September 1, 2025 • 55 mins
Struggle Jennings has lived a life few could imagine from surviving gunshots, serving time behind bars, and carrying the weight of being the grandson of country music icon Waylon Jennings. In this powerful conversation, he opens up about the turning points that led him from prison cells to packed-out shows, how he rewrote his story through music, and what it means to honor a legendary name while carving his own path.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:14):
Personally the Oldsman.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
The incredible stories are continuing. I can't wait for you
guys to listen to this interview. You may have heard
of this guy in a whole bunch of different ways.
Maybe you listen to one of his rap albums, or
maybe his country albums, or you followed along with him
on social media, or maybe from his famous grandfather. His
name is Struggle Jennings. He has a story full of resilience,
and he's been open and vulnerable about so many things
(00:39):
that have happened in his life. It's one of my
favorite interviews to date. So, without further ado, let's get
into it. I'm morgana here, I'm joined by Struggle Jennings,
and I'm really excited because Struggling I met Gosh three
or so years ago. We played in the Folds Honor
Celebrities softball game. So Struggle, thanks for joining me. This
(01:01):
is awesome.
Speaker 1 (01:02):
Now, thanks for having me. I got to carry that
trophy home that day you did. I was supposed to
give it to Jelly and he never picked it up,
so it is on my mantle.
Speaker 2 (01:10):
I love that You're like, by way, it's just mine now.
My first introduction to you was you pulled out a
whole bunch of snacks out of a backpack, and I
was like, I like this guy. Yeah, the dude I do.
Speaker 1 (01:19):
It was gonna be hot and I was gonna have
a lot of friends and just bring.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
Snacks for you knew how to make friends, like you
knew the momentum there.
Speaker 1 (01:27):
I grew up in a household where my mom we
moved like every nine months or something six to nine
months or every year. My mom was sixteen when she
had me, so she was one of those kind of
I need a fresh start, and we'd moved to the
other side of town, or we'd move here, move there,
and so, yeah, I learned how to make friends when
you're the new guy, bring.
Speaker 2 (01:45):
Snacks and talk to me about your life and your childhood.
Which also one of my questions, is Struggle your real
name or is.
Speaker 1 (01:52):
This just a snatch say stage name?
Speaker 2 (01:53):
Okay, why what is struggle?
Speaker 1 (01:56):
Like?
Speaker 2 (01:56):
Where did that come from?
Speaker 1 (01:57):
So I was actually with a friend of mine and
I started rapping. I just came home from a jail
sentence and I was a single dad with my two
kids and really trying to get my rap career off
the ground. And of course I had a name in
the streets, but I was like, I don't know if
this name is really digestive. I don't know if a
(02:20):
parent's gonna let her kid buy a CD from Little
Killer When I was a teenager, Do you get that name?
Speaker 2 (02:29):
Or does somebody give you that name?
Speaker 1 (02:31):
Somebody gives it to you? And the same way with
Struggle is a friend of mine. We were working, We're
about to go to our first studio session, and we
had been like practicing and writing songs and me and
him were doing like an EP together and a guy
named white Boy and he was like, man, he was like,
what are you gonna go by? I was like, man,
(02:52):
I don't know. I just I guess it'll come to me.
And he was like, man, you ought to go I
struggle And I was like struggle and he was like, yeah, bro,
Like I see nobody go through the stuff you go
through on a daily basis. He was like, you need
to go by a struggle and I was I was like,
all right, cool. So I started going back. At first
it was like young struggle, yeah, and as I got
older it became struggle and then my grandfather being whaling.
(03:15):
When I caught my case, they automatically started calling me
Struggle Jennings. They're like the grandson of Whaling Jennings, rappers
Struggle Jennings. And I was fighting it at first. I
was like, man, I was telling my guy that was
handling my socials and that was before Instagram or anything
like that. My Twitter is still a young strug had
(03:37):
young strugs. He was like, nah, man. He was like, dude,
if you google struggle, it's gonna pop up like kids
in Africa and all kinds of struggles that are like
going on. He was like, Struggle Jennings, it'll be Google.
I was like, man, I don't know. And I so
I called my uncle Shooter and he was like, nah,
Whalen would love that. He was like, take that name
(03:59):
and make it your own. And so I rode with it.
When by the time I came home there was really
no reversing it.
Speaker 2 (04:06):
It had already been done. Like you already became Struggle Jennings.
And you just mentioned your mom and talked to me
about childhood. She talked about your friends and you went
through a lot of struggle. What were some of those
moments in your life that led to where you are now?
Speaker 1 (04:21):
Yes, so I mean starting early. My mom was sixteen
when she had me, and she's the daughter of Jesse
Culture and Dwayne Eddy, who's legendary guitar player rock and roll,
and Jesse and Whalen had ran off together when my
mom was like four and moved from California to Nashville,
and Whalen adopted her and so forth, and then she
(04:44):
had me. At sixteen, she met my dad. My dad
was an old West Nashville came from poverty, just roughneck,
good old boy, and they met at the West Nashville
skating rink and one starry night in the back of
his el commedie, I was made.
Speaker 2 (05:02):
You love to tell that story, don't you.
Speaker 1 (05:04):
Yeah, yeah, I love it. Altum about as West Nashville
as they get. So they lasted until I was about four.
My grandpa bought them a house in Franklin in a
neighborhood called Maplewood. There was on like four or five
houses when he bought the house, and it was like
this single story, cute little house in Franklin, and then
(05:24):
the neighborhood built up. By the time I was six,
there was probably two hundred and fifty houses in the neighborhood,
but it was a pretty enclosed neighborhood, like one way in,
one way out. So as a child, I had a
pretty normal upbringing, like pretty clean cut. My mom was sixteen,
she was she was We were raising each other. The
(05:47):
firefighters were at our house every day because she was
burning something, trying to learn how to cook, and I
heard my dad. They split up when I was four,
so she was doing it on her own, but she
was still singing backup for Whaling, so she was gone
a lot on tour, and then in the summertimes, I'd
get to go on the bus or and I was
at Whaling's house a lot because me and Shooter are
just a year apart.
Speaker 2 (06:08):
Which Shooter is your uncle though.
Speaker 1 (06:10):
Yeah, that's Whaling and Jesse's only kid together. And so
then when I was went through some stuff, like when
I was like eight, my mom got in a real
abusive relationship. She got married to another guy. I watched
him beat the shit out of her, and of course
my dad came over there and ran him off. But
(06:32):
then when I was ten, my dad was murdered.
Speaker 2 (06:34):
I remember when we were talking before this, you had
mentioned that, and were you living with your dad at
the time.
Speaker 1 (06:40):
I was living with my mom, okay, And so when
that happened, I was outside playing football and my mom
called me and was like, Hey, your dad's on the
phone and wants to talk to you. And I was like,
I tell him. I called him back later. And then
when I came in that night, she was crying in
the back room all of a sudden, whaling and all
my family pulled up and at me down and said,
(07:01):
your dad's no longer with us. They told me it
was suicide. So throughout my childhood I was like living
with that regret. What if I would have answered the phone,
would he still be here? And it wasn't until I
was eighteen that I found out he was murdered.
Speaker 2 (07:17):
Were they telling you that to protect you? I assume.
Speaker 1 (07:20):
So my dad's side of the family knew what really happened,
but they were protecting the family, and so my mom
genuinely didn't. She thought that he had committed suicide. And
it wasn't ntil I was eighteen that I was like suicidal.
And I'd been living with my uncle because I started
getting in a lot of trouble. Twelve, I joined the gang,
(07:42):
started selling drugs. My mom had her and whaling it
kind of fell out because she was like starting to
date again, and he was like, hey, son just lost
his dad. You just got out of a terrible marriage.
Think you should chill a little bit. And she's twenty
something year old, young lady looking for love on her
own and alone, and.
Speaker 2 (08:02):
She's gone through a lot of stuff at this point.
Speaker 1 (08:03):
Yeah, for sure, And so she was kind of had
that mentality, you know what, I don't want your money,
I don't need your help. I'm gonna do it on
my own, and I'm gonna show you that I can
do it on my own. So it was like a
culture shock because the same time I lost my dad,
we moved to the other side of town, and she
got two jobs and was going to cosmetology school and
working her ass off, trying to raise me and not
(08:26):
cut the cord from the family, which I still was
at his house a lot because I was over there
hanging out with Shooter and all the holidays and stuff.
But financially, she wouldn't take anything from him, and she
was trying to prove. So we went through from what
seemed like a pretty normal childhood. I bid West Nashville
on the weekends a lot to see my dad or
my uncle and my cousins and stuff. So I always
(08:48):
straddle those tracks where when I was in West Nashville,
you know, I learned a lot of those irrational beliefs
and just the things that kind of sparked that mentality,
that outlaw mentality. But then I'd go to Whalen's house
and see the jag and the Cadillac and the maid
(09:08):
and the nanny and the guards.
Speaker 2 (09:10):
And these very two polarized lives.
Speaker 1 (09:13):
Yeah, and knowing Whalen came from nothing gave me that
sense of anything's possible. But then when I'd leave his
house and go back to my neighborhood, the only people
that had the Cadillacs and the Jaguars with the drug dealers.
So I was gravitated towards that because I saw a
quality of life that I knew is obtainable. I was
just in. I allowed my circumstance to keep me. This
(09:36):
is all I have, this is all I can do,
this is all I can get. That kind of led
me into being a drug dealer in most of my life, and.
Speaker 2 (09:42):
In a life of crime that's really tough too. Do
you look back at that time in your life, do
you are you not necessarily happy that it happened, but
do you feel like it made you who you are
today to be the.
Speaker 1 (09:53):
Person that you are on one thousand percent, like, I
have no regrets in life. I mean, there's some things
I wish I may not have said, a couple of
things I wish I hadn't done in my life. But
as far as looking back or having any kind of
like victim mentality, it's not like I went through everything
that I went through. It brought me exactly where I'm at,
made me who I am, and gave me the testimony
(10:15):
to be able to reach other people. It gave me
the insight and through the different phases, I just it
kept leveling me up to the place that I'm at
now as a man.
Speaker 2 (10:28):
Oh And I want to ask you, because I grew
up in rural Kansas. There's not a lot happening over there.
We got a lot of farmers and country lands.
Speaker 1 (10:36):
About it, and most people get in trouble. Was boring
is when you find shit to do.
Speaker 2 (10:41):
I did drink very early, that's very true, but there
wasn't a lot of activity. I wasn't around the whole bunch.
So when you get into drug dealing and stuff. I
have to imagine as a kid that was terrifying, and
you were doing and experiencing things that as a kid
you never should have had to.
Speaker 1 (10:56):
For sure, I think that we were so caught up
in the lyrics of Tupac and No Limit and master
p and we just accepted that as life, and that's
what it was, and that's what we gravitated towards. And
I don't ever really remember any time in my life
(11:18):
really being like poor me or I think because a
lot of times, because I had seen the two sides
so much, and I knew that Whaling grew up with nothing.
They were dirt poor in Texas, dirt floors, and he
made it out of there on a dream. And my
dream was just shifted a lot of times. Even though
(11:38):
I always had music in my heart and I wanted
to do music, there was a time where I wanted
to be Tony Montana. There was a time where I
wanted to be Tony Soprano. I want to be John Gotti.
Speaker 2 (11:46):
You went through different periods.
Speaker 1 (11:48):
I did. I did, yeah, for sure. No, there's you
can go back and look at pictures. There's times where
I had braids to my ass, and right where my
pants were and gold chain, and there's times where I
was in a three P suit thinking I was about
to start a mafia family.
Speaker 2 (12:05):
Do you feel like that was because you were going
back and forth, Like you would go and hang out
with your grandfather in this kind of fame filled and
very successful life, and you're seeing these things and you
want to be this one person, And then you'd go
back and you'd be with your mom and you'd see
this other side and you're like, well, I kind of
want both.
Speaker 1 (12:22):
Yeah. I still struggle with that, right, even there's times
where my career starts lifting to a certain place and
things get crazy and I'm like, and I really just
want to be home with the kids. Do I really
want to be a huge country star rapper entertainer or
do I want to be a PTA dad and coach
(12:42):
my son's football. There's still always that internal battle. The
music just won't let me go anywhere else. I'm so
embedded with just a love for your music is my
life to a point, my children in my life, and
my family of course, But I just had that a
gravitational pool that I've never been able to run from it,
(13:04):
even when I've tried. It's kind of like God, many
times I tried to run completely in the opposite direction
and something would happen that would be life altering, and
a bullet would miss me by inches or whatever the
case was, that it could have been really a lot
worse than it was, and always reeled me back in
(13:27):
to like, oh, I know this is what is true,
and this is true to me.
Speaker 2 (13:31):
Are you telling me that you've been shopped before? Oh?
Speaker 1 (13:33):
Yeah, I've been shot twice. I actually got shot. You
know where Big Bad Breakfast is? Yeah? Okay, so that
used to be Wendell Smith's. It was a corner store.
Speaker 2 (13:40):
Okay, window Smith is still there.
Speaker 1 (13:42):
The restaurant in the liquor store. Okay, So Big Bad
Breakfast was the convenience store. So old man Wendell had
the convenience store, the liquor store, and the restaurant. The
whole family worked in the restaurant. My aunt was a
waitress there. I think my dad bus tables there when
he was young. My grandma worked there. But then a
guy named Jakie Cook married Wendell Smith's daughter, Beverly Smith,
(14:06):
and so my whole life, Jakie Cook was running that
he was like an old school gambler, like southern mafia
type guy. His son Benji still runs and then the
grandson also runs a restaurant. But Jakie was just like
cool old a multi multi millionaire that you wouldn't even
(14:29):
you wouldn't even know it. Yeah, he's just cool, chill
old guy. A lot of them got their start with
like poker machines in the back.
Speaker 2 (14:35):
Of Yeah, wait until you got shot.
Speaker 1 (14:42):
Where Yeah, I got no shoot out there? When I
was young? How old were you hit in the shind
that actually ricocheted underneath the car, I believe, and it
hit me in the shin?
Speaker 2 (14:54):
What does it feel like to get shot?
Speaker 1 (14:56):
You don't realize you get shot at first, like you
don't feel it. You feel the sure of the tug,
but when you're in the moment with adrenaline, you don't
feel it like that.
Speaker 2 (15:05):
And this was that when you were wrapped up in
things back then.
Speaker 1 (15:07):
Oh yeah, one hundred percent. From the time I was twelve,
I always went through phases because I always knew better.
I had been planting those seeds by my mom and
my grandma heavy in church, and I had always been planted,
had seeds planted of right and wrong, but I just
tugged away from it so much, and so I went
(15:28):
through phases like twelve to fifteen, I was just wild,
went to move in with my uncle, was doing good
for a little while. It was like, yeah, I'm changing
my life, got caught back up, went to jail when
I was twenty one on a weed case. Then fifteen months,
got out, walked straight from five years raising my kids,
(15:51):
and then I always diverted back to it when things
got tough. It was like a comfort zone for me,
like I knew I was good at being bad.
Speaker 2 (16:00):
Yeah, and you knew there was money, and you knew
there was a way to help you survive.
Speaker 1 (16:04):
Yeah, yeah, temporary money. Yeah, even at the height of
my career in that world, even if I was making
hundreds of thousands of dollars a month. When you're living
that life, you don't really get to enjoy it or
spend it. It gets spent for you, like you're making
your friend's bonds, or you're paying for this funeral, or
(16:25):
you're somebody robs somebody and you gotta jurors and you
gotta so it's like there's all way, or you get
busted and they take everything you shore.
Speaker 2 (16:34):
It was like money that kind of felt like not yours.
Speaker 1 (16:38):
You just don't actually do anything losing. And that's why
I try to tell a lot of these young guys
now when I go into these prisons and talk and stuff,
is like it all looks good. But my uncle told
me when I was young, and they were caught up
in a lot of the same things too, But they
told me when I was young, They're like, man, there's
really only you never really retire from this. You either
end up dead or in prison.
Speaker 2 (16:59):
And so was twenty one your last one?
Speaker 1 (17:02):
No, And I just got home nine years ago. I
did five years from thirty one to thirty six. I
did five years federal prison and state prison. Came home
in twenty sixteen, was in a federal halfway house for
six months. Got out, me and Jelly started touring. Jelly
was just starting to get on his feet. He had
(17:23):
been putting in a lot of work, but he was
starting to catch a little bit of steam. And that
was still five years before. And we did a few albums,
did four albums called Whaling.
Speaker 2 (17:33):
And Willie and just obviously inspired from your grandfather.
Speaker 1 (17:37):
And their friendship and the two dualities of the two guys.
Speaker 2 (17:41):
And did you feel like you and Jelly were whaling?
Speaker 1 (17:44):
And Willie we still are. We still are to this day,
one hundred percent more stories I hear even now, I'm like, God,
this is crazy.
Speaker 2 (17:53):
Yeah, like the outlaw side and just the things you
guys have experienced were more personalities.
Speaker 1 (17:57):
Both both all the above.
Speaker 2 (18:00):
Really it's lat so who's whaling and Who's I'm whaling?
Speaker 1 (18:04):
I'm hard headed. I still wear a hat that says
CMA country my ass. And what makes Jelly Willy the lightheartedness.
He smokes a lot of weed.
Speaker 2 (18:15):
I'm following.
Speaker 1 (18:16):
Yeah, there's a lot of there's a lot of things.
And he's been incredibly successful and he moves really good
in that world, and he's he's just he's done so
much I'm proud of.
Speaker 2 (18:27):
And you get out nine years ago, and what has
been this stint that's kept you on this path to hopefully.
Speaker 1 (18:34):
Never go back to Let's talk about it, Morgan.
Speaker 2 (18:35):
Yeah, tell me when.
Speaker 1 (18:37):
I went to prison, the mother and my kids fell
really hard. My wife at the time, she got addicted
to drugs, ran off with one of my best friends
at the time. He ended up getting locked up. She
got in a relationship after a relationship with people that
were using drugs and doing drugs, and she just went
down a really dark path, ended up losing custody of
(18:59):
my kids. It's before she lost custody, it got super dark.
There was a time my daughter innocence. She was three
when I went to four when I went to prison.
By the time she was like five six, I'm calling
from prison her brothers and sisters having eight all day.
It's five o'clock in the afternoon. Her mom's passed out
on drugs. I had to teach her how to make
(19:19):
macaroni and cheese from a jail phone so she could
feed her siblings. And it was just thing after thing
like that where it just struck that chord that I
was like, this cannot be how the story is told.
This can't be what I leave my kids. This can't
I can't. I know where they're headed with the environment
(19:44):
they're in and what they're going through right now, and
it's not a pretty future. My daughter was molested in
a drug house. They ended up in foster care. Their
mother passed away from the drug overdose. That little girl
just graduated with the three point nine GPA honors. Oh yeah,
(20:05):
I love telling that when I say it on stage, like,
that's probably the loudest the crowd gets for me all night.
Speaker 2 (20:11):
But that's okay, I'll take that.
Speaker 1 (20:13):
Yeah. Yeah, But and all my kids are just thriving
and doing so good. But I really, when I was
in there, I had to really take full accountability for
all of it. I was like, I'm the one that
left them out there with a father. I left my
wife out there without a husband. I left my mom
without a son. I left my friends without their friend.
Because I was the provider for a lot of people
(20:34):
and always took care of everybody.
Speaker 2 (20:36):
And was that your wake up call? Just hearing that
phone call?
Speaker 1 (20:41):
Yeah? And I never really had a chance to go
back to sleep because it was every day I was
getting a call like that. And then meanwhile, Jelly's out
in a van, sleeping in a van tour and every
time I call him having that little bit of hope
of him going, man, this shits really happening. We're out here.
I'm in Tupelow tonight, I'm in Kansas City tonight, or
(21:04):
I'm here. So like hearing that and knowing, okay, this
is possible. I can't control what's going on out there.
The only thing I can control is what I do
with this situation and who I become and who I
come out. And so I just started stripping away all
those layers and figuring out, what are the thinking patterns
that keep bringing me back in here? Why do I
(21:25):
keep going back to the same thing, Why do I
keep making the same mistakes and decisions? And I had
to process a lot and figure it out, and so
I came out a completely different person. I had lost
one hundred and twenty pounds. I had rid myself of
a lot of irrational thinking and beliefs and things that
I was instilled through music and environment.
Speaker 2 (21:45):
And was that hard to rewrite, especially as you're sitting
in a prison where you're surrounded by people who have
similar minds?
Speaker 1 (21:54):
In a way?
Speaker 2 (21:55):
Was that hard to rewrite that entire story for you
to come out a completely different person?
Speaker 1 (22:01):
One thousand percent? But the thing about it is ninety
nine percent of people have it in them and they
want to change and they know better. It's just change
is scary. And I was beyond the fact the point
of fear. My fear had diverted from change to the
(22:24):
end result of what was going to happen. To my children.
I just saw something the other day. It was like,
change happens when the reality of the outcome becomes scarier
than the fear of change. Something like that.
Speaker 2 (22:43):
Essentially, what was happening to you in these moments? How
long like when you were getting those phone calls? How
much longer did you have to serve before you were
able to get out?
Speaker 1 (22:51):
Oh, it started as soon as I got in there.
It started happening. As soon as I was away, call
home and the first cause of this happened. I'm so so.
And then it's like you can just see the it
getting worse and worse. And as soon as I hit prison,
I walked in and I saw the different types of people, right,
(23:14):
And you have the group that's still gambling, smoking, doing drugs,
eating honey buns, sitting there watching TV all day. And
then you got the guys that are getting up, going
to classes all day, going to the yard to train,
stay in shape, and they stay in packs. And I
was like, that's what I want.
Speaker 2 (23:32):
And you went to the pack that was going to
the classes.
Speaker 1 (23:35):
Yeah, I took the cloud would take the classes so
many times that I would be the teacher.
Speaker 2 (23:42):
And what are the classes like what are these classes?
Speaker 1 (23:44):
You're like parenting and your finances, critical thinking. I did
all the drug programs, anti violence programs, just trying to
learn how to reel your anger in and catch it
before it gets anywhere. And I just rational self analysis
type stuff.
Speaker 2 (24:01):
But that was all a choice. You weren't required to
go to MEUD at all.
Speaker 1 (24:05):
The drug program you get time off if you take it,
so of course there's an incentive to that. But I
knew I needed it, and I did it in the state,
made parole in the state, but then I had to
go serve my FED time. So then when I went
to the FEDS and I went to do the program again,
because it would take a year off your sentence and
(24:25):
you'd get six months guaranteed halfway house. So you're literally
getting out eighteen months earlier if you do the drug program.
And I had five years fifty seven months in the
Feds and a thirteen year sentence in the state.
Speaker 2 (24:37):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (24:38):
But then the second time I went through that drug program,
already knew all of it because I had taken the
same program in the state, so I wasn't having to
learn anything. I was getting to digest it. So the
second time I went through the drug program. It like
light bulb struck and I was like, Okay, I got this.
Speaker 2 (24:55):
Yeah that first time, it was okay, this is all
information for the first time, I have.
Speaker 1 (25:00):
It, learn it, write it down, take a test once
I've already learned it, and I know I even pass
the test. I'm really learning it. It's really soaking in
at that point, I'm really understanding it.
Speaker 2 (25:10):
So struggle now. Obviously this is nine years ago, but
you now, do you look at your life and you
see your kids thriving, and you see you doing music
and doing the things that you would talk to Jelley
when you were in jail and he was doing Do
you look at your life now and you're like, dang, I.
Speaker 1 (25:29):
Did this, Yeah, But I still look at it like, man,
I need to do better. Every day I fall short
of something. I could jump to conclusions and be like, ah,
I should have sat on that a little longer, or
I could shift the blame and be like, man, I
can't do that. I really got to take accountability for that.
In relationships and business, I still make a lot of mistakes,
(25:51):
but I'm having to like really sit back and just
learn how to remind myself of who I will that
when I came home, because it's it's so easy to
come out of prison and be like, oh I got this,
watch this and be this great person, and then life
really starts happening. Life starts lifing, and you'll fall back
(26:12):
into old ways or you'll start to slip. And it's
just about readjusting yourself every day. And really prayer helps
me a lot, especially with anger, because I'll just assess
the day somebody might have said something hurt my feelings,
I might have done something to hurt somebody else's feelings,
and I just got to be like, look, I can't
let the sun set on my anger, pray about it,
(26:34):
give it to God, and wake up and start fresh
the next day. And that's really with that, and things
like staying in a good routine with the GEM, a
lot of community work, a lot of going into jails
and rehabs and speaking. And we're opening rehabs across the
country right now called Sound Sobriety where we're implementing songwriting
(26:57):
and it's me and Brandy Gilbert and a business partner
named Michael Fry and his wife and they were implementing
songwriting into their therapy teaching them how to put their
feelings and their emotions and their testimonies in a song
for him.
Speaker 2 (27:13):
Can I ask you this too, because I imagine growing
up in the ways that you did, you were not
taught to share your feelings and emotions. You were probably
taught that's not what you do.
Speaker 1 (27:24):
And yeah, so the men in my life, of course,
were like that, you don't cry, You don't tell anybody
how you feel or hold it in. You be a man,
you suck it up. But I was raised by a
single mama.
Speaker 2 (27:35):
They cried every day where she really went against that.
Speaker 1 (27:38):
Yeah, I'm a mama's boy, like the wrong commercial. Come on,
I'm boughting like a baby. And then even as a father,
had now see why the men told me that, because
there's a lot of time as a man, especially as
a father or a husband or a friend, you have
to you want to shield them from knowing how bad
(27:58):
it is sometimes, so you got to hold it in
and deal with it sometimes because if everybody's looking at
you as the breadwinner, the protector, the provider, the security,
you can't let him know that everything's in shambles and
you're trying to figure it out.
Speaker 2 (28:14):
Do you feel like that healing has started to reverse
for you now, Like you got out and you were
doing all this stuff to bounce back your life. Are
you now at the point where you're able to look
back on all it and start to kill your inner
self of stuff that was happening.
Speaker 1 (28:27):
Yeah, for sure. And when the mother and my kids died,
I wasn't able to grieve for a year, right because
my kids were grieving really heavy, and then I lost
the right behind it. We lost the father to my
two step kids. He died of the same way. So
(28:48):
between those two and then other friends and stuff, sometimes
I've had to put my grieving on the back burner,
and I've learned that's not always healthy, Like you have
to separate yourself and you got to go find your
own time to grieve, whether it's an hour car ride,
punching the steering wheel and screaming to God, whatever it is,
praying and crying and whatever that may be. Because I'm
(29:11):
dealing with it right now. I'm wearing these two necklaces
today because one of my best friends, Nemo's actually fighting
for his life right now, and I had just had
these made for us and was going to give them
to him. He was supposed to come down this week
and stay at my house and I didn't get a
chance to give him to him. But he's fighting right now.
And I had one of my best friends and workout
partners passed this morning. I've had to take I was
(29:33):
just on vacation when I heard when I got the
news about Nemo, and he wasn't an artist or singer,
but he was an incredible singer and a songwriter. But
he's just a biker. But we had got him to
record a song that he had wrote, and so I
literally had to like, we're on family vacation. I had
to break away and go, hey, y'all, I just need
a little while. And literally went there and turned that
(29:54):
song and repeat and cried like an animal for two
hours in the shower and then came out. I was like,
all right, let's go. You gotta find that time to grieve.
And I'm learning that life is You're always a student
and I'm always learning things.
Speaker 2 (30:08):
What do you feel like are some of your hardest lessons?
Because I was going to ask you about grief, because
I do feel like, unfortunately, you are no stranger to grief,
which sharing that of you getting in the shower and crying,
I think is a good lesson for a lot of people,
because grieving tends to be one of those processes we
just push back and do what needs to be done
to get through something.
Speaker 1 (30:29):
You try to be too tough, you'll find out how
weak you really are. Try to hold that in and
then it's gonna spill over and you're either gonna lash
out or you're gonna break, or you gotta allow yourself
to feel. You gotta allow yourself to release. You gotta
allow yourself to feel those emotions. The older I get,
the more I realize real men cry and they gotta.
(30:50):
We have emotions, we have feelings. We gotta let it out. Yes,
we gotta do it in our own time a lot
of times, because when you do have the women and
children of your house, friends and everybody looking at you
for that strength, you got to be strong for them.
But also when I was going through that, all my
daughters came up to me and I want to put
(31:10):
my arm around me, and I came back. They knew
that I was dealing with it, but I still just
put the smile on and we finished family vacation.
Speaker 2 (31:20):
How are you, I can only imagine how great of
a girl dad you are. I need to know like
girl dad struggles. Yeah, I'm hearing a like tough struggle, right,
I need girl dad struggle.
Speaker 1 (31:31):
I've got four daughters and yeah there. I love my sons.
Don't take you wrong, They're my little mini met. I'm
a little tougher on my boys because I want them
to be good men. I want them to love and
cherish the women in their life. That was one of
the last things my dad told me. Get your job
on this earth as a man to protect and provide
for the women in your life. Never put your hands
(31:52):
on a girl. So I'm super tough my boys about
their manners chivalry.
Speaker 2 (31:58):
So read in the next generation of men.
Speaker 1 (32:00):
Yeah, I tell people all the time. I don't want
to hear none of y'all complaining about the way this
country is. If you're not raising your kids to fix it,
if you're not raising your kids to be the next
generation and to do better than we did, then you're
missing your dropping the ball. But yeah, my girls. I
have the best relationship with my daughters. We text and
talk every day. We have twenty five year old named
(32:21):
Brianna Harness. She's my first born she's a blue singer.
She's got an incredible voice. She's just dropped i think
her fifth album, Wow.
Speaker 2 (32:30):
And she's twenty five.
Speaker 1 (32:31):
Yeah, but sure more than I have.
Speaker 2 (32:33):
I'm thirty hot Dawn Okay.
Speaker 1 (32:36):
She works ten hours a day on a farm I
think four days a week, and then cleans houses the
other days. She's like really independent as far as she
only calls me when it's an emergency for money, which
she knows I'd get her anything she needs and always
be there. But she's really crushing it. And then my
daughter Innocence, she's dating a professional boxer named Austin Delay,
(32:58):
who I've known forever. He's a good friend and I'm
great friends with his dad. And then I've got a daughter, Courtesy,
who's seventeen, and she's a straight A student. She'd i
think her lowest grade was in ninety eight. She'd like
one O four's and stuff is insane. But she gets
up every morning and goes to the gym five am,
does Bible study, goes to school, gets off school, goes
(33:19):
to work, and sometimes he goes back to the gym.
She's got a great relationship with her boyfriend. He's like
number one state in soccer and just you hear her
talk and she's got it figured out more than I do.
Speaker 2 (33:31):
Okay, And he didn't know like having your having them
meet the boyfriend situation for the first time, because when
I first met you, I was like, oh, dang, like
he's gonna he's be mean, tough, whatever, and then you're
just like this teddy bearry who was pulling snacks out
of his back back pull her opposite. But when they
first meet you, was it like oh crap.
Speaker 1 (33:47):
Oh yeah, And I've already got a reputation from the
previous life before and then being a rapper and then
my country singer, and I've got a checkered past and
live in a really nice neighborhood. So I'm already like
that dad, And I'm the type that snow he's not
picking you up, he's gonna knock on the door.
Speaker 2 (34:04):
Yeah, but you're making sure your girls are treated with
princess treatment as he should be.
Speaker 1 (34:08):
Yeah, And they know whatever you do to her, I'll
do to you. But I've had a couple that I
kind of had to tighten down on, But for the
most part, I raised my daughters to not settle, and
by giving them an example of I'm not perfect. I
(34:30):
definitely want my daughters to find somebody way better than
I am. But they see the way that I am
in my relationship, and they see how I am as
a man, and so they could they have a there's
a bar that they can't go under.
Speaker 2 (34:44):
So that you're telling me that they don't have the
bar in hell that some of us had. Yeah, I'm
proud of that for them.
Speaker 1 (34:52):
And then I got a daughter, my stepdaughter Patients. She's
like our wild one. She's incredible.
Speaker 2 (34:59):
She the youngest of all.
Speaker 1 (35:00):
She's young. She's not the youngest kid because we have
two boys that are younger than her, but she's the
youngest of the daughters. And she's just herself, Like she
chops her own hair. She wants to be a hairdresser,
so she's constantly her You never know when she walks
out of that room. You never know what color her
hair is going to be the next day. But it's
(35:20):
always fashionable and she looks good. She pulls it off.
She gets a little bit more trouble at school, but
it's because she doesn't take any shit, like she's just
she's she's like real. I don't want to say stubborn.
There's something else. All my kids have been through so much.
Like she just lost her father, her biological father, to
an overdose, and my kids lost their mother. And then
(35:42):
my two oldest kids, my son Little Will and my
daughter Brianna, their moms. She went through it. She was
a dancer and was on drugs and went to federal prison.
And but now she's three years clean and sober, doing good,
getting her life back in order. My kids still went
(36:02):
through a lot with what I put them through, what
their mothers put them through, and so there's a sense
of resilience and just strength. If you met courtesy first
she pulls up in her little lexus. In the first
couple of minutes, you're like, oh, this girl comes from money.
And then you start having a conversation. You're like, oh, no,
she'd been through some shit. She just wears it really
(36:22):
well and she's learned from it. I had two beautiful
young boys fourteen and thirteen, and ones in the boxing,
ones in the football, and they're both doing good in school.
Speaker 2 (36:33):
And so you're telling me, outside of all the toury
and all the stuff that you're doing, they're full on
down over here. Yeah, definitely, And you really could be
PGA down if you wanted to.
Speaker 1 (36:43):
Oh man, I would love to. I would love to
go in there and tell them how to get it right.
Speaker 2 (36:48):
Do all these things. That is what I suggest. Bring
the fruit snacks. I can totally see you bring fruit snacks.
Speaker 1 (36:53):
I love free snacks.
Speaker 2 (36:55):
You do with You also brought the bubblegum.
Speaker 1 (36:59):
You can't go on a base ball field that big
lead too.
Speaker 2 (37:02):
I like that trump. I feel like this needs to
be a thing.
Speaker 1 (37:05):
Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 2 (37:06):
You have so much of that musical touches in your life.
You mentioned it and your daughter's pursuing it. What was
that like for you? You take away all the other things
that you were experiencing in life. But you were the
grandson of Wielan Jennings's Jesse Coulter. You your uncle is
Shooter Jenny's You mentioned in just multiple different assets. How
you just have all these different connections to different things?
Speaker 1 (37:28):
No pressure?
Speaker 2 (37:29):
Yeah, what's that like?
Speaker 1 (37:30):
Well, that's why I became a rapper because I wasn't
gonna try. My mom is an incredible writer and singer,
and I grew up in a house with a piano
and whatever I was going through when I was little,
my earliest memories was her waking me up. Oh, come on,
we got to get ready for school. Come in the
living room, and I'd come in the living room, she'd
be this is the day, this is the day that
(37:51):
the Lord has made that the Lord I should be
playing hymnals and getting me up, and I'd be dancing
and so like music was always but I had such
I had boots that I could never feel like. I
could never be Whaling Jennings, but I can do the
shit out of struggle Jennings. And there was something Whaling
taught me early. He's don't try to stand in my light.
(38:14):
Don't stand in my shadow. Step outside and find your
own light and be yourself. So always be yourself, regardless
what you're going through. Stay true to what you're going through,
to yourself and your music, because there's millions of people
going through the same thing that you are and that
feel the same way. And you may not be everybody's
cup of tea, but you'll be somebody's cup of coffee.
Speaker 2 (38:36):
There's some great advice to get from Whaling. But also
as a listener and a fan of country music, we
know Whalen for outlaw country. We know the music that
he's sang about. We know what he sung about. Was
he like that tough exterior on you as a grandson,
or was it just a different person.
Speaker 1 (38:54):
Whalen was Whaling and he definitely had He was always Whaling.
He was always tough, but he was so loving and
he was such such an increase. He was more like
a dad to me because when my dad got killed,
I went and stayed with Whaling for a while. I
didn't go back to school that year. I took the
last half of school off and Whaling told the school
(39:17):
he'll be back next year. It was like, he'll be
back and he'll be in the next grade. Got it.
Speaker 2 (39:22):
You had somebody that was really having your back, not
just like a normal having your back, Oh.
Speaker 1 (39:26):
No, because he was he was really that guy. Like
he was firm, he was tough, but he was so
loving and he made me feel like I was the
coolest thing on the planet. I was only grandson that
lived in Nashville for a long time. Way moved to
Nashville and his brother moved to Nashville in their teens,
(39:46):
so I like grew up in the house. Shooter was
like a little bit more sheltered because he was in
the house all the time. Yeah, so I was like
the one that was coming from the outside end, like
first cigarette, showing him his first porn magazine. I was
the bad influence because I was out there in the
real world. But Shooter, he left home at eighteen to
go have a rock band in LA and never left LA,
(40:09):
and he had his own dark path and overcame all
of it. Now he's crushing it Grammy after granted Grammy
between Brandy Carlisle and Tanya Tucker and he just he's
producing all the Charlie Crockett stuff now and Jacob and
just went did a record with him, and I got
a record with him coming out next year. So he's
(40:29):
just he's crushing it. I'm Shooter's probably the best human
being on the face of the planet, in mys besides
my beautiful little daughters.
Speaker 2 (40:38):
And when you were a kid too, I was imagining
that you don't really know any different. This is just
your family, this is your life. Yeah, So at what
point did you realize.
Speaker 1 (40:48):
Get it in school? Like when you're in school, they'd
be like, oh, they would try to use it against you.
Speaker 2 (40:53):
Is that why you turned away from it originally? I
know you said that you didn't want to use the name.
Speaker 1 (40:57):
Yeah, because I always wanted to make my own. I
was friends with Yellow for probably a year and a
half before I've told him my grandpa was whaling. And
the night that I did, he was like what, dude, what?
And we're like drinking downtown Nashville, riding listening and we're
listening to a whaling song and I was like, here
was my grandfather. He's like what, turn it RD? And
(41:18):
he's like what And then he looked down. I've got
this big watch on this big expensive watch because I'm
a drug dealer. And he's like, you're wearing a watch
like it, and I said, you're right through it out
the window on Broadway. He still tells that story, but yeah.
And then I just I'd always gravitated towards rap because
that's the era that I grew up in, that's the
(41:39):
environment that I grew up in, That's what spoke to me.
But I loved country, and country was always the backdrop
Whaling and George Straight. I know just about every word
every George Straight song, and then being on tour, hearing
the instruments and the steel guitar like crying, and I
always loved it. That's why I was really like the
first one that ever put still guitar on a rap
(42:00):
record in early two thousands. I was the first one
that started blending the two genres. Besides, of course, Bubba
Sparks had a lot of country flavor in there. Timberland
was in the beats and stuff and Bubba's accent and
the Tim McGraw and but I was already mixing rap
records in my bedroom with country at that point when
(42:25):
that came out, and then a lot of people were like, Oh,
you can't mix country and rap. You're going to ruin
your career. And then I went to prison and came
home after I dropped out Lost Shit, went to prison,
came home, and it was like a whole new genre.
Speaker 2 (42:38):
Was that weird too? You drop an album, You're like, oh,
I get to promota and to sing about it. You
go to jail?
Speaker 1 (42:43):
Yeah, I dropped the song and then went to jail.
Actually the day I dropped the video, I went to
jail the same day and then I was gone five years,
About a year and a half into my sentence, we
dropped the whole album.
Speaker 2 (42:56):
So were you meeting phone calls from jail? And dropping
an album.
Speaker 1 (42:59):
Yeah. So I had a one of my best friends
in the world and he still works with me, does
all my content, shoots most of my videos, and he's
like my right hand man. Sebastian. He actually had signed
me to the label deal and then his father had
passed away and I quit hustling and all this, and
then he disappeared because he was having to deal with
(43:19):
his grief and get his family right and make sure
his mom didn't lose your house, and so he stepped away.
And then when he called me back, he's like, man,
what are you doing. I'm like, it's gotten dighted looking
at a bunch of time, and he was like, dude,
I'm coming down there. And we recorded I Am Struggle,
which was all wailing samples, and then me wrap into it,
(43:40):
and that was the album that outlaut Shit was on.
But we recorded it right before. It was like a
rat race to get an album done before I went
to prison, because I didn't really know how much time
I was looking at.
Speaker 2 (43:49):
Holy crap, I didn't know that about that record.
Speaker 1 (43:52):
Yeah, and it actually released while I was sitting in
a prison.
Speaker 2 (43:56):
When you had fans over this course of your career,
So was that so weird because you're like there and
you're not really getting to do or have any interaction
with what's happening with your music.
Speaker 1 (44:06):
Yeah, but like the guards would come in and be like, man,
we're listening to your song out in the parking lot,
and then people would come in and be like om.
And then especially being gone five years, so about a
time I'm in there three or four years, the song
has gotten big, so new people coming in they're like,
oh shit, so it's cool. I was getting a feeling
and I was getting a lot of fan mail in there,
which gave me a lot of inspiration and hope, and
(44:28):
I perfected handwriting.
Speaker 2 (44:30):
Were you a songwriting in ever when you were there?
Speaker 1 (44:33):
So when I went in there, I started scribbling a
bunch of lyrics and stuff, and then I was like,
you know what, I started to notice that everything I
was writing was from a perspective being in there, and
I was like, as I was changing, the narrative was changing.
So I was like, you know what, I'm not even
going to try to do this. I'm gonna sit in
(44:53):
here the next three years because I was like writing
the first two I was like, I'm just gonna absorb
and then when I get out, I'm a tell the story.
So as soon as I got out, Yellowolf put me
in the studio and I wasn't supposed to be recording
because I was in a federal halfway house. So I
had to have a real job. So yellow Wolf put
me on payroll as the merchandise marketing director, and I
(45:16):
had a little fake desk set up with a laptop
that didn't even work in the corner of the studio
in case the parole would come and have to check
out my little area. And I was in there writing
songs and recording.
Speaker 2 (45:29):
Well, work around, but you weren't working. It's just not
probably an official version of what work looks like.
Speaker 1 (45:35):
Yeah, so they were gonna violate me and send me
back because I was putting up these documentary episodes and
they were like, this isn't a real job. So they
were about to send me back. They came and told me.
They said, hey, you're going back to prison. This lady
came in. She was on fire. She was like, I'm
sending you back to prison. And I think, oh, this
(45:56):
is bs that you need to get a real job.
This isn't a real job. And then they tell me
I'm going. So I packed all my stuff doctor March
say goodbye to my kids after being gone all this time,
and they were in a foster and foster care at
the time. I had to say goodbye to them again.
(46:16):
Woke up the next morning and they were like, hey,
we need you to come downstairs. I thought Marshalls were
there to pick me up and go in there, and
that lady was like, I don't somebody called, and I
guess you got somebody on your side. But we're putting
an ankle monitor on you, Da da, and you're gonna
do this, and you're gonna do that. And I was like,
oh shit, I'm not going back. And then she leaves
(46:39):
and the director of the Halfway House caused me in
there and he puts me on speakerphone and it's the
lady that's over all the programs and she's like, dude,
I love your documentary. She's like, I'm gonna start using
it because greatness is in the gray area and we've
been black and white for so long. She was like,
I'm gonna lot you eight hours a week of studio time,
but you got to keep your job and you got
(47:00):
to bring your pay stubs in and pay your fees.
We got an ankle monitor on. She was like, that's
the only way that I could really justify and not
sending you back, and she really she helped out a lot.
And wow, so I ended up not going back. I
just took that one that one person to just believe
and go, Okay, this guy really has the opportunity to
make a change.
Speaker 2 (47:19):
And yeah, wow, that's a really cool story. I'm glad
that was not where I anticipated it going, but that
was really cool and also awesome just that there was
that one person out there who said, I'm going to
do things a little differently. Yeah, because it always takes
one person to make a change. Sometimes you do everything
monotonous and stay in the black and white. As she said,
because that's what you mentioned way before any of this,
(47:41):
was that change is hard. Yeah, making that changes hard,
and she just chose. And it's really cool that made
a point in your story. So all of your music,
I know we've talked about all the personal stuff, and
I think I could sit here and talk to you
all day about all of the things in your life.
But two things your music. How many albums do you have?
Speaker 1 (48:02):
I probably got like I'd say thirteen or fourteen out there,
but I've got I had eighty five now unreleased songs.
Speaker 2 (48:15):
Crazy.
Speaker 1 (48:15):
I'm about to release first single drops Friday for me
and Brian Martin did a EP called nineteen seventy six.
He had just got kicked off the Morgan Walling tour
and he came over. We were meeting for the first time,
going to write a song, and ended up with a
bottle of whiskey and telling me everything that was going
on in his life, and I said, man, let's do
(48:36):
album together. He was like getting blacklisted and stuff at
the time, and I'm like, I like you. And so
we sat in there five days, wrote five songs, brought
all the band in one room, let him rock. We
laid the vocals all super old school, got just a
real authentic feel. It's called nineteen seventy six. The album
(48:57):
is and it comes out October third.
Speaker 2 (49:01):
Wow. And that's the latest.
Speaker 1 (49:02):
September twenty sixth.
Speaker 2 (49:03):
Okay, that's the latest album of all of these.
Speaker 1 (49:06):
Yeah, yeah, that one's coming out. And then right behind
it in November, I have my album Last Name, produced
by Ned Cameron, who's incredible. He produced Only God Knows
Me and Jelly and a couple songs off my last album.
I've got a full album that's coming in November from
produced by him. Then I've got two more rap albums
(49:29):
that are finishing up now, and got the album produced
by Shooter. It's done. I got to go relay a
few vocals because I got with a vocal coach. I
was like, I'm going to take this serious. Being a
rapper so long and my heart being in country music
and wanting to go to switch completely over the country
was originally my idea. I just jumped in with a
(49:50):
vocal coach to just really learn and to perfect it
and find my voice and be able to use it.
Speaker 2 (49:57):
How do you have time to sleep and be a
dad when you have four actual albums that are happening
all on even more.
Speaker 1 (50:03):
Than that, because I got another one that we're recording
in August. It's all old school. I wrote a bunch
of songs with like Bob Depirot and a bunch of
old school writers that just it came out and it
was so different than the other stuff that I had
that I was like, oh, we got to put this
on a project. So me and a good friend of mine,
Zach Gardner, who's he co produces a lot of things
(50:25):
with me and he's incredible. So we're doing that in August,
and I wasn't. I was kind of chasing for a
little while the country radio thing. I was like, man,
we were all growing up as a kid listening to
the radio. You want to hear your stuff on the radio,
but there's a lot of steps involved to that. And
I was really getting the whole you got to completely
(50:47):
commit to country and can't put out any more rap.
And then Brandley Gilbert was like, bu but you can't
forget to dance with the girl that brought you to
the party and I can't not rap.
Speaker 2 (50:58):
That's sorry for you are.
Speaker 1 (51:00):
Yeah, it's part of who I am. So I was
just like, you know what, as much as I would
love country radio, maybe one day I'll get to hear
my songs on the radio, but I'm not gonna chase that.
I'm not gonna I'm gonna just keep doing exactly what
I'm doing. I'm gonna stay independent and I'm gonna keep
pumping these albums out. The hard part about being independent
is a lot of times you don't get the push
(51:20):
and you don't get the promotion and the marketing that
you would get if you were on a major label.
But so songs. It could be number one on country
and they get looked over, but they become other people's
favorite songs. Like fifty times a day I get comments
like why is this not number one in the country.
But I just I like to still be able to
(51:41):
go in the Kroger and shop. My community loves me.
I love to be able to pull up at the kids'
football games.
Speaker 2 (51:47):
And there's a lot of beauty and independent that you
get to put out what you want to put out
and do the projects you want to do. You have
so much more drive to do it too, so I
think it looks differently every we talk about this a
lot that fame is so shifted and you can have
a successful career any which way as long as you
go for it.
Speaker 1 (52:06):
Really, I want to do it till I'm ninety. I'm
going to be I don't care if it's just I
don't I was blessed to get to go do amphitheaters
with Jelly Row and watch that. Now he's in stadiums
with post and watching all that. I'm so proud of him.
But there's moments where I'm like, man, I see the
way he has to live. I see the way that
(52:27):
how busy he is and how much he doesn't. There's
moments where I'm like, man, I would be blessed to
be in that position. But I also kind of like being.
Speaker 2 (52:37):
Independent, absolutely, And I do love to end these things
on a piece of advice. And I want everybody to
go check out all of Struggles music. I think you
could listen to it for a whole entire year before
you made it through everything.
Speaker 1 (52:48):
I'm gonna drop a whole new catalogy.
Speaker 2 (52:50):
Yeah, so get through all of that. But I like
to end the podcast on whether it's piece of advice
or motivation or inspiration, something that maybe we haven't touched on. However,
the floor goes to you. But that's what I like
to end on.
Speaker 1 (53:05):
I've been blessed recently. I just got made the director
of Send Musicians to Prison. Nathan Lee has been running
it for sixteen years, and they took me into Rikers
Island and it was so special. I was like, and
I want to do this more and be a part
of it. And Nathan Lee had just been to where
he was stepping down from it and just staying on
(53:26):
the board and they were like, we're looking for a
new director, and so they all voted and I became
the new director. And so I'm getting to go back
into prisons. And one of the things that I find
the most, that I really is just on my heart
to tell people is don't let your past to find you.
There were so many times in life where people would
ask me like, are you ready, And I was like, yeah,
(53:46):
I was born ready, but I wasn't born ready. I
had to go through all the shit that I went
through to get ready. And I like to use the
analogy when they purified gold, they put it in a fire,
they pull it out, wipe off all the imperfections, and
they put it back in the fire. Don't be afraid
of those flames. Anything you're going through, anything you've been through,
it's all leading you up to where you're supposed to be.
(54:08):
You just have to keep that mindset. You have to
keep moving forward, make the best decisions you can, and
you will get where beyond where you can dream you
would be. In any aspect, whether it's success, business, relationships, love,
just keep moving and just lead with your heart and
don't give up.
Speaker 2 (54:28):
Oh that's a really good feasing. Congratulations on becoming the director.
I think that's really cool. Yeah, obviously that's going to
be a great way for you to get back in
the community. It's cool that you're changing what would have
been really beneficial and helpful for you. You're making sure
that's happening for other people, and I think that's really awesome.
Speaker 1 (54:44):
Well, I think it's better to focus on building something
bigger than yourself.
Speaker 2 (54:49):
Absolutely, it's a whole part. It's part of the reason
why we're here right so struggle. Thanks for being here,
Thanks for being so open sharing your story.
Speaker 1 (54:56):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (54:58):
I told you guys, this is a great one. I'm
happy it's finally in your hands. And if you liked it,
please subscribe to the podcast and follow at take This
personally on Instagram for so much more content. Thanks for
being here with me this week. As always, I'm happy
that you're here and I can't wait for you to
be here next week.
Personally the Oldsman.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
The incredible stories are continuing. I can't wait for you
guys to listen to this interview. You may have heard
of this guy in a whole bunch of different ways.
Maybe you listen to one of his rap albums, or
maybe his country albums, or you followed along with him
on social media, or maybe from his famous grandfather. His
name is Struggle Jennings. He has a story full of resilience,
and he's been open and vulnerable about so many things
(00:39):
that have happened in his life. It's one of my
favorite interviews to date. So, without further ado, let's get
into it. I'm morgana here, I'm joined by Struggle Jennings,
and I'm really excited because Struggling I met Gosh three
or so years ago. We played in the Folds Honor
Celebrities softball game. So Struggle, thanks for joining me. This
(01:01):
is awesome.
Speaker 1 (01:02):
Now, thanks for having me. I got to carry that
trophy home that day you did. I was supposed to
give it to Jelly and he never picked it up,
so it is on my mantle.
Speaker 2 (01:10):
I love that You're like, by way, it's just mine now.
My first introduction to you was you pulled out a
whole bunch of snacks out of a backpack, and I
was like, I like this guy. Yeah, the dude I do.
Speaker 1 (01:19):
It was gonna be hot and I was gonna have
a lot of friends and just bring.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
Snacks for you knew how to make friends, like you
knew the momentum there.
Speaker 1 (01:27):
I grew up in a household where my mom we
moved like every nine months or something six to nine
months or every year. My mom was sixteen when she
had me, so she was one of those kind of
I need a fresh start, and we'd moved to the
other side of town, or we'd move here, move there,
and so, yeah, I learned how to make friends when
you're the new guy, bring.
Speaker 2 (01:45):
Snacks and talk to me about your life and your childhood.
Which also one of my questions, is Struggle your real
name or is.
Speaker 1 (01:52):
This just a snatch say stage name?
Speaker 2 (01:53):
Okay, why what is struggle?
Speaker 1 (01:56):
Like?
Speaker 2 (01:56):
Where did that come from?
Speaker 1 (01:57):
So I was actually with a friend of mine and
I started rapping. I just came home from a jail
sentence and I was a single dad with my two
kids and really trying to get my rap career off
the ground. And of course I had a name in
the streets, but I was like, I don't know if
this name is really digestive. I don't know if a
(02:20):
parent's gonna let her kid buy a CD from Little
Killer When I was a teenager, Do you get that name?
Speaker 2 (02:29):
Or does somebody give you that name?
Speaker 1 (02:31):
Somebody gives it to you? And the same way with
Struggle is a friend of mine. We were working, We're
about to go to our first studio session, and we
had been like practicing and writing songs and me and
him were doing like an EP together and a guy
named white Boy and he was like, man, he was like,
what are you gonna go by? I was like, man,
(02:52):
I don't know. I just I guess it'll come to me.
And he was like, man, you ought to go I
struggle And I was like struggle and he was like, yeah, bro,
Like I see nobody go through the stuff you go
through on a daily basis. He was like, you need
to go by a struggle and I was I was like,
all right, cool. So I started going back. At first
it was like young struggle, yeah, and as I got
older it became struggle and then my grandfather being whaling.
(03:15):
When I caught my case, they automatically started calling me
Struggle Jennings. They're like the grandson of Whaling Jennings, rappers
Struggle Jennings. And I was fighting it at first. I
was like, man, I was telling my guy that was
handling my socials and that was before Instagram or anything
like that. My Twitter is still a young strug had
(03:37):
young strugs. He was like, nah, man. He was like, dude,
if you google struggle, it's gonna pop up like kids
in Africa and all kinds of struggles that are like
going on. He was like, Struggle Jennings, it'll be Google.
I was like, man, I don't know. And I so
I called my uncle Shooter and he was like, nah,
Whalen would love that. He was like, take that name
(03:59):
and make it your own. And so I rode with it.
When by the time I came home there was really
no reversing it.
Speaker 2 (04:06):
It had already been done. Like you already became Struggle Jennings.
And you just mentioned your mom and talked to me
about childhood. She talked about your friends and you went
through a lot of struggle. What were some of those
moments in your life that led to where you are now?
Speaker 1 (04:21):
Yes, so I mean starting early. My mom was sixteen
when she had me, and she's the daughter of Jesse
Culture and Dwayne Eddy, who's legendary guitar player rock and roll,
and Jesse and Whalen had ran off together when my
mom was like four and moved from California to Nashville,
and Whalen adopted her and so forth, and then she
(04:44):
had me. At sixteen, she met my dad. My dad
was an old West Nashville came from poverty, just roughneck,
good old boy, and they met at the West Nashville
skating rink and one starry night in the back of
his el commedie, I was made.
Speaker 2 (05:02):
You love to tell that story, don't you.
Speaker 1 (05:04):
Yeah, yeah, I love it. Altum about as West Nashville
as they get. So they lasted until I was about four.
My grandpa bought them a house in Franklin in a
neighborhood called Maplewood. There was on like four or five
houses when he bought the house, and it was like
this single story, cute little house in Franklin, and then
(05:24):
the neighborhood built up. By the time I was six,
there was probably two hundred and fifty houses in the neighborhood,
but it was a pretty enclosed neighborhood, like one way in,
one way out. So as a child, I had a
pretty normal upbringing, like pretty clean cut. My mom was sixteen,
she was she was We were raising each other. The
(05:47):
firefighters were at our house every day because she was
burning something, trying to learn how to cook, and I
heard my dad. They split up when I was four,
so she was doing it on her own, but she
was still singing backup for Whaling, so she was gone
a lot on tour, and then in the summertimes, I'd
get to go on the bus or and I was
at Whaling's house a lot because me and Shooter are
just a year apart.
Speaker 2 (06:08):
Which Shooter is your uncle though.
Speaker 1 (06:10):
Yeah, that's Whaling and Jesse's only kid together. And so
then when I was went through some stuff, like when
I was like eight, my mom got in a real
abusive relationship. She got married to another guy. I watched
him beat the shit out of her, and of course
my dad came over there and ran him off. But
(06:32):
then when I was ten, my dad was murdered.
Speaker 2 (06:34):
I remember when we were talking before this, you had
mentioned that, and were you living with your dad at
the time.
Speaker 1 (06:40):
I was living with my mom, okay, And so when
that happened, I was outside playing football and my mom
called me and was like, Hey, your dad's on the
phone and wants to talk to you. And I was like,
I tell him. I called him back later. And then
when I came in that night, she was crying in
the back room all of a sudden, whaling and all
my family pulled up and at me down and said,
(07:01):
your dad's no longer with us. They told me it
was suicide. So throughout my childhood I was like living
with that regret. What if I would have answered the phone,
would he still be here? And it wasn't until I
was eighteen that I found out he was murdered.
Speaker 2 (07:17):
Were they telling you that to protect you? I assume.
Speaker 1 (07:20):
So my dad's side of the family knew what really happened,
but they were protecting the family, and so my mom
genuinely didn't. She thought that he had committed suicide. And
it wasn't ntil I was eighteen that I was like suicidal.
And I'd been living with my uncle because I started
getting in a lot of trouble. Twelve, I joined the gang,
(07:42):
started selling drugs. My mom had her and whaling it
kind of fell out because she was like starting to
date again, and he was like, hey, son just lost
his dad. You just got out of a terrible marriage.
Think you should chill a little bit. And she's twenty
something year old, young lady looking for love on her
own and alone, and.
Speaker 2 (08:02):
She's gone through a lot of stuff at this point.
Speaker 1 (08:03):
Yeah, for sure, And so she was kind of had
that mentality, you know what, I don't want your money,
I don't need your help. I'm gonna do it on
my own, and I'm gonna show you that I can
do it on my own. So it was like a
culture shock because the same time I lost my dad,
we moved to the other side of town, and she
got two jobs and was going to cosmetology school and
working her ass off, trying to raise me and not
(08:26):
cut the cord from the family, which I still was
at his house a lot because I was over there
hanging out with Shooter and all the holidays and stuff.
But financially, she wouldn't take anything from him, and she
was trying to prove. So we went through from what
seemed like a pretty normal childhood. I bid West Nashville
on the weekends a lot to see my dad or
my uncle and my cousins and stuff. So I always
(08:48):
straddle those tracks where when I was in West Nashville,
you know, I learned a lot of those irrational beliefs
and just the things that kind of sparked that mentality,
that outlaw mentality. But then I'd go to Whalen's house
and see the jag and the Cadillac and the maid
(09:08):
and the nanny and the guards.
Speaker 2 (09:10):
And these very two polarized lives.
Speaker 1 (09:13):
Yeah, and knowing Whalen came from nothing gave me that
sense of anything's possible. But then when I'd leave his
house and go back to my neighborhood, the only people
that had the Cadillacs and the Jaguars with the drug dealers.
So I was gravitated towards that because I saw a
quality of life that I knew is obtainable. I was
just in. I allowed my circumstance to keep me. This
(09:36):
is all I have, this is all I can do,
this is all I can get. That kind of led
me into being a drug dealer in most of my life, and.
Speaker 2 (09:42):
In a life of crime that's really tough too. Do
you look back at that time in your life, do
you are you not necessarily happy that it happened, but
do you feel like it made you who you are
today to be the.
Speaker 1 (09:53):
Person that you are on one thousand percent, like, I
have no regrets in life. I mean, there's some things
I wish I may not have said, a couple of
things I wish I hadn't done in my life. But
as far as looking back or having any kind of
like victim mentality, it's not like I went through everything
that I went through. It brought me exactly where I'm at,
made me who I am, and gave me the testimony
(10:15):
to be able to reach other people. It gave me
the insight and through the different phases, I just it
kept leveling me up to the place that I'm at
now as a man.
Speaker 2 (10:28):
Oh And I want to ask you, because I grew
up in rural Kansas. There's not a lot happening over there.
We got a lot of farmers and country lands.
Speaker 1 (10:36):
About it, and most people get in trouble. Was boring
is when you find shit to do.
Speaker 2 (10:41):
I did drink very early, that's very true, but there
wasn't a lot of activity. I wasn't around the whole bunch.
So when you get into drug dealing and stuff. I
have to imagine as a kid that was terrifying, and
you were doing and experiencing things that as a kid
you never should have had to.
Speaker 1 (10:56):
For sure, I think that we were so caught up
in the lyrics of Tupac and No Limit and master
p and we just accepted that as life, and that's
what it was, and that's what we gravitated towards. And
I don't ever really remember any time in my life
(11:18):
really being like poor me or I think because a
lot of times, because I had seen the two sides
so much, and I knew that Whaling grew up with nothing.
They were dirt poor in Texas, dirt floors, and he
made it out of there on a dream. And my
dream was just shifted a lot of times. Even though
(11:38):
I always had music in my heart and I wanted
to do music, there was a time where I wanted
to be Tony Montana. There was a time where I
wanted to be Tony Soprano. I want to be John Gotti.
Speaker 2 (11:46):
You went through different periods.
Speaker 1 (11:48):
I did. I did, yeah, for sure. No, there's you
can go back and look at pictures. There's times where
I had braids to my ass, and right where my
pants were and gold chain, and there's times where I
was in a three P suit thinking I was about
to start a mafia family.
Speaker 2 (12:05):
Do you feel like that was because you were going
back and forth, Like you would go and hang out
with your grandfather in this kind of fame filled and
very successful life, and you're seeing these things and you
want to be this one person, And then you'd go
back and you'd be with your mom and you'd see
this other side and you're like, well, I kind of
want both.
Speaker 1 (12:22):
Yeah. I still struggle with that, right, even there's times
where my career starts lifting to a certain place and
things get crazy and I'm like, and I really just
want to be home with the kids. Do I really
want to be a huge country star rapper entertainer or
do I want to be a PTA dad and coach
(12:42):
my son's football. There's still always that internal battle. The
music just won't let me go anywhere else. I'm so
embedded with just a love for your music is my
life to a point, my children in my life, and
my family of course, But I just had that a
gravitational pool that I've never been able to run from it,
(13:04):
even when I've tried. It's kind of like God, many
times I tried to run completely in the opposite direction
and something would happen that would be life altering, and
a bullet would miss me by inches or whatever the
case was, that it could have been really a lot
worse than it was, and always reeled me back in
(13:27):
to like, oh, I know this is what is true,
and this is true to me.
Speaker 2 (13:31):
Are you telling me that you've been shopped before? Oh?
Speaker 1 (13:33):
Yeah, I've been shot twice. I actually got shot. You
know where Big Bad Breakfast is? Yeah? Okay, so that
used to be Wendell Smith's. It was a corner store.
Speaker 2 (13:40):
Okay, window Smith is still there.
Speaker 1 (13:42):
The restaurant in the liquor store. Okay, So Big Bad
Breakfast was the convenience store. So old man Wendell had
the convenience store, the liquor store, and the restaurant. The
whole family worked in the restaurant. My aunt was a
waitress there. I think my dad bus tables there when
he was young. My grandma worked there. But then a
guy named Jakie Cook married Wendell Smith's daughter, Beverly Smith,
(14:06):
and so my whole life, Jakie Cook was running that
he was like an old school gambler, like southern mafia
type guy. His son Benji still runs and then the
grandson also runs a restaurant. But Jakie was just like
cool old a multi multi millionaire that you wouldn't even
(14:29):
you wouldn't even know it. Yeah, he's just cool, chill
old guy. A lot of them got their start with
like poker machines in the back.
Speaker 2 (14:35):
Of Yeah, wait until you got shot.
Speaker 1 (14:42):
Where Yeah, I got no shoot out there? When I
was young? How old were you hit in the shind
that actually ricocheted underneath the car, I believe, and it
hit me in the shin?
Speaker 2 (14:54):
What does it feel like to get shot?
Speaker 1 (14:56):
You don't realize you get shot at first, like you
don't feel it. You feel the sure of the tug,
but when you're in the moment with adrenaline, you don't
feel it like that.
Speaker 2 (15:05):
And this was that when you were wrapped up in
things back then.
Speaker 1 (15:07):
Oh yeah, one hundred percent. From the time I was twelve,
I always went through phases because I always knew better.
I had been planting those seeds by my mom and
my grandma heavy in church, and I had always been planted,
had seeds planted of right and wrong, but I just
tugged away from it so much, and so I went
(15:28):
through phases like twelve to fifteen, I was just wild,
went to move in with my uncle, was doing good
for a little while. It was like, yeah, I'm changing
my life, got caught back up, went to jail when
I was twenty one on a weed case. Then fifteen months,
got out, walked straight from five years raising my kids,
(15:51):
and then I always diverted back to it when things
got tough. It was like a comfort zone for me,
like I knew I was good at being bad.
Speaker 2 (16:00):
Yeah, and you knew there was money, and you knew
there was a way to help you survive.
Speaker 1 (16:04):
Yeah, yeah, temporary money. Yeah, even at the height of
my career in that world, even if I was making
hundreds of thousands of dollars a month. When you're living
that life, you don't really get to enjoy it or
spend it. It gets spent for you, like you're making
your friend's bonds, or you're paying for this funeral, or
(16:25):
you're somebody robs somebody and you gotta jurors and you
gotta so it's like there's all way, or you get
busted and they take everything you shore.
Speaker 2 (16:34):
It was like money that kind of felt like not yours.
Speaker 1 (16:38):
You just don't actually do anything losing. And that's why
I try to tell a lot of these young guys
now when I go into these prisons and talk and stuff,
is like it all looks good. But my uncle told
me when I was young, and they were caught up
in a lot of the same things too, But they
told me when I was young, They're like, man, there's
really only you never really retire from this. You either
end up dead or in prison.
Speaker 2 (16:59):
And so was twenty one your last one?
Speaker 1 (17:02):
No, And I just got home nine years ago. I
did five years from thirty one to thirty six. I
did five years federal prison and state prison. Came home
in twenty sixteen, was in a federal halfway house for
six months. Got out, me and Jelly started touring. Jelly
was just starting to get on his feet. He had
(17:23):
been putting in a lot of work, but he was
starting to catch a little bit of steam. And that
was still five years before. And we did a few albums,
did four albums called Whaling.
Speaker 2 (17:33):
And Willie and just obviously inspired from your grandfather.
Speaker 1 (17:37):
And their friendship and the two dualities of the two guys.
Speaker 2 (17:41):
And did you feel like you and Jelly were whaling?
Speaker 1 (17:44):
And Willie we still are. We still are to this day,
one hundred percent more stories I hear even now, I'm like, God,
this is crazy.
Speaker 2 (17:53):
Yeah, like the outlaw side and just the things you
guys have experienced were more personalities.
Speaker 1 (17:57):
Both both all the above.
Speaker 2 (18:00):
Really it's lat so who's whaling and Who's I'm whaling?
Speaker 1 (18:04):
I'm hard headed. I still wear a hat that says
CMA country my ass. And what makes Jelly Willy the lightheartedness.
He smokes a lot of weed.
Speaker 2 (18:15):
I'm following.
Speaker 1 (18:16):
Yeah, there's a lot of there's a lot of things.
And he's been incredibly successful and he moves really good
in that world, and he's he's just he's done so
much I'm proud of.
Speaker 2 (18:27):
And you get out nine years ago, and what has
been this stint that's kept you on this path to hopefully.
Speaker 1 (18:34):
Never go back to Let's talk about it, Morgan.
Speaker 2 (18:35):
Yeah, tell me when.
Speaker 1 (18:37):
I went to prison, the mother and my kids fell
really hard. My wife at the time, she got addicted
to drugs, ran off with one of my best friends
at the time. He ended up getting locked up. She
got in a relationship after a relationship with people that
were using drugs and doing drugs, and she just went
down a really dark path, ended up losing custody of
(18:59):
my kids. It's before she lost custody, it got super dark.
There was a time my daughter innocence. She was three
when I went to four when I went to prison.
By the time she was like five six, I'm calling
from prison her brothers and sisters having eight all day.
It's five o'clock in the afternoon. Her mom's passed out
on drugs. I had to teach her how to make
(19:19):
macaroni and cheese from a jail phone so she could
feed her siblings. And it was just thing after thing
like that where it just struck that chord that I
was like, this cannot be how the story is told.
This can't be what I leave my kids. This can't
I can't. I know where they're headed with the environment
(19:44):
they're in and what they're going through right now, and
it's not a pretty future. My daughter was molested in
a drug house. They ended up in foster care. Their
mother passed away from the drug overdose. That little girl
just graduated with the three point nine GPA honors. Oh yeah,
(20:05):
I love telling that when I say it on stage, like,
that's probably the loudest the crowd gets for me all night.
Speaker 2 (20:11):
But that's okay, I'll take that.
Speaker 1 (20:13):
Yeah. Yeah, But and all my kids are just thriving
and doing so good. But I really, when I was
in there, I had to really take full accountability for
all of it. I was like, I'm the one that
left them out there with a father. I left my
wife out there without a husband. I left my mom
without a son. I left my friends without their friend.
Because I was the provider for a lot of people
(20:34):
and always took care of everybody.
Speaker 2 (20:36):
And was that your wake up call? Just hearing that
phone call?
Speaker 1 (20:41):
Yeah? And I never really had a chance to go
back to sleep because it was every day I was
getting a call like that. And then meanwhile, Jelly's out
in a van, sleeping in a van tour and every
time I call him having that little bit of hope
of him going, man, this shits really happening. We're out here.
I'm in Tupelow tonight, I'm in Kansas City tonight, or
(21:04):
I'm here. So like hearing that and knowing, okay, this
is possible. I can't control what's going on out there.
The only thing I can control is what I do
with this situation and who I become and who I
come out. And so I just started stripping away all
those layers and figuring out, what are the thinking patterns
that keep bringing me back in here? Why do I
(21:25):
keep going back to the same thing, Why do I
keep making the same mistakes and decisions? And I had
to process a lot and figure it out, and so
I came out a completely different person. I had lost
one hundred and twenty pounds. I had rid myself of
a lot of irrational thinking and beliefs and things that
I was instilled through music and environment.
Speaker 2 (21:45):
And was that hard to rewrite, especially as you're sitting
in a prison where you're surrounded by people who have
similar minds?
Speaker 1 (21:54):
In a way?
Speaker 2 (21:55):
Was that hard to rewrite that entire story for you
to come out a completely different person?
Speaker 1 (22:01):
One thousand percent? But the thing about it is ninety
nine percent of people have it in them and they
want to change and they know better. It's just change
is scary. And I was beyond the fact the point
of fear. My fear had diverted from change to the
(22:24):
end result of what was going to happen. To my children.
I just saw something the other day. It was like,
change happens when the reality of the outcome becomes scarier
than the fear of change. Something like that.
Speaker 2 (22:43):
Essentially, what was happening to you in these moments? How
long like when you were getting those phone calls? How
much longer did you have to serve before you were
able to get out?
Speaker 1 (22:51):
Oh, it started as soon as I got in there.
It started happening. As soon as I was away, call
home and the first cause of this happened. I'm so so.
And then it's like you can just see the it
getting worse and worse. And as soon as I hit prison,
I walked in and I saw the different types of people, right,
(23:14):
And you have the group that's still gambling, smoking, doing drugs,
eating honey buns, sitting there watching TV all day. And
then you got the guys that are getting up, going
to classes all day, going to the yard to train,
stay in shape, and they stay in packs. And I
was like, that's what I want.
Speaker 2 (23:32):
And you went to the pack that was going to
the classes.
Speaker 1 (23:35):
Yeah, I took the cloud would take the classes so
many times that I would be the teacher.
Speaker 2 (23:42):
And what are the classes like what are these classes?
Speaker 1 (23:44):
You're like parenting and your finances, critical thinking. I did
all the drug programs, anti violence programs, just trying to
learn how to reel your anger in and catch it
before it gets anywhere. And I just rational self analysis
type stuff.
Speaker 2 (24:01):
But that was all a choice. You weren't required to
go to MEUD at all.
Speaker 1 (24:05):
The drug program you get time off if you take it,
so of course there's an incentive to that. But I
knew I needed it, and I did it in the state,
made parole in the state, but then I had to
go serve my FED time. So then when I went
to the FEDS and I went to do the program again,
because it would take a year off your sentence and
(24:25):
you'd get six months guaranteed halfway house. So you're literally
getting out eighteen months earlier if you do the drug program.
And I had five years fifty seven months in the
Feds and a thirteen year sentence in the state.
Speaker 2 (24:37):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (24:38):
But then the second time I went through that drug program,
already knew all of it because I had taken the
same program in the state, so I wasn't having to
learn anything. I was getting to digest it. So the
second time I went through the drug program. It like
light bulb struck and I was like, Okay, I got this.
Speaker 2 (24:55):
Yeah that first time, it was okay, this is all
information for the first time, I have.
Speaker 1 (25:00):
It, learn it, write it down, take a test once
I've already learned it, and I know I even pass
the test. I'm really learning it. It's really soaking in
at that point, I'm really understanding it.
Speaker 2 (25:10):
So struggle now. Obviously this is nine years ago, but
you now, do you look at your life and you
see your kids thriving, and you see you doing music
and doing the things that you would talk to Jelley
when you were in jail and he was doing Do
you look at your life now and you're like, dang, I.
Speaker 1 (25:29):
Did this, Yeah, But I still look at it like, man,
I need to do better. Every day I fall short
of something. I could jump to conclusions and be like, ah,
I should have sat on that a little longer, or
I could shift the blame and be like, man, I
can't do that. I really got to take accountability for that.
In relationships and business, I still make a lot of mistakes,
(25:51):
but I'm having to like really sit back and just
learn how to remind myself of who I will that
when I came home, because it's it's so easy to
come out of prison and be like, oh I got this,
watch this and be this great person, and then life
really starts happening. Life starts lifing, and you'll fall back
(26:12):
into old ways or you'll start to slip. And it's
just about readjusting yourself every day. And really prayer helps
me a lot, especially with anger, because I'll just assess
the day somebody might have said something hurt my feelings,
I might have done something to hurt somebody else's feelings,
and I just got to be like, look, I can't
let the sun set on my anger, pray about it,
(26:34):
give it to God, and wake up and start fresh
the next day. And that's really with that, and things
like staying in a good routine with the GEM, a
lot of community work, a lot of going into jails
and rehabs and speaking. And we're opening rehabs across the
country right now called Sound Sobriety where we're implementing songwriting
(26:57):
and it's me and Brandy Gilbert and a business partner
named Michael Fry and his wife and they were implementing
songwriting into their therapy teaching them how to put their
feelings and their emotions and their testimonies in a song
for him.
Speaker 2 (27:13):
Can I ask you this too, because I imagine growing
up in the ways that you did, you were not
taught to share your feelings and emotions. You were probably
taught that's not what you do.
Speaker 1 (27:24):
And yeah, so the men in my life, of course,
were like that, you don't cry, You don't tell anybody
how you feel or hold it in. You be a man,
you suck it up. But I was raised by a
single mama.
Speaker 2 (27:35):
They cried every day where she really went against that.
Speaker 1 (27:38):
Yeah, I'm a mama's boy, like the wrong commercial. Come on,
I'm boughting like a baby. And then even as a father,
had now see why the men told me that, because
there's a lot of time as a man, especially as
a father or a husband or a friend, you have
to you want to shield them from knowing how bad
(27:58):
it is sometimes, so you got to hold it in
and deal with it sometimes because if everybody's looking at
you as the breadwinner, the protector, the provider, the security,
you can't let him know that everything's in shambles and
you're trying to figure it out.
Speaker 2 (28:14):
Do you feel like that healing has started to reverse
for you now, Like you got out and you were
doing all this stuff to bounce back your life. Are
you now at the point where you're able to look
back on all it and start to kill your inner
self of stuff that was happening.
Speaker 1 (28:27):
Yeah, for sure. And when the mother and my kids died,
I wasn't able to grieve for a year, right because
my kids were grieving really heavy, and then I lost
the right behind it. We lost the father to my
two step kids. He died of the same way. So
(28:48):
between those two and then other friends and stuff, sometimes
I've had to put my grieving on the back burner,
and I've learned that's not always healthy, Like you have
to separate yourself and you got to go find your
own time to grieve, whether it's an hour car ride,
punching the steering wheel and screaming to God, whatever it is,
praying and crying and whatever that may be. Because I'm
(29:11):
dealing with it right now. I'm wearing these two necklaces
today because one of my best friends, Nemo's actually fighting
for his life right now, and I had just had
these made for us and was going to give them
to him. He was supposed to come down this week
and stay at my house and I didn't get a
chance to give him to him. But he's fighting right now.
And I had one of my best friends and workout
partners passed this morning. I've had to take I was
(29:33):
just on vacation when I heard when I got the
news about Nemo, and he wasn't an artist or singer,
but he was an incredible singer and a songwriter. But
he's just a biker. But we had got him to
record a song that he had wrote, and so I
literally had to like, we're on family vacation. I had
to break away and go, hey, y'all, I just need
a little while. And literally went there and turned that
(29:54):
song and repeat and cried like an animal for two
hours in the shower and then came out. I was like,
all right, let's go. You gotta find that time to grieve.
And I'm learning that life is You're always a student
and I'm always learning things.
Speaker 2 (30:08):
What do you feel like are some of your hardest lessons?
Because I was going to ask you about grief, because
I do feel like, unfortunately, you are no stranger to grief,
which sharing that of you getting in the shower and crying,
I think is a good lesson for a lot of people,
because grieving tends to be one of those processes we
just push back and do what needs to be done
to get through something.
Speaker 1 (30:29):
You try to be too tough, you'll find out how
weak you really are. Try to hold that in and
then it's gonna spill over and you're either gonna lash
out or you're gonna break, or you gotta allow yourself
to feel. You gotta allow yourself to release. You gotta
allow yourself to feel those emotions. The older I get,
the more I realize real men cry and they gotta.
(30:50):
We have emotions, we have feelings. We gotta let it out. Yes,
we gotta do it in our own time a lot
of times, because when you do have the women and
children of your house, friends and everybody looking at you
for that strength, you got to be strong for them.
But also when I was going through that, all my
daughters came up to me and I want to put
(31:10):
my arm around me, and I came back. They knew
that I was dealing with it, but I still just
put the smile on and we finished family vacation.
Speaker 2 (31:20):
How are you, I can only imagine how great of
a girl dad you are. I need to know like
girl dad struggles. Yeah, I'm hearing a like tough struggle, right,
I need girl dad struggle.
Speaker 1 (31:31):
I've got four daughters and yeah there. I love my sons.
Don't take you wrong, They're my little mini met. I'm
a little tougher on my boys because I want them
to be good men. I want them to love and
cherish the women in their life. That was one of
the last things my dad told me. Get your job
on this earth as a man to protect and provide
for the women in your life. Never put your hands
(31:52):
on a girl. So I'm super tough my boys about
their manners chivalry.
Speaker 2 (31:58):
So read in the next generation of men.
Speaker 1 (32:00):
Yeah, I tell people all the time. I don't want
to hear none of y'all complaining about the way this
country is. If you're not raising your kids to fix it,
if you're not raising your kids to be the next
generation and to do better than we did, then you're
missing your dropping the ball. But yeah, my girls. I
have the best relationship with my daughters. We text and
talk every day. We have twenty five year old named
(32:21):
Brianna Harness. She's my first born she's a blue singer.
She's got an incredible voice. She's just dropped i think
her fifth album, Wow.
Speaker 2 (32:30):
And she's twenty five.
Speaker 1 (32:31):
Yeah, but sure more than I have.
Speaker 2 (32:33):
I'm thirty hot Dawn Okay.
Speaker 1 (32:36):
She works ten hours a day on a farm I
think four days a week, and then cleans houses the
other days. She's like really independent as far as she
only calls me when it's an emergency for money, which
she knows I'd get her anything she needs and always
be there. But she's really crushing it. And then my
daughter Innocence, she's dating a professional boxer named Austin Delay,
(32:58):
who I've known forever. He's a good friend and I'm
great friends with his dad. And then I've got a daughter, Courtesy,
who's seventeen, and she's a straight A student. She'd i
think her lowest grade was in ninety eight. She'd like
one O four's and stuff is insane. But she gets
up every morning and goes to the gym five am,
does Bible study, goes to school, gets off school, goes
(33:19):
to work, and sometimes he goes back to the gym.
She's got a great relationship with her boyfriend. He's like
number one state in soccer and just you hear her
talk and she's got it figured out more than I do.
Speaker 2 (33:31):
Okay, And he didn't know like having your having them
meet the boyfriend situation for the first time, because when
I first met you, I was like, oh, dang, like
he's gonna he's be mean, tough, whatever, and then you're
just like this teddy bearry who was pulling snacks out
of his back back pull her opposite. But when they
first meet you, was it like oh crap.
Speaker 1 (33:47):
Oh yeah, And I've already got a reputation from the
previous life before and then being a rapper and then
my country singer, and I've got a checkered past and
live in a really nice neighborhood. So I'm already like
that dad, And I'm the type that snow he's not
picking you up, he's gonna knock on the door.
Speaker 2 (34:04):
Yeah, but you're making sure your girls are treated with
princess treatment as he should be.
Speaker 1 (34:08):
Yeah, And they know whatever you do to her, I'll
do to you. But I've had a couple that I
kind of had to tighten down on, But for the
most part, I raised my daughters to not settle, and
by giving them an example of I'm not perfect. I
(34:30):
definitely want my daughters to find somebody way better than
I am. But they see the way that I am
in my relationship, and they see how I am as
a man, and so they could they have a there's
a bar that they can't go under.
Speaker 2 (34:44):
So that you're telling me that they don't have the
bar in hell that some of us had. Yeah, I'm
proud of that for them.
Speaker 1 (34:52):
And then I got a daughter, my stepdaughter Patients. She's
like our wild one. She's incredible.
Speaker 2 (34:59):
She the youngest of all.
Speaker 1 (35:00):
She's young. She's not the youngest kid because we have
two boys that are younger than her, but she's the
youngest of the daughters. And she's just herself, Like she
chops her own hair. She wants to be a hairdresser,
so she's constantly her You never know when she walks
out of that room. You never know what color her
hair is going to be the next day. But it's
(35:20):
always fashionable and she looks good. She pulls it off.
She gets a little bit more trouble at school, but
it's because she doesn't take any shit, like she's just
she's she's like real. I don't want to say stubborn.
There's something else. All my kids have been through so much.
Like she just lost her father, her biological father, to
an overdose, and my kids lost their mother. And then
(35:42):
my two oldest kids, my son Little Will and my
daughter Brianna, their moms. She went through it. She was
a dancer and was on drugs and went to federal prison.
And but now she's three years clean and sober, doing good,
getting her life back in order. My kids still went
(36:02):
through a lot with what I put them through, what
their mothers put them through, and so there's a sense
of resilience and just strength. If you met courtesy first
she pulls up in her little lexus. In the first
couple of minutes, you're like, oh, this girl comes from money.
And then you start having a conversation. You're like, oh, no,
she'd been through some shit. She just wears it really
(36:22):
well and she's learned from it. I had two beautiful
young boys fourteen and thirteen, and ones in the boxing,
ones in the football, and they're both doing good in school.
Speaker 2 (36:33):
And so you're telling me, outside of all the toury
and all the stuff that you're doing, they're full on
down over here. Yeah, definitely, And you really could be
PGA down if you wanted to.
Speaker 1 (36:43):
Oh man, I would love to. I would love to
go in there and tell them how to get it right.
Speaker 2 (36:48):
Do all these things. That is what I suggest. Bring
the fruit snacks. I can totally see you bring fruit snacks.
Speaker 1 (36:53):
I love free snacks.
Speaker 2 (36:55):
You do with You also brought the bubblegum.
Speaker 1 (36:59):
You can't go on a base ball field that big
lead too.
Speaker 2 (37:02):
I like that trump. I feel like this needs to
be a thing.
Speaker 1 (37:05):
Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 2 (37:06):
You have so much of that musical touches in your life.
You mentioned it and your daughter's pursuing it. What was
that like for you? You take away all the other things
that you were experiencing in life. But you were the
grandson of Wielan Jennings's Jesse Coulter. You your uncle is
Shooter Jenny's You mentioned in just multiple different assets. How
you just have all these different connections to different things?
Speaker 1 (37:28):
No pressure?
Speaker 2 (37:29):
Yeah, what's that like?
Speaker 1 (37:30):
Well, that's why I became a rapper because I wasn't
gonna try. My mom is an incredible writer and singer,
and I grew up in a house with a piano
and whatever I was going through when I was little,
my earliest memories was her waking me up. Oh, come on,
we got to get ready for school. Come in the
living room, and I'd come in the living room, she'd
be this is the day, this is the day that
(37:51):
the Lord has made that the Lord I should be
playing hymnals and getting me up, and I'd be dancing
and so like music was always but I had such
I had boots that I could never feel like. I
could never be Whaling Jennings, but I can do the
shit out of struggle Jennings. And there was something Whaling
taught me early. He's don't try to stand in my light.
(38:14):
Don't stand in my shadow. Step outside and find your
own light and be yourself. So always be yourself, regardless
what you're going through. Stay true to what you're going through,
to yourself and your music, because there's millions of people
going through the same thing that you are and that
feel the same way. And you may not be everybody's
cup of tea, but you'll be somebody's cup of coffee.
Speaker 2 (38:36):
There's some great advice to get from Whaling. But also
as a listener and a fan of country music, we
know Whalen for outlaw country. We know the music that
he's sang about. We know what he sung about. Was
he like that tough exterior on you as a grandson,
or was it just a different person.
Speaker 1 (38:54):
Whalen was Whaling and he definitely had He was always Whaling.
He was always tough, but he was so loving and
he was such such an increase. He was more like
a dad to me because when my dad got killed,
I went and stayed with Whaling for a while. I
didn't go back to school that year. I took the
last half of school off and Whaling told the school
(39:17):
he'll be back next year. It was like, he'll be
back and he'll be in the next grade. Got it.
Speaker 2 (39:22):
You had somebody that was really having your back, not
just like a normal having your back, Oh.
Speaker 1 (39:26):
No, because he was he was really that guy. Like
he was firm, he was tough, but he was so
loving and he made me feel like I was the
coolest thing on the planet. I was only grandson that
lived in Nashville for a long time. Way moved to
Nashville and his brother moved to Nashville in their teens,
(39:46):
so I like grew up in the house. Shooter was
like a little bit more sheltered because he was in
the house all the time. Yeah, so I was like
the one that was coming from the outside end, like
first cigarette, showing him his first porn magazine. I was
the bad influence because I was out there in the
real world. But Shooter, he left home at eighteen to
go have a rock band in LA and never left LA,
(40:09):
and he had his own dark path and overcame all
of it. Now he's crushing it Grammy after granted Grammy
between Brandy Carlisle and Tanya Tucker and he just he's
producing all the Charlie Crockett stuff now and Jacob and
just went did a record with him, and I got
a record with him coming out next year. So he's
(40:29):
just he's crushing it. I'm Shooter's probably the best human
being on the face of the planet, in mys besides
my beautiful little daughters.
Speaker 2 (40:38):
And when you were a kid too, I was imagining
that you don't really know any different. This is just
your family, this is your life. Yeah, So at what
point did you realize.
Speaker 1 (40:48):
Get it in school? Like when you're in school, they'd
be like, oh, they would try to use it against you.
Speaker 2 (40:53):
Is that why you turned away from it originally? I
know you said that you didn't want to use the name.
Speaker 1 (40:57):
Yeah, because I always wanted to make my own. I
was friends with Yellow for probably a year and a
half before I've told him my grandpa was whaling. And
the night that I did, he was like what, dude, what?
And we're like drinking downtown Nashville, riding listening and we're
listening to a whaling song and I was like, here
was my grandfather. He's like what, turn it RD? And
(41:18):
he's like what And then he looked down. I've got
this big watch on this big expensive watch because I'm
a drug dealer. And he's like, you're wearing a watch
like it, and I said, you're right through it out
the window on Broadway. He still tells that story, but yeah.
And then I just I'd always gravitated towards rap because
that's the era that I grew up in, that's the
(41:39):
environment that I grew up in, That's what spoke to me.
But I loved country, and country was always the backdrop
Whaling and George Straight. I know just about every word
every George Straight song, and then being on tour, hearing
the instruments and the steel guitar like crying, and I
always loved it. That's why I was really like the
first one that ever put still guitar on a rap
(42:00):
record in early two thousands. I was the first one
that started blending the two genres. Besides, of course, Bubba
Sparks had a lot of country flavor in there. Timberland
was in the beats and stuff and Bubba's accent and
the Tim McGraw and but I was already mixing rap
records in my bedroom with country at that point when
(42:25):
that came out, and then a lot of people were like, Oh,
you can't mix country and rap. You're going to ruin
your career. And then I went to prison and came
home after I dropped out Lost Shit, went to prison,
came home, and it was like a whole new genre.
Speaker 2 (42:38):
Was that weird too? You drop an album, You're like, oh,
I get to promota and to sing about it. You
go to jail?
Speaker 1 (42:43):
Yeah, I dropped the song and then went to jail.
Actually the day I dropped the video, I went to
jail the same day and then I was gone five years,
About a year and a half into my sentence, we
dropped the whole album.
Speaker 2 (42:56):
So were you meeting phone calls from jail? And dropping
an album.
Speaker 1 (42:59):
Yeah. So I had a one of my best friends
in the world and he still works with me, does
all my content, shoots most of my videos, and he's
like my right hand man. Sebastian. He actually had signed
me to the label deal and then his father had
passed away and I quit hustling and all this, and
then he disappeared because he was having to deal with
(43:19):
his grief and get his family right and make sure
his mom didn't lose your house, and so he stepped away.
And then when he called me back, he's like, man,
what are you doing. I'm like, it's gotten dighted looking
at a bunch of time, and he was like, dude,
I'm coming down there. And we recorded I Am Struggle,
which was all wailing samples, and then me wrap into it,
(43:40):
and that was the album that outlaut Shit was on.
But we recorded it right before. It was like a
rat race to get an album done before I went
to prison, because I didn't really know how much time
I was looking at.
Speaker 2 (43:49):
Holy crap, I didn't know that about that record.
Speaker 1 (43:52):
Yeah, and it actually released while I was sitting in
a prison.
Speaker 2 (43:56):
When you had fans over this course of your career,
So was that so weird because you're like there and
you're not really getting to do or have any interaction
with what's happening with your music.
Speaker 1 (44:06):
Yeah, but like the guards would come in and be like, man,
we're listening to your song out in the parking lot,
and then people would come in and be like om.
And then especially being gone five years, so about a
time I'm in there three or four years, the song
has gotten big, so new people coming in they're like,
oh shit, so it's cool. I was getting a feeling
and I was getting a lot of fan mail in there,
which gave me a lot of inspiration and hope, and
(44:28):
I perfected handwriting.
Speaker 2 (44:30):
Were you a songwriting in ever when you were there?
Speaker 1 (44:33):
So when I went in there, I started scribbling a
bunch of lyrics and stuff, and then I was like,
you know what, I started to notice that everything I
was writing was from a perspective being in there, and
I was like, as I was changing, the narrative was changing.
So I was like, you know what, I'm not even
going to try to do this. I'm gonna sit in
(44:53):
here the next three years because I was like writing
the first two I was like, I'm just gonna absorb
and then when I get out, I'm a tell the story.
So as soon as I got out, Yellowolf put me
in the studio and I wasn't supposed to be recording
because I was in a federal halfway house. So I
had to have a real job. So yellow Wolf put
me on payroll as the merchandise marketing director, and I
(45:16):
had a little fake desk set up with a laptop
that didn't even work in the corner of the studio
in case the parole would come and have to check
out my little area. And I was in there writing
songs and recording.
Speaker 2 (45:29):
Well, work around, but you weren't working. It's just not
probably an official version of what work looks like.
Speaker 1 (45:35):
Yeah, so they were gonna violate me and send me
back because I was putting up these documentary episodes and
they were like, this isn't a real job. So they
were about to send me back. They came and told me.
They said, hey, you're going back to prison. This lady
came in. She was on fire. She was like, I'm
sending you back to prison. And I think, oh, this
(45:56):
is bs that you need to get a real job.
This isn't a real job. And then they tell me
I'm going. So I packed all my stuff doctor March
say goodbye to my kids after being gone all this time,
and they were in a foster and foster care at
the time. I had to say goodbye to them again.
(46:16):
Woke up the next morning and they were like, hey,
we need you to come downstairs. I thought Marshalls were
there to pick me up and go in there, and
that lady was like, I don't somebody called, and I
guess you got somebody on your side. But we're putting
an ankle monitor on you, Da da, and you're gonna
do this, and you're gonna do that. And I was like,
oh shit, I'm not going back. And then she leaves
(46:39):
and the director of the Halfway House caused me in
there and he puts me on speakerphone and it's the
lady that's over all the programs and she's like, dude,
I love your documentary. She's like, I'm gonna start using
it because greatness is in the gray area and we've
been black and white for so long. She was like,
I'm gonna lot you eight hours a week of studio time,
but you got to keep your job and you got
(47:00):
to bring your pay stubs in and pay your fees.
We got an ankle monitor on. She was like, that's
the only way that I could really justify and not
sending you back, and she really she helped out a lot.
And wow, so I ended up not going back. I
just took that one that one person to just believe
and go, Okay, this guy really has the opportunity to
make a change.
Speaker 2 (47:19):
And yeah, wow, that's a really cool story. I'm glad
that was not where I anticipated it going, but that
was really cool and also awesome just that there was
that one person out there who said, I'm going to
do things a little differently. Yeah, because it always takes
one person to make a change. Sometimes you do everything
monotonous and stay in the black and white. As she said,
because that's what you mentioned way before any of this,
(47:41):
was that change is hard. Yeah, making that changes hard,
and she just chose. And it's really cool that made
a point in your story. So all of your music,
I know we've talked about all the personal stuff, and
I think I could sit here and talk to you
all day about all of the things in your life.
But two things your music. How many albums do you have?
Speaker 1 (48:02):
I probably got like I'd say thirteen or fourteen out there,
but I've got I had eighty five now unreleased songs.
Speaker 2 (48:15):
Crazy.
Speaker 1 (48:15):
I'm about to release first single drops Friday for me
and Brian Martin did a EP called nineteen seventy six.
He had just got kicked off the Morgan Walling tour
and he came over. We were meeting for the first time,
going to write a song, and ended up with a
bottle of whiskey and telling me everything that was going
on in his life, and I said, man, let's do
(48:36):
album together. He was like getting blacklisted and stuff at
the time, and I'm like, I like you. And so
we sat in there five days, wrote five songs, brought
all the band in one room, let him rock. We
laid the vocals all super old school, got just a
real authentic feel. It's called nineteen seventy six. The album
(48:57):
is and it comes out October third.
Speaker 2 (49:01):
Wow. And that's the latest.
Speaker 1 (49:02):
September twenty sixth.
Speaker 2 (49:03):
Okay, that's the latest album of all of these.
Speaker 1 (49:06):
Yeah, yeah, that one's coming out. And then right behind
it in November, I have my album Last Name, produced
by Ned Cameron, who's incredible. He produced Only God Knows
Me and Jelly and a couple songs off my last album.
I've got a full album that's coming in November from
produced by him. Then I've got two more rap albums
(49:29):
that are finishing up now, and got the album produced
by Shooter. It's done. I got to go relay a
few vocals because I got with a vocal coach. I
was like, I'm going to take this serious. Being a
rapper so long and my heart being in country music
and wanting to go to switch completely over the country
was originally my idea. I just jumped in with a
(49:50):
vocal coach to just really learn and to perfect it
and find my voice and be able to use it.
Speaker 2 (49:57):
How do you have time to sleep and be a
dad when you have four actual albums that are happening
all on even more.
Speaker 1 (50:03):
Than that, because I got another one that we're recording
in August. It's all old school. I wrote a bunch
of songs with like Bob Depirot and a bunch of
old school writers that just it came out and it
was so different than the other stuff that I had
that I was like, oh, we got to put this
on a project. So me and a good friend of mine,
Zach Gardner, who's he co produces a lot of things
(50:25):
with me and he's incredible. So we're doing that in August,
and I wasn't. I was kind of chasing for a
little while the country radio thing. I was like, man,
we were all growing up as a kid listening to
the radio. You want to hear your stuff on the radio,
but there's a lot of steps involved to that. And
I was really getting the whole you got to completely
(50:47):
commit to country and can't put out any more rap.
And then Brandley Gilbert was like, bu but you can't
forget to dance with the girl that brought you to
the party and I can't not rap.
Speaker 2 (50:58):
That's sorry for you are.
Speaker 1 (51:00):
Yeah, it's part of who I am. So I was
just like, you know what, as much as I would
love country radio, maybe one day I'll get to hear
my songs on the radio, but I'm not gonna chase that.
I'm not gonna I'm gonna just keep doing exactly what
I'm doing. I'm gonna stay independent and I'm gonna keep
pumping these albums out. The hard part about being independent
is a lot of times you don't get the push
(51:20):
and you don't get the promotion and the marketing that
you would get if you were on a major label.
But so songs. It could be number one on country
and they get looked over, but they become other people's
favorite songs. Like fifty times a day I get comments
like why is this not number one in the country.
But I just I like to still be able to
(51:41):
go in the Kroger and shop. My community loves me.
I love to be able to pull up at the kids'
football games.
Speaker 2 (51:47):
And there's a lot of beauty and independent that you
get to put out what you want to put out
and do the projects you want to do. You have
so much more drive to do it too, so I
think it looks differently every we talk about this a
lot that fame is so shifted and you can have
a successful career any which way as long as you
go for it.
Speaker 1 (52:06):
Really, I want to do it till I'm ninety. I'm
going to be I don't care if it's just I
don't I was blessed to get to go do amphitheaters
with Jelly Row and watch that. Now he's in stadiums
with post and watching all that. I'm so proud of him.
But there's moments where I'm like, man, I see the
way he has to live. I see the way that
(52:27):
how busy he is and how much he doesn't. There's
moments where I'm like, man, I would be blessed to
be in that position. But I also kind of like being.
Speaker 2 (52:37):
Independent, absolutely, And I do love to end these things
on a piece of advice. And I want everybody to
go check out all of Struggles music. I think you
could listen to it for a whole entire year before
you made it through everything.
Speaker 1 (52:48):
I'm gonna drop a whole new catalogy.
Speaker 2 (52:50):
Yeah, so get through all of that. But I like
to end the podcast on whether it's piece of advice
or motivation or inspiration, something that maybe we haven't touched on. However,
the floor goes to you. But that's what I like
to end on.
Speaker 1 (53:05):
I've been blessed recently. I just got made the director
of Send Musicians to Prison. Nathan Lee has been running
it for sixteen years, and they took me into Rikers
Island and it was so special. I was like, and
I want to do this more and be a part
of it. And Nathan Lee had just been to where
he was stepping down from it and just staying on
(53:26):
the board and they were like, we're looking for a
new director, and so they all voted and I became
the new director. And so I'm getting to go back
into prisons. And one of the things that I find
the most, that I really is just on my heart
to tell people is don't let your past to find you.
There were so many times in life where people would
ask me like, are you ready, And I was like, yeah,
(53:46):
I was born ready, but I wasn't born ready. I
had to go through all the shit that I went
through to get ready. And I like to use the
analogy when they purified gold, they put it in a fire,
they pull it out, wipe off all the imperfections, and
they put it back in the fire. Don't be afraid
of those flames. Anything you're going through, anything you've been through,
it's all leading you up to where you're supposed to be.
(54:08):
You just have to keep that mindset. You have to
keep moving forward, make the best decisions you can, and
you will get where beyond where you can dream you
would be. In any aspect, whether it's success, business, relationships, love,
just keep moving and just lead with your heart and
don't give up.
Speaker 2 (54:28):
Oh that's a really good feasing. Congratulations on becoming the director.
I think that's really cool. Yeah, obviously that's going to
be a great way for you to get back in
the community. It's cool that you're changing what would have
been really beneficial and helpful for you. You're making sure
that's happening for other people, and I think that's really awesome.
Speaker 1 (54:44):
Well, I think it's better to focus on building something
bigger than yourself.
Speaker 2 (54:49):
Absolutely, it's a whole part. It's part of the reason
why we're here right so struggle. Thanks for being here,
Thanks for being so open sharing your story.
Speaker 1 (54:56):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (54:58):
I told you guys, this is a great one. I'm
happy it's finally in your hands. And if you liked it,
please subscribe to the podcast and follow at take This
personally on Instagram for so much more content. Thanks for
being here with me this week. As always, I'm happy
that you're here and I can't wait for you to
be here next week.
Host
Morgan Huelsman
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