Speaker 1: Taking a Walk.
Speaker 2: I'm buzz night and welcome to the Taking a Walk Podcast.
Speaker 3: This is the podcast where we talk to artists and
Speaker 3: get their stories, their songs, their journeys.
Speaker 2: That shape them.
Speaker 3: Today, we take a walk with a voice that's become
Speaker 3: a staple of country and pop music over the past.
Speaker 2: Couple of decades.
Speaker 3: Charles Kelly a Grammy winning singer songwriter founding member of
Speaker 3: the chart topping trio Lady A. From his early days
Speaker 3: growing up in Augusta, Georgia, to forming a band with
Speaker 3: his brothers that caught the attention of James Brown, Charles
Speaker 3: has always followed the music wherever it led him. He's
Speaker 3: written songs for some of the biggest names in country,
Speaker 3: released acclaimed solo work, and opened up about his personal journey,
Speaker 3: including his path to sobriety and the lessons he's learned
Speaker 3: along the way.
Speaker 2: With a brand new solo.
Speaker 3: Album, Songs for a New Moon out now, and a
Speaker 3: growing family at home, Charles is embracing a new chapter,
Speaker 3: one filled with optimism, fresh perspective, and as always, unforgettable songs.
Speaker 3: Before we listen to the Taken a Walk Podcast episode
Speaker 3: with Charles Kelly of Lady A, fame. Let's take a
Speaker 3: look at the great career of this Grammy winning artist,
Speaker 3: and for that we go to our correspondent in Nashville,
Speaker 3: Sarah Harrelson.
Speaker 4: Thanks, buzz. I am really looking forward to this interview
Speaker 4: because I grew up, of course listening to Lady A
Speaker 4: and hearing Charles Kelly's voice. But when he released his
Speaker 4: first solo country album, The Driver in twenty sixteen, I
Speaker 4: just fell in love with that album. It's always been
Speaker 4: one of my favorites, so I'm really excited to finish listening.
Speaker 4: I've already listened to a little bit of songs for
Speaker 4: a New Moon, his new soft rock album, and it's
Speaker 4: filled with a lot of eighty since and of course
Speaker 4: his vocals are always amazing, but I am so curious
Speaker 4: to hear why he took this sort of direction with
Speaker 4: his music. And I also got to meet him when
Speaker 4: I was working in Nashville backstage at the CMT Awards,
Speaker 4: probably around twenty fifteen, and got to escort him backstage,
Speaker 4: and he was such a great guy, so I can
Speaker 4: only imagine that's how the interview went as well. Once again,
Speaker 4: I'm Sarah Harrelson, based right here in Nashville, Tennessee. And
Speaker 4: back to you buzz.
Speaker 2: Thanks so much, Sarah. Now Charles Kelly, Taking.
Speaker 3: A Walk, Charles Kelly, welcome to Taking a Walk, my friend. Hey,
Speaker 3: we do oh doing great, doing great, Thank you for
Speaker 3: being here. So, since we call this podcast taking a Walk,
Speaker 3: if you could take a walk with someone dead, doesn't
Speaker 3: have to be musical, but it could be someone involved
Speaker 3: with music.
Speaker 2: Who would you take a walk with? And where would
Speaker 2: you take that? Saunter?
Speaker 5: Oh gosh, Paul McCartney for sure. Yeah, there he is
Speaker 5: right there. Yeah, this is a kind.
Speaker 6: Of a wall.
Speaker 5: I've got a bunch of different influences up here, and
Speaker 5: all kinds of different genres of artists, but hugely influenced by.
Speaker 6: Just everything but Beatles. I think. I think Paul McCartney
Speaker 6: and you know.
Speaker 5: One of the best songwriters of all time, and he's
Speaker 5: just one of those guys I still haven't you know,
Speaker 5: haven't gotten to meet. I've been lucky enough to meet
Speaker 5: Bruce Springsteen. We got to do a show opening up
Speaker 5: for Bruce in London actually at Hyde Park a long
Speaker 5: time ago. That was pretty cool, funny story about that.
Speaker 5: We we had, like you know, any time in between songs.
Speaker 5: You know, these are diehard Bruce Springsteen fans, and you
Speaker 5: know they're like Bruce between I remember Hillary Goes, were
Speaker 5: they booing us and it was like, no, they're saying Bruce, like,
Speaker 5: don't take it like they're diehard fans, like they're they're
Speaker 5: ready for us to saying need you now and get
Speaker 5: off the stage so Bruce can come up here?
Speaker 2: Where would you go with Paul for that walk do
Speaker 2: you know?
Speaker 6: Oh, my gosh, somewhere you know.
Speaker 5: I would love to like just you know, walk through
Speaker 5: like I don't know, maybe maybe Abbey Road, the studios,
Speaker 5: you know, or something like that, and just hear some
Speaker 5: of those stories. But I don't know anywhere really, I
Speaker 5: mean it just just to be able to just have
Speaker 5: a moment with him would be would be pretty amazing,
Speaker 5: you know. But that was my first tattoo. Was was
Speaker 5: a lyric from Blackbird. All your life, you were only
Speaker 5: waiting for this moment to arise.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you were reading my questions.
Speaker 3: I was going to ask you about that and why
Speaker 3: do those words resonate with you to this day.
Speaker 6: I basically got this this tattoo.
Speaker 5: To me, it means it was around the time that
Speaker 5: I felt like my whole life was leading up to
Speaker 5: this band and leading up to this chase, you know,
Speaker 5: of being a musician, and you know, I felt like
Speaker 5: all my life I was only waiting for this moment
Speaker 5: to like have a chance to like follow my dream,
Speaker 5: you know. And so that's that was my first tattoo.
Speaker 5: And then I had another one about a year later,
Speaker 5: and then I didn't get another one for like five
Speaker 5: or six years, and then all of a sudden, I
Speaker 5: kind of went crazy, which is all over me now.
Speaker 3: Expression exactly the artistic expression. We're going to talk about
Speaker 3: songs for a New Moon. Congratulations on your new solo album.
Speaker 3: But I want to go back to Augusta, Georgia. As
Speaker 3: the youngest of three brothers, well musically inclined, what was
Speaker 3: it like being in the Kelly household?
Speaker 2: Was it was?
Speaker 5: It always filled with music? It was chaos, Yeah, it was.
Speaker 5: I had so I have two my oldest siblings, my
Speaker 5: sister Christy and John were ten years older than me,
Speaker 5: and then Josh and I, you know, were ten years younger,
Speaker 5: about the same age, and so we always had like
Speaker 5: so many different styles of music coming in and out.
Speaker 5: My mom loved R and B. My dad loved country,
Speaker 5: and then you know, my oldest siblings would bring home
Speaker 5: whatever was happening, you know, So it could have been
Speaker 5: Dave Matthew's band, it could have been Nirvana, it could
Speaker 5: have been just anything, you know. I mean it was
Speaker 5: like I got. I remember my oldest brother was obsessed
Speaker 5: with like led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath. So I like
Speaker 5: I had this mix of like, you know, listening to
Speaker 5: Delilah and Richard Mars in the car with my mom,
Speaker 5: to Garth Brooks with my dad, to you know, Ozzy
Speaker 5: Osbourne with my oldest brother, and so it was like
Speaker 5: this weird kind of like I just gravitated to whatever
Speaker 5: I felt great, you know, and felt right.
Speaker 6: And so I do remember though in my room, so
Speaker 6: like when my oldest siblings moved out, you.
Speaker 5: Know, I ended up getting like you know, we had
Speaker 5: like the whole upstairs to ourselves. And I remember my
Speaker 5: brother and I dragging out this old record player. It's
Speaker 5: a piece of furniture, you know that you would that
Speaker 5: you lift up the top and there's the record player
Speaker 5: in there. And being I was highly intrigued by it,
Speaker 5: and so I dug around found all these records. I
Speaker 5: remember lo and behold, I found the Fleetwood Mac Rumors record,
Speaker 5: and so we've got Stevie back there. But that was
Speaker 5: the first actual like vinyl. I think I was probably
Speaker 5: nine or ten years old, and I remember just sitting
Speaker 5: in my room like playing it over and over again.
Speaker 5: I mean, it had such an effect, Like no one
Speaker 5: told me to play it.
Speaker 6: I just was like, out of.
Speaker 5: All these records, I was like, this is the one.
Speaker 5: This is the one that's like blowing my mind. So,
Speaker 5: you know, there's a lot of those Fleetwood Mac influences
Speaker 5: in the band, and even on this record, there's a
Speaker 5: song called kiss this Thing Goodbye that is so reminiscent
Speaker 5: of a Fleetwood Mac you know, kind of base.
Speaker 6: Of music down there. You know a lot of those.
Speaker 5: Just great wholt saving bass crews and stuff, you know
Speaker 5: that they were so known for.
Speaker 2: And I think musical diversity really is an amazing part
Speaker 2: of the creative process for you. It really it feels
Speaker 2: that way.
Speaker 3: It just feels, you know, the rich experiences really play
Speaker 3: out in your music.
Speaker 6: It always has been.
Speaker 5: I mean, I think with the band and especially you know,
Speaker 5: as a solo artist, I mean I think I.
Speaker 6: Think you can't help but.
Speaker 5: Be influences, influenced by everything, especially you know, as we
Speaker 5: keep moving on in music, I feel like, you know,
Speaker 5: the genre border is is wide open. And I think
Speaker 5: that's because, you know, it's not like we grow up
Speaker 5: with one station in our town that we listen to.
Speaker 5: You know, we kind of grew up with everything, and
Speaker 5: especially just generation now. I mean, they're they're just putting
Speaker 5: together a little playlist, you know, they're they're listening to
Speaker 5: Drake and then turn around listening to Morgan Wallend and
Speaker 5: turn around listening to Taylor Swift.
Speaker 6: You know. So it's everything, and I think.
Speaker 5: That's what's so cool about where we are, and I
Speaker 5: hope it pushes, you know, the sound of music because too,
Speaker 5: I mean, you know, there's there's only so many chords,
Speaker 5: and so you know, we're all trying to find something
Speaker 5: that feels fresh. And for me, you know, with this project,
Speaker 5: I wanted it to feel very throwback and nostalgic, but
Speaker 5: still have a fresh, you.
Speaker 6: Know, current energy to it.
Speaker 5: And so it was fun kind of you know, kind
Speaker 5: of towing that line about about how much, you know,
Speaker 5: because I never wanted the music to feel like a
Speaker 5: character of the eighties, you know, I didn't want it
Speaker 5: to be like, Okay, he's just throwing together these you know,
Speaker 5: this wild you know, throwback poking fun.
Speaker 6: At thing, you know, and it's it's.
Speaker 5: Not it really truly is a celebration in a nod
Speaker 5: at all my heroes.
Speaker 2: You know, you and your your bros.
Speaker 3: You formed the Inside Blue as as teens, and you
Speaker 3: caught the attention of the one and only James Brown.
Speaker 5: Yeah, well at least his manager. Yeah, it it was
Speaker 5: pretty cool, uh that time. I remember our parents kind
Speaker 5: of we're a little hesitant of us signing any deals
Speaker 5: that early, but but it was cool to even have
Speaker 5: that opportunity. It's funny you did your research. My it's
Speaker 5: so funny that whole time when by so fast. I
Speaker 5: barely remember it because we had a band, you know,
Speaker 5: all through like middle school and high school and and
Speaker 5: you know, we had a little little tiny bit of
Speaker 5: buzz going, but you know, nothing really ended up coming
Speaker 5: of it. And I put music down all through college
Speaker 5: and everything. And and my brother Josh got a record
Speaker 5: deal out of college and eventually moved to Nashville.
Speaker 6: And he's the reason I gave this a shot. I
Speaker 6: moved to Nashville.
Speaker 5: You know, with with a ton of encouragement from him,
Speaker 5: and and you know, it was lucky enough to run
Speaker 5: into Hillary and and you know, taught my buddy David
Speaker 5: to move in town.
Speaker 6: We started this band.
Speaker 5: But but yeah, those early years it was pretty cool.
Speaker 5: I mean, we had this little five song EP and
Speaker 5: and you know it was Inside Blue because we did
Speaker 5: a little little bit of blues. We also, you know,
Speaker 5: it was very much you know, rock and roll stuff too,
Speaker 5: and so it was it was just it's funny that
Speaker 5: anybody was interesting, because if you go back and listen
Speaker 5: to those songs, they were they were pretty weak.
Speaker 6: They must have seen something in us.
Speaker 2: I guarantee they did. And look, everything starts as a
Speaker 2: as a germ, and then of an idea, and then
Speaker 2: it evolves and the passion flows.
Speaker 3: So give yourself more credit back for Inside Blue for sure.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 3: I have a friend that does this other podcast called
Speaker 3: Celebrity jobb Or, and he asked the question, if you
Speaker 3: weren't going to be a musician, what would you have been.
Speaker 2: Did you have a Plan B or were you a
Speaker 2: no Plan B? Guy?
Speaker 6: No, I did. I mean I went to the University
Speaker 6: of Georgia. I to me, music was was just going
Speaker 6: to be something in my life and maybe a party trick.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 5: I always kind of assumed I would have some you know,
Speaker 5: like cover band on the weekends I would play with.
Speaker 5: But I studied finance at Georgia and David and I
Speaker 5: did too, Dave as well, and yeah, you know, I
Speaker 5: was going to try to move.
Speaker 6: To Atlanta, get a job, you know, do that whole thing.
Speaker 5: And then you know, maybe if I went went to
Speaker 5: a wedding on the weekend, i'd hop up with a
Speaker 5: band and say, hey, guys, you know a little uh
Speaker 5: line of Ritchie, you know, something like that, and that
Speaker 5: would be kind of my party trick. But but so, yeah,
Speaker 5: something in the business world, hopefully. But I will say
Speaker 5: when I had graduated, I worked with my oldest brother
Speaker 5: and and we were he was he like flipped houses
Speaker 5: and did somewherecial real estate. So I had this degree
Speaker 5: and I remember like literally a week after I graduate,
Speaker 5: I go into work and and you know, he's like, well,
Speaker 5: one of our workers didn't come in today, so you
Speaker 5: gotta you gotta hop into the dump truck and.
Speaker 6: Take this take this stuff to the to the dump.
Speaker 6: And I just remember going like this is not what
Speaker 6: I thought it was going to be.
Speaker 3: Somehow you knew it triggered you exactly was that and
Speaker 3: it was a motivating trigger.
Speaker 6: It was, it was.
Speaker 5: I mean, I think I could have found happiness in anything.
Speaker 5: I mean, to me, I love I love putting in
Speaker 5: a hard day's work. I mean, that's just I really do.
Speaker 5: I mean, even to this day, there's something I just
Speaker 5: love about, you know, about working hard.
Speaker 6: I learned that from my dad. But to be able to.
Speaker 5: Find something though that you actually, you know, wake up
Speaker 5: and just feel like so lucky that you get to do.
Speaker 5: And you know, a lot of times, especially being you know,
Speaker 5: on stage and writing songs, it doesn't feel like work.
Speaker 6: The work comes in when with the travel.
Speaker 5: I feel like that's where that's where we earn the word,
Speaker 5: you know, we work for a living. But the rest
Speaker 5: of it, that's just all that's all fun.
Speaker 2: All right.
Speaker 3: So I do want to dig into the process for
Speaker 3: songs for a New Moon and the work behind that process.
Speaker 3: And I guess the first thing when I think of
Speaker 3: writing sessions is that the type of thing when you're
Speaker 3: in that process that you're nervous. Enthusiasm in a good
Speaker 3: way keeps you up at night, because you know the
Speaker 3: next morning you're waking up and you're going into a
Speaker 3: session exactly.
Speaker 5: I mean, I call it a lot of you know,
Speaker 5: I had a lot of cautious optimism. I've been doing
Speaker 5: this for you know, close to two decades now, and
Speaker 5: I know it's just you know, you get so you
Speaker 5: get so caught up and Okay, I want to make
Speaker 5: something special that sometimes you have to just step back
Speaker 5: and just do it. I feel like it's just literally
Speaker 5: go in and if it's moving you, there's a good
Speaker 5: chance that can move other people. I think any time
Speaker 5: in the past when I've tried to go in there
Speaker 5: and be like, all right, we got to write a
Speaker 5: hit like this or whatever. And so I really try
Speaker 5: to get out of my own way, honestly, and I
Speaker 5: think to be able to start writing music under a
Speaker 5: different betup music brought out something different in me. And
Speaker 5: it was the most fun I've ever had. I mean,
Speaker 5: I was writing with you know, guys like Josh here,
Speaker 5: who wrote Needs You Now with. I mean, he's one
Speaker 5: of the best songwriters in talent and he you know,
Speaker 5: when you got a guy like that say and when
Speaker 5: are we doing this again? This is so fresh because
Speaker 5: I think everybody needed to be pulled out of their
Speaker 5: box a little bit, you know, and this project allowed
Speaker 5: them to kind of show how versatile they all are.
Speaker 5: And and for me too, it brought out just this
Speaker 5: new sense of like, Okay, there's no rules, you know,
Speaker 5: I don't.
Speaker 6: Have to make a country record.
Speaker 5: I can go out here and try to do something
Speaker 5: different and fresh.
Speaker 6: Because, like you said, I am influenced by.
Speaker 5: So many different styles, but I think the common thread
Speaker 5: needed to be I needed to still sound authentically myself,
Speaker 5: you know. I didn't try to put on some you know,
Speaker 5: eighties voice that didn't sound like me or you know,
Speaker 5: whatever whatever that might be.
Speaker 6: You know, it still is my voice to the core.
Speaker 5: And I don't know there was there was just I
Speaker 5: don't know this like cool little hint of like, man,
Speaker 5: I think we're onto something here, you know, and I
Speaker 5: don't know where it'll go and what it'll be. And
Speaker 5: there was a sense of wanting to make sure we
Speaker 5: stayed precious with like staying there. And I think that's
Speaker 5: one reason I wanted to release it myself and like
Speaker 5: pay for it myself, because I was like, I know
Speaker 5: exactly what's going to happen when I take this into
Speaker 5: the label that you're gonna go. Okay, you've been known
Speaker 5: as a country artist. We gotta throw some mandolin on this,
Speaker 5: we gotta throw some steel guitar, and it just it
Speaker 5: didn't feel like the music needed that. And so I
Speaker 5: really have to give a lot of praise to to
Speaker 5: Big Machine for allowing me to just do this on
Speaker 5: my own as well, you know, I mean, I really
Speaker 5: just felt like I wanted this to be, you know,
Speaker 5: a success or failure on my own terms, if that
Speaker 5: makes sense.
Speaker 1: You know, We'll be right back with more of the
Speaker 1: Taking a Walk Podcast. Welcome back to the Taking a
Speaker 1: Walk Podcast.
Speaker 3: So take us through some of your favorite tracks or
Speaker 3: all of your favorite tracks.
Speaker 2: We got time. Charles, ah God, I think.
Speaker 5: I mean, the first song, Can't Lose You is what
Speaker 5: really kicked off the project. I mean, there's something about
Speaker 5: that song. I think it encompassed everything I wanted to
Speaker 5: say as well. I you know, I'm getting close to it.
Speaker 5: At the end of this month, I'll be three years sober.
Speaker 5: And so there was just a lot of growth, you know, spiritually,
Speaker 5: mentally and you know, with my relationship with my wife,
Speaker 5: and I wanted to put that into the music, you know,
Speaker 5: and I wanted to be it to be a joyful record,
Speaker 5: you know, and feel really redemptive and positive. And so
Speaker 5: I feel like that song encompassed kind of everything I
Speaker 5: was going for. And then from there it was like
Speaker 5: once I we had that song, the rest just kind
Speaker 5: of really came out really easily. I mean, I think
Speaker 5: my one of my favorites is a song called Can't
Speaker 5: Be Alone Tonight. There's just something about it that it
Speaker 5: reminds me of all those great eighties like ballads that
Speaker 5: just feel great. There's also a song called never Let
Speaker 5: You Go. He got the great Dan Huff, so he's
Speaker 5: also a great producer. But he used to play electric
Speaker 5: guitar on all those massive eighties and nineties hits that
Speaker 5: you've almost anything you've ever heard him. He's played with
Speaker 5: Michael Jackson, Journey, I mean, all these crazy bands you know,
Speaker 5: in the studio, and to have him. If you listen
Speaker 5: to that song, I think it's the tenth track off
Speaker 5: the record, there's just this epic electric guitar tone and
Speaker 5: solo section that he has that just I don't know,
Speaker 5: there's something about it where I was like, that's what
Speaker 5: I was going for. It has a key change, it
Speaker 5: has the electric guitar sound that only Dan could do.
Speaker 5: So there's a lot of those moments throughout the record,
Speaker 5: but I will say it changes which you know, which
Speaker 5: one is my favorite?
Speaker 3: I would expect it would, right because for a while,
Speaker 3: you're you're living with it for so long and in
Speaker 3: your mind you're going through the hard work that led
Speaker 3: up to the creation. So when you're in the studio
Speaker 3: and working on this and then you leave for the day,
Speaker 3: do you leave with tracks that you can listen to
Speaker 3: as you're driving driving home to kind of like think
Speaker 3: about it.
Speaker 5: Dude, and that that makes it exciting, you know. That's
Speaker 5: the great thing about you know, this whole record. I
Speaker 5: worked with Lindsay Rheims and another guy named Sam Ellis
Speaker 5: and you know, being able to actually you know, they
Speaker 5: programmed most of this stuff. So what we would do
Speaker 5: is we'd have pretty fully fleshed out, professional sounding demo
Speaker 5: and then you know, we would go and harvest out.
Speaker 5: We had like a drum day where we went this
Speaker 5: guy here in Stirling and then laid real drums on it,
Speaker 5: or we go, you know, lay bass. If we didn't
Speaker 5: like the way that that one of them played the bass.
Speaker 5: You know, we had a saxophone player come in or
Speaker 5: something like that. But we when we would leave each day,
Speaker 5: we would have a pretty solid foundation and feel for
Speaker 5: what we were going for.
Speaker 3: And then when you walk in the next day, then
Speaker 3: you've got like the ability to what you want to tweak, right, Yeah, So.
Speaker 5: We would leave there, we would have pretty much a
Speaker 5: you know, a full form of a song, and we
Speaker 5: were even able to, like sometimes we come back in
Speaker 5: tweak lyrics. If we got to live with him, we're like, Okay,
Speaker 5: I don't like the way this hook is turning and flipping.
Speaker 5: But you know, that's the difference I will say in
Speaker 5: how a lot of people right now than we did
Speaker 5: when I first started. You know, we used to go
Speaker 5: in there with an acoustic guitar. It sometimes you couldn't
Speaker 5: quite tell what it was going to be.
Speaker 6: I mean, need you now.
Speaker 5: As one of those examples, I remember we had this
Speaker 5: little acoustic, really rough sounding recording off of our computer,
Speaker 5: and you know, we almost didn't cut the song because
Speaker 5: it didn't sound as big as like the other demos
Speaker 5: we had. And so you know, to be able to
Speaker 5: like now really get an idea of how the song
Speaker 5: is going to sound when you leave. It's a big
Speaker 5: you know. It's just such a nice advantage to the
Speaker 5: writing process.
Speaker 3: Charles, What is recovery taught you that kind of leads
Speaker 3: into your musical process?
Speaker 6: Oh?
Speaker 5: Man, I think gratitude more than anything, I think, you know,
Speaker 5: I think I was hold on to a lot of fear,
Speaker 5: you know, fear of.
Speaker 6: A lot of stuff.
Speaker 5: I mean, fear of losing success, fear of, like of
Speaker 5: so many things I didn't even know that I was
Speaker 5: kind of fearful of, you know, and you kind of
Speaker 5: drink to kind of calm all that down. But I
Speaker 5: just think it brought a sense of gratitude of like
Speaker 5: where what I have and how much you know, I
Speaker 5: don't I don't want to lose this, and how much
Speaker 5: I just love it. And I think it also just
Speaker 5: made me enjoy the quiet moments of life.
Speaker 6: You know.
Speaker 5: I'm into so many different things. I mean, A small
Speaker 5: thing that I just love now that I used to
Speaker 5: never do is read. I mean, I've probably read a
Speaker 5: hundred books since I've you know, gotten sober, and like,
Speaker 5: I feel.
Speaker 6: Like my mind's expanding a little bit.
Speaker 5: I feel like I'm calming down and I'm just I'm
Speaker 5: realizing that some of the best things happened to when
Speaker 5: you get out of your own way, and you know,
Speaker 5: I feel like I really tried to do that with
Speaker 5: this record, and like, I don't know, I'm just kind
Speaker 5: of really just enjoying enjoying the journey of it. I mean,
Speaker 5: all the ups and downs are such a big part
Speaker 5: of what makes life kind of fun, you know, and
Speaker 5: celebrating the little winds that come along and uh, but really,
Speaker 5: I just I think it gave me a little bit
Speaker 5: more of a purpose to life and what I was
Speaker 5: going for. I used to live and die by the
Speaker 5: music business and successes and failures, and now I just
Speaker 5: I realized that, like it, it's not the end all
Speaker 5: be all, you know, and it should be fun. And
Speaker 5: I feel like I'm enjoying it again in a way
Speaker 5: that I kind of did when I first started, because
Speaker 5: I think when you don't know what's going to happen,
Speaker 5: you just you do celebrate any tiny little wind that
Speaker 5: you get. And once you've had success, well then you
Speaker 5: have a bar of that what what you think everything
Speaker 5: should reach for it.
Speaker 6: To be quote unquote a success.
Speaker 5: And you know, especially the song that needs you now
Speaker 5: it's like, well, that's going to come along once in
Speaker 5: a lifetime.
Speaker 6: Like so if that that's my bar, I'm never going
Speaker 6: to be happy, you know very well.
Speaker 3: Put, do you get nervous before you're presenting to I
Speaker 3: don't know, like a scop worshitto or something like that.
Speaker 6: Always, I mean always you're a little nervous.
Speaker 5: I mean, I think there's nothing more heartbreaking sometimes for
Speaker 5: an artist when you play something for your management or
Speaker 5: label or friends even and they're.
Speaker 6: Just like, yeah, that's nice.
Speaker 5: I like that, and you're like, shoot, that was not
Speaker 5: the expectation or it was not the response I wanted.
Speaker 5: But but I just again just you know, I think
Speaker 5: for this, I just knew I was digging it so
Speaker 5: much and I was enjoying it that I was like,
Speaker 5: no matter what anybody says, like, I've got to do this,
Speaker 5: and I don't know, just for everybody or on my
Speaker 5: team to kind of follow me down this journey. But
Speaker 5: I got a lot of encouragement, I mean early, right
Speaker 5: from the get go, Like when when you know my
Speaker 5: team heard Can't Lose You and another song called Run,
Speaker 5: they were like this, whatever this is, keep doing it.
Speaker 5: And so I did get a whole lot of encouragement.
Speaker 5: My wife was really big with that too, just kept
Speaker 5: saying like this is you're onto something. Just keep going
Speaker 5: down this road, don't put a timeline on it, and
Speaker 5: see where it goes.
Speaker 6: You know.
Speaker 3: So a new album, growing family, fresh outfit. What are
Speaker 3: you most excited about as far as the next chapter?
Speaker 5: Oh gosh, I just it just it's fun to see
Speaker 5: people respond to something in a fresh way, you know.
Speaker 5: I think that's what makes putting this out solo kind
Speaker 5: of fun too, because I am a new artist in
Speaker 5: a way, you know. I mean I put a solo
Speaker 5: record out, you know, about eight or nine years ago,
Speaker 5: but you know, it's still a fresh introduction in a
Speaker 5: new sound, and so there's there's, you know, a certain
Speaker 5: vulnerability and like healthy kind of anxiety about what's what
Speaker 5: it's going to do.
Speaker 6: And I think that actually makes it kind of fun.
Speaker 6: I'm allowed to fail.
Speaker 5: It's okay, It's it's a little more scary when Lady
Speaker 5: A fails, you know, a project comes out fails, But
Speaker 5: when I fails, like, okay, cool, it was something fun anyway.
Speaker 5: So you know, I can always kind of play it
Speaker 5: off that uh that you know, I didn't I didn't care.
Speaker 6: If it went back, obviously I do. I think any
Speaker 6: artist wants it to be heard.
Speaker 5: I mean, you know, I'm not looking for this to
Speaker 5: be some giant, you know, Sabrina Carpenter global smash. But
Speaker 5: I tell you, if it could reach reach a really
Speaker 5: great audience and I was able to actually go out
Speaker 5: and do some shows, you know, and have a have
Speaker 5: a you know, have a have a packed house somewhere,
Speaker 5: and be able to actually perform these songs, I think
Speaker 5: that's what gets me the most excited, because it's such
Speaker 5: a fun bed of music that even when I was
Speaker 5: just rehearsing with the guys, you know, we did some
Speaker 5: content of just kind of a live show of some
Speaker 5: of these songs that we're gonna, you know, share online, I.
Speaker 6: Couldn't stop dancing.
Speaker 5: I was like, I've never like moved like this, and
Speaker 5: I'm sure I look ridiculous, but I can't help myself.
Speaker 5: I was like, I can't help but move when I
Speaker 5: sang this music. So I think it would just be
Speaker 5: a very joyful show, you know. So I'm hoping that
Speaker 5: can can come about at some point.
Speaker 3: On closing, if you could go back and give advice
Speaker 3: to your younger self, maybe that fourteen year old writing
Speaker 3: songs with Dave.
Speaker 5: What would you say, Oh gosh, Well, first off, I'd say,
Speaker 5: learn how to play piano. That you know, that was
Speaker 5: That's one thing. If I could go to Eddie young
Speaker 5: kid and be like, learn how to play piano. I
Speaker 5: can play guitar, and I used to. I grew up
Speaker 5: playing drums. That was my instrument in the band. I
Speaker 5: played drums and sing But I wish I could have
Speaker 5: played I wish I could play piano.
Speaker 6: I feel like I would.
Speaker 5: I would have written a heck of a lot more songs,
Speaker 5: you know, if I was able to do that. But
Speaker 5: I think the advice would just be just enjoy the journey.
Speaker 5: I mean, I think at the beginning, you know, the
Speaker 5: first ten years, it was so much fun. And in
Speaker 5: the middle of that career it kind of got where
Speaker 5: I was not enjoying it, and I think you have
Speaker 5: to love it, you have to enjoy it, and you
Speaker 5: have to just, I don't know, sometimes just sort of
Speaker 5: remind yourself that you get to do what you love
Speaker 5: to do. So I think that would be the thing
Speaker 5: I would love to have told myself early on. Well
Speaker 5: also too, just you never know where life's going to go.
Speaker 5: I mean, my fourteen year old self would have never
Speaker 5: dreamed I was actually going to do this for a living.
Speaker 3: You know, Charles, this is why I love what I do.
Speaker 3: I'm so grateful for the opportunity.
Speaker 2: To talk to you.
Speaker 3: Congratulations on this chapter Songs for a New Moon, and
Speaker 3: thanks for all the great music you continue to give us.
Speaker 6: My friend, Thank you, Boss, Appreciate you, buddy.
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