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Speaker 1: Welcome, Welcome, Welcome back to the Bob Left Sets podcast.

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Speaker 1: My guest today is the one and only Jamie Johnston. Jamie,

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Speaker 1: you just put out a new album, Midnight Gasoline, your

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Speaker 1: first in fourteen years. But what's the break.

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Speaker 2: About a lot of different things? I guess, Uh. One,

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Speaker 2: I'd just been on the road, uh, seemingly NonStop and

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Speaker 2: just didn't have time to write, didn't have time to record.

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Speaker 2: But there's also writer's block, and writer's block came in,

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Speaker 2: I guess from a head injury.

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Speaker 1: So tell me about this head injury.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I was walking out of the studio one night.

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Speaker 2: Tw and I were leaving, uh, my studio and stepped

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Speaker 2: out onto the asphalt and it had frozen over while

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Speaker 2: we were inside working, And as soon as I took

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Speaker 2: a step on the asphalt, both of my feet came

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Speaker 2: up and broke the fall with the corner of my

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Speaker 2: head and I hit so hard that blood shot out

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Speaker 2: both nostrils, and of course we got cleaned up and

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Speaker 2: went on to the bar.

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Speaker 1: Okay, you went to went to the bar. Did you

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Speaker 1: ultimately go to the emergency room or see a doctor.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, it was a couple of days later, and i'd

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Speaker 2: had a concussion.

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Speaker 1: Okay, so the blood you were bleeding, but you didn't

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Speaker 1: have like a brain bleed, which could kill you.

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Speaker 2: What it didn't?

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Speaker 1: So you know, I know, and I haven't had a

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Speaker 1: concussion myself, but I know people who have. So you're

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Speaker 1: after effects went on for a long time. How long

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Speaker 1: did the after effects the concussion last?

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Speaker 2: Years? I think the first time I really addressed it,

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Speaker 2: I did this program out in Scottsdale, Arizona. Back then

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Speaker 2: it was called brain State Technology. A man named Lee

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Speaker 2: Gertis came up with a technique of basically playing back

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Speaker 2: your brain activity in your ears real time, and it's

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Speaker 2: like your brain can detect itself and fix itself in

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Speaker 2: certain ways. I remember Lee telling me, he said, I

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Speaker 2: don't have to know exactly how the brain works. The

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Speaker 2: brain knows how it works, and it knows how it

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Speaker 2: doesn't work. And that seemed to really helped me for

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Speaker 2: a while. The company has since changed names. I think

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Speaker 2: they go by Sarah set Now start with a C.

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Speaker 1: Okay, so when did this fall happen?

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Speaker 2: It's two thy ten?

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Speaker 1: And do you think you're fully recovered? Now?

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Speaker 2: I don't know what to think now, but it's a

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Speaker 2: lot better than it used to be, but it's still

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Speaker 2: not like it was before, if that makes any sense.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, sure there's improvement. When it was bad, what was

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Speaker 1: it like?

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Speaker 2: Everything seemed to put me in fight or flight. It

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Speaker 2: was like I was walking around nine point nine out

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Speaker 2: of ten almost all the time, and you and I

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Speaker 2: could be having a conversation and you'd say one thing

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Speaker 2: that triggered me, and it would absolutely infuriate me to

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Speaker 2: the point I need to separate myself from you. Different

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Speaker 2: things like that. It was like parts of it were

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Speaker 2: uncharacteristically angry about things, and the other parts were there.

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Speaker 2: You know. Songwriting used to be something that was an

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Speaker 2: ongoing process with me. I was always writing, even if

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Speaker 2: I was having a conversation with somebody, I was still

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Speaker 2: in the back of my mind etching out some sort

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Speaker 2: of a song detail or working on something that I'd

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Speaker 2: started earlier. But it was always running behind the scenes.

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Speaker 2: And all of that seemed to come to a screeching

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Speaker 2: halt around that time, and songwriting turned into a more

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Speaker 2: of a chore. It was something I they had to

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Speaker 2: dig into and focus on in order to even complete

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Speaker 2: the exercise. There's so many songs that I would that

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Speaker 2: I started and just never never finished. You know that

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Speaker 2: I would start and just leave little parts of songs

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Speaker 2: or just little lines or lyrics or you know, certain things.

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Speaker 2: It was almost like a junk yard of song parts

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Speaker 2: on legal pads laying around the house.

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Speaker 1: Okay, in this period of years when you were having

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Speaker 1: the after effects of the concussions, were you on your

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Speaker 1: own or was there continuing medical treatment or did you

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Speaker 1: have a significant other orho was helping you? What was

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Speaker 1: going on now?

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Speaker 2: I never really had any help with it. If I

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Speaker 2: ever did anything to treat it, it was, you know,

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Speaker 2: suggestions I would get from a friend here or there,

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Speaker 2: and things that I would try out well that didn't work,

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Speaker 2: and then just go back on the road. It's not

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Speaker 2: easy to get any kind of medical care when you're

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Speaker 2: constantly touring.

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Speaker 1: So if this lead date, do you believe your ability

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Speaker 1: to write songs is fully re establish itself.

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Speaker 2: I feel like I'm able to do it now, and

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Speaker 2: that's something that I haven't felt in a long time.

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Speaker 2: And I never really did quit. You know, I tried

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Speaker 2: and I but my productivity level suffered as a result,

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Speaker 2: and it was more important to me over the past. Ever,

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Speaker 2: how many years that I tour, you know, that's what

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Speaker 2: was paying the bills.

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Speaker 1: So despite all these after effects, you could play and

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Speaker 1: you could go on the road. Yeah, how difficult was

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Speaker 1: that for you?

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Speaker 2: I wouldn't say it was difficult. It was you know,

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Speaker 2: touring is the road trades everybody the same, you know,

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Speaker 2: it's it's the same level of stress and struggle that

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Speaker 2: everybody else has to go through. Those of us who

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Speaker 2: travel understand it doesn't It doesn't trade anybody any differently.

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Speaker 2: So I can't say it wasn't some kind of work,

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Speaker 2: but I don't think the road was any more work

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Speaker 2: as a result of a concussion.

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Speaker 1: Okay, Willie Nelson legendarily got home and still slept on

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Speaker 1: the bus. And there are different ways to travel. At

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Speaker 1: the other extreme, there are acts the play stadiums where

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Speaker 1: they are in one location and they take a jet

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Speaker 1: to each gig. So you know, although all roadwork is stressful,

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Speaker 1: depending on the income, it can be more stressful. Would

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Speaker 1: you say that.

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Speaker 2: There's all kinds of ways to do it, and I've

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Speaker 2: done it most of those ways. But yeah, there were

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Speaker 2: a lot of years there where I just lived on

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Speaker 2: the bus. I remember one year I went six or

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Speaker 2: eight months something like that and never even saw my house.

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Speaker 1: And you know, some people that are on the road

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Speaker 1: because they have to make a living. Other people, I

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Speaker 1: know they're on the road because they just have to play.

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Speaker 2: What's it for you, I'd say sort of both. I

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Speaker 2: could never come off of the road altogether and just

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Speaker 2: give it up. That's not in me. I'm more like

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Speaker 2: Willy in that regard. But I am getting to a

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Speaker 2: point where I don't have to be on the road

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Speaker 2: three hundred days a year anymore.

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Speaker 1: You know.

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Speaker 2: I've got a you know, Fyonce, and had to get married,

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Speaker 2: and so I'm looking for more of a lifestyle.

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Speaker 1: Well where'd you meet her?

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Speaker 2: We met at the governor's inauguration in Mississippi in twenty twenty.

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Speaker 1: Wait wait wait, wait, hey, what were you doing at

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Speaker 1: the inauguration? B how'd you meet her?

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Speaker 2: Well? All good questions. I got an invitation in the

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Speaker 2: mail to go to the inauguration from the governor's brother,

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Speaker 2: who is a friend of mine. He supports our annual

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Speaker 2: NICKI Mitchell golf tournament every year. And I remember when

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Speaker 2: when Todd and I first became friends, his brother was

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Speaker 2: the lieutenant governor. Well, I didn't even know he was

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Speaker 2: running for governor. We just don't talk about that sort

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Speaker 2: of thing. And I didn't get the invitation myself. My

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Speaker 2: assistant got the invitation in the mail and she said, oh,

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Speaker 2: I'm sure he'll want to go to this. So she

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Speaker 2: just put it on my calendar and it was about

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Speaker 2: a week and I remember looking at the calendar and

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Speaker 2: I said, Hannah, what is this inauguration thing? What am

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Speaker 2: I doing? And she said, You're going to the governor's

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Speaker 2: inauguration governor of what she said, governor of Mississippi. And

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Speaker 2: I went, I'll be damp. I guess he ran for

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Speaker 2: governor and won. So I had this idea that I

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Speaker 2: would go down there and be hanging out in the

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Speaker 2: back of a bunch of Mississippians and watching the inauguration

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Speaker 2: from the back of a crowd out in the open.

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Speaker 2: When I got down there, it was raining, like Noah

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Speaker 2: was going to be flooding by any moment, you know.

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Speaker 2: Animals were lining up too. By two and the Pearl

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Speaker 2: River had come up out of the banks. It was

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Speaker 2: an epic flood that year. So they moved the inauguration indoors. Well,

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Speaker 2: I'm wearing jeans and a denim shirt. I looked like

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Speaker 2: I came to change the light bulbs. So I'm standing there,

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Speaker 2: and they put me in a prominent seat at the

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Speaker 2: front of the room, sitting next to the treasurer and

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Speaker 2: his wife. Everybody in there is dressed to the nines,

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Speaker 2: and I look like the long guy that got ushered in.

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Speaker 2: But so the governor and his security staff start walking by,

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Speaker 2: and I backed. I stood up out of my chairs

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Speaker 2: and backed myself up against the wall so they could

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Speaker 2: make the turn and get around the corner to get

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Speaker 2: to the stage. And I looked over next to me,

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Speaker 2: and she was backed up on the same wall, right

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Speaker 2: there next to me, And I remember I asked her,

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Speaker 2: I said, what are you hiding from?

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Speaker 1: So? Was it an instant romance? Oh?

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Speaker 2: I can't say instant, but on my behalf it sure was.

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Speaker 1: So who pursued who?

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Speaker 2: Oh? You kid? And I chased her all over the

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Speaker 2: place after that. If I wasn't on the road, I

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Speaker 2: was making my way back to Jackson, Mississippi.

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Speaker 1: And how hard was she to catch?

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Speaker 2: She's nearly impossible. Took some doing.

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Speaker 1: So what sealed the deal?

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Speaker 2: Well, you know it ain't over yet. This is that wedding,

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Speaker 2: ain't till May, so there's probably still some room. I

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Speaker 2: don't know. I think I must be that kind of

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Speaker 2: guy that she never thought she would meet. And she's

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Speaker 2: certainly the kind of woman I never thought I would meet.

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Speaker 1: And what's her life about?

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Speaker 2: Well, she's an attorney. When I met her, she was

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Speaker 2: working with the State Supreme Court. She left that job

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Speaker 2: and got a gig working for the Attorney General. And

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Speaker 2: when she left them, she went to work with Morgan

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Speaker 2: and Morgan oh so, but she is incredibly smart, incredibly beautiful,

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Speaker 2: and she comes from the coast and I believe the

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Speaker 2: term is coon ass, but she's just a gorgeous coon

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Speaker 2: ass Mississippi lawyer.

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Speaker 1: Okay, you're a musician who lives his life on the road,

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Speaker 1: So what's it gonna look like when you're married?

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Speaker 2: Well, I guess that's what we're trying to carve out

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Speaker 2: right now. I can't stay on the road as much

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Speaker 2: as I used to, and I don't want to, you know,

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Speaker 2: I want to come home and have a have a

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Speaker 2: better version of a life with her.

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Speaker 1: And does she plan to continue to work? And where

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Speaker 1: do you plan to live?

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Speaker 2: She is definitely going to continue to work. We're probably

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Speaker 2: going to have house, a house in Nashville for my

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Speaker 2: music business, and probably a place down in Mississippi. And

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Speaker 2: her whole family's from m Kill.

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Speaker 1: And so you're going to have children?

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Speaker 2: Oh, I don't know. We'll find out.

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Speaker 1: Okay, you're forty nine. How old is she today?

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Speaker 2: She's thirty three.

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Speaker 1: Okay, Well, the reason I asked is, you know, in

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Speaker 1: terms of having children, age can make a difference. Let

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Speaker 1: me go back a step. You talked about the governor's

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Speaker 1: brother going to your fundraiser golf tournament. Are you a golfer?

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Speaker 2: I wasn't until Willie, and golf ain't even the worst

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Speaker 2: thing he got me hooked on when I had quit

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Speaker 2: drinking in twenty eleven and I kind of needed something

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Speaker 2: to pour all my time into, and Willie invited me

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Speaker 2: to go to his He called it his first annual

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Speaker 2: Fourth of July golf tournament, what turned out to be

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Speaker 2: his only annual fourth at golf tournament. And I learned

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Speaker 2: how to swing a club and hit a golf ball

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Speaker 2: at Willy's course. It was a burden Aalics country club,

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Speaker 2: but it's now Willie's cutting put. It's a nine hole

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Speaker 2: executive out there in burden Alice, Texas Spicewood.

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Speaker 1: Okay, so you got sober, Willy invited you, you went

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Speaker 1: to the event. How much have you played thereafter?

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Speaker 2: I guess for the first few years after that. I

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Speaker 2: took it on as an assignment. And I mean I

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Speaker 2: was out there on the course every time it rain

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Speaker 2: or shine. It didn't matter, man. I would turn around,

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Speaker 2: get out there and go spend hours out there, hitting

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Speaker 2: about a thousand balls a day, that sort of thing,

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Speaker 2: especially after Alice Cooper told me that that was really

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Speaker 2: what kept him off the bottle for a while. He

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Speaker 2: said he leaned on golf too.

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Speaker 1: So how much do you play now? And how good

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Speaker 1: are you?

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Speaker 2: I'm not good at all. I do enjoy it, but

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Speaker 2: it's not one of those things that ever registered with me.

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Speaker 2: I still can't go out there and you know, put

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Speaker 2: one right up the middle every time. I have to

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Speaker 2: go out there and figure out what am I doing

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Speaker 2: wrong today? But I enjoy it.

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Speaker 1: But how much do you play now?

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Speaker 2: I probably four or five times a year. I just

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Speaker 2: don't have a whole lot of time for it anymore.

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Speaker 1: Okay, how does Jamie Johnson from Alabama country musician meet

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Speaker 1: Alice Cooper?

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Speaker 2: It would have been at one of his shows, and

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Speaker 2: he was opening for Rob Zombie. And I remember that

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Speaker 2: night pretty well because we went back and forth. We

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Speaker 2: went and saw Alice's show first, and then we drove

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Speaker 2: from that venue to the Rhyme and caught Don Williams set,

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Speaker 2: and left Don Williams and got back over to Alice

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Speaker 2: This show right about the time Rob Zombie was on

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Speaker 2: his second or third song, so we got to see

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Speaker 2: all three of them in one night.

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Speaker 1: Okay, you happened to look a little bit in terms

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Speaker 1: of you know your hero or whatever like Rob Zombie.

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Speaker 1: But what were you doing there to begin with? You

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Speaker 1: were Rob Zombie fan?

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Speaker 2: Well, I had definitely heard of him because back then,

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Speaker 2: before my hair turned blonde and gray and everything else

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Speaker 2: when it had some color in it, I was constantly

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Speaker 2: getting confused for Rob Zombie. And when I met him,

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Speaker 2: I told him my name, he said, oh, you're Jamie Johnson.

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Speaker 2: I now looked at him and I said, yeah, well,

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Speaker 2: I see it now too. But I wasn't very familiar

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Speaker 2: with his music until that night. But man, he is

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Speaker 2: absolutely wonderful. And I wanted to go meet Alice because

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Speaker 2: I knew he and Willie were good friends.

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Speaker 1: Okay, how did you meet Willie.

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Speaker 2: H through Pooty?

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Speaker 1: Okay, tell me that story.

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Speaker 2: Well, Pooty Locke was one of Willie's old friends. They went,

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Speaker 2: they went back a long time. Pooty's business card with

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Speaker 2: Willie said he was the vibe coordinator. That's his role

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Speaker 2: on the Willie Nelson to her back then, Well, I

283
00:19:34,560 --> 00:19:40,280
Speaker 2: met Pooty at the exit in in Nashville, and all

284
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Speaker 2: I knew about him that night was everybody kept saying,

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Speaker 2: that's Pooty, he's with Willie. Well, I went and introduced myself.

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Speaker 2: We shook hands, told a few jokes. I bought him

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00:19:55,960 --> 00:20:00,439
Speaker 2: a beer, he turned around, We traded numbers and just

288
00:20:00,520 --> 00:20:06,679
Speaker 2: became instant friends, you know. And the next thing that

289
00:20:06,840 --> 00:20:10,120
Speaker 2: happened after that, Willie invited me to go play farm Maid,

290
00:20:11,040 --> 00:20:14,479
Speaker 2: and I believe every bit of that came through Foody

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Speaker 2: and some of the other guys in the band that

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00:20:16,359 --> 00:20:20,080
Speaker 2: i'd met. So the first time I played farm Maid

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Speaker 2: was in two thousand and eight.

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Speaker 1: Okay, you played farm Maid. How did you go one

295
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Speaker 1: on one with Willy? And were you instant friends? What

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Speaker 1: was going on?

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Speaker 2: Yeah, that was pretty well immediate. I had met Willy,

298
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Speaker 2: but it was in nineteen ninety seven at a show

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Speaker 2: he did in Auburn, Alabama, and it was brief. I

300
00:20:44,000 --> 00:20:46,000
Speaker 2: just got in a line of folks that were hanging

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Speaker 2: out outside his bus, and of course I had my

302
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Speaker 2: guitar and just like everybody else, hey would you sign

303
00:20:53,320 --> 00:20:57,520
Speaker 2: my guitar? Well, over the years, that signature that he

304
00:20:57,600 --> 00:21:00,280
Speaker 2: put on the side of my guitar rubbed off off

305
00:21:01,000 --> 00:21:03,800
Speaker 2: and so when I saw him again at Farm Maide,

306
00:21:03,840 --> 00:21:06,240
Speaker 2: I grabbed my guitar and had him sign the front

307
00:21:07,000 --> 00:21:08,600
Speaker 2: and this time I had to wear it with all

308
00:21:08,640 --> 00:21:10,760
Speaker 2: the spray, a little lacquer over it when I got

309
00:21:10,800 --> 00:21:14,240
Speaker 2: done and keep it from rubbing off. It's it's still

310
00:21:14,280 --> 00:21:14,960
Speaker 2: on there today.

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Speaker 1: Are you know? You talked about introducing yourself to whody.

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Speaker 1: Is that your personality that you go up and introduce

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Speaker 1: and me connections?

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Speaker 2: I did back then, but I was also kind of

315
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Speaker 2: the new guy and the music business and was still

316
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Speaker 2: kind of in a mode of network and I guess

317
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Speaker 2: at the time. Now I don't hardly ever go out

318
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Speaker 2: the bars, but uh, but back then, it was it

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Speaker 2: was my It was normal.

320
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Speaker 1: Okay, But you've been in the business for decades. Are

321
00:21:54,440 --> 00:21:58,119
Speaker 1: you the type of guy who knows everybody or just

322
00:21:58,160 --> 00:21:59,399
Speaker 1: the people. No.

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Speaker 2: I know who I know, And every now and then

324
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Speaker 2: I might meet somebody that walks up and introduces themselves.

325
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Speaker 2: And I meet people all the time that you know

326
00:22:12,720 --> 00:22:13,960
Speaker 2: I probably should.

327
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Speaker 1: Know, so generally speak you know, some people I know,

328
00:22:19,280 --> 00:22:22,560
Speaker 1: they're on the road or they're home. They're on their computers,

329
00:22:22,600 --> 00:22:26,600
Speaker 1: they're sending messages to all these people they know. They

330
00:22:26,600 --> 00:22:28,840
Speaker 1: may not even see them for a while because they're

331
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Speaker 1: on the road. Are you the type of person who

332
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Speaker 1: keeps contact with your friends.

333
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Speaker 2: I try to. I try to keep up with people

334
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Speaker 2: I love, and sometimes it's possible and sometimes it's just not.

335
00:22:44,000 --> 00:22:47,200
Speaker 2: But I feel like I surround myself with the kind

336
00:22:47,200 --> 00:22:49,840
Speaker 2: of friends that it's all right if you go go

337
00:22:49,960 --> 00:22:54,919
Speaker 2: awhile and you're not able to catch up. But I

338
00:22:54,960 --> 00:22:58,240
Speaker 2: mean I have to these days. It seems like I

339
00:22:58,320 --> 00:23:00,399
Speaker 2: have to schedule time to think about something.

340
00:23:02,440 --> 00:23:05,560
Speaker 1: So are there one or two people that you can

341
00:23:05,600 --> 00:23:06,440
Speaker 1: really rely on?

342
00:23:09,600 --> 00:23:12,240
Speaker 2: I've got way more than one or two. I'm a

343
00:23:12,359 --> 00:23:17,119
Speaker 2: very fortunate man in that regard. I'm surrounded by people

344
00:23:17,119 --> 00:23:17,720
Speaker 2: who love me.

345
00:23:18,400 --> 00:23:21,320
Speaker 1: And are those people from people you grew up with,

346
00:23:21,520 --> 00:23:23,760
Speaker 1: people you met in the music business, People you just

347
00:23:23,840 --> 00:23:24,680
Speaker 1: met in passing.

348
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Speaker 2: Some are everything, you know. I've got friends that I've

349
00:23:31,119 --> 00:23:38,439
Speaker 2: had since Man, there's a family of them down in

350
00:23:38,480 --> 00:23:41,320
Speaker 2: Montgomery I've known since I was three or four years old.

351
00:23:42,520 --> 00:23:47,480
Speaker 2: You know, the Walley family. But I've got some other

352
00:23:47,520 --> 00:23:51,879
Speaker 2: friends from elementary school, go back to first grade. And

353
00:23:51,960 --> 00:23:56,800
Speaker 2: I've got brand new friends that that I love just

354
00:23:56,840 --> 00:23:59,000
Speaker 2: as dearly as if we have known each other for

355
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Speaker 2: twenty years.

356
00:24:01,720 --> 00:24:04,000
Speaker 1: And I mean, I realize you're on the road so much,

357
00:24:04,000 --> 00:24:06,720
Speaker 1: and after you're on the road, if you're home, you

358
00:24:06,760 --> 00:24:09,960
Speaker 1: don't want to leave. But generally speaking, are you the

359
00:24:10,080 --> 00:24:13,960
Speaker 1: kind of guy who if I say, hey, Jamie, you

360
00:24:14,000 --> 00:24:16,199
Speaker 1: know we're gonna go to this guy's house, there'd be

361
00:24:16,200 --> 00:24:18,920
Speaker 1: some good people there, you're gonna say no, or you're

362
00:24:18,920 --> 00:24:20,560
Speaker 1: gonna say yeah, that sounds good.

363
00:24:22,440 --> 00:24:26,040
Speaker 2: I'm gonna say no, and I'm gonna be overruled by Britney.

364
00:24:26,040 --> 00:24:28,720
Speaker 2: Who's gonna remind me you're supposed to be getting out

365
00:24:28,720 --> 00:24:30,879
Speaker 2: and mingling with people and getting to know people.

366
00:24:30,960 --> 00:24:34,560
Speaker 1: Let's go, Okay, that's good.

367
00:24:34,720 --> 00:24:37,280
Speaker 2: I'm an introvert. I like to stay home and reach

368
00:24:37,400 --> 00:24:38,800
Speaker 2: charge the battery when I can.

369
00:24:39,200 --> 00:24:43,639
Speaker 1: So you're still sober, right, Yes, sir, So, how do

370
00:24:43,680 --> 00:24:45,840
Speaker 1: you fill your time when you're home or when you're

371
00:24:45,840 --> 00:24:47,240
Speaker 1: on the road not performing?

372
00:24:52,320 --> 00:24:55,120
Speaker 2: I would say I feel most of it writing songs

373
00:24:55,200 --> 00:25:03,000
Speaker 2: and recording in the studio, and I read a good bit.

374
00:25:04,760 --> 00:25:06,120
Speaker 1: What do you read?

375
00:25:08,200 --> 00:25:08,840
Speaker 2: That depends?

376
00:25:10,600 --> 00:25:15,520
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm a big reader. There's magazines, there's newspapers,

377
00:25:16,119 --> 00:25:18,200
Speaker 1: there's fiction, there's nonfiction.

378
00:25:21,240 --> 00:25:26,360
Speaker 2: Yeah, I've read all of it. Uh. I like the classics,

379
00:25:27,080 --> 00:25:33,720
Speaker 2: like a good Stein back Okay, I like JD. Sallenger.

380
00:25:35,560 --> 00:25:38,000
Speaker 2: He didn't uh, he didn't write much, but man when

381
00:25:38,040 --> 00:25:40,600
Speaker 2: he did, it was easy to get locked into his

382
00:25:41,320 --> 00:25:42,240
Speaker 2: writer's voice.

383
00:25:42,920 --> 00:25:43,640
Speaker 1: Absolutely.

384
00:25:44,480 --> 00:25:46,480
Speaker 2: It just kind of puts you puts me in a

385
00:25:47,400 --> 00:25:50,040
Speaker 2: in a mode. I don't usually pick up a Sallenger

386
00:25:50,119 --> 00:25:52,520
Speaker 2: without reading every single one of them back to back.

387
00:25:54,000 --> 00:25:54,119
Speaker 1: Uh.

388
00:25:54,800 --> 00:25:59,640
Speaker 2: Here. Lately, my my book of choice, oddly enough, has

389
00:25:59,680 --> 00:26:04,479
Speaker 2: been the the Bible. I started from Genesis and I

390
00:26:04,480 --> 00:26:08,880
Speaker 2: guess it's been about almost two months ago and right

391
00:26:08,920 --> 00:26:13,160
Speaker 2: now I'm finishing up Jeremiah.

392
00:26:13,560 --> 00:26:15,600
Speaker 1: Did you study that stuff as a kid or is

393
00:26:15,640 --> 00:26:17,679
Speaker 1: this the first or second time around or what?

394
00:26:19,840 --> 00:26:23,960
Speaker 2: I can't say I studied it, but I did hear

395
00:26:24,160 --> 00:26:29,640
Speaker 2: all the stories. And you know, I like to say

396
00:26:29,880 --> 00:26:31,560
Speaker 2: I read it, but I read it with a young

397
00:26:31,640 --> 00:26:35,720
Speaker 2: mind and I haven't read it since. And the things

398
00:26:35,720 --> 00:26:38,320
Speaker 2: that I have read I probably read twenty five years

399
00:26:38,320 --> 00:26:42,920
Speaker 2: ago or so, and this is my first time reading

400
00:26:42,960 --> 00:26:47,080
Speaker 2: them at this age with a little bit more life seasoning,

401
00:26:49,000 --> 00:26:51,439
Speaker 2: and the stories kind of hit different.

402
00:26:53,000 --> 00:26:54,719
Speaker 1: So what inspired you to pick it up?

403
00:27:01,440 --> 00:27:08,600
Speaker 2: It's hard to say. There's probably a lot of different

404
00:27:08,640 --> 00:27:10,000
Speaker 2: factors playing into that.

405
00:27:12,000 --> 00:27:14,520
Speaker 1: Okay, are you a religious man?

406
00:27:19,920 --> 00:27:22,320
Speaker 2: I think we all are to a degree, and I'd

407
00:27:22,359 --> 00:27:25,960
Speaker 2: say right now my degree has intensified over the past

408
00:27:25,960 --> 00:27:27,159
Speaker 2: several months.

409
00:27:28,160 --> 00:27:29,800
Speaker 1: Was there a reason it was intensified?

410
00:27:32,400 --> 00:27:35,119
Speaker 2: Probably a lot of life change is happening at one time.

411
00:27:35,240 --> 00:27:38,440
Speaker 2: It's a first record I've put out in fourteen years.

412
00:27:39,400 --> 00:27:46,320
Speaker 2: It's also getting engaged and having that wedding day coming.

413
00:27:47,320 --> 00:27:50,280
Speaker 2: But it's also some friends passing away and that sort

414
00:27:50,280 --> 00:27:50,600
Speaker 2: of thing.

415
00:27:51,920 --> 00:27:53,560
Speaker 1: Friends died before their time.

416
00:27:55,040 --> 00:27:59,080
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's happened a lot. You know. I've had a

417
00:27:59,119 --> 00:28:01,240
Speaker 2: lot of friends asked away, way to you.

418
00:28:02,280 --> 00:28:05,840
Speaker 1: From misadventure or illness or accidents.

419
00:28:07,200 --> 00:28:09,600
Speaker 2: Well, some of both, some of everything, you know. Some

420
00:28:10,040 --> 00:28:13,000
Speaker 2: I had one of them that overdosed, one of them

421
00:28:13,040 --> 00:28:16,440
Speaker 2: that died from type one diabetes, one of them got

422
00:28:16,480 --> 00:28:20,280
Speaker 2: shot in the head.

423
00:28:20,520 --> 00:28:23,800
Speaker 1: Tell me about the guy being what were the circumstances

424
00:28:23,800 --> 00:28:25,000
Speaker 1: that he gets shot in the head?

425
00:28:28,920 --> 00:28:34,120
Speaker 2: Well, the best I understood it was he was smoking

426
00:28:34,200 --> 00:28:36,840
Speaker 2: inside a bar and the bar owner didn't want him

427
00:28:36,840 --> 00:28:41,280
Speaker 2: smoking in there. And uh, I don't know what was

428
00:28:41,320 --> 00:28:44,080
Speaker 2: said back and forth, but Wayne was the kind of

429
00:28:44,120 --> 00:28:51,680
Speaker 2: guy that had the innate ability to absolutely uh infuriate

430
00:28:51,920 --> 00:28:57,280
Speaker 2: somebody with his words. He could make you so mad

431
00:28:57,400 --> 00:29:02,760
Speaker 2: with just a pointed comment. And he wasn't the kind

432
00:29:02,800 --> 00:29:08,760
Speaker 2: of guy that went around looking for trouble. But it

433
00:29:09,760 --> 00:29:12,000
Speaker 2: definitely found him that night.

434
00:29:13,240 --> 00:29:14,880
Speaker 1: The guy shot him in the bar.

435
00:29:16,400 --> 00:29:18,040
Speaker 2: Yeah.

436
00:29:18,080 --> 00:29:20,120
Speaker 1: Did the guy pay at the price for that, go

437
00:29:20,240 --> 00:29:21,240
Speaker 1: to jail or anything?

438
00:29:22,880 --> 00:29:27,040
Speaker 2: Yeah, he did. He was convicted and I think he

439
00:29:27,120 --> 00:29:34,480
Speaker 2: might still be in jail. And do you want a gun, Yes, sir,

440
00:29:35,280 --> 00:29:36,400
Speaker 2: oh quite a few.

441
00:29:37,920 --> 00:29:40,440
Speaker 1: Are you type of person who has it purely for

442
00:29:40,520 --> 00:29:43,160
Speaker 1: defense or are you a hunter or target shooter?

443
00:29:45,600 --> 00:29:50,280
Speaker 2: Well? I grew up in the country, and you didn't

444
00:29:50,320 --> 00:29:53,560
Speaker 2: necessarily have a gun out in the country for people.

445
00:29:54,640 --> 00:29:56,280
Speaker 2: You had it because if you were going to be

446
00:29:56,320 --> 00:29:58,920
Speaker 2: walking around anywhere, it might be a snake, it might

447
00:29:58,960 --> 00:30:04,400
Speaker 2: be a cootie, could be something dangerous that you needed protection.

448
00:30:04,560 --> 00:30:07,400
Speaker 2: From it probably wasn't going to be a burglar breaking

449
00:30:07,440 --> 00:30:13,680
Speaker 2: in your house. So I grew up around guns, and uh,

450
00:30:13,880 --> 00:30:18,520
Speaker 2: when I was nineteen I joined the United States Marine Corps. Well,

451
00:30:18,560 --> 00:30:21,760
Speaker 2: I've also been trained in how to use guns, and

452
00:30:23,800 --> 00:30:25,480
Speaker 2: they're very much a part of who I am.

453
00:30:27,400 --> 00:30:29,840
Speaker 1: So when was the last time you fired a gun?

454
00:30:38,600 --> 00:30:42,560
Speaker 2: It's it's probably been a couple of years now. No,

455
00:30:42,760 --> 00:30:46,720
Speaker 2: I can't say that I killed a I killed a nail.

456
00:30:46,840 --> 00:30:51,480
Speaker 2: Last year I went up to Saskatchewan, went hunting with

457
00:30:51,520 --> 00:30:57,920
Speaker 2: a buddy of mine up there, and left everything up there.

458
00:30:57,960 --> 00:30:59,880
Speaker 2: I didn't bring a gun in there. We used one

459
00:31:00,160 --> 00:31:02,600
Speaker 2: his and I left all the meet up there with him.

460
00:31:04,760 --> 00:31:09,720
Speaker 1: What inspired you to join the Marines? And you don't

461
00:31:09,800 --> 00:31:12,280
Speaker 1: seem to me the type of guy who wants to

462
00:31:12,320 --> 00:31:15,680
Speaker 1: color between the lines and take orders from other people.

463
00:31:20,800 --> 00:31:23,040
Speaker 2: I knew from the time I was a young kid

464
00:31:23,080 --> 00:31:25,960
Speaker 2: that I was going to be a marine. And I

465
00:31:25,960 --> 00:31:30,040
Speaker 2: don't know where I got that from. I just always knew.

466
00:31:32,360 --> 00:31:38,480
Speaker 2: And I had a free ride scholarship at Jacksonville State University,

467
00:31:38,960 --> 00:31:40,720
Speaker 2: and so I went up there and did a couple

468
00:31:40,760 --> 00:31:45,040
Speaker 2: of years learning music theory and all that kind of thing.

469
00:31:45,920 --> 00:31:50,080
Speaker 2: And when I was done with that, and I may

470
00:31:50,160 --> 00:31:53,480
Speaker 2: not when I had gotten my degree. I don't mean

471
00:31:53,520 --> 00:31:55,400
Speaker 2: I got a degree. I was just done with it.

472
00:31:58,400 --> 00:32:01,400
Speaker 2: I went and found a recruit we were in Montgomery, Alabama,

473
00:32:01,480 --> 00:32:03,959
Speaker 2: and told him I wanted to be a marine. It

474
00:32:04,040 --> 00:32:05,240
Speaker 2: was time for me to go do that.

475
00:32:05,400 --> 00:32:05,600
Speaker 1: Now.

476
00:32:07,200 --> 00:32:11,160
Speaker 2: They offered me a spot in the Marine Corps band

477
00:32:12,320 --> 00:32:14,800
Speaker 2: and I remember laughing at the recruiter and I said,

478
00:32:15,480 --> 00:32:21,040
Speaker 2: I'm not going to be that kind of marine. He said,

479
00:32:21,040 --> 00:32:25,040
Speaker 2: all right, he said, well, you you scored pretty well

480
00:32:25,080 --> 00:32:28,240
Speaker 2: on the as fab test. We don't we make you

481
00:32:28,560 --> 00:32:33,720
Speaker 2: a mortarman. So I became a mortarman in the Marine Corps.

482
00:32:34,920 --> 00:32:36,640
Speaker 1: And so what did that actually involve?

483
00:32:36,720 --> 00:32:44,680
Speaker 2: Doing a lot of yelling, a lot of go a

484
00:32:44,680 --> 00:32:48,360
Speaker 2: lot of going deaf, a lot of a lot of

485
00:32:48,400 --> 00:32:51,160
Speaker 2: shots fired out of a tube that sat right next

486
00:32:51,200 --> 00:32:57,960
Speaker 2: to my ear For about eight years. It was fun

487
00:32:58,480 --> 00:33:01,120
Speaker 2: and you had to love it and hated all in

488
00:33:01,200 --> 00:33:04,240
Speaker 2: the same breath. And I learned that love and hate

489
00:33:04,280 --> 00:33:06,920
Speaker 2: were the same emotion. They both come from the same place.

490
00:33:16,240 --> 00:33:18,320
Speaker 1: Okay, so if you were doing it for eight years,

491
00:33:18,320 --> 00:33:19,160
Speaker 1: you weumped.

492
00:33:20,840 --> 00:33:23,520
Speaker 2: Now when I signed up, they weren't offering any four

493
00:33:23,600 --> 00:33:27,720
Speaker 2: year contracts. They were only offering eight year contracts, and

494
00:33:28,400 --> 00:33:31,520
Speaker 2: so the one there were some guys that could do

495
00:33:32,200 --> 00:33:35,920
Speaker 2: four year active and four inactive, and then the one

496
00:33:35,960 --> 00:33:39,800
Speaker 2: that I did was called a six and two. I'm

497
00:33:39,840 --> 00:33:43,320
Speaker 2: also still kind of a control freak, and I was

498
00:33:43,400 --> 00:33:46,600
Speaker 2: back then too, and I didn't like the idea of

499
00:33:46,680 --> 00:33:50,120
Speaker 2: having to go to Okinawa and places like that, you know,

500
00:33:50,200 --> 00:33:54,400
Speaker 2: where I'd just be completely uprooted. So I signed up

501
00:33:54,440 --> 00:33:57,160
Speaker 2: as a reservist where I could pick the classes that

502
00:33:57,240 --> 00:33:59,200
Speaker 2: I wanted to go to, you know, where you'd go

503
00:33:59,240 --> 00:34:01,200
Speaker 2: do this for a couple of months, and then go

504
00:34:01,240 --> 00:34:03,800
Speaker 2: do that for a few months, and you know, at

505
00:34:03,880 --> 00:34:06,560
Speaker 2: least I had some kind of control over where I'd

506
00:34:06,600 --> 00:34:09,040
Speaker 2: be stationed and for how long and that sort of thing.

507
00:34:09,960 --> 00:34:13,680
Speaker 1: Okay, was the reservist only the last two years of

508
00:34:13,719 --> 00:34:14,400
Speaker 1: the whole time.

509
00:34:15,400 --> 00:34:16,400
Speaker 2: It was a whole time.

510
00:34:16,880 --> 00:34:22,759
Speaker 1: Yeah, So when would they call you up and say, hey,

511
00:34:22,760 --> 00:34:23,560
Speaker 1: you got a report?

512
00:34:25,719 --> 00:34:29,360
Speaker 2: Well, there was you know, your one weekend a month

513
00:34:29,400 --> 00:34:31,760
Speaker 2: that was always on the schedule. There was two weeks

514
00:34:31,800 --> 00:34:34,840
Speaker 2: over the summer. And in addition to that, if you

515
00:34:34,880 --> 00:34:38,959
Speaker 2: wanted to take different classes and courses and that sort

516
00:34:39,000 --> 00:34:44,080
Speaker 2: of thing, you could you could sign up and you know,

517
00:34:45,120 --> 00:34:47,919
Speaker 2: go to San Diego for a couple of months, train

518
00:34:47,960 --> 00:34:51,239
Speaker 2: at Camp Pendleton and be studying a specific kind of

519
00:34:52,040 --> 00:34:54,040
Speaker 2: thing for a couple of months, and leave that and

520
00:34:54,080 --> 00:34:58,880
Speaker 2: go go do something in Jacksonville, North Carolina, or wherever else.

521
00:35:00,760 --> 00:35:02,680
Speaker 1: So if you had to do it all over again,

522
00:35:02,719 --> 00:35:03,920
Speaker 1: would you have joined the Marines?

523
00:35:05,400 --> 00:35:07,320
Speaker 2: Oh? Hell yeah?

524
00:35:07,360 --> 00:35:09,279
Speaker 1: So what exactly did you get out of it?

525
00:35:11,360 --> 00:35:13,880
Speaker 2: I got a nice scar on the outside of my

526
00:35:14,000 --> 00:35:19,240
Speaker 2: right knee over here, got a bad case of arthritis.

527
00:35:22,680 --> 00:35:25,680
Speaker 2: I got some really cool camouflages closed I keep in

528
00:35:25,719 --> 00:35:29,799
Speaker 2: a closet because they're all too small. I got a

529
00:35:29,800 --> 00:35:34,120
Speaker 2: bunch of loud, long lasting friendships with guys that are

530
00:35:34,160 --> 00:35:37,719
Speaker 2: so close I don't even think the word brother would

531
00:35:37,800 --> 00:35:45,480
Speaker 2: be accurate enough to describe them. I've got some friends

532
00:35:45,520 --> 00:35:49,799
Speaker 2: from that generation of my life right there that you

533
00:35:49,920 --> 00:35:53,200
Speaker 2: know you can count on when everything else goes to hell,

534
00:35:53,920 --> 00:35:54,880
Speaker 2: the Marines come in.

535
00:35:57,080 --> 00:36:03,239
Speaker 1: So you never saw any action or anything, no, sir,

536
00:36:04,600 --> 00:36:10,399
Speaker 1: And yeah there's a camaraderie. How about all the discipline

537
00:36:10,440 --> 00:36:12,279
Speaker 1: and you know, were you down with that?

538
00:36:15,680 --> 00:36:18,760
Speaker 2: Yeah? But that's been there all my life. That didn't

539
00:36:19,000 --> 00:36:22,560
Speaker 2: that didn't even start with the Marine Corps. Uh. That

540
00:36:22,719 --> 00:36:26,600
Speaker 2: started probably from my mother more than anything her. Her

541
00:36:26,600 --> 00:36:30,879
Speaker 2: mother was a marine, so I knew how to make

542
00:36:30,920 --> 00:36:31,799
Speaker 2: a bed by God.

543
00:36:35,960 --> 00:36:43,000
Speaker 1: So you see group in the country exactly where, well, that's.

544
00:36:42,840 --> 00:36:46,080
Speaker 2: Spout what I'm thinking of when I say that in

545
00:36:46,120 --> 00:36:51,719
Speaker 2: the country's way out in rural Montgomery, Alabama. It's uh

546
00:36:52,360 --> 00:36:56,880
Speaker 2: south of the city, and it's on the road that

547
00:36:57,080 --> 00:37:07,200
Speaker 2: uh uh Stay Young wrote that song about the seven

548
00:37:07,239 --> 00:37:10,759
Speaker 2: Bridges road, right, the one that the song that the

549
00:37:10,800 --> 00:37:15,080
Speaker 2: Eagles recorded, right, But he wrote it he grew up

550
00:37:15,120 --> 00:37:17,040
Speaker 2: out there in the same place that I did. And

551
00:37:17,080 --> 00:37:19,520
Speaker 2: he called it the seven Bridges Road because if you

552
00:37:19,640 --> 00:37:23,280
Speaker 2: left Montgomery going down that road right there, you crossed

553
00:37:23,320 --> 00:37:27,200
Speaker 2: over seven bridges before you got to his house. But

554
00:37:27,320 --> 00:37:31,600
Speaker 2: that uh, that old moss in the trees, there's some

555
00:37:31,640 --> 00:37:35,200
Speaker 2: of the most beautiful Spanish moss. And if you catch

556
00:37:35,239 --> 00:37:37,600
Speaker 2: it on them, on them one of those big old

557
00:37:38,120 --> 00:37:42,080
Speaker 2: full moon nights and you see that stuff glowing against

558
00:37:42,120 --> 00:37:44,279
Speaker 2: the sky, it's one of the most beautiful things I'll

559
00:37:44,280 --> 00:37:44,880
Speaker 2: ever see.

560
00:37:46,440 --> 00:37:51,040
Speaker 1: So how far from downtown was where you grew up.

561
00:37:54,320 --> 00:37:58,440
Speaker 2: It was thirty minutes if you drive slow in fifteen

562
00:37:58,520 --> 00:38:00,000
Speaker 2: minutes if you drive normally.

563
00:38:02,719 --> 00:38:05,480
Speaker 1: Okay, what'd your parents do for a living?

564
00:38:09,040 --> 00:38:13,760
Speaker 2: My mother was a paralegal, and my dad was always

565
00:38:13,800 --> 00:38:17,560
Speaker 2: in retail sales in one way or another. When I

566
00:38:17,640 --> 00:38:24,080
Speaker 2: was born, he was managing a super Rex drugs down

567
00:38:24,120 --> 00:38:28,040
Speaker 2: in Troy, Alabama, and he did everything over the years.

568
00:38:28,080 --> 00:38:37,439
Speaker 2: He managed Wilson's and helped them trends what's the word

569
00:38:37,719 --> 00:38:42,560
Speaker 2: transfer into a service merchandise. He worked for Circuit City

570
00:38:42,600 --> 00:38:46,960
Speaker 2: for a while. He managed a warehouse for a furniture store,

571
00:38:46,960 --> 00:38:48,520
Speaker 2: all kinds of things.

572
00:38:50,560 --> 00:38:54,160
Speaker 1: And what was your relationship with your parents then and now?

573
00:38:54,280 --> 00:38:57,240
Speaker 1: Were you the type of person who was testing the rules?

574
00:38:57,280 --> 00:38:59,480
Speaker 1: Your type person who's dying to get out of the house.

575
00:39:03,960 --> 00:39:08,640
Speaker 2: I wouldn't say I tested the rules. I'm not one

576
00:39:08,680 --> 00:39:11,520
Speaker 2: that kind of just pushes to see how much somebody

577
00:39:11,520 --> 00:39:16,160
Speaker 2: can take, you know. But I do appreciate a good

578
00:39:16,200 --> 00:39:18,719
Speaker 2: amount of freedom, and I felt like they gave it

579
00:39:18,719 --> 00:39:23,120
Speaker 2: to me when when I was young, I learned that

580
00:39:23,120 --> 00:39:25,960
Speaker 2: if I made good grades, that the answer to whatever

581
00:39:26,000 --> 00:39:30,000
Speaker 2: I wanted to do was yes. And so I studied

582
00:39:30,000 --> 00:39:32,759
Speaker 2: hard and I kept my grades up and made sure

583
00:39:32,800 --> 00:39:35,200
Speaker 2: that I had enough leniency when the time came.

584
00:39:36,160 --> 00:39:37,480
Speaker 1: How many kids in the family.

585
00:39:39,200 --> 00:39:41,480
Speaker 2: I had three sisters, so there was four of us.

586
00:39:41,880 --> 00:39:44,120
Speaker 1: And where are you in the hierarchy.

587
00:39:45,000 --> 00:39:45,560
Speaker 2: Number two?

588
00:39:47,440 --> 00:39:50,880
Speaker 1: And did your parents treat you all equally? Or because

589
00:39:50,920 --> 00:39:53,000
Speaker 1: you were the boy, you were the fear heard son.

590
00:39:55,560 --> 00:39:59,960
Speaker 2: Well, from my perspective, I thought we all got everything equal.

591
00:40:00,200 --> 00:40:04,240
Speaker 2: But you listen to my sisters, you get a different

592
00:40:04,280 --> 00:40:07,200
Speaker 2: take on it. I thought it was I thought it

593
00:40:07,239 --> 00:40:09,279
Speaker 2: was fairly equal. All of us got some.

594
00:40:11,160 --> 00:40:16,120
Speaker 1: And then you were good in school? Were you like

595
00:40:17,160 --> 00:40:18,320
Speaker 1: number one in the class?

596
00:40:21,440 --> 00:40:24,600
Speaker 2: I know, I wouldn't say that. It was always somebody

597
00:40:24,640 --> 00:40:29,680
Speaker 2: in there smarter and made better grades. But I was

598
00:40:29,719 --> 00:40:33,680
Speaker 2: an age student. I hated getting bees. I hated missing

599
00:40:33,719 --> 00:40:35,399
Speaker 2: one if I knew I could get them all.

600
00:40:35,400 --> 00:40:45,279
Speaker 1: Right, Okay? And what about friends in sports and other activities? Yeah?

601
00:40:45,320 --> 00:40:49,040
Speaker 2: I played enough sports I did. I played soccer a lot,

602
00:40:49,120 --> 00:40:53,160
Speaker 2: I played some football, some baseball. I wrestled one year.

603
00:40:53,200 --> 00:40:57,200
Speaker 2: I tried just about everything. Just I was good. I

604
00:40:57,280 --> 00:41:01,320
Speaker 2: was a good fast runner, and I was always strong

605
00:41:01,400 --> 00:41:05,319
Speaker 2: as far as my size and my body weight. You know,

606
00:41:05,400 --> 00:41:10,759
Speaker 2: I never was a real big guy. I was a

607
00:41:10,800 --> 00:41:12,839
Speaker 2: guy that could hit the pull up bar and real

608
00:41:12,920 --> 00:41:15,600
Speaker 2: quick knock out twenty wow.

609
00:41:16,480 --> 00:41:18,680
Speaker 1: So you were still getting these in high school?

610
00:41:20,800 --> 00:41:21,480
Speaker 2: Oh yeah?

611
00:41:22,239 --> 00:41:25,200
Speaker 1: So what if I talked to high school Jamie Johnson,

612
00:41:25,280 --> 00:41:27,759
Speaker 1: what would he have said his future path would be.

613
00:41:30,160 --> 00:41:33,839
Speaker 2: I'd have probably said something along the lines of engineering

614
00:41:33,960 --> 00:41:40,920
Speaker 2: or architecture. I always saw myself as getting into building

615
00:41:41,040 --> 00:41:42,960
Speaker 2: science or something like that.

616
00:41:42,880 --> 00:41:47,360
Speaker 1: You know. So how did it switch to music?

617
00:41:50,200 --> 00:41:54,319
Speaker 2: I'd say that switch happened in Nashville. I had a

618
00:41:54,360 --> 00:42:00,759
Speaker 2: construction company do an insurance restoration. I was a general contractor.

619
00:42:00,800 --> 00:42:04,080
Speaker 2: We came in and rebuilt stuff that had been burned

620
00:42:04,120 --> 00:42:07,200
Speaker 2: in a fire, blown over in a tornado, and that

621
00:42:07,239 --> 00:42:12,560
Speaker 2: sort of thing. I wasn't a good business man, or

622
00:42:12,600 --> 00:42:19,240
Speaker 2: that company would have survived. But uh, I really didn't

623
00:42:19,560 --> 00:42:22,760
Speaker 2: do well in terms of business. I did did good work,

624
00:42:22,840 --> 00:42:31,440
Speaker 2: you know, but the business ended up bankrupt. I did

625
00:42:31,480 --> 00:42:35,920
Speaker 2: a reorganization bankrupt and paid off all the debt from it,

626
00:42:35,960 --> 00:42:37,840
Speaker 2: and I ended up paying off all that debt with

627
00:42:37,960 --> 00:42:39,919
Speaker 2: my music royalties.

628
00:42:43,520 --> 00:42:48,920
Speaker 1: Okay, let's really buy a couple of steps. You got

629
00:42:48,960 --> 00:42:54,640
Speaker 1: this free ride to college, you're an e student. How'd

630
00:42:54,640 --> 00:42:55,879
Speaker 1: you decide to drop out?

631
00:42:58,000 --> 00:43:05,120
Speaker 2: It was about money. I was tired of working like

632
00:43:05,280 --> 00:43:09,719
Speaker 2: crazy to pay a rent and only these utilities and

633
00:43:09,760 --> 00:43:14,920
Speaker 2: everything else, just to live this subpar kind of lifestyle

634
00:43:14,960 --> 00:43:17,640
Speaker 2: where you never had money to do anything. I mean,

635
00:43:17,680 --> 00:43:20,120
Speaker 2: I never had money for gas putting the car, and

636
00:43:20,160 --> 00:43:24,839
Speaker 2: I was delivering pizzas at the time, so it just

637
00:43:24,880 --> 00:43:30,879
Speaker 2: got to be a little too much of a challenge.

638
00:43:31,200 --> 00:43:33,680
Speaker 2: Even with the full ride scholarship, it was hard to

639
00:43:33,760 --> 00:43:35,240
Speaker 2: keep up with bills.

640
00:43:36,440 --> 00:43:38,880
Speaker 1: But you were taking music courses there.

641
00:43:41,239 --> 00:43:44,239
Speaker 2: Oh yeah. I was taking all kinds of music courses,

642
00:43:45,239 --> 00:43:53,719
Speaker 2: including applied science on French horn, and I think I

643
00:43:53,760 --> 00:43:55,839
Speaker 2: had gotten to a point where I felt like I

644
00:43:55,960 --> 00:43:59,800
Speaker 2: wasn't learning much. I was just practicing all the time.

645
00:44:01,600 --> 00:44:04,239
Speaker 1: So how did you end up in Nashville.

646
00:44:04,480 --> 00:44:09,319
Speaker 2: Well, I always knew Nashville was in my future. I

647
00:44:09,400 --> 00:44:16,359
Speaker 2: just didn't know when. When I decided to leave Montgomery,

648
00:44:17,080 --> 00:44:20,080
Speaker 2: I had already had a job at a cable company

649
00:44:20,120 --> 00:44:24,160
Speaker 2: where I was making all kinds of money going door

650
00:44:24,200 --> 00:44:26,680
Speaker 2: to door and signing people up for this new cable

651
00:44:26,719 --> 00:44:32,520
Speaker 2: company down there, and I realized I really didn't want

652
00:44:32,520 --> 00:44:35,440
Speaker 2: to be in sales for the rest of my life.

653
00:44:36,160 --> 00:44:39,800
Speaker 2: And I also realized that my writing, as far as songs,

654
00:44:40,520 --> 00:44:44,680
Speaker 2: was getting better and better. I had a little following

655
00:44:45,400 --> 00:44:52,920
Speaker 2: in a local bar down there called Pure Country, and

656
00:44:53,000 --> 00:44:55,120
Speaker 2: I had a lot of friends down there that really

657
00:44:55,160 --> 00:44:59,000
Speaker 2: supported me. I had a group of guys that were

658
00:44:59,000 --> 00:45:01,520
Speaker 2: in a band that I thought was really good. It

659
00:45:01,600 --> 00:45:05,279
Speaker 2: was called Southern Sons, and these guys had all come

660
00:45:05,320 --> 00:45:11,400
Speaker 2: to Nashville and were given the country music scene a

661
00:45:11,520 --> 00:45:15,399
Speaker 2: run for the money, and they were starting to have

662
00:45:15,440 --> 00:45:18,440
Speaker 2: some success. And one of them, in particular, had gotten

663
00:45:18,440 --> 00:45:28,360
Speaker 2: a job with CMT. He was a program director with CMT. Well,

664
00:45:29,320 --> 00:45:33,319
Speaker 2: Kurk Brewer is his name. Kirk told me about this

665
00:45:33,520 --> 00:45:37,600
Speaker 2: sign company that his wife was working for at the

666
00:45:37,640 --> 00:45:41,120
Speaker 2: time and said, man, they need a good outside sales

667
00:45:41,160 --> 00:45:44,240
Speaker 2: rep and this could be a way to get started

668
00:45:44,280 --> 00:45:48,440
Speaker 2: in Nashville for you. Well, I came up and interviewed

669
00:45:48,440 --> 00:45:52,080
Speaker 2: with that company and got the job, and so I

670
00:45:52,200 --> 00:45:54,760
Speaker 2: moved to town January the first two thousand.

671
00:45:55,280 --> 00:45:58,399
Speaker 1: Okay, let me kind of get this street we're and

672
00:45:58,440 --> 00:46:00,680
Speaker 1: when did you have the construction company?

673
00:46:03,480 --> 00:46:08,440
Speaker 2: Well, the construction company was about my third job in Nashville.

674
00:46:08,640 --> 00:46:12,960
Speaker 2: That fast science gig lasted me, I guess until about

675
00:46:13,000 --> 00:46:17,880
Speaker 2: October that year, and I had to resign my posts

676
00:46:18,400 --> 00:46:21,440
Speaker 2: when I went to help this guy figure out the

677
00:46:21,440 --> 00:46:25,480
Speaker 2: color scheme for his restaurant, only to find out that

678
00:46:25,560 --> 00:46:28,520
Speaker 2: I couldn't help him at all, and he couldn't help me.

679
00:46:28,600 --> 00:46:32,080
Speaker 2: At all. And he kept asking me what color do

680
00:46:32,160 --> 00:46:33,880
Speaker 2: you think this ought to be? And what color do

681
00:46:34,000 --> 00:46:36,719
Speaker 2: you think that ought to be? And I finally had

682
00:46:36,760 --> 00:46:40,480
Speaker 2: to tell him, right, I can't help you at all

683
00:46:40,560 --> 00:46:43,359
Speaker 2: with this. I'm colorblind. He said, hell, I'm colorblind too.

684
00:46:47,520 --> 00:46:51,320
Speaker 2: So I had to go back to the office until

685
00:46:51,400 --> 00:46:54,160
Speaker 2: the owner of the company. I said, Man, I can't

686
00:46:54,239 --> 00:46:57,600
Speaker 2: thank you enough for the opportunity, but I can't do

687
00:46:57,719 --> 00:47:02,759
Speaker 2: this a fish out the out of the pond over here.

688
00:47:02,800 --> 00:47:06,319
Speaker 2: I can't be out here talking to people about very

689
00:47:06,400 --> 00:47:09,600
Speaker 2: specific colors too. It's not just hey, we think this

690
00:47:09,640 --> 00:47:12,719
Speaker 2: ought to be yellow, you know, it had to be

691
00:47:12,760 --> 00:47:15,759
Speaker 2: a They called them Pantone colors, and there's got to

692
00:47:15,760 --> 00:47:21,120
Speaker 2: be fifteen thousand shades of yellow, and man, you mess

693
00:47:21,200 --> 00:47:23,960
Speaker 2: that up one time, buddy, it's a it's a mess.

694
00:47:25,080 --> 00:47:27,520
Speaker 2: So I left that company and went to work with

695
00:47:27,760 --> 00:47:30,920
Speaker 2: a different company where I didn't have to discern colors.

696
00:47:31,120 --> 00:47:33,720
Speaker 2: I went to work with a company called Heartland Pump.

697
00:47:35,600 --> 00:47:39,840
Speaker 2: And this company would rent out big industrial water pumps

698
00:47:39,960 --> 00:47:43,120
Speaker 2: to do like a creek bypass if you were going

699
00:47:43,200 --> 00:47:44,920
Speaker 2: to build a bridge over a creek.

700
00:47:46,080 --> 00:47:46,200
Speaker 1: Uh.

701
00:47:46,680 --> 00:47:51,759
Speaker 2: And they also dewatered rock quarries and mines and all

702
00:47:51,800 --> 00:47:55,560
Speaker 2: that sort of thing, so we're bypasses whatever anything had

703
00:47:55,600 --> 00:47:58,880
Speaker 2: to be bypassed. They had a pump and a plug system.

704
00:47:59,800 --> 00:48:03,359
Speaker 2: And I loved that company. I loved everybody I got

705
00:48:03,400 --> 00:48:06,680
Speaker 2: to know there. That's where I was when nine to

706
00:48:06,680 --> 00:48:10,839
Speaker 2: eleven happened. By the way, I was sitting in their

707
00:48:10,880 --> 00:48:18,880
Speaker 2: conference room in Carbondale or Carterville, Illinois. That the owner

708
00:48:18,920 --> 00:48:22,160
Speaker 2: and I, well, he sold the companies since then, but

709
00:48:22,520 --> 00:48:27,239
Speaker 2: he and I we still talk and try to try

710
00:48:27,239 --> 00:48:31,200
Speaker 2: to keep current. And it would have been that company

711
00:48:31,280 --> 00:48:35,240
Speaker 2: right there that I left. When my then wife Amy

712
00:48:36,160 --> 00:48:41,879
Speaker 2: inherited her parents construction company, they decided they were going

713
00:48:41,920 --> 00:48:44,799
Speaker 2: out of business and that they'd been an insurance restoration

714
00:48:45,840 --> 00:48:49,719
Speaker 2: her whole life, and so they left her the assets

715
00:48:49,760 --> 00:48:56,719
Speaker 2: of the company. We started another construction company. But even

716
00:48:56,760 --> 00:48:59,759
Speaker 2: before that, back in Montgomery, I was framing houses all

717
00:48:59,840 --> 00:49:02,200
Speaker 2: the time in between jobs and that sort of thing.

718
00:49:02,239 --> 00:49:06,560
Speaker 2: So I've always had had a background in construction and

719
00:49:06,920 --> 00:49:10,280
Speaker 2: a hunger for it. I still love it. I still

720
00:49:10,320 --> 00:49:14,000
Speaker 2: love it. If I'm not building or renovating something, I

721
00:49:14,000 --> 00:49:15,080
Speaker 2: feel like something's wrong.

722
00:49:23,520 --> 00:49:28,120
Speaker 1: So do you think you were a bad businessman because

723
00:49:28,160 --> 00:49:29,680
Speaker 1: you were essentially an artist?

724
00:49:32,080 --> 00:49:34,560
Speaker 2: I think I was a bad business man because I

725
00:49:34,680 --> 00:49:39,280
Speaker 2: legitimately couldn't give a rat's ass about money. I don't

726
00:49:39,280 --> 00:49:42,720
Speaker 2: care about money. It's the least valuable thing on the planet,

727
00:49:43,360 --> 00:49:47,120
Speaker 2: and I just refused to ever learn anything about it.

728
00:49:47,239 --> 00:49:51,000
Speaker 2: The first time I ever had to dive in and

729
00:49:51,120 --> 00:49:54,359
Speaker 2: learn something about the principles of money, it was when

730
00:49:54,400 --> 00:49:58,200
Speaker 2: I first got to Nashville. I started listening to a

731
00:49:58,239 --> 00:50:04,160
Speaker 2: program on the AM RADI the Dave Ramsey Show, right,

732
00:50:04,440 --> 00:50:07,680
Speaker 2: And I remember listening to Dave Ramsey and starting to

733
00:50:07,719 --> 00:50:14,480
Speaker 2: feel guilty about my own personal finances. But that was

734
00:50:14,520 --> 00:50:18,440
Speaker 2: a That was the first time I ever, uh, it

735
00:50:18,560 --> 00:50:20,760
Speaker 2: ever dawned on me that you know, you should stop

736
00:50:20,800 --> 00:50:24,200
Speaker 2: and learn how money operates. And it just took me

737
00:50:24,239 --> 00:50:25,480
Speaker 2: a while to kind of catch on.

738
00:50:26,520 --> 00:50:29,680
Speaker 1: Well, the music business is femous and raife, with even

739
00:50:29,719 --> 00:50:34,080
Speaker 1: the most successful musicians being ripped off. Since you weren't

740
00:50:34,120 --> 00:50:36,239
Speaker 1: an expert in money, have you've been ripped off?

741
00:50:38,880 --> 00:50:41,400
Speaker 2: Well, if you're not an expert in money, you can't

742
00:50:41,440 --> 00:50:42,960
Speaker 2: say that you got ripped off.

743
00:50:43,480 --> 00:50:46,200
Speaker 1: Excellent point. There's the A level student.

744
00:50:46,360 --> 00:50:53,719
Speaker 2: Okay, you have to pay attention. Money cannot wait to

745
00:50:53,760 --> 00:50:56,160
Speaker 2: get away from you. And if you're not aiming it

746
00:50:56,239 --> 00:51:00,120
Speaker 2: in a direction. It's gonna go whatever direction seems like

747
00:51:00,200 --> 00:51:03,640
Speaker 2: the least resistance.

748
00:51:06,320 --> 00:51:11,920
Speaker 1: Okay, when did you first pick up an instrument and

749
00:51:11,960 --> 00:51:16,439
Speaker 1: when did you decide you wanted to write songs.

750
00:51:22,160 --> 00:51:24,680
Speaker 2: I'd say the first time I picked up an instrument

751
00:51:24,719 --> 00:51:27,920
Speaker 2: would have been a guitar. I mean picked it up

752
00:51:27,920 --> 00:51:32,560
Speaker 2: with the intent of learning how to play, not just

753
00:51:32,680 --> 00:51:36,000
Speaker 2: banging around and making a noise like you know sometimes

754
00:51:36,080 --> 00:51:40,799
Speaker 2: kids will do. And for me that probably would have

755
00:51:40,800 --> 00:51:48,520
Speaker 2: happened around five or six years old. I remember my

756
00:51:48,640 --> 00:51:53,399
Speaker 2: dad would play songs on his guitar and he would

757
00:51:53,400 --> 00:51:57,080
Speaker 2: strum some chords and the songs that he were playing

758
00:51:57,080 --> 00:52:01,600
Speaker 2: and I didn't know about you know, some people wrote

759
00:52:01,600 --> 00:52:04,040
Speaker 2: these songs and that sort of thing. I just knew

760
00:52:04,040 --> 00:52:08,480
Speaker 2: my dad sang all these songs. Well, a lot of

761
00:52:08,480 --> 00:52:12,879
Speaker 2: the Hank Williams songs that I learned from early childhood.

762
00:52:13,320 --> 00:52:19,280
Speaker 2: I thought those are my dad's songs. I remember first

763
00:52:19,280 --> 00:52:22,120
Speaker 2: time hearing Hank Williams on the radio and thinking that's

764
00:52:22,120 --> 00:52:31,239
Speaker 2: my dad's song. Who's this guy? I just kind of

765
00:52:31,360 --> 00:52:35,960
Speaker 2: I grew up with a passion for music, though, it's

766
00:52:36,000 --> 00:52:39,279
Speaker 2: what really drove me. And even if I didn't know

767
00:52:39,320 --> 00:52:42,160
Speaker 2: how to play. There was always this version of me

768
00:52:42,280 --> 00:52:45,800
Speaker 2: that was writing my own song, and it might have

769
00:52:45,920 --> 00:52:49,320
Speaker 2: just been taken the lyrics to somebody else's and replacing

770
00:52:49,360 --> 00:52:55,640
Speaker 2: them with whatever I was thinking about, but it was

771
00:52:55,680 --> 00:52:56,880
Speaker 2: always a hunger for me.

772
00:52:58,360 --> 00:53:02,680
Speaker 1: Now, other than your father, were you listening to the

773
00:53:02,880 --> 00:53:06,840
Speaker 1: radio you were born in seventy five, MTV hits in

774
00:53:06,920 --> 00:53:10,640
Speaker 1: eighty one, What music were you listening to and where

775
00:53:10,640 --> 00:53:11,480
Speaker 1: did you find it?

776
00:53:13,280 --> 00:53:17,160
Speaker 2: We didn't have MTV. We had those rabbit ears on

777
00:53:17,200 --> 00:53:21,279
Speaker 2: the TV that picked up the three channels for free.

778
00:53:24,400 --> 00:53:26,520
Speaker 2: Music for me would have been what we heard on

779
00:53:26,560 --> 00:53:34,000
Speaker 2: the radio. I remember I was a big Buddy Holly fan,

780
00:53:36,960 --> 00:53:39,720
Speaker 2: and it was like the first two or three tapes

781
00:53:39,760 --> 00:53:44,120
Speaker 2: that I ever bought were Buddy Holly, and I remember

782
00:53:44,160 --> 00:53:50,240
Speaker 2: when I found out that Whalon Jennings had played bass

783
00:53:50,880 --> 00:53:54,560
Speaker 2: and Buddy's band, and Whalen was also the guy on

784
00:53:54,640 --> 00:53:57,400
Speaker 2: the Dukes of Hazard, and that turned me into the

785
00:53:57,400 --> 00:54:04,720
Speaker 2: biggest Whalon Jennings fan ever. So it's all kind of interwoven.

786
00:54:04,800 --> 00:54:07,680
Speaker 2: But we didn't we didn't have no MTV in my

787
00:54:07,800 --> 00:54:12,239
Speaker 2: house growing up. We had vinyl records and my mother

788
00:54:12,520 --> 00:54:15,960
Speaker 2: was a big Alabama fan and she had every record

789
00:54:16,000 --> 00:54:18,200
Speaker 2: that they put out, and I'm talking about the day

790
00:54:18,280 --> 00:54:22,600
Speaker 2: it became available. She came home with that record. And

791
00:54:23,320 --> 00:54:26,600
Speaker 2: we also had a book that had the sheet music

792
00:54:26,680 --> 00:54:29,680
Speaker 2: of all these Alabama records. I think I had like

793
00:54:29,800 --> 00:54:35,000
Speaker 2: six different albums, including My Homes in Alabama. And that's

794
00:54:35,040 --> 00:54:37,000
Speaker 2: the first song I ever learned how to play on

795
00:54:37,040 --> 00:54:40,000
Speaker 2: a guitar and sing. I learned it right out of

796
00:54:40,040 --> 00:54:40,520
Speaker 2: that book.

797
00:54:43,000 --> 00:54:46,160
Speaker 1: So you were listening mostly to country music. Did you

798
00:54:46,200 --> 00:54:47,640
Speaker 1: listen to any rock music?

799
00:54:50,800 --> 00:54:55,360
Speaker 2: Probably, but I didn't know there was a difference. To

800
00:54:55,760 --> 00:55:00,200
Speaker 2: me the Eagles. That wasn't really rock, you know, the

801
00:55:00,239 --> 00:55:04,880
Speaker 2: main heaven. It fit just as good with our country

802
00:55:04,960 --> 00:55:08,480
Speaker 2: music as it did anything else. But that would have

803
00:55:08,480 --> 00:55:10,440
Speaker 2: been the version of rock and roll I listened to.

804
00:55:10,560 --> 00:55:14,040
Speaker 2: My sister was down the hallway with her Madonna records

805
00:55:14,080 --> 00:55:17,680
Speaker 2: and Prince and she even had that Guns and Roses

806
00:55:17,760 --> 00:55:18,879
Speaker 2: record when it came out.

807
00:55:20,200 --> 00:55:22,040
Speaker 1: Did you like Appetite for Disruption?

808
00:55:27,040 --> 00:55:31,480
Speaker 2: Not? Probably? Not at first. I mean, down on my

809
00:55:31,680 --> 00:55:34,000
Speaker 2: end of the hall, it was still Vern Godzeden and

810
00:55:34,120 --> 00:55:34,880
Speaker 2: Merle Haggard.

811
00:55:37,239 --> 00:55:40,480
Speaker 1: Okay, So if you pick up a guitar at age

812
00:55:40,520 --> 00:55:43,560
Speaker 1: five or six, when you're in high school, are you

813
00:55:43,680 --> 00:55:45,680
Speaker 1: known as the guy who plays a guitar. Did you

814
00:55:45,719 --> 00:55:48,520
Speaker 1: play any gigs, form many bands anything like that.

815
00:55:51,200 --> 00:55:56,400
Speaker 2: No, most people didn't even know I did anything of musical,

816
00:55:56,680 --> 00:56:01,799
Speaker 2: I guess until about seventh grade. And that's but I

817
00:56:01,880 --> 00:56:04,279
Speaker 2: also kept to myself. You know, I didn't have a

818
00:56:04,320 --> 00:56:07,279
Speaker 2: whole lot of friends. Well, we lived so far out

819
00:56:07,280 --> 00:56:09,680
Speaker 2: in the country. Wasn't like I would get home from

820
00:56:09,960 --> 00:56:13,160
Speaker 2: school and hop on my bicycle and go visit friends.

821
00:56:13,800 --> 00:56:19,080
Speaker 2: We just didn't have neighbors like that. I kind of

822
00:56:19,120 --> 00:56:23,239
Speaker 2: grew up on my own, So even if I did

823
00:56:23,440 --> 00:56:25,560
Speaker 2: learn something on the guitar, it wasn't like I had

824
00:56:25,560 --> 00:56:27,719
Speaker 2: anybody I could call up and share it with. I

825
00:56:27,840 --> 00:56:29,600
Speaker 2: just played for my dad when he got home.

826
00:56:32,200 --> 00:56:36,320
Speaker 1: So okay, that seventh grade people learned you played the guitar.

827
00:56:36,840 --> 00:56:38,120
Speaker 1: How did they find out?

828
00:56:40,160 --> 00:56:42,440
Speaker 2: Well, it wasn't guitar at first. It would have been

829
00:56:42,480 --> 00:56:45,840
Speaker 2: that French orn that I was learning in the beginner band.

830
00:56:47,120 --> 00:56:52,200
Speaker 2: And I didn't stay in beginner band for very long.

831
00:56:53,640 --> 00:56:57,239
Speaker 2: I practiced so much, and I had already learned how

832
00:56:57,239 --> 00:57:00,400
Speaker 2: to read sheet music. My dad taught help me on

833
00:57:00,520 --> 00:57:06,680
Speaker 2: my hand growing up. You take your five fingers right there,

834
00:57:06,680 --> 00:57:10,640
Speaker 2: and they represent the five bars of a staff and

835
00:57:10,719 --> 00:57:14,360
Speaker 2: if it's a line, it's every good boy does fine.

836
00:57:14,440 --> 00:57:19,120
Speaker 2: And if it's a space, it's face face. So he

837
00:57:19,200 --> 00:57:21,560
Speaker 2: taught me how to reach sheep music just looking at

838
00:57:21,560 --> 00:57:25,680
Speaker 2: the palm of my hand. And the more I practiced

839
00:57:25,720 --> 00:57:29,120
Speaker 2: on that horn, the better I got. Within a few weeks,

840
00:57:29,280 --> 00:57:32,720
Speaker 2: the band director of that junior high school had me

841
00:57:32,800 --> 00:57:35,200
Speaker 2: sitting in with the advance band.

842
00:57:37,760 --> 00:57:39,960
Speaker 1: Okay, then what happened?

843
00:57:42,440 --> 00:57:48,680
Speaker 2: I got into Drumming Bugle Corps. After that, this old

844
00:57:48,720 --> 00:57:53,080
Speaker 2: drum and Bugle Corps had well, they had a couple

845
00:57:53,080 --> 00:57:56,120
Speaker 2: of years back in eighty and eighty one, and then

846
00:57:56,160 --> 00:57:58,840
Speaker 2: they were just kind of coming back out. It's called

847
00:57:58,920 --> 00:58:03,600
Speaker 2: south Wind, and they had some auditions and I went

848
00:58:03,680 --> 00:58:07,280
Speaker 2: an auditioned for them and got into that where I

849
00:58:07,280 --> 00:58:14,120
Speaker 2: could travel during the summer. And I guess since it's

850
00:58:14,160 --> 00:58:18,920
Speaker 2: been since I was about twelve thirteen years old, I

851
00:58:18,960 --> 00:58:22,840
Speaker 2: started spending my summers out on the road traveling with

852
00:58:22,920 --> 00:58:27,280
Speaker 2: that Drumming Bugle Corps. So I've been a traveling musician

853
00:58:28,480 --> 00:58:29,880
Speaker 2: most of my life now.

854
00:58:30,400 --> 00:58:34,360
Speaker 1: Okay, so what are you playing in the Drumming Bugle Corps.

855
00:58:35,880 --> 00:58:38,160
Speaker 2: Well, they called it a soprano, but it was a

856
00:58:38,160 --> 00:58:42,480
Speaker 2: soprano bugle, which is akin to a two valve trumpet.

857
00:58:43,880 --> 00:58:48,240
Speaker 1: Okay, okay, you started with a French worn your father

858
00:58:48,360 --> 00:58:51,440
Speaker 1: helped you out. You would greet how'd you get into

859
00:58:51,480 --> 00:58:52,000
Speaker 1: the bugle?

860
00:58:54,000 --> 00:58:57,080
Speaker 2: That was it. I heard these guys were taking auditions

861
00:58:57,080 --> 00:59:00,720
Speaker 2: and trying to put this corps back together. I went

862
00:59:00,760 --> 00:59:05,000
Speaker 2: and auditioned, and uh, and became became one of them.

863
00:59:06,520 --> 00:59:09,520
Speaker 2: And uh, that's also kind of what started me down

864
00:59:09,600 --> 00:59:14,400
Speaker 2: that path of I guess you'd call it discipline, but

865
00:59:15,080 --> 00:59:17,920
Speaker 2: you had to have a good degree a discipline to

866
00:59:18,280 --> 00:59:21,160
Speaker 2: be successful in the drummer bugle corps.

867
00:59:23,000 --> 00:59:26,160
Speaker 1: Okay, are you the type of person that you can

868
00:59:26,240 --> 00:59:27,800
Speaker 1: pick up and play any instrument?

869
00:59:30,560 --> 00:59:33,280
Speaker 2: I wouldn't say that, but I can figure it out,

870
00:59:33,840 --> 00:59:38,320
Speaker 2: you know, I can. I can usually get some some

871
00:59:38,440 --> 00:59:39,840
Speaker 2: kind of tone out of anything.

872
00:59:41,720 --> 00:59:43,720
Speaker 1: So you're in the drum and bugle cort and you're

873
00:59:43,760 --> 00:59:45,800
Speaker 1: traveling during the summer, where you're going.

874
00:59:48,720 --> 00:59:55,080
Speaker 2: All over. We would travel, Uh, you'd stay at high schools.

875
00:59:56,240 --> 00:59:58,560
Speaker 2: You know, most of us had a little sleeping bag

876
00:59:58,720 --> 01:00:04,440
Speaker 2: or a bedroll or whatever enough closed to get you

877
01:00:04,520 --> 01:00:11,200
Speaker 2: through the summer, and did our work out on football

878
01:00:11,240 --> 01:00:13,439
Speaker 2: fields and that sort of thing. In fact, that's where

879
01:00:13,440 --> 01:00:18,400
Speaker 2: our shows were were in some of these uh big

880
01:00:18,400 --> 01:00:24,440
Speaker 2: old high school and college football stadiums. So that was

881
01:00:24,480 --> 01:00:27,160
Speaker 2: the kind of places we'd travel. We didn't stay in hotels.

882
01:00:28,000 --> 01:00:30,840
Speaker 2: I learned to sleep in a luggage rack on a bus.

883
01:00:31,960 --> 01:00:34,840
Speaker 1: Well, I mean, you're in Alabama. How far from Alabama

884
01:00:34,920 --> 01:00:35,440
Speaker 1: would you go?

885
01:00:37,480 --> 01:00:42,640
Speaker 2: Oh? Hell? I remember seeing Niagara Falls for the first time.

886
01:00:42,680 --> 01:00:45,640
Speaker 2: Oh wow, about thirteen years old. I mean we got out.

887
01:00:47,240 --> 01:00:53,720
Speaker 2: We did some sure enough, travel up New York, Maine, Kansas, Tennessee.

888
01:00:54,040 --> 01:00:57,680
Speaker 2: I mean just we went everywhere we toured.

889
01:00:57,840 --> 01:01:02,160
Speaker 1: Okay, in the world of drumming google cores, was this

890
01:01:02,400 --> 01:01:06,400
Speaker 1: like a known good? I mean, is there a hierarchy

891
01:01:06,440 --> 01:01:09,080
Speaker 1: of drumming and bugle cores? Oh?

892
01:01:09,240 --> 01:01:14,560
Speaker 2: Yeah. Ours wasn't necessarily one of the best. It was

893
01:01:16,120 --> 01:01:19,320
Speaker 2: a smaller cores. Back then, they used to have this division.

894
01:01:19,400 --> 01:01:22,560
Speaker 2: It was called Age sixty I think it was. And

895
01:01:22,640 --> 01:01:24,880
Speaker 2: all it meant was you didn't have as many members

896
01:01:24,880 --> 01:01:28,520
Speaker 2: as the bigger cores, and we didn't. We had a

897
01:01:28,600 --> 01:01:32,640
Speaker 2: very small drummer bugle corps. But for our size, we

898
01:01:32,640 --> 01:01:33,400
Speaker 2: were really good.

899
01:01:34,800 --> 01:01:36,480
Speaker 1: And how many summers did you do that?

900
01:01:38,920 --> 01:01:43,960
Speaker 2: Oh? I did probably two summers traveling with those guys.

901
01:01:44,000 --> 01:01:46,600
Speaker 2: But I probably did winter camps and that sort of

902
01:01:46,640 --> 01:01:48,600
Speaker 2: thing four years or so.

903
01:01:48,600 --> 01:01:50,760
Speaker 1: So how did it end with the drum and bugle corps.

904
01:01:53,200 --> 01:01:55,680
Speaker 2: Well, you age out at twenty one, but I didn't

905
01:01:55,680 --> 01:01:58,520
Speaker 2: get anywhere close to that. I did it up until

906
01:01:58,560 --> 01:02:00,880
Speaker 2: I got into high school, and by then I was

907
01:02:00,920 --> 01:02:04,400
Speaker 2: already working during the summers and didn't have didn't have

908
01:02:04,440 --> 01:02:05,520
Speaker 2: time to do it anymore.

909
01:02:06,520 --> 01:02:10,960
Speaker 1: So when did you start playing guitar and writing songs

910
01:02:11,720 --> 01:02:14,640
Speaker 1: to the point where other people heard you perform?

911
01:02:17,240 --> 01:02:20,400
Speaker 2: I guess by the time I was in tenth grade

912
01:02:20,480 --> 01:02:23,360
Speaker 2: or so, I was already sharing songs that I wrote

913
01:02:23,400 --> 01:02:28,160
Speaker 2: with some some friends, you know, some guys and gals

914
01:02:28,200 --> 01:02:35,160
Speaker 2: I was hanging out with aside from school, but not

915
01:02:35,400 --> 01:02:37,800
Speaker 2: to the point where I was bothering people with it.

916
01:02:37,880 --> 01:02:41,160
Speaker 2: Are you know, purposely pursuing Hey, check out this song

917
01:02:41,280 --> 01:02:45,160
Speaker 2: I wrote, just you know. But by the time I

918
01:02:45,280 --> 01:02:50,200
Speaker 2: was a junior in high school. I remember then there

919
01:02:50,320 --> 01:02:53,360
Speaker 2: was a group of kids from my church that really

920
01:02:53,400 --> 01:02:57,200
Speaker 2: thought it was a neat thing. But my dad had

921
01:02:57,240 --> 01:03:01,560
Speaker 2: me and my sister playing in church with him from

922
01:03:01,600 --> 01:03:03,720
Speaker 2: a young age. So for a lot of the people

923
01:03:03,760 --> 01:03:07,680
Speaker 2: in our church, they just that they knew since I

924
01:03:07,760 --> 01:03:10,440
Speaker 2: was about ten years old or so that you know

925
01:03:12,080 --> 01:03:15,560
Speaker 2: that I played guitar and sang harmony with my dad

926
01:03:15,600 --> 01:03:17,400
Speaker 2: when he would get up and sing in front of

927
01:03:17,440 --> 01:03:17,840
Speaker 2: the church.

928
01:03:19,040 --> 01:03:23,640
Speaker 1: And did you ever play high school talent shows or

929
01:03:23,720 --> 01:03:27,600
Speaker 1: you know sweet sixteens bar Mitzvah's anything like that.

930
01:03:30,560 --> 01:03:34,280
Speaker 2: No, I never got into that sort of thing. I

931
01:03:34,320 --> 01:03:38,520
Speaker 2: never saw music as a competition, and I just saw

932
01:03:38,520 --> 01:03:43,120
Speaker 2: it as a something I really wanted to do and

933
01:03:43,280 --> 01:03:46,120
Speaker 2: I wanted to do it well, but I didn't. I

934
01:03:46,120 --> 01:03:51,439
Speaker 2: didn't get into the competitive stuff with it so much.

935
01:03:51,720 --> 01:03:54,240
Speaker 2: And I did some of that. You know, the drum

936
01:03:54,320 --> 01:03:57,120
Speaker 2: Corps thing was a competition, but I really didn't care

937
01:03:57,160 --> 01:03:59,760
Speaker 2: how we did. I was in it more for the

938
01:04:00,640 --> 01:04:03,520
Speaker 2: getting the summer away from the house and getting to

939
01:04:03,560 --> 01:04:07,200
Speaker 2: travel than I was and anything else. And now even

940
01:04:07,240 --> 01:04:10,720
Speaker 2: the stuff or like state band competitions and all that

941
01:04:10,760 --> 01:04:12,840
Speaker 2: where you get the ribbons and all that kind of thing,

942
01:04:12,880 --> 01:04:14,160
Speaker 2: I didn't care about that. Junt.

943
01:04:17,480 --> 01:04:23,480
Speaker 1: Okay, you grew up in Alabama. Even at this late date,

944
01:04:24,160 --> 01:04:27,280
Speaker 1: the North in the South are very different, and you've

945
01:04:27,320 --> 01:04:32,800
Speaker 1: also traveled around the country. What do people who don't

946
01:04:32,840 --> 01:04:35,320
Speaker 1: live in the South, don't live in Alabama, what don't

947
01:04:35,360 --> 01:04:37,560
Speaker 1: they understand about Alabama.

948
01:04:42,440 --> 01:04:44,760
Speaker 2: Well, that's a tough one. I guess it had a

949
01:04:44,800 --> 01:04:51,040
Speaker 2: perspective comes into play. Being from Alabama is the only

950
01:04:51,120 --> 01:04:54,520
Speaker 2: perspective that I have, So I'm not real sure what

951
01:04:54,720 --> 01:05:01,360
Speaker 2: somebody else's perspective of Alabama would be. I am aware

952
01:05:01,400 --> 01:05:04,800
Speaker 2: that there's a lot of things that we considered normal

953
01:05:05,880 --> 01:05:10,600
Speaker 2: down there that that other people would consider taboo, like

954
01:05:10,680 --> 01:05:16,080
Speaker 2: putting cheese in your grits. Uh. Some people you have

955
01:05:16,160 --> 01:05:21,360
Speaker 2: to explain to them what grits are. So I don't

956
01:05:21,400 --> 01:05:23,840
Speaker 2: know that there's there's probably a lot of things that

957
01:05:24,680 --> 01:05:30,480
Speaker 2: uh about Alabama that would be taboo even to today's Alabama.

958
01:05:32,000 --> 01:05:35,080
Speaker 2: It's changed a lot, just like everywhere else in the world,

959
01:05:35,320 --> 01:05:41,000
Speaker 2: especially over the past since the information age came in.

960
01:05:48,920 --> 01:05:51,560
Speaker 1: We're in wind in this scenario, did you meet your

961
01:05:51,560 --> 01:05:52,320
Speaker 1: first wife?

962
01:05:53,400 --> 01:05:58,120
Speaker 2: I met Amy. When I first got to Nashville. It

963
01:05:58,280 --> 01:06:03,600
Speaker 2: snowed fores well for me, being from South Alabama, I've

964
01:06:03,800 --> 01:06:06,040
Speaker 2: never seen that much snow in my life. And I

965
01:06:06,080 --> 01:06:10,680
Speaker 2: had a couple of dogs I had rescued from this

966
01:06:10,880 --> 01:06:16,600
Speaker 2: shelter down there. They were Japanese akitas, and I took

967
01:06:16,640 --> 01:06:21,000
Speaker 2: them over to the side of priests dam where they

968
01:06:21,040 --> 01:06:24,720
Speaker 2: got a nice steep hill and I just let them

969
01:06:24,800 --> 01:06:28,320
Speaker 2: drag everybody around in the snow that day, where her

970
01:06:28,360 --> 01:06:31,440
Speaker 2: friends thought it was a lot of fun to grab

971
01:06:31,440 --> 01:06:33,560
Speaker 2: a hold of these two akitas and ride them down

972
01:06:33,600 --> 01:06:37,560
Speaker 2: this hill, let these dogs pull their sled around.

973
01:06:38,920 --> 01:06:43,880
Speaker 1: So, hi'd you meet her? And how did it become

974
01:06:44,400 --> 01:06:45,960
Speaker 1: a romance in marriage?

975
01:06:48,600 --> 01:06:52,080
Speaker 2: So they invited me to do to go to church,

976
01:06:53,520 --> 01:06:59,160
Speaker 2: and I started going to that church. It was it

977
01:06:59,200 --> 01:07:05,400
Speaker 2: was Two Rivers Baptist, and it was the biggest church

978
01:07:05,440 --> 01:07:09,680
Speaker 2: I'd ever seen in my life. It was a big, old,

979
01:07:09,720 --> 01:07:14,800
Speaker 2: massive building and it kind of helped me, you know,

980
01:07:14,920 --> 01:07:20,800
Speaker 2: meet some people and get rooted and get established in Nashville. So, oh,

981
01:07:22,800 --> 01:07:25,680
Speaker 2: I guess for me, Amy goes back to the very

982
01:07:25,720 --> 01:07:29,120
Speaker 2: beginning of my time in Nashville, which has been twenty

983
01:07:29,160 --> 01:07:32,760
Speaker 2: five years now. She wouldn't appreciate me mentioning the number

984
01:07:32,760 --> 01:07:38,480
Speaker 2: of years for that. For that, I apologize.

985
01:07:39,160 --> 01:07:40,480
Speaker 1: How did it end with Amy?

986
01:07:44,640 --> 01:07:48,320
Speaker 2: Willie says, you never have an ex wife, there's only

987
01:07:48,360 --> 01:07:54,640
Speaker 2: additional ones, So there is no end. Amy and I

988
01:07:54,680 --> 01:07:58,880
Speaker 2: are still wonderful friends today and we have a twenty

989
01:07:58,920 --> 01:08:04,760
Speaker 2: one year old daughter, and there's no end to that. Relationship.

990
01:08:06,240 --> 01:08:11,960
Speaker 2: It's just it's morphed into a beautiful friendship over the years.

991
01:08:13,240 --> 01:08:14,600
Speaker 1: Well, who wanted the divorce?

992
01:08:17,400 --> 01:08:20,639
Speaker 2: You know, some scabs are better left unpicked at up.

993
01:08:23,160 --> 01:08:28,479
Speaker 1: Okay, Well, let's just put it this way. You're great

994
01:08:28,560 --> 01:08:33,559
Speaker 1: friends now you were married before? Were you always great friends?

995
01:08:33,640 --> 01:08:35,679
Speaker 1: Or where there were some bumps in the road before

996
01:08:35,720 --> 01:08:38,520
Speaker 1: you became great friends?

997
01:08:40,000 --> 01:08:44,160
Speaker 2: I like any good friendship. We've had some bumps in

998
01:08:44,200 --> 01:08:47,320
Speaker 2: the road. We just chose not to dwell on them

999
01:08:47,479 --> 01:08:50,080
Speaker 2: longer than it took to put them away and move

1000
01:08:50,160 --> 01:08:52,759
Speaker 2: on and forgive and forget.

1001
01:08:54,040 --> 01:08:56,320
Speaker 1: And what is your twenty one year old daughter up to?

1002
01:09:00,000 --> 01:09:04,519
Speaker 2: Whatever she decides is the correct answer. She's a very

1003
01:09:04,600 --> 01:09:10,519
Speaker 2: smart young lady. And I mean she's got a brilliant mind.

1004
01:09:11,560 --> 01:09:17,719
Speaker 2: She's got a wonderful discipline and a great disposition. She's

1005
01:09:18,120 --> 01:09:20,800
Speaker 2: smart enough to do anything she puts her mind to,

1006
01:09:21,000 --> 01:09:26,240
Speaker 2: and she knows that, and she's very selective about what

1007
01:09:26,400 --> 01:09:30,120
Speaker 2: she will apply herself to, and when she does, there's

1008
01:09:30,160 --> 01:09:36,600
Speaker 2: nothing stopping her. She goes to Sanford University. She's studying

1009
01:09:37,040 --> 01:09:40,920
Speaker 2: physical therapy, and I'm sure that may change a couple

1010
01:09:40,920 --> 01:09:43,479
Speaker 2: of more times before she graduates, but she's in her

1011
01:09:43,520 --> 01:09:44,599
Speaker 2: third year right now?

1012
01:09:45,920 --> 01:09:47,880
Speaker 1: And did Aby ever find somebody new?

1013
01:09:49,439 --> 01:09:53,599
Speaker 2: Oh? Yeah, she got married probably four or five years ago.

1014
01:09:53,840 --> 01:09:57,240
Speaker 2: I want to say it was during the lockdown with COVID.

1015
01:09:59,080 --> 01:10:01,599
Speaker 2: And he's a good he's good to our daughter, and

1016
01:10:02,120 --> 01:10:05,000
Speaker 2: he's great for Amy. So I like him a lot.

1017
01:10:05,360 --> 01:10:06,280
Speaker 2: His name is Keith.

1018
01:10:07,680 --> 01:10:15,000
Speaker 1: Okay, So you move to Nashville because there's a job

1019
01:10:15,080 --> 01:10:20,719
Speaker 1: with the sign company. You ultimately get into construction. We're

1020
01:10:20,920 --> 01:10:24,479
Speaker 1: in this narrative. Do you say I want to make

1021
01:10:24,600 --> 01:10:25,759
Speaker 1: music my career.

1022
01:10:28,880 --> 01:10:31,600
Speaker 2: I think the whole point of me coming to Nashville

1023
01:10:32,280 --> 01:10:37,120
Speaker 2: was about making music my career. I guess I got

1024
01:10:38,560 --> 01:10:41,719
Speaker 2: really serious in it, and it took me a while.

1025
01:10:41,760 --> 01:10:45,240
Speaker 2: I had to I had to grow a business in

1026
01:10:45,920 --> 01:10:52,439
Speaker 2: singing demos, and that started just about from the beginning too.

1027
01:10:52,880 --> 01:10:55,799
Speaker 2: When I got to Nashville, I guess it was within

1028
01:10:55,840 --> 01:10:58,000
Speaker 2: a couple of weeks. I had met a guy in

1029
01:10:58,080 --> 01:11:01,519
Speaker 2: one of the bars down on Lower Broad UH named

1030
01:11:01,560 --> 01:11:07,320
Speaker 2: Greg Perkins. And Greg was a fiddle and steel player. Uh.

1031
01:11:07,400 --> 01:11:10,400
Speaker 2: He played with Tammy Wyett and some other ones. But

1032
01:11:10,479 --> 01:11:14,719
Speaker 2: he he had asked me to come down to his studio,

1033
01:11:14,800 --> 01:11:17,840
Speaker 2: which is in the old r c A building on

1034
01:11:18,080 --> 01:11:22,680
Speaker 2: Music Row, and uh, and sing some demos. And so

1035
01:11:22,720 --> 01:11:26,760
Speaker 2: the first thing, the thing I ever sang, uh, that

1036
01:11:26,960 --> 01:11:29,840
Speaker 2: was recorded, was in that building. And that's that's where

1037
01:11:29,840 --> 01:11:33,640
Speaker 2: my studio is today. His his studio was on the

1038
01:11:33,680 --> 01:11:39,640
Speaker 2: first floor. Mine's mine's on the third floor. Oh but

1039
01:11:39,760 --> 01:11:42,759
Speaker 2: I in one way or another, I've been making music

1040
01:11:42,840 --> 01:11:44,679
Speaker 2: in that building ever since I got to town.

1041
01:11:45,840 --> 01:11:50,920
Speaker 1: Okay, so you meet Perkins and he says, come sing

1042
01:11:50,960 --> 01:11:54,080
Speaker 1: on the demos. What happens after that.

1043
01:11:56,760 --> 01:11:59,920
Speaker 2: Well, I met some other folks, and you know, once

1044
01:12:00,240 --> 01:12:05,040
Speaker 2: they start passing around these songs trying to get somebody

1045
01:12:05,040 --> 01:12:08,040
Speaker 2: to cut these songs, your voice is going around with them.

1046
01:12:09,040 --> 01:12:11,200
Speaker 2: One of the first things he had me do was

1047
01:12:11,200 --> 01:12:16,880
Speaker 2: a duet and with a singer I didn't know at

1048
01:12:16,920 --> 01:12:20,680
Speaker 2: the time. Again, I'm new to town. Everybody's new to me. Well,

1049
01:12:20,680 --> 01:12:24,160
Speaker 2: this gal comes in and she's about twelve months pregnant

1050
01:12:25,040 --> 01:12:27,960
Speaker 2: and she, I mean, you know, that turkey button was

1051
01:12:28,040 --> 01:12:31,240
Speaker 2: just looked like it had popped three weeks ago. She

1052
01:12:31,479 --> 01:12:35,080
Speaker 2: was very pregnant, about to give birth to this baby.

1053
01:12:35,680 --> 01:12:38,160
Speaker 2: And walked in there, and I mean, within twenty minutes

1054
01:12:38,200 --> 01:12:40,759
Speaker 2: had just delivered one of the best vocals I've ever heard.

1055
01:12:40,960 --> 01:12:45,280
Speaker 2: I knew people could sing like that. And she walked

1056
01:12:45,280 --> 01:12:48,280
Speaker 2: out and he explained to me, he said, that's Gretchen Wilson.

1057
01:12:48,320 --> 01:12:51,840
Speaker 2: You're gonna be hearing that name, and boy did everybody

1058
01:12:51,880 --> 01:12:55,840
Speaker 2: hear that name. After that, she was something else.

1059
01:12:56,640 --> 01:12:59,240
Speaker 1: So that was before her redneck woman hit.

1060
01:13:00,720 --> 01:13:03,200
Speaker 2: Yes, sir, and she she pretty much taught me what

1061
01:13:03,320 --> 01:13:05,559
Speaker 2: it was like to walk in a studio and deliver

1062
01:13:06,520 --> 01:13:10,960
Speaker 2: a vocal performance. You know, you could lollygag around in

1063
01:13:11,000 --> 01:13:13,719
Speaker 2: there for three hours and get something that sounds like crap,

1064
01:13:13,840 --> 01:13:16,240
Speaker 2: or you can you can walk in there and just

1065
01:13:16,600 --> 01:13:18,880
Speaker 2: pour the coals to it and be done in ten

1066
01:13:18,960 --> 01:13:21,760
Speaker 2: minutes and you make a make a good sized check.

1067
01:13:22,080 --> 01:13:24,880
Speaker 1: So, so what is the trick?

1068
01:13:27,000 --> 01:13:31,679
Speaker 2: Open up? Don't don't be so reserved with it. Don't

1069
01:13:31,680 --> 01:13:34,800
Speaker 2: be in there humming around trying to figure out you know,

1070
01:13:34,840 --> 01:13:37,639
Speaker 2: you got to go in there with everything you got,

1071
01:13:37,760 --> 01:13:41,240
Speaker 2: let that personality come open, and then try to reel

1072
01:13:41,320 --> 01:13:45,599
Speaker 2: that back in if it's too much. But uh, that's

1073
01:13:45,640 --> 01:13:48,160
Speaker 2: what that's what I learned from watching her do it.

1074
01:13:48,960 --> 01:13:53,280
Speaker 1: Okay, you're selling point for these demos, Perkins or somebody else.

1075
01:13:53,360 --> 01:13:58,240
Speaker 1: Immediately realized you had a signature, very unique and great voices.

1076
01:13:58,320 --> 01:13:59,679
Speaker 1: That what made it happen.

1077
01:14:02,680 --> 01:14:05,960
Speaker 2: I would say, it's what God it started, you know,

1078
01:14:06,280 --> 01:14:11,120
Speaker 2: But once people start hearing your voice, after that, it's

1079
01:14:11,200 --> 01:14:14,320
Speaker 2: like that, it's how many times do they hear your voice?

1080
01:14:14,479 --> 01:14:17,120
Speaker 2: If every time they hear a song and they go,

1081
01:14:17,360 --> 01:14:19,439
Speaker 2: who in the hell is that singing? And it's your

1082
01:14:19,560 --> 01:14:23,840
Speaker 2: name that comes out, they go, man, that guy, and

1083
01:14:23,880 --> 01:14:27,040
Speaker 2: they start marking your name. And so I guess over

1084
01:14:27,360 --> 01:14:30,200
Speaker 2: the course of a few years, I must have sang

1085
01:14:30,280 --> 01:14:36,519
Speaker 2: a couple of thousand demos, and I became that guy

1086
01:14:36,600 --> 01:14:40,559
Speaker 2: that everybody recognized my voice even if we'd never met.

1087
01:14:42,000 --> 01:14:45,320
Speaker 1: And at the time, will you pling out it all?

1088
01:14:45,439 --> 01:14:46,960
Speaker 1: Or its all like recording?

1089
01:14:48,840 --> 01:14:53,000
Speaker 2: I was always playing out in the bars if I could,

1090
01:14:53,920 --> 01:14:59,160
Speaker 2: and I was also doing writer shows. Anytime I could

1091
01:15:00,280 --> 01:15:02,400
Speaker 2: get out in front of a crowd, I was, I

1092
01:15:02,479 --> 01:15:06,240
Speaker 2: was going to I played a writer's round one night.

1093
01:15:06,479 --> 01:15:08,800
Speaker 2: A buddy of mine that was he actually produced a

1094
01:15:08,840 --> 01:15:12,080
Speaker 2: record on me, Dave Brainer invited me to do this

1095
01:15:12,160 --> 01:15:16,599
Speaker 2: writer's round around two thousand and one, and I remember

1096
01:15:16,600 --> 01:15:19,959
Speaker 2: that because it was about a week after nine eleven,

1097
01:15:21,280 --> 01:15:24,439
Speaker 2: and uh, I went and played this writer's round and

1098
01:15:24,479 --> 01:15:26,760
Speaker 2: on the other end of the round from me was

1099
01:15:27,040 --> 01:15:32,880
Speaker 2: Randy Hardison. Randy was a studio drummer and a hell

1100
01:15:32,920 --> 01:15:38,000
Speaker 2: of a songwriter. And I learned that that night, when

1101
01:15:38,080 --> 01:15:41,280
Speaker 2: when every song that I did followed one that you

1102
01:15:41,320 --> 01:15:44,599
Speaker 2: know that Randy sang, I learned that my songs suck

1103
01:15:46,160 --> 01:15:50,799
Speaker 2: that you know, he had these these top level songs

1104
01:15:50,880 --> 01:15:55,000
Speaker 2: down there and and and perfect delivery, and uh, I

1105
01:15:55,360 --> 01:15:58,720
Speaker 2: realized all I was doing was singing down here. When

1106
01:15:58,720 --> 01:16:03,320
Speaker 2: we got done with that round, he and I traded

1107
01:16:03,439 --> 01:16:06,600
Speaker 2: numbers and he's He's the one that got me to

1108
01:16:06,600 --> 01:16:09,479
Speaker 2: Buddy Cannon. He's the one that introduced me to Buddy

1109
01:16:09,479 --> 01:16:15,000
Speaker 2: and Noroh and Buddy and I have been friends ever since.

1110
01:16:15,800 --> 01:16:19,240
Speaker 1: Okay, so you know you ultimately had a couple of

1111
01:16:19,320 --> 01:16:23,360
Speaker 1: huge hits like Hockey Talk Badonka Donk. When did you

1112
01:16:23,439 --> 01:16:27,280
Speaker 1: start writing songs that were circulated and how did that

1113
01:16:27,360 --> 01:16:30,400
Speaker 1: happen as supposed to just singing on demos.

1114
01:16:34,360 --> 01:16:37,280
Speaker 2: I was already working on an album in two thousand

1115
01:16:37,320 --> 01:16:43,080
Speaker 2: and one and with with Dave, which we released it

1116
01:16:43,120 --> 01:16:47,000
Speaker 2: on my own and uh May of two thousand and two,

1117
01:16:48,400 --> 01:16:50,400
Speaker 2: so that that would have been the first stuff that

1118
01:16:50,720 --> 01:16:52,519
Speaker 2: I put out there. I put it out. It was

1119
01:16:52,800 --> 01:17:00,760
Speaker 2: a record called They Called Me Country and even at

1120
01:17:00,760 --> 01:17:03,880
Speaker 2: the same time then I'm still singing demos and singing

1121
01:17:04,240 --> 01:17:08,200
Speaker 2: singing songs for everybody else as a songwriter. That that

1122
01:17:08,200 --> 01:17:11,559
Speaker 2: would have been the first stuff. Uh, but donka don't

1123
01:17:11,600 --> 01:17:15,880
Speaker 2: came later. And this this was after meeting a bunch

1124
01:17:15,920 --> 01:17:23,040
Speaker 2: of studio musicians. You know, Randy Hardison, he got killed

1125
01:17:24,200 --> 01:17:28,920
Speaker 2: probably with I don't know man, six months after I

1126
01:17:29,000 --> 01:17:33,240
Speaker 2: met him. We were talking about doing a record together

1127
01:17:33,400 --> 01:17:37,960
Speaker 2: and and you know, writing together and all this kind

1128
01:17:37,960 --> 01:17:40,040
Speaker 2: of thing, but we didn't even have enough time to

1129
01:17:40,040 --> 01:17:44,920
Speaker 2: get anything on the calendar. Really yeah, and uh, and

1130
01:17:44,960 --> 01:17:50,360
Speaker 2: he was well, I say, murdered, even though them guys

1131
01:17:50,400 --> 01:17:54,759
Speaker 2: got off from from it, but they still killed my friend.

1132
01:18:01,280 --> 01:18:03,600
Speaker 2: But through him, I got to meet a bunch of

1133
01:18:03,600 --> 01:18:07,360
Speaker 2: other studio musicians and I kind of learned by that

1134
01:18:07,479 --> 01:18:11,759
Speaker 2: time the ropes of the demo business. So I started

1135
01:18:11,920 --> 01:18:19,519
Speaker 2: hanging out with other writers that had publishing deals and

1136
01:18:20,080 --> 01:18:23,759
Speaker 2: was starting to kind of I had booked my first

1137
01:18:23,800 --> 01:18:29,240
Speaker 2: session that em I was helping me with, and at

1138
01:18:29,280 --> 01:18:31,360
Speaker 2: the time I wasn't even signed to em I, but

1139
01:18:31,400 --> 01:18:33,760
Speaker 2: they were willing to pay for a session or two

1140
01:18:34,880 --> 01:18:39,719
Speaker 2: on good faith. And I had written this great song

1141
01:18:39,800 --> 01:18:43,960
Speaker 2: the night before and I couldn't wait to get into

1142
01:18:44,000 --> 01:18:47,479
Speaker 2: the studio the next day because it was my first

1143
01:18:47,520 --> 01:18:51,559
Speaker 2: tracking session on these new demos. Well, I was gonna

1144
01:18:51,560 --> 01:18:54,880
Speaker 2: bump the donk a donk off of that session, but

1145
01:18:54,960 --> 01:18:57,280
Speaker 2: I'd been out drinking the night before. I think I

1146
01:18:57,360 --> 01:19:00,559
Speaker 2: was playing that new song for Luke Bryan hanging out

1147
01:19:00,600 --> 01:19:03,200
Speaker 2: in the car of the parking lot in front of

1148
01:19:03,280 --> 01:19:09,280
Speaker 2: tin roof, and uh whatever whatever happened next. I remember

1149
01:19:09,320 --> 01:19:12,840
Speaker 2: I was late to the session by about ten minutes

1150
01:19:12,960 --> 01:19:14,760
Speaker 2: or so, and when I walked in, the band was

1151
01:19:14,800 --> 01:19:20,720
Speaker 2: already playing Badonka dont I thought, was it too late

1152
01:19:20,760 --> 01:19:22,240
Speaker 2: for that? I guess.

1153
01:19:24,120 --> 01:19:28,320
Speaker 1: So you were hanging with Luke Bryant before he had

1154
01:19:28,400 --> 01:19:28,760
Speaker 1: a deal.

1155
01:19:30,560 --> 01:19:34,840
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, we were. We were all kind of yeah,

1156
01:19:35,800 --> 01:19:41,519
Speaker 2: just good friends back then. You know, there was a

1157
01:19:41,720 --> 01:19:43,680
Speaker 2: there was a group of us that hung out and

1158
01:19:43,720 --> 01:19:46,920
Speaker 2: the bars together, and we all knew each other from

1159
01:19:47,000 --> 01:19:49,880
Speaker 2: the writers rounds and from the from the various things

1160
01:19:49,880 --> 01:19:57,960
Speaker 2: that we were all getting into. Yeah, Randy uh Howser

1161
01:19:58,040 --> 01:20:04,200
Speaker 2: is a good friend of mine. Jared Nehman, Dallas Davidson,

1162
01:20:04,320 --> 01:20:11,000
Speaker 2: Rob Hatch, we were all friends back then and supported

1163
01:20:11,040 --> 01:20:14,639
Speaker 2: each other. It was wasn't a competitive thing, you know,

1164
01:20:14,760 --> 01:20:17,439
Speaker 2: like you're trying to get somebody else's gig or nothing

1165
01:20:17,560 --> 01:20:21,080
Speaker 2: like that. If I find out these guys are playing somewhere,

1166
01:20:21,479 --> 01:20:24,080
Speaker 2: I'm gonna go hang out and support, just be there

1167
01:20:24,120 --> 01:20:26,800
Speaker 2: for them, you know. Plus it's good music.

1168
01:20:34,560 --> 01:20:40,000
Speaker 1: The people who had success of a grander scale, like

1169
01:20:40,160 --> 01:20:44,480
Speaker 1: Luke Bryan. Did you see that in advance? Were you surprised?

1170
01:20:46,400 --> 01:20:50,160
Speaker 2: Oh? I wasn't surprised, but nobody. You couldn't predict that

1171
01:20:50,240 --> 01:20:53,600
Speaker 2: stuff back then. You know, I couldn't look over that

1172
01:20:53,680 --> 01:20:57,320
Speaker 2: group of friends and decided in advance who was gonna

1173
01:20:57,400 --> 01:21:02,920
Speaker 2: hit one over the wall. And you know, I knew

1174
01:21:03,000 --> 01:21:07,400
Speaker 2: every one of them was capable, and still are. You

1175
01:21:07,479 --> 01:21:09,519
Speaker 2: never know what to expect out of those guys.

1176
01:21:09,920 --> 01:21:13,840
Speaker 1: Okay, so the first album, m I paid for it.

1177
01:21:16,120 --> 01:21:20,040
Speaker 2: No, I paid for the first one. Actually, I'd have

1178
01:21:20,160 --> 01:21:22,960
Speaker 2: to correct myself on that. Mister Garner paid for the

1179
01:21:23,000 --> 01:21:28,920
Speaker 2: first one, John Garner. I paid him back though, if

1180
01:21:28,920 --> 01:21:29,760
Speaker 2: that counts.

1181
01:21:30,320 --> 01:21:31,640
Speaker 1: Do you remember how much it was?

1182
01:21:36,600 --> 01:21:38,559
Speaker 2: If I had to guess, I'd say it was probably

1183
01:21:38,640 --> 01:21:41,400
Speaker 2: about thirty thousand dollars something like that.

1184
01:21:41,720 --> 01:21:46,800
Speaker 1: Okay, you cut the album, what happens after you put

1185
01:21:46,840 --> 01:21:47,160
Speaker 1: it out?

1186
01:21:52,840 --> 01:22:01,320
Speaker 2: You can almost hear yourself going broke. It's a it's

1187
01:22:01,360 --> 01:22:04,840
Speaker 2: the sound of going broke. You play in your own album,

1188
01:22:04,960 --> 01:22:07,280
Speaker 2: in your own truck, going up and down the road.

1189
01:22:08,479 --> 01:22:12,759
Speaker 2: It's not like any kind of there's an immediate change,

1190
01:22:12,800 --> 01:22:16,720
Speaker 2: and suddenly I'm, you know, hearing the sounds of registers

1191
01:22:16,840 --> 01:22:20,759
Speaker 2: ring in the background. I think I printed two thousand

1192
01:22:20,880 --> 01:22:26,080
Speaker 2: copies of that album, and we probably sold half of them,

1193
01:22:27,560 --> 01:22:32,040
Speaker 2: and I gave a bunch of them away to the

1194
01:22:32,160 --> 01:22:35,760
Speaker 2: USO at one point. And I still get a lot

1195
01:22:35,800 --> 01:22:38,040
Speaker 2: of those guys and gals and bring me their copy

1196
01:22:38,120 --> 01:22:45,080
Speaker 2: to sign that they got when they were overseas. Of

1197
01:22:45,120 --> 01:22:48,120
Speaker 2: course I see them still. They people put them on

1198
01:22:48,200 --> 01:22:49,280
Speaker 2: eBay and sell them.

1199
01:22:50,720 --> 01:22:56,400
Speaker 1: So did the first album? Did it lead to something?

1200
01:22:56,479 --> 01:22:58,360
Speaker 1: Did it cause a certain success?

1201
01:23:00,960 --> 01:23:02,800
Speaker 2: I guess you have to look at it like it

1202
01:23:02,840 --> 01:23:05,439
Speaker 2: was a business card, and it made its way around

1203
01:23:05,439 --> 01:23:09,280
Speaker 2: to a lot of offices, and later on a lot

1204
01:23:09,280 --> 01:23:12,960
Speaker 2: of good opportunity came from that. People who wouldn't have

1205
01:23:12,960 --> 01:23:15,519
Speaker 2: taken a meeting with me otherwise, but because they had

1206
01:23:15,520 --> 01:23:18,920
Speaker 2: this CD sitting on their desk, you know, they had

1207
01:23:18,960 --> 01:23:22,960
Speaker 2: something that was at least somewhat representative of what I

1208
01:23:23,000 --> 01:23:29,760
Speaker 2: can do. I wrote just about every song on there

1209
01:23:29,840 --> 01:23:37,080
Speaker 2: with the exception of a couple of cover songs, and yeah,

1210
01:23:37,280 --> 01:23:41,240
Speaker 2: it definitely opened a lot of doors. E AM. I

1211
01:23:41,280 --> 01:23:45,439
Speaker 2: paid for the first demo sessions that I did after that,

1212
01:23:45,560 --> 01:23:48,559
Speaker 2: and they helped me a lot kind of getting my

1213
01:23:49,360 --> 01:23:54,000
Speaker 2: feed in the door of the labels. Back back in

1214
01:23:54,080 --> 01:23:57,320
Speaker 2: that day before it was before social media, and so

1215
01:23:57,760 --> 01:24:00,240
Speaker 2: the only kind of attention you would ever get would

1216
01:24:00,240 --> 01:24:03,360
Speaker 2: have been word of mouth in town. And it helped

1217
01:24:03,360 --> 01:24:07,000
Speaker 2: me tremendously to have the biggest publisher in town open

1218
01:24:07,080 --> 01:24:10,479
Speaker 2: all these doors and start pitching my songs to A

1219
01:24:10,640 --> 01:24:14,320
Speaker 2: and R representatives at labels. That's how I met Brian Wright.

1220
01:24:16,200 --> 01:24:20,360
Speaker 2: Brian was an an R rep for Universal of Mercury

1221
01:24:20,400 --> 01:24:28,439
Speaker 2: and MCA, and he's ultimately the guy that after a

1222
01:24:30,560 --> 01:24:37,400
Speaker 2: my attempt with BNA Records failed, I wrote in Color

1223
01:24:37,439 --> 01:24:39,479
Speaker 2: and a bunch of other songs, went and recorded an

1224
01:24:39,560 --> 01:24:43,599
Speaker 2: album called That Lonesome Song. And it was Brian Wright

1225
01:24:43,640 --> 01:24:47,360
Speaker 2: that brought me into Mercury Records in two thousand and eight.

1226
01:24:50,560 --> 01:24:54,160
Speaker 1: Okay, but you did make a record for BNA.

1227
01:24:55,680 --> 01:24:58,400
Speaker 2: Yep, it's called The Dollar And how did.

1228
01:24:58,240 --> 01:25:01,640
Speaker 1: That come to happen? What happened in the week of

1229
01:25:01,680 --> 01:25:02,439
Speaker 1: that coming out?

1230
01:25:07,760 --> 01:25:14,000
Speaker 2: Well, I guess the record would be an A. At

1231
01:25:14,040 --> 01:25:16,839
Speaker 2: the time, I kind of had a buzz going around

1232
01:25:16,880 --> 01:25:21,840
Speaker 2: town and there were some opportunity at some labels, but

1233
01:25:22,200 --> 01:25:26,080
Speaker 2: Joe Gilani was the first one to make me an

1234
01:25:26,160 --> 01:25:34,440
Speaker 2: offer and and put a record deal together, and I

1235
01:25:34,479 --> 01:25:38,720
Speaker 2: took the opportunity. It seemed like a It seemed like

1236
01:25:38,800 --> 01:25:42,880
Speaker 2: a great deal to me at the time. And you know,

1237
01:25:43,200 --> 01:25:45,160
Speaker 2: if I had it to do over again, I'd still

1238
01:25:45,200 --> 01:25:48,000
Speaker 2: do it. I probably would have done some things different,

1239
01:25:48,080 --> 01:25:55,639
Speaker 2: but I got to put out a a Buddy Cannon record,

1240
01:25:56,600 --> 01:25:59,320
Speaker 2: so I know it's a good record. It sounds great.

1241
01:25:59,360 --> 01:26:03,640
Speaker 2: Some of the songs on there I probably would not

1242
01:26:03,760 --> 01:26:06,600
Speaker 2: cut if I had it to do over. But it

1243
01:26:06,640 --> 01:26:07,639
Speaker 2: ain't a bad record.

1244
01:26:09,320 --> 01:26:12,479
Speaker 1: So how is it in with BNA such as you

1245
01:26:12,560 --> 01:26:15,800
Speaker 1: get on Mercury.

1246
01:26:17,160 --> 01:26:22,200
Speaker 2: Oh, I was kind of a problem child for Joe,

1247
01:26:26,240 --> 01:26:29,800
Speaker 2: and I've apologized to him since, so I could. I

1248
01:26:29,840 --> 01:26:31,880
Speaker 2: think it's all right to tell the story, But uh,

1249
01:26:35,160 --> 01:26:39,040
Speaker 2: I don't know. Like like you said about the Marine Corps,

1250
01:26:40,520 --> 01:26:44,720
Speaker 2: that discipline only goes so far with me. And I

1251
01:26:44,720 --> 01:26:47,280
Speaker 2: guess when I got my opportunity with bn A, I

1252
01:26:47,400 --> 01:26:49,519
Speaker 2: was done with people telling me what to do and

1253
01:26:49,560 --> 01:26:53,400
Speaker 2: what time to do it, and uh, it just kind

1254
01:26:53,439 --> 01:26:58,559
Speaker 2: of it didn't set well with me, So I stayed

1255
01:26:58,640 --> 01:27:00,719
Speaker 2: drunk a lot of the time. Plus I was dealing

1256
01:27:00,760 --> 01:27:06,280
Speaker 2: with a divorce and my life was changing in all

1257
01:27:06,360 --> 01:27:08,679
Speaker 2: kinds of ways, and a lot of it wasn't real good.

1258
01:27:10,400 --> 01:27:13,960
Speaker 2: And so that that deal lasted as long as it

1259
01:27:14,000 --> 01:27:17,200
Speaker 2: took to to try and push a single or two

1260
01:27:17,280 --> 01:27:21,479
Speaker 2: at country radio and country radio where that didn't embrace

1261
01:27:21,600 --> 01:27:26,400
Speaker 2: me at all. They I must have repelled them in

1262
01:27:26,479 --> 01:27:28,240
Speaker 2: a lot of different ways.

1263
01:27:28,920 --> 01:27:31,599
Speaker 1: Okay, we're in this scenario. Do you give up your

1264
01:27:31,680 --> 01:27:32,520
Speaker 1: d job.

1265
01:27:34,560 --> 01:27:38,000
Speaker 2: That would have been before that BNA record?

1266
01:27:39,520 --> 01:27:45,200
Speaker 1: So what happens first Mercury is interested or BNA says

1267
01:27:45,240 --> 01:27:46,719
Speaker 1: we don't want to work with you anymore.

1268
01:27:49,920 --> 01:27:54,120
Speaker 2: Well, Mercury didn't come until after BNA. But even when

1269
01:27:54,160 --> 01:27:58,160
Speaker 2: I did that BNA deal, after Joe had made me

1270
01:27:58,280 --> 01:28:00,920
Speaker 2: the offer, I still call Brian right and told him, man,

1271
01:28:01,080 --> 01:28:02,360
Speaker 2: just bring me an offer.

1272
01:28:03,600 --> 01:28:03,720
Speaker 1: Well.

1273
01:28:03,800 --> 01:28:06,800
Speaker 2: The reason I couldn't get an offer from Mercury at

1274
01:28:06,840 --> 01:28:12,960
Speaker 2: the time was because James Stroud had joined Lewis at

1275
01:28:13,040 --> 01:28:17,160
Speaker 2: Mercury and he had had a policy that he was

1276
01:28:17,200 --> 01:28:19,719
Speaker 2: going to be producing any new artists that were signed

1277
01:28:19,800 --> 01:28:24,200
Speaker 2: under the umbrella for that duration of his tenure there. Well,

1278
01:28:24,240 --> 01:28:28,120
Speaker 2: I already had a relationship with Buddy Cannon, and I

1279
01:28:28,160 --> 01:28:30,360
Speaker 2: was determined he was going to be the guy producing

1280
01:28:30,439 --> 01:28:35,720
Speaker 2: my record and I didn't Uh, I didn't see the

1281
01:28:35,760 --> 01:28:40,160
Speaker 2: need and it would have felt like a betrayal to

1282
01:28:40,240 --> 01:28:42,880
Speaker 2: me and I couldn't do that.

1283
01:28:44,640 --> 01:28:49,880
Speaker 1: Okay, So how did you get involved in writing give

1284
01:28:49,920 --> 01:28:52,439
Speaker 1: it Away? And Ladies Love Country Boys?

1285
01:28:56,120 --> 01:29:02,200
Speaker 2: Well, ladies love country boys? It was uh, kind of

1286
01:29:02,240 --> 01:29:10,360
Speaker 2: a nod to Ladies love Outlaws. That's been so long ago,

1287
01:29:10,439 --> 01:29:11,599
Speaker 2: I can't hardly remember.

1288
01:29:12,640 --> 01:29:13,680
Speaker 1: I remember.

1289
01:29:17,760 --> 01:29:22,519
Speaker 2: Very little. I can't e I can't even remember writing

1290
01:29:22,560 --> 01:29:29,120
Speaker 2: that song though, that's been a quite a while back. Now,

1291
01:29:31,200 --> 01:29:32,760
Speaker 2: what other one did you ask me about?

1292
01:29:32,800 --> 01:29:33,360
Speaker 1: Give it Away?

1293
01:29:33,840 --> 01:29:37,600
Speaker 2: I would give it away? Well, give it Away was

1294
01:29:37,680 --> 01:29:42,479
Speaker 2: kind of was written after the BNA deal, and that

1295
01:29:42,640 --> 01:29:45,320
Speaker 2: was my first time to write. I think it was

1296
01:29:45,360 --> 01:29:49,120
Speaker 2: my first time to write with Whispering Bill Anderson. Buddy

1297
01:29:49,120 --> 01:29:51,800
Speaker 2: had called me in and said, hey, you need to

1298
01:29:51,840 --> 01:29:58,680
Speaker 2: meet Bill. So we came in to write, and I

1299
01:29:58,800 --> 01:30:04,920
Speaker 2: had written that idea, but I didn't expand on it

1300
01:30:04,960 --> 01:30:07,400
Speaker 2: even in my notes. And so when I told them

1301
01:30:07,439 --> 01:30:13,760
Speaker 2: the idea, they asked me to explain it, and I said, well,

1302
01:30:13,800 --> 01:30:16,600
Speaker 2: you know, sort of like she was storming through the

1303
01:30:16,640 --> 01:30:18,679
Speaker 2: house that day and I could tell she was leaving,

1304
01:30:18,720 --> 01:30:20,559
Speaker 2: but I thought, all she'll be back. And she turned

1305
01:30:20,560 --> 01:30:22,400
Speaker 2: around and turn her pointing at the walls and all

1306
01:30:22,439 --> 01:30:25,400
Speaker 2: this stuff, and said, you see that, just give it away.

1307
01:30:26,760 --> 01:30:30,599
Speaker 2: Well I spit it out and something just like that,

1308
01:30:30,680 --> 01:30:34,720
Speaker 2: and Bill said, I love everything you just said. How

1309
01:30:34,760 --> 01:30:37,719
Speaker 2: do we incorporate that? That might be your whole first verse?

1310
01:30:38,479 --> 01:30:38,599
Speaker 1: Had?

1311
01:30:38,960 --> 01:30:41,439
Speaker 2: I had to back up the tape and play it

1312
01:30:41,520 --> 01:30:43,360
Speaker 2: just to find out what all I had said, and

1313
01:30:43,680 --> 01:30:46,960
Speaker 2: I wrote it down the way that it came out.

1314
01:30:47,080 --> 01:30:48,960
Speaker 2: She was storming through the house that day and I

1315
01:30:48,960 --> 01:30:51,240
Speaker 2: could tell she was leaving, but I thought, all hell,

1316
01:30:51,360 --> 01:30:58,439
Speaker 2: she'll be back. So that I remember we were sitting

1317
01:30:58,439 --> 01:31:01,920
Speaker 2: there talking about putting the mellow to all those words,

1318
01:31:03,320 --> 01:31:07,800
Speaker 2: and Buddy said, why don't you just let it be

1319
01:31:07,880 --> 01:31:13,280
Speaker 2: a recitation? And I remember hearing Bill Anderson go a

1320
01:31:13,360 --> 01:31:23,840
Speaker 2: recitation that's brilliant. The I learned a lot right with

1321
01:31:23,960 --> 01:31:29,559
Speaker 2: those two guys. You know, Bill Anderson, he is the

1322
01:31:29,640 --> 01:31:34,560
Speaker 2: consummate Nashville songwriter. He's had a hit in every generation,

1323
01:31:34,920 --> 01:31:40,519
Speaker 2: in every decade since well before I was born and

1324
01:31:40,720 --> 01:31:43,400
Speaker 2: just one of the greatest people you could meet, one

1325
01:31:43,400 --> 01:31:44,920
Speaker 2: of the greatest songwriters ever.

1326
01:31:47,320 --> 01:31:52,880
Speaker 1: So how long after you've that afternoon did he get

1327
01:31:52,920 --> 01:31:54,599
Speaker 1: to George Street and it came out?

1328
01:31:58,400 --> 01:32:02,360
Speaker 2: It didn't happen the afternoon wrote it. We put together

1329
01:32:02,439 --> 01:32:06,680
Speaker 2: a work tape and and I mean, I don't know

1330
01:32:06,680 --> 01:32:11,000
Speaker 2: how many times I even had that song demos over

1331
01:32:11,080 --> 01:32:14,439
Speaker 2: the years. I'd say within a couple of months. Though.

1332
01:32:15,120 --> 01:32:19,880
Speaker 2: My manager at the time was IRV Woolsey, and IRV

1333
01:32:20,000 --> 01:32:24,080
Speaker 2: was also George Strait's manager. And I remember I was

1334
01:32:24,080 --> 01:32:28,880
Speaker 2: in Myrtle Beach. I was working on one of the

1335
01:32:28,920 --> 01:32:32,720
Speaker 2: shows that I had booked, and I got a call

1336
01:32:32,800 --> 01:32:36,519
Speaker 2: from IRV and he said, George just cut your song.

1337
01:32:38,320 --> 01:32:41,160
Speaker 2: They were down in the shrimp boat in Key West,

1338
01:32:41,600 --> 01:32:45,920
Speaker 2: Jimmy Buffett Shrimp Boat Studio, and IRV told me, he said,

1339
01:32:46,240 --> 01:32:48,920
Speaker 2: you know, George just cut your song. Of course I'm

1340
01:32:50,280 --> 01:32:52,799
Speaker 2: doing double backflips on the other end of the line

1341
01:32:55,320 --> 01:32:57,639
Speaker 2: and I had to ask you, but I said, what

1342
01:32:57,640 --> 01:33:00,519
Speaker 2: what song are you talking about? They said, give it away?

1343
01:33:00,680 --> 01:33:02,840
Speaker 2: And I thought, man, I would have never thought George

1344
01:33:02,880 --> 01:33:05,599
Speaker 2: Strait would cut that, but I'm glad he did.

1345
01:33:07,479 --> 01:33:11,200
Speaker 1: Okay, what about what it became a huge hit. He

1346
01:33:11,360 --> 01:33:12,200
Speaker 1: went to number one.

1347
01:33:16,240 --> 01:33:20,640
Speaker 2: It felt in a lot of ways like redemption. It

1348
01:33:20,720 --> 01:33:28,519
Speaker 2: felt like I think I described it in a song.

1349
01:33:28,560 --> 01:33:32,080
Speaker 2: It felt like I'd been forgiven for all my wrongs.

1350
01:33:33,840 --> 01:33:39,160
Speaker 2: And it really put me back in the gear of

1351
01:33:39,200 --> 01:33:45,439
Speaker 2: writing songs and looking to record again. It's like George

1352
01:33:45,479 --> 01:33:49,120
Speaker 2: decided country music wasn't done with me just yet.

1353
01:33:50,840 --> 01:33:54,080
Speaker 1: Okay, you make a deal with Mercury and Luke Lewis

1354
01:33:55,240 --> 01:33:59,960
Speaker 1: and you make an album and Dave Cobb is the producer.

1355
01:34:00,240 --> 01:34:03,280
Speaker 1: Dave Cobb is one of the hottest guys in Nashville

1356
01:34:03,360 --> 01:34:07,160
Speaker 1: today and has been for like a decade at this point.

1357
01:34:07,560 --> 01:34:10,479
Speaker 1: But when you were working with him, it was at

1358
01:34:10,520 --> 01:34:12,880
Speaker 1: the very beginning. How'd you get involved with Deve Cobb?

1359
01:34:14,880 --> 01:34:20,479
Speaker 2: Well before Dave, I had already finished that album. I

1360
01:34:20,520 --> 01:34:23,360
Speaker 2: had already written everything I was gonna put on it

1361
01:34:23,400 --> 01:34:25,640
Speaker 2: and recorded everything I was gonna put on it. We

1362
01:34:25,640 --> 01:34:29,519
Speaker 2: were in the studio working on the mixes, and Shooter

1363
01:34:29,840 --> 01:34:33,719
Speaker 2: had introduced me to Dave before that, and Shooter Jennings

1364
01:34:33,760 --> 01:34:37,160
Speaker 2: and Shooter keeps telling me, and I mean now he's

1365
01:34:37,160 --> 01:34:39,439
Speaker 2: calling me every other day going, hey, you got to

1366
01:34:39,439 --> 01:34:43,040
Speaker 2: come work with Dave and I said, well, Shooter, I've

1367
01:34:43,120 --> 01:34:46,920
Speaker 2: already I'm already done with this record. You got to

1368
01:34:47,080 --> 01:34:49,479
Speaker 2: give me some time to get this thing. But he said,

1369
01:34:49,479 --> 01:34:51,720
Speaker 2: you don't need to release that record until you come

1370
01:34:51,800 --> 01:34:56,519
Speaker 2: out here and meet Dave. I said, all right, Well,

1371
01:34:58,080 --> 01:35:01,360
Speaker 2: I had this promotional thing I had to go to

1372
01:35:01,760 --> 01:35:09,320
Speaker 2: LA for for this show called Nashville and not the

1373
01:35:09,360 --> 01:35:14,160
Speaker 2: one that everybody got crazy about later on, but this

1374
01:35:14,360 --> 01:35:19,559
Speaker 2: was the preliminary version of Nashville. When they first told

1375
01:35:19,640 --> 01:35:24,400
Speaker 2: me about it, they said it was a documentary. Later

1376
01:35:24,439 --> 01:35:29,839
Speaker 2: on I heard the word docu soap, and it turns

1377
01:35:29,840 --> 01:35:33,599
Speaker 2: out this was what is it they call it when

1378
01:35:37,080 --> 01:35:41,400
Speaker 2: reality TV. This was before they ever had coined the

1379
01:35:41,400 --> 01:35:44,120
Speaker 2: phrase reality TV. This would have been one of the

1380
01:35:44,120 --> 01:35:48,640
Speaker 2: first kind of kind of things like that. And I

1381
01:35:48,640 --> 01:35:51,120
Speaker 2: had to go out there to promote that show. So

1382
01:35:51,200 --> 01:35:53,360
Speaker 2: I told Dave. I said, while I'm out there, let's

1383
01:35:53,400 --> 01:35:56,320
Speaker 2: take a few days and get in the studio. I'll

1384
01:35:56,320 --> 01:35:59,080
Speaker 2: bring all the songs that I've got. We could even

1385
01:35:59,120 --> 01:36:02,320
Speaker 2: write some out there, and if it doesn't work, you're

1386
01:36:02,360 --> 01:36:11,600
Speaker 2: eating the cost of this. And I really got to

1387
01:36:12,320 --> 01:36:17,280
Speaker 2: love Dave Cobb getting in the studio working with the

1388
01:36:17,800 --> 01:36:20,679
Speaker 2: band he had out there those guys were just starving

1389
01:36:20,760 --> 01:36:23,200
Speaker 2: for some good country music, and I happened to have

1390
01:36:23,280 --> 01:36:26,400
Speaker 2: a bucket full of it. We sat down and had

1391
01:36:26,439 --> 01:36:29,479
Speaker 2: the probably one of the best three day sessions I've

1392
01:36:29,479 --> 01:36:31,719
Speaker 2: ever been through in my life. It was just one

1393
01:36:31,760 --> 01:36:35,519
Speaker 2: song after another, and when I got done, I realized

1394
01:36:35,560 --> 01:36:38,400
Speaker 2: I now had a perfect conundrum. I've got to figure

1395
01:36:38,400 --> 01:36:41,880
Speaker 2: out what to do with all these songs. And so

1396
01:36:42,000 --> 01:36:44,640
Speaker 2: I got back to Nashville and t W and I

1397
01:36:44,680 --> 01:36:47,880
Speaker 2: sat there in the control room. We realized, Man, we're

1398
01:36:47,880 --> 01:36:50,160
Speaker 2: gonna we need to take a couple of these songs

1399
01:36:50,160 --> 01:36:56,519
Speaker 2: and put them on this record before we put it out. So, yeah,

1400
01:36:56,640 --> 01:36:59,680
Speaker 2: Dave Cobb helped me help me produce some of the

1401
01:37:00,080 --> 01:37:03,280
Speaker 2: that Lonesome Song, and then after that we put out

1402
01:37:03,320 --> 01:37:06,639
Speaker 2: that double album, The Guitar Song, which was a lot

1403
01:37:06,680 --> 01:37:13,000
Speaker 2: of those Dave Cobb produced songs on there. And yeah,

1404
01:37:13,720 --> 01:37:18,559
Speaker 2: he was a fine producer, but not in this way

1405
01:37:18,600 --> 01:37:21,639
Speaker 2: where like he's dominating the sessions and that sort of thing.

1406
01:37:21,760 --> 01:37:26,439
Speaker 2: David just has this finely tuned ear for guitar sounds.

1407
01:37:26,479 --> 01:37:29,400
Speaker 2: If I told him I really want to sound on

1408
01:37:29,439 --> 01:37:34,720
Speaker 2: this like Leonyard Skinnard in the seventies, he's going to

1409
01:37:34,800 --> 01:37:38,320
Speaker 2: know exactly what amp, exactly what guitar, and not just

1410
01:37:38,439 --> 01:37:40,479
Speaker 2: know what they are. He's got them hanging on his

1411
01:37:40,600 --> 01:37:44,320
Speaker 2: wall and go over there and pick up a nineteen

1412
01:37:44,920 --> 01:37:48,920
Speaker 2: fifty whatever, Les Paul, and here's a Princeton amp that

1413
01:37:49,040 --> 01:37:56,320
Speaker 2: you play that through. And a brilliant idea guy and

1414
01:37:56,360 --> 01:38:01,880
Speaker 2: a strategist in the studio. He doesn't waste time and

1415
01:38:01,920 --> 01:38:04,679
Speaker 2: he doesn't let it all slip away. He can really

1416
01:38:04,720 --> 01:38:07,320
Speaker 2: get to the heart of something really quick. He's a

1417
01:38:07,360 --> 01:38:12,360
Speaker 2: truly talented human band. So I stole Dave's band and

1418
01:38:12,400 --> 01:38:13,320
Speaker 2: took him on the road.

1419
01:38:15,439 --> 01:38:17,000
Speaker 1: You made him a full time producer.

1420
01:38:18,240 --> 01:38:21,120
Speaker 2: No, I literally stole his band. I took his drummer

1421
01:38:21,200 --> 01:38:25,080
Speaker 2: and the guitar player Raddy Cope, and I put him

1422
01:38:25,080 --> 01:38:28,040
Speaker 2: in my traveling band and took him on the road.

1423
01:38:28,040 --> 01:38:31,000
Speaker 2: And they've had to move to Nashville to steal them back.

1424
01:38:33,160 --> 01:38:36,960
Speaker 1: So you know, on that record and on the new record,

1425
01:38:37,760 --> 01:38:42,720
Speaker 1: another producer credited is the Kent Hardly Plea Boys, And

1426
01:38:42,840 --> 01:38:45,960
Speaker 1: obviously that's a joke. Knt Hardley Plea Boys, is that

1427
01:38:46,320 --> 01:38:47,680
Speaker 1: just basically.

1428
01:38:47,160 --> 01:38:52,479
Speaker 2: You No, No, that's my old demo band. Those are

1429
01:38:52,479 --> 01:38:55,439
Speaker 2: the guys I used to make a living with We

1430
01:38:55,439 --> 01:38:59,720
Speaker 2: were kind of we were just a squad of hooligans

1431
01:38:59,720 --> 01:39:03,120
Speaker 2: that figured out a niche where we could make a living,

1432
01:39:03,560 --> 01:39:07,160
Speaker 2: get the bills paid. All we were doing were cutting

1433
01:39:07,200 --> 01:39:11,640
Speaker 2: demos that for songs that other songwriters had written. You know,

1434
01:39:11,720 --> 01:39:15,360
Speaker 2: we'd get in there and chart them up, get a lyric,

1435
01:39:15,680 --> 01:39:19,200
Speaker 2: put them all together, tw do all the mixes, and

1436
01:39:20,160 --> 01:39:26,240
Speaker 2: we ran pretty much. It was like a cycle. You know,

1437
01:39:26,600 --> 01:39:29,439
Speaker 2: we could we could have all that that stuff done,

1438
01:39:29,479 --> 01:39:32,800
Speaker 2: probably knock out an album in four days, you know,

1439
01:39:33,280 --> 01:39:36,400
Speaker 2: track it one day to a couple of days, vocals

1440
01:39:36,400 --> 01:39:39,880
Speaker 2: and mixes, and have it turned in after that, you know,

1441
01:39:40,920 --> 01:39:42,519
Speaker 2: better than some people's albums.

1442
01:39:43,680 --> 01:39:46,040
Speaker 1: And you're still working with those guys today on your

1443
01:39:46,080 --> 01:39:46,679
Speaker 1: new album.

1444
01:39:48,439 --> 01:39:50,320
Speaker 2: Well, work is a strong word for it.

1445
01:39:50,360 --> 01:39:54,719
Speaker 1: But yeah, it's a strong word because you don't consider

1446
01:39:54,800 --> 01:39:58,800
Speaker 1: playing music work or there is something about the guys.

1447
01:39:59,000 --> 01:39:59,839
Speaker 1: What do you mean.

1448
01:40:01,360 --> 01:40:04,120
Speaker 2: It ain't work. We get together and hang around and

1449
01:40:04,200 --> 01:40:07,160
Speaker 2: somebody will play a work tape and next thing you know,

1450
01:40:07,200 --> 01:40:09,559
Speaker 2: we got the headphones on and we're laying it down.

1451
01:40:09,680 --> 01:40:12,640
Speaker 2: That ain't work. That's just loving what you do.

1452
01:40:20,880 --> 01:40:26,120
Speaker 1: Okay? On that album in color is on that did

1453
01:40:26,160 --> 01:40:28,799
Speaker 1: you realize that would have as much of an impact

1454
01:40:28,840 --> 01:40:29,479
Speaker 1: as it did.

1455
01:40:31,720 --> 01:40:39,559
Speaker 2: No and color came around after a BMI award show.

1456
01:40:43,280 --> 01:40:46,920
Speaker 2: So let me back up completely and tell you I'm color.

1457
01:40:46,640 --> 01:40:52,600
Speaker 1: Blind, right, Well you said that. Yeah.

1458
01:40:52,680 --> 01:40:56,920
Speaker 2: So they were playing some photos on the back wall

1459
01:40:56,960 --> 01:41:03,960
Speaker 2: of the BMI that night, and I really didn't gather

1460
01:41:04,160 --> 01:41:12,240
Speaker 2: until I saw Lee Thomas Miller. I ran into him

1461
01:41:12,280 --> 01:41:14,280
Speaker 2: on a sidewalk out in front of B of My

1462
01:41:14,960 --> 01:41:20,280
Speaker 2: a few days after that, and he was telling me

1463
01:41:20,320 --> 01:41:23,519
Speaker 2: about those pictures. He said, did you see at the

1464
01:41:23,520 --> 01:41:25,719
Speaker 2: b of MY Awards the other night those old black

1465
01:41:25,760 --> 01:41:28,559
Speaker 2: and white pictures they were playing on the wall? And

1466
01:41:28,640 --> 01:41:30,519
Speaker 2: I did. I was sitting there looking at him, but

1467
01:41:30,560 --> 01:41:32,639
Speaker 2: it didn't occur to me that they were black and white.

1468
01:41:33,920 --> 01:41:36,840
Speaker 2: And he said, I know what I see when I

1469
01:41:36,880 --> 01:41:39,800
Speaker 2: look at those pictures. I see Bill Anderson and a

1470
01:41:39,840 --> 01:41:44,760
Speaker 2: couple of random people. But I wonder what Bill Anderson

1471
01:41:44,840 --> 01:41:48,599
Speaker 2: sees when he looks at those pictures. Well, as soon

1472
01:41:48,640 --> 01:41:51,400
Speaker 2: as he started talking about black and white, my brain's

1473
01:41:51,439 --> 01:41:56,719
Speaker 2: over here on autopilot. And I remember growing up hearing

1474
01:41:56,800 --> 01:42:01,800
Speaker 2: about the Wizard of Oz when they had corrected the

1475
01:42:01,840 --> 01:42:04,240
Speaker 2: color and put it in code of color. And the

1476
01:42:04,240 --> 01:42:06,040
Speaker 2: big deal at the time was that It was an

1477
01:42:06,600 --> 01:42:11,920
Speaker 2: irreversible procedure that they did on the original tape, and

1478
01:42:11,960 --> 01:42:14,640
Speaker 2: so there was no going back and reverting back to

1479
01:42:14,720 --> 01:42:18,519
Speaker 2: the original black and white version of it. Once they

1480
01:42:18,560 --> 01:42:23,519
Speaker 2: did this, and I remember the big slogan was where's

1481
01:42:23,560 --> 01:42:26,719
Speaker 2: the diva? I see it in color? So that's hanging

1482
01:42:26,760 --> 01:42:30,000
Speaker 2: around in the back of my mind. And when he

1483
01:42:30,040 --> 01:42:33,840
Speaker 2: got done telling me, you know, what does Bill Anderson see?

1484
01:42:33,920 --> 01:42:37,479
Speaker 2: I said, yeah, you should have seen it in color. Huh. Well,

1485
01:42:37,800 --> 01:42:42,559
Speaker 2: we laughed and had that Dewey Cox moment where we're

1486
01:42:43,320 --> 01:42:47,040
Speaker 2: gazing off into the wilderness trying to see if some

1487
01:42:47,600 --> 01:42:53,320
Speaker 2: ideas come. But we wrote down a writing day to

1488
01:42:53,400 --> 01:42:57,000
Speaker 2: get together and write that idea. In the morning we

1489
01:42:57,080 --> 01:43:00,600
Speaker 2: got together, we were still poor in the coffee, and

1490
01:43:00,840 --> 01:43:04,680
Speaker 2: James Otto called me and said his co writers had

1491
01:43:04,720 --> 01:43:07,840
Speaker 2: canceled on him that day. I said, well, me and

1492
01:43:07,960 --> 01:43:09,960
Speaker 2: Lee are about to sit down and write this song

1493
01:43:10,360 --> 01:43:12,639
Speaker 2: and it ought to be a pretty easy rite. Why

1494
01:43:12,640 --> 01:43:18,160
Speaker 2: don't you come over here and join us. So when

1495
01:43:18,160 --> 01:43:20,320
Speaker 2: we got done with the song, we realized we had

1496
01:43:20,360 --> 01:43:25,360
Speaker 2: put a little bit of each of our grandfathers in

1497
01:43:25,520 --> 01:43:28,840
Speaker 2: that song. And I didn't really realize even then that

1498
01:43:28,880 --> 01:43:32,559
Speaker 2: we had written a song that was based on an

1499
01:43:32,680 --> 01:43:40,120
Speaker 2: entire generation. It was really based on our personal experiences,

1500
01:43:40,720 --> 01:43:43,160
Speaker 2: and the experience is just sitting there looking through an

1501
01:43:43,160 --> 01:43:48,559
Speaker 2: old photo album where everything's in black and white. Ours

1502
01:43:48,680 --> 01:43:51,160
Speaker 2: is the first generation that saw those old black and

1503
01:43:51,200 --> 01:43:55,760
Speaker 2: white pictures turn into color and saw color pictures turn

1504
01:43:55,840 --> 01:44:05,160
Speaker 2: into digital. So I guess that's where the idea impacts.

1505
01:44:06,880 --> 01:44:09,720
Speaker 1: Okay, stopping for a second, did you do a lot

1506
01:44:09,720 --> 01:44:18,439
Speaker 1: of those writing sessions still do? Okay? And the record

1507
01:44:18,560 --> 01:44:22,320
Speaker 1: was a huge critical success in commercial success, how did

1508
01:44:22,360 --> 01:44:22,920
Speaker 1: that feel?

1509
01:44:28,560 --> 01:44:35,080
Speaker 2: Everything got busy, I mean busier than you can ever imagine,

1510
01:44:36,680 --> 01:44:39,080
Speaker 2: Like you can't keep a calendar. You have to have

1511
01:44:39,240 --> 01:44:42,599
Speaker 2: somebody nearby who has the calendar, You have to have

1512
01:44:42,640 --> 01:44:45,559
Speaker 2: somebody else do the drive, and you got to have

1513
01:44:45,680 --> 01:44:49,479
Speaker 2: somebody else that can get us past security in these

1514
01:44:49,520 --> 01:44:52,840
Speaker 2: places because you're in a hurry. You know, you got

1515
01:44:52,880 --> 01:44:54,880
Speaker 2: a lot of things to do and very little time

1516
01:44:54,920 --> 01:44:57,120
Speaker 2: in the day to get them all done. So that

1517
01:44:57,320 --> 01:45:00,280
Speaker 2: was the first impact that I remember it having. I

1518
01:45:00,280 --> 01:45:02,120
Speaker 2: remember it was the first time I had to have

1519
01:45:02,200 --> 01:45:07,400
Speaker 2: somebody whose whole job it was to buy clothes for

1520
01:45:07,560 --> 01:45:12,000
Speaker 2: me because of all the different events we were doing

1521
01:45:12,040 --> 01:45:12,479
Speaker 2: that year.

1522
01:45:15,280 --> 01:45:19,000
Speaker 1: So after that cycle ends. To what degree did you

1523
01:45:19,080 --> 01:45:23,240
Speaker 1: have pressure from Mercury to have another hit.

1524
01:45:26,000 --> 01:45:28,519
Speaker 2: I don't know that there was ever any real pressure.

1525
01:45:28,960 --> 01:45:31,519
Speaker 2: I know that they had a high cost of living

1526
01:45:31,560 --> 01:45:34,479
Speaker 2: that they sent out the country radio and it was

1527
01:45:34,520 --> 01:45:38,240
Speaker 2: immediately rejected, And there was probably some other songs that

1528
01:45:38,280 --> 01:45:43,000
Speaker 2: we sent out there, and if there was a pressure,

1529
01:45:43,040 --> 01:45:45,040
Speaker 2: it was one that they didn't pass on to me.

1530
01:45:46,920 --> 01:45:49,880
Speaker 2: But over time I kind of recognized that country radio

1531
01:45:50,040 --> 01:45:52,559
Speaker 2: was never going to play my songs and it seemed

1532
01:45:52,600 --> 01:45:57,000
Speaker 2: like a big waste of financial resources to keep going

1533
01:45:57,000 --> 01:46:00,639
Speaker 2: around the country and asking them to. You know, every

1534
01:46:00,640 --> 01:46:04,000
Speaker 2: time you go out there and work a song at

1535
01:46:04,080 --> 01:46:07,439
Speaker 2: these radio stations, you're spending a lot of money to

1536
01:46:07,520 --> 01:46:09,960
Speaker 2: get around there to visit them. Well, I had already

1537
01:46:10,000 --> 01:46:15,200
Speaker 2: done by this time several times over and running up

1538
01:46:15,280 --> 01:46:19,400
Speaker 2: huge bills with these record labels wasn't what I intended

1539
01:46:19,439 --> 01:46:22,160
Speaker 2: to keep doing, especially if it was never going to

1540
01:46:22,200 --> 01:46:26,000
Speaker 2: pay off. So I kind of retired from from pitching

1541
01:46:26,080 --> 01:46:28,960
Speaker 2: songs to country radio. And that would have been around

1542
01:46:29,200 --> 01:46:30,280
Speaker 2: eight or nine.

1543
01:46:30,400 --> 01:46:33,800
Speaker 1: Really, So how did it end with Mercury.

1544
01:46:36,160 --> 01:46:40,879
Speaker 2: Well, it ended when Luke Lewis retired, That's what I figured,

1545
01:46:42,160 --> 01:46:45,719
Speaker 2: and I just really didn't want to make another record

1546
01:46:45,760 --> 01:46:50,840
Speaker 2: after that. You know, I was by twenty ten, I'd

1547
01:46:50,880 --> 01:46:55,800
Speaker 2: already had that concussion, and Luke retired. They brought in

1548
01:46:56,080 --> 01:46:58,559
Speaker 2: Mike Dungan, who was nice enough to let me out

1549
01:46:58,560 --> 01:47:03,120
Speaker 2: of my deal. But when when Mike and I first met,

1550
01:47:02,520 --> 01:47:06,120
Speaker 2: I I told him my heart just wasn't in it anymore,

1551
01:47:07,160 --> 01:47:09,240
Speaker 2: and uh, it was it was time for me to

1552
01:47:09,280 --> 01:47:13,320
Speaker 2: step aside. And uh, he was nice enough he let

1553
01:47:13,360 --> 01:47:15,240
Speaker 2: me out of my deal. And I think it was

1554
01:47:16,600 --> 01:47:19,880
Speaker 2: maybe two weeks later they had already signed Chris Stapleton,

1555
01:47:21,560 --> 01:47:25,040
Speaker 2: and hey, man, I couldn't be more proud. I was like,

1556
01:47:25,680 --> 01:47:28,960
Speaker 2: they nailed it. They nailed it. They got the best

1557
01:47:29,040 --> 01:47:30,280
Speaker 2: damson singer in town.

1558
01:47:30,880 --> 01:47:32,320
Speaker 1: Had you known Chris before?

1559
01:47:33,640 --> 01:47:37,240
Speaker 2: I didn't know him. I knew his wife, Morgan. Uh.

1560
01:47:37,280 --> 01:47:40,200
Speaker 2: We were both demo singers together, and she was also

1561
01:47:40,320 --> 01:47:43,559
Speaker 2: on B and A the same time that I was,

1562
01:47:44,520 --> 01:47:48,880
Speaker 2: and uh, she and I did some demos together back

1563
01:47:48,920 --> 01:47:52,240
Speaker 2: in the day. I knew of Chris because he was

1564
01:47:52,280 --> 01:47:55,679
Speaker 2: one of those voices that every time I got stunned

1565
01:47:55,720 --> 01:47:59,160
Speaker 2: listening to a song and asked, who is that? My God,

1566
01:47:59,800 --> 01:48:04,320
Speaker 2: that's Chris Stapleton. Jesus. He was one of those guys.

1567
01:48:04,360 --> 01:48:07,160
Speaker 2: It was just every time I heard his voice, it

1568
01:48:07,240 --> 01:48:10,960
Speaker 2: was distinct, it was as real and just as man.

1569
01:48:11,000 --> 01:48:14,080
Speaker 2: It was so good still is he's great.

1570
01:48:14,640 --> 01:48:23,400
Speaker 1: So it ends with Mercury. You've had the concussion. Do

1571
01:48:23,479 --> 01:48:26,400
Speaker 1: you think you're never going to make another record? Are

1572
01:48:26,400 --> 01:48:29,040
Speaker 1: you depressed? I mean, what's your state of mind? Then?

1573
01:48:36,680 --> 01:48:40,439
Speaker 2: No. I was absolutely convinced I had made my last record.

1574
01:48:42,040 --> 01:48:45,160
Speaker 2: I just knew it. I didn't have it in my

1575
01:48:47,960 --> 01:48:52,800
Speaker 2: I wasn't inspired anymore. You know. I'd made all of

1576
01:48:52,800 --> 01:48:56,400
Speaker 2: these records or recorded all of these songs, and I

1577
01:48:56,439 --> 01:48:59,760
Speaker 2: had yet to have any kind of financial success in

1578
01:48:59,800 --> 01:49:04,840
Speaker 2: the and the record business. In fact, somebody else owned

1579
01:49:04,920 --> 01:49:07,920
Speaker 2: my publishing and somebody else owned my masters, and it

1580
01:49:08,040 --> 01:49:10,280
Speaker 2: was one of those things. It was like I didn't

1581
01:49:10,280 --> 01:49:14,160
Speaker 2: get anything out of it. You know, radio never even

1582
01:49:14,160 --> 01:49:17,519
Speaker 2: played my songs. I got some trophies, but hell, who

1583
01:49:17,560 --> 01:49:21,800
Speaker 2: wants that, you know? So it just didn't do me

1584
01:49:21,880 --> 01:49:24,639
Speaker 2: any good. And I was really done with it all,

1585
01:49:24,840 --> 01:49:27,719
Speaker 2: to be honest, and I just didn't have a reason

1586
01:49:27,760 --> 01:49:32,040
Speaker 2: to make another to record another session. I didn't want

1587
01:49:32,080 --> 01:49:39,120
Speaker 2: to do it. And I still had friends that would

1588
01:49:39,240 --> 01:49:42,320
Speaker 2: hate come sing on the song with me. And you know,

1589
01:49:43,520 --> 01:49:46,040
Speaker 2: do stuff like that here and there, and I guess

1590
01:49:46,040 --> 01:49:49,240
Speaker 2: I had enough of that. Where I was still appearing

1591
01:49:49,280 --> 01:49:53,919
Speaker 2: on fifteen albums a year, there were just everybody else's records,

1592
01:49:53,960 --> 01:49:58,559
Speaker 2: and you know, I was content with that for the

1593
01:49:58,600 --> 01:50:03,840
Speaker 2: longest time. It wasn't really until Toby Keith passed away

1594
01:50:05,320 --> 01:50:08,439
Speaker 2: that I kind of woke up and recognized that's the

1595
01:50:08,560 --> 01:50:13,120
Speaker 2: end of his contribution to country music. That's it. Whatever

1596
01:50:13,160 --> 01:50:16,200
Speaker 2: he's recorded up to this date is all we're getting.

1597
01:50:17,920 --> 01:50:21,800
Speaker 2: So I started paying attention to my own and realizing

1598
01:50:21,840 --> 01:50:24,479
Speaker 2: I'm nowhere near done. I got a lot of work

1599
01:50:24,520 --> 01:50:27,439
Speaker 2: to do. I got a lot of music I got

1600
01:50:27,439 --> 01:50:31,400
Speaker 2: to put out just to even get caught up. So

1601
01:50:31,680 --> 01:50:35,240
Speaker 2: that's what kind of got me back in the studio.

1602
01:50:35,560 --> 01:50:42,479
Speaker 1: Okay, but in that interim, you were continuing to work live. Yeah,

1603
01:50:42,520 --> 01:50:46,519
Speaker 1: But were your numbers going down because you had no

1604
01:50:46,680 --> 01:50:47,880
Speaker 1: record in the marketplace.

1605
01:50:51,840 --> 01:50:55,920
Speaker 2: I don't think so. I think it was quite the opposite.

1606
01:50:56,000 --> 01:51:00,320
Speaker 2: Brian Wright tells me all the time that those records

1607
01:51:00,320 --> 01:51:05,559
Speaker 2: are still type performing records at their label. The thing

1608
01:51:05,600 --> 01:51:08,280
Speaker 2: that happens is after you, when you're not on a

1609
01:51:08,320 --> 01:51:11,000
Speaker 2: major label, there's no more of the parties where they

1610
01:51:11,040 --> 01:51:14,439
Speaker 2: celebrate you now have a gold record, or your gold

1611
01:51:14,479 --> 01:51:17,719
Speaker 2: record's gone platinum, or now you've gone double platinum. And

1612
01:51:18,000 --> 01:51:20,840
Speaker 2: it wasn't until I put out another record where they

1613
01:51:20,880 --> 01:51:25,200
Speaker 2: are I aa uh, I think that's what it's called.

1614
01:51:25,240 --> 01:51:32,400
Speaker 2: And they've certified. They refreshed all their numbers one day

1615
01:51:32,400 --> 01:51:35,200
Speaker 2: and I got to see what some of these albums

1616
01:51:35,200 --> 01:51:37,719
Speaker 2: had actually done. And it's kind of nice.

1617
01:51:39,000 --> 01:51:40,960
Speaker 1: And you know, you rent up a lot of costs

1618
01:51:40,960 --> 01:51:43,400
Speaker 1: going to radio whatever. Do you make any money off

1619
01:51:43,439 --> 01:51:44,320
Speaker 1: the records?

1620
01:51:47,000 --> 01:51:49,160
Speaker 2: I suppose I've made a nickel or two. Now I

1621
01:51:49,200 --> 01:51:52,800
Speaker 2: don't know what all's recouped and what happened recouped. I

1622
01:51:52,840 --> 01:51:56,400
Speaker 2: think that's that's something for the lawyers and the CPAs

1623
01:51:56,439 --> 01:51:57,120
Speaker 2: to sort out.

1624
01:51:58,320 --> 01:52:00,280
Speaker 1: So how did you end up making a new record

1625
01:52:00,360 --> 01:52:01,280
Speaker 1: with Warner.

1626
01:52:05,160 --> 01:52:10,560
Speaker 2: It started with Brian Wright again when he and Stephanie

1627
01:52:10,680 --> 01:52:17,439
Speaker 2: left Mercury. His wife Stephanie that they left Mercury and

1628
01:52:17,479 --> 01:52:20,400
Speaker 2: I told him, I said, well, I guess we're making

1629
01:52:20,439 --> 01:52:24,280
Speaker 2: another record. He didn't have anything, He didn't have anything

1630
01:52:24,320 --> 01:52:27,680
Speaker 2: else to do, and I really didn't either. But at

1631
01:52:27,680 --> 01:52:34,640
Speaker 2: the same time, Chris Lacy, Chris and I pretty much

1632
01:52:34,680 --> 01:52:37,680
Speaker 2: started our careers running the same time, and We've been

1633
01:52:37,720 --> 01:52:41,200
Speaker 2: friends for an awful long time. Well over the years,

1634
01:52:41,240 --> 01:52:44,800
Speaker 2: she moved up through the ranks of a publishing and

1635
01:52:44,840 --> 01:52:47,599
Speaker 2: got into the record business and ended up with Warner

1636
01:52:48,560 --> 01:52:52,400
Speaker 2: and handed up in the in the driver's seat over there,

1637
01:52:53,800 --> 01:53:00,599
Speaker 2: And she came to me one day and just says,

1638
01:53:01,360 --> 01:53:04,479
Speaker 2: we're not done by a long shot. She says, I

1639
01:53:04,520 --> 01:53:07,720
Speaker 2: don't want a record from you in hopes that we're

1640
01:53:07,760 --> 01:53:09,559
Speaker 2: going to make a bunch of money off of you.

1641
01:53:10,400 --> 01:53:12,559
Speaker 2: I just want you to get back to doing what

1642
01:53:12,600 --> 01:53:15,280
Speaker 2: you were put on this earth to do, and get

1643
01:53:15,320 --> 01:53:18,639
Speaker 2: you back to making country music records. And I don't

1644
01:53:18,680 --> 01:53:24,560
Speaker 2: care what it takes. I'm here to help. And so

1645
01:53:24,800 --> 01:53:28,320
Speaker 2: I didn't have a reason not to anymore. And I

1646
01:53:28,479 --> 01:53:33,320
Speaker 2: just kind of I gave up on the whole idea

1647
01:53:33,360 --> 01:53:36,280
Speaker 2: that I would never make another record. I abandoned that

1648
01:53:36,400 --> 01:53:40,160
Speaker 2: whatsoever and just started from scratch and started back in

1649
01:53:40,200 --> 01:53:44,080
Speaker 2: the writing rooms. And man, it took me forever to

1650
01:53:44,160 --> 01:53:46,880
Speaker 2: figure out how to write songs again. You ought to

1651
01:53:46,920 --> 01:53:54,479
Speaker 2: hear them first ones I wrote. They're absolute garbage. It's

1652
01:53:54,560 --> 01:53:57,479
Speaker 2: like any kind of craft, the more you do it,

1653
01:53:57,520 --> 01:54:01,559
Speaker 2: the better you get. Really had to get back in it,

1654
01:54:04,000 --> 01:54:07,360
Speaker 2: and I mean with a lot of time invested in

1655
01:54:08,080 --> 01:54:12,560
Speaker 2: writing with some of the greatest writers that I can

1656
01:54:13,120 --> 01:54:15,720
Speaker 2: get in the room with, and Chris Stapleton was one

1657
01:54:15,760 --> 01:54:21,400
Speaker 2: of those. He really helped light my pilot light again

1658
01:54:21,439 --> 01:54:22,559
Speaker 2: and get me back to going.

1659
01:54:24,160 --> 01:54:27,160
Speaker 1: So how long to go did this process begin?

1660
01:54:31,720 --> 01:54:35,280
Speaker 2: I'm trying to figure it's twenty twenty five now. I

1661
01:54:35,320 --> 01:54:39,280
Speaker 2: guess this would have been uh as far as the

1662
01:54:39,360 --> 01:54:43,440
Speaker 2: record goes, probably two or three years now. As far

1663
01:54:43,480 --> 01:54:47,360
Speaker 2: as the writing, Chris and I really started writing together,

1664
01:54:47,480 --> 01:54:51,520
Speaker 2: I guess around twenty eighteen, twenty nineteen. We'd written some

1665
01:54:51,640 --> 01:54:57,240
Speaker 2: songs together back back around nine twenty ten, but I

1666
01:54:57,280 --> 01:55:02,600
Speaker 2: mean we really got to, you know, working together, around

1667
01:55:02,680 --> 01:55:04,680
Speaker 2: eighteen or so.

1668
01:55:04,680 --> 01:55:09,520
Speaker 1: So the album's been out for a while, you can reflect,

1669
01:55:10,760 --> 01:55:13,200
Speaker 1: what do you think about the experience having done it?

1670
01:55:15,960 --> 01:55:18,800
Speaker 2: I thank God every day that he put friends around

1671
01:55:18,880 --> 01:55:22,120
Speaker 2: me that loved me enough to remind me what my

1672
01:55:22,240 --> 01:55:27,200
Speaker 2: purpose is. It would have been easy for everybody just

1673
01:55:27,240 --> 01:55:31,640
Speaker 2: to leave me alone and that would have been the

1674
01:55:31,800 --> 01:55:36,680
Speaker 2: end of it. But I have all these people who

1675
01:55:36,720 --> 01:55:39,960
Speaker 2: love me in my life enough to make me get

1676
01:55:40,040 --> 01:55:43,560
Speaker 2: up and do it again. That wouldn't leave me just

1677
01:55:43,640 --> 01:55:44,240
Speaker 2: sitting there.

1678
01:55:46,240 --> 01:55:51,040
Speaker 1: And now that the project has finished is Warner, and

1679
01:55:51,080 --> 01:55:54,240
Speaker 1: everybody's still excited as excited about moving forward.

1680
01:55:56,400 --> 01:56:00,920
Speaker 2: I hope so I have an answer. I haven't checked

1681
01:56:00,960 --> 01:56:06,760
Speaker 2: the numbers lately, but I don't I doubt that even

1682
01:56:06,800 --> 01:56:09,960
Speaker 2: if it didn't perform well that they would give up

1683
01:56:10,000 --> 01:56:11,960
Speaker 2: on me. They seemed like such a great team of

1684
01:56:12,000 --> 01:56:16,200
Speaker 2: people over there, and you know, I really enjoy making

1685
01:56:16,280 --> 01:56:19,720
Speaker 2: records with them, and I really never thought i'd enjoy

1686
01:56:19,880 --> 01:56:23,480
Speaker 2: that aspect of working with a label. I always kind

1687
01:56:23,480 --> 01:56:25,720
Speaker 2: of looked at the at the labels and thought, man,

1688
01:56:26,280 --> 01:56:29,840
Speaker 2: I can't do nothing to make them happy. Every song

1689
01:56:29,920 --> 01:56:32,360
Speaker 2: I wrote was to this or to that, or too

1690
01:56:32,400 --> 01:56:36,560
Speaker 2: long or too short, or too country and not country enough.

1691
01:56:44,320 --> 01:56:45,839
Speaker 1: So how did you get sober?

1692
01:56:49,520 --> 01:56:55,080
Speaker 2: Well, that's a long story too. I got tired of

1693
01:56:55,120 --> 01:57:03,360
Speaker 2: waking up surprised I would. I was a heavy drinker

1694
01:57:06,520 --> 01:57:09,160
Speaker 2: and I wasn't a social drinker. It wasn't like I

1695
01:57:09,240 --> 01:57:12,400
Speaker 2: was gonna have two or three after work and then

1696
01:57:12,480 --> 01:57:18,280
Speaker 2: go home if I If I had one, I had

1697
01:57:18,360 --> 01:57:20,920
Speaker 2: just decided how the rest of the evening was gonna go.

1698
01:57:24,680 --> 01:57:27,640
Speaker 2: So drinking wasn't one of those things that I It's

1699
01:57:27,640 --> 01:57:31,200
Speaker 2: not like I didn't have the ability to stop. I

1700
01:57:31,200 --> 01:57:33,440
Speaker 2: didn't ever, just said that I didn't have a reason

1701
01:57:33,480 --> 01:57:38,280
Speaker 2: to see if I had the ability. I just really

1702
01:57:38,400 --> 01:57:43,080
Speaker 2: liked a drink, and I found out from years of

1703
01:57:43,160 --> 01:57:46,600
Speaker 2: therapy later that it was probably masking some other kind

1704
01:57:46,640 --> 01:57:53,320
Speaker 2: of pain or hiding something else behind it. I quit

1705
01:57:53,400 --> 01:57:58,440
Speaker 2: drinking in twenty eleven. I still taste it when I

1706
01:57:58,480 --> 01:58:05,880
Speaker 2: burt all these years later, seems like it's still fresh

1707
01:58:05,920 --> 01:58:09,360
Speaker 2: on my mind. I don't think I'll live long enough

1708
01:58:09,360 --> 01:58:17,120
Speaker 2: to forget what Jack Daniels tastes like. I quit smoking

1709
01:58:17,400 --> 01:58:25,200
Speaker 2: pot probably around twenty fifteen, and I didn't smoke for

1710
01:58:25,240 --> 01:58:30,000
Speaker 2: the longest time, And I also didn't write anything for

1711
01:58:30,040 --> 01:58:33,880
Speaker 2: the longest time, and didn't record anything that didn't have

1712
01:58:33,960 --> 01:58:38,160
Speaker 2: any passion for most of it for the longest time.

1713
01:58:40,080 --> 01:58:43,000
Speaker 2: And for the most part, I still don't smoke. But

1714
01:58:43,400 --> 01:58:45,720
Speaker 2: every now and then I may have one when I'm

1715
01:58:45,720 --> 01:58:50,240
Speaker 2: writing a song or something like that, if I felt

1716
01:58:50,280 --> 01:58:55,800
Speaker 2: like I needed to lift an inhibition or something. And

1717
01:58:56,160 --> 01:58:57,840
Speaker 2: what it is it is like you sit down to

1718
01:58:57,880 --> 01:59:02,800
Speaker 2: write and you get this washing negativity over you. It's

1719
01:59:03,360 --> 01:59:06,000
Speaker 2: it's the analytical part of my brain that I can't

1720
01:59:06,000 --> 01:59:11,000
Speaker 2: seem to get past. It's it's a bunch of cluttered

1721
01:59:11,080 --> 01:59:15,520
Speaker 2: up noise, and it stops you from being as creative

1722
01:59:15,560 --> 01:59:16,480
Speaker 2: as you should be.

1723
01:59:17,840 --> 01:59:21,320
Speaker 1: What were the triggers to stop drinking and to stop

1724
01:59:21,400 --> 01:59:22,720
Speaker 1: smoking pot?

1725
01:59:28,720 --> 01:59:32,280
Speaker 2: The main trigger to stop drinking drinking would have been

1726
01:59:32,320 --> 01:59:36,760
Speaker 2: my daughter. She was at the time seven years old,

1727
01:59:37,640 --> 01:59:43,200
Speaker 2: and was you know, you're being an example one way

1728
01:59:43,320 --> 01:59:46,680
Speaker 2: or the other, and up until that point in her life,

1729
01:59:46,760 --> 01:59:51,960
Speaker 2: I'd been a bad example and I was adamant about

1730
01:59:51,960 --> 01:59:57,560
Speaker 2: correcting that. So she she was a driving factor and

1731
01:59:58,320 --> 02:00:04,960
Speaker 2: quitting drinking. Pott was not really something I felt like

1732
02:00:05,040 --> 02:00:10,080
Speaker 2: I ever had any kind of issue with. I was

1733
02:00:10,120 --> 02:00:12,040
Speaker 2: always kind of, you know, take it or leave it.

1734
02:00:12,080 --> 02:00:17,080
Speaker 2: As far as POT was, I never saw the harm

1735
02:00:17,120 --> 02:00:17,320
Speaker 2: in it.

1736
02:00:18,000 --> 02:00:23,280
Speaker 1: Going back to drinking, when you stop drinking, you have

1737
02:00:23,360 --> 02:00:26,520
Speaker 1: to change your lifestyle because you're not going to the

1738
02:00:26,560 --> 02:00:29,640
Speaker 1: bar and your friends always say, oh, let's go out

1739
02:00:29,680 --> 02:00:32,560
Speaker 1: for a drink. What's wrong with you? How did you

1740
02:00:32,680 --> 02:00:35,560
Speaker 1: actually stop drinking? And how hard was the transition?

1741
02:00:38,880 --> 02:00:41,120
Speaker 2: Well, you're gonna have to change a lot of things,

1742
02:00:41,520 --> 02:00:43,240
Speaker 2: and that is one of the things I had to

1743
02:00:43,320 --> 02:00:48,640
Speaker 2: change was my entire social life was happening in these bars,

1744
02:00:50,120 --> 02:00:53,240
Speaker 2: and it wasn't much of a life to begin with.

1745
02:00:53,360 --> 02:00:57,200
Speaker 2: If I'm being one hundred percent honest. People tell you

1746
02:00:57,320 --> 02:00:59,360
Speaker 2: had a good time, but if you don't remember having

1747
02:00:59,400 --> 02:01:01,360
Speaker 2: a good time, did you really have a good time?

1748
02:01:04,240 --> 02:01:07,880
Speaker 2: So it wasn't doing me much good to begin with,

1749
02:01:08,720 --> 02:01:13,480
Speaker 2: and it was starting to damage my relationships beyond repair.

1750
02:01:14,800 --> 02:01:16,840
Speaker 2: And it was not something that I had to have

1751
02:01:16,880 --> 02:01:19,920
Speaker 2: a whole lot of coersion to make a decision that

1752
02:01:20,000 --> 02:01:23,320
Speaker 2: this wasn't doing me a lot of good. You know,

1753
02:01:23,800 --> 02:01:27,880
Speaker 2: I don't. If you know, there's people out there who

1754
02:01:27,960 --> 02:01:31,960
Speaker 2: can drink and it doesn't do anything at all. There's

1755
02:01:32,000 --> 02:01:35,480
Speaker 2: other people who when they drink, their life starts falling apart.

1756
02:01:35,520 --> 02:01:38,880
Speaker 2: And those people know what I'm talking about. When you

1757
02:01:39,440 --> 02:01:42,840
Speaker 2: drink and it starts impacting your relationships with people you

1758
02:01:42,920 --> 02:01:46,200
Speaker 2: love and people who love you, it's time to examine,

1759
02:01:47,120 --> 02:01:49,040
Speaker 2: and it's probably time to pull up and give it

1760
02:01:49,040 --> 02:01:49,560
Speaker 2: a break.

1761
02:01:52,240 --> 02:01:56,040
Speaker 1: So did you go to rehib did you go to AA?

1762
02:01:56,320 --> 02:01:57,600
Speaker 1: Did you just cool turkey?

1763
02:02:00,280 --> 02:02:04,280
Speaker 2: I'm a very stubborn man, and all I had to

1764
02:02:04,320 --> 02:02:08,080
Speaker 2: do was rewire the drinking into that part of my

1765
02:02:08,240 --> 02:02:13,400
Speaker 2: mind that makes me upset. And once I had it

1766
02:02:13,440 --> 02:02:16,800
Speaker 2: wired in there correctly, it was one of those things

1767
02:02:16,800 --> 02:02:20,120
Speaker 2: that I knew I didn't need any more help to

1768
02:02:20,560 --> 02:02:26,920
Speaker 2: deal with I'd already dealt with it. I realized that

1769
02:02:26,920 --> 02:02:30,080
Speaker 2: that sort of thing doesn't work for a lot of people,

1770
02:02:30,120 --> 02:02:34,200
Speaker 2: and so I don't advocate for that style. But if

1771
02:02:34,240 --> 02:02:36,160
Speaker 2: I tell you I'm going to do something, you can

1772
02:02:36,200 --> 02:02:38,840
Speaker 2: take it to the bank. And if I tell you

1773
02:02:38,920 --> 02:02:41,440
Speaker 2: I'm not gonna do something, there's nothing you can do

1774
02:02:41,480 --> 02:02:44,920
Speaker 2: that'll make me even reconsider my position on it.

1775
02:02:46,840 --> 02:02:51,440
Speaker 1: Okay, something you said at the top was you're an

1776
02:02:51,560 --> 02:02:57,480
Speaker 1: angry guy. Now, needless to say your regular demeanor in

1777
02:02:57,640 --> 02:03:02,560
Speaker 1: talking that doesn't come cross. But tell me more about

1778
02:03:02,600 --> 02:03:03,200
Speaker 1: your anger.

1779
02:03:07,000 --> 02:03:12,440
Speaker 2: I wish I knew more about it. It's it's not

1780
02:03:12,560 --> 02:03:16,040
Speaker 2: there always, And I don't know that I would describe

1781
02:03:16,080 --> 02:03:20,720
Speaker 2: myself overall as angry. I think I would describe myself

1782
02:03:20,760 --> 02:03:26,720
Speaker 2: as it was more like high blood pressure. It was

1783
02:03:26,800 --> 02:03:33,680
Speaker 2: like being being always at the at the brink of stress.

1784
02:03:35,360 --> 02:03:37,680
Speaker 2: You know, when your stress is at a perfect ten

1785
02:03:37,840 --> 02:03:40,600
Speaker 2: and any little thing can tip you over the edge.

1786
02:03:41,240 --> 02:03:45,960
Speaker 2: And I think that's what the concussion had done to me.

1787
02:03:46,800 --> 02:03:50,560
Speaker 2: It it had raised my stress level to a permanent level.

1788
02:03:52,440 --> 02:03:55,640
Speaker 2: Drinking didn't bring it back down anymore like it used to.

1789
02:03:56,760 --> 02:04:04,280
Speaker 2: Nothing did, and that that's the part that that sent

1790
02:04:04,360 --> 02:04:08,200
Speaker 2: me to the brain state technology and leke artists and

1791
02:04:09,320 --> 02:04:14,800
Speaker 2: all those guys to start getting I guess it's called

1792
02:04:14,840 --> 02:04:15,720
Speaker 2: brain balancing.

1793
02:04:17,760 --> 02:04:22,560
Speaker 1: I'm not sure. But the anger do you feel separate

1794
02:04:24,160 --> 02:04:30,480
Speaker 1: from other people in society and do things frustrate you?

1795
02:04:31,040 --> 02:04:33,320
Speaker 1: Is it that kind of anger? Or you're out with

1796
02:04:33,360 --> 02:04:37,040
Speaker 1: some people and somebody is just talking and you're saying, men,

1797
02:04:37,040 --> 02:04:38,680
Speaker 1: they just can't handle this anymore.

1798
02:04:43,480 --> 02:04:52,720
Speaker 2: No, it's not a It was more personal things, you know.

1799
02:04:52,840 --> 02:04:54,800
Speaker 2: It was more things that I had to deal with.

1800
02:04:54,880 --> 02:04:59,080
Speaker 2: I guess over time. I think the root word that

1801
02:04:59,160 --> 02:05:02,400
Speaker 2: I've been learning in the Bible here lately is forgiveness,

1802
02:05:03,800 --> 02:05:10,840
Speaker 2: And what does that really mean? To receive forgiveness means

1803
02:05:10,880 --> 02:05:16,480
Speaker 2: you have to admit having wronged somebody and you received

1804
02:05:16,560 --> 02:05:21,000
Speaker 2: the forgiveness as a gift, but you first have to

1805
02:05:21,080 --> 02:05:25,320
Speaker 2: repent and you have to do your best to make

1806
02:05:25,360 --> 02:05:29,240
Speaker 2: the thing right. And it's not a skill that a

1807
02:05:29,280 --> 02:05:33,120
Speaker 2: whole lot of people possess today. People don't like to

1808
02:05:33,160 --> 02:05:37,400
Speaker 2: admit they've been wrong. They don't like to admit they've

1809
02:05:37,440 --> 02:05:41,440
Speaker 2: done wrong or said something wrong, or you know, maybe

1810
02:05:41,480 --> 02:05:47,800
Speaker 2: betrayed a friendship, behaved in some way that wasn't appropriate

1811
02:05:47,960 --> 02:05:52,520
Speaker 2: or very friendly, and we don't like to be called

1812
02:05:52,560 --> 02:05:59,280
Speaker 2: out on our bullshit, and I guess that's coming and going.

1813
02:06:00,640 --> 02:06:08,320
Speaker 2: So what I'm learning is we're supposed to forgive as

1814
02:06:08,360 --> 02:06:15,920
Speaker 2: we're forgiven, and it's hard. It's hard to forgive, just outright,

1815
02:06:16,640 --> 02:06:20,120
Speaker 2: especially to forgive somebody who's never issued an apology for

1816
02:06:20,200 --> 02:06:27,200
Speaker 2: what they did. It's hard, but it's not impossible. And

1817
02:06:27,240 --> 02:06:28,720
Speaker 2: it was a lot of that kind of pin up

1818
02:06:28,760 --> 02:06:31,720
Speaker 2: frustration that I just carried with me for so many

1819
02:06:31,880 --> 02:06:37,000
Speaker 2: years and allowed it to eat me up from the inside.

1820
02:06:37,240 --> 02:06:40,880
Speaker 2: You know that holding a grudge poisons the vessel in

1821
02:06:40,960 --> 02:06:45,879
Speaker 2: which it's kept. That's what I was. I was a

1822
02:06:45,880 --> 02:06:52,160
Speaker 2: poisoned vessel for a while. It gets better every day.

1823
02:06:53,640 --> 02:06:58,040
Speaker 1: Well, that's good to hear, and I think, on that

1824
02:06:58,200 --> 02:07:03,200
Speaker 1: note of insight, we're going to leave it at that. Jamie,

1825
02:07:04,400 --> 02:07:08,080
Speaker 1: been fascinating speaking with you. I want to thank you

1826
02:07:08,160 --> 02:07:10,120
Speaker 1: for taking this time with my audience.

1827
02:07:12,160 --> 02:07:17,640
Speaker 2: You wrote such a wonderful column about my show out

1828
02:07:17,680 --> 02:07:20,320
Speaker 2: in Los Angeles one year, and I want you to

1829
02:07:20,400 --> 02:07:22,880
Speaker 2: know you put a smile on my face and made

1830
02:07:22,880 --> 02:07:26,520
Speaker 2: my heart beat a little bit prouder. And I appreciate

1831
02:07:26,680 --> 02:07:30,080
Speaker 2: all of the words of encouragement I've gotten from you,

1832
02:07:30,200 --> 02:07:32,400
Speaker 2: Bob over the years. Thank you.

1833
02:07:32,800 --> 02:07:34,920
Speaker 1: Well, you know, I remember it was at the Wilter,

1834
02:07:35,040 --> 02:07:39,600
Speaker 1: and I remember exactly where I was standing. I was

1835
02:07:39,640 --> 02:07:43,000
Speaker 1: a big fan and it was a great show, and

1836
02:07:43,080 --> 02:07:46,200
Speaker 1: it's great to finally pluck your feast to face.

1837
02:07:47,400 --> 02:07:49,600
Speaker 2: Thank you so much that it was the biggest pat

1838
02:07:49,720 --> 02:07:52,480
Speaker 2: on the back for me. It meant so much to

1839
02:07:52,560 --> 02:07:55,120
Speaker 2: me and I still wear that like a badge of honor.

1840
02:07:55,200 --> 02:07:55,640
Speaker 2: Thank you.

1841
02:07:57,400 --> 02:08:00,680
Speaker 1: While you're leaving me speechless with a smile, my thieves

1842
02:08:02,240 --> 02:08:04,280
Speaker 1: and I think we're going to leave it at that

1843
02:08:04,560 --> 02:08:07,360
Speaker 1: till next time. This is Bob leftstis