40:44.920 --> 0:40:47.319
<v Speaker 1>and say you got to stop doing that. You're going

0:40:47.360 --> 0:40:49.719
<v Speaker 1>to blow your career up. And I listened to that

0:40:49.800 --> 0:40:51.600
<v Speaker 1>for quite a while. I'd go, Okay, well, I don't

0:40:51.600 --> 0:40:53.120
<v Speaker 1>want to blow my career up, and I don't want

0:40:53.160 --> 0:40:55.399
<v Speaker 1>to cost Kenny his career, and you got a band

0:40:55.440 --> 0:40:58.160
<v Speaker 1>and crew and bus drivers and yeah, wife and kids,

0:40:58.239 --> 0:41:02.160
<v Speaker 1>and okay, okay, I'll back up. But after a while, man,

0:41:02.239 --> 0:41:04.520
<v Speaker 1>it got to the point where I said, yeah, that's

0:41:04.560 --> 0:41:07.840
<v Speaker 1>being a hypocrite. And so if it means that I

0:41:07.920 --> 0:41:10.160
<v Speaker 1>got to say exactly what I know needs to be

0:41:10.360 --> 0:41:12.759
<v Speaker 1>said and do it like it needs to be done,

0:41:13.160 --> 0:41:15.719
<v Speaker 1>I run the risk of losing this industry that has

0:41:15.760 --> 0:41:17.840
<v Speaker 1>put more plaques on my walls than I can count.

0:41:18.520 --> 0:41:20.200
<v Speaker 1>They will be done with me if I ever go

0:41:20.320 --> 0:41:23.960
<v Speaker 1>to this point. But can I live with myself if

0:41:23.960 --> 0:41:26.040
<v Speaker 1>I keep playing this stupid game with these people? And

0:41:26.120 --> 0:41:28.040
<v Speaker 1>the answer was no, you can't. And by the way,

0:41:28.120 --> 0:41:30.040
<v Speaker 1>your sons are watching you, and what are they going

0:41:30.120 --> 0:41:31.800
<v Speaker 1>to do when they grow up and get out of

0:41:31.840 --> 0:41:34.480
<v Speaker 1>the house, They'll go, well, yeah, I really don't like

0:41:34.560 --> 0:41:36.520
<v Speaker 1>how this is going. But you know what Dad did.

0:41:36.760 --> 0:41:38.680
<v Speaker 1>Dad just yelled at the TV, rolled over and took

0:41:38.719 --> 0:41:41.080
<v Speaker 1>the check, kept going. Which is the problem with a

0:41:41.160 --> 0:41:46.319
<v Speaker 1>lot of Americans and Christians that they'll just roll over

0:41:46.840 --> 0:41:51.439
<v Speaker 1>and get along, get along and stay in a nice, easy,

0:41:51.480 --> 0:41:54.520
<v Speaker 1>comfortable spot instead of taking the harder route and punching

0:41:54.560 --> 0:41:54.800
<v Speaker 1>through it.

0:41:54.960 --> 0:41:57.400
<v Speaker 2>It's a good time to talk about revelation. You mentioned

0:41:57.400 --> 0:42:00.200
<v Speaker 2>it a moment ago, which is this incredible soult you

0:42:00.280 --> 0:42:03.759
<v Speaker 2>wrote this year, and you said, I'm gonna quote it

0:42:03.920 --> 0:42:05.840
<v Speaker 2>felt like a hammer hit me in the back of

0:42:05.920 --> 0:42:10.239
<v Speaker 2>the head. Was it physical? Was it a jolt? No?

0:42:10.320 --> 0:42:12.719
<v Speaker 1>I mean no, not like a physical hammer. But it

0:42:12.960 --> 0:42:16.120
<v Speaker 1>was if you could take a thought and pound it

0:42:16.160 --> 0:42:18.520
<v Speaker 1>into your head, as if you hit yourself with a hammer.

0:42:18.640 --> 0:42:20.800
<v Speaker 1>That's what it felt like. It was mine in my

0:42:20.840 --> 0:42:25.840
<v Speaker 1>own business, and I mean out of nowhere Boom. I

0:42:25.880 --> 0:42:30.040
<v Speaker 1>could hear the melody, I could hear the lyrics. I'm

0:42:30.120 --> 0:42:33.319
<v Speaker 1>seeing that Revelation. This is when you know, there's been

0:42:33.440 --> 0:42:38.160
<v Speaker 1>so much intensity placed upon our country and so many

0:42:38.320 --> 0:42:41.719
<v Speaker 1>things going on that I have read about in the

0:42:41.760 --> 0:42:43.800
<v Speaker 1>Bible my entire life, and I've heard it preach my

0:42:44.000 --> 0:42:47.120
<v Speaker 1>entire life, and not until recently have many of those

0:42:47.160 --> 0:42:50.320
<v Speaker 1>things even been possible to be carried out. You know,

0:42:50.480 --> 0:42:53.720
<v Speaker 1>most of Revelation and Daniel and Second Thessalonians and places

0:42:53.760 --> 0:42:55.959
<v Speaker 1>that talk about the end times seem like science fiction

0:42:56.480 --> 0:42:59.400
<v Speaker 1>to people, including my own father. He goes, We never

0:42:59.400 --> 0:43:03.000
<v Speaker 1>could understand and how these things could be possible, he says,

0:43:03.160 --> 0:43:07.160
<v Speaker 1>until recently, and now it's really easy to track everybody

0:43:07.239 --> 0:43:09.040
<v Speaker 1>on the face of the earth. It's really easy to

0:43:09.200 --> 0:43:12.200
<v Speaker 1>control how you spend your money and what you're allowed

0:43:12.239 --> 0:43:14.239
<v Speaker 1>to buy and sell, which is what the mark of

0:43:14.280 --> 0:43:17.520
<v Speaker 1>the Beast is about, he said. With the advent of tech,

0:43:17.800 --> 0:43:20.279
<v Speaker 1>where we are in the world today, the globalization of

0:43:20.360 --> 0:43:25.520
<v Speaker 1>everyone that is new, that's new that allows for these

0:43:25.600 --> 0:43:27.680
<v Speaker 1>things to now take place. It doesn't mean they're going

0:43:27.719 --> 0:43:30.200
<v Speaker 1>to take place tomorrow or even in my lifetime. But

0:43:30.320 --> 0:43:33.440
<v Speaker 1>it's now possible and we're looking at it. So I've

0:43:33.480 --> 0:43:36.840
<v Speaker 1>been thinking about that and really scrutinizing things and watching

0:43:36.920 --> 0:43:39.360
<v Speaker 1>and that's when that song came and I realized, Raymond,

0:43:39.440 --> 0:43:42.759
<v Speaker 1>nobody had written this song. I started going back through

0:43:42.840 --> 0:43:46.359
<v Speaker 1>gospel bands, Christian artists, contre artists. I could not find

0:43:46.440 --> 0:43:50.200
<v Speaker 1>anybody that literally wrote what the book says in the Book.

0:43:50.040 --> 0:43:53.759
<v Speaker 2>Of Revelation, and and Saint Michael the Archangel and the

0:43:53.840 --> 0:43:56.279
<v Speaker 2>battle with Lucifer. I mean, the whole thing is in there.

0:43:56.360 --> 0:43:58.120
<v Speaker 2>All of that is there, all of in the song.

0:43:58.520 --> 0:44:01.439
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, And it's throughout the bios the song. Yeah.

0:44:01.480 --> 0:44:01.879
<v Speaker 2>The video.

0:44:02.200 --> 0:44:07.040
<v Speaker 1>The goal of the video was can we show what

0:44:07.680 --> 0:44:11.040
<v Speaker 1>spiritual warfare would look like if it came into the physical.

0:44:12.440 --> 0:44:15.160
<v Speaker 1>I remember telling my video director, Doc Abbott, who lives

0:44:15.200 --> 0:44:17.560
<v Speaker 1>here in Nashville. He goes, how do you think how

0:44:17.640 --> 0:44:21.719
<v Speaker 1>do we do that? I go, probably CGI. I said,

0:44:21.719 --> 0:44:23.800
<v Speaker 1>I've got a great guy that works with Tom McDonald,

0:44:23.840 --> 0:44:27.480
<v Speaker 1>who's probably my favorite rapper, alive out in California and

0:44:27.560 --> 0:44:29.239
<v Speaker 1>he has a lot of CGI in his videos. I

0:44:29.280 --> 0:44:31.160
<v Speaker 1>called Tom told him the idea. He goes, oh, yeah,

0:44:31.360 --> 0:44:33.759
<v Speaker 1>you need to work with Jareded. Jared's up in Washington State.

0:44:34.440 --> 0:44:36.960
<v Speaker 1>So I sent it to Jared. He goes, that's going

0:44:37.040 --> 0:44:40.279
<v Speaker 1>to be difficult, but I'm definitely capable of making that happen.

0:44:40.360 --> 0:44:42.960
<v Speaker 1>I said, I want the Devil and Michael the Archangel

0:44:43.040 --> 0:44:45.960
<v Speaker 1>to have a battle, with me standing in between them.

0:44:46.960 --> 0:44:49.920
<v Speaker 1>That's what I'm looking for. He goes, okay, and so

0:44:50.040 --> 0:44:51.800
<v Speaker 1>we shot it, and that's what the video is.

0:44:52.160 --> 0:44:54.200
<v Speaker 2>Have you ever seen a video like that? No, I've

0:44:54.239 --> 0:44:56.160
<v Speaker 2>never seen a video like that. I never heard a

0:44:56.239 --> 0:44:58.400
<v Speaker 2>song like that either. Yeah, it's a pathetic song in

0:44:58.520 --> 0:45:01.719
<v Speaker 2>many ways. Do you think of it that way?

0:45:02.080 --> 0:45:04.879
<v Speaker 1>No, because the song is not really even a song.

0:45:04.960 --> 0:45:06.960
<v Speaker 1>It's me saying what the pages of the book say.

0:45:07.000 --> 0:45:09.240
<v Speaker 1>I just made them rhyme. Those are not my words,

0:45:09.239 --> 0:45:10.279
<v Speaker 1>those are John's words.

0:45:10.400 --> 0:45:13.920
<v Speaker 2>Well, but those are prophetic. It's a prophetic yesterday and.

0:45:13.960 --> 0:45:17.280
<v Speaker 1>Today spoken by the prophet John as he was exiled

0:45:17.320 --> 0:45:20.960
<v Speaker 1>to Patmos. He's writing what he's seeing and hearing, and

0:45:21.160 --> 0:45:23.879
<v Speaker 1>that becomes a book of revelation. And two thousand plus

0:45:24.000 --> 0:45:27.640
<v Speaker 1>years later, we're standing in situations that look an awful

0:45:27.680 --> 0:45:30.479
<v Speaker 1>lot like what he was talking about. And so here's

0:45:30.560 --> 0:45:34.399
<v Speaker 1>your lone songwriter who think God doesn't have a record deal,

0:45:34.520 --> 0:45:36.759
<v Speaker 1>publishing deal, or any company that can tell me I

0:45:36.840 --> 0:45:39.480
<v Speaker 1>can't put that song because you would have been not

0:45:39.520 --> 0:45:42.000
<v Speaker 1>in a million years never, you would have never heard

0:45:42.040 --> 0:45:44.480
<v Speaker 1>a song if I had a record deal. That song

0:45:44.560 --> 0:45:45.239
<v Speaker 1>does not get heart.

0:45:45.320 --> 0:45:47.719
<v Speaker 2>You've got a new song that I just heard. Yeah,

0:45:47.800 --> 0:45:50.000
<v Speaker 2>it has read it, but I've been reading about it.

0:45:50.480 --> 0:45:53.399
<v Speaker 2>And tell me about this song.

0:45:53.800 --> 0:45:58.240
<v Speaker 1>Well, if you can say you're inspired by by Sean Combes.

0:46:00.760 --> 0:46:03.200
<v Speaker 1>I saw a video a couple of weeks ago of

0:46:03.320 --> 0:46:08.400
<v Speaker 1>that monster looking right into the microphone bright lights on

0:46:08.560 --> 0:46:11.520
<v Speaker 1>a stage. He looks in the camera and he goes,

0:46:12.239 --> 0:46:16.840
<v Speaker 1>I own your soul. I own it. I determine what

0:46:17.000 --> 0:46:20.560
<v Speaker 1>your kids wear. I determine what your kids listen to.

0:46:20.960 --> 0:46:23.799
<v Speaker 1>I determined all these things about your life, about your

0:46:23.920 --> 0:46:26.479
<v Speaker 1>kid's lives. And he's got that look in his face,

0:46:26.680 --> 0:46:29.960
<v Speaker 1>just look like looking straight at the devil. And I said,

0:46:30.040 --> 0:46:33.560
<v Speaker 1>look at this guy walking out here in broad daylight,

0:46:34.840 --> 0:46:38.520
<v Speaker 1>saying he owns us and owns the souls of our children.

0:46:38.560 --> 0:46:42.200
<v Speaker 1>Reminded me of Goliath walking out, mister hih and mighty,

0:46:42.320 --> 0:46:46.120
<v Speaker 1>mister powerful, biggest guy on the block walking out when

0:46:46.239 --> 0:46:51.359
<v Speaker 1>Glath called out the Israelis and he's just mocking them incessantly,

0:46:51.800 --> 0:46:53.400
<v Speaker 1>and they all stood back, like, what are we going

0:46:53.440 --> 0:46:55.360
<v Speaker 1>to do? He's too powerful, he's too big. And then

0:46:55.440 --> 0:46:57.919
<v Speaker 1>David walks up and hits him with a rock, which

0:46:57.960 --> 0:47:01.600
<v Speaker 1>didn't kill him, oh so helped him down. He takes

0:47:01.640 --> 0:47:03.520
<v Speaker 1>a gliass On sword and cuts his head off. So

0:47:03.560 --> 0:47:07.440
<v Speaker 1>I go, okay, okay, Sean Combs. So your weapon of

0:47:07.640 --> 0:47:14.279
<v Speaker 1>choice is music? Correct? Mine? Too nice to meet you,

0:47:15.239 --> 0:47:18.120
<v Speaker 1>So I thought, you know what, nobody's written a song

0:47:18.360 --> 0:47:20.759
<v Speaker 1>about these devils. Nobody's written that.

0:47:21.719 --> 0:47:24.200
<v Speaker 2>So well, it's really not about the devils. It's about

0:47:24.239 --> 0:47:26.560
<v Speaker 2>the defiant reaction to the devil.

0:47:27.920 --> 0:47:33.520
<v Speaker 1>Correct. We are not supposed to, as Christians, be weak.

0:47:37.080 --> 0:47:39.040
<v Speaker 1>The people that wrote the books and the Bibles were

0:47:39.080 --> 0:47:41.680
<v Speaker 1>not weak people. Jesus was not a weak. Jesus was

0:47:41.760 --> 0:47:44.960
<v Speaker 1>so strong he allowed human beings to torture him to death.

0:47:45.800 --> 0:47:50.800
<v Speaker 1>He allowed them to do that. It says in the

0:47:50.880 --> 0:47:53.960
<v Speaker 1>Bible that we are supposed to be weapons in the

0:47:54.080 --> 0:47:57.880
<v Speaker 1>hands of God to tear down the thresholds of Hell. Itself,

0:47:59.080 --> 0:48:02.200
<v Speaker 1>a weapon cannot itself. An axe cannot cut down a

0:48:02.280 --> 0:48:04.800
<v Speaker 1>tree by itself. It takes an operator to pick that

0:48:04.960 --> 0:48:07.040
<v Speaker 1>axe up. Now, you hope when you pick it up.

0:48:07.520 --> 0:48:09.880
<v Speaker 1>That it is heavy, and it is sharp, and it

0:48:10.000 --> 0:48:12.840
<v Speaker 1>has cut trees down before. And when you start wailing

0:48:12.880 --> 0:48:14.880
<v Speaker 1>away at that tree, chunks of wood are going to

0:48:14.920 --> 0:48:18.319
<v Speaker 1>go flying. You hope that tool is ready when you're

0:48:18.360 --> 0:48:21.560
<v Speaker 1>ready to pick it up. So I look at myself

0:48:21.640 --> 0:48:23.440
<v Speaker 1>and I look at other Christians in this country, that

0:48:23.640 --> 0:48:26.560
<v Speaker 1>we better be preparing ourselves to be the tool He

0:48:26.680 --> 0:48:29.359
<v Speaker 1>created you to be. Maybe one guy's an axe, one

0:48:29.400 --> 0:48:32.640
<v Speaker 1>guy's a screwdriver, one guy's this, one guy's that they

0:48:32.719 --> 0:48:36.320
<v Speaker 1>do this. Everybody's got their job. But be prepared for

0:48:36.480 --> 0:48:38.520
<v Speaker 1>him to use you and the way he wants to

0:48:38.680 --> 0:48:42.480
<v Speaker 1>use you to bring it to these people, Raymond. The

0:48:43.239 --> 0:48:46.680
<v Speaker 1>most egregious sin I believe a person can commit is

0:48:46.760 --> 0:48:50.560
<v Speaker 1>to harm children. And the reason I believe that is

0:48:50.680 --> 0:48:53.239
<v Speaker 1>because Jesus Christ himself said in the New Testament, you'd

0:48:53.280 --> 0:48:55.839
<v Speaker 1>be better off to have a millstone tied around your

0:48:55.920 --> 0:48:58.200
<v Speaker 1>neck and cast into the sea than to ever cause

0:48:58.239 --> 0:49:00.799
<v Speaker 1>one of these little ones to stumble. He didn't say

0:49:00.840 --> 0:49:03.120
<v Speaker 1>to kill them or hurt them or abuse them. He

0:49:03.160 --> 0:49:05.080
<v Speaker 1>said to mess with them at all, to mess with

0:49:05.160 --> 0:49:08.680
<v Speaker 1>their innocence at all. He'd be better off dead than

0:49:08.760 --> 0:49:11.279
<v Speaker 1>ever being that person. So we know how Son of

0:49:11.320 --> 0:49:13.719
<v Speaker 1>God felt about it. And now we look around our

0:49:13.760 --> 0:49:16.040
<v Speaker 1>country and Tom Holman's going, there's three hundred to five

0:49:16.080 --> 0:49:18.920
<v Speaker 1>hundred thousand missing kids that we know about that have

0:49:19.040 --> 0:49:22.680
<v Speaker 1>come across the border. That's not even taking into account

0:49:22.719 --> 0:49:25.000
<v Speaker 1>all the other ones they didn't come across.

0:49:24.640 --> 0:49:26.400
<v Speaker 2>The American citizen bingo.

0:49:27.040 --> 0:49:29.560
<v Speaker 1>And we're allowing this to go forward. And then you've

0:49:29.600 --> 0:49:32.480
<v Speaker 1>got people like Sean Combe standing there on television telling

0:49:32.640 --> 0:49:35.360
<v Speaker 1>us that he owns our souls and owns our kids' lives.

0:49:35.920 --> 0:49:37.279
<v Speaker 1>How long are we going to sit around and just

0:49:37.360 --> 0:49:39.640
<v Speaker 1>let them keep talking to us like that, because it

0:49:39.640 --> 0:49:42.439
<v Speaker 1>ain't just talk. They're doing it. So that's what set

0:49:42.480 --> 0:49:44.239
<v Speaker 1>you off to all the same time, can you tell?

0:49:44.800 --> 0:49:45.640
<v Speaker 1>Can you tell? Oh?

0:49:45.760 --> 0:49:47.600
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, I can. I could feel it in the lyrics.

0:49:47.680 --> 0:49:49.719
<v Speaker 1>Face is getting hot talking about it.

0:49:50.239 --> 0:49:52.080
<v Speaker 2>Tell people about this song. About the lyrics, I mean,

0:49:52.120 --> 0:49:55.520
<v Speaker 2>it's basically go and repent now, brother, while I go

0:49:55.600 --> 0:49:59.000
<v Speaker 2>get my gun. This is not I'm gonna go pray

0:49:59.080 --> 0:49:59.319
<v Speaker 2>for you.

0:49:59.360 --> 0:50:02.280
<v Speaker 1>At point is song is you come after my kids.

0:50:03.360 --> 0:50:05.600
<v Speaker 1>Horrible things are going to happen to you. You will

0:50:05.640 --> 0:50:07.719
<v Speaker 1>not survive what happens to you if you come after

0:50:07.960 --> 0:50:11.319
<v Speaker 1>my kids. You will not survive. You think you're tough,

0:50:12.560 --> 0:50:15.960
<v Speaker 1>try it one time. Come on, come on up my road,

0:50:16.560 --> 0:50:18.279
<v Speaker 1>Come on up and try to get my kid one time.

0:50:18.360 --> 0:50:20.040
<v Speaker 1>Try to take one of my sons and see what

0:50:20.160 --> 0:50:23.080
<v Speaker 1>I do to you. Is what the song is all about.

0:50:23.560 --> 0:50:25.880
<v Speaker 1>It and it talks about because we fight with the

0:50:25.960 --> 0:50:28.480
<v Speaker 1>sword of the Heavenly Father and we ain't afraid to die.

0:50:30.920 --> 0:50:33.560
<v Speaker 1>Are you afraid to die for your kids? Me either?

0:50:35.160 --> 0:50:37.440
<v Speaker 1>I would stand right in front of whatever I had

0:50:37.520 --> 0:50:41.000
<v Speaker 1>to gladly, happily. That song is going to to keep them,

0:50:41.320 --> 0:50:43.200
<v Speaker 1>you know, to keep these demons off my kids.

0:50:43.280 --> 0:50:44.880
<v Speaker 2>That song is going to be a huge hit, not

0:50:45.000 --> 0:50:46.640
<v Speaker 2>because you wrote it to be a big hit, but

0:50:46.760 --> 0:50:47.680
<v Speaker 2>because it resonates.

0:50:47.800 --> 0:50:52.520
<v Speaker 1>I wrote it out of sheer anger towards these people,

0:50:53.440 --> 0:50:57.319
<v Speaker 1>and I want most of them. Probably won't hear this song.

0:50:57.400 --> 0:50:59.040
<v Speaker 1>I don't even know when I'm going to put it out,

0:50:59.160 --> 0:51:03.480
<v Speaker 1>probably pretty soon. It doesn't matter if they don't hear it.

0:51:03.560 --> 0:51:06.160
<v Speaker 1>I want parents to hear it. I want parents, moms

0:51:06.200 --> 0:51:08.560
<v Speaker 1>and dads to realize we do not have to put

0:51:08.640 --> 0:51:11.279
<v Speaker 1>up with these people and listen to them and give

0:51:11.360 --> 0:51:15.640
<v Speaker 1>no rebut back to them. Because they're so powerful, they

0:51:15.719 --> 0:51:18.920
<v Speaker 1>have no power their power comes from the Father lies

0:51:18.960 --> 0:51:20.560
<v Speaker 1>and we all know what happens to him. He gets

0:51:20.640 --> 0:51:23.160
<v Speaker 1>utterly destroyed in the end. You see what I'm saying.

0:51:23.600 --> 0:51:26.560
<v Speaker 2>I do, And John, I love that you're writing. This

0:51:26.760 --> 0:51:30.200
<v Speaker 2>is the path of every artist, whether it's Irving Berlin

0:51:30.320 --> 0:51:33.640
<v Speaker 2>or the great novelists of the eighteenth century. They're writing

0:51:33.719 --> 0:51:37.080
<v Speaker 2>about their time and they're using their art to speak

0:51:37.160 --> 0:51:40.600
<v Speaker 2>to that moment. Correct, And that makes it like the

0:51:40.640 --> 0:51:43.720
<v Speaker 2>Book of Revelation. It's true in the moment it was written,

0:51:44.360 --> 0:51:47.040
<v Speaker 2>it's true for all time. In the case Revelation, it's

0:51:47.040 --> 0:51:50.120
<v Speaker 2>going to happen in the future too. So it's the

0:51:50.200 --> 0:51:52.960
<v Speaker 2>alpha and the omega, it's all of it. Art has

0:51:53.040 --> 0:51:55.440
<v Speaker 2>that same power, though in some ways Do you feel

0:51:55.440 --> 0:51:59.160
<v Speaker 2>a part of that and has that and why aren't

0:51:59.280 --> 0:52:04.200
<v Speaker 2>others speak to that same country? Music always reflected the

0:52:04.239 --> 0:52:07.400
<v Speaker 2>heart of the people in a powerful direct way, and

0:52:07.520 --> 0:52:11.560
<v Speaker 2>we're still singing he stopped Loving Her today and we're

0:52:11.600 --> 0:52:14.959
<v Speaker 2>still singing those songs. Yeah, because they were so true

0:52:14.960 --> 0:52:17.200
<v Speaker 2>in the moment they were written. Do you feel this

0:52:17.400 --> 0:52:19.040
<v Speaker 2>is a part of that tradition?

0:52:20.640 --> 0:52:24.440
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, I just feel that the age were in currently

0:52:25.000 --> 0:52:28.880
<v Speaker 1>in the world and in our country. Sometimes I wonder

0:52:29.480 --> 0:52:32.719
<v Speaker 1>if Johnny Cash was alive in twenty twenty four, what

0:52:32.800 --> 0:52:35.520
<v Speaker 1>would he say if Charlie Daniels, who was a good

0:52:35.560 --> 0:52:38.719
<v Speaker 1>friend of mine, if he was still around he died

0:52:38.760 --> 0:52:42.840
<v Speaker 1>in twenty twenty, right before it all got crazy, what

0:52:42.920 --> 0:52:43.560
<v Speaker 1>would he say?

0:52:44.040 --> 0:52:44.160
<v Speaker 2>Now?

0:52:44.239 --> 0:52:46.480
<v Speaker 1>These are old men, and I have to think there's

0:52:46.520 --> 0:52:48.759
<v Speaker 1>a big advantage to being an old man, being in

0:52:48.840 --> 0:52:53.120
<v Speaker 1>your eighties that you just don't care anymore. Well, I'm

0:52:53.160 --> 0:52:55.320
<v Speaker 1>not an old man. I'm fifty, so I'm not a

0:52:55.440 --> 0:52:58.120
<v Speaker 1>young guy. But I'm not an old guy and I

0:52:58.200 --> 0:53:01.239
<v Speaker 1>don't care. As a matter of fact, it worries me more.

0:53:01.840 --> 0:53:05.360
<v Speaker 1>If something is laid on me to go say and

0:53:05.520 --> 0:53:09.680
<v Speaker 1>I don't say it. That is more dangerous than saying it,

0:53:10.040 --> 0:53:11.520
<v Speaker 1>because guess who you just upset?

0:53:12.920 --> 0:53:13.279
<v Speaker 2>The boss.

0:53:14.560 --> 0:53:16.800
<v Speaker 1>I put that on you and you did not follow

0:53:16.880 --> 0:53:19.920
<v Speaker 1>through with it. So guess what. I ain't sending you

0:53:19.960 --> 0:53:21.960
<v Speaker 1>any more of those or whatever else he might decide

0:53:22.000 --> 0:53:25.960
<v Speaker 1>to do. I think he opens doors for people who

0:53:26.000 --> 0:53:28.600
<v Speaker 1>have enough nerve to run through them. I don't think

0:53:28.640 --> 0:53:32.040
<v Speaker 1>he opens doors for everybody. I think he opens especially

0:53:32.160 --> 0:53:34.320
<v Speaker 1>the dangerous doors, the doors he goes. I need this

0:53:34.440 --> 0:53:36.800
<v Speaker 1>to be said. I need this. I need people to

0:53:36.920 --> 0:53:40.239
<v Speaker 1>hear this message song, whatever it might be, and so

0:53:40.320 --> 0:53:42.080
<v Speaker 1>I'm going to put it in that kid's brain and

0:53:42.120 --> 0:53:44.040
<v Speaker 1>see if he's got enough, you know what, to carry

0:53:44.080 --> 0:53:47.080
<v Speaker 1>through with it. And I'll be honest, it is unnerving

0:53:47.160 --> 0:53:49.320
<v Speaker 1>to talk about those things, those subjects.

0:53:49.680 --> 0:53:50.880
<v Speaker 2>What do your colleagues say to you?

0:53:54.840 --> 0:53:57.880
<v Speaker 1>Most of them that are my actual friends. Thank you

0:53:58.000 --> 0:54:00.520
<v Speaker 1>for saying that. Ah, I wish I could say that.

0:54:00.880 --> 0:54:01.680
<v Speaker 1>I get that a lot.

0:54:01.840 --> 0:54:03.520
<v Speaker 2>I'll bet I'll have some.

0:54:03.560 --> 0:54:05.680
<v Speaker 1>Of the biggest country artists out there, even some of

0:54:05.719 --> 0:54:08.840
<v Speaker 1>the new ones that are massive right now back channel

0:54:08.880 --> 0:54:11.560
<v Speaker 1>and direct message of me on X. Hey, I heard

0:54:11.600 --> 0:54:13.799
<v Speaker 1>that interview you did with so and so, keep it up.

0:54:13.920 --> 0:54:16.359
<v Speaker 1>Wish I could say that. I could show you those

0:54:16.520 --> 0:54:19.399
<v Speaker 1>over and over and over that say that, and I go, well,

0:54:19.440 --> 0:54:21.840
<v Speaker 1>that's I wish they would say it, but I understand

0:54:21.840 --> 0:54:23.440
<v Speaker 1>why they don't. They're right in the middle of what's

0:54:23.520 --> 0:54:26.879
<v Speaker 1>going on. I know what's at stake. So maybe my job,

0:54:27.000 --> 0:54:30.200
<v Speaker 1>Raymond is right now is to keep your mind standing

0:54:30.239 --> 0:54:33.400
<v Speaker 1>wide open and he hits you with something that he

0:54:33.440 --> 0:54:35.320
<v Speaker 1>wants to be said, write it down, do it the

0:54:35.400 --> 0:54:38.399
<v Speaker 1>best you can, and unapologetically slam it out there.

0:54:39.320 --> 0:54:42.680
<v Speaker 2>I forgot you were at the Mandolay Day shooting. Right

0:54:42.840 --> 0:54:46.279
<v Speaker 2>you were performing with Jason Alden. What did you think

0:54:46.360 --> 0:54:49.840
<v Speaker 2>when that hill of gunfires started falling on these poor people?

0:54:50.360 --> 0:54:54.120
<v Speaker 2>It almost hit you. You were there, what forty minutes before?

0:54:54.200 --> 0:54:56.439
<v Speaker 1>I was there forty five minutes before the bullets started

0:54:56.480 --> 0:54:59.759
<v Speaker 1>flying through the drum risers on the stage. So big.

0:54:59.840 --> 0:55:03.680
<v Speaker 1>And we opened for Aldean that night, and so as

0:55:03.719 --> 0:55:06.680
<v Speaker 1>soon as we got through playing, we left on the bus.

0:55:07.000 --> 0:55:09.880
<v Speaker 1>Actually had a Rednick Riviera kind of satellite little bar

0:55:10.040 --> 0:55:11.680
<v Speaker 1>over there, and I we'll go over there and hang

0:55:11.719 --> 0:55:13.640
<v Speaker 1>out with the local band and you know, get ready

0:55:13.680 --> 0:55:16.759
<v Speaker 1>to leave town. We get over there and we're up

0:55:16.760 --> 0:55:18.920
<v Speaker 1>there singing a little bit. The security man comes up

0:55:18.960 --> 0:55:20.560
<v Speaker 1>to me and he says, he go stop the music.

0:55:20.600 --> 0:55:22.279
<v Speaker 1>Stop the music. I'm like, what are you talking about?

0:55:22.280 --> 0:55:24.319
<v Speaker 1>He goes, stop the music. They pulled the plug, killed

0:55:24.360 --> 0:55:26.879
<v Speaker 1>the pa. I'm like, what is going on? And they say,

0:55:26.960 --> 0:55:29.759
<v Speaker 1>there's a mass shooting happening at where you guys just

0:55:29.880 --> 0:55:31.000
<v Speaker 1>were at the concert.

0:55:31.120 --> 0:55:31.560
<v Speaker 2>I'm went what?

0:55:32.560 --> 0:55:34.759
<v Speaker 1>So everybody got quiet. We turned on the local news.

0:55:34.840 --> 0:55:37.680
<v Speaker 1>We had, you know, we had TVs everywhere, and the

0:55:37.840 --> 0:55:42.759
<v Speaker 1>local news is reporting if you were anywhere near Mandalay Bay,

0:55:43.280 --> 0:55:48.480
<v Speaker 1>Bellagio or Caesar's Palace. Get away from the windows. Well,

0:55:48.520 --> 0:55:50.520
<v Speaker 1>we were looking right at Blagio. We're looking at the

0:55:50.560 --> 0:55:53.520
<v Speaker 1>fountains and all that. I'm like, everybody, get away from

0:55:53.520 --> 0:55:55.400
<v Speaker 1>the glass. So you go get off in the corner.

0:55:56.239 --> 0:55:58.960
<v Speaker 1>And I remember looking down you can hear all this

0:55:59.120 --> 0:56:01.399
<v Speaker 1>racket going on. We're kind of up high. We're looking

0:56:01.440 --> 0:56:03.600
<v Speaker 1>down and you could see police squads moving through the

0:56:03.640 --> 0:56:07.239
<v Speaker 1>streets down below. I'm like, okay, so somebody's on the

0:56:07.320 --> 0:56:11.279
<v Speaker 1>loose through the town. So I said, somebody needs a

0:56:11.280 --> 0:56:14.000
<v Speaker 1>whole point on this front door. And I asked, has

0:56:14.040 --> 0:56:16.000
<v Speaker 1>anybody got a weapon in here? And everybody went, h

0:56:16.160 --> 0:56:19.200
<v Speaker 1>I know, well I did the only one. I had

0:56:19.200 --> 0:56:21.759
<v Speaker 1>a Colt forty five in my belt, so I pulled

0:56:21.800 --> 0:56:24.040
<v Speaker 1>it out start walking to the front door. We got

0:56:24.080 --> 0:56:27.800
<v Speaker 1>a glass door and this big old cop officer brown

0:56:28.800 --> 0:56:31.239
<v Speaker 1>flops his badge out and I looked at him. I thought, oh,

0:56:31.280 --> 0:56:33.239
<v Speaker 1>I'm in trouble because I have a firearms. First thing

0:56:33.280 --> 0:56:37.520
<v Speaker 1>I thought, he goes, I'm a police officer Minneapolis Police Department.

0:56:37.560 --> 0:56:41.080
<v Speaker 1>I'm here with my wife on our honeymoon. Can I

0:56:41.560 --> 0:56:45.919
<v Speaker 1>have that and let me protect the door? I said, yes, sir,

0:56:46.200 --> 0:56:48.600
<v Speaker 1>and I turned the gun around. I said it's not chambered,

0:56:48.640 --> 0:56:50.200
<v Speaker 1>and he grabbed it, went it is now, and he

0:56:50.320 --> 0:56:52.640
<v Speaker 1>racked it, got down on one knee and put his

0:56:52.719 --> 0:56:55.440
<v Speaker 1>elbow up on the T shirt table there and just

0:56:55.560 --> 0:56:57.200
<v Speaker 1>held point on that door because for all we knew,

0:56:57.200 --> 0:56:59.640
<v Speaker 1>somebody was coming straight through the door. Got back home

0:56:59.719 --> 0:57:02.680
<v Speaker 1>after all that had happened, and going through my suitcase,

0:57:04.080 --> 0:57:06.439
<v Speaker 1>and I found the hotel key because we were staying

0:57:06.480 --> 0:57:09.560
<v Speaker 1>at the MGM. Found the hotel key, and I'm watching

0:57:09.600 --> 0:57:11.360
<v Speaker 1>the news, and I'm looking at the room number on

0:57:11.440 --> 0:57:13.200
<v Speaker 1>my hotel key, and I'm looking at the news, going,

0:57:13.280 --> 0:57:16.600
<v Speaker 1>hang on a minute. My ceiling of my room was

0:57:16.680 --> 0:57:18.960
<v Speaker 1>the floor of that guy that was lobbing those bullets

0:57:19.000 --> 0:57:21.760
<v Speaker 1>shouter all day. I'd been up in that room just

0:57:21.840 --> 0:57:23.960
<v Speaker 1>waiting for the show to start. He was literally right

0:57:24.000 --> 0:57:24.760
<v Speaker 1>there all day long.

0:57:25.200 --> 0:57:27.840
<v Speaker 2>Are you satisfied with the answers that we've gotten about

0:57:28.440 --> 0:57:28.720
<v Speaker 2>this guy?

0:57:29.040 --> 0:57:29.560
<v Speaker 1>What answer?

0:57:29.800 --> 0:57:32.400
<v Speaker 2>This old man running back and forth between how you

0:57:32.520 --> 0:57:33.800
<v Speaker 2>know how long? That's sweet? Was?

0:57:34.080 --> 0:57:36.760
<v Speaker 1>What answer? There are more cameras per square inch in

0:57:36.840 --> 0:57:39.439
<v Speaker 1>Las Vegas, Nevada than probably any city on the earth.

0:57:39.480 --> 0:57:44.240
<v Speaker 1>There are cameras everywhere everywhere, can't find any camera footage

0:57:44.280 --> 0:57:46.320
<v Speaker 1>the cameras we don't have cameras. Reminds me of other

0:57:46.360 --> 0:57:49.800
<v Speaker 1>things I've heard since then. And then you start thinking about, well,

0:57:49.840 --> 0:57:51.720
<v Speaker 1>how in the world can one guy sit in a

0:57:51.760 --> 0:57:53.720
<v Speaker 1>hotel room like that, because my hotel room would have

0:57:53.720 --> 0:57:57.320
<v Speaker 1>been exactly like his and fire thousands and thousands of

0:57:57.440 --> 0:57:59.800
<v Speaker 1>rounds and not choked to death. That's the first thing

0:57:59.840 --> 0:58:02.240
<v Speaker 1>I thought, I'm a shooter. I'm like, man, if you

0:58:02.280 --> 0:58:05.800
<v Speaker 1>fire enough rounds outside, you can serve. Okay, clearly are

0:58:06.120 --> 0:58:08.360
<v Speaker 1>he's inside a hotel room doing this? And then you

0:58:08.440 --> 0:58:10.520
<v Speaker 1>think about what the local news said, get away from

0:58:10.560 --> 0:58:13.480
<v Speaker 1>these hotels and get away. And then national news took it.

0:58:13.560 --> 0:58:16.439
<v Speaker 1>And I remember seeing the big FBI guy leaning over

0:58:16.560 --> 0:58:19.280
<v Speaker 1>that sheriff while the sheriff hands are just shaking like

0:58:19.360 --> 0:58:21.680
<v Speaker 1>a leaf, trying to read the statement. There's the FBI.

0:58:21.680 --> 0:58:25.200
<v Speaker 1>I'm going, what is going? What happened? What really happened here?

0:58:25.720 --> 0:58:29.120
<v Speaker 1>Anybody that was there, anybody that was around that situation.

0:58:29.680 --> 0:58:32.280
<v Speaker 1>None of us believe a word that we were told.

0:58:32.640 --> 0:58:34.880
<v Speaker 1>And I'm hoping in this new administration that is one

0:58:34.920 --> 0:58:39.200
<v Speaker 1>of the things. There's many, but I hope they tell

0:58:39.320 --> 0:58:42.920
<v Speaker 1>us what that actually was, what actually went down to

0:58:43.040 --> 0:58:45.520
<v Speaker 1>a lot of people, that over fifty people got killed

0:58:45.520 --> 0:58:46.200
<v Speaker 1>at that concert.

0:58:46.360 --> 0:58:50.120
<v Speaker 2>Your fans, yeah, your fans. You had met with some

0:58:50.240 --> 0:58:52.840
<v Speaker 2>of these people who were victims of this right before

0:58:52.880 --> 0:58:53.360
<v Speaker 2>the concert.

0:58:53.520 --> 0:58:56.240
<v Speaker 1>Died. Yeah, that died. A young young man came through

0:58:56.280 --> 0:58:59.000
<v Speaker 1>with his wife and the meet and greet, big fan

0:58:59.160 --> 0:59:01.920
<v Speaker 1>took pictures with him. And I got word that when

0:59:01.960 --> 0:59:04.080
<v Speaker 1>the bullets came in, he turned his back to where

0:59:04.120 --> 0:59:06.120
<v Speaker 1>the bullets were coming, shielding his wife, and he took

0:59:06.160 --> 0:59:09.080
<v Speaker 1>several rounds in the back and he died. And you know,

0:59:09.840 --> 0:59:13.600
<v Speaker 1>they deserve answers. We deserve answers. And pardon me for

0:59:13.720 --> 0:59:16.040
<v Speaker 1>being so skeptical when you go through something like that

0:59:16.240 --> 0:59:17.560
<v Speaker 1>and you go back and look at it and go,

0:59:18.240 --> 0:59:21.200
<v Speaker 1>that is not true. That is not true what they're

0:59:21.240 --> 0:59:23.440
<v Speaker 1>telling us. And America knows that a lot of things

0:59:23.480 --> 0:59:25.520
<v Speaker 1>have happened in our country that America knows is not

0:59:25.640 --> 0:59:26.040
<v Speaker 1>the truth.

0:59:26.840 --> 0:59:30.000
<v Speaker 2>We need answers particularly for that. I mean, that is

0:59:30.080 --> 0:59:32.680
<v Speaker 2>a that well the shooting here in Nashville too, that's

0:59:32.680 --> 0:59:37.000
<v Speaker 2>school shooting here not sufficient answer now, and we're talking

0:59:37.000 --> 0:59:37.920
<v Speaker 2>about babies, and.

0:59:39.080 --> 0:59:41.480
<v Speaker 1>You, Valdi, why are their cops standing in a hallway

0:59:41.520 --> 0:59:45.040
<v Speaker 1>for an hour while this guy's executing kids, and they're

0:59:45.080 --> 0:59:48.280
<v Speaker 1>all got bullet proof vest rifles, everything they need to

0:59:48.400 --> 0:59:50.360
<v Speaker 1>walk in that room and take that guy out, and

0:59:50.480 --> 0:59:53.360
<v Speaker 1>they just stand there for an hour as the shots

0:59:53.440 --> 0:59:56.840
<v Speaker 1>keep popping and killing these kids. Yeah, America is sick

0:59:56.880 --> 0:59:58.640
<v Speaker 1>and tired of it. Honestly, that's one reason why Trump

0:59:58.720 --> 1:00:04.080
<v Speaker 1>won it. It is the gravity that is that finally

1:00:04.120 --> 1:00:06.640
<v Speaker 1>got together of all these things, put all into one

1:00:06.680 --> 1:00:09.360
<v Speaker 1>big package and drop it in your lap and go Trump,

1:00:09.920 --> 1:00:13.520
<v Speaker 1>fix this. Tell us the truth, tell us what's going on.

1:00:13.840 --> 1:00:15.360
<v Speaker 1>I have a feeling if we all know the real

1:00:15.440 --> 1:00:18.520
<v Speaker 1>truth about everything, it would change America's future for probably

1:00:18.560 --> 1:00:21.040
<v Speaker 1>a century, because it'd be real hard to trick us

1:00:21.080 --> 1:00:22.480
<v Speaker 1>in anything again for a long time.

1:00:23.400 --> 1:00:26.840
<v Speaker 2>Tell me about Rednick Riviera. I've loved the Rednick Riviera

1:00:26.920 --> 1:00:29.320
<v Speaker 2>because I know the origins of that. But I'll bet

1:00:29.320 --> 1:00:31.840
<v Speaker 2>a lot of people, yeah, the Gulf Coast. Tell people

1:00:32.040 --> 1:00:34.520
<v Speaker 2>where that title came from. Why you had to call

1:00:34.560 --> 1:00:35.760
<v Speaker 2>it Redknick Era.

1:00:36.080 --> 1:00:38.640
<v Speaker 1>As a as a songwriter, it's one of my favorite

1:00:38.680 --> 1:00:42.480
<v Speaker 1>phrases because it's funny. First of all, I like funny stuff,

1:00:42.880 --> 1:00:46.360
<v Speaker 1>but it's basically back in the sixties, people living on

1:00:46.600 --> 1:00:48.680
<v Speaker 1>limited income, which is still the way it is today,

1:00:49.000 --> 1:00:50.960
<v Speaker 1>couldn't afford to go to the French rivi era. So

1:00:51.040 --> 1:00:52.760
<v Speaker 1>where would they go. We've got to go to the

1:00:52.880 --> 1:00:56.320
<v Speaker 1>Rednick Rivier. So that's like destin Florida golf shores as

1:00:56.480 --> 1:01:00.280
<v Speaker 1>small city beach, and the beaches are pristine, and the

1:01:00.320 --> 1:01:02.440
<v Speaker 1>food is great, and there's music everywhere, and you can

1:01:02.560 --> 1:01:05.280
<v Speaker 1>drive there, you can afford to stay there for a week,

1:01:05.520 --> 1:01:08.120
<v Speaker 1>and your family have a good time. Yeah, And so

1:01:08.160 --> 1:01:10.240
<v Speaker 1>I always thought, man, what a great phrase. Growing up

1:01:10.360 --> 1:01:12.640
<v Speaker 1>blue collar myself, I thought, Yeah, I remember calling it

1:01:12.720 --> 1:01:14.680
<v Speaker 1>Rednick Rivera when I was a kid. First time I

1:01:14.680 --> 1:01:17.360
<v Speaker 1>ever got stung by jellyfish was in Panama City Beach.

1:01:17.360 --> 1:01:19.000
<v Speaker 1>My dad drove us down there in the station wagon.

1:01:19.400 --> 1:01:23.040
<v Speaker 1>And so I thought that should be a brand into itself.

1:01:23.120 --> 1:01:27.480
<v Speaker 1>So I wanted to step out and build all American,

1:01:27.480 --> 1:01:31.120
<v Speaker 1>one hundred percent made in the USA brand that reflected

1:01:31.960 --> 1:01:35.360
<v Speaker 1>my life. Like basically, I grew up blue collar. My

1:01:35.480 --> 1:01:37.960
<v Speaker 1>brain still works that way. But you go to a

1:01:38.040 --> 1:01:40.000
<v Speaker 1>place you can afford because it's truly nice, and you

1:01:40.080 --> 1:01:42.720
<v Speaker 1>make memories with the family. And can we get back

1:01:42.760 --> 1:01:45.320
<v Speaker 1>to veterans to a brand which we have to fold.

1:01:45.880 --> 1:01:47.360
<v Speaker 2>How many tuitions have you paid?

1:01:47.400 --> 1:01:49.920
<v Speaker 1>The folds and on it a lot, It'd be hard

1:01:49.960 --> 1:01:53.320
<v Speaker 1>to say how many tuitions we've The brand has generated

1:01:53.400 --> 1:01:56.520
<v Speaker 1>one point six million dollars since twenty eighteen. That's a

1:01:56.640 --> 1:02:01.360
<v Speaker 1>lot for any brand, much less privately owned, small upstart brand.

1:02:02.200 --> 1:02:06.520
<v Speaker 1>But I look at that as you know, the only

1:02:06.600 --> 1:02:09.760
<v Speaker 1>reason guys with high school diplomas who grew up in

1:02:09.840 --> 1:02:12.640
<v Speaker 1>a double wide in Texas and nothing fancy get to

1:02:12.720 --> 1:02:16.680
<v Speaker 1>go out here and just shoot at the moon, literally

1:02:17.080 --> 1:02:18.640
<v Speaker 1>just go all the way as hard as you want

1:02:18.680 --> 1:02:20.920
<v Speaker 1>to go and chase the American dream. It's because of

1:02:20.920 --> 1:02:24.080
<v Speaker 1>the United States Military. Short of those men and women,

1:02:24.840 --> 1:02:26.520
<v Speaker 1>you don't get to sit here and be on TV.

1:02:26.760 --> 1:02:28.680
<v Speaker 1>I don't get to go make music. Nobody gets to

1:02:28.760 --> 1:02:31.400
<v Speaker 1>do what they want to do short of life liberty

1:02:31.400 --> 1:02:34.040
<v Speaker 1>and pursuit of happiness being kept in tact by the

1:02:34.200 --> 1:02:38.680
<v Speaker 1>US military, And so Folds of Honor puts kids and

1:02:38.760 --> 1:02:42.000
<v Speaker 1>spouses through college who lost their mom or dad, or

1:02:42.040 --> 1:02:44.240
<v Speaker 1>who have a family members one hundred percent disabled. That

1:02:44.400 --> 1:02:46.840
<v Speaker 1>was the income earner. And so there's people all of

1:02:46.920 --> 1:02:49.760
<v Speaker 1>the US right now going to college partially subsidized by

1:02:49.840 --> 1:02:50.920
<v Speaker 1>redneck Riviera.

1:02:50.640 --> 1:02:52.280
<v Speaker 2>Love that I love it, and you got and you

1:02:52.360 --> 1:02:54.600
<v Speaker 2>have the club here in Nashville, which is a great

1:02:54.720 --> 1:02:56.280
<v Speaker 2>place to one place if you want to come to

1:02:56.360 --> 1:02:58.760
<v Speaker 2>if you're coming to Nashville, you should go to the

1:02:58.840 --> 1:03:00.920
<v Speaker 2>Redneck Revere. It's a lot fun. It's a great bar,

1:03:01.000 --> 1:03:04.400
<v Speaker 2>there's live music. And you were one of the first

1:03:04.560 --> 1:03:08.360
<v Speaker 2>country artists really to start. I mean everybody followed John

1:03:08.400 --> 1:03:09.480
<v Speaker 2>Rich's lead on this way.

1:03:10.000 --> 1:03:12.439
<v Speaker 1>Everybody Alan Jackson had to play. There was a couple

1:03:12.480 --> 1:03:14.680
<v Speaker 1>of the big dogs. Yeah, they had couple places, not

1:03:14.840 --> 1:03:16.600
<v Speaker 1>like it is now. Everybody and the dog's trying to

1:03:16.600 --> 1:03:18.760
<v Speaker 1>get a place. It brought you out, I mean it truly.

1:03:18.920 --> 1:03:21.000
<v Speaker 1>I think every building down there has a country artist's

1:03:21.080 --> 1:03:23.840
<v Speaker 1>name on it at this point. But we try to

1:03:23.880 --> 1:03:26.240
<v Speaker 1>make the bar really be its own thing, and it

1:03:26.560 --> 1:03:28.920
<v Speaker 1>really is. When you walk in the front door, we

1:03:29.040 --> 1:03:31.000
<v Speaker 1>call it the Heroes Bar, and that's where if you're

1:03:31.040 --> 1:03:34.520
<v Speaker 1>a vet, active duty or a first responder you get

1:03:34.560 --> 1:03:36.760
<v Speaker 1>the seat and the first drinks on the house and

1:03:36.840 --> 1:03:40.720
<v Speaker 1>the walls are covered in patches and military coins. Probably

1:03:40.720 --> 1:03:43.920
<v Speaker 1>the proudest moment I've had seeing that place operate was

1:03:44.080 --> 1:03:45.960
<v Speaker 1>a bunch of rowdy guys were down there having a

1:03:46.040 --> 1:03:50.400
<v Speaker 1>batchlor party. That's the Rednick Riviera, And I mean they're

1:03:50.440 --> 1:03:52.439
<v Speaker 1>getting you know, you could imagine you're having a big time.

1:03:52.880 --> 1:03:55.880
<v Speaker 1>And these two old Vietnam vets come walking in with

1:03:56.000 --> 1:03:59.640
<v Speaker 1>their Vietnam Veteran ball caps on. They come walking in.

1:04:00.120 --> 1:04:02.000
<v Speaker 1>It's six deep at the bar. You can't get up

1:04:02.040 --> 1:04:04.960
<v Speaker 1>to the bar. And I watched these bachelor party guys

1:04:06.120 --> 1:04:08.520
<v Speaker 1>see those old men and got up out of their

1:04:08.600 --> 1:04:10.160
<v Speaker 1>chairs and moved people out of the way and said

1:04:10.840 --> 1:04:14.080
<v Speaker 1>take much hair, come on, take much here and sat

1:04:14.120 --> 1:04:16.160
<v Speaker 1>the old man down at their chairs and then they

1:04:16.240 --> 1:04:18.480
<v Speaker 1>got up and that was the coveted spot to sit

1:04:19.160 --> 1:04:21.480
<v Speaker 1>and respected those old men for their service. So that's

1:04:21.520 --> 1:04:24.880
<v Speaker 1>really the culture of that kind of encapsulates the whole brand.

1:04:24.720 --> 1:04:27.320
<v Speaker 2>Really well, and what the country should be.

1:04:28.040 --> 1:04:29.160
<v Speaker 1>The hope we get back to that.

1:04:29.600 --> 1:04:31.520
<v Speaker 2>I think we're getting there. I want to ask you

1:04:31.640 --> 1:04:33.760
<v Speaker 2>quickly before I get to I have a list of questions.

1:04:33.760 --> 1:04:36.720
<v Speaker 2>I ask everybody. Give me the state of country music

1:04:36.760 --> 1:04:39.840
<v Speaker 2>through John Richard's eyes. Now you've said there couldn't be

1:04:39.920 --> 1:04:43.560
<v Speaker 2>a Loretta Lynd today, there couldn't be a Johnny Cash today.

1:04:44.000 --> 1:04:47.400
<v Speaker 2>Why not, especially when you hear those young artists reaching

1:04:47.440 --> 1:04:49.680
<v Speaker 2>out to you privately and saying thank you for saying that.

1:04:51.120 --> 1:04:53.840
<v Speaker 2>Clearly that's where they are still.

1:04:54.000 --> 1:04:57.400
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, So the talent of a Loretta Lynn or the

1:04:57.520 --> 1:05:00.880
<v Speaker 1>talent of a Johnny Cash can ex to Nashville and

1:05:01.080 --> 1:05:05.280
<v Speaker 1>does there there are people with unbelievable talent in Nashville

1:05:05.320 --> 1:05:07.280
<v Speaker 1>that are that are coming up through the ranks. The

1:05:07.400 --> 1:05:14.600
<v Speaker 1>part that's different is is the record label's stranglehold on creativity.

1:05:16.040 --> 1:05:20.720
<v Speaker 1>Back in the day, Johnny Cash could sing you know,

1:05:20.920 --> 1:05:23.160
<v Speaker 1>I shot a man in Reno just to watch him die,

1:05:25.040 --> 1:05:27.040
<v Speaker 1>and they would let him put that out and let

1:05:27.120 --> 1:05:29.040
<v Speaker 1>the fans decide if they like a song like that

1:05:29.240 --> 1:05:30.960
<v Speaker 1>or if Johnny Cash is too crazy. I don't want

1:05:30.960 --> 1:05:33.800
<v Speaker 1>to ever hear that again. That's really not how it

1:05:33.960 --> 1:05:36.120
<v Speaker 1>is now. And I know that for a fact because

1:05:36.160 --> 1:05:38.640
<v Speaker 1>I was in it. And then now all these artists

1:05:38.680 --> 1:05:41.040
<v Speaker 1>that come to me and go, I'm gonna play at me.

1:05:41.120 --> 1:05:42.640
<v Speaker 1>I'm gonna send you a song I just wrote. The

1:05:42.720 --> 1:05:44.160
<v Speaker 1>label's not gonnaver let me put it out, but I

1:05:44.200 --> 1:05:46.000
<v Speaker 1>wanted you to hear it. Anyway. They'll send me a

1:05:46.120 --> 1:05:48.400
<v Speaker 1>song and it'll be it'll be making some kind of

1:05:48.440 --> 1:05:52.320
<v Speaker 1>a cultural statement or something, and they won't even bother

1:05:52.480 --> 1:05:54.760
<v Speaker 1>turning it in to the record label. It's almost like

1:05:55.080 --> 1:05:58.240
<v Speaker 1>it's not censorship, because nobody ever puts it forward to

1:05:58.280 --> 1:05:58.640
<v Speaker 1>even be.

1:05:58.720 --> 1:06:01.880
<v Speaker 2>Some self censorship. It's else. They get what they understand,

1:06:02.520 --> 1:06:03.640
<v Speaker 2>what's going to make a no go?

1:06:03.880 --> 1:06:06.640
<v Speaker 1>So why don't even try? And that's not healthy?

1:06:07.200 --> 1:06:09.800
<v Speaker 2>No? Okay, I gotta put my hat on. Can you

1:06:09.840 --> 1:06:12.200
<v Speaker 2>throw that hat to me for a second? I gotta

1:06:12.200 --> 1:06:12.600
<v Speaker 2>put my hair.

1:06:12.760 --> 1:06:14.320
<v Speaker 1>I didn't know. I think that's my hand I got

1:06:14.520 --> 1:06:17.440
<v Speaker 1>it almost looks like a look at that. Look at you.

1:06:17.720 --> 1:06:18.360
<v Speaker 2>That's a big one.

1:06:18.960 --> 1:06:21.160
<v Speaker 1>All right, one tip, pull it down a little bit lower.

1:06:21.480 --> 1:06:24.720
<v Speaker 2>There you go. That's it. That's quite. That guy's ready

1:06:24.720 --> 1:06:25.560
<v Speaker 2>for the grand ole up.

1:06:25.640 --> 1:06:26.280
<v Speaker 1>Really all right?

1:06:26.360 --> 1:06:28.960
<v Speaker 2>Here we go, ladies, And they won't let me on

1:06:29.000 --> 1:06:31.520
<v Speaker 2>the opery. That'll bring down the stage forever. Okay. These

1:06:31.560 --> 1:06:35.280
<v Speaker 2>are my royal grande questionnaire questions I asked everybody. He's

1:06:35.280 --> 1:06:38.560
<v Speaker 2>a rapid fire, but they're important. Who is the person

1:06:38.680 --> 1:06:42.120
<v Speaker 2>you most admire my dad? Why?

1:06:43.560 --> 1:06:46.680
<v Speaker 1>Because he is unyielding and relentless.

1:06:47.720 --> 1:06:50.960
<v Speaker 2>You took the lesson? Well, my friend, who's the person

1:06:51.040 --> 1:06:52.640
<v Speaker 2>you most despise.

1:06:55.160 --> 1:06:59.120
<v Speaker 1>Right now? Sean Combs and anybody like him?

1:07:00.200 --> 1:07:08.240
<v Speaker 2>What is your best feature loyalty, ah, and your worst.

1:07:11.800 --> 1:07:15.160
<v Speaker 1>Hm? Which one should I pick?

1:07:16.280 --> 1:07:17.640
<v Speaker 2>Pick a card? Any card?

1:07:20.480 --> 1:07:23.400
<v Speaker 1>I would say, h rushing to judgment.

1:07:25.240 --> 1:07:29.280
<v Speaker 2>The last great book you read? And your favorite book?

1:07:30.040 --> 1:07:31.600
<v Speaker 2>I think I know the answer to this one.

1:07:32.440 --> 1:07:36.160
<v Speaker 1>Well, I mean discounting the Bible, not counting the not

1:07:36.280 --> 1:07:38.640
<v Speaker 1>counting the Bible. Hill Billy Elogy is one of my

1:07:38.840 --> 1:07:40.760
<v Speaker 1>town favorite books. To be honest with the book. Yeah,

1:07:40.960 --> 1:07:43.760
<v Speaker 1>it reminds me of where I grew up, my people.

1:07:44.360 --> 1:07:45.200
<v Speaker 2>The American people.

1:07:45.640 --> 1:07:51.680
<v Speaker 1>What do you fear, John, something happening to my kids?

1:07:53.040 --> 1:07:56.000
<v Speaker 2>We all fear that, all of us. The greatest virtue

1:07:56.400 --> 1:07:56.680
<v Speaker 2>is what.

1:07:59.360 --> 1:07:59.800
<v Speaker 1>Patience.

1:08:03.320 --> 1:08:05.720
<v Speaker 2>I think we have a shared lack of that. If

1:08:06.120 --> 1:08:14.880
<v Speaker 2>it gets out what the word you could not live without? Idiot?

1:08:15.480 --> 1:08:17.080
<v Speaker 1>I say that word a lot every day. Look at

1:08:17.120 --> 1:08:19.960
<v Speaker 1>this idiot. Sometimes I'm looking in the mirror and go

1:08:20.040 --> 1:08:20.880
<v Speaker 1>look at this he Oh.

1:08:20.960 --> 1:08:24.160
<v Speaker 2>No, you shouldn't do that. If you could live anywhere,

1:08:24.439 --> 1:08:25.160
<v Speaker 2>where would you live?

1:08:27.439 --> 1:08:29.200
<v Speaker 1>Probably just outside of Yellowstone?

1:08:30.640 --> 1:08:31.920
<v Speaker 2>Wow? Except in the winter.

1:08:32.560 --> 1:08:33.479
<v Speaker 1>No, in the winter too.

1:08:33.520 --> 1:08:34.240
<v Speaker 2>Gets a little deeper.

1:08:34.400 --> 1:08:36.840
<v Speaker 1>That's why with me. Wow. Yeah, I like it out there.

1:08:36.920 --> 1:08:41.400
<v Speaker 2>Beautiful country, good air, beautiful country. What is your biggest regret?

1:08:41.600 --> 1:08:47.080
<v Speaker 1>John? Not jumping that train and getting the hell out

1:08:47.080 --> 1:08:47.639
<v Speaker 1>of this interview.

1:08:49.080 --> 1:08:55.560
<v Speaker 2>We're almost done. Your biggest regret, John, besides jumping the train, biggest.

1:08:55.200 --> 1:09:00.559
<v Speaker 1>Regret probably disrespecting my father and my youth. H I've

1:09:00.600 --> 1:09:03.280
<v Speaker 1>apologized since then, but still I regret it.

1:09:03.520 --> 1:09:06.360
<v Speaker 2>The best piece of advice you ever got was.

1:09:06.400 --> 1:09:10.840
<v Speaker 1>What You're never truly free until you can say no.

1:09:12.040 --> 1:09:13.719
<v Speaker 1>Who gave it to you, Larry Gatlin?

1:09:14.000 --> 1:09:17.479
<v Speaker 2>Wow, You're never truly free until you can say no.

1:09:17.680 --> 1:09:18.280
<v Speaker 2>I love that.

1:09:18.479 --> 1:09:18.840
<v Speaker 1>That's right.

1:09:19.360 --> 1:09:22.479
<v Speaker 2>If you could not do what you're doing now, you

1:09:22.560 --> 1:09:24.800
<v Speaker 2>weren't a singer and a songwriter, what would you be?

1:09:25.080 --> 1:09:27.080
<v Speaker 2>What would you like to do? What else were you

1:09:27.200 --> 1:09:28.320
<v Speaker 2>called to do? Do you think.

1:09:30.200 --> 1:09:32.680
<v Speaker 1>Something where I can inspire people? Whatever that would be.

1:09:32.960 --> 1:09:35.479
<v Speaker 1>I've always thought if I'd ever gone into the military,

1:09:35.680 --> 1:09:37.320
<v Speaker 1>I would have been a guy that would have really

1:09:37.439 --> 1:09:41.240
<v Speaker 1>probably enjoyed that and excelled at it, being around other

1:09:41.760 --> 1:09:45.320
<v Speaker 1>really competent people, younger ones, especially bringing them up. I

1:09:45.360 --> 1:09:47.160
<v Speaker 1>don't know that it would have been military, but something

1:09:47.160 --> 1:09:48.600
<v Speaker 1>that would have put me in a spot where I

1:09:48.680 --> 1:09:50.519
<v Speaker 1>can communicate, Like.

1:09:50.560 --> 1:09:54.120
<v Speaker 2>That final question, what happens when this life is over?

1:09:55.160 --> 1:09:57.960
<v Speaker 1>When this life is over, every single human being that's

1:09:58.040 --> 1:10:00.960
<v Speaker 1>ever lived stands directly in front of the Son of God,

1:10:01.640 --> 1:10:03.880
<v Speaker 1>and he will either say come on in or he'll

1:10:03.880 --> 1:10:06.280
<v Speaker 1>say depart from me. I never knew you one or

1:10:06.280 --> 1:10:08.320
<v Speaker 1>the other. And the only way you get into heaven

1:10:08.400 --> 1:10:11.599
<v Speaker 1>is by submitting your entire life and will to Jesus Christ.

1:10:11.880 --> 1:10:15.880
<v Speaker 1>Going to church will not get you in. Academia about

1:10:15.880 --> 1:10:17.960
<v Speaker 1>the Bible will not get you in. All of your

1:10:17.960 --> 1:10:20.439
<v Speaker 1>philosophy will not get you in. Doing good deeds will

1:10:20.479 --> 1:10:22.920
<v Speaker 1>not get you in. If that was the case, the

1:10:23.000 --> 1:10:24.920
<v Speaker 1>thief on the cross would have never gone into heaven.

1:10:26.120 --> 1:10:27.280
<v Speaker 1>That's what happens when you die.

1:10:27.560 --> 1:10:30.479
<v Speaker 2>No, you're on your way there, my friend God, bless you.

1:10:30.560 --> 1:10:31.559
<v Speaker 2>Great John.

1:10:31.680 --> 1:10:33.640
<v Speaker 1>Yes see you next time looks good.

1:10:34.040 --> 1:10:36.599
<v Speaker 2>I've never taken it off. Now here's the least in town.

1:10:36.800 --> 1:10:37.519
<v Speaker 1>Give me one of these.

1:10:38.400 --> 1:10:42.639
<v Speaker 2>There you go, Thank you John. Okay, here's the hole.

1:10:42.840 --> 1:10:44.920
<v Speaker 2>You know. This one idea that always sticks in my

1:10:45.080 --> 1:10:48.920
<v Speaker 2>mind after an interview. I loved what John Rich shared there,

1:10:49.600 --> 1:10:53.840
<v Speaker 2>when everything is out of your control, find the one

1:10:54.000 --> 1:10:58.400
<v Speaker 2>thing you still can control, and control it, do the

1:10:58.479 --> 1:11:01.639
<v Speaker 2>one right thing you're capable of, and build from there.

1:11:02.000 --> 1:11:04.360
<v Speaker 2>The other thing that I think is so good is

1:11:04.479 --> 1:11:08.200
<v Speaker 2>that God opens doors for those who run to him. Oh,

1:11:08.520 --> 1:11:12.840
<v Speaker 2>and keep your hat on. I'll carry a lot of

1:11:12.880 --> 1:11:14.479
<v Speaker 2>those things with me. I hope you'll carry them with you.

1:11:14.760 --> 1:11:17.560
<v Speaker 2>Why live a dry, narrow, constricted life when if you

1:11:17.680 --> 1:11:21.160
<v Speaker 2>fill it with good things, it can flow into a broad,

1:11:21.600 --> 1:11:25.280
<v Speaker 2>thriving Arroyo Grande. I'm raining at Arroyo. Make sure you

1:11:25.520 --> 1:11:28.560
<v Speaker 2>like and subscribe to this episode. Thank you for diving in,

1:11:28.680 --> 1:11:33.679
<v Speaker 2>and we'll see you next time. Arroyo Grande is produced

1:11:33.720 --> 1:11:37.200
<v Speaker 2>in partnership with iHeart Podcasts and is available on the

1:11:37.280 --> 1:11:40.680
<v Speaker 2>iHeartRadio app or wherever you get your podcasts.