Speaker 1: Hey, it's Granger Smith. This is the Granger Smith Podcast,
Speaker 1: Episode nine. I had to learn a lot of things
Speaker 1: in the music business the hard way, through a lot
Speaker 1: of miles, a lot of years, a lot of failure,
Speaker 1: and in this episode, I want to talk about a
Speaker 1: fundamental time when everything changed for me. I saw things
Speaker 1: differently for the first time. Twenty eighteen's here. The tour
Speaker 1: is going awesome. We're in Ohio today halfway through this day,
Speaker 1: so I'm probably not going to finish the podcast until tomorrow.
Speaker 1: In Pennsylvania, it's so awesome to go out on stage
Speaker 1: and see ye Nation. And that's what we call our fans,
Speaker 1: our people. They wear the Yee hats and shirts and
Speaker 1: hold flags and signs. They're so passionate about the music,
Speaker 1: and that is what keeps me going. That's what fuels me,
Speaker 1: the fans. That's where it starts to me, and that's
Speaker 1: where it's going to end. One day, when I don't
Speaker 1: have any fans left, that's when I'll have to quit.
Speaker 1: But I didn't always think that way. It wasn't always
Speaker 1: about the fans. It was about, at one point climbing
Speaker 1: the ladder of music and making making songs and hopefully
Speaker 1: getting a record deal. But amazingly enough, you don't realize
Speaker 1: until later that it's the fans that provide all of
Speaker 1: that for you. And I learned it the hard way,
Speaker 1: and I'll tell you all about that. So once again,
Speaker 1: I'm in the back of my bus wild Flower, and
Speaker 1: it is cold, really cold in Ohio today. I'm looking
Speaker 1: out the window and there's about six inches of snow
Speaker 1: covering the parking lot of this empty venue, and that
Speaker 1: seems to be to be chasing us around. The cold
Speaker 1: weather is oh I mean, we are playing the Northeast
Speaker 1: and the Upper Midwest, and so you would expect this
Speaker 1: time of year it's going to be really really cold.
Speaker 1: You know. I asked you guys on the last few
Speaker 1: podcasts if you needed a question answered, then it would
Speaker 1: be easy. Asked the question on social media and then
Speaker 1: hashtag Granger Smith podcast and we'll keep on doing that.
Speaker 1: And I'm pulling them up right now, and I have
Speaker 1: a question from Matthew Porter. It says, why did you
Speaker 1: choose to rap the song B twenty four? I know
Speaker 1: your grandpa flew them, but would love to know why
Speaker 1: you made it into a rap song. Hey, it's a
Speaker 1: great question. Oh yeah, I got my clap down. I
Speaker 1: let it give right stuff, Granger Smith coming to your
Speaker 1: team thousand, I got my trigger cop and you won't
Speaker 1: lock me up. Round propellent, gold, boom and booming round round.
Speaker 1: That's how we fellow in the sky. And I'm sick
Speaker 1: and tired of contempt of every means of travel, every day,
Speaker 1: same game, with the same battle, bumpa bumpa traffic jam
Speaker 1: on the inter state. Back in forty one, they did
Speaker 1: it roll that way. I'm going back like that to
Speaker 1: the way they were when all the ladies look flying
Speaker 1: the min first you think of cadillacsy the only way
Speaker 1: to ride. If you want to find me, be looking
Speaker 1: in the sky and be twenty four running and be
Speaker 1: twenty I'm never gonna uss going more because now I'm
Speaker 1: flying in a B twenty four. So there's a lot
Speaker 1: of people that are probably wondering what the heck is
Speaker 1: going on. And that was a release by me in
Speaker 1: twenty ten, and there's a reason. It's not because I
Speaker 1: was trying to do a side project and try to
Speaker 1: be a famous rapper, especially with how terrible I am
Speaker 1: at rapping. Let me start at the beginning. My grandfather,
Speaker 1: as I've talked about a bunch, was a a B
Speaker 1: twenty four bomber pilot in World War Two in nineteen
Speaker 1: forty four. I found out a lot about this later
Speaker 1: in life because he never talked about it. But it
Speaker 1: wasn't until after he passed away that I read his
Speaker 1: flight diary and my dad put a lot of his
Speaker 1: stories together, and I was just I just could not
Speaker 1: believe what he went through as a twenty four year
Speaker 1: old young man in those skies in Western Europe. I
Speaker 1: actually wrote a song about just that. It's called five
Speaker 1: More Minutes. I get a call after I wrote the
Speaker 1: song five more Minutes, I get a call from this
Speaker 1: organization that actually had the last existing, still functioning B
Speaker 1: twenty four aircraft, and they wanted me to be able
Speaker 1: to go up and fly in it. Now that's I
Speaker 1: looked at that as an amazing opportunity, not only for
Speaker 1: me to experience that feeling in those sounds that my
Speaker 1: grandfather must have known so well, but so that other
Speaker 1: people could learn about the B twenty four as well.
Speaker 1: So I remember it very clear. One day I was
Speaker 1: outside and I was mowing the grass, and at the time,
Speaker 1: in twenty ten Lonely Island from Saturday Night Live was
Speaker 1: very popular, and they had a song out called I'm
Speaker 1: on a Boat? Does anybody remember that? And that's when
Speaker 1: it hit me that I could either go in and
Speaker 1: make this little video about me touring of B twenty
Speaker 1: four and talking about how majestic the plane is, and
Speaker 1: that video would get a few views. Or I could
Speaker 1: try to make a splash and I could try to
Speaker 1: make a song like I'm on a Boat and call
Speaker 1: it B twenty four and write a rap song and
Speaker 1: make this ridiculous music video from a country singer, and
Speaker 1: hopefully that would get a lot of views and would
Speaker 1: get a lot of eyes on the B twenty four.
Speaker 1: And we had a great time making it. The song
Speaker 1: was easy to write. I did it right there as
Speaker 1: I was mowing the grass. And you know what the
Speaker 1: plan worked, because here I am eight years later talking
Speaker 1: about it on a podcast, because you guys are wondering, Hey,
Speaker 1: what's up with that B twenty four songs? Last podcast,
Speaker 1: I left off with a story I was telling you
Speaker 1: about me putting out my very first album that I
Speaker 1: recorded completely in my own house in College Station, Texas.
Speaker 1: It was called Living Like a Lone star and I
Speaker 1: was very, very proud of this album. As you can imagine,
Speaker 1: I started from the ground up and I built everything,
Speaker 1: wrote all the songs, built, you know, everything from the
Speaker 1: kick drum to every guitar was right there with my
Speaker 1: hands on it. And so this was a piece of
Speaker 1: me that I really wanted to do good, and it
Speaker 1: really didn't. I think the album was centered around the
Speaker 1: song Colorblind. It was one of the first songs I
Speaker 1: wrote for it, and to this day, I think my
Speaker 1: favorite song I've ever written. And just hearing this now,
Speaker 1: it just kind of takes me straight back to where
Speaker 1: I was in my life in college station. I want
Speaker 1: to be color blind, and I would never think about
Speaker 1: your soft green eyes, Sweetland. Here would never cross my mind.
Speaker 1: There'd be no a black gown you slip into at night.
Speaker 1: Maybe I'd forget about your own brownskin, stop dreaming about
Speaker 1: the taste to sounding I wouldn't be heard now and
Speaker 1: listen you, I wouldn't know a single thing about It.
Speaker 1: Wasn't just that I worked hard on these songs in
Speaker 1: this album. It was that I poured my heart into it.
Speaker 1: I was telling stories that were mine, that were real
Speaker 1: emotions I was going through and when it was finished,
Speaker 1: I felt like it was a snapshot of my life.
Speaker 1: And I don't know why. At the time, I thought
Speaker 1: that just because I was doing that, people would hear it,
Speaker 1: latch onto it, and come to the shows. But they didn't.
Speaker 1: No one was coming to the show still, and I
Speaker 1: even had what I thought was good music, and that
Speaker 1: didn't matter. It's funny because now I'm sitting here, however,
Speaker 1: many years later, at a sold out show in Ohio,
Speaker 1: in between meet and greets, doing a podcast talking about
Speaker 1: not having fans. It's been a long journey, and I
Speaker 1: think I could pinpoint one specific time when it started
Speaker 1: to change. Back on the bus after meet and greet,
Speaker 1: and I brought a letter with me that I got
Speaker 1: from a fan, and I get letters a lot. Then
Speaker 1: I encourage them because I read every word. They mean
Speaker 1: a lot to me. And I found this paragraph in
Speaker 1: here in this letter that's very relevant to what I'm
Speaker 1: trying to say here in this podcast. Then it says next,
Speaker 1: I need to thank you for devoting so much time
Speaker 1: and energy into connecting with your fans. I've been a
Speaker 1: country music fan, going to twelve concerts a year since
Speaker 1: I was a twelve year old girl. No one has
Speaker 1: ever appreciated their fans the way that you do. And
Speaker 1: you know what, that is the compliment that I want.
Speaker 1: That's what I'm looking for. If I could stand out
Speaker 1: in any way. I want to be the guy that
Speaker 1: appreciates the fans more than anyone else. And I do
Speaker 1: that because of these days, these early days when I
Speaker 1: was making me music in every fan mattered, one at
Speaker 1: a time. I want you to remember a name, because
Speaker 1: this is the guy that first got me on the
Speaker 1: path of thinking this way. His name is Benjamin Knox.
Speaker 1: He's an artist, a local artist in college days in Texas,
Speaker 1: and he's a kind of a local legend. He draws
Speaker 1: pictures for Texas A and M and he's very good
Speaker 1: at it. And he liked my music. So he was
Speaker 1: a fan, and he would be one of the few
Speaker 1: fans that would come and watch me play. And after
Speaker 1: one show he said, hey, man, could I buy you
Speaker 1: a beer? I want to talk to you a little
Speaker 1: bit about what you got going on. And here I am,
Speaker 1: this young kid, and I said sure, And what he
Speaker 1: told me led me down a path that I'll never forget.
Speaker 1: This podcast is brought to you by the brand New
Speaker 1: album when the good guys win. I hope you guys
Speaker 1: hear it and let me know what you think. Let
Speaker 1: me know your favorite songs. That's really important. It helps
Speaker 1: me build a set list and know what you guys
Speaker 1: are really digging. It's also brought to you by eeee Energy,
Speaker 1: my energy drink that me and my others created, and
Speaker 1: I love this drink with you. In fact, it's almost
Speaker 1: showtime here and I'm about to crack one myself. And lastly,
Speaker 1: there's EEE Apparel, the badge of VEE Nation. Very soon,
Speaker 1: we'll have a brand new line of tanks and t
Speaker 1: shirts for the spring and summer. Go to grangersmith dot
Speaker 1: com for all that stuff. I always feel like I
Speaker 1: need to apologize for that low rumble of the Generator,
Speaker 1: but I guess that's the best I could do with
Speaker 1: a tour bus podcast. This is what Benjamin Knox told
Speaker 1: me that night when he bought me a beer, and
Speaker 1: I tell this same story over and over to opening
Speaker 1: bands that we tour with. So if you're an aspiring
Speaker 1: singer songwriter, are you no one that you'd like to
Speaker 1: share this message with? I think it's really important advice
Speaker 1: to hear now. Benjamin has a very successful business in
Speaker 1: College Station, Texas. He's a very talented painter. But he
Speaker 1: told me that he donates a huge portion of his
Speaker 1: proceeds to charities back into the community, the community that
Speaker 1: provides the career for him, the community that supports him
Speaker 1: and allows him to live out his dream as an artist. Now,
Speaker 1: he told me, not only was that important to give
Speaker 1: back to the community financially, but it was also important
Speaker 1: to him creatively. It was good for his soul, good
Speaker 1: for his heart to know that he was helping out
Speaker 1: the very people that are helping him. Now. It's easier
Speaker 1: said than done. It has to come from the right
Speaker 1: place right. It can't be manufactured. It has to be real, genuine,
Speaker 1: And it's not a new concept. I mean, Saint Francis said,
Speaker 1: for it is in giving that we receive. But what
Speaker 1: if you were like me and you didn't have any money,
Speaker 1: what can you possibly give? So I said, well, what
Speaker 1: does a guy like me do. I'm a starving artist myself,
Speaker 1: I have nothing. And he said, you have your music.
Speaker 1: That is your gift. And before you make any money
Speaker 1: in music, if you ever do, you have that that
Speaker 1: is your gift. And I said, well, that's easy to say,
Speaker 1: but how do I give it? No one goes to
Speaker 1: my shows, and he said, it's all around you. You
Speaker 1: got to open your eyes. And he's right, and to
Speaker 1: anyone listening now, I say, find your gift. Find your gift.
Speaker 1: And sitting there with Benjamin, he said, you know I
Speaker 1: got something for you. He said, I was having lunch
Speaker 1: today and I was checking out and there was a
Speaker 1: jar on the table and it said help Mendy walk.
Speaker 1: And the story was there was a girl that was
Speaker 1: in a car accident. She was paralyzed from the waist down,
Speaker 1: and she was going through rehab so that she could
Speaker 1: walk across the stage to get her diplomat graduation. It's
Speaker 1: a great cause and that was a good place to start,
Speaker 1: he said, Grater, you'll never believe how motivated this will
Speaker 1: make you, how happy it'll make your soul to be
Speaker 1: able to do stuff like this, and to keep your
Speaker 1: eyes open because it's not just Mindy, it's all around us.
Speaker 1: There's people that need our help, and all we have
Speaker 1: to do is be aware of that. He said. If
Speaker 1: you do that, if you give back, he said, I
Speaker 1: promise you, it will come back to you and your
Speaker 1: career tenfold, and I believe Tom. Here's a front floor
Speaker 1: swing at Jemima's house, and a little stream up in
Speaker 1: the mountains, a shot gun seed and an ocean breeze.
Speaker 1: There's the fairest wheel, just spending around a midnight moon,
Speaker 1: I shining down, a red sunset and a cotton dress.
Speaker 1: So here I am in Pennsylvania. We've arrived for the
Speaker 1: show tonight. Last night was great in Ohio. If you
Speaker 1: want to catch up with me, go to grangersmith dot
Speaker 1: com Forward Slash Tour. We'll be at a place very
Speaker 1: close to you soon, I promise. And if you want
Speaker 1: to meet me up close and personal, we offer VIP packages.
Speaker 1: We have gold and silver, and gold gets to go
Speaker 1: on the bus and get some solid time with me
Speaker 1: hang out. If you just want to meet me and
Speaker 1: take a picture, we have that option too. I love
Speaker 1: being able to meet you guys, and so those are
Speaker 1: really important parts of my day. Back to the story,
Speaker 1: Benjaminnox's words really resonated with me, And actually I went
Speaker 1: to that place that he had lunch and I looked
Speaker 1: up Mendy and I called them and asked if I
Speaker 1: could donate a concert, a benefit concert to help Mendy
Speaker 1: walk and I never heard back. But that wasn't the point.
Speaker 1: It wasn't about that. It was about me learning, me
Speaker 1: learning how to be a public figure, because a person
Speaker 1: that survives on the community needs to give to the
Speaker 1: community and think about community and genuinely care about their community.
Speaker 1: That's the price of the dream. It's easy to me,
Speaker 1: it's an easy concept. My mind changed from how do
Speaker 1: I get people to listen to this new album too?
Speaker 1: How do I get people to care enough to listen
Speaker 1: to this new album? And those were two very different things,
Speaker 1: and it wasn't eat. But as I started giving more,
Speaker 1: as I started becoming more aware of people around me,
Speaker 1: things started changing slowly, very slowly, but they started changing
Speaker 1: until something really big happened. At least for where I
Speaker 1: was at the time. It was the biggest thing that
Speaker 1: had ever happened to me in music period. And it
Speaker 1: was such a simple idea. Some of you listening to
Speaker 1: this might know the song we Bleed Maroon, some of
Speaker 1: you might not. But the truth is, in two thousand
Speaker 1: and seven, if you were a fan of me at all,
Speaker 1: it was because of we Bleed Maroon. It all started
Speaker 1: late one night, driving home from a show in Arkansas,
Speaker 1: and no one came to this show like usual. And
Speaker 1: as I was driving through the rain middle of the night,
Speaker 1: band to sleep, and I was thinking, I go out
Speaker 1: on the weekends and I play concerts, and I leave
Speaker 1: all the people that know the most about me. It's
Speaker 1: a small pocket of them, but I leave them to
Speaker 1: go out and try to win fans in other places.
Speaker 1: I'm forgetting about my own community. So I got to
Speaker 1: work and I wrote them a song. It's upon a penny.
Speaker 1: Old sully En wished me some luck in your farmer's fight.
Speaker 1: Were a boys or battle? Oh you're arm drown each
Speaker 1: other seeing how blocause that's what we do when we leave.
Speaker 1: This is how it all went down. I got home,
Speaker 1: I wrote the song. I recorded it, very simple, me
Speaker 1: and a guitar. I emailed it to a few people
Speaker 1: at the university and said, hey, here's this song. I
Speaker 1: wrote it. I know you don't know who I am,
Speaker 1: but maybe you could use it for something, a charity
Speaker 1: or some kind of fundraiser. And I didn't hear back
Speaker 1: from it, and that didn't surprise me until the next day.
Speaker 1: I'm driving down the road and I hear it on
Speaker 1: the radio. That version. I freaked out, pulled a U turn,
Speaker 1: went straight to the radio station and walked in there
Speaker 1: and said, hey, guys, please please that song you just played,
Speaker 1: don't play it anymore. They looked at me like I
Speaker 1: was crazy, and I said no, I'm going to go
Speaker 1: record that with my band. So I went home, called
Speaker 1: the band, They met me, and one day we had
Speaker 1: the full version recorded and I sent it back to
Speaker 1: the radio stations and the song went crazy. I'd never
Speaker 1: seen anything like that. I'd never experienced a quote hit.
Speaker 1: Now it was small time. Nonetheless, I'd never experienced anything
Speaker 1: like that, and everything changed. My shows went through the roof.
Speaker 1: People were singing along and all because I was focusing
Speaker 1: on them. I was playing music to them specifically, and
Speaker 1: it wasn't just that song. The other song started picking up.
Speaker 1: Traction two I Living like a lone star album favorite song,
Speaker 1: color Blind, that I had written, all of a sudden
Speaker 1: kind of started becoming popular. And after I donated the
Speaker 1: song to the university and gave them all the proceeds,
Speaker 1: my shows increased. And so, just like Benjamin X told me,
Speaker 1: everything came back to me tenfold. I was able to
Speaker 1: pay off all my music debts. I was able to
Speaker 1: take that next step in my career, and if I
Speaker 1: hadn't been for that, I would have been in a
Speaker 1: lot of trouble. We Bleed Maroon saved me. No fans
Speaker 1: saved me. Somepon a penny. See how the hag sas line?
Speaker 1: We do, Yeah, bastline, we do right here after Dixie
Speaker 1: Chicken too, we Blabe Kyla season has made history with
Speaker 1: me and forever, and it's true. I'm forever grateful for
Speaker 1: that town. It gave me a dream, and I still
Speaker 1: had a lot more dream left. I still have a
Speaker 1: lot more story after that, because I wasn't even close
Speaker 1: to understanding the full potential of embracing the community, and
Speaker 1: I hadn't put on a combat boot yet. I hadn't
Speaker 1: traveled to the other side of the world to truly
Speaker 1: understand the healing power of music and to learn that
Speaker 1: as a musician. It was my responsibility to share that.
Speaker 1: But I would very soon, and I'll tell you that
Speaker 1: story very soon. Meanwhile, it's been a long tour. I'm
Speaker 1: going to play this show in Pennsylvania and head back home.
Speaker 1: I've got an anniversary date with my wife tomorrow night.
Speaker 1: You know when we believe Maroon came out. I hadn't
Speaker 1: even met Amberg yet, but I was close. It was
Speaker 1: actually music that brought us together. It was actually a
Speaker 1: song called Don't Listen to the Radio, and that too,
Speaker 1: in more ways than one, changed everything. I found my gift,
Speaker 1: what's yours? It happens side that. Out of the blood
Speaker 1: scat lost in her food last year. When it happens
Speaker 1: like that, nothing to Lowes turns right into you, Judy.
Speaker 1: All you can do just to keep her around till
Speaker 1: the moon goes down in her back into your house,
Speaker 1: one thing leaks to another. You love each other when
Speaker 1: looking you never loved back. It happens like that. Thank
Speaker 1: you for listening to this podcast. Come find us on
Speaker 1: tour Grangersmith dot com Forward Slash Tour. We'll see y'all
Speaker 1: down the road.