Speaker 1: All right, welcome to episode three of the Bobby Cast.
Speaker 1: Thanks for our sponsoring Blue and Sleep Number, and our
Speaker 1: guest is Devin Dawson. Hey buddy, I am good. Yes,
Speaker 1: I just came from the airport, as you see. I
Speaker 1: got my bags and my guitar. Where were you came from? Chicago?
Speaker 1: Was supposed to fly in last night, missed my connecting flight,
Speaker 1: got the hotel, had to get the early flight. It
Speaker 1: all worked out fine. I'm just like in my airport,
Speaker 1: get up here and wait, So is it you missed
Speaker 1: the flight on your own because you were well. I
Speaker 1: was with my band and uh well my three piece
Speaker 1: you know we have sometimes we do full band, sometimes
Speaker 1: we do just acoustic three piece. And we were coming
Speaker 1: from Fort Wayne and the flight literally like we landed
Speaker 1: five minutes after our connecting flight. Wasn't to know. It
Speaker 1: was not my fault. So they got me a hotel
Speaker 1: and then you had to stay the night that it
Speaker 1: was you know what, it could be worse, man, but
Speaker 1: I'm here and I made it, so no complaints. Man.
Speaker 1: I got my coffee too, so it's all good. What
Speaker 1: do you drink? Just black iced cough even if it's
Speaker 1: like negative a million degrees in the winter. Always always
Speaker 1: iced coffee, but black, always black. Yeah, where'd you grow up? California.
Speaker 1: Grew up in a town called Orangeville, which is kind
Speaker 1: of outside of thirty minutes outside of Sacramento. Yeah, so
Speaker 1: northern California, Northern California. Northern cal always say this about
Speaker 1: Northern California. People always feel like they're more human than
Speaker 1: the Southern California people. I know, I don't know if
Speaker 1: I've ever used the word human more, but like that's
Speaker 1: a good way to put it. It's it's definitely two
Speaker 1: different states, you know what I mean. Like I feel
Speaker 1: like it's just a completely like once you cross over
Speaker 1: the grape Vine and you get down into the southern California,
Speaker 1: it's just a whole different energy, a whole different ball game.
Speaker 1: People like look in the eyeballs. In Northern California, it's nice.
Speaker 1: Southern California people like trying to hand you stuff and
Speaker 1: trying to always find the angle, which but I get
Speaker 1: I get it because you kind of have to, you know,
Speaker 1: you kind of have to play that like puff your
Speaker 1: chest a little bit and turn your chin music up
Speaker 1: or whatever. Nick Jonas says, you know, like he kind
Speaker 1: of got to like the Nashville is the same way,
Speaker 1: Like I feel like Nashville and l A are the same,
Speaker 1: just a little smaller and you dress a little different.
Speaker 1: I think Nashville is more familiar. It's got more of
Speaker 1: a camaraderie thing, like we want to we all want
Speaker 1: to get to the top, right, but we want to
Speaker 1: do it together, Whereas I feel like sometimes in l A,
Speaker 1: the stigma is more like I want to get to
Speaker 1: the top by standing on your shoulders somebody else, you
Speaker 1: know what I mean. Like I feel like Nashville fakes
Speaker 1: like they want to do it together. Man, I have
Speaker 1: more I have more faith, I have more positivity. And
Speaker 1: maybe it's just because I'm green and wide eyed and um,
Speaker 1: you know, doing my thing and I haven't experienced any
Speaker 1: of that. There are great people. And when I moved town,
Speaker 1: I thought, I'm not gonna be friends with nobody, like
Speaker 1: that was gonna be my thing. I'm gonna move to town.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna be friends with nobody, and I'm gonna be
Speaker 1: completely objective about everything. And so if something sucks, I
Speaker 1: get on the ear and say it sucks. And if
Speaker 1: it's awesome, I say it's awesome. Which you should, which
Speaker 1: I should, and I still really try to do. But
Speaker 1: there there are such good people here though, that it's
Speaker 1: been hard for me to keep from having friendships. It's
Speaker 1: hard for me to not right because I didn't want
Speaker 1: to have friends in the business at all, because I
Speaker 1: wanted to be a voice of the people, not a
Speaker 1: voice that is it. Because of the things that you
Speaker 1: had heard from maybe l A or New York are
Speaker 1: other places that you had been, and so you'd kind
Speaker 1: of maybe gotten used to that stigma and that coming here,
Speaker 1: you know, like it was gonna be the same. No,
Speaker 1: not at all. I was just like, I'm going to
Speaker 1: not be the voice of the industry, and then I would.
Speaker 1: Then I became friends with Dirks Past, Eric Passley. Then
Speaker 1: it's just like you meet good humans, you know, Like,
Speaker 1: how as much as I don't want to be friends
Speaker 1: with Philip from a little big town, you just kind
Speaker 1: of are. So I'm glad, I'm big fan of yours.
Speaker 1: Where do we meet? I can tell you this. I
Speaker 1: was sitting at dinner with Dan, Dan and Shay and
Speaker 1: you obviously you're very close to great, great friends, And
Speaker 1: it was probably like January of this year, and I
Speaker 1: was like, Hey, what's up with this devon dude? Like,
Speaker 1: because I was listening to music and I even, uh,
Speaker 1: it's way before stuff I come out. And I had
Speaker 1: even called you head of your record label, and I
Speaker 1: was like, hey, let me hear some of this devon. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think told me that he did. You were barking
Speaker 1: up the stree a little bit, and I don't bark
Speaker 1: up anybody's tree. And it wasn't even yet a project
Speaker 1: coming out. I just wanted to because I was curious
Speaker 1: because I had seen you play a couple of things,
Speaker 1: and that I didn't even know about the YouTube thing.
Speaker 1: And I'll get to that in a second. I had
Speaker 1: no idea that that you did it, which is kind
Speaker 1: of cool that you didn't no idea. So I'll come
Speaker 1: back to that because I have questions because I know.
Speaker 1: And so I was like, let me hear about this guy,
Speaker 1: because I heard your sound and I would see you
Speaker 1: and I was like, Okay, that doesn't fit. And I
Speaker 1: like that things that don't fit always make everything else fit,
Speaker 1: Like things that don't fit bust in and everything else
Speaker 1: fits around them if it's if it's really good. And
Speaker 1: so I've heard you play it and obviously here's a song,
Speaker 1: remember months ago just being like, this song is so
Speaker 1: freaking good. Count on me. You gotta tell me that
Speaker 1: you make this record, and I bet you get the
Speaker 1: normal that's not country. I bet you got that well,
Speaker 1: of course. I mean I feel like I feel like
Speaker 1: a lot of people get that right now. And everyone
Speaker 1: has their own version of what country is or what
Speaker 1: how it's influenced them, you know, and like we're all
Speaker 1: products of how we've grown up or what we've grown
Speaker 1: up listening to. And I grew up listening to a
Speaker 1: lot of country, a lot of soul, a lot of rock,
Speaker 1: and each one of them has its own kind of
Speaker 1: influence on what I do. Like the country shines in
Speaker 1: my lyrics and in my honesty and my storytelling per se,
Speaker 1: or just the way that I set up a song,
Speaker 1: like the kind of culture of songwriting in country music
Speaker 1: and in Nashville. And I think sonically the rock comes
Speaker 1: through in the grittiness of the sounds, and and the
Speaker 1: soul kind of comes through with the groove and then
Speaker 1: hopefully the emotion behind my voice, and so it all
Speaker 1: kind of works together. Um, But you know, being in Nashville,
Speaker 1: in this community, like we were talking about in the
Speaker 1: songwriting that is just like so inherent and important. That's
Speaker 1: what drew me to this town in this genre, and
Speaker 1: it just was the only place that I knew I
Speaker 1: could really do what I wanted to do wholeheartedly. You know.
Speaker 1: Obviously the same thing because again, you grew up in
Speaker 1: a place that when people a California, but northern California's
Speaker 1: pretty country, it is. It's crazy. People don't realize how
Speaker 1: rural not only Northern California, but most of California is.
Speaker 1: I mean, you have San Francisco and you have l
Speaker 1: A and everything else is pretty much just farms in
Speaker 1: in little towns. And I grew up in Orangeville, is
Speaker 1: thirty minutes outside of Sacramento, and it's just like a
Speaker 1: little kind of horse country pocket. Like I literally grew
Speaker 1: up in a converted barn, Like my dad has a
Speaker 1: converted barn and that was the house, you know, and
Speaker 1: built a house from my grandparents up on the hill.
Speaker 1: And my my aunt lives behind us and her her
Speaker 1: you know, daughter and cousin lives right. It's this whole
Speaker 1: part of town that's just like kind of horses and
Speaker 1: turkeys and all that and so it's like it's just
Speaker 1: a it's just a it's a pace, right, It's a
Speaker 1: pace of life, it's a way of life. It's just
Speaker 1: this thing that you know, it's a culture of what
Speaker 1: how you grew up? I guess right. And you know
Speaker 1: when you say you talk about your music, I get
Speaker 1: the same thing that people look at me or they
Speaker 1: hear the other kind of music that I'll play on
Speaker 1: the show because I play hip hop on the show.
Speaker 1: I love, of course, I'll play the rocks. I love
Speaker 1: rock like I love. But I grew up in a
Speaker 1: small town in Arkansas and I was raised on country.
Speaker 1: People like, hey, so what is country to you? And
Speaker 1: to me, it's about the authenticity of the lyric more
Speaker 1: than it is a steel guitar, right, And steel guitars
Speaker 1: are great and that's traditional, that's very traditional. But I
Speaker 1: think today's country is more of let's have honest lyric. Yeah. Well,
Speaker 1: I'm I love a steel I'm such a sucker for
Speaker 1: a steel, but I want it when it's supposed to
Speaker 1: be there, not because it has to be, you know.
Speaker 1: And I think you're totally right. And that's what I say,
Speaker 1: is that it's all about the lyric. It's all about
Speaker 1: the song. It's the way that you set up a hook.
Speaker 1: It's the way that you peel back the layers and
Speaker 1: you don't give him everything until the very last line
Speaker 1: and you tie that little bow on because country listeners
Speaker 1: are gonna wait for that story, you know, like that's
Speaker 1: what they expect, that's what they've been bred to do
Speaker 1: in a way of listened to a song in a
Speaker 1: certain way and appreciate a song in a certain way.
Speaker 1: And that's why I'm here because I love it too.
Speaker 1: So your brother is in music, he is. Yeah, So
Speaker 1: I have a twin brother. First of all, I'm the
Speaker 1: old Yeah, I'm the older one. Thirteen minutes and up
Speaker 1: until yesterday, i mean, met these two uh little girls
Speaker 1: at a meet and greet yesterday in Fort Wayne, and
Speaker 1: they were thirty three minutes apart, and I'm we're thirteen
Speaker 1: minutes apart, which I would up until yesterday was the
Speaker 1: longest I'd ever heard of, like thirty three minutes. After
Speaker 1: two minutes, it's usually like two minutes. It's usually like
Speaker 1: all right, I'm ready, let's go, you know, and uh so, yeah,
Speaker 1: And the cool thing is that we both grew up
Speaker 1: playing music. Together started a band when we were twelve,
Speaker 1: like rock band with our friends, garage band after school
Speaker 1: every day. I played bass, he played drums. And we've
Speaker 1: kind of worked our way through the industry and figured
Speaker 1: out where we landed and what was our calling and
Speaker 1: why we're here. And he's more on the production kind
Speaker 1: of writing side, and obviously I'm more on the kind
Speaker 1: of writing artist singing side. And we're rather than being opposites,
Speaker 1: were more compliments. We compliment each other. Um because identical,
Speaker 1: we're fraternal, so fraternal technically means separate eggs, which I
Speaker 1: want to get him a shirt for a birthday that
Speaker 1: says separate eggs minels say egg one on the back
Speaker 1: as we'll say too. I don't want to like you
Speaker 1: guys look alike. We look like brothers that just happened
Speaker 1: to be born at the same time. He's a little
Speaker 1: bit more he's got a little bit more fair complexion
Speaker 1: than I do. Um, and he wears glasses. UM. I
Speaker 1: don't know, he's it's just it's a really cool time,
Speaker 1: and it's it's a cool opportunity to to be able
Speaker 1: to both do music and oh well, we each have
Speaker 1: our own foundation to stand down we each have our
Speaker 1: own circles that obviously intersect in some way, but there's
Speaker 1: no weird comparison, Like he's doing cool things in his
Speaker 1: own right and I'm doing cool things in my own right,
Speaker 1: and we come together to help each other out, but
Speaker 1: there's never any weird like, man, I wish I was
Speaker 1: doing that or whatever. Like it's just I feel like
Speaker 1: that's so lucky that I that we get to be
Speaker 1: able to just interact normally like that and there's no
Speaker 1: weird anything in between. I don't know, I just feel
Speaker 1: like that could be rare, you know, just to see
Speaker 1: how rare it is to be doing this for a
Speaker 1: living in the first place, and then have your twin
Speaker 1: brother be doing it too. I just I don't know,
Speaker 1: it just blows my mind. Let me talk about Sleep
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Speaker 1: All right, so how about this? Let's they want to play?
Speaker 1: Because again I didn't know. I knew nothing about the
Speaker 1: YouTube thing, and I was like, oh is the guy?
Speaker 1: I gotta find it because I don't even know about it? Okay,
Speaker 1: So it's a Taylor Swift mash up correct blank space. Okay,
Speaker 1: Honest to god, I knew nothing of it. I love that.
Speaker 1: It seriously makes me so happy. Okay, and this may
Speaker 1: be the first time I've ever heard again in my life.
Speaker 1: I don't know if I've ever even heard this. I
Speaker 1: got you change Dame day dream in my eye? You
Speaker 1: got that clastic. Who's the girl? Her name is Luisa Wendorff.
Speaker 1: And we met at Belmont, like literally, my whole circle
Speaker 1: is Belmont people like most people that I met the
Speaker 1: first day, which is even crazier to say. But she
Speaker 1: we were just in the same dorm together and just
Speaker 1: kind of wrote and she would sing harmonies on my
Speaker 1: songs and I'd play guitar for her, and it just
Speaker 1: one day kind of just happened, like crashing down. We
Speaker 1: come back every time, out of sight, out of style, say, Okay,
Speaker 1: so I don't have a visual because I don't know
Speaker 1: that I've seen it. So what are you two just
Speaker 1: sitting in a room playing this for the video? So
Speaker 1: literally we we That's how we did it. Like it
Speaker 1: was Thanksgiving one day and we just kind of came
Speaker 1: together and she's like, let's do it. Let's do a
Speaker 1: mash up because that was kind of her brand on YouTube,
Speaker 1: you know. And I had just been writing songs because
Speaker 1: I don't really I don't really do covers like I
Speaker 1: I don't do them in my set, like I just
Speaker 1: I love. If I'm going to do something, I want
Speaker 1: to make it my own. But I write too many
Speaker 1: songs to do covers. It's I'm not against it. I
Speaker 1: just love sharing my words, right, and so you know,
Speaker 1: it was weird to have that be one of the
Speaker 1: first breakout things was a cover. But we're just sitting
Speaker 1: around one day and she's like, let's do a mash up,
Speaker 1: and we kind of chose these two Taylor Swift songs
Speaker 1: because it had just come out and I hadn't even
Speaker 1: heard the record yet, and it kind of just fell
Speaker 1: together in a couple of minutes and we listened back
Speaker 1: to the little iPhone recording, we were like, there's something there.
Speaker 1: Literally like did the recording with my brother the next day,
Speaker 1: and then my really good friend life Thomas, who does
Speaker 1: a lot of my videos and pictures still um went
Speaker 1: out to some random road in Leaper's Fork that I
Speaker 1: literally couldn't even get back to if I tried, and
Speaker 1: just did this kind of like back to act on
Speaker 1: a road. I had a guitar, She's singing this kind
Speaker 1: of duet back to that we are lips sinking. So
Speaker 1: we recorded it and then did a video to it
Speaker 1: and blth this kind of like spinning around us with
Speaker 1: her camera, and it just was this really quick thing
Speaker 1: that we didn't even think about. Nobody did it for
Speaker 1: any other reason than we thought it was good and
Speaker 1: it was fun and we wanted to share it and
Speaker 1: put it out December, I think of fourteen, and literally
Speaker 1: the next day Taylor Swift saw it and tweeted it
Speaker 1: and facebooked it and Google Plus did or whatever all
Speaker 1: those you know, and it's ever since then, it's just
Speaker 1: been a whirlwind. So so is that a thing to
Speaker 1: where it does feel like your life changes when you
Speaker 1: go viral? Aside from this, a lot of people go
Speaker 1: viral like you went viral? Yeah, I mean, okay, So
Speaker 1: what I usually say is, you know, you always want
Speaker 1: to know what what's it like to go viral, how
Speaker 1: does that happen? What does it feel like? And then
Speaker 1: being on the other side of that, it's literally the
Speaker 1: same thing. I have no idea how it happened. Like
Speaker 1: it's just this crazy kind of it's its own people
Speaker 1: calling you. Do you haven't heard from the unreal dude?
Speaker 1: Like the day I woke up um to that happening,
Speaker 1: my phone was kept going off in the morning, and
Speaker 1: I had gone out a couple of nights before the
Speaker 1: night before, getting sushi and drinking saki with hometown friends
Speaker 1: because we're all home for Christmas, you know, we've all
Speaker 1: kind of gone our separate, separate ways. And I woke up,
Speaker 1: I was kind of hungover, you know, and my phone's
Speaker 1: buzzing in the corner. I'm like, God, who is calling
Speaker 1: me right now? You know? And I went over there
Speaker 1: and I had like so many emails and messages and
Speaker 1: and notifications that I tried to like unlock my phone
Speaker 1: and it just froze. Like I had to like go
Speaker 1: in and like delete emails like on my computer for
Speaker 1: it to even open up. It was just ridiculous and
Speaker 1: kind of just watching it happen and writing that wave
Speaker 1: again is like, you don't even know. It's got a
Speaker 1: mind of its own, It's got a life of its own.
Speaker 1: Did you make money off of that? Because you had
Speaker 1: so many views? Yeah? On YouTube? You know, there's a
Speaker 1: certain thing, like you going into it, you should. And
Speaker 1: I learned this after the fact. You it's easier to
Speaker 1: monetize beforehand, or choose that you want to monetize, like right. Um.
Speaker 1: And so we made a certain amount of money off
Speaker 1: of that YouTube video, but the most you know, most
Speaker 1: of the profits in the finance came from selling it
Speaker 1: on iTunes. Um. And we ended up going to We
Speaker 1: ended up playing the Red Carpet on the Grammys that year,
Speaker 1: which was the first time anybody has ever sag live
Speaker 1: on the Red Carpet, which was unreal from from a
Speaker 1: viral video, from a viral video wow. Yeah, from just
Speaker 1: sitting there with her going hey, let's do the song
Speaker 1: and you shot it, just doing something that we thought
Speaker 1: felt right and that was fun. Nobody did it for
Speaker 1: any financial purpose. Nobody did it for anything other and like, honestly,
Speaker 1: like I appreciate the financial aspect because it allowed me
Speaker 1: to free up other parts of my life and then
Speaker 1: so solely focused on music. But it was more about
Speaker 1: like the the affirmation and the confidence of like, Okay,
Speaker 1: I'm doing something right as an artist, you know, because
Speaker 1: I had I had a couple of songs on hold
Speaker 1: and cut, and I was kind of working on publishing
Speaker 1: deals and stuff, so I had a little bit of
Speaker 1: a snowball going, but it like turned it into like
Speaker 1: a snowman. You know, did you worry you were going
Speaker 1: to get painted into that the YouTube because there are
Speaker 1: YouTube artists and they're just gonna be YouTube artists. For
Speaker 1: the most part, I don't think I was worried. I
Speaker 1: definitely think that's part of the conversation, and that's why
Speaker 1: I was saying, like when you didn't know anything about it,
Speaker 1: like I was like totally okay with that. I think
Speaker 1: I wanted to. I know, I wanted to embrace it
Speaker 1: and like be grateful for everything that it brought me.
Speaker 1: But I also didn't want it to define me because,
Speaker 1: like I said, I'm not I'm not a cover guy,
Speaker 1: Like I just love writing songs. I do it every day,
Speaker 1: not a cover guy. And that went viral. I know,
Speaker 1: That's what I'm saying. The fresh thing that ever, which
Speaker 1: maybe tells me that I'm an idiot and I should
Speaker 1: probably do more, but I just right way too much,
Speaker 1: like I do it every day, and I you know,
Speaker 1: I could probably make two or three other records right
Speaker 1: now other than the one that I have, you know,
Speaker 1: that's coming out next year. But it's just like, I
Speaker 1: don't know, It's just was a crazy moment that literally
Speaker 1: was just for nothing else than just friends having fun
Speaker 1: and doing what we do together. And and then Taylor Swift,
Speaker 1: you know, appreciating the art of it, I guess, and
Speaker 1: and and giving us a shout out, which is not
Speaker 1: the first time she's done that. She's known for that
Speaker 1: and I still do this day. I haven't met her. Um,
Speaker 1: we obviously have some sort of like mutual friends in
Speaker 1: the industry, so I got a chance to write her
Speaker 1: an email and stuff and say thanks, but I'd like
Speaker 1: to give her a hug in person and say thanks
Speaker 1: for everything one day. You know. So, did that open
Speaker 1: doors for you in town as far as hey, We'd
Speaker 1: like to sign you absolutely. Yeah. Um, was there a
Speaker 1: bidding war on you because of that? I mean, I
Speaker 1: don't know if I would. I mean, yeah, Like, there
Speaker 1: was a lot of there was a lot of interest
Speaker 1: from every side of of every fact all of a
Speaker 1: sudden and everybody unreal, unreal, And I think I think
Speaker 1: part of the battle of getting to that place is
Speaker 1: just being what I call kicked into the eye like
Speaker 1: how many people are like like working at dominoes and
Speaker 1: write and ashes every day. But it's it's it's just
Speaker 1: and and how many people at a record label would
Speaker 1: die to find that guy, you know? And it's like
Speaker 1: we need to help each other. And it's just awareness
Speaker 1: a lot of the times. And so that was, like
Speaker 1: I said, the financial thing was amazing and it allowed
Speaker 1: me to free up other parts of my life, but
Speaker 1: it was more about the being kicked into the eye
Speaker 1: and the awareness of, oh, this guy's is doing something
Speaker 1: whatever he's doing like and it sounds cool, So let's
Speaker 1: go hang and meet with him. And you know, it
Speaker 1: takes a lot of you've gotta come with the songs.
Speaker 1: You gotta come with the hard work. You gotta come
Speaker 1: with and with everything and and and being you gotta
Speaker 1: be grateful and humble for everything along the way. And
Speaker 1: I am you know, how does you know who to
Speaker 1: surround yourself with? Though? Because here you go. Now it's
Speaker 1: big boy time. And for me, I've learned it's all
Speaker 1: about the people you put around. Like I can be
Speaker 1: as good as I am, but if I don't have
Speaker 1: the right people, I'm not going to succeed. Your team
Speaker 1: is an extension of you, and you should be able
Speaker 1: to even though you know you want to make every decision,
Speaker 1: if you can't one day, you should be completely confident
Speaker 1: that somebody else would know what to do in your
Speaker 1: shoes be like grabbing on you right there, and it's like, what,
Speaker 1: how do you, at your tender age decide what who's
Speaker 1: really is? As cheesy as it is, dude, just the gut.
Speaker 1: The gut is the most powerful thing in the universe.
Speaker 1: Whether you're writing songs, whether you're trying to build a team,
Speaker 1: whether you're thinking about whether you should go home or
Speaker 1: you should go do this or whatever, just go with
Speaker 1: your gut, man. And it's the cheesiest thing in the world.
Speaker 1: And that's the one thing that helped me along the way,
Speaker 1: was when I had a lot of decisions and like,
Speaker 1: going back to what we said earlier, there's so many
Speaker 1: good people in Nashville, Like, how are you supposed to
Speaker 1: choose between the best person in the world and the
Speaker 1: other best person in the world. You know, I write
Speaker 1: a book and I was talking about the gut and
Speaker 1: what the gut really is, and we go we say
Speaker 1: gut because it's like, regardless of our brain having eleven ideas.
Speaker 1: It's what we really feel is the right thing, even
Speaker 1: though there are other options in way things that weigh.
Speaker 1: And so I read that read this book. It's about
Speaker 1: why the gut is actually the brain, and it's actually
Speaker 1: the part of the brain that you should follow because
Speaker 1: is your instinct. Your gut is actually your brain's instinct,
Speaker 1: and your instinct is right. And and they talked to
Speaker 1: all of I give you an example from one of
Speaker 1: the stories they told. They took a piece of art
Speaker 1: and I'm total nerds, so allowing me the nerd for something.
Speaker 1: They took a piece of art and it had been
Speaker 1: in through like twenty conservatories through and they couldn't determine
Speaker 1: if it was real or not, if it was this
Speaker 1: artist had really made it, or if it was a fake.
Speaker 1: And so they took it to all these people and
Speaker 1: these people have spent months with it months months, months,
Speaker 1: and like seventy people had said, no, this is not real.
Speaker 1: People that have spent all this time with it. Then
Speaker 1: they took it to these this other group of you,
Speaker 1: this is an experiment because they knew if it was
Speaker 1: real or not. Then they took it to these other
Speaker 1: people and they were also experts, and they went, just
Speaker 1: give it your gut, and their gut reaction was almost
Speaker 1: that it's real. They just went with the gut. Their
Speaker 1: gut was right, and so they did want experiment and
Speaker 1: it was real. And eighty of the people that just
Speaker 1: want with instinct and gut were right. And the people
Speaker 1: that sit there and looked and thought and kind of wait,
Speaker 1: I don't they were wrong. Then you get in your
Speaker 1: head and then you said, then it was like, always
Speaker 1: go with your gut, because even if you're wrong, more
Speaker 1: time is than not. Your gut is your brain's first
Speaker 1: instinct of what is right. And so when you say
Speaker 1: going anyway, trust your senses. Like sometimes you're you're looking
Speaker 1: at a picture in your eye knows what compositionally it
Speaker 1: should look like, or you know, you know what smell
Speaker 1: is right whatever. I mean, that's the weirdest example. But
Speaker 1: just trust your senses and go with your gut. It's
Speaker 1: the cheesiest thing in the world. And it's not the
Speaker 1: easiest thing to also follow because it's hard, Like what
Speaker 1: is my gut saying? You know, like your gut saying
Speaker 1: the first thing that comes to you exactly. That's how
Speaker 1: that's how I now engage. My gut is what's my
Speaker 1: first instinct on this? Yeah, okay, that's my gut and
Speaker 1: that's what I should go in. And funny enough, when
Speaker 1: you when you when you try to deny that or
Speaker 1: you try to go around it, you end up coming
Speaker 1: back to it. Always. It's always that first thought, best
Speaker 1: thought kind of thing where you're like, well, maybe it's this,
Speaker 1: maybe it's this, and then you go through all this
Speaker 1: and then you really zoom out again and you're like, nope,
Speaker 1: it's the first thing. Who's your person, Like who's your confident?
Speaker 1: Your manager? I know how it could be your manager,
Speaker 1: like who is it for you? Or it's like man,
Speaker 1: I need some help, let me lean? Is it another artist?
Speaker 1: Like who is it? Yeah? I mean there's it's hard
Speaker 1: to choose just one person. Um. My manager just inherently
Speaker 1: is a huge confident obviously because he's in everything and
Speaker 1: every day and every hour. His name is Todd Ramy.
Speaker 1: He works with Jason Owen a sandbox and so but
Speaker 1: also I work. I'm really close with everyone on my team,
Speaker 1: like my label Chris Lacey is my A and R
Speaker 1: and S BO. I always call him my Nashville dad
Speaker 1: and I they talk about songs with me. They work
Speaker 1: through lyrics, they work through album artwork. We just worried
Speaker 1: about sequencing and like the sequence that I chose for
Speaker 1: the record wasn't right it like I thought it was.
Speaker 1: And then I then I listened down to Chris Lacey's
Speaker 1: and hers was perfect. You know. It's like I trust everybody,
Speaker 1: like my business manager, if you know. I went to
Speaker 1: I went to Belmont and she said, you know, I
Speaker 1: know you just got signed, but we got to pay
Speaker 1: off these student loans, you know, And I'm like, all right,
Speaker 1: I trust you. Let's do it. You know, like whatever
Speaker 1: it is, like it's in businessman. Is that a weird thing?
Speaker 1: Because listen, I come, all right, come for money. So
Speaker 1: I don't know money. I have no education. You have money.
Speaker 1: I don't know. And I had to get a business manager. Again.
Speaker 1: It was a gut thing. And I think I think
Speaker 1: going through the motions of writing and meeting people and
Speaker 1: taking meetings and going to lunch, and then like I
Speaker 1: met a lot of these people while I was still
Speaker 1: at Belmont through like uh, you know, internships or or
Speaker 1: convocations where I would meet people and we already had
Speaker 1: a relationship, and then it came time for me to like, Okay,
Speaker 1: I need some help, and I already had people that
Speaker 1: I trusted, um just from a friendship relational side, regardless
Speaker 1: of the business side of it. And I think the
Speaker 1: beauty of a business manager for me is the fact
Speaker 1: that I don't have to worry about any of that,
Speaker 1: and I trust you, and I can really just focus
Speaker 1: again on the art and on the music, and on
Speaker 1: the work, and on the travel and on the plane
Speaker 1: if you're listening to this. And again, until recently, I
Speaker 1: didn't know what a business manager was. I'll be honest
Speaker 1: with until I had, until I had to get one.
Speaker 1: But like for me, I have to pay percentages to
Speaker 1: a lot of things. Like I have a manager, I
Speaker 1: have an agent. I have to So just to break
Speaker 1: it down, let's say I make ten dollars, Okay, I'll
Speaker 1: go do a stand up shore. I'll make ten dollars. Well,
Speaker 1: my manager is fifting for sent my agent gets ten percent,
Speaker 1: my busines manager gets five percent, and so before you
Speaker 1: know it, there there's thirty percent gone. But instead of
Speaker 1: me having to pay all this stuff, your business manager
Speaker 1: takes care of it. They do taxes, they do all
Speaker 1: of this stuff. What percentages get involved, like I got
Speaker 1: I have no idea what's going on, Yeah, but you
Speaker 1: know what and and and a lot of people. You know,
Speaker 1: you obviously want to get the best deal. You want
Speaker 1: to feel like you're getting a good deal. You know,
Speaker 1: even if it's like an eighty thousand dollar car, if
Speaker 1: all of a sudden it's sixty thousand, you know, it's
Speaker 1: still expensive, but you're feeling like you're getting a good deal.
Speaker 1: So you're like, you know what, I'm into it, you know.
Speaker 1: And I've never been one to be afraid of giving
Speaker 1: up equity for for talent and family and reason, like
Speaker 1: I don't somebody said to me, I don't want to
Speaker 1: be rich alone, you know what I mean, Like, it's
Speaker 1: not really Obviously, this is a music business, so it's
Speaker 1: obviously about financials at the end of the day. But
Speaker 1: it's more about being able to do this for a
Speaker 1: living and be comfortable. And if I could have a
Speaker 1: team and a family around me and we can all
Speaker 1: be successful together, that would be so much more meaningful
Speaker 1: to me than you know, nickel and diming and trying
Speaker 1: to squeeze every little last thing out. You know, I
Speaker 1: just I don't have time to worry about it. Man.
Speaker 1: I just I'm just more worried about music, you know.
Speaker 1: And it's funny you bring up business manager because I'm
Speaker 1: the same way with mine now, Like I'm very close
Speaker 1: to her because I don't know enough about it and
Speaker 1: I trust her and I trust that she's going to
Speaker 1: look out for me. Isn't that crazy? That? And I
Speaker 1: never thought even even existed. I didn't even know what
Speaker 1: it was a thing. So I come from you go
Speaker 1: to work, and you work at the mill or you
Speaker 1: do and you just pay your bills. But then I
Speaker 1: trust someone to have access to everything that i'd like,
Speaker 1: and without it I would just be lost. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: just I don't know. I think when you go back
Speaker 1: to how do you choose these people? It's again obviously
Speaker 1: a gut thing, but it's like things sift out. The
Speaker 1: gold will find its way out, like the time will
Speaker 1: go by and the energy will happen, and you'll be
Speaker 1: connected to certain people that you should be with. What
Speaker 1: I did, I called so I didn't know anything about it, right,
Speaker 1: I just picked up like literally I just got on
Speaker 1: my computer typed business manager. Yeah, that's literally what I did,
Speaker 1: because I knew nothing about it, and I was sitting
Speaker 1: at home on my on the calculator on my phone
Speaker 1: just figure out how to pay people and want to
Speaker 1: pay people and had to have to pay band members
Speaker 1: for the band, and so I'm doing all and I'm like,
Speaker 1: I'm getting lost. So I asked and say, hey, what
Speaker 1: I do this? He should get a business major. So
Speaker 1: I called and I won't say any name, but I called.
Speaker 1: I just look up. First one pops up called say hey,
Speaker 1: I'm looking for a business manager. I talked on the
Speaker 1: radio for a living um, and they're like, oh, you know,
Speaker 1: we don't have any room for you, and right now
Speaker 1: we're full, our rosters full. And I was like, okay, great,
Speaker 1: I said. They're like, we'll take your name. Though, I
Speaker 1: was like great, sure um at this point, and listen,
Speaker 1: I wasn't going in screaming on Bobby Bones. I was like, okay, yeah,
Speaker 1: my name is Bobby Bones. So I should hang up boom.
Speaker 1: Five minutes, I get a call back, Oh, we we
Speaker 1: love her. No. I was like, not gonna do it.
Speaker 1: So then I call another one kind of the same situation.
Speaker 1: You know what, our roster's full, we don't have time
Speaker 1: for Anna for DJ. I call mine now, and I said, hey, listen,
Speaker 1: I don't know anything about having a business manager. I've
Speaker 1: never had money. I've never had money. I talked on
Speaker 1: the radio um and they were like, well, what what
Speaker 1: kind of questions do you have? And I was like, okay,
Speaker 1: they're just asking, and so never from mentioned a people
Speaker 1: about it. Then at the end I was like, hey,
Speaker 1: here's the real story, Like I'm a national syndicate radio host,
Speaker 1: I'm a good living I really need help. And so
Speaker 1: after I got a couple of those hey we're fools.
Speaker 1: Oh no, no, no, no, we're not. I want with
Speaker 1: the person who was like, it doesn't matter to me,
Speaker 1: like what do you what kind of questions do you have?
Speaker 1: Let us answer your questions to figure out And for
Speaker 1: me that was and it's not just that I had
Speaker 1: a friend wants This is one of my favorite stories.
Speaker 1: My friend who I played Legion baseball with. So he
Speaker 1: went to different school, but his dad was a doctor
Speaker 1: and his dad wore a pair of old dirty jeans
Speaker 1: and a T shirt. And he would go look at
Speaker 1: schools and school sometimes when they yeah, they show them
Speaker 1: to learned a little bit. And he finally went to
Speaker 1: a school and they they took him around everywhere and
Speaker 1: they didn't care what he looked like. And that's a
Speaker 1: school they moved to and went to. And I was
Speaker 1: like that, And I think that story has kind of
Speaker 1: shaped how I am with people, Like I want to
Speaker 1: give them the lowest possible they and see how they
Speaker 1: respect that. How do you eat your bartender or your
Speaker 1: waiter or when someone's not looked Dude, have you ever
Speaker 1: gone out to eat with somebody that maybe you hadn't
Speaker 1: and then one time like you loved him and they're great,
Speaker 1: and then they treat they treat me like crap. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and you're like, oh, I don't know, right, It's still real.
Speaker 1: I bartended through college and you know, on one hand,
Speaker 1: I always expect good service because I come from good service.
Speaker 1: But that doesn't mean treat somebody like crap, you know
Speaker 1: what I mean. There's there's a there's a line between
Speaker 1: expecting to be you know, taken care of, and if
Speaker 1: you're not, like you know, it's there's other ways to
Speaker 1: deal with it than being a butt head. And I
Speaker 1: waited tables and for me, I wish everybody would have
Speaker 1: to serve, because if everybody had to serve, people would
Speaker 1: treat people differently. But you know, I come from a
Speaker 1: place to where at times it was the kitchen's fault
Speaker 1: and I got in trouble for it. And that rolls
Speaker 1: over into life too. Sometimes if something is wrong here,
Speaker 1: I look at it and go, Okay, maybe it was
Speaker 1: the kid. I'm not talking about what Maybe it was
Speaker 1: the kitchen's fault, right, even though I'm not even it's
Speaker 1: not even about waiting tables anymore. You know, maybe somebody
Speaker 1: rear ended me or maybe something maybe maybe it was
Speaker 1: a kitchen's fault. You know, I tried and to put
Speaker 1: that in them out like things I've learned from other jobs,
Speaker 1: they're actually so much more meat. You can't. Like there's
Speaker 1: a lot of people that you know, and I am
Speaker 1: also guilty of this in my own right, but skipping steps,
Speaker 1: you know, or or getting certain like positive things that
Speaker 1: happened in their life. And I think these steps are
Speaker 1: so important. Like I was, I was in a band
Speaker 1: when I was twelve, all the way through the end
Speaker 1: of high school. You know, garage bands started out playing
Speaker 1: like classic rock, and then through like middle school and
Speaker 1: high school, kept getting angstier and angstier and heavier and heavier.
Speaker 1: And heavier, and by the end of high school we
Speaker 1: were in this very heavy, technical death metal band and
Speaker 1: we've been playing. You know, we've been playing together for
Speaker 1: six years, touring up, calling you cool. It's calling me
Speaker 1: like like seven times in a rows. We're doing it's
Speaker 1: a six one five number, which I always answered, but
Speaker 1: this time they can wait, A know, both of our
Speaker 1: pon like turning it over. You know, I didn't miss
Speaker 1: a beat though, you said, I see, I kept um.
Speaker 1: And so after we you know, we got signed after
Speaker 1: high school and instead of going to college, I toured
Speaker 1: in a metal band for four years after high school,
Speaker 1: which was my dad's like worst nightmare. I mean he
Speaker 1: supported it, obviously, but I just don't think he understood
Speaker 1: it because he he comes from again, no money works
Speaker 1: for everything. You have rax to riches, and that's the
Speaker 1: way he raised my my brother, and I is like,
Speaker 1: no financial help really and you know incentives if you
Speaker 1: get straight a's, you like that kind of thing. And
Speaker 1: and so let me get the start. You went to
Speaker 1: high school, then you went and you toured for years,
Speaker 1: and then you went back to college. Correct, Yeah, so
Speaker 1: I I I was in I think I had a
Speaker 1: week of I was in just community college after you know, local,
Speaker 1: and a week into that we got signed and I said, yeah.
Speaker 1: I was like, Dad, I'm gonna do this. You know, like,
Speaker 1: on one hand, you have college, which I think is
Speaker 1: very important, But on the other hand, I have this
Speaker 1: dream of mine that's just right here, you know, and
Speaker 1: you can always come back to college, and I did
Speaker 1: and I graduated right. But again, going back to those
Speaker 1: four years of messing up, of doing it all wrong,
Speaker 1: of of learning and having those steps and kicking the
Speaker 1: little hitting my shins on the stairs on the way up,
Speaker 1: and all that stuff that has informed now again my
Speaker 1: gut in the way that I choose my team, in
Speaker 1: the way that I'm attracted to certain people and the
Speaker 1: people that I know are right for me. And so
Speaker 1: I always say I'm lucky to have messed up before.
Speaker 1: I'm lucky to have had a second chance, because I
Speaker 1: feel like that's when you really get to dig in
Speaker 1: and be like, all right, I know what's up this time.
Speaker 1: I feel the same way about saying I got started
Speaker 1: really early in my career, like I got to started
Speaker 1: a teenager and right now, and which means I got
Speaker 1: to screw up earlier and screwing up earlier allowed me
Speaker 1: to be better later. And I think that was a
Speaker 1: big deal for me, is that since I started, I
Speaker 1: was able to do all my juice up, oh every
Speaker 1: way possible. I mean, when you're sixteen, seventeen years old
Speaker 1: and I didn't know how to talk a little, it
Speaker 1: took me years to stop doing it. Took me years
Speaker 1: of sucking of not getting ratings, and I'm like, what
Speaker 1: what do I am? I getting ratting zero and kaolas boy,
Speaker 1: and I was like, welcome to the wacky morning shows,
Speaker 1: and I want even do it mornings. I was doing nights,
Speaker 1: and I was like, if I can't get ratings, doing
Speaker 1: is absolutely best I can, I might as well not
Speaker 1: get ratings being me. And the once I started to
Speaker 1: kind of be me, they started to go rise up
Speaker 1: a little bit. One of my favorite quotes and it's
Speaker 1: a John Merrick quote, and I loved your interview with him,
Speaker 1: by the way, A huge fan of his, and he
Speaker 1: says something along the lines of my failure to sound
Speaker 1: like my heroes has allowed me to sound like myself.
Speaker 1: Like you trip along these things that you're imitating along
Speaker 1: the way, and then you finally realize, like Okay, I
Speaker 1: gotta stop pushing so hard and just exist. And it's
Speaker 1: cheesy and it's hippie and all that, you know, but
Speaker 1: like it's so real. Man, I just love those words.
Speaker 1: Steve Martin has kind of the same thing where he's like,
Speaker 1: you know, greatness comes from people trying to be like
Speaker 1: the people they admire and not being able to and
Speaker 1: in that process, since they can't, they form another way
Speaker 1: and so and and he's talking about comedy and music
Speaker 1: and play yeah anything, like he's really one of the
Speaker 1: great Blue Apron for one second, So let me talk
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Speaker 1: free Blue Apron, a better way to cook. All right,
Speaker 1: So tell me about this band, this metal band you
Speaker 1: were in. Yeah, so okay, So we had many names
Speaker 1: along the way, but which one got signed got a
Speaker 1: big deal. So we got signed. Well, we changed the
Speaker 1: name because it wasn't working, so we when we got signed,
Speaker 1: it was called Fate. Worst worst name ever. Still have
Speaker 1: the old merchant. Dude, it's the worst thing. I'll bring
Speaker 1: it in f a t E got it. I'll bring
Speaker 1: you a shirt one day. It's just it's ridiculous um
Speaker 1: and then you know, copyright and like trademark issues because
Speaker 1: it was so like there's escaped to fate and then
Speaker 1: there's just a bunch of you know. And so we
Speaker 1: changed it to a band called Shadow of the Colossus,
Speaker 1: which was very that sounds like you're going to stabs epic, right, yeah.
Speaker 1: And I mean we played heavy technical like only beats
Speaker 1: per minute. Like I always say, we were at a
Speaker 1: hundred percent of our capacity a hundred percent of the time.
Speaker 1: And that's what the joy was for us. That's what
Speaker 1: the lure was, is that we're always pushing our limits,
Speaker 1: you know, and and that's kind of this path that
Speaker 1: we were called on, and that was what we used
Speaker 1: to do. So we always kept pushing it, always kept
Speaker 1: pushing it. And we toured for four years. And it
Speaker 1: was one of those things if we started getting success
Speaker 1: and I was like, oh, you manage people, yeah, let's
Speaker 1: do it. Oh you book people, yeah, oh you're a
Speaker 1: labeled let's do it, like no meetings, really know anything else,
Speaker 1: just like young and dumb and hungry, you know, and
Speaker 1: going for it. And we slummed it out, dude, slum
Speaker 1: to her. And that's what I call it, Like fifteen passion,
Speaker 1: fifteen passenger vans, sleeping in Walmart parking lots uh, eating
Speaker 1: mcdoubles once a day, you know, the whole, the whole thing.
Speaker 1: And I'm again so thankful for it. But in the moment,
Speaker 1: it's hard to see that that's a good thing for you.
Speaker 1: Um But after four years of that, and like the
Speaker 1: whole time I brought an acoustic and I'm writing my
Speaker 1: own songs on the side, literally just for my own
Speaker 1: peace of mind. Was nineteen got my heartbroken for the
Speaker 1: first time needed I'm not a good like in relationships,
Speaker 1: I suck at communication. I'm the worst. Like it's just
Speaker 1: this wall where I can't get it out, you know,
Speaker 1: And and and writing a song and like hiding behind
Speaker 1: a guitar, I can say whatever I want some for
Speaker 1: some reason, I can sing it to your face, like
Speaker 1: I don't know why, it's just it's that's the way
Speaker 1: that I can finally get find a way to get
Speaker 1: it out right. And so I just did that on
Speaker 1: the side the whole time in the band. And you know, realize,
Speaker 1: I don't know. I grew, like I said, grew up
Speaker 1: listening to country music and kind of learned how to
Speaker 1: write songs by listening to the way that people set
Speaker 1: their songs up. And so when I started writing on
Speaker 1: my own, that's kind of where I went, just lyrically,
Speaker 1: I guess, maybe not sonically, but it just kind of
Speaker 1: took over more of my heart in a while, like
Speaker 1: the metal kind of started diminishing and it wasn't fulfilling,
Speaker 1: and then the song. Yeah, honestly, I did dude headbanging
Speaker 1: every night, as dumb as it sounds. We used to
Speaker 1: get what I called bangovers, where the next day you
Speaker 1: can't move because your neck is so stiff. Yeah, we
Speaker 1: called him bangovers. It's pretty Did you come up with that?
Speaker 1: You know? We came up with that, dude? I liked it. Okay,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna play because I haven't heard this. Here's um
Speaker 1: what's in? Okay? This is a shadow of the coloss
Speaker 1: As a song called Insurgent. Oh my gosh, you have it. Wait,
Speaker 1: who's singing? Okay? So it is our buddy Drew from
Speaker 1: my hometown. Okay, so you weren't even the lead singer. Nope,
Speaker 1: where were you playing? I played bass? So my I
Speaker 1: played bass, my brother played drums. Were the rhythm section twins.
Speaker 1: I can't believe you pulled that up. It's crazy, man.
Speaker 1: Yeah wow, well I bet the crowds were scary. That
Speaker 1: will come to those shows. Unreal, so fun, the funnest
Speaker 1: thing ever. And gosh, I'm probably going to regret this.
Speaker 1: I told I told Tom Pulman this once and he
Speaker 1: will not let it down. We used to like I
Speaker 1: used to. I used to spit on people like they
Speaker 1: would love it, Like we'd be up there just like
Speaker 1: like you know what I mean. It was like what
Speaker 1: are we doing? I'm looking back, like like was all underground,
Speaker 1: Like we didn't release through iTunes, we did only did
Speaker 1: bands uh was it band camp or whatever? The reps
Speaker 1: like it was all underground all like d I y
Speaker 1: like for a reason, like we were we're just like
Speaker 1: against the man people time. Dude, it was so bad
Speaker 1: and like what a band like this get girls though
Speaker 1: it sounds like a bunch of it's a lot of dudes. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean you'd be surprised, like there's it's a it's
Speaker 1: an age thing. It's a culture pop is what I
Speaker 1: like to call it. It's like, you know, like I said,
Speaker 1: you're going through high school. You're trying to make sense
Speaker 1: of all these kind of angsty kind of feelings and
Speaker 1: you're trying to figure out who you are, and there's
Speaker 1: like that. You would be surprised, Like there was a
Speaker 1: huge uh scene for it in my in my hometown,
Speaker 1: and there's you know everything everybody in between. Man, you know,
Speaker 1: you'd be surprised. Um, and this comes out of you
Speaker 1: right here. You call made of the spectrum. But that's
Speaker 1: the thing, and that's really my heart, the biggest it's
Speaker 1: not even hurdle anymore. Can I just kick it down?
Speaker 1: When I moved here, it was you can't do this
Speaker 1: because you have too many other interests. But it's like,
Speaker 1: pick up anybody's freaking phone. Look at the music that
Speaker 1: people are streaming buying what nobody has one format of
Speaker 1: music and it's not what people want. Even the artists,
Speaker 1: all the artists that come through here, there are influences.
Speaker 1: Aren't just all country music artists, And you know what,
Speaker 1: it's probably some most, but a lot of them. And
Speaker 1: it's the artist now who are who are getting a
Speaker 1: lot of pushback, but they're having a huge amount of
Speaker 1: success because that's what today's country is like. Look at
Speaker 1: look at TRS Thomas Schrtz last record. If there's dance
Speaker 1: tracks on there, there's like do wop something, straight country songs,
Speaker 1: Mary that is just straight up country songs, the country songs.
Speaker 1: But it's not even the fact of each of those individually.
Speaker 1: It's the fact that he is a country music listener
Speaker 1: and artists. But even he's like, I have these other
Speaker 1: influence course, and this is what country music is to me.
Speaker 1: And I appreciate that because people like him have a platform,
Speaker 1: they have a voice, they have power to influence and
Speaker 1: and kind of not make it easier but pave the
Speaker 1: way for the rest of us. And not like I'm
Speaker 1: doing anything that I'm not like, I'm I'm always going
Speaker 1: to be unapologetically wholeheartedly me. Like there's songs on this
Speaker 1: record that tap into the heavier side of me, and
Speaker 1: it's like, this is this is just what I do,
Speaker 1: like just trying to, you know, fail being like my
Speaker 1: heroes and just figure out what my influences are and
Speaker 1: then just put every little piece of every little corner
Speaker 1: in my heart in my mind on this record, you know.
Speaker 1: And it's like that's just what you should do. That's
Speaker 1: what your job is as an artist, you know. Blind
Speaker 1: Man Flower. This is the first song I ever released
Speaker 1: as a as a solo artist. Ye, what was my
Speaker 1: buddy Andy Albert? Was it? Since that was your first
Speaker 1: song insult? It was that weird. It was such sonically different. Well,
Speaker 1: that was maybe three three years into living in Nashville,
Speaker 1: so I had already are you in the culture then, right,
Speaker 1: you know? And I, you know, I'd put up like
Speaker 1: stuff on SoundCloud and like made videos and like people knew.
Speaker 1: And it's like people will always ask, like, how do
Speaker 1: you go from such heavy metal to country or to
Speaker 1: writing these love songs? And it was really about just
Speaker 1: reverting back to what I started with, you know, and
Speaker 1: what felt right in my heart or just what was
Speaker 1: just like what came out naturally. Um. And so blind
Speaker 1: Man was the first song. You know, as you're developing
Speaker 1: through writing and through writing for other people and you
Speaker 1: get a publishing deal and you're playing shows and you're
Speaker 1: figuring out who you are, there's certain songs that come
Speaker 1: along that define who you are and what you want
Speaker 1: to say. And that was one of the first ones
Speaker 1: that I was like, that is me. That's got a
Speaker 1: rock solid lyric, it's got this really cool vibe. The
Speaker 1: melodies you can sing along too, and it means something
Speaker 1: like lyrically, I need to sing about something I can't.
Speaker 1: I just I need to chew on something like I
Speaker 1: am so guilty of not having like woe wos in
Speaker 1: my song, just because like if I have real estate,
Speaker 1: I need to say I have to say something, you know.
Speaker 1: And that was one of the first songs that came
Speaker 1: out where I was like, let's record it, let's put
Speaker 1: it out, like that's what I want people to That's
Speaker 1: what I want people to hear. Are you stilding the
Speaker 1: all black and white stuff all time? Always? Yeah? Well
Speaker 1: you mean eventually you're gonna have to not do that? Well,
Speaker 1: I don't know, man, we'll see. We'll see what happens forever.
Speaker 1: Just go all black and white on Instagram. I bet
Speaker 1: you I can, but you eventually you're going to be
Speaker 1: like I've done one. So listen, I'm that's the that's
Speaker 1: the thing that I've talked about with a couple people.
Speaker 1: It won't happen forever, but when it doesn't, tell me
Speaker 1: why you decided to go all black and white? Okay.
Speaker 1: So it wasn't like one day I woke up and
Speaker 1: I was like, you know, what I'm gonna do this,
Speaker 1: This is my brand, this is who I am. It
Speaker 1: really was like this, like somebody was tugging on my
Speaker 1: on my collar, like I would buy clothes like I
Speaker 1: wear black all black two and it's just like I
Speaker 1: would buy grays and greens in earth tones or what.
Speaker 1: I just would never wear them like I would put
Speaker 1: it on. It's like it doesn't look right. And I
Speaker 1: kind of just gave into it one day over time.
Speaker 1: And I think a lot of influences from being in
Speaker 1: a metal band, because obviously we all really wear black,
Speaker 1: you know, and that's kind of the root of that
Speaker 1: kind of visual or that esthetic in a way, and
Speaker 1: so that's kind of part of that influence. But also,
Speaker 1: and this is something that I only stumbled on recently
Speaker 1: because you're so close to it when you grew up.
Speaker 1: And this might sound done, but I grew up three
Speaker 1: minutes from fulsome prison. I love Johnny Cash and his
Speaker 1: artistry in the way that nobody sounded like him before him,
Speaker 1: and nobody will ever sound like him after him. But
Speaker 1: he just had a way of doing his thing. And
Speaker 1: I feel like that kind of literally right, three minutes
Speaker 1: from my three minutes from my house, and I feel
Speaker 1: like subconsciously that kind of seeped in to my influence,
Speaker 1: even though I didn't know really how cool that was
Speaker 1: until I flew until I moved away, and you kind
Speaker 1: of finally get some perspective. Um, but something in between
Speaker 1: those and it just feels right, dude. I just like
Speaker 1: that kind of classic vibe that it, that it gives off.
Speaker 1: Like I could see a picture in color and then
Speaker 1: I'll put it in black and white when I'm editing
Speaker 1: or whatever, and I'm like, yeah, that looks right. Like
Speaker 1: I've tried, Like We've had stylists and photo shoots like
Speaker 1: what about red? What about a white shirt? And I'm
Speaker 1: like I'll try it, you know, and like everyone goes,
Speaker 1: we get him back it's like it doesn't look right,
Speaker 1: you know. So I'm just kind of going with my gut.
Speaker 1: I don't know, but I do think one day I
Speaker 1: would like to do something different. But I would hope
Speaker 1: that because I've set such a deep root in my
Speaker 1: love for that aesthetic, that it should mean something. It
Speaker 1: should be for a reason, um, not to like set
Speaker 1: it up or anything, but different record or different move
Speaker 1: or different story, whatever it is, you know, for do
Speaker 1: it for a reason, not just to not do it anymore.
Speaker 1: You know, you know, I phone black, I you're gonna
Speaker 1: get the new It depends. People listen these things two
Speaker 1: years after, But are you getting the eight or the tin? Honestly,
Speaker 1: waiting the ten scares me, dude, because you're the face.
Speaker 1: I guess yeah, I just I don't know. Like, do
Speaker 1: you snapchat? I don't snapchat much. I'm mostly on Instagram.
Speaker 1: That's my That's my biggest thing. Do you ever use
Speaker 1: face filters on inst your story? Yeah? See, okay, so
Speaker 1: I do love the face filters. That is the same thing.
Speaker 1: If the government's stealing or using our partial recognition they
Speaker 1: already got. I was gonna say, we're already a foot
Speaker 1: in the door, like it's already now. It's like it's
Speaker 1: just hook line and sinker at this point. It's just
Speaker 1: I'm sure I'll be fine with it. It's just the
Speaker 1: initial like feeling that I got when I saw the videos.
Speaker 1: I'm just like that makes me cringe. Man, Like I
Speaker 1: think about the thumb print whenever that first. The same thing. Yeah,
Speaker 1: if you don't do it, they don't care what you
Speaker 1: are you going to get it? Of course I'm going
Speaker 1: to get it. I'm probably gonna get it, of course,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna for different reasons. What do you have you
Speaker 1: updated dropping system? No, I haven't. I suck at it.
Speaker 1: It's fantastically even the texting, Yeah, all the little options
Speaker 1: on the I'm like, you can send song. I mean,
Speaker 1: the updates really great. But you strike him as a
Speaker 1: real tech savvy guy. I'm decent um. I'm not like,
Speaker 1: I'm not like a dive in deep nerd tech savvy guy,
Speaker 1: but I can. I can get by man, but actually
Speaker 1: a big Lord of the Rings nerd. Though, yes, how
Speaker 1: did you know that? Are we talking about now? I
Speaker 1: don't think so. Here's my story. I watched Lord of
Speaker 1: the Ring because I was like, Okay, there's gotta be
Speaker 1: something to this, because like reality, you mean, or like
Speaker 1: but I look at IMDb or like a run and
Speaker 1: I believe that if a lot of people say something's good,
Speaker 1: then it's probably pretty good. Like I believe that I've
Speaker 1: never seen episode of Sopranos, but I believe probably freaking
Speaker 1: really good show because not that many people will say
Speaker 1: it's good, it's not. It sounds like I gotta watch
Speaker 1: The Lord of the Rings because there's something to it
Speaker 1: and I want one Christmas vacation. I watched all of them.
Speaker 1: It was okay, like what I know, and I'm not
Speaker 1: even to be a hater, but you know, it's okay,
Speaker 1: like you're either there's I'm just two tests with people,
Speaker 1: like I know. I did not like it. I did
Speaker 1: not like it at all. Yeah, I'm gonna do it.
Speaker 1: Pissed me off. Was at the end of the first one.
Speaker 1: They're just they're just they're just beginning, and I was like,
Speaker 1: I just watched it for three and it ends up
Speaker 1: walking up a hill. But I watched them all and
Speaker 1: I'm not a hater of it at all because I
Speaker 1: love when people are passionate about something that's not hurting
Speaker 1: other people. Yeah, I don't care what you're passionate about,
Speaker 1: if you like love my Little Pony or fancy football
Speaker 1: or Lord of the Rings, if it's not hurting anybody.
Speaker 1: I love just passion. So it's in no way that
Speaker 1: But I was like, what am I missing because I
Speaker 1: watched all of it? Due to me, it was it
Speaker 1: was the imagination of it, like he literally created his
Speaker 1: own language, like Jared Tolkien, like literally created his own language,
Speaker 1: like just stop there, like you're a beast already, like
Speaker 1: and then creating these stories and and and a world
Speaker 1: in a map, and like I'm getting really nerdy, but
Speaker 1: like it's just it's this kind of again, this kind
Speaker 1: of dark aesthetic that I just am always drawn to
Speaker 1: in the storyline and not not just giving it away,
Speaker 1: Like you gotta spend three movies. You got to spend
Speaker 1: three hours just getting introd into the people, you know,
Speaker 1: three hours each time? Oh my god, I don't know.
Speaker 1: And I always always go back and forth on which
Speaker 1: one is my favorite, because they each have their own
Speaker 1: Like the second one, the Two Towers, is the darkest
Speaker 1: of them, like it's the most kind of sinister, but
Speaker 1: the third one is just so epic with the battle scenes.
Speaker 1: Like I'm I will go into deep into this if
Speaker 1: you what about because I love Game of Thrones. I'm
Speaker 1: not against I'm not against fantasy in any way whatsoever.
Speaker 1: I watched that and thought it was fine. I was
Speaker 1: just like I was missing it felt like I was missing.
Speaker 1: The rings was a little it's a little slow. It's
Speaker 1: a little it's a little born. You gotta be kidding me,
Speaker 1: you're telling me, Laura, And I watched nine hours and
Speaker 1: they didn't walking at the end. I just like, I
Speaker 1: don't know, I just love it, man, I just like
Speaker 1: sunk right into it. I think like Lord of the
Speaker 1: Rings that much of the game. Okay, so you're talking
Speaker 1: about like going on Rotten Tomatoes and seeing something that
Speaker 1: everyone's watching and like love Game of Throne. Honestly, I
Speaker 1: thought it was good. I just don't have I don't
Speaker 1: have time. And if you don't keep up, if you're
Speaker 1: not where ever went to. Yes, I just like I've
Speaker 1: seen like one of the first one of the like,
Speaker 1: and I just like, there's no way, there's absolutely no way.
Speaker 1: That's such a daunting task for me to try to
Speaker 1: to like accomplished watching that whole thing, Like there's when
Speaker 1: when am I going to do that? There's no way
Speaker 1: how I do it. You don't even sleep, you down
Speaker 1: me either. But I'm on a bus or I'm on
Speaker 1: a freaking airplane all the time. And that's why I do.
Speaker 1: I just download and watch if I can see. I
Speaker 1: have a rare gift of being able to sleep on airplanes,
Speaker 1: and so that's when I sleep, like I I will
Speaker 1: I'll sleep two hours a night or whatever and go
Speaker 1: out and make it sure I'm doing my thing and
Speaker 1: then I'll get on an airplane and pass out. So
Speaker 1: that's when I when I should be watching movies is
Speaker 1: when I'm sleeping. So so what's your deal? And again,
Speaker 1: these things are not you know, podcasts are done and
Speaker 1: they're heard over months and months, so it's probably gonna
Speaker 1: be an old question by the time a lot of
Speaker 1: good hear this. So like, what's the deal with with music?
Speaker 1: And like, when are you gonna put out a whole
Speaker 1: bunch of it? Yeah, I mean, dude, I'm I'm chomping
Speaker 1: at the bit, man, I'm so stoked. Um. So we
Speaker 1: have three songs out right now, UM, one single on
Speaker 1: the radio which is an insane sentence that will never
Speaker 1: get old. UM. And I think we planned to release
Speaker 1: three more before the record comes out. UM, can't give
Speaker 1: you the exact date yet, but it's going to be
Speaker 1: in January. So cool. So early next year, early next year,
Speaker 1: which is great because it's I always like starting off
Speaker 1: a year like that. Just we all kind of go
Speaker 1: away for the Christmas and Hanuker or whatever you do
Speaker 1: and and Thanksgiving and you kind of come back and
Speaker 1: you're just ready for something, you know, and what's upbout
Speaker 1: the Z by the way, because I look at your
Speaker 1: name and it's always the Z Devin search for it.
Speaker 1: I can't. Why can I happen? So mckittye, like he
Speaker 1: always calls people by their like their handle, and he
Speaker 1: always calls me at Z Devon, so I always call
Speaker 1: him Ryan mcradio but um or Mr Bobby Bones, you know.
Speaker 1: But okay, So I was in middle school and like
Speaker 1: back when you create, like your A O L, like
Speaker 1: bass player, A eight, like atl dot com or whatever,
Speaker 1: like all of those handles that you just regret. Ever
Speaker 1: making for some reason, convinced people that for a couple
Speaker 1: of weeks that my name started with the Z, that
Speaker 1: it was just silent, and so I had to I
Speaker 1: had to back it up with the with the handle,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean, And and it just stuck.
Speaker 1: And I've never It's just like a two week little thing,
Speaker 1: and I've never changed it. In in the beginning of
Speaker 1: like getting signed and trying to like putting put my
Speaker 1: music out and my image and my name and all
Speaker 1: that stuff, they were like, we really, we really need
Speaker 1: to change it to Devin Dawson or Devin Dawson music.
Speaker 1: And I was like nope, keeping it Like there's there's
Speaker 1: I trust a lot of my team, like I said,
Speaker 1: but there's certain things where I'll be a difficult artist.
Speaker 1: I don't care, like if it feels right, and the
Speaker 1: thing you want to be difficult about is the z
Speaker 1: it's it's it's petty. Sometimes there's guy for guys that's
Speaker 1: keeping yeah, and that's like I've had a couple of
Speaker 1: people be like what is that and I'm like, honestly,
Speaker 1: it's the dumbest thing, but like I just love it, man,
Speaker 1: and like you know, bad girl re re Like not
Speaker 1: everyone is Rihanna music or Bobby Bones radio whatever. Some
Speaker 1: guys squatted it and holds it. Yeah, that's that's rough. Man.
Speaker 1: Does anyone have just Devin Dawson? Yes, they do. And
Speaker 1: I remember I remember messaging him like dude, like send
Speaker 1: you a twelve pack of beer or something. I didn't
Speaker 1: even offer money. I was like, dude, what's I tried
Speaker 1: to do the broer out, like what's up, dude? Like
Speaker 1: dig your name man, you know, like is it really
Speaker 1: someone named Devin Dawson or they it's it's it was
Speaker 1: him before and he doesn't even like post. You know,
Speaker 1: it's one of those like hasn't gone on in two years,
Speaker 1: but like won't let it go, and so I it
Speaker 1: was another one of those like signs of like I'm
Speaker 1: keeping my thing, like I'm doing I'm staying true and
Speaker 1: it's you know, at the very least, it's it's kind
Speaker 1: of something funny to talk about and it makes me laugh.
Speaker 1: So dude, I PRETI you come and by feel like
Speaker 1: I feel like it's been an hour an hour into this, Dude,
Speaker 1: we could do this forever. You still get excited when
Speaker 1: you hear it. Dude, it will never get older. And
Speaker 1: I feel like that's how you should choose songs where
Speaker 1: every single time you hear it for hopefully fifty years,
Speaker 1: it will never it will never deminish. That's what everybody
Speaker 1: says until they get tired of playing it. Like I
Speaker 1: feel like Paul McCartney probably is good and playing help yeah,
Speaker 1: probably doesn't want to play Hey, Jude more, probably good,
Speaker 1: But dude, I don't know, like you can only do
Speaker 1: so much, you know what I mean, And you can
Speaker 1: only like you gotta choose based on what you think
Speaker 1: is going to last and hold up and if if
Speaker 1: that one finally after twenty years gets old to you,
Speaker 1: then the one that probably would have just lasted fifteen.
Speaker 1: You know, you gotta you gotta put your best foot forward.
Speaker 1: And I think the hardest part as a songwriter is
Speaker 1: the fact that I write every day and that's probably
Speaker 1: a two year old, two and a half year old
Speaker 1: song at this point, and it still feels good, you know.
Speaker 1: But I'm just like stoked on just putting new music
Speaker 1: out man, So well, thanks stopping by dude, Devin Dawson,
Speaker 1: check out all on Me or maybe if you're hearing
Speaker 1: this epiod first of the year by the record. The
Speaker 1: whole record is fantastic. I already downloaded it right right, yea, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: we'll play cool act. I believe it. Yeah yeah yeah yeah,
Speaker 1: all right, we'll see you, uh next time is alright,