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October 14, 2025 66 mins

The week Reid and Dan host legendary artist and Grand Ole Opry member, Jamey Johnson out in God's Country. They dive in on why it's been 14 years since Jamey has released new music and how his current duet came to fruition. Jamey tells the story behind how "In Color" became the song that is it and the personal touches they were able to throw in there throughout the writing process. Reid and Dan ask a million questions about the legendary "Traler Park Boys" here in Nashville and Jamey shares some stories that had the boys in tears. The episode ends with a George Jones gravorite and we don't know who's gonna fill his shoes after this!

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Episode Transcript

Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
Yeah, what is up?

Speaker 2 (00:07):
You were off of God's Country with your boys, Read
and dan isbel Ye also known as the Brothers Hunt,
where we weekly take a drive to the intersection of
country music and the great outdoors, two things that go together.

Speaker 1 (00:24):
Like one hundred episodes in God's Country, Baby, you've been
here for one hundred episodes again with pop a Gun.
Appreciate that one hundred unbelievable. It's kind of unbelievable that
people care that much that it's kept us around for
one hundred, one hundred hours while more talking more than that,

(00:48):
what's one hundred hours, it's probably one hundred and fifty
hours when you talk about all of the b roll
and stuff we can't cut and ads andtros. Yeah, a
lot of talking. Man. If you listen to a hundred episodes,
appreciate you leave us a review and tell us that
you have because I'm curious that tell us your favorite
episode and leave us five stars.

Speaker 2 (01:05):
Any uh, let's do this five star reviews, and any
like moments out of the last hundred episodes that's been
your favorite. Maybe my favorite moment from God's Country podcast
over the last hundred episodes.

Speaker 1 (01:16):
Maybe get a little real going to some favorite moments
and see how it goes. This show is also brought
to you by me teacher and hey, t e s
do you remember yours? Uh like that?

Speaker 2 (01:31):
Maybe he oh beat still sponsor man shown now shout
out to the coas but still sponsorman the show. Now,
baby Jamie Johnson put his on in the middle of
our show.

Speaker 1 (01:45):
Didn't have no socks on, just slipped in his ten.

Speaker 2 (01:48):
Tantos cus the co sponsoring the show.

Speaker 1 (01:52):
Now baby, Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, go the show's
really good. Wrong man, think about that. Man, we had
we'd have no sponsors at the beginning. Remember there was
nobody around sponsors. We have no boots. We had that
little room over there. We're just sitting on some couches

(02:12):
trying to convince our friends to come in. Yeah, now
we're turning them down.

Speaker 2 (02:17):
That's right now. We're just we got this cool new room. Yep,
not really new, probably done fifty episodes.

Speaker 1 (02:22):
A new guy rais not new, and the new guy
Raise not new.

Speaker 2 (02:25):
Been here for dude, Ray has almost been here for
one hundred show.

Speaker 1 (02:29):
I bet he's been there for our seventy. Give yourself
a round of applause. Ray, I remember that.

Speaker 2 (02:36):
Yeah, You're our money, right, Jammie Johnson Man speaking of
a hundredth episode, Jamie Freaking Johnson.

Speaker 1 (02:45):
I think we might have a moment that will live
forever on the Internet.

Speaker 2 (02:51):
I think virality is coming. It's coming. Dude, This guy
I kind of like blacked out and asked him to
do something and he did it. Yeah, I was did
it better. He did more than anybody, you know, how
many people.

Speaker 1 (03:05):
It's kind of like if people ask us to play
kind of Love You makee You're like, oh yeah, sure,
kind of the song you're known for a little bit,
which which which is fine if anybody ever wants to
ask will But here's the thing too, though, It's like,
it's one thing to see us sit there and play
kind of Love We Make with a guitar, But it's
another thing if if Luke comes is sitting there and

(03:26):
and he plays kind of Love We Make and he's
kind of that James kind of both because he wrote
it in saying yes, But like.

Speaker 2 (03:31):
How many how many people have I ever? How many
times have I sat down and played that song but
and heard it from somebody else instead of that guy,
instead of the dude that did it.

Speaker 1 (03:42):
God Man Killer song man, But you know what all
this stuff, he's.

Speaker 2 (03:47):
An unbelievable songwriter, man, and surround himself with unbelievable songwriters.

Speaker 1 (03:51):
You know, I heard I can't remember it was, I
think it was Chris Stapleton said that he Hell's Jamie
Johnson is the best vocalist it's ever come through Nashville. Yeah,
I mean, Chris Stapleson said, that's an argument to be
had for sure. He's it's unbelievable Stomper I would say,
just one of the coolest voices, especially to hear in

(04:13):
these headphones, Like you get to hear no doubt the
timbre of it, and man, he's just a cool dude.
There's also like, so I feel like there are tanks
that get filled for great vocalists. Like sometimes there's like
a uh literal vocal tone tank, right, Then there's like
ability to move around tank. Then there's conviction. Then there's

(04:35):
the storytelling. I feel like his storytelling and conviction tank
is like and then you build that up with his
like mega solid mechanics, control and control. But then there's
already been that kid's hard to be.

Speaker 2 (04:50):
Yeah, there's he does all that in a vocal range
that's like this that's far on the Stapleton's is this. Yeah,
he can go, but like Jamie does all that, Jamie
is the best at that.

Speaker 1 (05:03):
He lives in the basement. Dude, Yeah, dude, he's a
basement singer. Stays down there in that.

Speaker 3 (05:08):
Man.

Speaker 2 (05:09):
And I know, like a lot of a lot of
our episodes are like, you know, we do what you're
mad at, and then we talked something about hunting and
then we go into the music thing. This one, for
some reason, it just never took to a thing. I know,
there were so much we never talked about hunting a
little bit, but like it was just we just talked.

Speaker 1 (05:28):
It's almost like.

Speaker 2 (05:29):
We knew him and we were just it was kind
of like getting to know him, but you knew him.

Speaker 1 (05:33):
He was exactly like I thought he would be because
of all those dudes. You know, Yeah, he was exactly
like that. Like you always hear these stories, Oh Jamie Johnson,
some mysterious and scared like nobody. He sweetheart. It was awesome, awesome,
kind of looks like he could kill you at any moment, though,
he was like that under control.

Speaker 2 (05:53):
Did you see that scoldering yet on those diamonds were
like flashing eyes making me like I felt one time
I got tranced by it. I feel like it asked
me to sell my soul?

Speaker 1 (06:02):
Am I trans right now? I don't know, dude. Did
he steal all my songwriting ability through that? My soul
and song way?

Speaker 2 (06:08):
I gotta check my song idea One of my song
idealist was empty.

Speaker 1 (06:13):
It wouldn't hurt nothing. Yeah, I would admit that he
wouldn't use any of them. Oh. Jamie Johnson, one hundred episodes.
Jamie Johnson, y'all go way to go, follow us, leave us.
I appreciate you country, thanks for hanging around. Can't believe
y'all I listened to us. Yeah, yeah, we love y'all.
Thanks for sticking around. Here's to another hundred. Here's to
another hundred. See you, thanks Jimmy Johnson.

Speaker 4 (06:34):
By I swore off of managers for the longest time.
I was out golfing with t K one day, and
I've known him for for years just through Toby and.

Speaker 3 (06:52):
Well.

Speaker 4 (06:53):
When we golf, we didn't talk business. Yeah, but my
phone had rang a one hundred times that day and
I was not enjoying my round as a result, And
finally I hung the phone up that last time threw
it in the glove box of that golf cart, and
I looked at t K. I said, if if I

(07:14):
get out of my own way and just hand you everything,
are you sure you can run my business and make
me more money than I am.

Speaker 3 (07:24):
He looked at me and went, oh.

Speaker 1 (07:26):
Yeah, that's my guy. Hell Ya.

Speaker 3 (07:30):
I was like done.

Speaker 1 (07:31):
I'm always about handing handed people responsibilities that know more
about it than I do.

Speaker 3 (07:37):
Well. I mean that's a that's a skill set.

Speaker 2 (07:41):
One thousand percent saying it's important too, right, I mean,
especially in this kind of business.

Speaker 1 (07:47):
Ray, are we rolling? I need a little I need
a little hiphone volume? Are more me and his ears? Yeah?
I need less of him and more me and his ears?

Speaker 5 (07:58):
Uh?

Speaker 1 (07:59):
Yeah, there is he is? Where were we good? As
far as being up on the mics?

Speaker 3 (08:02):
You need to give us a free now we're chilling
y'all playing music in there. I need to hear.

Speaker 1 (08:07):
No, no, I don't think no, no, no, uh no.

Speaker 2 (08:11):
Going back to that, I think that's important because you
always hear about like you're only as good as the
people you surround yourself with, and especially in a business
like this, if you have a good team, if you
don't have a good team, it makes it that much harder,
almost impossible.

Speaker 3 (08:23):
Yeah, but with.

Speaker 2 (08:24):
A good team, you know, you need every little break
and every little piece of luck you can in this.

Speaker 3 (08:28):
Town, and well you do too.

Speaker 5 (08:30):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (08:31):
Yeah, absolutely. I mean I feel like I've been around
long enough to watch people kind of not work because
they have teams, yeah, and not want to change and
want to stay with them and prove somebody wrong. And
it don't work like that sometimes.

Speaker 3 (08:47):
Yeah, I'm from Alabama. There ain't no.

Speaker 1 (08:50):
Teams this week. God, God, Georgia, Dude, I lots money
on that. Damn give us an intro, dude, I like
when you do it.

Speaker 4 (08:59):
I hate that for Georgia fans, and I ain't even
bothered to reach out to any of my Georgia friends.

Speaker 3 (09:05):
Know who they are.

Speaker 1 (09:07):
I hated it. I know who they are.

Speaker 4 (09:08):
I've been withholding all my text messages, just letting it
so that we may remain.

Speaker 2 (09:16):
I hated it for my fan duel account because it
definitely I definitely tell you. I mean, George was the
under you know, even early they were hurt, that one hurt.

Speaker 4 (09:25):
That one hurt, that hurt well you and I thought
it was like maybe seven until the guy got on
it and said it was ten out of the past
eleven times, and I thought, oh, that next one's gonna hurt.

Speaker 1 (09:40):
Yeah, ten out eleven that has Bama's won.

Speaker 3 (09:44):
Yeah, yeah, ten out of eleven.

Speaker 1 (09:46):
That's crazy.

Speaker 3 (09:47):
That's almost all of them.

Speaker 1 (09:48):
It's real close. It's really a good percentage.

Speaker 3 (09:53):
Yeah, and I love all my Georgia fans, But man.

Speaker 1 (09:57):
What do you think, uh? What do you think of
doubt this is doing this morning?

Speaker 3 (10:01):
Not drinking? I think he was.

Speaker 1 (10:05):
He's been probably working out. From the looks of him,
he's wilton away.

Speaker 3 (10:10):
I don't know what he's doing.

Speaker 4 (10:11):
Every time I see he's just more slim and more slim,
and now he's putting muscle on.

Speaker 3 (10:16):
So I think you're right. He's good for him.

Speaker 4 (10:18):
He's probably went out strength training this morning, strength training,
and things like this happened.

Speaker 3 (10:23):
We train harder.

Speaker 1 (10:24):
That's true. That's true.

Speaker 2 (10:26):
That's a little different from about twenty thirty years ago. Yeah, dude,
I had to get my stuff together.

Speaker 3 (10:32):
Dude.

Speaker 1 (10:32):
I mean I clicked forty and it was like now
never kind of you know what I mean? And it
started turning out. After having kids and a pretty great wife,
I was like, maybe I want to live this life
a little bit. I hang around.

Speaker 3 (10:47):
I want to be here a while.

Speaker 2 (10:48):
I don't give it about having six pack. I just
want to put I just want to live a longer.
I don't care about being hot.

Speaker 3 (10:54):
With That train left the station a while.

Speaker 1 (10:57):
That train had never been through my email on the
tracks of my station. They're gonna get mad at if
we don't do it. We've got a grand old off
remember a marine, one of the best beards in country music,
A big deer killing Alabama boy, artist, songwriter. Some of
the grace greatest songs to ever come out of this town.

(11:18):
A few of them I listened to this morning.

Speaker 3 (11:20):
So good.

Speaker 1 (11:21):
We've got the one and only Jamie Johnson on GCP
this week. Also what you're are yes on our one
hundredth episode, guest, Let's go yeah man, I can't believe

(11:41):
you all are listening, and there's gonna be more every week.
Look at the PROD sponsorship. Will appreciate that. I knew
you're an Alabama boy. I did not know you were
a big deer killing Alabama boy.

Speaker 3 (11:54):
I don't know about all of the deer killing. There
ain't many down there.

Speaker 1 (11:59):
You can shoot that legally where where in Alabama? Where'd
you grow up?

Speaker 4 (12:05):
We were out in the country, just southeast of Montgomery,
kind of down there in the way out to Troy. Yeah, okay,
is that anywhere close to like, uh, pretty close Thomasville.

Speaker 3 (12:23):
Tell ma, aint far?

Speaker 2 (12:24):
Tell me ain't far? Yeah, dude, does look good on you, bro,
They do look good. Yeah, Lee, just an artist, It's
just an artist.

Speaker 3 (12:32):
I'll start bringing socks over here.

Speaker 1 (12:35):
I didn't. I ain't got none on anything of this morning. Yeah.
So uh so, uh whole life down there, spen your
whole life down there up here?

Speaker 4 (12:45):
Well, yeah, I moved to Nashville January first, two thousand. Uh,
I was still twenty four and uh I've been in
Nashville for longer than that now. Yeah, it's been over
twenty five years. Here we're talking about it.

Speaker 1 (13:04):
The Lonesome Song and all that, Oh dude, in two
thousand and eight, two thousand and six, I mean that
stuff was coming out. I mean that's when I mean
I was graduating and I remember bomping that stuff, dude,
I mean mowing down the roses and all that. Man
was So when was that two thousand and eight? Yeah,
or sick that one might have even been six.

Speaker 3 (13:24):
Was that before well, Cowboy and Wade and I left
for radio tour in July five.

Speaker 1 (13:33):
I got you wow. So but was that with your first?
Was that with a dollar?

Speaker 3 (13:38):
Yeah? To the dollars that been even earlier.

Speaker 4 (13:41):
And there was a point we used to where the
dollar and honky Tonk Badonka Donk were like two places
apart on the charts.

Speaker 1 (13:51):
I think I'm of them, Jamie Johnson, genius.

Speaker 4 (13:54):
The dollar was there first, and Badonka Dounk was like
a fast train that just went by, nearly ripped the
paint off for everything the way by.

Speaker 1 (14:04):
Who So we haven't done what you're mad at. I've
got so many This is interesting. This is better.

Speaker 2 (14:10):
I feel like I know you real well because we
know Rob Hatch real well, and I've spent a.

Speaker 3 (14:15):
Lot of troublemakers.

Speaker 2 (14:19):
Yeah, I've heard a million stories about the trailer park.
I'm sorry, no, dude, I mean, I will say this.
I've been in a I've been in a truck with
Rob Hatch heading to deer Camp for about five hours,
and he never quit talking. I never quit telling stories
about y'all.

Speaker 1 (14:35):
And we never got tired of them.

Speaker 2 (14:37):
I mean, honestly, in my mind, dude, some of my
favorite like some of them, like when I think about
just laughing the harness of ever laughed to some of
those stories.

Speaker 3 (14:45):
Dude.

Speaker 1 (14:46):
You know, it's hard to hear a story that you
aren't involved with and genuinely like belly laugh at it.
But dude, I mean you know the one oh yeah
that immediately comes to mind. I can't even well, I'm
trying to. I'm trying to think of how to let
you know the story without just throwing a towel off
the stage. There your towel, Does that get it?

Speaker 4 (15:05):
M m no, kind of wrapped around that it doesn't
conjure up any.

Speaker 1 (15:13):
Yeah, I'm sure it doesn't particular memory. I'm sure it doesn't.
It wouldn't for me anyway. Yeah that I'm the same way.
I feel like I've known you. I've watched your career
and watched you come up and heard stories and know
all you buddies. It's a pleasure to have you here.

Speaker 3 (15:31):
Man.

Speaker 1 (15:32):
You look great.

Speaker 4 (15:32):
Thank you. Yeah, I've been having fun lately, so yeah,
for you. I don't get to see those guys enough.
That's why we book annual things. Yeah, you know, I
was hoping that the writer's trip down to the Bahamas
had become an annual.

Speaker 3 (15:48):
Yeah, but we have to work at it. Everybody's schedules
are so wide open, dude.

Speaker 2 (15:55):
I mean it's very rare that, you know, there's classes
that move into this town and there's little cliques and
buddy groups and they'll name there's they'll sell the trailer
parker something else.

Speaker 1 (16:07):
But y'all's group.

Speaker 2 (16:09):
I don't know of another group that's come through here
in the last twenty years, thirty years where every one
of you became very successful in this town either as
an artist or either as a songwriter, and you're still around.

Speaker 1 (16:24):
Like all of all of y'all, your whole buddy group
back then. Give us a rundown of of of.

Speaker 3 (16:29):
The core how that came to be. Yeah, I think
I think Listener would love to.

Speaker 4 (16:34):
Hear that well, at least from my perspective, and I
think it would be similar for the others as well.
From from my perspective, I was out there playing every
time I could, you know, out and out around Nashville.
What Demon brand, Yeah, particularly, but uh.

Speaker 2 (16:51):
That's that's back in the day when there was there
was it was just that that mud parking lot across from.

Speaker 4 (16:56):
At Old Shawney's Park and yeah, that's right, that's where
I used to park my truck. And there's so many
things went down over there. Yeah, and we were young
and it was kind of our our bar crawl. We
knew every one of the bar owners and the management
and the staff and all of them because we played

(17:18):
all of them. But we had some that we played
quite a bit more. And one of them was Old
shy Town. We went in there one night and we're
sitting there.

Speaker 1 (17:32):
Because we've had a lot of them on the show.
We've had Lee, we've had Rob.

Speaker 3 (17:39):
I bet this would have been Jared and.

Speaker 1 (17:41):
Rob, Jared Neman and Robatge all right.

Speaker 4 (17:47):
If if not, it was Jared Neman and John Stone.
Not to be confused with the tutsis John Stone. There's
two of them, same time, same ara that we kept them,
uh separated.

Speaker 3 (18:01):
Isn't that way?

Speaker 1 (18:04):
Johnstone?

Speaker 3 (18:05):
Yeah?

Speaker 4 (18:05):
And then there was our guy John and he was
a songwriter. Funny dude, good songwriter.

Speaker 3 (18:12):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (18:12):
We went in there and were watching this dueling piano
thing and it's us and like maybe one dude he
seemed like he might have been with them, And there
was the bar owner and I just not own her
the but the bartender I went to.

Speaker 3 (18:33):
Ask her. I said that.

Speaker 4 (18:36):
When these guys take a break, you mind if we
hope up and do a song or two. She said, sure,
I don't mind if you do it. Now tell them
to kick rocks.

Speaker 1 (18:47):
Yeah, get up there.

Speaker 4 (18:48):
She went up there, told those guys take a break,
let us play. We walked up there and sat down
on a few barstools, let up some acoustic guitars in
the in the PA system back here, and a couple
of microphones, and we had a field day. We started
playing country songs.

Speaker 3 (19:09):
Yeah, and.

Speaker 4 (19:11):
While we were in the middle of a song, the
bouncers walked up started pushing them two pianos to the
back of the bar, and them guys were walking out
the front. Yeah, that thing is over.

Speaker 1 (19:29):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (19:31):
I hated that for those guys, but that's why they
called us head hunters. Yeah, you know, we were exactly
those guys.

Speaker 3 (19:39):
Man.

Speaker 4 (19:39):
If I could walk into a boring bar and I
know it's because of what what kind of music you're
playing in here, I know that's something I can fix. Well,
me and John Stone and Jared Nemon sat down and
the originally it was the three of us playing that
little bar uh in shy Town turned into our clubhouse.

Speaker 3 (20:00):
Oh very much.

Speaker 1 (20:01):
So, that's awesome.

Speaker 4 (20:02):
We had super soakers full of like and this was
probably the genius of Jared Nemon if I had anything
to if I had to guess where the idea originated,
we had super soakers. Well, Jared and John would load
theirs with tequila Sunrise and like a water down tequila Sunrise,

(20:27):
and all the girls got those. Yeah, well, all the
guys got this Bacardi one fifty one.

Speaker 3 (20:34):
From my so we spend all.

Speaker 4 (20:38):
Night just dosing these dudes us with a car octane liquor.
Whether you get them in the eye or what, it's
still fun. Oh yeah, that's having a ball me, you know,
just yeah, let them have it. By the end of
the night. We always ended up with like three bachelorette

(20:59):
party and these dudes are being hauled out of here.

Speaker 3 (21:02):
Man.

Speaker 4 (21:03):
Jared put a guy in a cab one night and
gave the cab driver twenty bucks. He said, what address
Jared said that way?

Speaker 1 (21:13):
The guy went right, it's awesome, that's beautiful, that's awesome.
All right, you gonna do it? Yeah, we should. They're
gonna get mad at us. Oh yeah, of course enough.

Speaker 5 (21:30):
What you mad at?

Speaker 1 (21:32):
Just tell us what it is. What you're mad at?

Speaker 2 (21:36):
Is it you in the Lost kids, might be Boss
Man or your neighbor's cat.

Speaker 3 (21:41):
Just tell us what you mad.

Speaker 1 (21:47):
Here you go.

Speaker 3 (21:50):
I don't think I've gotten in touch with my anger.

Speaker 2 (21:54):
It's early, yeah, because you'd be glad, you'd be glad
at something, and yeah, man, I'll tell you what I'm
mad at. This is just petty. But uh, I watched
that Cowboys Packers game last night. Yeah, yeah, dude, stayed
up late because it was such a good game, had
a little money on it.

Speaker 1 (22:14):
You didn't know.

Speaker 2 (22:15):
I did know, but I didn't think there was a possibility, right,
And it's it still makes me mad that NFL games,
foot football games, American football games can end in a tie.

Speaker 3 (22:27):
Yeah that it was forty forty what was that?

Speaker 1 (22:31):
Oh dude? And they were driving up and down.

Speaker 2 (22:33):
They scored, I think both of them scored in their
last two drives down the field and to push it
into overtime, and then they both scored in overtime.

Speaker 1 (22:41):
Did you see them all going like oh dude? Yeah,
Like they were like yeah, just they were like, how
do you feel about this game? He's like, well, I'm
kind of just stealing, accepting the fact that we just
played our ass off for three and a half hours
and it ended up to time. Yeah. I thought that
was kind of myself. Let the let the people get
with the you know.

Speaker 2 (22:59):
I mean, I understand they're good and they're gonna score,
but but somebody's got to win at some point.

Speaker 3 (23:03):
Man.

Speaker 1 (23:03):
Yeah. Yeah, wow, maybe man, that's a good one.

Speaker 5 (23:07):
Uh.

Speaker 1 (23:08):
I'm mad that I have called my neighbor to help
pull me out my tractor out twice, and I have
to I just have to admit, like you know, when
you have to admit that, like somebody knows more about
something than you do.

Speaker 2 (23:22):
And it's like that guy knows more of that, especially
like a manly thing. Yeah, like a tough Thing's what
I'm trying to get to.

Speaker 1 (23:28):
Yeah. Well, he's like an equipment guy, right, so he
like does all this equipment stuff. He's got caterpillars and saying, uh,
skid stick, He's got all this stuff.

Speaker 3 (23:39):
Right.

Speaker 1 (23:40):
So I'm bushy having yesterday and I'm looking at this
tree and I'm like, I'm pretty sure I bush aged
behind and it's on a i mean a bowl. Basically,
I'm pretty sure, I bush off behind that tree, but
there's two trees and they look identical, so I can't
remember which one I bush off behind, so I go
behind it. When I do, I feel that tractor start
lean and hard left. Then all of a sudden it

(24:01):
drops off in a hole. And I look back and
my right tires in the air spinning, and I was like,
I'm I could very well die from this. I probably
need to turn the tractor off and realize that I've
messed up here and either call you or call Tanner. Well,
he lives right down the road, and I was like,
better call Tanner. Yeah, yeah, you get me killed. So

(24:22):
I flipped that tract earlier. He's like helps. He was
doing something awesome like pressure washing and something. Kids stare that.
He just total manly thing. He's like, give me ten
I'll be up there, man. I was like, all right,
So I went in. I found a jar of apple
pot moonshine. I was like, that's a pretty good trade
for help pulling a tractor out, right. So he pulls up.
I'm like, hey, man, sorry, dude, here's this for your trouble.

(24:46):
He drives around there and he's like he's looking at
it and he's like, this is the second time he's
done this, got it full dry, Like, yeah, I learned
that last time you got me out that I had
to correctly put it in a full dry. He's like, well,
you step on differential down there to lock it, lock
it in all four wheels. And I was like, no,

(25:06):
I did not do that. He was like, all right, well,
put your bushog down a little bit, and I lowered
the bush like, bring you front in, bload it up,
did all the like stuff that I should know. And
then I stepped on that real differential and he stood
on the side of it and like trying to balance
a little bit, yeah, counterweight. It just crawled right out

(25:26):
and I was like, I need you to pull me out,
just need to change in your truck and all that.
Two times. I just needed you to come to tell
me how to work my own track. And I caught
myself going like, I mean that will was in the
air a minute ago. He's like, yeah, man, I'm sure
it was. Man. Tell you're kind of saying you're mad
at myself. You're kind of I'm very thankful for him

(25:47):
for coming to help me.

Speaker 3 (25:48):
We're not born knowing that's true. That's right.

Speaker 1 (25:51):
There's a bit of a learning.

Speaker 2 (25:52):
You gotta slip a tractor every now and then to
learn how to not flip a track.

Speaker 1 (25:56):
You glad? Are you mad at anything?

Speaker 4 (25:57):
I ain't mad at nothing for you. I'm I'm running
a pretty good pace right now. I'm too busy to
be too upset about anything.

Speaker 1 (26:07):
I love that, man. I'm happy to hear that. Man.

Speaker 2 (26:09):
Yeah, what do you uh? Can you give me? Like,
can you give me the best marine story you got?

Speaker 3 (26:17):
No?

Speaker 2 (26:18):
No, do you do you have a marine story that's
on the lines, Like if the lines right here and
this is not telling, can I can.

Speaker 4 (26:27):
Tell you the stuff that's cleaned up for public consumption?

Speaker 1 (26:30):
Yeah? I cleaned something up for us.

Speaker 2 (26:32):
I'm just fascinated with it because I read I read
a thing that you were I mean, you just missed
going to Afghanistan right by Well.

Speaker 4 (26:41):
I served an eight year contracting there was in the
war and the years. Yeah, but the week after I
got my discharge, a buddy of mine who got in
a week or two after I did it, got orders
and they were freezing them at a certain date, And
it turned out that date was right after my no way,

(27:04):
my eggsit day.

Speaker 3 (27:05):
Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 (27:06):
So even if you had like a week left on it,
if you got froze, you were going.

Speaker 4 (27:10):
It was to the point that when the packet came
in the mail, I knew it was either.

Speaker 1 (27:16):
Orders, yeah, or dismissal or something. It had to be something. Man.

Speaker 4 (27:21):
We didn't even open it right away. I think I
waited about a week because I kept hearing from all
of everybody else they were getting orders.

Speaker 1 (27:32):
So it was just sitting there in the envelope, you
just like, wait on that one.

Speaker 4 (27:36):
Well, I don't think I took it as a relief
either way.

Speaker 1 (27:40):
I was about to say, yeah, like, how'd you take it?

Speaker 4 (27:42):
Because it ended an era for me. There were probably
a couple of my buddies that if they had been activated,
I'd had to go, and I'd been right there with them. Yeah,
we all got discharged that were on my side of
the timeline.

Speaker 1 (28:00):
What was the decision to get into the Marines.

Speaker 4 (28:03):
I just always knew I was going to be a marine,
really from the time I was a young kid. I
don't know if it was something that I heard. I
know my grandmother on my mother's side was a marine
in the World War Two era.

Speaker 3 (28:18):
I don't know.

Speaker 4 (28:18):
I just always knew I was going to do it,
And after I went to Jacksonville State for a couple
of years working on a music education.

Speaker 1 (28:27):
And English their brother that is literally where I was. Yep.

Speaker 4 (28:32):
I got through a couple of years of that, and
I thought that now is the time to do that.
I don't want to wait until I'm much older and
be trying to prove myself on paras isle. You know,
so I went at nineteen.

Speaker 1 (28:46):
Yeah, are you playing music back then or did it
come on later?

Speaker 3 (28:49):
Yeah?

Speaker 4 (28:50):
I mean music goes back into my early childhood.

Speaker 2 (28:54):
What was it like in your early childhood? Where did
the love come from? Who were you listening to? Who
are your inspiration?

Speaker 4 (29:00):
I was born in seventy five, and if you start
really paying attention to country music, I guess around seventy nine.
But I got to see the entire eighties catalog as
it unfolded, and I mean we studied every note.

Speaker 1 (29:16):
Really.

Speaker 3 (29:17):
Oh we had good music, man.

Speaker 1 (29:19):
Yeah, who's your favorites from back then?

Speaker 3 (29:20):
Well?

Speaker 4 (29:21):
You had Kenny Rogers and Dolly Parton and they were
kind of like the magic do it?

Speaker 1 (29:26):
Yeah?

Speaker 4 (29:27):
We also had Willie, We had Merle Haggard, George Jones,
and judge, Randy Travis.

Speaker 1 (29:35):
The judge. Nobody ever says the judge.

Speaker 3 (29:37):
They were Alabama. Yeah, I mean it just kept going.

Speaker 1 (29:41):
Yeah, it really does. I mean when you look back
on that, really it really does keep going. It was
one rich era in country music. Randy Travor. We got
on a Rabbit Randy Travis thing the other day. Man,
I feel like he flies under the radar a lot,
like a lot of those guys get the top slots
of that era. But dude, Randy Travis was gold. Dude. Yeah,

(30:01):
there were so many of them that weren't so many? Yeah,
really there really were. That was an era of great
of great music.

Speaker 4 (30:08):
I'll get in spells on the stage where I just
sit there popping out eighty songs. We went through a
good set the other night in Fort Worth at Billy Bobb's.

Speaker 1 (30:21):
That's a place you could play him too. Yeah.

Speaker 4 (30:23):
We played some Bell and Me brothers, some Ronnie millsap.
We did kt Osland song.

Speaker 1 (30:30):
Tell me this man, this is my whole thing with
ronniey Millsap. Right, there's a stranger in my house. Say
the words to me. There's of course a stranger in
my house. Somebody here that I can't see a stranger
in my house. The guy's blindbody here trying to take
her away from He's blind, dude. Yeah, of course he

(30:52):
can't see him.

Speaker 4 (30:53):
Well right, I don't think he thought everybody knew he
was blind.

Speaker 1 (30:57):
Really, yeah, I don't know either. I just assumed everybody
knew is blond.

Speaker 3 (31:02):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (31:03):
Okay, Well then, because it makes sense, no wonder he
can't see him? Well, he blind.

Speaker 4 (31:10):
I found out I was color blind when I got
into the Marine Corps. When they handed me that little card. Yeah,
they said how many or what number do you see?
Was the question, and I thought he was asking me
to count all these dots.

Speaker 1 (31:26):
Dave me a while.

Speaker 4 (31:27):
I started counting them in groups, and he said what number?
And I was like, man, that's pretty impatient.

Speaker 1 (31:33):
I'm to four hundred.

Speaker 4 (31:35):
Yeah, I'm just multiplying in my head. He said, you
don't see a number, and I went He said, has
anybody ever told you you're color blind?

Speaker 1 (31:45):
Wow?

Speaker 3 (31:46):
I said, no, that's how in color was born? No way, dude.

Speaker 4 (31:52):
So there were some pictures being played on the wall.
Had to be of my awards. One night I saw
him everybody on you. They were up there while you
were having your drink for you, take your seat and
all that. So the next day or so, I ran
into Lee Thomas Miller out on the sidewalk and he said,
those black and white pictures they were playing on the wall.

(32:15):
He said, I know what I see, I said, a
young version of like Bill Anderson. But I wonder what
Bill sees like you? Why is this moment captured? Who
were these random people that we don't know anything about?
And I said, yeah, you should have seen it in color.

Speaker 3 (32:31):
Huh.

Speaker 4 (32:33):
But here's why colorblind people focusing on certain keywords. I
didn't think about those pictures being black and white until
he said that, And that was the first time that
in my mind, I'm sitting there pondering. So while he's
moving forward with the conversation, my mind sitting there thinking about.

Speaker 3 (32:51):
The Wizard of Oz probably.

Speaker 4 (32:53):
Early eighties, might have been nineteen eighty or late seventies
one that they had finally colorized the Widow with the
Wizard of Art, and it was the big mantra was
see it in color. And so when he said those
pictures were in black and white, the first thing that
registered to me was you got to see it in color?
Sly so being color blind is is how you should

(33:19):
have seen it in color? Who did you write that
with Lee Thomas with him?

Speaker 1 (33:25):
That's cool that you stayed true to that idea.

Speaker 4 (33:28):
Well, the morning we got together to write, James Otto
Yeah called me up, said his co writers had canceled
on him, and I said, Be and Lee have got
a pretty strong idea. Didn't take too long. Why don't
you come write this one with us. Music Row back
then was like a campus. You know, it wasn't so
the competitive that we forgot to be loving and human

(33:52):
and you know, including somebody in a song that was
already half wrote it seemed didn't seem like the wrong
thing to do. But James, when he got there, he's
the one that came up with that core progression in
that melody.

Speaker 1 (34:06):
He's a killer vocalist. Dude, That guy is next level
man and a great dude too, just a great dude. Yeah,
that's cool that y'all pulled him in on that man.

Speaker 4 (34:17):
Just oh, it wouldn't have been the same with that really. Well,
it's probably also why the song has three verses. I
think it's because each of us had a picture in
our mind. We were trying to paint of our grandparents.

Speaker 1 (34:29):
God that song, man, I mean that's a generational oh
dune for sure.

Speaker 3 (34:34):
I mean, yeah, I can.

Speaker 1 (34:35):
Remember how much I have to pay you to play
versus course over right now.

Speaker 3 (34:39):
You don't pay me nothing.

Speaker 1 (34:41):
That is about to be. It's a good thing because
he got.

Speaker 3 (34:44):
These boots, will do.

Speaker 1 (34:47):
I'm gonna fan.

Speaker 2 (34:48):
I'm a fangirl and video you dude, you're literally yes, dude,
this is about to be a highlight of my Nashville
career probably.

Speaker 1 (34:58):
So this is with the hundredth.

Speaker 2 (35:02):
This is the hundredth of this episode, and this moment
right here before it even starts might be probably top
five of the hundred.

Speaker 1 (35:10):
I don't believe you asked him to play it, but
I'm really glad you did. Now that he's going to.
If you want to play the whole thing, that'd be
fine too. It's early in the morning, so it is.

(35:35):
We'll do this when a little lower.

Speaker 4 (35:37):
All right, I said, Grandpa, what's this picture here? It's

(35:57):
all black and white. It ain't real clear. It's that
you there.

Speaker 3 (36:05):
You said, yeah, I was eleven.

Speaker 4 (36:12):
Times from tough back in thirty five. That's me and
Uncle Joe trying to survive a cotton form in a
great depression. If it looks like we were scared, like

(36:34):
a couple kids just trying to.

Speaker 5 (36:37):
Save each other, you should have seen it in color.
On this one.

Speaker 4 (36:48):
Here was taken overseas in the middle of Hell, nineteen
forty three in the winter time. You can go on
mo see my bridge. That was my tail gunner, Old
Johnny McGee. He was a high school teacher from New

(37:11):
Orleans and he had my back right through the day
we left. If it looks like we were scared and
like a couple of kids just try and save each other,
you should have seen it in color. A pictures worth

(37:39):
a thousand words. But you can't see what those shades
of great keep cover.

Speaker 5 (37:47):
You should have seen it in cover.

Speaker 4 (38:07):
This one is my favorite one. This is me and
me Mam in the summer sun, all dressed up the
day we set our facts. You can't tell it here,
but it was hot. That gm ad Robs was red,

(38:28):
her eyes were blue.

Speaker 3 (38:31):
Just look at that. My Oh, I was so proud.

Speaker 5 (38:42):
That's the story of my.

Speaker 4 (38:44):
Life right there in black and why. And if it
looks like we were scared, like a couple of kids.

Speaker 5 (39:05):
Just trying to save each other, you should have seen
it in color.

Speaker 4 (39:15):
A pictures worth a thousand words. But you can't see
what those shades of great keep cover.

Speaker 5 (39:25):
You should have seen it in color.

Speaker 1 (39:45):
Best stand that's standing up, standing up for me, man,
standing up, gotta stand up on that.

Speaker 3 (39:55):
Thank you.

Speaker 1 (40:00):
God, dude, you sound like a record, right You sounded
like a record right then?

Speaker 3 (40:05):
I mean this nine.

Speaker 2 (40:08):
I mean, did you when you got done that day,
when you're putting the guitars in the cases.

Speaker 1 (40:14):
I got a text thing. I'm shook up over that.
That was I mean, I was unbelieved. It was like spiritual. Man,
that's crazy. When you get at that point, you probably
you know, like us and like songwriters that are gonna
do it today.

Speaker 2 (40:27):
Man, they're gonna finish your song. You're gonna go hey boys,
that was fun. Man, let's do it again. Great song.
Let's you know, let's let's not let this one go
to waste. Let's let's try to like what was the
conversation after you right that freaking tune?

Speaker 3 (40:40):
Man, it was like a tuesday we wrote another one.

Speaker 1 (40:44):
Nothing out of than normal.

Speaker 4 (40:46):
No, I mean we knew we had a good song. Yeah,
don't get me wrong, but it wasn't like we were
spiking the football. Yeah, play ain't been run yet. Sure,
it's not a hit until after the success. Right before that,
it's just a song.

Speaker 1 (41:00):
So you decide that you're gonna put it on your record.
Good one, I guess you were. You were already working
on a record probably at the time.

Speaker 4 (41:07):
I was working on a lot of different things. Yeah,
but yeah, trying to get to another record deal I've
been dropped off of my first one. Was definitely writing.
I was writing a lot of different songs, I know,
mowing down the roses game in that in that time
period and high costs of living all that.

Speaker 1 (41:28):
What year y'all write that it had to be seven.

Speaker 3 (41:33):
In color?

Speaker 4 (41:34):
Would have been oh seven, probably early o seven, as
we had it on a record by the end of
that year, uh that we had released.

Speaker 3 (41:46):
The original version of Lonesome Song. Yeah, that is.

Speaker 1 (41:50):
That song is super tough, man. I'm familiar with that
as well. Man. That is. I love the progression in
that that flat seven that you're going to in there,
is that's a that sounds like And look, you're either
really great at conveying a message and telling stories or
possibly both, or you were living that. I mean, were

(42:10):
you living that or was that stories.

Speaker 4 (42:13):
All right, So it was not uncommon for me to
be sleeping in my truck in that Shawnees parking lot.
I was a general contractor and had to be on
the job side by like six point thirty. And in
that era, I wasn't just the general contractor. My then

(42:34):
wife Amy, it was her parents had left her this
construction company, and I had to get a contractors to
run help out with it because it got to be
a lot to manage there For a while, I'm out
in the bars every night, still doing what I need
to be doing. I felt like I needed to be doing,

(42:55):
which was just drinking and singing country music.

Speaker 3 (42:58):
You know.

Speaker 4 (42:58):
We did all of that and said it is for networking.
Turns out, I mean it is.

Speaker 3 (43:03):
It was. It was it's networking.

Speaker 1 (43:05):
It was fun.

Speaker 4 (43:06):
It's being where you're supposed to be when you're supposed
to be there. And that's what we did. That's what
we did better than anybody else. We got in the
bars and made our living.

Speaker 1 (43:15):
What's it like now when when you and Dallas and
Rob and all y'all you if you ever all get together,
Dallas and Rob.

Speaker 2 (43:24):
And you and Luke and Lee and Nem Nemen and
Houser and Guy. I mean that list alone, man, I.

Speaker 1 (43:31):
Mean and arguably like some of the greatest singers. Yeah,
and some of the threaded in the country music of
the greatest the history of the last two decades.

Speaker 4 (43:43):
I think that's the thing about the trailer Park is
nobody's trying to be the eest of anything. Yeah, I
ain't trying to be the longest living or the most
hits or the best at anything. And either are they
solid And that's what made some so boldly unique, as
if they're they're unafraid to just be the loud of

(44:04):
what they are.

Speaker 3 (44:05):
Yeah, that's my buddies.

Speaker 4 (44:07):
You know, they're not out there trying to be anything.

Speaker 1 (44:12):
Yeah, all right, I know you got one story you
can tell us about the trailer park boys. I know
you get something, just something. Doesn't have to be crazy.
We can save that for afterwards.

Speaker 4 (44:21):
We all loaded up in a van one winter in
a blizzard.

Speaker 1 (44:27):
It's already funny thinking about all y'all bet.

Speaker 4 (44:31):
And it was Jared Nemon's can't say them trying to
figure out no, there, you can't save them six words.
It was Jared Nemon's van, which to even conjure it
up in my mind. A company's an odor for some reason.

Speaker 1 (44:53):
Yeah, I imagine.

Speaker 4 (44:54):
Brandy and Dallas, we're both sick. When we we thought
common cold, whatever, it's wintertime, it's season. We didn't think
nothing of it. But they were way sicker than they
let on, but.

Speaker 1 (45:07):
Wasn't missing the trip they're going on trip.

Speaker 4 (45:09):
We all went on this trip. We're going to Liberal, Kansas,
the bottom left hand corner of Kansas.

Speaker 1 (45:17):
From here, probably about a fifteen hour drive.

Speaker 3 (45:19):
Well, we did it in the snow.

Speaker 4 (45:21):
It took quite a while, and all of us took
a turn drive in that van on that trip. We
go out there and it's Jared Nemon's hometown. By the
time we got to Liberal Kansas, we were all on
desk door. We'd all been riding in the Petrie Dish
with Dallas and Randy, and everybody's just dying, you know,

(45:46):
can't breathe.

Speaker 3 (45:47):
The next constricted.

Speaker 4 (45:51):
We get out there and we go to do this
show at the bar, and all of us kind of
took shifts on three barstools. And that wasn't because we
couldn't fit more. It was just when there was no
need to put up more, there was always three of
us in the van, one out back throwing up over here.

Speaker 3 (46:12):
Yeah, we we did.

Speaker 1 (46:13):
Let somebody go as long as they could.

Speaker 4 (46:14):
And then yep, Randy didn't even bother. He went back
to the room. Dallas, I think had either back at
the room earlier, was on the van. I did a
song and went outside and was throwing up trying.

Speaker 3 (46:28):
To get on. It was so bad.

Speaker 4 (46:32):
And uh, I remember us going to see the only
doctor we could see in Liberal, Kansas and it was
a town guy in of collegist.

Speaker 1 (46:43):
And I wrote it in and he was like, what
in the world.

Speaker 4 (46:48):
We didn't think about none of that. He was great,
anybody that whatever, you give me a shot.

Speaker 3 (46:54):
Who it comes from.

Speaker 1 (46:55):
Somebody can write a script.

Speaker 4 (46:56):
And somebody get this thing out. You know, we got
a bug in here trying to kill us all. So
we go to the town guy of college's office and
we're piled up inside inside the little run with the
just got the table and all that, and the doctor

(47:17):
turns around, gets a little steroid into the needle there,
turns around, he looks, he says, who's first?

Speaker 3 (47:25):
Me and Randy?

Speaker 4 (47:27):
Those are both just dropped him And.

Speaker 1 (47:32):
As you can get it.

Speaker 3 (47:33):
In, just go.

Speaker 4 (47:34):
Doctor looks at us. He said, these can go in
your arm. Randy said, I had to climb back out
of the stirrups.

Speaker 1 (47:52):
Man, I mean we could go forever.

Speaker 2 (47:56):
Yeah, I mean did you like, did y'all ever just
take a step back and go like, man, these are
these are probably going to be some of the funnest
days and some of the best days of our life.

Speaker 4 (48:05):
What an hour later and he had given us this
prescription for cough syrup. Well, we go to the grocery
store and they hand us what looks like a pint
of whiskey, and it's a cough syrup. So we passed
it around in no regard to what any of those
words on that label. We're just passing the bottle like

(48:29):
buddies passing the whiskey around the truck. And then we
go to get something meat, and we were sitting there
wrapping up lunch, and it occurred to every one of.

Speaker 1 (48:39):
Us, somebody to dry here, y'all high? Is that just
me in there?

Speaker 3 (48:47):
Oh?

Speaker 5 (48:48):
Man?

Speaker 1 (48:48):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (48:49):
See it in the unicorns.

Speaker 1 (48:50):
Hey, I'll tell you that. Honestly, I've had codeine being sick,
like the liquid coating. If you had that, the only dude,
it was only I only heard.

Speaker 2 (49:03):
That's there's a postal long song that he sings about cod's.

Speaker 1 (49:07):
I mean that's what that's what the drink is. Whatever
that drink I can't rememb where they call it syrup
or something. Yeah, where they mix a lemonade and yeah,
codine or whatever. Yeah, that's what that is. They dropped
the code in. Yeah, so I've actually taken it like that,
like for being sick.

Speaker 3 (49:25):
We were, says I when says R what cod you were?

Speaker 1 (49:28):
Says IRT when says are learning even a thing? That's
so funny. Man, God, I can sit here and just
listen to you tell stories. I know, I know, I know,
I got to keep He's got commers ten thirty. Let's
talk about it. Never going to be man?

Speaker 3 (49:43):
Yeah?

Speaker 1 (49:44):
Uh he said, that's a Ronnie Dunn song, right.

Speaker 3 (49:46):
But he's singing with Yeah.

Speaker 4 (49:47):
So Ronnie read this emo yeah twenty ten and he said,
I just wrote this song about you, And.

Speaker 1 (49:55):
How does that work? How does it?

Speaker 3 (49:58):
Well? He was, Ronnie done, he can have anybody's email address,
he won't.

Speaker 2 (50:01):
Sure, Well, I'm just saying, like, writing a song about
you like that. He just got inspired to write a
song about you.

Speaker 4 (50:07):
Well, yeah, I think in his to hear him tell
the story now. I think in his mind at the time,
they were watching Nashville change, yeah, from what it used
to be into something else, which is what Nashville was
always doing.

Speaker 1 (50:23):
By the way, twenty ten was kind of scary for
me as a pursuing songwriter because I got here to
do one thing and.

Speaker 3 (50:32):
Twenty ten hit and it flipped on it.

Speaker 1 (50:34):
It was not even. I was like, well, if these
are the songs that are going to get cut because
I was just trying to be, you know, a lunch
bellt songwriter. I was like, I'm not anywhere even and
I wasn't for ten years. I mean, I kept doing
what it was that I did, but for ten years, dude,
I couldn't get a sniff and somehow I was. Sonny

(50:54):
was gracious enough to kind of keep me around, you know,
getting little cuts here the album cuts, yeah, here and
there for people that were still kind of doing traditionally
type stuff, but nobody cared about twenty twen was was.

Speaker 4 (51:07):
Was yeah, it was all changing in one way. And uh,
I think that's what he wrote about me, the new
kid in town, as a stoner singing through a homegrown
grin up on stage. He's a lone or got a
small band of outlaw friends. Yeah, so my can't hardly

(51:28):
playboys my studio band. Yeah, they all went out on
the road with me to make sure that we we
drew the audience in and made sure that they got
what they paid to hear.

Speaker 3 (51:41):
Yeah, Ronnie.

Speaker 4 (51:43):
His perspective of all that was the legacy of country music.
Then the big stars as Ben's never gonna be.

Speaker 1 (51:52):
Yeah. Yeah, I feel like I feel like I kind
of know them all, kind of feel like I know
the guys have turned into big, giant stars, and the
kind of guys that were and then the kind of
guys that went home. Man, did you did you say, yeah,
I'll cut that song if you sing it with me. No.

Speaker 4 (52:08):
He sent me that in twenty ten, and I quit
making records for fourteen years.

Speaker 1 (52:12):
I guess that's how'd you come back? How'd you find it?

Speaker 3 (52:16):
Well? It was the last thing that I had put
in the basket.

Speaker 1 (52:19):
Really, so you just went back to the basket and
went through some stuff.

Speaker 4 (52:23):
It was sort of you know, I'm talking about just
an imaginary.

Speaker 3 (52:27):
Basket in my mind.

Speaker 1 (52:28):
Yeah, me too.

Speaker 4 (52:29):
It was the last thing I had loaded up back
when I was thinking of making another record.

Speaker 1 (52:33):
But fourteen years ago, I mean, I can't even I
don't even remember where I was. Well, I guess I
was just coming to Natville. What made you? What made you?
What made you stop doing records? Did you get?

Speaker 3 (52:43):
Was it combination?

Speaker 4 (52:44):
It was just a But the end result was I
making records didn't make me any money.

Speaker 1 (52:50):
Huh.

Speaker 4 (52:51):
It didn't turn It didn't move the needle from me financially.
And when it got down to fight or flight and
I was stuck in by mode, I was just like, man,
that's the last thing I need to be messing with
right now, you know, is just leave that alone. So
if I wanted to put out a new song, I
did it live or I sent it to Willie or

(53:14):
Merle or George Strait.

Speaker 1 (53:17):
You know.

Speaker 4 (53:18):
I sent songs to people and got some songs cut.
But I just enjoyed my time.

Speaker 1 (53:24):
It was just.

Speaker 4 (53:26):
Taking some time and getting to be a true songwriter.
To me, meant I don't write because it's Thursday at
ten am. I write because I can't sit here thinking
about this and not write this down. I've got to
stop what I'm doing and go right That's why I
want to write songs. It should be out of an

(53:47):
abundance of passion. And sometimes you can aid that along
with Thursday at ten with your schedule. You know, you
can't predict when you're going to be creative, but you
can try Thursday at ten and uh that that's where

(54:08):
I am with that too. You know, if I don't
get things on the calendar, they don't come to pass right.
They just heard things that I'm always thinking about.

Speaker 1 (54:17):
You know, It's a healthy balance, isn't it, Because you
can also you can you can be too creative and
not putting the effort to it, but you can also
be too busy to not be creative. It's it's kind
that you got to find that that line.

Speaker 4 (54:30):
I've got a handful of go to songwriters that I
kind of use their brain as a memory back up.

Speaker 3 (54:37):
Yeah it's on.

Speaker 4 (54:38):
And one of them lately has been Earnest and that
that poor guy gets messages from me at three four
in the mornings.

Speaker 1 (54:47):
He's probably up, He's probably up with new.

Speaker 4 (54:50):
It's it's a matter of time before there's a song
born from that.

Speaker 1 (54:54):
But yeah, I love that guy. Man, he's a good
one song right. Who's you guys? Right now? You said
four or five? Who or the who? Who's your Mount
Rushmore of songwriters?

Speaker 4 (55:03):
Well, I don't know that. It's like a Mount Rushmore
kind of thing. Oh, you buddies, it's just inner circle
kind of But I.

Speaker 1 (55:09):
Do want to pick your songwrit of brain too. It's okay,
so inner circle, who's you, guys? I just want to
see if I know, it depends on what I'm looking for.
It's true.

Speaker 3 (55:16):
For my money, there's not a better songwriter than Dallas Davidson.

Speaker 1 (55:20):
Killer.

Speaker 4 (55:21):
He's killer, which also means that it's hard to get
time yeah with him, because everybody wants the same time, you.

Speaker 1 (55:28):
Know, And he's the one that can kind of do
it all right, Yeah, so versatile. He can go he
can go and go cheesy, but but do it at
a pro level and make it work. And he can
also go depth and do it at a probably he's
the R and B singer to me, he can rip on.

Speaker 3 (55:46):
Yeah. Yeah, it's it's hard to do better than that. Yeah,
you just right.

Speaker 4 (55:50):
If I could get more more time between my schedule
and his, I think it would be it would be good.
But in the meantime, I bump him some ideas here
and there. Yeah, Randy Howes or ribe hatch Uh your dudes. Yeah,
I still it's my guys. I know when when when
I'm looking to write, these are the first ones I call.

Speaker 3 (56:11):
H oh yeah, Lee and Jared.

Speaker 1 (56:13):
Kind of how special as that? I love that it's
so special. I mean we kind of got there with
our dudes. I know we're kind of the same absolutely, man,
A lot of the guys that we came up with. Yeah,
we did the same thing, you know. And I'm always
open to a new songwriter and a new well not
always open most of the time. I'm open to, you know,
a new songwriter, new artist.

Speaker 2 (56:31):
But you get your you find that you get your
good like you get your best stuff with.

Speaker 1 (56:35):
Your boys because you can trust them. You can trust
them with what you're trying to. You know that they're
going to take into account what you're trying to.

Speaker 5 (56:42):
Eric.

Speaker 1 (56:42):
Oh yeah, really well, so I got the right with
him today.

Speaker 4 (56:45):
But I got to write with him and Riley Green. Yeah,
and uh we came up with a great song and
recorded it and I don't know what's uh, if it's going.

Speaker 3 (56:58):
To be released or whatever.

Speaker 1 (56:59):
Probably you recorded with him, I thought it was See Eric,
is that guy to Raleigh. Yeah, that's that's right, Rileigh.
What if Riley wants to write a song, he's gonna.

Speaker 3 (57:09):
Go to Eric.

Speaker 1 (57:10):
Yeah. It's a great songwriter, and Raley is a great
songwriter in his own Yeah. You know, kind of the
same thing though. Both Alabama boys, aren't you Yeah Jacksonville,
Yeah said earlier, that's right. I couldn't remember if I
knew he was from around marriage, couldn't remember where. Yeah.
I like O'Reilly man, he's a yeah.

Speaker 4 (57:28):
How to describe his They say it's a little paradise
that he that he's got there and.

Speaker 1 (57:34):
His spot down there.

Speaker 3 (57:35):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (57:36):
Sure, I've never been down there, but I've heard people
talk about it that have gone there and done this
guitar pools and his Golden Song and the Golden Saw.

Speaker 3 (57:44):
Yeah, oh I loved it. We did that during a
golf tournament. We did Yeah.

Speaker 1 (57:49):
I think I saw a clip of you picking on
him a little bit. It's nice to see somebody pick
on green that so beautiful.

Speaker 3 (58:00):
He ain't bad.

Speaker 1 (58:01):
Nah, he's a lot of fun. How is your golf game?

Speaker 3 (58:05):
Wink? How much longer?

Speaker 1 (58:05):
Be?

Speaker 4 (58:06):
Oh my god, I hit a guy in that tournament
I played with Riley. I hit him as I hit
a three wood pretty hard. Yeah, I was about two
seventy off of the green, and I want you to
know it upset me that that ball got interfered with
it was on his way. Oh I think I'd made it. Geez,

(58:27):
I think.

Speaker 3 (58:27):
I had it.

Speaker 1 (58:28):
That's stroking right there.

Speaker 4 (58:30):
But about forty yards off of the contact of that ball,
I heard that thud of that meat where to hit
him slap, It's like right up in the stomach and
the ribs.

Speaker 1 (58:42):
Well, if you hit the ball good, it sounds like
he was kind of in the way a little bit maybe.

Speaker 3 (58:46):
And I just remember the poor guy kind of crunching up. Yeah.

Speaker 4 (58:53):
I hadn't hit anybody yet, but I hit some carts.
He wanted to get a picture I but he got one.
He wanted a hold his shirt up, and yeah, I opted.

Speaker 3 (59:04):
Out of it. Oh you did. I don't want the evidence.

Speaker 1 (59:08):
A buddy of ours, remember they hit that woman on
the arm and it was a almost broke her arm
a golf ball blister, dude, it was crazy appealed And.

Speaker 3 (59:19):
That's amazing how hard that ball is screaming.

Speaker 1 (59:23):
Especially coming at you with it after connecting hitting it
off the screws of a three wood.

Speaker 4 (59:28):
Yeah, I mean it had to punch the distance. When
I got to you, amazed him. I said, did that
feel like it was going a little lessing?

Speaker 1 (59:39):
Is gonna cut back toward the green a little bit? Yeah,
had a little cut on, a little baby draw on
that man?

Speaker 3 (59:46):
Which way was that?

Speaker 1 (59:50):
Man? Well, hey, you're you're wrapping up your twenty twenty
five tour at the Skirmer Horn here in Nashville.

Speaker 3 (59:56):
That's gonna be fun.

Speaker 1 (59:57):
See eighteen. What's that show gonna look like?

Speaker 3 (01:00:00):
I don't even know?

Speaker 1 (01:00:02):
Yeah, symphonic.

Speaker 3 (01:00:05):
Well so some people don't know.

Speaker 4 (01:00:08):
But I started my whole music education with a French one. Wow,
early born at trumpet, learned how to play all that stuff.
Went joined a drum a bugle corps called South Wind,
and maybe that's now the Marine thing was before then.
I think I only joined the South one because it

(01:00:29):
reminded me of the Marine Corps. Yeah, so this is
gonna be kind of a full circle moment, coming back
to the to the Symphony. To do it here in
Nashville's I don't do very many shows here. If if
I play here, it's hugely sitting in with somebody at
the rhyme or playing the ipry yeah, uh and the
skirmer horn. I've been wanting to do this for quite

(01:00:50):
a while. I've done a few songs with him.

Speaker 3 (01:00:52):
Over the years.

Speaker 1 (01:00:54):
You love Nashville.

Speaker 4 (01:00:56):
Absolutely, I you know, like every other town, it's got
some some drawbacks and you know, some some bad stuff,
but when you look at it on the whole, it's
a tough town full of survivors. And it might be
the all the people pushing into the town that are

(01:01:17):
here for the same reason. Yeah, you know, they're survivors too.

Speaker 1 (01:01:20):
I just I want there's a lot of perspective songwriters
that listen to this, And I mean, you're one of
the greats man, and everybody knows that, and the town
loves you and appreciate you like crazy. We know, we
know your skill set, we know what you do as
a vocalist, but you're also a killer songwriter. If you
had some just words of wisdom for these guys listening,
what would what would your advice to to them be? Man?

Speaker 4 (01:01:40):
Honestly, it's the same advice people have heard for years.

Speaker 1 (01:01:45):
You know.

Speaker 4 (01:01:46):
Cowboy Eddie Long told a steel player one time to
take a couple of weeks off and then quit.

Speaker 1 (01:01:57):
I felt they were going somewhere. That's funny.

Speaker 4 (01:02:04):
My advice has always been in a similar fashion, the
last one to quit wins. If quitting ain't an option,
waiting around as your only option, and you keep doing
what you do. You don't write songs for the money.
None of us ever started that way.

Speaker 1 (01:02:21):
No, no, we didn't start that way.

Speaker 3 (01:02:23):
For sure, none of us did.

Speaker 1 (01:02:26):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:02:26):
So you write songs for the right reason, and then
when those songs connect, they'll do well. Yeah, and you
won't be that budding songwriter for long. Yeah, you know,
especially not when it's open season on your catalog. Yeah,
you have one head. Everybody wants to know what else
you wrote?

Speaker 1 (01:02:45):
Right, Well, Bro, you're a legend. Man. Yeah, thanks for coming.
I stay here for three hours. I feel like we
hadn't touched nothing. We just talked, but I kind of
I kind of loved it. Man, Y too got you
to COVID zone. Man, appreciate you. Appreciate you ripping those
they careful because they slip when they're new.

Speaker 3 (01:03:05):
Man.

Speaker 1 (01:03:08):
We do a little thing to end all every show.

Speaker 2 (01:03:10):
We do a favorite segment and uh, if you if
you you've got a few minutes, if you just is
there a song that you just love that you could
play a verse chorus for us that's special to you
and special to me?

Speaker 1 (01:03:21):
Yeah? And why is it special? I'll help you out
on that.

Speaker 5 (01:03:26):
Mm hm.

Speaker 1 (01:03:34):
It feels like a Willie song.

Speaker 3 (01:03:43):
You know. Life is full of sangers.

Speaker 5 (01:03:47):
Mm hmmm, but just a.

Speaker 3 (01:03:50):
Few were chosen.

Speaker 5 (01:03:54):
The tear your herder.

Speaker 4 (01:03:58):
When they say, m hm, imagine life without him?

Speaker 3 (01:04:08):
All your radio heroes.

Speaker 4 (01:04:12):
Like the Eye along the walks through Jessey's dreams.

Speaker 3 (01:04:21):
No, they will never be another.

Speaker 4 (01:04:26):
Red headed stranger or a man in black and falls
prison blue, the.

Speaker 3 (01:04:39):
Yoki from Muschookee or Hello darling.

Speaker 5 (01:04:48):
Lord.

Speaker 4 (01:04:48):
I wonder who's gonna fill their shoes? Who's gonna fill
their shoe? Who's gonna stand that all? Who's gonna play
the ipry and the wall Beast cannon ball? Who's gonna

(01:05:14):
give their hard and soul to get to me?

Speaker 3 (01:05:21):
Lord? I wonder.

Speaker 5 (01:05:25):
Who's gonna fill their shoes?

Speaker 1 (01:05:31):
Jimmy Johnson put real sad this is over? Did anybody well?
I guess that was who wrote that? Do you know
who wrote that? For?

Speaker 3 (01:05:39):
George?

Speaker 5 (01:05:40):
Did?

Speaker 1 (01:05:40):
Did he writes?

Speaker 4 (01:05:41):
He?

Speaker 3 (01:05:41):
Right?

Speaker 1 (01:05:41):
Did Georgijones? Right?

Speaker 3 (01:05:43):
Yeah? He did? But he didn't right that.

Speaker 1 (01:05:46):
Yeah, dide I keep you here all day long. You
gotta go, you're busy man.

Speaker 3 (01:05:51):
It has been a time come back.

Speaker 1 (01:05:53):
Thank you, somethank you for thanks for coming and hanging Yeah,
I appreciate I'm a big fan, always have been, always
will be. Yep, you're the real deal.

Speaker 2 (01:06:00):
Thanks for hanging out in God absolutely, man, thank you,
God bless.

Speaker 1 (01:06:06):
Appreciate you. Hey, we'll check you out next time. See
you later.
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Dan Isbell

Dan Isbell

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