November 23, 2020 • 51 mins
Wells is living the “salt life” when country star Chuck Wicks rolls on by!
Find out how Chuck went from growing up on a potato farm to becoming one of the biggest songwriters in Nashville and taking the stage on Dancing with the Stars!
Chuck reveals how he now related to Jason Aldean!
And we hear the story of how Chuck “stole Cinderella”!
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Do you believe in hand off? You're welcome roll it.
This is the Wells Cast with Wells Adams and I
Heart Radio podcast. Here's a commercial stage. Myself to myself,
(00:24):
that's for sure. How's everybody doing? Getting really excited here
in vaccine news? Yeah, all right, that's what we're waiting for.
What we're waiting for, guys, our time, shine, vaccine time.
Let's go, give me three doses. Let's go. I need
to get out of the house. Your boy needs to
(00:46):
go black out at a bar like the old days.
All right, I need to call an uber and not
tell my friends I'm leaving and fall asleep in the
back of it and have the uber driver hit me
on the knee and say, hey, dude, you're home. Also,
you might have a problem. That's what I need. Okay.
Also I can see my family, but that's also second
dairy to me. Wanting to go to a bar again.
(01:08):
I want to see live music. Ah, we're wasting my
good hangover years. You know, I'm still young enough where
I can handle it. By the time we get out
of this freaking pandemic, my laver is gonna be shot.
I'm not gonna be able to handle it the next day,
not a little bounce back that used to would have
missed my good hangover years, among the other things that
(01:30):
this pandemic is ruining a good christ I'm so excited
for today's show though. Today we're talking to a guy
who really has done it all. Played college ball, moved
to Nashville, started songwriting for some of the biggest names
in country and then finally someone's like, you're good looking,
do you're talented? What about you? Had a huge hit
called Stealing Cinderella, which just shot him into the stratosphere
(01:54):
in country music. He did some reality TV, he was
on a huge syndicated morning radio show, he did Dancing
with the Stars, and now he's got a new hit
out called solid Gold. He's a good man, he's a
good looking man, and I'm super pumped to talk to
Chuck Wicks today. We're gonna take a quick break when
we come back, the man the myth of the legend
(02:16):
with the larynx of solid Gold. It's Chuck Wicks. Stick
around y'all, all right, welcome back to the Wells cast.
Very excited to have Chuck Wicks on the show. YO,
(02:37):
don't know what's going down. Sorry, Mr car, I was
gonna answer, but I was in the bathroom. I figured
i'd let you, I'd save you from that taking a
big old grumper. Well, you know, I've had a lot
of I've had a lot of cereal this morning. Yeah,
a lot of fiber. That'll do it to you. How
are you good? Man? My wife is very pregnant right now.
So I'm just hanging out waiting. You know. I I
(02:59):
got stripped rules from her that I cannot leave the
house or her side come November sixteen. So I am on.
I'm on a whole different kind of quarantine. I am like,
I got an all set of rules just for me.
So she's like ready to ready to pop. Yeah, she's ready,
(03:20):
and I'm ready. I'm ready for her to pop. I
am gonna miss her belly though. I think pregnant, well,
my pregnant wife, pregnant women, pregnant women in general. I
think here sexy, but my wife pregnant is like, wow,
it's a different deal. Really. Oh yeah, I mean, like,
I know a lot of people are into it, but like,
so what is it specifically? Well, when you say into it,
(03:43):
you said it was sexy, bro, Oh yeah, that's sexy. Um,
It's just one of those things, especially with you know,
when your wife is carrying your child, it there's it's
a whole different kind of love for that person, and
there's a whole different kind of action for that person
because you're making life together and to know that she's
(04:07):
growing your child. You know, it's like a whole different
And they glow. Man, the whole glowing thing like where
they where people say, oh, you're glowing. It's true. They
when I mean, they're not glowing when they have morning
sickness and they're you know, they're tired and they're back
hurts and stuff like that. But when the moment is right,
they truly do are are glowing. I think it's just
(04:28):
a very attractive thing. What number child is this for you?
This is my first child, and but I have three
step kids. I have three daughters that are I'm a stepdad.
I call my bonus daughters. So when I married Cassie,
she had three daughters already. One one's Avery, who is
nine years old, and then the other two are a
(04:50):
little older one and twenty Mattie and Mackenzie. And I
always got to put this into reference because people are like,
wait a minute, Cassie is my wife's she has Cassie
has a twenty one year old, a twenty year old,
and a nine year old, and we have We always
like to clarify so people don't just assume things. Um.
(05:10):
She from her previous marriage, she adopted Maddie and Mackenzie
because her her ex husband had children before and their mother. Unfortunately,
their mother had passed away from breast cancer, so when
they got married, they didn't have a mom like like
their mom. Their mom had passed away. So she was
she was a superstar man. She I think she adopted
(05:32):
them when she was twenty two years old, so it's
pretty crazy. She's a She's a one of a kind
for sure. That's amazing man. Well, congratulations, good luck on everything.
Do you know what you're having boy? Wow? Oh yeah,
we trust me. I just I just told you I
have three bonus daughters. I need a boy, need some
more testosterone in the house. Well, congratulations and good luck, dude.
(05:55):
I don't know if you remember meeting me, but I
was on your show one time. No remember, I remember.
I remember like it was yesterday. You came into studio.
You're great. You leaned over and I was like man,
this guy is a good looking dude. What's this, guys,
here's more to this guy in just a pretty face
and I looked you up and I was like, Oh,
this guy's cool. Man. So yeah, I do remember. It
was America's morning show at the time. I know that,
(06:17):
like it went through like different iterations or whatnot. But
I had known Blair Garner, who was I guess the
main guy on that radio show or he was one
who kind of put it together. I had known him
for a while because his partner at the times cousin
was my ex girlfriend. What I remember about that interview
was Blair trying to figure out a way for me
(06:39):
to get back with her, like get back together with her,
and I was like, it's not gonna happen. Guys, I
don't know what to tell you. I didn't know that
behind the scenes stuff. I didn't because i'd pick up
on any of that. Well, it's good to see you again, man,
and congratulations one on becoming a dad again in a
couple of days. That's super awesome. And then also congratu
(07:00):
relations on Solid Gold Man. Yeah, Solid Gold, it's been
it's been interesting. I just signed my third record deal
in Nashville, Tennessee. And I always say, you know, I
I got my start in two thousand seven. I signed
with our Cia Records and had a few hits with them,
and then time went by, I got dropped. I signed
another deal and had some success there, but not like
(07:20):
huge success. And then I, like we were talking about,
I ended up getting into radio and having a radio
show and and doing that for five six years. And
then as I got out of that, I was one
of the ones that got let go during the pandemic.
So when that happened, it was kind of crazy, you feel,
And I'm sure a lot of people that are listening
right now can relate because it's such a strange time.
(07:43):
If you get let go, or you get fired, or
you get whatever whatever you want to call it, you
get you get kind of like punched in the face,
you know you or you get hit you know it's
a big gut punch or whatever you want to call it.
And I started panicking because I have a pregnant wife.
I'm you know, a year into my marriage, which I
was making pretty decent money doing what I was doing,
(08:04):
and I got comfortable and I knew what I was
I knew what tomorrow was going to bring as far
as a paycheck, and you know, I felt good. I
felt good about where I was. And then when when
that's ripped away, you do go in a panic mode.
And I got two phone calls the day, um the
entire morning show that I did got let Go. One
was from Bobby Bones with I Heart Radio, and the
(08:28):
other one was from Verge Records. Verge Record says, hey, man,
I'm sorry to hear that you got let go? Are
you ready to start making some music again? And I
was just like, hell, yeah, I am, let's go. I
was like, thank the Lord. I mean, it was just
I think the Lord works in mysterious ways and there's
always a rhyme and reason for everything. So I think
(08:50):
I'm glad I didn't have to wait too long to
see that there was something on the other side. And
you know, coming out with my third record deal, Third
Times a Charm, I wanted to come out of the
gate with a song like solid Gold because it's I
wrote it by myself. I had I haven't released music
in a while, and I just wanted to kind of
(09:11):
make a statement that like, hey, I'm still a songwriter.
I still you know, have traditional roots to my music
that I love and Solid Gold is that perfect marriage
of that because I wrote it and it it is
somewhat of a throwback song now that the wheels will
turn in on that song. We got another one coming
(09:33):
and this was not it was on purpose and not
on purpose, but we're releasing a song called Old with
You on December four, And December four is also the
induced date for my child. And as most songwriters will
tell you, their songs are their babies, right, So I'm like,
gotta release it. We gotta. I gotta have two babies
(09:53):
on that day. I gotta have a song baby and
a real baby. We shot the video for Old with You,
and um my wife and I are just are the
only two in the video. And and I can't wait
too for people to see this. It's a It's one
of those songs where you immediately you're like, okay, that's
a wedding song. Do you remember that song Adam Sandler
(10:13):
did on the plane and wedding singer? I ontanna? What
is that? Good? Oh with you? Or whatever it is?
At least I can find it. Yeah, see if you
find it. But I when I went to write that song,
my my buddy that came up with the title. He goes, Man,
I want to write a song called Old with You.
I immediately thought about that Adam Sandler song and I
(10:35):
love that song. Granted it's Adam sanding Leer and he's
not I mean, but I love that song because it's
so simple and it's so real. It's kind of like
what guys think anyway, what you know the lyrics in
that song. So we wrote it from a more lyrical
standpoint that can happen on radio and be taking a
little more seriously. Um, So we're excited about all with
(10:58):
You and coming out with that right around the corner.
So here's the song fairness. So it could be so
nice chron old miss You, Kiss You Sam. They're so talented.
(11:19):
Well that's exciting, man. I love equating it to like
my two babies are coming out kind of at the
same time. At the end of the day, It's true
what they say, like necessity is the mother of invention,
and you know you getting let go from that show,
I guess maybe like for shoot into doing something that
you probably should have been doing in the first place.
(11:40):
Like I know you as like this amazing songwriter and
singer from a guy who lived to Nashville for twelve
years while you were there. So I'm just glad to
see you kind of back doing I think the thing
that you were meant to do. I am sorry that
you got let go, but I've worked in radio since
I was in high school and don't worry about it.
(12:01):
It's funny. When I did get let go, I had
a bunch of radio people reach out to me and says, well, congratulations,
now you know what it's like to really be in radio.
And I appreciate you saying that. I do think they
kind of made the decision for me. The company I
used to work for, they probably made a decision for
me that I should have made a while ago. When
you start getting comfortable, at least for me, and this
(12:21):
is with anything, even when I was just doing music.
I when I had success out of the gate with
our CEA Records, I got a little comfortable and I
got a little lazy. So when you start getting comfortable,
you don't press as much and you don't push as much.
Now I'm pushing again, and it feels it feels good.
I was telling my wife. I was like, man, it
(12:41):
it just feels good to be in a room and
start being creative again and writing songs and you know,
kind of hanging out with artists again that I'm not
the radio guy that is also an artist. They kind
of look there like it's almost like art. It sounds crazy,
but it's like artist artists type of deal. I don't know.
It's it's refreshing to say released. Yeah. I have a
bunch of musician friends from all over the place. But
(13:04):
when I was in Nashville, I remember there was a
little bit of like are you are we talking as
you're my friend or are we talking as like your
bid on your radio show on Monday morning. I just
need to know, like where we are, and so I
understand where you're coming from where It's like, it's nice now,
I'm just it's just artists, artists. We're just talking about
songwriting or whatever. You know. There's no hidden that A
(13:26):
lot of people don't know that. They don't think about
this except us, right, except that if you're sitting in
the chair. But that's the thing. Do you like me
or do you like the chair I'm sitting. Yeah, And
I think you'll back me up on this. You can
tell pretty quick who was genuine and who is not.
Oh yeah, I'm just talking to you because the chair
you're sitting. Yeah, totally. I wanted to play a little
(13:48):
bit of Solid Gold and then maybe talk a little
bit about the new and gold with you and how
it sounds like it kind of loops back to how
you get your start with stealing Cinderella. But here's Solid Gold.
I will listening to this earlier today. Man, I just
absolutely love this track. I've never needed money, I've never
(14:09):
needed face. Justine to sold every Night, close to Me,
all Love, Yes sold lock Conte song Twanging Old Mr
(14:35):
John Is song gone. You can find it on now
speaking to Okay. So, I love a lot of things
about this song, and tell me if I'm wrong, But
I'm getting such a old school Willie Nelson ballad vibe
(14:59):
from this tune, which is why I think I was like,
it's like fell in love with it. Do you hear that?
Am I crazy? Yeah? No? I And that's a compliment
for sure. So thank you. So I originally took this song. Um,
when I write by myself, it takes me a while
to write a song by myself because I I nitpick it.
When you write with other writers, usually you know you
(15:19):
get in there and you'll start at ten thirty and
you'll be done by five. And then if you want
to nitpick it, you gotta get all the writers back
in the room again. Well, when I write by myself,
I can just pick up the guitar and nitpick all
I want, whenever I want, if I can. And it
took me, like I probably fine tuned this song for
three or four months, just kind of like working with
different melodies and stuff. And you can tell us a
(15:42):
very laid back, right, It's a very laid back song.
And I almost sing the vocal like behind the beat
a little bit. And that's what Nelson does a lot.
He sings behind the beat or in front of the beat.
He's never really on the beat. When I first went
in the studio, played it for the studio musicians and
I was like, hey, I'm this is how I'm seeing
the song. It's crazy. The guy that was running the
(16:02):
session that day, he looked at me and he said,
he goes, man, I love it. I love doing it
laid back like that, but it's it's it's very Willie Nelson,
and he goes, I want to I want to make
it more progressive, and I want to make it more
radio friendly and all this stuff. I'm like, really, and
he was like no, I just think that's so we
(16:22):
did it. I was. I was like, Okay, let's give
it a shot. And we did it, and it missed
the mark. It like totally. It took the song somewhere
where it wasn't supposed to be. So I never I
never even sang on what we recorded that day for
solid goal. I just I was like, it's not there,
it's not it fast forward. I get, you know, the
(16:43):
record deal and stuff like that. I said, I, you know,
I'm gonna call my buddy, Jimmy Ritchie, who's a big
producer and he does a lot of traditional records. He's done.
He did Jacowen's early stuff, but he's done like Clay
Walker and these guys that like, you know, Mark Chestnutt,
these pretty country guys that have had huge success. And
I was like, this is a guy that will probably
(17:04):
knock it out of the park in the studio. And
he didn't try. Jimmy didn't try to change what the
song was, and that what we just listened to was
the outcome. And when I heard it, I'm like, oh, yeah,
that's it. And that's kind of why I wanted to
come out of the gate with this song. Was because
because if you go back and listen to all my songs,
(17:25):
I'm all over the map. I mean, one song will
be super traditional and then hell, one song will be
super pop and one song will you know, be in
the middle or whatever. I feel. I if I would
have went the pop route or something like that, I
just think it wouldn't it wouldn't have stuck out. I
wanted to release something that I could stand by and
(17:45):
be like, well, this is what this is why I
love country music. I do love people like Willie Nelson.
I do love great love songs and ballads. That's why
I love singing. I'm I'm a ballad singer. You know.
I love up tempos, and trust me, I need more
so I can so I can get out there and
you know, and tour more. And nobody wants to fall asleep.
But this was just a great way to start kick
(18:07):
start back into the the realm of things and moving forward.
I think with like a song like Old with You
that we've been talking about as well, that's a little
more radio friendly, and that's exactly why we're gonna go
to country radio with that, but solid Gold is certain
is I'll never forget when American songwriter the magazine said Hey,
I want to do a piece on Chuck wicks And
(18:29):
and his song solid Gold. That's when I was like,
oh my god, I want to be in there. I've
always wanted to be an American songwriter. I've always wanted
to be in it. I've never been in That was like, Okay,
check that off the list. Now I made the right
decision and release Solid Gold. Because that happened like nothing
else could happen with Solid Gold, and because it was
an American songwriter, I'm good, and because wells Adam is
talking about it, I'm good. It's so funny, like that
(18:51):
first engineer or producer that you're working with on Solid Gold,
I understand where he's coming from, and like, listen, at
the end of the day, you make money off a
radio hit, but it's so funny that, like, you know,
you would want to change the song that's so very
much like an old school throwback with actual names of
throwback in old school you know, country grades to like
(19:13):
a progressive radio hit. But I get it. Anyways, I
just really love that song. I guess I gotta ask,
does your wife really love that song? I mean, she's right,
she's actually came to the door because a dog call crazy.
I love my favorite, not Old with You. I love
so I solid Gold was like I used to pick
(19:33):
up the guitar and just sing it to her and Avery,
our little nine year old I used to. We have
a video I think still like where I was singing
and Avery was dancing, and like Avery is like one
of these I don't know if all kids are like this,
but she can hear a song one time and she'll
know every single lyric. I'm not worse at that. Like
I I am not a cover band guy, like if you,
(19:54):
I can't. I know songs and I can sing with
him on the radio, but I have to learn them,
like really learn in them to try to to play
it live or play the whole thing through. But yeah,
I guess I guess it is true, so I will
call it is her favorite. But now that she's in
the video with Old with You, I think they will
probably be your favorite next. I'm excited for Old with
You to come out, and you said it was it's
(20:14):
just like the perfect wedding song, which I gotta say
I feel like this is the perfect wedding song with
the big time single ground dancer with looking up at
him in her as France char look to him, I'm
(20:37):
just rudding stealing, Sander. I mean, dude, uh, Phil Fulmer
love that song so much that he had to come
and play his daughter's wedding to sing that song. Yeah,
that was pretty cool. I never wrote that song to
be a wedding song. I wrote that song because head
(21:00):
of our c A of of A and R he's
a good buddy of my now Jim Jim Katino. He
was just like, hey, man, I don't think we have
your first single out of the box, Shet. He goes,
just go home, write about something you know, like, write
about something that you love. Like if it's real, then
people will know it's real. That it becomes believable then
because it's just gonna come through naturally. That is real.
(21:22):
I said, Okay. At the time, I was seeing this
girl and we're dating for like four years at this time,
and she moved up to Nashville to be with me,
and her summer gig down in Florida was playing Cinderella.
She played Cinderella Walt Disney World, so I came up
with the whole the whole chorus. I was like, she's
playing Cinderella, I know, for his bike and that The
(21:43):
next day I had a co write with George Tarn
and Rivers Rutherford. George Terren Rivers Rutherford wrote when I
Get Where I'm Going for for Brad Paisley. They're great
songwriters outside of that song, but that song in particular
reminded of what Stealing Cinderella should sound like. So I
was like, I'm gonna bring this idea to them, and
(22:05):
we ended up writing that song and we wrote it
in three hours. Dude, it was crazy. We wrote it.
We actually we wrote it probably in two and a
half because we went to lunch, came back and kind
of tightened it up, so it was like it wasn't
even really full three hours. And they were able to
relate to it because they had daughters, you know, they
had I was at the time I was dating. I wasn't,
but I didn't have kids or I knew what it
(22:27):
would be like to have kids, and they had came out.
They came at Stealing Cinderella from a different perspective, and
that's why I think so many dads related to it.
That's when I knew it was a special song. Like
you said, when Philip Former um asked me to sing
at his wedding, I didn't know who Phil Former was. Sadly,
I grew up. I grew up in I know, I
(22:48):
grew up in Delaware and there's probably people listening right
now they're like, who's doing Former? So just real quick.
Philip Falmer was the head coach of the Tennessee Balls
for years. I don't even know where he coaches now,
but I think he's just not an announcer. What do
you call it, like an analyst? Yeah, big name, big college,
especially if you're in the SEC or in the South.
So very cool thing. Well, I grew up in Delaware.
(23:10):
We had University of Delaware Blue Hens, the only female mascot,
and college football so and we were Division one two
A or whatever it is. So I didn't really follow
college football until I went to school down in Florida,
and I still didn't really know too much about Knoxville
and Tennessee and how strong their roots are in Philip Former.
But I went there and I was like, well, cool,
(23:32):
let's do it. The only sending route at the time
was not a hit. It was at fifty six on
the charts. I was like, well, I'll go here since
he's well known, and maybe it will back to our conversation.
Do you like me or do you like the chair
I'm sitting in? I really like the chair that Philip
Former was sitting in, So I I went there. I
end up falling in love with his family. What a
(23:54):
great family, A great guy, a great coach obviously coach
Payton Manning. I mean, so I did the song and
knowing that he was a very well known football coach,
strong guy yells a lot. That kind of deal. When
every time he turned around and I saw his face
when he was danced with his daughter, he was crying,
and that's when I knew. I was like, oh, I
was like, man, I always knew that I'm strong believer
(24:16):
that music heels and music can change people and their
feelings and make them go to places and remembering things
and so on. But I never thought. That's when I
knew that my songs could do that. And it was
really flipped the switch for me. It ended up being
a huge wedding song. But that see, that's a father
daughter dance Old with You is a bride and groom dance. Yeah,
(24:40):
all right, your ear monopolizing all the facets of the
nuptials and I like it. Oh yeah, And I dude,
I just married somebody like two months ago. So I'm like,
I'm full service over here. I can carry you do
the father daughter dance and the first dance that's hilarious. Well,
I'm I'm excited for or oh with you to come out.
(25:01):
You said it's gonna come out what next month? December four?
December four? All right, we'll keep your eyes peeled for that.
But in the meantime, go listen to Solid Gold. Came
out kind of at the end of October. I want
to take a quick break. When we come back. I
want to do the thing that this show is meant
to do, which is talk about origin stories. I want
to find out how the hell you became so successful.
You down with that, Let's do it, all right, quick break,
(25:21):
we come back. Chuck Wicks here on the Wells Guy.
All right, back on the Wells cast. I have singer, songwriter,
baseball player, officiant at weddings, dog owner, radio host, am
(25:46):
I forgetting any what else do you do? Retired dancer
was on Dancing with the Stars retired right now, Dance
of the Star is on right now. Do you watch it?
And are you like, uh, that sucked? I so before
I was on that show, never watched it. I watched
it this season before I was on the show, and
(26:07):
then I watched a couple of seasons afterwards that I
was on it, and then I stopped, And now if
it's on, I'll watch. I always like to see who's
on it because the bigger, the bigger, the name that's
on it, it kind of gives me, you know, credit.
I'm like, see they were on it. You know I'm
pretty famous too. I was a background dancer last season
(26:29):
for Joe's Dancer. I've done it so hard and sucked,
But like every time I talked to somebody, who's who's
on it? It's so much work. You lose a bunch
of way your sore. Was that your experience with that.
I did not lose weight. Here's here is the It
is hard, though it's very nerve racking. I was always
like before our dances, man, I was like back in
(26:50):
the hallways because a lot of people know this American
idol was across the hall. So we did on the
CBS lots so American idols across the hall, so if
I went to the bathroom, I'd run into like whoever
was on American Idol that season. That was an Adam
Lambert season. So I remember, I remember going to the
bathroom and I would run into Adam Lambert all time,
like what's up man? Singing? Well, you're doing good? You
(27:11):
go yeah, pretty good? You dance it pretty good? Pretty good? Yea,
all right, hopefully I'll see you next week. I don't know.
I don't know how far did you get. I got
fifth place, I think the place. That's pretty good. I mean,
like it's such a popularity contest now, you know, because
I think so much depends on voting. My buddy, who
(27:31):
was on it last season, was the worst dancer I've
ever seen ever. He never got better, but he was
like top three because people loved him and they kept
voting him in, you know, so that means people must
have loved you. Who was it? Who was your buddy?
His name was grocery store Joe. He was on he
was on The Bachelor. I know who it is. He
was terrible and then he made me come on and
(27:53):
help him dancing. He was so bad that they invited
a bunch of other bachelor people to distract from how
bad he was, and then they brought me on and
I was even worse than he was, and so I
guess it works. Everyone just making fun of me anyways.
But yeah, he was like third, he like almost won
the thing, and it was terrible. That's because a lot
of people loved him and voted for him. So if
(28:14):
you've got fifth, Matt means people must loved you. Yeah,
I hope. So I'm trying to still trying to find
those people that voted for me. I feel like I
feel like they left me. They're like, Okay, we're over it.
I love finding out where where people came from and
how the hell they got here, kind of a blueprint
for success. You talked earlier in the show about growing
up in Delaware. Were you a musical kid, Like, did
(28:36):
you have the bug early? Not at all. I grew
up on a potata farm. We were well, we were
called grain farmers, so we did like corn, wheat, barley, soybeans. Uh.
Super normal kids, super small town in Smyrna, Delaware. All
I cared about was I wanted to play baseball, get
a cool truck. When I was sixteen and work on
(28:57):
the farm and then go to college and play baseball.
That was my That was That was it. I loved
country music though, like I would sing. I would sing
around the farm. I would sing, like if we had
a party. You know, a lot of my friends would
be like, Chuck sing that Joe Dippie song or like,
you know, sing that Tim McGraw song or whatever, and
I would like do that and but did not how
(29:18):
to play the guitar or nothing, so I just sing.
I would just like we would find the song, like
we we'd get the CD out, play it and I
would sing with them. They're like, oh man, you sound
just like them. That was kind of it. Like I
didn't sing in church. I didn't do any of that.
My parents weren't singers. My dad was in one play.
(29:39):
He's trying to take credit for ship and it's not happening.
I was like, dude, you were in one play and
it wasn't even the lead. But when I went to college,
I end up playing baseball Florida Southern College. I wasn't
playing that much. It was one of those things where
I probably went to the wrong school or whatever. You
can make a million excuses all athletes do. And that's
when I had to figure out. I was like, well,
I'm gonna pick up a guitar, learned how to play guitar.
(30:01):
I didn't know anything about Nashville, Tennessee. I didn't know
anything about how do how do you get a record deal?
I didn't know it was a thing. I just didn't
think about it. I was like, Oh, I love what's
on the radio. I never thought about how do you
get on the radio because it just wasn't a dream
of mine. I just loved it. I loved music. I
loved imitating the people. So there was this this girl
that played soccer at Florida Southern College and she goes, hey,
(30:24):
I heard you can sing pretty good. I was like, well,
I love to say, because I would sing around the
dorm rooms. And actually, I don't think i've ever really
told this story. Titanic came out in like nineties seven
or eight, and that was when I was a freshman
in college, and I used to be we had the
big showers where everybody had to use the same showers
in the dorm room. I would wait until like midnight
(30:44):
take my shower then because I did not want to
take showers with other people. So I'd wait till midnight,
take a shower, and I would do the I would
like rocket out and I would do it so loud.
People would come out of their dorm room and they'd
be like, shut up, try to sleep. That was so
(31:05):
memorable for certain people. My best friend in college that
married my wife and I. He actually as he was
getting ready to marry us, he goes, let me tell
you a little backstory about Chuck, and he brought that
up like at the ceremony, like when we was marrying us.
So I think that's how it got out to this
girl that played soccer that like, hey, I heard you
got a pretty good voice. So she goes, let's sing together,
(31:28):
and I was like, all right, cool. She goes, you
need to meet my manager. That was the moment where
it just kind of opened up. I'm like, what, hold up,
you have a manager. She's like, oh yeah. And this
was like the big boom, like when in Saint Backstreet Boys.
This is when all that no strings attached, all that
stuff was rocking. It was in Orlando, so we were
(31:50):
Florida Southern was in Lakeland, forty five minutes away, and
not even so Loo Parleman, all these guys that like
started these boy bands. He was there, like we if
we went downtown, we'd see like one of the Backstreet
boys Loo Perlman. And so I met all these managers
and production companies and all that stuff through this girl.
And then I met a vocal coach that way, and
(32:10):
I just I had to tell the vocal coach I'm like, hey,
I'm not a boy band singer. I need to sing
country music. That's like what I love to do. And
she's like, well, I used to intern at our c
A Records in Nashville. I'm like, I love it, let's go.
So she so she would take me up. We would
(32:31):
in between school. I'd find like I take the like
a long weekend or in the summer. I'd go up
there for like a week, and she'd introduced me to people.
And that's how I actually got the connection to our
c A Records and ended up signing the record deal
with them. That is bonkers, Yeah, I mean, it wasn't
like this life long I have to make this happen.
(32:52):
I'm going to have this amazing team around me with management,
with all these things. No, it was like my vocal
coach knew somebody she was able to get it into
the right hand. She you know that she gave I
made a horrible demo okay in in Orlando. If I
listened to it, I I need to find it. Actually
I did Brian McKnight's song One Last Cry okay, and
(33:16):
then I did an Andy Griggs song because it was
like one of the songs I was loving at the time.
It was actually an old Whale and Jenny song was
like a he redid and I was like, I'm in
my mind right not knowing anything about how to get
started or get indoor. I'm like, I just think. I
was just thinking, like how can I show them that
I can sing different things? So I was like, all right,
(33:38):
grime Knight, Andy Griggs, I'll go super country, super R
and B pop. Did those two songs made a like
a three ring binder folder. I put my eight by
ten on the outside, glossy eight by ten on the
outside of the binder. You opened it up and had
a CD holder in there. I put my CD holder
in there with my two songs. When my picture on
(34:01):
the c D, the actual c D, I had a
little bio in there, but a little one page bio
in there, and that's what she gave to someone in
finance at our Cia Records, not even like the person
that signs people. Yeah, so she gives it to the
finance guy. And the finance guy, Lawrence Lawren, bless his heart,
(34:25):
great guy, ended up being friends with him because I
would the guy I've just caught up, stay at my
house and let's get you connected with everybody because his
wife worked at Curb Records and at the time Tim
mcgrawl was over at Curb Records and all of stuff.
How I was making my connections was through my vocal coach,
through the finance guy at our Cia Records, through the
(34:45):
wife of the finance guy that had Curb Records, And
that's how it all, like the whole synergy thing started
and meeting the right people and it finally made its
way the little twosong demo to Jim Katino, who is
now head of A and R at r C A Record.
When I met him, he would like he was like
in his first year of A and R. He heard
it and I'll never forget it. It was during c
(35:08):
n A Fest like in June, the big festival that
we have here in Nashville. He called me. He got
my number, because of course I had my number in
my binder. He called me and he said, he said, hey, man,
I just chuck. I'm like, hey, dude, what's up. And
he's like, hey, it's Jim Patino A and R R
C I. I I listened to your c D. He goes, Man,
I think there's something there. He sounds pretty good. He goes,
(35:28):
I'm on my way to a Kenny Chesney sound check
right now over at Nissan Stadium. When I get back,
can you meet me at my office and just sing
for me in person? First of all, I was like,
you're gonna Kenny Chesney sound check? He's like yeah, He's like,
we'll take too long. I go, well, I don't play
guitar or nothing. Do you just want to sing acapella
for you? He's like, yeah, just do that. That's fine.
(35:49):
So I came in there and dude, now knowing Jim
Contino and he's just a big, burly guy, and I
was singing one last Cry and an Andy Greg song
to him acapella, face to face across the desk. That's
what got me in the door to and finally end
up after a couple more steps to sign with our
CIA Records. So you signed with our CIA. I suppose
(36:11):
you graduate from college and then moved to Nashville negative
the minute. That meeting got me another meeting with everybody
like the head of A and R Joe Galante who
ran our CIA Records. That got me that meeting where
I had to sing for them live and I brought
guitar players in. Jim Coatino found me a producer, Monty
(36:34):
pal who did like all Diamond Rios stuff. So we
came in with a team and then presented ourselves again
and at that point they gave me what they call
a developmental deal, and that's when they basically sign you
to develop so no one else can sign you in town.
You come back later and see if they'll sign you
(36:56):
to the full deal. Well, as soon as I signed
a development deal, I quit college and moved to Nashville.
Two classes short of graduating. I'm like, I'm out. Have
you since finished those classes? No? No? And I actually,
um I checked in with them maybe like six years ago.
I was like, hey, can I take some online courses
like just to finish these two classes? And they looked
(37:18):
up my info and they're like, oh, the curriculum has
changed since you left. You now have you now have
to take like six more classes. Now, keep in mind
if you google Florida Southern College alumni most notable, like
most notable, they had me on there. They're like, wait
(37:40):
a minute, what what is this. You're gonna take credit.
You're you're gonna make me go back and you can't
use me like that. I'm taking my name, Like, give
me a diploma, you need an honorary diploma. They do that.
I feel like, I don't know, maybe Okay, I feel
like it should happen. I think, well, I'll call some people.
I know, some people who know some people will make
(38:02):
this happen. Okay, you quit school with two classes to go,
hanging everything on a developmental deal. You moved to Nashville.
What do you do first? You just immediately start writing songs. Yeah, so,
Monty pap it was is a great Songwriter's read a
bunch of Keith Theravan songs, other songs, Tim mcgrawl song
with all the stuff. He was the guy that taught
me it really had a songwright. So he took me
(38:22):
under his wing. When I moved up to town. I
basically was as apprentice, and I just learned how to
write songs with him. And then you know, when you
signed a developmental deal or you're attached to any kind
of major record label, songwriters come out of the works
and they're like, all right with you, all write with you,
all write with you because you know I could be
the next big thing. Then they never know. So what
(38:44):
I did was I took advantage of those relationships and
I kept them. That's the key. Like if you meet
somebody great, that's fantastic, Just don't meet him and be
fine with one conversation with them. Get to know them
and learn from them. And that's what I did, is
like I wanted. I told him flat out, I'm like, listen,
I'm learning. So I let them take the reins on everything.
(39:06):
I never never walked into a writing room to just
pretend that I know exactly what I'm doing, because I didn't,
especially in the beginning when I first moved to town.
It's crazy. I had the development deal and about two
weeks later, once I really moved here, they ended up
not picking me up for the full record deal. So
I had to then make the decision, will do I
(39:27):
go see other record labels? Now in my mind, I
was just like, all right, wait a minute, take a
step back, take a deep breath. If our c A
felt like I wasn't ready, and I and now me
looking back, I wasn't ready. I was not ready. If
they don't think I'm ready, what what makes me think
that another label's gonna think I'm ready? So what I
did was I got a job parking cars. That's how
(39:48):
I made my money. Hundred bucks a night. I was happy,
you know, hunter bucks a night. I was super happy.
Lived in a little apartment, had the girl I wrote
Stealing Center Sits Stealing Cendarrell about move up with me.
She We've lived the same little apartment. And I just
grinded it out. Man. For four years, I did nothing
but write songs, learn the craft, find out who I
was as an artist. I'm a very competitive guy. When
(40:10):
I felt like I was ready, the first stop I
was gonna make was our CIA Records, because I wanted
to prove to them that I was. I was like, no, no, no,
you made a mistake. I'm ready. I'm your guy. And man,
through those four years, I really did find out who
I was as an artist. That never changes, By the way,
you're you're always evolving as an artist, or you should
be the artist that I was ten years ago, fifteen
(40:31):
years it's not even close to what the artist I
am today. It's you know, we all evolved and we
should you want to do that. I went right back
into our ce A with a team again. It was
Monty Poal and Dan Huck, great producer. We played three
three songs for them in the conference room before I
got to the elevator at our CIA Records was which
(40:52):
is just a hallways length away. They said we're going
to sign Chuck and I signed a full record deal.
And that's when it all. It just happened quick. I was.
That's when I just started, you know, writing, writing, writing,
Get into studio, Get into studio, try to find that record.
And that's when Stealing Cinderella was written. All these things
they stick you out there, man, they throw you out there,
(41:13):
and it's a big deal. Like to go out there
as a new artist and have our c A behind
you and our CIA that's Elvis Presley's record label, you
know what I'm saying. So it's like it's got this
big cool nostalgia, it's got this thing to it. It
was nerve wracking man. Go out, you go out on
radio tour. You see every single radio station and you try,
you try. As a brand new artist, you're on radio
tour and you try to win every single radio station
(41:35):
one by one. You try to win him over and
say yes, I believe in you and I'm gonna play
your song. And that's that's that's really when the work begins.
You know, there's a cool lesson to be had there.
It reminds me of when I had Gavin McGraw on
this show. It had similar story to yours is he
was offered a deal, but it wasn't for enough money.
(41:57):
The way that he took that was, you're not offering
me very much money because you don't believe in what
I can do. And that means that I need to
go and I need to work and get better so
when I come back, you'll think I'm worth more. And
so what you're trying to tell me is that I'm
I'm not there yet. You're doing a similar thing of like, Okay,
(42:17):
I need to go home my craft for four years
and come back, because a lot of people take that
and they take that failure and they just like admit defeat.
But the truth of the matter is is that you've
got to keep on failing to get better to become
the thing that you want to be right. And I
think that's a really cool lesson that you had to
live through to get to where you are now. Yeah,
(42:39):
I think that's with everything, man. I think it's you know,
if someone can't if someone's listening right now and you
can't relate to that musically, you can relate to it
with your job, or you can relate to it with
your relationship, or you can relate to it when you're
raising your kids. You know, you may maybe you did
something wrong. You're like, oh, I didn't really teach them
a lesson that time. I need to do it this way.
It'll be better and they'll learn more. It's universal. It's
(43:00):
a universal language of learning from defeat. It's the whole
slogan of you know, if you get knocked down, to
get back up, I mean, anything you do, you just
gotta keep on pushing forward. So you get signed by
our ci A, you go on radio tours. And I
was a music director at radio stations. I remember musicians
coming in spinning their demo and trying to get airplay
(43:21):
and all that kind of stuff. I guess you you
kind of worked the system for a while. Was there
a moment that you were like, I made it? Yes,
there was a There was two different moments. Um one
in particular was when I was on the Grand of
Opry the first time, because it was at the time
it was being televised, so not only did they want
me to sing and make my debut and it was fantastic,
(43:41):
but they wanted me to host a show as well.
So I'm like, oh my god, can I just focus
on one thing? Jeez? It was pretty nerve wracking. Actually,
I'm probably glad they did make me do that because
I couldn't focus too much on one thing and maybe
psych myself out or whatever. But it was that moment
Grandi Operate, And it was the first time because I
went from conference rooms doing the radio tour straight to
(44:03):
opening up for Brad Paisley on tour and my first
stop was in Denver, Colorado in an arena where the
Nuggets play, so I was just like, holy crap, this
is not a conference room. This is amazing. So that's
when I was just like, Okay, this is cool. At
what point did Dancing the Stars come into play, and
then America's Morning Show come into play. Dancing with the
(44:23):
Stars came about because when I I so, I ended
up dating Julienne Huff for a while and we met.
Actually I was on my about to be on my
third single, so um s the only Cinderella All I
ever wanted. Both went up the chart and had a
lot of success with them, and then I started dating Julianne,
and that's when I started going out to l a
on CBS lots to support her, just to support her.
(44:46):
We met because we were touring with Brad Paisley together.
It was like Me jul Rodney Atkins, and that's how
we started dating. And at the time, the casting director
for Dancing with the Stars was coming out to see
the shows because she wanted juel to be on Dancing
with the Stars and she also knew Julianne, so she
was coming out and because Jewel was on my season
(45:07):
and Ty Murray her husband the bull Rider, well, Jewel
ended up getting hurt and so on whatever, But because
she saw me there, then she would see me backstage
at the season before because I was dating Julianne that
season before I was on the whole the casting whole
casting director and their people and the producers of the show.
They like, they say, hey, Chuck he goes, you got
(45:28):
a minute. I'm like sure. They took me in this
room and sat me down like a conference room. I'm like,
what the heck is going on. They're like, so, we
love your personality and love that you know you're country musician,
and we just think you would be great for this show.
Do you want to be on Dancing with the Stars
next year? I'm like, yes, I knew I would love
(45:50):
to be up. And here's the kicker. Julianne was not
supposed to be. Julianne was not even gonna be on
the show. She told that the the directors that she
was not gonna do next year. I was supposed to
be teamed up with like something like Edits or something
somebody else. I think last minute, Julianne was just like, well,
I'll come back and do the season with you because
(46:11):
it only makes sense. So that's a lot of people
thought we met on that show, and we did not.
We actually were dating beforehand, then we were on the
show together, and then we ended up breaking up like
six months after the show. So that's how us Dance
where the Stars happened. I was just in the right
place at the right time, you know, to to kind
of get noticed or recognize by the the people that
(46:31):
make the decisions. I was on my third single when
I was on Dancing with the Stars and I'll never
forget it. I was still with our Cate Records. It
was a song called Man of the House, and it
was such a special song. It was about troops overseas
and kids at are back home, being the man of
the house taking care of the you know, the moms
and dads, whoever is back home, waiting for the loved
ones to come back. And it was doing so well.
It was like in the twenties on the chart. And
(46:52):
the minute I got kicked off the show, the minute
I got kicked off the Dancing with the Stars, they
dropped a single from radio. It made no sense to
me because we still a bullet, like we were still
going up the chart. In their minds, You're like, Okay,
he's off the show. Now we're done with this song.
We're not gonna take advantage of it. And that's really
when I started to know I was in trouble. At
our ci A and Man two more singles later, I
(47:14):
ended up getting dropped from our ci A. There's so
many reasons why that happens. I mean, it can be
from management, it can be from a new well, a
new a new president came in and started running our
c A and Sony, so you know, he wasn't the
guy that signed me. So there's all these different reasons.
But that's when rail World came into play. I asked
(47:36):
to do America's Morning Show. Maybe about a couple of
years later, I was still looking for another deal. I
was running out of money, Like dude, it was getting bad. Man.
I was just like, well, man, I'm not touring that
much anymore. I don't know what I'm gonna do. Like
I was, legit running out of money. And Blair Garner
with America's Morning Show, was like, hey, I got this
idea that I'm doing. I want you to be a
(47:57):
part of it. And I was like, what is it?
And it was that it was a radio show that
started it in New York City and then was gonna
ended up ended up being syndicated and a bunch of
different markets, and we did it all from Nashville. And
I'm just like, dude, I'm in and That's that's how
that the whole thing came about, and that's that's how
I knew I loved radio, dude. I I love being
on the radio as a singer, of course, but I
love doing radio to like I love doing ship. I
(48:18):
love doing morning show or a podcast or whatever it is.
You know, Chuck Wicks, I know you gotta go, but
I want to say thank you so much for for
taking your time telling your story. It's amazing. Everyone out there,
go stream, download by whatever, Solid Gold. Don't forget that
All with You is coming out December four. Keep your
eyes peeled for that. If people can want to follow you,
where do they go at Chuck Wicks on the Instagram.
(48:38):
Baby dude, thank you so much. Men, you rock. Brother. Alright,
I called you dead. Alright Dad, alright, dad, alright, goodbye son,
alright dad, see you well later. Man. I feel so bad.
He he was like, I'll call you back. We I
have I have a meeting with Spotify, and you know
I'll call you back. I'm like, no, man, don't worry
(49:00):
about it. Do your do your thing. But listen, Chuck Wicks.
What a nice guy, super freaking talented, just the best
I've known him. You know, Like I said, I've known
him for a while. It's fun to have him on
my show because I've been on his. But I gotta say, man,
I always knew him as this like juggernaut songwriter, singer,
performer in Nashville, And when he started doing the radio stuff,
(49:21):
I was like, that's interesting. So here's the rub, here's
here's the lowdown of this whole thing. I had been
approached by Blair Gardner to do that show with them.
Obviously I wasn't the name that Chuck Wicks was, but
I think I was the backup. I remember hearing that
being like, man, he got he got that gig, and
he's a singer. He doesn't need he doesn't need this
radio gig. You know, give it to the radio kid.
(49:42):
He's such a nice guy, so freaking talented, And I
love this story. Man. You also, by the way, you
can tell how radio savvy he's gotten. I literally said
fifteen words he just went. When people interview me, I
always am like, they must be so annoyed because I
just talked the entire time. But now being on the
(50:03):
other end of it, I loved it. It was the
easiest show I've ever time I'm boma didn't get to
do rapid fire questions with him. Maybe we'll we'll have
him back on later down the line and we'll we'll
get to it. Anyways, guys, hope you enjoyed the Wells
Cast this week. I did. That was such a fun show.
I loved it. Don't forget to rate and review the show.
That does help the show. Tell your friends about it
(50:23):
as well, and tweet to us or instagram us at
Wells Adams or at the Wells Cast on Insta and
tell us who you want to have on the show next.
Cool all right, by the way, how about him doing
the Titanic thing? That was crazy really good too. I
can't wait for his version of Old with You to
(50:46):
come out, but but I guess we'll just you know,
close with this one until we get coming out. Alright,
guys the furnace, have a great week. I'll see you.
Let us by Old will you. I'll miss you, kiss you.
(51:13):
Give you my code when you are subscribe to Wealth
Cast on I Heart Radio, Apple Podcasts, or anywhere you
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Do you believe in hand off? You're welcome roll it.
This is the Wells Cast with Wells Adams and I
Heart Radio podcast. Here's a commercial stage. Myself to myself,
(00:24):
that's for sure. How's everybody doing? Getting really excited here
in vaccine news? Yeah, all right, that's what we're waiting for.
What we're waiting for, guys, our time, shine, vaccine time.
Let's go, give me three doses. Let's go. I need
to get out of the house. Your boy needs to
(00:46):
go black out at a bar like the old days.
All right, I need to call an uber and not
tell my friends I'm leaving and fall asleep in the
back of it and have the uber driver hit me
on the knee and say, hey, dude, you're home. Also,
you might have a problem. That's what I need. Okay.
Also I can see my family, but that's also second
dairy to me. Wanting to go to a bar again.
(01:08):
I want to see live music. Ah, we're wasting my
good hangover years. You know, I'm still young enough where
I can handle it. By the time we get out
of this freaking pandemic, my laver is gonna be shot.
I'm not gonna be able to handle it the next day,
not a little bounce back that used to would have
missed my good hangover years, among the other things that
(01:30):
this pandemic is ruining a good christ I'm so excited
for today's show though. Today we're talking to a guy
who really has done it all. Played college ball, moved
to Nashville, started songwriting for some of the biggest names
in country and then finally someone's like, you're good looking,
do you're talented? What about you? Had a huge hit
called Stealing Cinderella, which just shot him into the stratosphere
(01:54):
in country music. He did some reality TV, he was
on a huge syndicated morning radio show, he did Dancing
with the Stars, and now he's got a new hit
out called solid Gold. He's a good man, he's a
good looking man, and I'm super pumped to talk to
Chuck Wicks today. We're gonna take a quick break when
we come back, the man the myth of the legend
(02:16):
with the larynx of solid Gold. It's Chuck Wicks. Stick
around y'all, all right, welcome back to the Wells cast.
Very excited to have Chuck Wicks on the show. YO,
(02:37):
don't know what's going down. Sorry, Mr car, I was
gonna answer, but I was in the bathroom. I figured
i'd let you, I'd save you from that taking a
big old grumper. Well, you know, I've had a lot
of I've had a lot of cereal this morning. Yeah,
a lot of fiber. That'll do it to you. How
are you good? Man? My wife is very pregnant right now.
So I'm just hanging out waiting. You know. I I
(02:59):
got stripped rules from her that I cannot leave the
house or her side come November sixteen. So I am on.
I'm on a whole different kind of quarantine. I am like,
I got an all set of rules just for me.
So she's like ready to ready to pop. Yeah, she's ready,
(03:20):
and I'm ready. I'm ready for her to pop. I
am gonna miss her belly though. I think pregnant, well,
my pregnant wife, pregnant women, pregnant women in general. I
think here sexy, but my wife pregnant is like, wow,
it's a different deal. Really. Oh yeah, I mean, like,
I know a lot of people are into it, but like,
so what is it specifically? Well, when you say into it,
(03:43):
you said it was sexy, bro, Oh yeah, that's sexy. Um,
It's just one of those things, especially with you know,
when your wife is carrying your child, it there's it's
a whole different kind of love for that person, and
there's a whole different kind of action for that person
because you're making life together and to know that she's
(04:07):
growing your child. You know, it's like a whole different
And they glow. Man, the whole glowing thing like where
they where people say, oh, you're glowing. It's true. They
when I mean, they're not glowing when they have morning
sickness and they're you know, they're tired and they're back
hurts and stuff like that. But when the moment is right,
they truly do are are glowing. I think it's just
(04:28):
a very attractive thing. What number child is this for you?
This is my first child, and but I have three
step kids. I have three daughters that are I'm a stepdad.
I call my bonus daughters. So when I married Cassie,
she had three daughters already. One one's Avery, who is
nine years old, and then the other two are a
(04:50):
little older one and twenty Mattie and Mackenzie. And I
always got to put this into reference because people are like,
wait a minute, Cassie is my wife's she has Cassie
has a twenty one year old, a twenty year old,
and a nine year old, and we have We always
like to clarify so people don't just assume things. Um.
(05:10):
She from her previous marriage, she adopted Maddie and Mackenzie
because her her ex husband had children before and their mother. Unfortunately,
their mother had passed away from breast cancer, so when
they got married, they didn't have a mom like like
their mom. Their mom had passed away. So she was
she was a superstar man. She I think she adopted
(05:32):
them when she was twenty two years old, so it's
pretty crazy. She's a She's a one of a kind
for sure. That's amazing man. Well, congratulations, good luck on everything.
Do you know what you're having boy? Wow? Oh yeah,
we trust me. I just I just told you I
have three bonus daughters. I need a boy, need some
more testosterone in the house. Well, congratulations and good luck, dude.
(05:55):
I don't know if you remember meeting me, but I
was on your show one time. No remember, I remember.
I remember like it was yesterday. You came into studio.
You're great. You leaned over and I was like man,
this guy is a good looking dude. What's this, guys,
here's more to this guy in just a pretty face
and I looked you up and I was like, Oh,
this guy's cool. Man. So yeah, I do remember. It
was America's morning show at the time. I know that,
(06:17):
like it went through like different iterations or whatnot. But
I had known Blair Garner, who was I guess the
main guy on that radio show or he was one
who kind of put it together. I had known him
for a while because his partner at the times cousin
was my ex girlfriend. What I remember about that interview
was Blair trying to figure out a way for me
(06:39):
to get back with her, like get back together with her,
and I was like, it's not gonna happen. Guys, I
don't know what to tell you. I didn't know that
behind the scenes stuff. I didn't because i'd pick up
on any of that. Well, it's good to see you again, man,
and congratulations one on becoming a dad again in a
couple of days. That's super awesome. And then also congratu
(07:00):
relations on Solid Gold Man. Yeah, Solid Gold, it's been
it's been interesting. I just signed my third record deal
in Nashville, Tennessee. And I always say, you know, I
I got my start in two thousand seven. I signed
with our Cia Records and had a few hits with them,
and then time went by, I got dropped. I signed
another deal and had some success there, but not like
(07:20):
huge success. And then I, like we were talking about,
I ended up getting into radio and having a radio
show and and doing that for five six years. And
then as I got out of that, I was one
of the ones that got let go during the pandemic.
So when that happened, it was kind of crazy, you feel,
And I'm sure a lot of people that are listening
right now can relate because it's such a strange time.
(07:43):
If you get let go, or you get fired, or
you get whatever whatever you want to call it, you
get you get kind of like punched in the face,
you know you or you get hit you know it's
a big gut punch or whatever you want to call it.
And I started panicking because I have a pregnant wife.
I'm you know, a year into my marriage, which I
was making pretty decent money doing what I was doing,
(08:04):
and I got comfortable and I knew what I was
I knew what tomorrow was going to bring as far
as a paycheck, and you know, I felt good. I
felt good about where I was. And then when when
that's ripped away, you do go in a panic mode.
And I got two phone calls the day, um the
entire morning show that I did got let Go. One
was from Bobby Bones with I Heart Radio, and the
(08:28):
other one was from Verge Records. Verge Record says, hey, man,
I'm sorry to hear that you got let go? Are
you ready to start making some music again? And I
was just like, hell, yeah, I am, let's go. I
was like, thank the Lord. I mean, it was just
I think the Lord works in mysterious ways and there's
always a rhyme and reason for everything. So I think
(08:50):
I'm glad I didn't have to wait too long to
see that there was something on the other side. And
you know, coming out with my third record deal, Third
Times a Charm, I wanted to come out of the
gate with a song like solid Gold because it's I
wrote it by myself. I had I haven't released music
in a while, and I just wanted to kind of
(09:11):
make a statement that like, hey, I'm still a songwriter.
I still you know, have traditional roots to my music
that I love and Solid Gold is that perfect marriage
of that because I wrote it and it it is
somewhat of a throwback song now that the wheels will
turn in on that song. We got another one coming
(09:33):
and this was not it was on purpose and not
on purpose, but we're releasing a song called Old with
You on December four, And December four is also the
induced date for my child. And as most songwriters will
tell you, their songs are their babies, right, So I'm like,
gotta release it. We gotta. I gotta have two babies
(09:53):
on that day. I gotta have a song baby and
a real baby. We shot the video for Old with You,
and um my wife and I are just are the
only two in the video. And and I can't wait
too for people to see this. It's a It's one
of those songs where you immediately you're like, okay, that's
a wedding song. Do you remember that song Adam Sandler
(10:13):
did on the plane and wedding singer? I ontanna? What
is that? Good? Oh with you? Or whatever it is?
At least I can find it. Yeah, see if you
find it. But I when I went to write that song,
my my buddy that came up with the title. He goes, Man,
I want to write a song called Old with You.
I immediately thought about that Adam Sandler song and I
(10:35):
love that song. Granted it's Adam sanding Leer and he's
not I mean, but I love that song because it's
so simple and it's so real. It's kind of like
what guys think anyway, what you know the lyrics in
that song. So we wrote it from a more lyrical
standpoint that can happen on radio and be taking a
little more seriously. Um, So we're excited about all with
(10:58):
You and coming out with that right around the corner.
So here's the song fairness. So it could be so
nice chron old miss You, Kiss You Sam. They're so talented.
(11:19):
Well that's exciting, man. I love equating it to like
my two babies are coming out kind of at the
same time. At the end of the day, It's true
what they say, like necessity is the mother of invention,
and you know you getting let go from that show,
I guess maybe like for shoot into doing something that
you probably should have been doing in the first place.
(11:40):
Like I know you as like this amazing songwriter and
singer from a guy who lived to Nashville for twelve
years while you were there. So I'm just glad to
see you kind of back doing I think the thing
that you were meant to do. I am sorry that
you got let go, but I've worked in radio since
I was in high school and don't worry about it.
(12:01):
It's funny. When I did get let go, I had
a bunch of radio people reach out to me and says, well, congratulations,
now you know what it's like to really be in radio.
And I appreciate you saying that. I do think they
kind of made the decision for me. The company I
used to work for, they probably made a decision for
me that I should have made a while ago. When
you start getting comfortable, at least for me, and this
(12:21):
is with anything, even when I was just doing music.
I when I had success out of the gate with
our CEA Records, I got a little comfortable and I
got a little lazy. So when you start getting comfortable,
you don't press as much and you don't push as much.
Now I'm pushing again, and it feels it feels good.
I was telling my wife. I was like, man, it
(12:41):
it just feels good to be in a room and
start being creative again and writing songs and you know,
kind of hanging out with artists again that I'm not
the radio guy that is also an artist. They kind
of look there like it's almost like art. It sounds crazy,
but it's like artist artists type of deal. I don't know.
It's it's refreshing to say released. Yeah. I have a
bunch of musician friends from all over the place. But
(13:04):
when I was in Nashville, I remember there was a
little bit of like are you are we talking as
you're my friend or are we talking as like your
bid on your radio show on Monday morning. I just
need to know, like where we are, and so I
understand where you're coming from where It's like, it's nice now,
I'm just it's just artists, artists. We're just talking about
songwriting or whatever. You know. There's no hidden that A
(13:26):
lot of people don't know that. They don't think about
this except us, right, except that if you're sitting in
the chair. But that's the thing. Do you like me
or do you like the chair I'm sitting. Yeah, And
I think you'll back me up on this. You can
tell pretty quick who was genuine and who is not.
Oh yeah, I'm just talking to you because the chair
you're sitting. Yeah, totally. I wanted to play a little
(13:48):
bit of Solid Gold and then maybe talk a little
bit about the new and gold with you and how
it sounds like it kind of loops back to how
you get your start with stealing Cinderella. But here's Solid Gold.
I will listening to this earlier today. Man, I just
absolutely love this track. I've never needed money, I've never
(14:09):
needed face. Justine to sold every Night, close to Me,
all Love, Yes sold lock Conte song Twanging Old Mr
(14:35):
John Is song gone. You can find it on now
speaking to Okay. So, I love a lot of things
about this song, and tell me if I'm wrong, But
I'm getting such a old school Willie Nelson ballad vibe
(14:59):
from this tune, which is why I think I was like,
it's like fell in love with it. Do you hear that?
Am I crazy? Yeah? No? I And that's a compliment
for sure. So thank you. So I originally took this song. Um,
when I write by myself, it takes me a while
to write a song by myself because I I nitpick it.
When you write with other writers, usually you know you
(15:19):
get in there and you'll start at ten thirty and
you'll be done by five. And then if you want
to nitpick it, you gotta get all the writers back
in the room again. Well, when I write by myself,
I can just pick up the guitar and nitpick all
I want, whenever I want, if I can. And it
took me, like I probably fine tuned this song for
three or four months, just kind of like working with
different melodies and stuff. And you can tell us a
(15:42):
very laid back, right, It's a very laid back song.
And I almost sing the vocal like behind the beat
a little bit. And that's what Nelson does a lot.
He sings behind the beat or in front of the beat.
He's never really on the beat. When I first went
in the studio, played it for the studio musicians and
I was like, hey, I'm this is how I'm seeing
the song. It's crazy. The guy that was running the
(16:02):
session that day, he looked at me and he said,
he goes, man, I love it. I love doing it
laid back like that, but it's it's it's very Willie Nelson,
and he goes, I want to I want to make
it more progressive, and I want to make it more
radio friendly and all this stuff. I'm like, really, and
he was like no, I just think that's so we
(16:22):
did it. I was. I was like, Okay, let's give
it a shot. And we did it, and it missed
the mark. It like totally. It took the song somewhere
where it wasn't supposed to be. So I never I
never even sang on what we recorded that day for
solid goal. I just I was like, it's not there,
it's not it fast forward. I get, you know, the
(16:43):
record deal and stuff like that. I said, I, you know,
I'm gonna call my buddy, Jimmy Ritchie, who's a big
producer and he does a lot of traditional records. He's done.
He did Jacowen's early stuff, but he's done like Clay
Walker and these guys that like, you know, Mark Chestnutt,
these pretty country guys that have had huge success. And
I was like, this is a guy that will probably
(17:04):
knock it out of the park in the studio. And
he didn't try. Jimmy didn't try to change what the
song was, and that what we just listened to was
the outcome. And when I heard it, I'm like, oh, yeah,
that's it. And that's kind of why I wanted to
come out of the gate with this song. Was because
because if you go back and listen to all my songs,
(17:25):
I'm all over the map. I mean, one song will
be super traditional and then hell, one song will be
super pop and one song will you know, be in
the middle or whatever. I feel. I if I would
have went the pop route or something like that, I
just think it wouldn't it wouldn't have stuck out. I
wanted to release something that I could stand by and
(17:45):
be like, well, this is what this is why I
love country music. I do love people like Willie Nelson.
I do love great love songs and ballads. That's why
I love singing. I'm I'm a ballad singer. You know.
I love up tempos, and trust me, I need more
so I can so I can get out there and
you know, and tour more. And nobody wants to fall asleep.
But this was just a great way to start kick
(18:07):
start back into the the realm of things and moving forward.
I think with like a song like Old with You
that we've been talking about as well, that's a little
more radio friendly, and that's exactly why we're gonna go
to country radio with that, but solid Gold is certain
is I'll never forget when American songwriter the magazine said Hey,
I want to do a piece on Chuck wicks And
(18:29):
and his song solid Gold. That's when I was like,
oh my god, I want to be in there. I've
always wanted to be an American songwriter. I've always wanted
to be in it. I've never been in That was like, Okay,
check that off the list. Now I made the right
decision and release Solid Gold. Because that happened like nothing
else could happen with Solid Gold, and because it was
an American songwriter, I'm good, and because wells Adam is
talking about it, I'm good. It's so funny, like that
(18:51):
first engineer or producer that you're working with on Solid Gold,
I understand where he's coming from, and like, listen, at
the end of the day, you make money off a
radio hit, but it's so funny that, like, you know,
you would want to change the song that's so very
much like an old school throwback with actual names of
throwback in old school you know, country grades to like
(19:13):
a progressive radio hit. But I get it. Anyways, I
just really love that song. I guess I gotta ask,
does your wife really love that song? I mean, she's right,
she's actually came to the door because a dog call crazy.
I love my favorite, not Old with You. I love
so I solid Gold was like I used to pick
(19:33):
up the guitar and just sing it to her and Avery,
our little nine year old I used to. We have
a video I think still like where I was singing
and Avery was dancing, and like Avery is like one
of these I don't know if all kids are like this,
but she can hear a song one time and she'll
know every single lyric. I'm not worse at that. Like
I I am not a cover band guy, like if you,
(19:54):
I can't. I know songs and I can sing with
him on the radio, but I have to learn them,
like really learn in them to try to to play
it live or play the whole thing through. But yeah,
I guess I guess it is true, so I will
call it is her favorite. But now that she's in
the video with Old with You, I think they will
probably be your favorite next. I'm excited for Old with
You to come out, and you said it was it's
(20:14):
just like the perfect wedding song, which I gotta say
I feel like this is the perfect wedding song with
the big time single ground dancer with looking up at
him in her as France char look to him, I'm
(20:37):
just rudding stealing, Sander. I mean, dude, uh, Phil Fulmer
love that song so much that he had to come
and play his daughter's wedding to sing that song. Yeah,
that was pretty cool. I never wrote that song to
be a wedding song. I wrote that song because head
(21:00):
of our c A of of A and R he's
a good buddy of my now Jim Jim Katino. He
was just like, hey, man, I don't think we have
your first single out of the box, Shet. He goes,
just go home, write about something you know, like, write
about something that you love. Like if it's real, then
people will know it's real. That it becomes believable then
because it's just gonna come through naturally. That is real.
(21:22):
I said, Okay. At the time, I was seeing this
girl and we're dating for like four years at this time,
and she moved up to Nashville to be with me,
and her summer gig down in Florida was playing Cinderella.
She played Cinderella Walt Disney World, so I came up
with the whole the whole chorus. I was like, she's
playing Cinderella, I know, for his bike and that The
(21:43):
next day I had a co write with George Tarn
and Rivers Rutherford. George Terren Rivers Rutherford wrote when I
Get Where I'm Going for for Brad Paisley. They're great
songwriters outside of that song, but that song in particular
reminded of what Stealing Cinderella should sound like. So I
was like, I'm gonna bring this idea to them, and
(22:05):
we ended up writing that song and we wrote it
in three hours. Dude, it was crazy. We wrote it.
We actually we wrote it probably in two and a
half because we went to lunch, came back and kind
of tightened it up, so it was like it wasn't
even really full three hours. And they were able to
relate to it because they had daughters, you know, they
had I was at the time I was dating. I wasn't,
but I didn't have kids or I knew what it
(22:27):
would be like to have kids, and they had came out.
They came at Stealing Cinderella from a different perspective, and
that's why I think so many dads related to it.
That's when I knew it was a special song. Like
you said, when Philip Former um asked me to sing
at his wedding, I didn't know who Phil Former was. Sadly,
I grew up. I grew up in I know, I
(22:48):
grew up in Delaware and there's probably people listening right
now they're like, who's doing Former? So just real quick.
Philip Falmer was the head coach of the Tennessee Balls
for years. I don't even know where he coaches now,
but I think he's just not an announcer. What do
you call it, like an analyst? Yeah, big name, big college,
especially if you're in the SEC or in the South.
So very cool thing. Well, I grew up in Delaware.
(23:10):
We had University of Delaware Blue Hens, the only female mascot,
and college football so and we were Division one two
A or whatever it is. So I didn't really follow
college football until I went to school down in Florida,
and I still didn't really know too much about Knoxville
and Tennessee and how strong their roots are in Philip Former.
But I went there and I was like, well, cool,
(23:32):
let's do it. The only sending route at the time
was not a hit. It was at fifty six on
the charts. I was like, well, I'll go here since
he's well known, and maybe it will back to our conversation.
Do you like me or do you like the chair
I'm sitting in? I really like the chair that Philip
Former was sitting in, So I I went there. I
end up falling in love with his family. What a
(23:54):
great family, A great guy, a great coach obviously coach
Payton Manning. I mean, so I did the song and
knowing that he was a very well known football coach,
strong guy yells a lot. That kind of deal. When
every time he turned around and I saw his face
when he was danced with his daughter, he was crying,
and that's when I knew. I was like, oh, I
was like, man, I always knew that I'm strong believer
(24:16):
that music heels and music can change people and their
feelings and make them go to places and remembering things
and so on. But I never thought. That's when I
knew that my songs could do that. And it was
really flipped the switch for me. It ended up being
a huge wedding song. But that see, that's a father
daughter dance Old with You is a bride and groom dance. Yeah,
(24:40):
all right, your ear monopolizing all the facets of the
nuptials and I like it. Oh yeah, And I dude,
I just married somebody like two months ago. So I'm like,
I'm full service over here. I can carry you do
the father daughter dance and the first dance that's hilarious. Well,
I'm I'm excited for or oh with you to come out.
(25:01):
You said it's gonna come out what next month? December four?
December four? All right, we'll keep your eyes peeled for that.
But in the meantime, go listen to Solid Gold. Came
out kind of at the end of October. I want
to take a quick break. When we come back. I
want to do the thing that this show is meant
to do, which is talk about origin stories. I want
to find out how the hell you became so successful.
You down with that, Let's do it, all right, quick break,
(25:21):
we come back. Chuck Wicks here on the Wells Guy.
All right, back on the Wells cast. I have singer, songwriter,
baseball player, officiant at weddings, dog owner, radio host, am
(25:46):
I forgetting any what else do you do? Retired dancer
was on Dancing with the Stars retired right now, Dance
of the Star is on right now. Do you watch it?
And are you like, uh, that sucked? I so before
I was on that show, never watched it. I watched
it this season before I was on the show, and
(26:07):
then I watched a couple of seasons afterwards that I
was on it, and then I stopped, And now if
it's on, I'll watch. I always like to see who's
on it because the bigger, the bigger, the name that's
on it, it kind of gives me, you know, credit.
I'm like, see they were on it. You know I'm
pretty famous too. I was a background dancer last season
(26:29):
for Joe's Dancer. I've done it so hard and sucked,
But like every time I talked to somebody, who's who's
on it? It's so much work. You lose a bunch
of way your sore. Was that your experience with that.
I did not lose weight. Here's here is the It
is hard, though it's very nerve racking. I was always
like before our dances, man, I was like back in
(26:50):
the hallways because a lot of people know this American
idol was across the hall. So we did on the
CBS lots so American idols across the hall, so if
I went to the bathroom, I'd run into like whoever
was on American Idol that season. That was an Adam
Lambert season. So I remember, I remember going to the
bathroom and I would run into Adam Lambert all time,
like what's up man? Singing? Well, you're doing good? You
(27:11):
go yeah, pretty good? You dance it pretty good? Pretty good? Yea,
all right, hopefully I'll see you next week. I don't know.
I don't know how far did you get. I got
fifth place, I think the place. That's pretty good. I mean,
like it's such a popularity contest now, you know, because
I think so much depends on voting. My buddy, who
(27:31):
was on it last season, was the worst dancer I've
ever seen ever. He never got better, but he was
like top three because people loved him and they kept
voting him in, you know, so that means people must
have loved you. Who was it? Who was your buddy?
His name was grocery store Joe. He was on he
was on The Bachelor. I know who it is. He
was terrible and then he made me come on and
(27:53):
help him dancing. He was so bad that they invited
a bunch of other bachelor people to distract from how
bad he was, and then they brought me on and
I was even worse than he was, and so I
guess it works. Everyone just making fun of me anyways.
But yeah, he was like third, he like almost won
the thing, and it was terrible. That's because a lot
of people loved him and voted for him. So if
(28:14):
you've got fifth, Matt means people must loved you. Yeah,
I hope. So I'm trying to still trying to find
those people that voted for me. I feel like I
feel like they left me. They're like, Okay, we're over it.
I love finding out where where people came from and
how the hell they got here, kind of a blueprint
for success. You talked earlier in the show about growing
up in Delaware. Were you a musical kid, Like, did
(28:36):
you have the bug early? Not at all. I grew
up on a potata farm. We were well, we were
called grain farmers, so we did like corn, wheat, barley, soybeans. Uh.
Super normal kids, super small town in Smyrna, Delaware. All
I cared about was I wanted to play baseball, get
a cool truck. When I was sixteen and work on
(28:57):
the farm and then go to college and play baseball.
That was my That was That was it. I loved
country music though, like I would sing. I would sing
around the farm. I would sing, like if we had
a party. You know, a lot of my friends would
be like, Chuck sing that Joe Dippie song or like,
you know, sing that Tim McGraw song or whatever, and
I would like do that and but did not how
(29:18):
to play the guitar or nothing, so I just sing.
I would just like we would find the song, like
we we'd get the CD out, play it and I
would sing with them. They're like, oh man, you sound
just like them. That was kind of it. Like I
didn't sing in church. I didn't do any of that.
My parents weren't singers. My dad was in one play.
(29:39):
He's trying to take credit for ship and it's not happening.
I was like, dude, you were in one play and
it wasn't even the lead. But when I went to college,
I end up playing baseball Florida Southern College. I wasn't
playing that much. It was one of those things where
I probably went to the wrong school or whatever. You
can make a million excuses all athletes do. And that's
when I had to figure out. I was like, well,
I'm gonna pick up a guitar, learned how to play guitar.
(30:01):
I didn't know anything about Nashville, Tennessee. I didn't know
anything about how do how do you get a record deal?
I didn't know it was a thing. I just didn't
think about it. I was like, Oh, I love what's
on the radio. I never thought about how do you
get on the radio because it just wasn't a dream
of mine. I just loved it. I loved music. I
loved imitating the people. So there was this this girl
that played soccer at Florida Southern College and she goes, hey,
(30:24):
I heard you can sing pretty good. I was like, well,
I love to say, because I would sing around the
dorm rooms. And actually, I don't think i've ever really
told this story. Titanic came out in like nineties seven
or eight, and that was when I was a freshman
in college, and I used to be we had the
big showers where everybody had to use the same showers
in the dorm room. I would wait until like midnight
(30:44):
take my shower then because I did not want to
take showers with other people. So I'd wait till midnight,
take a shower, and I would do the I would
like rocket out and I would do it so loud.
People would come out of their dorm room and they'd
be like, shut up, try to sleep. That was so
(31:05):
memorable for certain people. My best friend in college that
married my wife and I. He actually as he was
getting ready to marry us, he goes, let me tell
you a little backstory about Chuck, and he brought that
up like at the ceremony, like when we was marrying us.
So I think that's how it got out to this
girl that played soccer that like, hey, I heard you
got a pretty good voice. So she goes, let's sing together,
(31:28):
and I was like, all right, cool. She goes, you
need to meet my manager. That was the moment where
it just kind of opened up. I'm like, what, hold up,
you have a manager. She's like, oh yeah. And this
was like the big boom, like when in Saint Backstreet Boys.
This is when all that no strings attached, all that
stuff was rocking. It was in Orlando, so we were
(31:50):
Florida Southern was in Lakeland, forty five minutes away, and
not even so Loo Parleman, all these guys that like
started these boy bands. He was there, like we if
we went downtown, we'd see like one of the Backstreet
boys Loo Perlman. And so I met all these managers
and production companies and all that stuff through this girl.
And then I met a vocal coach that way, and
(32:10):
I just I had to tell the vocal coach I'm like, hey,
I'm not a boy band singer. I need to sing
country music. That's like what I love to do. And
she's like, well, I used to intern at our c
A Records in Nashville. I'm like, I love it, let's go.
So she so she would take me up. We would
(32:31):
in between school. I'd find like I take the like
a long weekend or in the summer. I'd go up
there for like a week, and she'd introduced me to people.
And that's how I actually got the connection to our
c A Records and ended up signing the record deal
with them. That is bonkers, Yeah, I mean, it wasn't
like this life long I have to make this happen.
(32:52):
I'm going to have this amazing team around me with management,
with all these things. No, it was like my vocal
coach knew somebody she was able to get it into
the right hand. She you know that she gave I
made a horrible demo okay in in Orlando. If I
listened to it, I I need to find it. Actually
I did Brian McKnight's song One Last Cry okay, and
(33:16):
then I did an Andy Griggs song because it was
like one of the songs I was loving at the time.
It was actually an old Whale and Jenny song was
like a he redid and I was like, I'm in
my mind right not knowing anything about how to get
started or get indoor. I'm like, I just think. I
was just thinking, like how can I show them that
I can sing different things? So I was like, all right,
(33:38):
grime Knight, Andy Griggs, I'll go super country, super R
and B pop. Did those two songs made a like
a three ring binder folder. I put my eight by
ten on the outside, glossy eight by ten on the
outside of the binder. You opened it up and had
a CD holder in there. I put my CD holder
in there with my two songs. When my picture on
(34:01):
the c D, the actual c D, I had a
little bio in there, but a little one page bio
in there, and that's what she gave to someone in
finance at our Cia Records, not even like the person
that signs people. Yeah, so she gives it to the
finance guy. And the finance guy, Lawrence Lawren, bless his heart,
(34:25):
great guy, ended up being friends with him because I
would the guy I've just caught up, stay at my
house and let's get you connected with everybody because his
wife worked at Curb Records and at the time Tim
mcgrawl was over at Curb Records and all of stuff.
How I was making my connections was through my vocal coach,
through the finance guy at our Cia Records, through the
(34:45):
wife of the finance guy that had Curb Records, And
that's how it all, like the whole synergy thing started
and meeting the right people and it finally made its
way the little twosong demo to Jim Katino, who is
now head of A and R at r C A Record.
When I met him, he would like he was like
in his first year of A and R. He heard
it and I'll never forget it. It was during c
(35:08):
n A Fest like in June, the big festival that
we have here in Nashville. He called me. He got
my number, because of course I had my number in
my binder. He called me and he said, he said, hey, man,
I just chuck. I'm like, hey, dude, what's up. And
he's like, hey, it's Jim Patino A and R R
C I. I I listened to your c D. He goes, Man,
I think there's something there. He sounds pretty good. He goes,
(35:28):
I'm on my way to a Kenny Chesney sound check
right now over at Nissan Stadium. When I get back,
can you meet me at my office and just sing
for me in person? First of all, I was like,
you're gonna Kenny Chesney sound check? He's like yeah, He's like,
we'll take too long. I go, well, I don't play
guitar or nothing. Do you just want to sing acapella
for you? He's like, yeah, just do that. That's fine.
(35:49):
So I came in there and dude, now knowing Jim
Contino and he's just a big, burly guy, and I
was singing one last Cry and an Andy Greg song
to him acapella, face to face across the desk. That's
what got me in the door to and finally end
up after a couple more steps to sign with our
CIA Records. So you signed with our CIA. I suppose
(36:11):
you graduate from college and then moved to Nashville negative
the minute. That meeting got me another meeting with everybody
like the head of A and R Joe Galante who
ran our CIA Records. That got me that meeting where
I had to sing for them live and I brought
guitar players in. Jim Coatino found me a producer, Monty
(36:34):
pal who did like all Diamond Rios stuff. So we
came in with a team and then presented ourselves again
and at that point they gave me what they call
a developmental deal, and that's when they basically sign you
to develop so no one else can sign you in town.
You come back later and see if they'll sign you
(36:56):
to the full deal. Well, as soon as I signed
a development deal, I quit college and moved to Nashville.
Two classes short of graduating. I'm like, I'm out. Have
you since finished those classes? No? No? And I actually,
um I checked in with them maybe like six years ago.
I was like, hey, can I take some online courses
like just to finish these two classes? And they looked
(37:18):
up my info and they're like, oh, the curriculum has
changed since you left. You now have you now have
to take like six more classes. Now, keep in mind
if you google Florida Southern College alumni most notable, like
most notable, they had me on there. They're like, wait
(37:40):
a minute, what what is this. You're gonna take credit.
You're you're gonna make me go back and you can't
use me like that. I'm taking my name, Like, give
me a diploma, you need an honorary diploma. They do that.
I feel like, I don't know, maybe Okay, I feel
like it should happen. I think, well, I'll call some people.
I know, some people who know some people will make
(38:02):
this happen. Okay, you quit school with two classes to go,
hanging everything on a developmental deal. You moved to Nashville.
What do you do first? You just immediately start writing songs. Yeah, so,
Monty pap it was is a great Songwriter's read a
bunch of Keith Theravan songs, other songs, Tim mcgrawl song
with all the stuff. He was the guy that taught
me it really had a songwright. So he took me
(38:22):
under his wing. When I moved up to town. I
basically was as apprentice, and I just learned how to
write songs with him. And then you know, when you
signed a developmental deal or you're attached to any kind
of major record label, songwriters come out of the works
and they're like, all right with you, all write with you,
all write with you because you know I could be
the next big thing. Then they never know. So what
(38:44):
I did was I took advantage of those relationships and
I kept them. That's the key. Like if you meet
somebody great, that's fantastic, Just don't meet him and be
fine with one conversation with them. Get to know them
and learn from them. And that's what I did, is
like I wanted. I told him flat out, I'm like, listen,
I'm learning. So I let them take the reins on everything.
(39:06):
I never never walked into a writing room to just
pretend that I know exactly what I'm doing, because I didn't,
especially in the beginning when I first moved to town.
It's crazy. I had the development deal and about two
weeks later, once I really moved here, they ended up
not picking me up for the full record deal. So
I had to then make the decision, will do I
(39:27):
go see other record labels? Now in my mind, I
was just like, all right, wait a minute, take a
step back, take a deep breath. If our c A
felt like I wasn't ready, and I and now me
looking back, I wasn't ready. I was not ready. If
they don't think I'm ready, what what makes me think
that another label's gonna think I'm ready? So what I
did was I got a job parking cars. That's how
(39:48):
I made my money. Hundred bucks a night. I was happy,
you know, hunter bucks a night. I was super happy.
Lived in a little apartment, had the girl I wrote
Stealing Center Sits Stealing Cendarrell about move up with me.
She We've lived the same little apartment. And I just
grinded it out. Man. For four years, I did nothing
but write songs, learn the craft, find out who I
was as an artist. I'm a very competitive guy. When
(40:10):
I felt like I was ready, the first stop I
was gonna make was our CIA Records, because I wanted
to prove to them that I was. I was like, no, no, no,
you made a mistake. I'm ready. I'm your guy. And man,
through those four years, I really did find out who
I was as an artist. That never changes, By the way,
you're you're always evolving as an artist, or you should
be the artist that I was ten years ago, fifteen
(40:31):
years it's not even close to what the artist I
am today. It's you know, we all evolved and we
should you want to do that. I went right back
into our ce A with a team again. It was
Monty Poal and Dan Huck, great producer. We played three
three songs for them in the conference room before I
got to the elevator at our CIA Records was which
(40:52):
is just a hallways length away. They said we're going
to sign Chuck and I signed a full record deal.
And that's when it all. It just happened quick. I was.
That's when I just started, you know, writing, writing, writing,
Get into studio, Get into studio, try to find that record.
And that's when Stealing Cinderella was written. All these things
they stick you out there, man, they throw you out there,
(41:13):
and it's a big deal. Like to go out there
as a new artist and have our c A behind
you and our CIA that's Elvis Presley's record label, you
know what I'm saying. So it's like it's got this
big cool nostalgia, it's got this thing to it. It
was nerve wracking man. Go out, you go out on
radio tour. You see every single radio station and you try,
you try. As a brand new artist, you're on radio
tour and you try to win every single radio station
(41:35):
one by one. You try to win him over and
say yes, I believe in you and I'm gonna play
your song. And that's that's that's really when the work begins.
You know, there's a cool lesson to be had there.
It reminds me of when I had Gavin McGraw on
this show. It had similar story to yours is he
was offered a deal, but it wasn't for enough money.
(41:57):
The way that he took that was, you're not offering
me very much money because you don't believe in what
I can do. And that means that I need to
go and I need to work and get better so
when I come back, you'll think I'm worth more. And
so what you're trying to tell me is that I'm
I'm not there yet. You're doing a similar thing of like, Okay,
(42:17):
I need to go home my craft for four years
and come back, because a lot of people take that
and they take that failure and they just like admit defeat.
But the truth of the matter is is that you've
got to keep on failing to get better to become
the thing that you want to be right. And I
think that's a really cool lesson that you had to
live through to get to where you are now. Yeah,
(42:39):
I think that's with everything, man. I think it's you know,
if someone can't if someone's listening right now and you
can't relate to that musically, you can relate to it
with your job, or you can relate to it with
your relationship, or you can relate to it when you're
raising your kids. You know, you may maybe you did
something wrong. You're like, oh, I didn't really teach them
a lesson that time. I need to do it this way.
It'll be better and they'll learn more. It's universal. It's
(43:00):
a universal language of learning from defeat. It's the whole
slogan of you know, if you get knocked down, to
get back up, I mean, anything you do, you just
gotta keep on pushing forward. So you get signed by
our ci A, you go on radio tours. And I
was a music director at radio stations. I remember musicians
coming in spinning their demo and trying to get airplay
(43:21):
and all that kind of stuff. I guess you you
kind of worked the system for a while. Was there
a moment that you were like, I made it? Yes,
there was a There was two different moments. Um one
in particular was when I was on the Grand of
Opry the first time, because it was at the time
it was being televised, so not only did they want
me to sing and make my debut and it was fantastic,
(43:41):
but they wanted me to host a show as well.
So I'm like, oh my god, can I just focus
on one thing? Jeez? It was pretty nerve wracking. Actually,
I'm probably glad they did make me do that because
I couldn't focus too much on one thing and maybe
psych myself out or whatever. But it was that moment
Grandi Operate, And it was the first time because I
went from conference rooms doing the radio tour straight to
(44:03):
opening up for Brad Paisley on tour and my first
stop was in Denver, Colorado in an arena where the
Nuggets play, so I was just like, holy crap, this
is not a conference room. This is amazing. So that's
when I was just like, Okay, this is cool. At
what point did Dancing the Stars come into play, and
then America's Morning Show come into play. Dancing with the
(44:23):
Stars came about because when I I so, I ended
up dating Julienne Huff for a while and we met.
Actually I was on my about to be on my
third single, so um s the only Cinderella All I
ever wanted. Both went up the chart and had a
lot of success with them, and then I started dating Julianne,
and that's when I started going out to l a
on CBS lots to support her, just to support her.
(44:46):
We met because we were touring with Brad Paisley together.
It was like Me jul Rodney Atkins, and that's how
we started dating. And at the time, the casting director
for Dancing with the Stars was coming out to see
the shows because she wanted juel to be on Dancing
with the Stars and she also knew Julianne, so she
was coming out and because Jewel was on my season
(45:07):
and Ty Murray her husband the bull Rider, well, Jewel
ended up getting hurt and so on whatever, But because
she saw me there, then she would see me backstage
at the season before because I was dating Julianne that
season before I was on the whole the casting whole
casting director and their people and the producers of the show.
They like, they say, hey, Chuck he goes, you got
(45:28):
a minute. I'm like sure. They took me in this
room and sat me down like a conference room. I'm like,
what the heck is going on. They're like, so, we
love your personality and love that you know you're country musician,
and we just think you would be great for this show.
Do you want to be on Dancing with the Stars
next year? I'm like, yes, I knew I would love
(45:50):
to be up. And here's the kicker. Julianne was not
supposed to be. Julianne was not even gonna be on
the show. She told that the the directors that she
was not gonna do next year. I was supposed to
be teamed up with like something like Edits or something
somebody else. I think last minute, Julianne was just like, well,
I'll come back and do the season with you because
(46:11):
it only makes sense. So that's a lot of people
thought we met on that show, and we did not.
We actually were dating beforehand, then we were on the
show together, and then we ended up breaking up like
six months after the show. So that's how us Dance
where the Stars happened. I was just in the right
place at the right time, you know, to to kind
of get noticed or recognize by the the people that
(46:31):
make the decisions. I was on my third single when
I was on Dancing with the Stars and I'll never
forget it. I was still with our Cate Records. It
was a song called Man of the House, and it
was such a special song. It was about troops overseas
and kids at are back home, being the man of
the house taking care of the you know, the moms
and dads, whoever is back home, waiting for the loved
ones to come back. And it was doing so well.
It was like in the twenties on the chart. And
(46:52):
the minute I got kicked off the show, the minute
I got kicked off the Dancing with the Stars, they
dropped a single from radio. It made no sense to
me because we still a bullet, like we were still
going up the chart. In their minds, You're like, Okay,
he's off the show. Now we're done with this song.
We're not gonna take advantage of it. And that's really
when I started to know I was in trouble. At
our ci A and Man two more singles later, I
(47:14):
ended up getting dropped from our ci A. There's so
many reasons why that happens. I mean, it can be
from management, it can be from a new well, a
new a new president came in and started running our
c A and Sony, so you know, he wasn't the
guy that signed me. So there's all these different reasons.
But that's when rail World came into play. I asked
(47:36):
to do America's Morning Show. Maybe about a couple of
years later, I was still looking for another deal. I
was running out of money, Like dude, it was getting bad. Man.
I was just like, well, man, I'm not touring that
much anymore. I don't know what I'm gonna do. Like
I was, legit running out of money. And Blair Garner
with America's Morning Show, was like, hey, I got this
idea that I'm doing. I want you to be a
(47:57):
part of it. And I was like, what is it?
And it was that it was a radio show that
started it in New York City and then was gonna
ended up ended up being syndicated and a bunch of
different markets, and we did it all from Nashville. And
I'm just like, dude, I'm in and That's that's how
that the whole thing came about, and that's that's how
I knew I loved radio, dude. I I love being
on the radio as a singer, of course, but I
love doing radio to like I love doing ship. I
(48:18):
love doing morning show or a podcast or whatever it is.
You know, Chuck Wicks, I know you gotta go, but
I want to say thank you so much for for
taking your time telling your story. It's amazing. Everyone out there,
go stream, download by whatever, Solid Gold. Don't forget that
All with You is coming out December four. Keep your
eyes peeled for that. If people can want to follow you,
where do they go at Chuck Wicks on the Instagram.
(48:38):
Baby dude, thank you so much. Men, you rock. Brother. Alright,
I called you dead. Alright Dad, alright, dad, alright, goodbye son,
alright dad, see you well later. Man. I feel so bad.
He he was like, I'll call you back. We I
have I have a meeting with Spotify, and you know
I'll call you back. I'm like, no, man, don't worry
(49:00):
about it. Do your do your thing. But listen, Chuck Wicks.
What a nice guy, super freaking talented, just the best
I've known him. You know, Like I said, I've known
him for a while. It's fun to have him on
my show because I've been on his. But I gotta say, man,
I always knew him as this like juggernaut songwriter, singer,
performer in Nashville, And when he started doing the radio stuff,
(49:21):
I was like, that's interesting. So here's the rub, here's
here's the lowdown of this whole thing. I had been
approached by Blair Gardner to do that show with them.
Obviously I wasn't the name that Chuck Wicks was, but
I think I was the backup. I remember hearing that
being like, man, he got he got that gig, and
he's a singer. He doesn't need he doesn't need this
radio gig. You know, give it to the radio kid.
(49:42):
He's such a nice guy, so freaking talented, And I
love this story. Man. You also, by the way, you
can tell how radio savvy he's gotten. I literally said
fifteen words he just went. When people interview me, I
always am like, they must be so annoyed because I
just talked the entire time. But now being on the
(50:03):
other end of it, I loved it. It was the
easiest show I've ever time I'm boma didn't get to
do rapid fire questions with him. Maybe we'll we'll have
him back on later down the line and we'll we'll
get to it. Anyways, guys, hope you enjoyed the Wells
Cast this week. I did. That was such a fun show.
I loved it. Don't forget to rate and review the show.
That does help the show. Tell your friends about it
(50:23):
as well, and tweet to us or instagram us at
Wells Adams or at the Wells Cast on Insta and
tell us who you want to have on the show next.
Cool all right, by the way, how about him doing
the Titanic thing? That was crazy really good too. I
can't wait for his version of Old with You to
(50:46):
come out, but but I guess we'll just you know,
close with this one until we get coming out. Alright,
guys the furnace, have a great week. I'll see you.
Let us by Old will you. I'll miss you, kiss you.
(51:13):
Give you my code when you are subscribe to Wealth
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