Bobby talks to Heath Sanders about his crazy journey. He was working in the oil fields of Arkansas just a few years ago and now is about to send his first single to country radio. He talks about all the ups and downs and the moment he decided to pursue music and give up his day job. Plus the Top 5 New music releases of the week and music news!
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
Hey, guys, welcome to episode to eighty four. We'll talk
to Heat Sanders. He was working in oil field. I
think he'd never played music again, hadn't played in years.
Next thing you know, he's getting santin ovations everywhere he goes.
So it's a great story. Hang out for that. And
here are the top five songs of the week that
I think you should check out. At number five, last
week's guest it was Brooke Eden has a new song
(00:24):
called Sunroof. If you want to hear a story, go
back and listen on last week's episodes fantastic. Here's the
clip of Sunroof. At number four, new artist and TikTok
(00:46):
or Ashley Cook put out a new song called Sunday
Morning kind of Saturday Night. I need Sunday Saturday Night.
She's got a little heat on her right now, and
good for her. We had her on a few weeks ago,
was it. Yeah, Yeah, she got a little heat on her.
(01:07):
People were like going, Okay, I don't know if she's
signed anywhere yet, but she's probably getting some interest. If
you can develop a TikTok following, they'll sign you. I
think we saw that with Priscilla Block I mean, you
gotta be good, but it's like your own little mini
business there with a TikTok following. The only weird thing
is I see some of these TikTokers, even people, they'll go,
I'm number one in the iTunes country chart, and I'm like,
(01:28):
nobody downloads songs anymore. That's like, you know, I think
she was one of them is doing that too, and
she's killing it. And this is not to take away
from that, but I'm like, nobody looks at iTunes country
that unless you're on it. Nobody looks at the iTunes chart.
But she's killing it. Good for her. At number three,
Thomas Read announced he's releasing a new album called Country
Again side a It'll be at April. He released two
(01:51):
new songs today called growing Up and Want It Again.
Here's a clip of Wanted Again this We're Good six
shot number two. This week, Randa Lambert announced she's releasing
a new project called The Marfa Tapes on May seventh.
(02:14):
She released a song from the album today called in
His Arms. It is Some Half Man and down Easy
Breaking Horses It San Tome and number one is Gray Robinson.
She has a new single called Happy She was on
the morning show last week, and she was so good.
And here's the clip of Happy, I'm Happy, Happy, I'm Happy.
(02:39):
It's s some time and that is so searching. Never
done me. I would ever found the real pain, but
I didn't. Ever's where It's gone. I can see shoved.
(03:04):
Some other songs that check out that didn't make the
top five, but Travis Tripp put out a new song
called Smoking a Bar, Luke Bryan released a new song
called Drink a Little Whiskey Down. Palmley and Blanco Brown
put an acoustic version of Just the Way, and Maroon
five has a new song called Beautiful Mistakes with Megan
the Stallion new albums. I don't know who any of
these people are? Oh Kings of Leon, Jay Gonzalez, of
(03:26):
dry By Truckers, I don't know. I don't know. Do
you know these people are? I know the Kings of
Leon too, I know. I just look at the whole list. Yeah,
I wish I knew more who these people were. Willie
Nelson has a new book coming out called Letters to
America June twenty nine. It's an inspiring collection of letters
from Willie to his readers about what it means to
be an American. That would be a pretty good coffee
(03:47):
table book. I bet like it's not something you're gonna
want to sit down and read all the time. But
I think if you're just chilling board, you want a
real letter or two. You know, I probably get that one. Well,
my favorite song, second favorite ever song, it's close my
favorite song you ever stopped this train? But John Mayer
blue Eyes Crying in the Rain could be number two.
(04:08):
Ain't No Sunshine. There's a two A and two B
Kenny Rogers Number one's coming to Vinyl for the first time,
which I do have that CD in my jukebox, VINYLOYL.
And also I'm not cool Vinyl. I don't like Eddie.
I get on Instagram and I'm like, it's Sunday morning,
here's the Vinyl whatever he does, And here's the story
(04:32):
behind how Vinyl was pressed back in the twelve Can
hear the crash? Roman number once said vinyls like final,
it's fine and final here it is Eddie. What are
you doing? Uh? CMA Fest canceled for a second year
in a row. If this festival would have been scheduled
another forty five days later, I think they would have
had it close. I'm just saying it was in that
(04:52):
time period. It was June. If it would have been
late July August, I think they would have still had it,
but it would just schedule for June. Felt bad for
them they had to cancel it. We are right on
the edge of beating this thing right on it. Garth
Brooks reschedules his Charlotte date. Gotta big goal arena show
(05:14):
there that's happening. Miranda Lambert is opening a Broadway bar.
Should be the first female country stry to have a
bar on Lower Broadway. What's an n f T. So
it's like I was trying to understand it to you're
reading about it. It's basically like, is it cryptocurrency? Like cryptocurrency? Yes,
their services Kings and Leon released their new album titled
(05:38):
When You See It Yourself, which we just talked about,
in the form of a non fungible token that's n
f T, becoming the first band ever do so. They're
types of cryptocurrencies, but instead of holding money, they can
hold assets like art, tickets, and music. So do you
buy it and get the token? You get like different
layers of it, yes, like tickets, front row seats, stuff
(05:58):
like that I bet it's cool. Well, I just don't
know it sounds cool. Uh. And then finally Blanco Brown's
talking about his accident, the motorcycle um accident opens up
about the head on motorcycle accident. They killed him back
in August. He said, there's nothing more than land there
and hearing your doctors say, if we don't get him blood,
he's not gonna make it. Dang, Blanco said, please don't
(06:18):
let me leave. He says he has good days and
painful days, but tries to remain upbeat. He's been in
the studio working on an album which you come out
later this year, and him and Palmly are killing it
right now with this song. All right, there's your news.
Enjoy today's podcast. I love talking with Heath Sanders. You're
gonna like it. It's long, but if it wasn't good,
I would have shut it down, you know, twenty minutes
into a but it's good. Check it out. Thank you.
(06:38):
Guess with Heath Sanders right now, one of my favorite
new artists in country music. But before we went on,
I was reading a story about UH festivals and they
think Live Nation is going Hey. We think by mid
July we're going again. Yeah, dude, we're ready to. But
but but it's like they need the proper medical clearance
to do that. Everybody, all artists want to do it. Yeah,
(07:00):
everybody wants to get out and perform again. I want
to get out and do comedy in theaters. But we
can't until the promoters have less liability. That's really so.
And then everybody's gonna have to be vaccinated. Right if
you're gonna go performing around folks, we're gonna have to
start a show we're vaccinated. How was it a talking
(07:20):
to a therapist yesterday and she was like, yeah, I
can see you. You can come in two weeks after
your your second vaccination. So now things starting to happen
where people are going, hey, we need to get your vaccine.
But that being said, everybody's getting on with me. I
got friends around here that are my age, a couple
years younger, and they're like, and you don't have it yet,
No I don't. I'm like, shut up, super tall, athletic
(07:48):
and got its vaccination. And what people are saying, and
I believe most of them, is that they have found
places with extra because unless you're sixty five right now,
you won't get one, or a healthcare worker or most teachers. Um,
but let's go. Let's where do I get the extra ones?
I don't want to go to waste. I'll drive two
hours right now just because I want to get back
(08:09):
to work. Uh. And it's it's even more than one. Man.
We really have to you know that, we just have to.
But we have to let the people that are a
little more compromised shot at it first. But if if
they're wasted away, I want to go get one of
those wasting away or a wink wink, or just turn
my head somebody stabs me something. Wait, what what's happening here? Yeah?
(08:29):
I just want to go back home and hug my
grandma man and feel feel good about it. Where's your
grandma really, Marshall? Have you seen her at all? Uh?
No you haven't. I'll talk to her on the phone.
My stepdad, who's sixty five, he was really squirmish about
seeing anyone because he's older and if he gets it,
like Caitlin's grandfather, h he almost died of it. The
(08:51):
hospital called said he it's coin flip if he lives.
They didn't say it that nonchalant like you guys, what
sound it's going flip. You know. I hope you'm a
good day, but he got really really bad and so,
um yeah, older you are, or you know, any conditions
you have makes it worse. Is that why you haven't
seen her? She kind of going, hey, you guys, stay away. No,
she wants me to come, so but you don't want to. Yeah,
(09:11):
you know That's what I told her, was like, you know,
it gets you sick, you know, on accident. I mean
we're still because you'd be fine, sure right if you
got it. But if she got it's a whole different story.
It is. It is well not to just talk about coronavirus.
That's what we're talking about. For the Mikes went on,
how are you playing any shows at all right now? Man,
I actually played on this weekend. Yeah, yeah, in Springfield,
Missouri for for it was a private gig for a
(09:34):
buddy's business. Um but yeah, all the protocols were in
place and they keep it pretty separated. Yeah, they limited
our capacity and and all that and everything was. Everything
was done problem meet and greats. No, No, No, as
bad as I want to, I'm not a big fan
of because I would I would do an hour before show.
Then we I'd play for an hour and a half,
you know, or do comedy for an hour and a half,
(09:54):
and then stay for two or three hours and meet everybody.
Possibly then I started to get sick a lot because
I just felt like I was around that many people.
Most people are fine, but like one or two and
people would get and it's a curse and it's beautiful,
but people would they feel like they know me, and
that's my job and I love it. But when they
start to kiss on me and stuff like, and I'm
(10:16):
not asking for it, I do start to go, all right,
this is a little boundaries. And I'm so glad you
said that. I guess that makes me feel better, because
for about the first year of this, I stayed sick.
I stay sick all the time. I would compare it
to like a kindergarten teacher or you know, at the
first of the school year with all these kids coming in.
Great problem to have the people want to kiss on me.
I don't want to be kissing on I don't want
(10:36):
to kissed on my people. I know only Caitlyn. That's it.
I don't get any unsolicited kisses. I'm gonna have stepped
my game up again. Here's the difference. You're like a
man's man. You know, you got the beard and the
full arm tattoo of a what is that a grizzly bear.
Yeah yeah, I actually just got to it this weekend.
That's a lot, yeah it is. How How long did
that take? About five hours at one time? Arms still
(10:59):
sore a little bit, not bad. How long did you
keep the plastic on? Just like at home? He took
it off. You start, you put lotion on it. Yeah,
but you do you do the kind without any kind
of scent or anything or it's just that's just the
clearer small dose on there. My buddy Bubba, everyone hooked
me up. Man. He keep flies into Nash like one.
So he does like cane browns and stuff from where
from Phoenix? I think he lives in Phoenix, but he
(11:20):
flies from Yeah, he was on he was on Eat Masters.
That's a legit tattoo. Yeah, man, I kind of got
a theme going here, so you know, I was I
was born and raised in the Ozarks, and I grew
up fishing four or five days a week at my grandpa,
and we fished Bear Creek, the Little Red River, and
the Buffalo River. So the Bear's kind of memory of
Bear Creek. And then this is an actual photo of
(11:40):
the little Red River down here, and then I'm gonna
get a buffalo over here eventually. That's cool. Did it
means something to you? And it's also cool how these
guys can make ink on skin look real. It's amazing.
And it's not a flat surface, it's around surface, you know,
and they still skin moves around. Yes. Yeah, I've got
(12:01):
a few minor and as detailed there. My right arm
has got you know, I think four or five. I've
got picture on my winer and then a picture of
my butth hole. They're on the front and back side
of my arm. See, I still gotta get those. Yeah,
it was Oh, I thought you. One of my said,
there's tough. Let me play a couple of things from
heats here. Uh, here is the single Old Schools in
(12:24):
here you go steal? Yes, yes, steady. We'll play a
(12:51):
couple other things before we kind of get into your story.
Let's do This is from the video that went viral
in eighteen. This is you doing a cover of Chris
Staple It either way, we can just go. When did
(13:15):
you start to feel that video was starting to catch
on places. Did you feel it? It kind of happened overnight. Man,
I kind of woke up to it. Really, Yeah, did
you put it up yourself or did somebody else put
it up? Of you? I put it up. It started
out as a dare, though Buddy went from Texas. He
actually working on fills in Texas. He texts me one day,
Texas texts me and uh, he said, did cook cover?
(13:37):
Either way you put it online or you ain't gotta
hare one? And I was like, dude, it'll take me
forever to learn that song. So it took me like
two weeks to learn it. But yeah, that's what it
started as. It was a dare. And then man, I
just kind of woke up to a lot of screenshots
from buddies and you know, and friends that they were
seen this thing go viral, and it's like, oh my god,
it's crazy. It's it's crazy to hear that, and to
(13:58):
hear how much my voice has changed. Then it's it's
odd to look back and listen. You're working it now
more consistently. Right, Yeah, well, you learn, you learn how
to breathe, and you know, I haven't had any lessons
or any vocal lessons or anything like that. But you just,
I guess, like anything, you just kind of adapted and
you learn how to do it a little better as
you go. I want to come back to that in
a minute, but let's start when you were nine ten
(14:19):
years old. Wol you want to be when you grow up?
I think I want to be a vet back then,
or a cattle farmer I got or both, but no singing. No,
at that young, it wasn't in your mind you wanted
to be famous in a superstar never never was, And
I don't think I still don't think it is. Bobby'll
be honest with you, man, I think it's it's weird,
Like I don't uh, I don't wake up every morning
(14:40):
dreaming of fame and fortune. Uh Yeah. I'd be nice
to give my kids a you know, when I had kids,
to a good raising, you know, and a good you know,
give them more than I had when I was a kid.
But you know, I'm just I'm just so wrapped up
and being here in the moment and just so excited
that man, I'm you know, we we talked to radio
people from the UK this morning and King is spending
my stuff over there, and it's like and you're reaching
(15:03):
people across the globe and touching the hearts of mind's dad,
and that's that's awesome. I mean, I don't I don't
know if I have time to that's so overwhelming to
me that that I don't really have time to sit
and think about fame and fortune and the riches of
it all. I don't guess when did you start to
know that you could sing? Or did you have start
having interest in singing? Man? I was probably two and
(15:25):
a half her So seriously, man, they started putting me
on stage at churches up there. Okay, so we're going
back then because I said nine or ten, you don't
want to sing, but you've already been singing. Yeah, yeah,
I mean not Yeah. They couldn't shut me up when
I was a kid. So so you wanted to sing,
You just didn't think you would be a singer for
a career. Yeah. I always sang. Everybody everybody around my
(15:45):
hometown knew I could sing, and I was you know,
so you were good as a kid. I could carry
you tune you're like seven or eight. But you also
had no fear to sing. You would get up a
church thing. I've always had fear. Now, the stage, stage frau.
It has always been a thing for me and it
still is. I still I was still get nervous, not
as bad, but I still get pretty terrified of there
are times, but yeah, especially by myself, just in the truck,
(16:08):
around my parents or whatever. Music constantly kind of poured
out of me as a child. I always thought it
would drive me in, saying, going to bed with a
melody in your head and waking up with the one
in your head, But it hasn't. What is your parents
do musically as the what they listened to or do
they play anything? Like? How did that come down to you? Yeah? So, um,
(16:29):
I guess every one of my my immediate family family
played an instrument except my mom um. And she she
could tap the far otup steering wheel. But because she's
saying no, not really, so she kind of missed having
the musical ability. Yeah she did, she had the love,
she just didn't have the ability. And then my dad
(16:50):
and step mom were God, they were like the Jeff
and Sherry Easter in my hometown. I mean Dad could
sang his tail off. Yeah, it sounded like he sounded
a lot before he preached his voice out. Now his
voice is really deep and gravelly. But before then he
was everybody called him like the Vince Gill of Searcy County.
I mean he could really sing. So can he sing
like Vince Gill sinks of high Yeah he could, he
(17:11):
used to. Could. He can't anymore. But so your dad
was a great thing. Okay, well that makes sense. Somewhere
this had to pass down to you. Yeah, well do
you know, you know, have you ever heard of a
man name Elton Britt? So Elton Britt was the first,
the first country artist in America to ever sell a
million records. And he's my great great uncle. He is
(17:33):
my I guess my great great grandmother's brother. I think
if that's how that worked. But uh, yeah, he's got
a song called the Stars. There's a star spangled banner
waving somewhere. Um it was a huge hit back in
like World War two. Um. So so yeah, there's there's
all kinds of memorability about him in in Searcy County.
(17:53):
They're actually inducting him into the Arkansas Country Music Hall
of Fame this year, and so really cool man, so
many holy uncle Sam's great hero was getting to go there.
Well I wish that I could also live some day
(18:15):
so he could sing. Your family was singing, your dad
was a good singer. Did your dad tell you he
he you need to get up and sing like you
got you have, you have a talent, don't waste it. Yeah,
I don't ever remember him telling me that. I don't
think it was more just kind of a given if
you if you had a voice, you got up there
and used it there there. There were a lot of
people in our church who didn't have a voice at all.
He still used it. That was me in church. I
didn't have voice at all, and I was up there.
(18:36):
So I'm glad when this life is all so did
I'm trying to just kind of get a grasp on
when you started to go, even if it's not for
a career. I want to go out and sing and
make a little extra money, because that's what you were
(18:57):
doing when I met you. You were singing at a bar, right. Yeah. So,
so my first love was was drums. Got my first
set of drums and I was ten, and then I played.
I played the drums on up through my teens and
uh any sort of banded high school like rock band
or no. No. My poor parents, man, we lived in
about an eight hundred square foot two bedroom house and
I practiced five hours a day and I don't know
how they kept their sanity, but uh um. Later on,
(19:20):
I think around I was around nineteen or twenty, I
had a band called the Lost Greenoes out of Conway, Arkansas,
hit me up and I went and drummed for them
in local bars. Then I played for a band out
of my hometown called Cavin favor Um. I sang a
few while play yeah all drums. So did you guysuate
high school? Uh? Yeah? Okay? So did you go to
college at all? So okay, most people in my tennant
(19:42):
go to college either because nobody's going to college. You
worked at the mill, you know where I'm from. So
you finished high school? And do you go start working
in the oil fields then and then playing music on
the side? Yeah? Um, so I got a job in
the old fields, right. Actually I worked at a pizza
hut and at a high school right out of high school.
Um or I was in high school at the time.
As soon as I've turned eight teen, I had a
regular that came in about once a week at pizza hut,
(20:04):
and I guess he took a liking to me and
my work ethic, and you know, I just took good
care of him, him and his wife and everything. And
so the day I turned eight teen, he had me
a job lined up at a well head repair business
out of Alma, Arkansas. And I've done that for about uh.
I've done that for about a year and ended up
going in doing some other stuff trimming trees and stuff
for Rockstaw Electric. But yeah, I was doing I was
(20:25):
doing music on the side, but then only lasted a
couple of years. After the drum career was over. Me
and a buddy, uh, we started a little duo also
making drums for a local band. You're not making much money, no,
I mean honestly, playing drums for a band for an
artist for the one or two hits, you're not making
that much money. You know, you're still trying to get
your place, hopefully the art like for you. For example,
(20:46):
if you're hiring a drummer, you know you're gonna pay him,
you know, a couple hundred bucks a show or whatever
it is, if it's a good show for you. But
he's not in it for a couple hundred bucks. He's
in it because if you blow up he's going to
be your drummer the same way. You're not making a
munch of money right now, but you're doing this because
if you do blow up, then you're set. It's a
time investment. That's what it is. Anyone to create a world.
I've had to do it. I've had to do it.
(21:07):
So Okay, so you're not making a bunch of money,
but you're working Monday through Friday. What are you playing
just Friday and Saturday nights? Yeah, but it's man, it's
not we're playing like the local VFW and it's just
all our buddies and um, you know, after after the
drum thing was done, you know, we started a little
duo and that we only played maybe six or seven
shows man, before I said, you know what this, I'm
(21:27):
getting up too early during the week and then we're
staying out all night party in And it's crazy that
they didn't let you sing. If you just sing one song,
you're like I'd sing occasionally on the drums. How do
you sing one song and they not look at you
and go, oh, you're the one that should sing. Well,
It's it's like you're better than the lead singer. To
be honest, singing, just singing, Yeah, I would think so. Yeah, Well,
(21:48):
but then again, you know, you sign up as a drummer. Man.
You don't want to step on anybody's toes. If I
was a singer of that band and you started singing,
and I knew you were better than be like no
more songs for that guy, you wouldn't just saying no
their note. You're just sing one and beat me and
been like that while we have the drummer singing. You
need to focus on your So okay, you're waking up
two early in the morning, you decide you don't want
(22:09):
to wake up and then stay up all night and
play it and then do it again. Yeah, and then
I just dropped it completely. I just I just walked
away from him. Was so hard. No, what was it doing? Called? Uh,
it wouldn't. It was just it was just me and
my buddy Daniel, And what would you do? I would
sing and play the bongos. I had a little set
of bongoes on the tambourine that I would like tap
(22:30):
around on. Oh it was so bad, dude, it was
so bad. And he wouldn't do it. He played the guitar,
he'd played the guitar and sing, and then and then
when I sing, he'd sing harmony for me. And where
would you guys play? We actually played? Uh. Our biggest
gig was Jibs and Moralton. You remember Jibs and Stale
used to play it a lot. I didn't go Morrelton
was kind of a little too up north for me. Yeah. Still,
(22:51):
I used to go watch Still, like when when he
was a big deal back home years ago. Yeah, you
go watch Matt Stelle. Oh yeah, dude, that's funny. Oh yeah,
brood then absolutely phenomenal, phenomenal man um, you ever heard
his Aaron Neville impression? Like, dude, Yeah, I remember before.
I'll never forget that. I'll never forget that. I was
(23:12):
probably got. I was probably twenty years old when I
started to do that. Thinking about Matt two is because
Matt and I are buds, not too I mean, we
bond over Arkansas sports, much like Justin Moore. I mean,
especially with guys in general. We need something to bring
us together so then we can be together. I like,
(23:33):
I like Matt still, and I would if I were
hay Len Will she calls her girlfriends, let's just do
something together. However, I would never call Matt and be like, hey, buddy,
let's just do something together, like hey, the game's on,
or let's go because I took Matt to watch the
one of these football games, like we're going to the game,
let's go. But it's just a different world for guys.
(23:53):
We can't just be like I just I just haven't
been around you in a while. I need to be
around So Matt and I use arkans all sports out,
much like gotta do with a lot of my guys
with the hunting, you know, a lot of my boys
with the hunting and fishing, fantasy football, or even video games.
Like I'll be talking to some of my friends on
video games playing basketball. I don't. I like video games fine,
but mostly I like playing with my my like my friends,
(24:16):
and we talk and we've talked a little bit basketball.
But it's also like what's happening with kids, Like what's happening,
What's what's happened on live? What's happening with But Matt
steals oddly incredibly smart, like the guys. It it's so stupid.
He's so smart. But it's crazy. You go watch him
back in the day. Were you doing music at all?
When he was playing, So you were just going as
(24:37):
a fan. Yeah, yeah, just as would you ever go
to like karaoke places and singing people be like dang dud,
why don't you like trying to sing for real? Yeah? Yeah,
but you just you know, I mean, did you take
that with a grain of salt? You know, just because
you're the you're a good singer in Marshal, Arkansas? Agree?
I agree, But a great singer from Marshall, Arkansas might
(24:59):
be a good singer. And did you ever were you
a journey open arms kind of guy? Yeah, journey My
mom loved journey Man. Here I am, come on, I
can see he's doing that in the whole place. Did
you get girls by singing? Yeah, they came out to
be like, oh my god. That was kind of the icebreaker.
Yeah yeah, get tar around the camp fire on tailgate.
(25:19):
But that works every time you quit music. But how
long did you stop doing shows? Um? Oh, it had
to be you had to be eleven years, twelve years? Insane, right,
isn't that that's insane? Nuts? So, but is there this
thirst inside of you to somehow, at some point get
(25:42):
back out three minutes for fun? Or had you just
been like you know that was an old me. Yeah
there there really was, man, They're there, always was that there.
But you just man, you eat put Mike and a
living in front. I everythink. You know, you can't be
dragging in Monday morning, you know when not when gas
lives depend on you, you know, and you be in
there embody in mind. Um. But I'll tell you what
(26:03):
really re regn out of this. And I haven't had
the opportunity to tell this story very much, so I don't.
But uh, there's a girl name of Charlotte Lee here
in town. She's in Arkansas, and back back when they
cut my hours in the oil field, I was looking
for side work and you know, on top of playing
music on the side a little bit. Um kind of
had that idea in the back of my mind, but
(26:23):
it just wasn't It didn't come to fru wishing yet.
But I had a friend that knew I was looking
for sidework and she called me up one day. She
was like, Hey, I got this girl. She needs her band,
needs a ride and needs a driver in a van
to go to Billy Bob's in Texas to open up
for the Eli Young band. And she's like, pays pretty good.
So do you want to do it? And I said absolutely,
So one weekend I spent driving Charlotte down to Billy
(26:46):
Bob's and just being around that environment again, and spending
the night at Billy Bob's and watching Eli Young and
helping them load in and load out. I caught the bug, man,
I caught the bug. And it was the next week
that that up my p A system and started play. Right,
So you going to help somebody else get down there,
it's what helps you get here. Absolutely yeah. I was
(27:08):
eight up by the time I got back. I was like,
oh my god, I want to do this again. So
when you get home you think I just watched it,
it reminds me of how much I loved it. What's
what's the first step? Then? Do you start going let
me write some songs? You get an old guitar out? Yeah,
you find something you can sale so you can afford
to to buy to buy the stuff that it. You
(27:28):
know that it takes to do that, and and yet, man,
I'll tell you my first gig out Bobby was what
did you still have a guitar? Though? Um? Yeah, yeah,
I had an old guitar and how was it? Is awful?
I still got it. Yeah, but it was good enough
to go and play the bar. And is that what
you did was good enough? Yeah? So what was what
was the first first per I won't even say show.
(27:48):
What was your first performance back after sitting out for
ten years? So, uh, we discussed the other day. I
mean you discussed my Buddies restaurant run my buddy round
dressed and Leslie Arkansas, and uh he offered to let
me come play up there. And it was a little
sooner than I expected, So I had to cram learning
(28:09):
a two hour set list. You know, hadn't done this
in TOLF thirteen years. And uh, I get up there
and I do pretty good my first set. Now the
town comes out. I mean, of course everybody knows I
can say, so people came wat. Yeah, so people came out.
I mean the place was packed and um, coming out
of retirement packing out Ryan's main Street grill baby. Um. Anyways,
(28:34):
to get up there and in my first set goes
goes pretty good for you know, first polished upe as
I am, which is not very uh. But the second set,
Now Ryan's got a mom and her name is Dicky,
and she's just she's this big sweetheart. You ever meet
in your laugh. But she's got a little lory set there.
Now what does that mean. I mean she's just got
a little she get a little meaneness center, you know,
but she just sweeties can beat. And she when I
(28:56):
come off for a break after my first set, she
walked up and she to me a Scotch glass full
of patron was fault in lime as she said there
and I turned it up, Bobby, and that was that
was the biggest mistake of playing them. He's a industry
to date. Because I got back up there and by
the time I got about my fourth song, that drone
(29:18):
hit me, and I think about a third of the
people left. I got it. No, I don't know if
you're being you know, facetious exaggerating a little bit. You
do you think that you were slurring your guitar playing
wasn't a goain? Yeah, I think I started probably missing
chords and slurring a little bit and uh yeah, and
(29:39):
the hometown was pretty disappointed to me. I'll come down
off the stage and and I told Ryan, I was like, dude,
I think this is I don't think this is for me, man,
I don't think this is from a period. Yeah, grand
opening grand clothes. I was drunk, Yeah, I was drunk,
but I was humiliated something something fierce. What do you
tell you? He's like, no, dude, no, you're meant to
do that. So it's next. What did you do after that?
(30:01):
You get there again? Yeah? Yeah, I ended up playing
rhymes a few more towns and the local VFW. There's
always the VFW. Man, Um, what will they give you
fifty bucks or anything? Yeah? Yeah, you know tips and
fifty bucks, or they charge a little cover and you
know a couple of three bucks and you make make
gas money. Man, That's really what what it was for me, dude.
It was all about by being able to buy my
(30:22):
launch at work, you know, gas money, and also some
sort of fulfillment, right like you had the bug, you
needed the bug to be fature. Yeah. Yeah, So at
what point did you make that video? Did you start
to play bars and make us start making a little
more money as you started to get better? Was there
like a scene near where you were and I saw
where you could play a bar They give you a
hundred hundred bucks though, that's really yeah, the crowds. Once
(30:44):
I stuck with it, the crowd started kind of turning
out and and local businesses. You know, words spreads pretty
fast in those little towns, and you know on Facebook
and stuff, and I think I had about five followers
from my Facebook, so um, word was getting out and
I started playing some restaurants and bars and and Conway
and Clinton and stuff, and um, yeah it was. It
was pretty wild, man. Look back on when I heard
(31:06):
you playing that that what bar was that you're playing in?
When I heard that clip the stable to one, I
was in my bedroom at my house. Oh that wasn't
I guess that's right. That's right. I was thinking of
another video of you playing at a bar somewhere that
someone had sent me. But that's right, it wasn't your bedroom.
What kind of places were you playing at that point,
same same stuff. Yeah, just little restaurants and little bars, man.
I mean mostly it was like like if I played
(31:28):
a bar in in Marshall likes a place like Ryan's.
You know, people came to listen. If I played a
bar in Conway, a third of the people came to listen,
and the other two thirds were just there to eat
their meal. And yeah, I was background noise. Did you
think that you had a career at all? Or you
the day you recorded that in your room, did you
have a just a sliver that you could do this
(31:49):
for a living? That's that's still being honest. Yea honest No, sir,
not not ever, not every one time that did it
ever cross my mind? Hey man, you might have a
chance in Nashville. You might have a chance with might
to live in doing this. Have you ever been up
here to Nashville. I've never seen the town. So one
night I'm on Facebook and a friend said, hey, you
(32:09):
see this guy heat Standers. He's from, you know, around
where we're from, obviously, And I was like, uh no,
let me watch it. And ever I get videos, good god.
I mean, if somebody sings, period, I'm tagged in it, dude,
any video, any video I comment on TikTok or Instagram,
Hey dude, can you tag Bobby and let so TikTok's
(32:29):
but Facebook, you know, people leave music on my car
if they know, you know. But it's I mean, that's
the tree that I grew. So I ain't hating the tree,
but sometimes trail dropping on and your head like that hurts,
but it's it's a great tree. But I was like,
all right, let me let me look it's because somebody
from where I'm from is gonna get a little more
of a look than somebody not, at least a first look.
(32:51):
And I was like, let me see this guy in
good And I heard you and I was like, wow, guy,
it's pretty good. Then I remember I messaged you on
Facebook and just said, hey, heats this by bone and
you didn't message me back for a little bit because
I think maybe you thought it was a spam account. No,
I was actually on the phone with me. Yeah, I
was on the phone with my tour manager because he's
the one that called me and told me you wrote
me because he wrote me on my music page and
(33:13):
he called me to music page or is he was
he he was part of it. Yeah, he was on
it and he saw me message. He saw he saw you.
I actually saw the message pop up after he had called.
I got off and the banner was still up. Um.
But I end up calling him back and I was like, man,
I don't think that's I think that's a spam account.
I think that. So then one of my producers, Morgan
(33:34):
or Elea was Morgan. So Morrigan now works with me
on my management team. But she message he was like, no,
that's really him. And so you and I talked and
I don't remember if I said hey it was was
it like hey, get to Nashville tomorrow or this week
or I don't remember. Man, that's such a blur. But
what's crazy. What's crazy is that when Morgan answered the phone,
(33:57):
or when I asked the phone, it was Morgan, like, dude,
I felt like I knew her. I've been listening, I dude,
I've been listening to you guys for five years. I'm
talking religiously every morning from six to ten. Dude, that
was it. I mean, it work by myself. It could
have been a person pranking you as me too, right, Yeah, yeah,
I get it. I get it. Yeah. And I remember
telling Markan, hey, let's get him in Nashville and you
drove overnight. If I remember, I don't think so. Here's
(34:18):
the deal. Here's why I don't think so, and I
don't remember it very well. But better story if you
say that. But well, I know it kind of is.
I know what it kind of is, and I like,
I don't want to kill it. But um, so here's
the deal. Here's the truth. Man. When my phone went
off and it was you, I was sitting down. I
was sitting there in my living room with my pin
in my hand and my guitar in my lap, rotting Bloodline,
(34:38):
Rotting Bloodline. I had a first verse and a half
of course written. When the that's the first song I
ever wrote, dude, Like, yeah, well, so I tried to
write a couple of songs in my early twenties, back
when I was doing the show thing and they were
so bad, dude, They're so bad that I did never
try again. I just thought it wasn't for me, and
I will. I think it was Sunday. I think it
(34:59):
was a sun you reach up because I woke up
that day like, man, I ain't got nothing to do.
Let's start, Let's try to write a song. Because the
video just went viral and it kind of inspired me
a little bit. And so that was crazy. The first
time I've ever picked up a pen in thirteen fourteen years,
phone goes off and it's the DJ that I listened
to every morning, the Morning show I listened to every
morning for five years. You know, it's like, I don't
(35:20):
know what kind of time and anyways, no listen. That's crazy, dude,
that's crazy. It could be some sort of divide something.
I just don't like to throw myself in the mix
with Yep, me and God. We worked that out. We
had a little talk. I knew it Bobby making phone
calls uhum. But but no, I ended up calling my
buddy Jamie Jones as soon as I got the phone
with you, um, the next day, because you invited me
(35:42):
down the same one of my songs, will do. I
didn't have a song. I have half a song, So
I freaked out. Dude, I agreed, but I was freaking
out and said I didn't know you didn't have a
bad dude, I didn't. Uh. And I call my buddy
Jamie Jones, which lives in Dardenell and I think we
spent a day on it. And because I think it
was only like two days you gave me to get
to Nashville. Um. But I that's why I say I
don't think it was over. Not because me and Jamie
(36:02):
finished the song like the next day. And then I
was sitting in the motel room the night before the
show learning how to play the Dying Thing and trying
to remember the words. You know, So what was that
was that bloodline? We'll get a clip of this here
here you going. He's the last name, County Ross, He's
(36:23):
got it, Challis tam Challis ton Nes seeing to its
fine jo away, trying to find a little reason. Who
das booth rocks over done such a good job. I
(36:46):
mean it sounds like a rock song. Yeah, sounds like
a cut your boy singing a rock song. So you're
in Nashville. Obviously you drove overnight. I was like, get on,
you jump in the car immediately, drow It's fast. You
could alway in Nahville. I think I'm gonna go with
that story, though Mike I was thinking of I think
I'm sticking with that. ConTroll with it, bro. Yeah, I
really felt that way that that was it. I could
just tell people that me and Jamie finished it over
(37:06):
not in the truck. Yes, I remember again, I'm gonna
tell you what I remember. It may not be as accurate, foggy,
but I remember thinking you were you were good. But
I wanted people to tell you if you were any
good or not like that, because again I was biased.
You grew up or I grew up and you were good.
(37:27):
I was like, superstar, just go ahead and get it
to him. So why brought in three people right, Brian
ratt Um, help me, brother, No, you're wrong guy. George,
Now George was George there? I think was there? It
was Brian Rott, somebody, a lady from Sony and then
(37:50):
um it was a guitar for was the guitar for
what's his name? Oh it's on tap my tongue. Man. Yeah,
I don't know. I don't even I don't remember. Lauren
Jo yeah, Laura, Okay. All I remember is I brought
in three people that were nice enough to come up
and and give you. Christian Bush. It was Christian Boys,
(38:12):
that's right, who's like a dear friend. That's why I
called him in. And he also has so many number ones. Yeah,
I was Christian. He was in town, which is which
was rare. Yeah, Christian Bush, somebody from Sony and who
else lt It was l LT and Brian. So you
come in, you perform, and didn't you leave with one
(38:33):
of them or like go somewhere with one of them? Yeah?
First I went and walked around Sony with with lt
UM and they liked you. They didn't have to do that. Yeah. No,
they introduced me all the staff and then and then uh,
Brian said to call him after we left there. So
we went hung with Brian at Universal and went up
to his office and sit and listen to a bunch
of uncut Chris Stapleton stuff and a bunch of uncut
Eric Church stuff and it was awesome. That's that's gotta
(38:54):
be cool, dude. It was crazy. I left left there
with a stack of vinyls. I could barely get out
the door. Man, it was soul killer. That my first
trip to Nashville and I get to go do that. Really,
that was crazy. So how did it? Because I've known
George for a long time, how did you guys get
into contact? Um? So I met my management pretty early on,
(39:16):
which is Pete Hartungue and L three and he managed
he manages Justin Moore. Go right, Um, Justin is on
George's label, and Pete had told George about me early on.
They didn't get too excited, man, really, Um, but George
did come out when we went out to cut five sides,
which Bloodline was was one of them, and then Proud
(39:37):
and Down the South, which we ended up releasing independently. Um,
when we went out to cut those at the Castle,
George ended up just popping up And I was like well,
who's that And he's like, oh, that's that's the head
of Valerie, and that's that's that's you know, that's that's
Justin's guy. And I was like, awesome, man. And uh
so Georgia ended up hainting out with the whole day.
And George has just kind of kept tabs on this
(39:58):
thing the whole time, you know, this whole time, he's
just always kind of been, you know, in the background. Um.
And then he got me a meeting with Borsheatow one
day and I had four songs total in my catalog. Man.
I played Borshetow three songs and he was like, well,
you got any more? And I was like, well I
got one more and he's like, well place your full catalog,
you know. But uh yeah, George has just always kind
(40:19):
of been there. Man. Did you get a publish your
deal first? Yeah? Yeah, at Sony I think they changed it.
They changed the name the other day to Sony Sony
Music Publishing or something. Um, so that's gonna be pretty cool.
At the pinion to write songs, hecky, you didn't write
a song until Oh no, dude, that's what's crazy. And
I told Pete, you know, man, I had you know,
being being established and having a life there in Arkansas
(40:40):
and having bills to pay and all that and not
being able to just jerk up and and move. Um,
you know, I told Pete, you know, man, I'm I'm
not some spring chicken. You know, I need a paycheck
before I make that leap. And sure enough, man, we
get the We got the pub deal before I even
had an address in Tennessee, which is which is something something.
And to be said for Sony there, how crazy was
(41:02):
it to quit your job like a work to come
and do music? It was terrifying, dude, Yeah, it was terrifying. Yeah,
that took a lot of soul searching, man, it really did,
because that's you don't walk away from a job like
that in Arkansas because once you once you leave it,
you never get it back. You've got a hundred guys
behind you that are that are just just dedicating, just
just hard working, that that are waiting to take your position. Um,
(41:24):
so I knew that there was there was no return,
if I know, if I jumped in it was it
was both feet first and but also how exciting it
was amazing? Right? Yeah? So but did you write songs
to drive back and forth for a while. Did you
come to Nashville in Arkansas? Yeah, a year and a half.
A year and a half. I would get up this
is my schedule. I'd get up on Sunday and I
drive was it about six and a half fires? Drive
(41:47):
six and a half fires to Nashville and I'd write Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday,
and typically Thursday morning, and then I would drive home
Thursday night and then we play show Friday and shows
Friday and Saturday, and then I drive back to nash
On on Sunday. Um. But it was just my buddy
Mark Allan Springer. He's from Wiener, Arkansas. And do you
know Mark? I know, well, yes, some New Jones Burro, um,
(42:14):
but Mark Mark wrote, Um, Mark wrote two Spars and
Hurricane Workcorn don't grow all that. And Mark kind of
took me under his wayne and um let me stay
at his place for for a while down in Summertown.
And so that that was a rough goal, man, I mean,
putting in all those hours and all that Winshield time
was it was, it was rough. But what was to move? Um?
(42:36):
I knew it had to be here. Man. You don't
make it, You don't make it. Nash without being here.
You just don't. I mean, you gotta be here because
when the you know, when the if you gotta if
you got a pub deal or you gotta you know,
you got a record deal man. When when it's just
like any other job, when they say they need something,
you gotta have it. You gotta be there. You gotta
do it. M big move man. Because you're right, you
(42:56):
weren't nineteen. Oh that's it, that's really all. You'd already
established what you had your life. Oh, I could already
see that. The I could already see the rest of
my life ahead of me. I really could just just
out there just growing old and watching the dogs and
the kids in the grass grow. Remember running into you?
Maybe it was in Northwest Arkansas. Justin was playing at
(43:19):
the JJ's beer garden. So it went to Justin and
I went to razorback game that day and Justin Moore
and he was like Hey, He's like, hey, come on
out and sing a song with me. I'm gonna be
at Jjay's. And I was like, I was gonna go
home that night, but I love Justin. Justin been for
a long time, and I was like all right, as
what do you mean to say. He goes, well, what
(43:41):
do you know? And I was like, what if we
do dust on the bottle? He's like perfect. So I
go out and I ran into you there, and I
think you were going about to move up there. Yeah.
Actually I'll never forget that because I walked her out
by you and you go, hey, dude, you're just gonna
walk by me. The dude. But yeah, the dude that,
the dude that had a hand and change in your
laugh forever for this now got you a pub bill.
(44:06):
Don't even know you anymore. So when did the record
deal come about? Like the artist deal? Um, I think
it was. I think it was about this time last
year or a little a little more. What what what
inspired that from them? Like? What do you think they
saw in you? What are they telling you? Like, this
is why we're gonna sign you to an artist? Honestly, honestly,
it was another video. I hate to just put it
(44:27):
all off on that, but uh, you know, because we
were we were buggets, Scott, you know, we we wanted
we wanted to be with Valerie and uh, you know
we're bugging George and and uh we kind of gave
him some room to breathe. After a couple a couple
of meetings and uh, I ended up doing a show.
I don't remember where it was, but um it was.
It was that a place was there was some really
good acoustics and really cool environment, and that buddy just
(44:47):
set a cell phone up and record me and my
guitar player, Casey doing Faithfully, and that video went viral. Um.
I think in two days we had over a million
views on it. And so I screenshot it and in
it over to Pete, my manager, and he's forwarded onto George,
which it eventually ended up in Scott's hands, and Scot's like,
all right, that's that's enough. I've seen. I've seen enough.
(45:08):
Let's let's pull him in. I'm I'm sitting in Uh,
I'm standing in my backyard actually with a post hole
digger in my hand, building the fence for my dogs
and phone rings and Peet's like, hey man, you gotta,
you gotta you're sitting down and I was like, no,
I need to and he's like, probably you just got
a record deal day, so damn it's awesome. Yeah. What's
funny too about Faithfully is that when you play the rhyman.
I was like he can play with the ryman. That's
(45:29):
what you did in the freaking crowd and melted. Yeah,
you killed that song. I gotta tell you that. Thanks
for having me there, because that's people when people ask
me the peak so far, that's the peak for me
so far. Yeah. That and and not only did I
play the rhyme? Did I standing ovation man? That that
I as about as out of body is I've ever came. Actually,
(45:50):
I'll never I'll never forget them stressing the point to
exit stage right. When we were done, exit stage right.
They told us like five times. And I was so
out of my mind from that crowd clapping for me
that accident stage left. I got shovel up by everybody
that was waiting to go on stage. Excuse me, excuse me,
excuse me, pardon me. I think you might be wrong,
(46:12):
but I think I've had you out twice because I
had you came in. You played at my little rock
theater show and then the rhyme and the only two times. Right, Um,
that's about right, Robin's Center, Yeah, no show, Yeah, that's it, right,
I guess. So my point is you're a hundred percent
of getting standing ovations because both crowds stood up. Oh yeah, dude,
(46:34):
oh wow, forget about that. Yeah, And I made the
joke before. I don't like to go after him. He
came to my three thousand seed Theater is my home crowd.
I was so pumped and they're like exhausted because he
just went on, that's awesome. Man. So you're you got
(46:55):
a place now, like you're here, this is home. Yeah.
I was talking about that with Todio folks today. Somebody
asked me today, like, what's what's been the greatest thing
about moving to Nashville. And the greatest thing about moving
to Nashville to me is man. You know, of course,
not to go too far into like how I was
raising stuff and you know the pennycost the world and
all that. But when you grow up like that, it
separates you. That's your whole goal in life is to
(47:17):
be separate from the world. And you tend to feel
like an outcast and you feel you never seem to
fit in or feel comfortable in your own skin. And uh,
you know, I'm not real big on small talk and
I never have been. I'm really bad to you know,
to uh to meet someone and then dig too deep
too early or or as Christ able to sit on
(47:38):
your show one time, pull the curtain back too far,
I think, um, right off the bat. And now that
I've come to Nashville and I've got to be around
songwriters and this industry, I think it all makes sense. Man.
I think I've always I didn't know it, but I
think I've always kind of seen the world through the
eyes of a songwriter, and uh they I think we
(47:59):
tend to overland over analyze things and and to really
look deeper into into the heart and into things. And uh,
it's it's oddly enough, man, moving from those dark mountains
to Nashville. I feel at home here. Man. It's weird.
You ever be out of work and have a great
song idea back in the day and then you just
(48:21):
held onto it or did all kind of stuck o
kind I sucked. I think I've always had I think
I've always had indecent ideas passed by my passed by
my you know, passed by me to grab out this guy.
But you know, I didn't have the knowledge back then
to write it down. And have you done any lessons
to learn how to not wear your voice out? No?
I actually, uh, I actually just started established my my
(48:43):
relationship with the folks of Vanderbilt. Um, I actually go
for my second appointment in in a couple of days
for them to start just just teaching me. I mean,
because that is my money, that's that's my that's my tool.
It's not And if there's no shame because you're not
going to hey, don't teach, You're not having to be
tired of sing. It's like teach, we had to sing
so I can sing for thirty years efficiently. Yes, Um,
(49:03):
that's just it, man. And I'm still at the point
in my career were Um, I'm still doing two our
shows a lot of times to two and a half
hour shows. And you know, most of your most of
your big acts and your openers don't have to sing
that long. Um. And so it's men. You do two
of those shows a weekend. It's rough on you, man,
especially you know the way I sang in my style
of saying, which has changed substantially. I've I've learned to
(49:24):
relax and not pushed so hard and all that, But um,
I definitely still need to help. I think I'll always
need to help you. Is it true that you don't
follow razorback football anymore? Man, I don't. I don't dude,
growing up like I did him out here, So where's
the door? Sir? Um Man, I tell you, growing up
like I did and not having sports in my life,
(49:47):
you know it just I was. My heroes were Fred Bear,
you know, the bow hunters and um you know guys
like that that were that really that really stood out
to me. Chuck Adams was another great bow hunter back
when I was a kid. Was like Bill Dance. Yeah. Yeah,
well build answers a fisherman? You know, yeah, say did
(50:10):
you have fisherman heroes too? Not necessarily, it was more
so because because back back then you had VH. My
uncle had a VHS uh like cabinet. He didn't know
I knew Bill Dancers. I'm sorry, brother, and I'm sorry.
I know where do you think I grew up? What's
wrong with you? No? Man? Bill Dance a Fisherman? Yeah.
(50:33):
I was making the point of was it just hunters
or did you also have Sorry, we watched Bill Dance
every Sunday. You moved so fast, I'll just try to
keep up all the day. Go ahead. I was trying
to keep up. So your your heroes because sports, sports
wasn't brought into your life, were people that were great
at things that were brought into your life. That's interesting.
(50:54):
I never you and your dad. You dad still alive,
You're still close? Not okay, So I never had a
dad right ever, and I had. I pursued sports because
other men liked sports, and I felt like that gave
me something to talk to them about and something to
bond over since when I had nobody to go. Because later,
(51:16):
hunting and fishing was very much a step dad thing
with me, who was like, that's all we did, right,
It was all I mean, depending on what season it was,
depending on if we were in a blind, if we
were in a tree stand, if we But for me,
I went after sports because I was just looking for
some sort of mail connection. You're right to man, because
like I'm sitting here the other day, and and Adam
(51:36):
Hambrigs here in Stales here and you guys are all
talking sports and I'm just kind of and and the
thing is, man, I love to watch football, like I
love college ball. I don't really watch the NFL, but
I love to watch college football. But I just I don't.
I don't put force the brain power to keep up
with them all. Well, and you never had to write
it's not ingrained in you at this point. Could trust me,
if I could at times not be a fan, I
(51:57):
wouldn't because it sucks. Man's that second half, dude. But
it's heartbreaking, you know, because you know, I lived in
Florida for a while and I was never Yeah, I
lived in Florida for a couple of years in my twenties,
and I was never as rabid a razorback fan as
I was when I moved to Florida and got surrounded
by Gator fans. I had to be. And also, it's
(52:19):
just home, right, like, that's that's from and that's all
we got, man, that that's it. Man. I have so
much pride where I'm from. I thought it too, man,
And I think that's man. I think that that Arkansas
kind of a little Texas in that way. They were
very proud of where we're from, especially if you're you know,
if you're from those little small towns, dude, there's that
place is special, dude. I mean I walk I step
(52:39):
into those art mountains, but and I'm on holy ground.
That place means something to me. That's been the hardest
part of the whole move is realizing how attached I
was to that geography there in that land. So you're
you're about to go to for radio ads, dude, march yates,
we're recording this on a Monday, right, so a week
from today Old school was in goes to radio. It's
(53:02):
been out for a bit. But then there's a concentrated
effort by your team. They only listen to team only
has so many so much time, and so many resources,
but they're gonna use their time and resources to try
to make this song a hit. So what is that?
This is the next step in your overall journey, Like
you're freaking having a song go to radio by real
life label. No, man, it's nuts. And I got a
(53:22):
team that do their beasts. I mean they are They're crazy.
I mean, dude, I get I'll wake up the emails
and I have emails coming in after i'd go to sleep.
Do you feel the support? Yeah? Yeah, I feel so.
Because here's the deal, man, and this is this is
just me being honest, dude. I think when they signed
me it was more like a single deal. Let's let's
(53:43):
cut a single, see how it does, and then we
decide whether we want to keep it or not. And
I think as we progressed and I got to do
in some some live performances in front of the staff
and stuff. You know, they ship me off to Cancoon
like two weeks after they after they signed us to
do the year and you would know what to do
the year and deal for Big Machine. You know, they
have a big left. Yeah, it was really cool. Man.
I've never been on the country obviously, and uh, I
(54:04):
got to go down there and do that. And I
remember when it all happened. Man, it was really cool
because I got up there and I sang old schools
in and then I sang them common ground um and
gotta standing old from them. And at the end of that,
I walked down and George walked over to me and
he's like, hey, man, Scott wants to talk to you.
And so Scott pulled me over the side and he's like, listen,
we're gonna we're gonna cut We're gonna cut four and
(54:26):
we're gonna give you any producer you want. We're gonna
do anything. You're fixing the priority And it all changed
right there, boom, just like that. And so now I
feel like I am a priority there and they are
really stepping up, stepping out, and working their butts off.
For me, here is a common ground from the common
ground DP. We're all we're all strong, we're all right,
(54:49):
we're all wrong, we all in common ground. Good one man,
Thank you sir. You wrote that, you wrote all four
of you. So that's that man, Yeah, calm ground? Was
that one that you stepped back from? Though? And you're like,
I can't believe I helped draft that. I can't believe.
(55:10):
Here is I can't undo? I do gain all the world?
Do you sit that? You never? Man? He's such fun.
Look at your bull. You're done, have done it again.
It's damn good bad. You won't gonna turn this truckle around.
(55:31):
You don't stay tr but we both know the truth.
You can't. Here is one more. This is love needs
making for his knees tick. Just like all the time
(55:52):
it's Wan sick, it's look knees making an So I
pulled up a post here February for February eleven. This
is by you, y'all. Exclamation exclamation, exclamation, exclamation. I just
(56:14):
got off the phone with Morrigan, the producer of the
Bobby Bone Show. I'm freaking out. Tune in tomorrow morning
at am kissing ninety six. If you're in arkansas'll be
speaking with Bobby. So maybe I talked to you on
the phone the next day and then I was like,
get here by Friday. That starts to see him, right, Huh, Yeah,
that was it. Listen, man, I couldn't be prouder, not
of you before you like you are. You know what
(56:35):
people call the American dream, and you're just right in
the middle of it. Yeah, if you ten years and
you if you're living a life that you feel like, man,
I feel good. I don't care if you're rich or not,
but it's like I feel good with what I've accomplished.
That's the American dream to come from wherever and go wherever, up, down, left, right.
But you get to make that call and you're living
it and you're in the middle of it, and I'm
(56:57):
just so proud to see someone like you because you're
You're everybody I grew up around. I know, have you
ever been to a barbecue? You've met me, you know
what it's like, and you know it's like me too.
When I go back home, I'm like, hey, you guys
can do whatever you want. If I can get out
of here because I chose to, or if you want
(57:18):
to stay here and you choose to, you can do
whatever you want as long as you make that decision
to pursue it. It may not be tomorrow. Something may
come to you five years and you have to make
a tough decision. You gotta make a tough decision. Like
I'm proud that you made decisions. I'm proud that you're
starting to feel like people care about you in this industry.
I'm proud that they're giving you a shot there, paying
(57:39):
bills for you. It's just it's just working out. Man.
I'll just appreciate you giving me a chance. Bobbly, I
really day, that's all I gave it, right, I said,
I just said, people open a little cracks for me,
and then I kicked a hole in the wall once
I had a crack. And that's what you're doing. Yeah,
I think it was. I was talking to somebody here
while back about about my story and how it's how
it's more than anything, it's really a story preparation, you know,
(58:01):
and so so you're ready, Just be ready. You know,
you may not be able to create create the opportunities
that you you need, but somebody else may be able
to and you may not be able to dictate the
time that it happens. Just be ready to do it, man.
And that's that's really what this this whole thing has
just been a series of small challenges and hills and
and getting over stage fright and nerves and you know,
(58:25):
swallowing the fear and dealing with it and and now
we're here, you know. But and that's really all it's
been is they they open the doors and I walk
through a man. But you just gotta be ready to
deliver when the time comes, and you gotta say yes,
you got to, man, because you won't get questions anymore,
you won't get asked anymore. Even if you don't feel
like you can do it, say yes, I figure it out.
(58:45):
That's right, That's right. I mean the last thing I
always said this man, even before I had the opportunity
to do this. I mean, it's I've never want, I
just want. I just my biggest fear in life is
sitting on my front porch when I'm a dy thinking well,
what if you know, what if I my debt decision
and decided to give that a shot and took that risk.
You know, that's That's really what it is for me. Man,
(59:06):
I just want to be proud of that. When I'm
when I'm sitting on the porch, we don't speak, you know,
I tell you I believe in you. Well, thanks, Bob.
I do Heat Sanders Music, follow him on Instagram Heat
Sanders Music, and hopefully get to know him now because
he'll walk right by you and forget who you are.
(59:26):
That's like that. I was like, dude, turn turn around.
I'm right, what's happening. I'll tell you what when I
get this. When I get this, these lockdowns lifted this
pandemic under control. I ain't walking by a soul, dude,
I'm hugging. I'm hugging every person that gets in arms
linked to me. Oh man, I'm proud. I'm proud and proud.
All right, we spent an hour here. I'm just probably
the longest interview've ever done. Yeah, probably, I mean, have
you done an hour interview with anybody? Straight up things?
(59:47):
So it's tough. You really got to be with the
pro you know, you really do know, you really got
to be with the Like, what's it like to be
on Bobby? It's like, I don't know. I just take
his hand and just kind of follow wherever it goes.
All right, you guys should get Calming Ground the EP. Uh,
it's got four songs on it. We played all four
of them here, you guys, if you if you hear
this months later, this is our podcast too. Uh. He'll
be out touring. Go see him. If he's in town
(01:00:09):
opening for somebody or doing a club show or um.
Just go see him. You will be impressed for sure.
All right. There he is at Heath Sanders Music, Heath Sanders.
Everybody
Hey, guys, welcome to episode to eighty four. We'll talk
to Heat Sanders. He was working in oil field. I
think he'd never played music again, hadn't played in years.
Next thing you know, he's getting santin ovations everywhere he goes.
So it's a great story. Hang out for that. And
here are the top five songs of the week that
I think you should check out. At number five, last
week's guest it was Brooke Eden has a new song
(00:24):
called Sunroof. If you want to hear a story, go
back and listen on last week's episodes fantastic. Here's the
clip of Sunroof. At number four, new artist and TikTok
(00:46):
or Ashley Cook put out a new song called Sunday
Morning kind of Saturday Night. I need Sunday Saturday Night.
She's got a little heat on her right now, and
good for her. We had her on a few weeks ago,
was it. Yeah, Yeah, she got a little heat on her.
(01:07):
People were like going, Okay, I don't know if she's
signed anywhere yet, but she's probably getting some interest. If
you can develop a TikTok following, they'll sign you. I
think we saw that with Priscilla Block I mean, you
gotta be good, but it's like your own little mini
business there with a TikTok following. The only weird thing
is I see some of these TikTokers, even people, they'll go,
I'm number one in the iTunes country chart, and I'm like,
(01:28):
nobody downloads songs anymore. That's like, you know, I think
she was one of them is doing that too, and
she's killing it. And this is not to take away
from that, but I'm like, nobody looks at iTunes country
that unless you're on it. Nobody looks at the iTunes chart.
But she's killing it. Good for her. At number three,
Thomas Read announced he's releasing a new album called Country
Again side a It'll be at April. He released two
(01:51):
new songs today called growing Up and Want It Again.
Here's a clip of Wanted Again this We're Good six
shot number two. This week, Randa Lambert announced she's releasing
a new project called The Marfa Tapes on May seventh.
(02:14):
She released a song from the album today called in
His Arms. It is Some Half Man and down Easy
Breaking Horses It San Tome and number one is Gray Robinson.
She has a new single called Happy She was on
the morning show last week, and she was so good.
And here's the clip of Happy, I'm Happy, Happy, I'm Happy.
(02:39):
It's s some time and that is so searching. Never
done me. I would ever found the real pain, but
I didn't. Ever's where It's gone. I can see shoved.
(03:04):
Some other songs that check out that didn't make the
top five, but Travis Tripp put out a new song
called Smoking a Bar, Luke Bryan released a new song
called Drink a Little Whiskey Down. Palmley and Blanco Brown
put an acoustic version of Just the Way, and Maroon
five has a new song called Beautiful Mistakes with Megan
the Stallion new albums. I don't know who any of
these people are? Oh Kings of Leon, Jay Gonzalez, of
(03:26):
dry By Truckers, I don't know. I don't know. Do
you know these people are? I know the Kings of
Leon too, I know. I just look at the whole list. Yeah,
I wish I knew more who these people were. Willie
Nelson has a new book coming out called Letters to
America June twenty nine. It's an inspiring collection of letters
from Willie to his readers about what it means to
be an American. That would be a pretty good coffee
(03:47):
table book. I bet like it's not something you're gonna
want to sit down and read all the time. But
I think if you're just chilling board, you want a
real letter or two. You know, I probably get that one. Well,
my favorite song, second favorite ever song, it's close my
favorite song you ever stopped this train? But John Mayer
blue Eyes Crying in the Rain could be number two.
(04:08):
Ain't No Sunshine. There's a two A and two B
Kenny Rogers Number one's coming to Vinyl for the first time,
which I do have that CD in my jukebox, VINYLOYL.
And also I'm not cool Vinyl. I don't like Eddie.
I get on Instagram and I'm like, it's Sunday morning,
here's the Vinyl whatever he does, And here's the story
(04:32):
behind how Vinyl was pressed back in the twelve Can
hear the crash? Roman number once said vinyls like final,
it's fine and final here it is Eddie. What are
you doing? Uh? CMA Fest canceled for a second year
in a row. If this festival would have been scheduled
another forty five days later, I think they would have
had it close. I'm just saying it was in that
(04:52):
time period. It was June. If it would have been
late July August, I think they would have still had it,
but it would just schedule for June. Felt bad for
them they had to cancel it. We are right on
the edge of beating this thing right on it. Garth
Brooks reschedules his Charlotte date. Gotta big goal arena show
(05:14):
there that's happening. Miranda Lambert is opening a Broadway bar.
Should be the first female country stry to have a
bar on Lower Broadway. What's an n f T. So
it's like I was trying to understand it to you're
reading about it. It's basically like, is it cryptocurrency? Like cryptocurrency? Yes,
their services Kings and Leon released their new album titled
(05:38):
When You See It Yourself, which we just talked about,
in the form of a non fungible token that's n
f T, becoming the first band ever do so. They're
types of cryptocurrencies, but instead of holding money, they can
hold assets like art, tickets, and music. So do you
buy it and get the token? You get like different
layers of it, yes, like tickets, front row seats, stuff
(05:58):
like that I bet it's cool. Well, I just don't
know it sounds cool. Uh. And then finally Blanco Brown's
talking about his accident, the motorcycle um accident opens up
about the head on motorcycle accident. They killed him back
in August. He said, there's nothing more than land there
and hearing your doctors say, if we don't get him blood,
he's not gonna make it. Dang, Blanco said, please don't
(06:18):
let me leave. He says he has good days and
painful days, but tries to remain upbeat. He's been in
the studio working on an album which you come out
later this year, and him and Palmly are killing it
right now with this song. All right, there's your news.
Enjoy today's podcast. I love talking with Heath Sanders. You're
gonna like it. It's long, but if it wasn't good,
I would have shut it down, you know, twenty minutes
into a but it's good. Check it out. Thank you.
(06:38):
Guess with Heath Sanders right now, one of my favorite
new artists in country music. But before we went on,
I was reading a story about UH festivals and they
think Live Nation is going Hey. We think by mid
July we're going again. Yeah, dude, we're ready to. But
but but it's like they need the proper medical clearance
to do that. Everybody, all artists want to do it. Yeah,
(07:00):
everybody wants to get out and perform again. I want
to get out and do comedy in theaters. But we
can't until the promoters have less liability. That's really so.
And then everybody's gonna have to be vaccinated. Right if
you're gonna go performing around folks, we're gonna have to
start a show we're vaccinated. How was it a talking
(07:20):
to a therapist yesterday and she was like, yeah, I
can see you. You can come in two weeks after
your your second vaccination. So now things starting to happen
where people are going, hey, we need to get your vaccine.
But that being said, everybody's getting on with me. I
got friends around here that are my age, a couple
years younger, and they're like, and you don't have it yet,
No I don't. I'm like, shut up, super tall, athletic
(07:48):
and got its vaccination. And what people are saying, and
I believe most of them, is that they have found
places with extra because unless you're sixty five right now,
you won't get one, or a healthcare worker or most teachers. Um,
but let's go. Let's where do I get the extra ones?
I don't want to go to waste. I'll drive two
hours right now just because I want to get back
(08:09):
to work. Uh. And it's it's even more than one. Man.
We really have to you know that, we just have to.
But we have to let the people that are a
little more compromised shot at it first. But if if
they're wasted away, I want to go get one of
those wasting away or a wink wink, or just turn
my head somebody stabs me something. Wait, what what's happening here? Yeah?
(08:29):
I just want to go back home and hug my
grandma man and feel feel good about it. Where's your
grandma really, Marshall? Have you seen her at all? Uh?
No you haven't. I'll talk to her on the phone.
My stepdad, who's sixty five, he was really squirmish about
seeing anyone because he's older and if he gets it,
like Caitlin's grandfather, h he almost died of it. The
(08:51):
hospital called said he it's coin flip if he lives.
They didn't say it that nonchalant like you guys, what
sound it's going flip. You know. I hope you'm a
good day, but he got really really bad and so,
um yeah, older you are, or you know, any conditions
you have makes it worse. Is that why you haven't
seen her? She kind of going, hey, you guys, stay away. No,
she wants me to come, so but you don't want to. Yeah,
(09:11):
you know That's what I told her, was like, you know,
it gets you sick, you know, on accident. I mean
we're still because you'd be fine, sure right if you
got it. But if she got it's a whole different story.
It is. It is well not to just talk about coronavirus.
That's what we're talking about. For the Mikes went on,
how are you playing any shows at all right now? Man,
I actually played on this weekend. Yeah, yeah, in Springfield,
Missouri for for it was a private gig for a
(09:34):
buddy's business. Um but yeah, all the protocols were in
place and they keep it pretty separated. Yeah, they limited
our capacity and and all that and everything was. Everything
was done problem meet and greats. No, No, No, as
bad as I want to, I'm not a big fan
of because I would I would do an hour before show.
Then we I'd play for an hour and a half,
you know, or do comedy for an hour and a half,
(09:54):
and then stay for two or three hours and meet everybody.
Possibly then I started to get sick a lot because
I just felt like I was around that many people.
Most people are fine, but like one or two and
people would get and it's a curse and it's beautiful,
but people would they feel like they know me, and
that's my job and I love it. But when they
start to kiss on me and stuff like, and I'm
(10:16):
not asking for it, I do start to go, all right,
this is a little boundaries. And I'm so glad you
said that. I guess that makes me feel better, because
for about the first year of this, I stayed sick.
I stay sick all the time. I would compare it
to like a kindergarten teacher or you know, at the
first of the school year with all these kids coming in.
Great problem to have the people want to kiss on me.
I don't want to be kissing on I don't want
(10:36):
to kissed on my people. I know only Caitlyn. That's it.
I don't get any unsolicited kisses. I'm gonna have stepped
my game up again. Here's the difference. You're like a
man's man. You know, you got the beard and the
full arm tattoo of a what is that a grizzly bear.
Yeah yeah, I actually just got to it this weekend.
That's a lot, yeah it is. How How long did
that take? About five hours at one time? Arms still
(10:59):
sore a little bit, not bad. How long did you
keep the plastic on? Just like at home? He took
it off. You start, you put lotion on it. Yeah,
but you do you do the kind without any kind
of scent or anything or it's just that's just the
clearer small dose on there. My buddy Bubba, everyone hooked
me up. Man. He keep flies into Nash like one.
So he does like cane browns and stuff from where
from Phoenix? I think he lives in Phoenix, but he
(11:20):
flies from Yeah, he was on he was on Eat Masters.
That's a legit tattoo. Yeah, man, I kind of got
a theme going here, so you know, I was I
was born and raised in the Ozarks, and I grew
up fishing four or five days a week at my grandpa,
and we fished Bear Creek, the Little Red River, and
the Buffalo River. So the Bear's kind of memory of
Bear Creek. And then this is an actual photo of
(11:40):
the little Red River down here, and then I'm gonna
get a buffalo over here eventually. That's cool. Did it
means something to you? And it's also cool how these
guys can make ink on skin look real. It's amazing.
And it's not a flat surface, it's around surface, you know,
and they still skin moves around. Yes. Yeah, I've got
(12:01):
a few minor and as detailed there. My right arm
has got you know, I think four or five. I've
got picture on my winer and then a picture of
my butth hole. They're on the front and back side
of my arm. See, I still gotta get those. Yeah,
it was Oh, I thought you. One of my said,
there's tough. Let me play a couple of things from
heats here. Uh, here is the single Old Schools in
(12:24):
here you go steal? Yes, yes, steady. We'll play a
(12:51):
couple other things before we kind of get into your story.
Let's do This is from the video that went viral
in eighteen. This is you doing a cover of Chris
Staple It either way, we can just go. When did
(13:15):
you start to feel that video was starting to catch
on places. Did you feel it? It kind of happened overnight. Man,
I kind of woke up to it. Really, Yeah, did
you put it up yourself or did somebody else put
it up? Of you? I put it up. It started
out as a dare, though Buddy went from Texas. He
actually working on fills in Texas. He texts me one day,
Texas texts me and uh, he said, did cook cover?
(13:37):
Either way you put it online or you ain't gotta
hare one? And I was like, dude, it'll take me
forever to learn that song. So it took me like
two weeks to learn it. But yeah, that's what it
started as. It was a dare. And then man, I
just kind of woke up to a lot of screenshots
from buddies and you know, and friends that they were
seen this thing go viral, and it's like, oh my god,
it's crazy. It's it's crazy to hear that, and to
(13:58):
hear how much my voice has changed. Then it's it's
odd to look back and listen. You're working it now
more consistently. Right, Yeah, well, you learn, you learn how
to breathe, and you know, I haven't had any lessons
or any vocal lessons or anything like that. But you just,
I guess, like anything, you just kind of adapted and
you learn how to do it a little better as
you go. I want to come back to that in
a minute, but let's start when you were nine ten
(14:19):
years old. Wol you want to be when you grow up?
I think I want to be a vet back then,
or a cattle farmer I got or both, but no singing. No,
at that young, it wasn't in your mind you wanted
to be famous in a superstar never never was, And
I don't think I still don't think it is. Bobby'll
be honest with you, man, I think it's it's weird,
Like I don't uh, I don't wake up every morning
(14:40):
dreaming of fame and fortune. Uh Yeah. I'd be nice
to give my kids a you know, when I had kids,
to a good raising, you know, and a good you know,
give them more than I had when I was a kid.
But you know, I'm just I'm just so wrapped up
and being here in the moment and just so excited
that man, I'm you know, we we talked to radio
people from the UK this morning and King is spending
my stuff over there, and it's like and you're reaching
(15:03):
people across the globe and touching the hearts of mind's dad,
and that's that's awesome. I mean, I don't I don't
know if I have time to that's so overwhelming to
me that that I don't really have time to sit
and think about fame and fortune and the riches of
it all. I don't guess when did you start to
know that you could sing? Or did you have start
having interest in singing? Man? I was probably two and
(15:25):
a half her So seriously, man, they started putting me
on stage at churches up there. Okay, so we're going
back then because I said nine or ten, you don't
want to sing, but you've already been singing. Yeah, yeah,
I mean not Yeah. They couldn't shut me up when
I was a kid. So so you wanted to sing,
You just didn't think you would be a singer for
a career. Yeah. I always sang. Everybody everybody around my
(15:45):
hometown knew I could sing, and I was you know,
so you were good as a kid. I could carry
you tune you're like seven or eight. But you also
had no fear to sing. You would get up a
church thing. I've always had fear. Now, the stage, stage frau.
It has always been a thing for me and it
still is. I still I was still get nervous, not
as bad, but I still get pretty terrified of there
are times, but yeah, especially by myself, just in the truck,
(16:08):
around my parents or whatever. Music constantly kind of poured
out of me as a child. I always thought it
would drive me in, saying, going to bed with a
melody in your head and waking up with the one
in your head, But it hasn't. What is your parents
do musically as the what they listened to or do
they play anything? Like? How did that come down to you? Yeah? So, um,
(16:29):
I guess every one of my my immediate family family
played an instrument except my mom um. And she she
could tap the far otup steering wheel. But because she's
saying no, not really, so she kind of missed having
the musical ability. Yeah she did, she had the love,
she just didn't have the ability. And then my dad
(16:50):
and step mom were God, they were like the Jeff
and Sherry Easter in my hometown. I mean Dad could
sang his tail off. Yeah, it sounded like he sounded
a lot before he preached his voice out. Now his
voice is really deep and gravelly. But before then he
was everybody called him like the Vince Gill of Searcy County.
I mean he could really sing. So can he sing
like Vince Gill sinks of high Yeah he could, he
(17:11):
used to. Could. He can't anymore. But so your dad
was a great thing. Okay, well that makes sense. Somewhere
this had to pass down to you. Yeah, well do
you know, you know, have you ever heard of a
man name Elton Britt? So Elton Britt was the first,
the first country artist in America to ever sell a
million records. And he's my great great uncle. He is
(17:33):
my I guess my great great grandmother's brother. I think
if that's how that worked. But uh, yeah, he's got
a song called the Stars. There's a star spangled banner
waving somewhere. Um it was a huge hit back in
like World War two. Um. So so yeah, there's there's
all kinds of memorability about him in in Searcy County.
(17:53):
They're actually inducting him into the Arkansas Country Music Hall
of Fame this year, and so really cool man, so
many holy uncle Sam's great hero was getting to go there.
Well I wish that I could also live some day
(18:15):
so he could sing. Your family was singing, your dad
was a good singer. Did your dad tell you he
he you need to get up and sing like you
got you have, you have a talent, don't waste it. Yeah,
I don't ever remember him telling me that. I don't
think it was more just kind of a given if
you if you had a voice, you got up there
and used it there there. There were a lot of
people in our church who didn't have a voice at all.
He still used it. That was me in church. I
didn't have voice at all, and I was up there.
(18:36):
So I'm glad when this life is all so did
I'm trying to just kind of get a grasp on
when you started to go, even if it's not for
a career. I want to go out and sing and
make a little extra money, because that's what you were
(18:57):
doing when I met you. You were singing at a bar, right. Yeah. So,
so my first love was was drums. Got my first
set of drums and I was ten, and then I played.
I played the drums on up through my teens and
uh any sort of banded high school like rock band
or no. No. My poor parents, man, we lived in
about an eight hundred square foot two bedroom house and
I practiced five hours a day and I don't know
how they kept their sanity, but uh um. Later on,
(19:20):
I think around I was around nineteen or twenty, I
had a band called the Lost Greenoes out of Conway, Arkansas,
hit me up and I went and drummed for them
in local bars. Then I played for a band out
of my hometown called Cavin favor Um. I sang a
few while play yeah all drums. So did you guysuate
high school? Uh? Yeah? Okay? So did you go to
college at all? So okay, most people in my tennant
(19:42):
go to college either because nobody's going to college. You
worked at the mill, you know where I'm from. So
you finished high school? And do you go start working
in the oil fields then and then playing music on
the side? Yeah? Um, so I got a job in
the old fields, right. Actually I worked at a pizza
hut and at a high school right out of high school.
Um or I was in high school at the time.
As soon as I've turned eight teen, I had a
regular that came in about once a week at pizza hut,
(20:04):
and I guess he took a liking to me and
my work ethic, and you know, I just took good
care of him, him and his wife and everything. And
so the day I turned eight teen, he had me
a job lined up at a well head repair business
out of Alma, Arkansas. And I've done that for about uh.
I've done that for about a year and ended up
going in doing some other stuff trimming trees and stuff
for Rockstaw Electric. But yeah, I was doing I was
(20:25):
doing music on the side, but then only lasted a
couple of years. After the drum career was over. Me
and a buddy, uh, we started a little duo also
making drums for a local band. You're not making much money, no,
I mean honestly, playing drums for a band for an
artist for the one or two hits, you're not making
that much money. You know, you're still trying to get
your place, hopefully the art like for you. For example,
(20:46):
if you're hiring a drummer, you know you're gonna pay him,
you know, a couple hundred bucks a show or whatever
it is, if it's a good show for you. But
he's not in it for a couple hundred bucks. He's
in it because if you blow up he's going to
be your drummer the same way. You're not making a
munch of money right now, but you're doing this because
if you do blow up, then you're set. It's a
time investment. That's what it is. Anyone to create a world.
I've had to do it. I've had to do it.
(21:07):
So Okay, so you're not making a bunch of money,
but you're working Monday through Friday. What are you playing
just Friday and Saturday nights? Yeah, but it's man, it's
not we're playing like the local VFW and it's just
all our buddies and um, you know, after after the
drum thing was done, you know, we started a little
duo and that we only played maybe six or seven
shows man, before I said, you know what this, I'm
(21:27):
getting up too early during the week and then we're
staying out all night party in And it's crazy that
they didn't let you sing. If you just sing one song,
you're like I'd sing occasionally on the drums. How do
you sing one song and they not look at you
and go, oh, you're the one that should sing. Well,
It's it's like you're better than the lead singer. To
be honest, singing, just singing, Yeah, I would think so. Yeah, Well,
(21:48):
but then again, you know, you sign up as a drummer. Man.
You don't want to step on anybody's toes. If I
was a singer of that band and you started singing,
and I knew you were better than be like no
more songs for that guy, you wouldn't just saying no
their note. You're just sing one and beat me and
been like that while we have the drummer singing. You
need to focus on your So okay, you're waking up
two early in the morning, you decide you don't want
(22:09):
to wake up and then stay up all night and
play it and then do it again. Yeah, and then
I just dropped it completely. I just I just walked
away from him. Was so hard. No, what was it doing? Called? Uh,
it wouldn't. It was just it was just me and
my buddy Daniel, And what would you do? I would
sing and play the bongos. I had a little set
of bongoes on the tambourine that I would like tap
(22:30):
around on. Oh it was so bad, dude, it was
so bad. And he wouldn't do it. He played the guitar,
he'd played the guitar and sing, and then and then
when I sing, he'd sing harmony for me. And where
would you guys play? We actually played? Uh. Our biggest
gig was Jibs and Moralton. You remember Jibs and Stale
used to play it a lot. I didn't go Morrelton
was kind of a little too up north for me. Yeah. Still,
(22:51):
I used to go watch Still, like when when he
was a big deal back home years ago. Yeah, you
go watch Matt Stelle. Oh yeah, dude, that's funny. Oh yeah,
brood then absolutely phenomenal, phenomenal man um, you ever heard
his Aaron Neville impression? Like, dude, Yeah, I remember before.
I'll never forget that. I'll never forget that. I was
(23:12):
probably got. I was probably twenty years old when I
started to do that. Thinking about Matt two is because
Matt and I are buds, not too I mean, we
bond over Arkansas sports, much like Justin Moore. I mean,
especially with guys in general. We need something to bring
us together so then we can be together. I like,
(23:33):
I like Matt still, and I would if I were
hay Len Will she calls her girlfriends, let's just do
something together. However, I would never call Matt and be like, hey, buddy,
let's just do something together, like hey, the game's on,
or let's go because I took Matt to watch the
one of these football games, like we're going to the game,
let's go. But it's just a different world for guys.
(23:53):
We can't just be like I just I just haven't
been around you in a while. I need to be
around So Matt and I use arkans all sports out,
much like gotta do with a lot of my guys
with the hunting, you know, a lot of my boys
with the hunting and fishing, fantasy football, or even video games.
Like I'll be talking to some of my friends on
video games playing basketball. I don't. I like video games fine,
but mostly I like playing with my my like my friends,
(24:16):
and we talk and we've talked a little bit basketball.
But it's also like what's happening with kids, Like what's happening,
What's what's happened on live? What's happening with But Matt
steals oddly incredibly smart, like the guys. It it's so stupid.
He's so smart. But it's crazy. You go watch him
back in the day. Were you doing music at all?
When he was playing, So you were just going as
(24:37):
a fan. Yeah, yeah, just as would you ever go
to like karaoke places and singing people be like dang dud,
why don't you like trying to sing for real? Yeah? Yeah,
but you just you know, I mean, did you take
that with a grain of salt? You know, just because
you're the you're a good singer in Marshal, Arkansas? Agree?
I agree, But a great singer from Marshall, Arkansas might
(24:59):
be a good singer. And did you ever were you
a journey open arms kind of guy? Yeah, journey My
mom loved journey Man. Here I am, come on, I
can see he's doing that in the whole place. Did
you get girls by singing? Yeah, they came out to
be like, oh my god. That was kind of the icebreaker.
Yeah yeah, get tar around the camp fire on tailgate.
(25:19):
But that works every time you quit music. But how
long did you stop doing shows? Um? Oh, it had
to be you had to be eleven years, twelve years? Insane, right,
isn't that that's insane? Nuts? So, but is there this
thirst inside of you to somehow, at some point get
(25:42):
back out three minutes for fun? Or had you just
been like you know that was an old me. Yeah
there there really was, man, They're there, always was that there.
But you just man, you eat put Mike and a
living in front. I everythink. You know, you can't be
dragging in Monday morning, you know when not when gas
lives depend on you, you know, and you be in
there embody in mind. Um. But I'll tell you what
(26:03):
really re regn out of this. And I haven't had
the opportunity to tell this story very much, so I don't.
But uh, there's a girl name of Charlotte Lee here
in town. She's in Arkansas, and back back when they
cut my hours in the oil field, I was looking
for side work and you know, on top of playing
music on the side a little bit. Um kind of
had that idea in the back of my mind, but
(26:23):
it just wasn't It didn't come to fru wishing yet.
But I had a friend that knew I was looking
for sidework and she called me up one day. She
was like, Hey, I got this girl. She needs her band,
needs a ride and needs a driver in a van
to go to Billy Bob's in Texas to open up
for the Eli Young band. And she's like, pays pretty good.
So do you want to do it? And I said absolutely,
So one weekend I spent driving Charlotte down to Billy
(26:46):
Bob's and just being around that environment again, and spending
the night at Billy Bob's and watching Eli Young and
helping them load in and load out. I caught the bug, man,
I caught the bug. And it was the next week
that that up my p A system and started play. Right,
So you going to help somebody else get down there,
it's what helps you get here. Absolutely yeah. I was
(27:08):
eight up by the time I got back. I was like,
oh my god, I want to do this again. So
when you get home you think I just watched it,
it reminds me of how much I loved it. What's
what's the first step? Then? Do you start going let
me write some songs? You get an old guitar out? Yeah,
you find something you can sale so you can afford
to to buy to buy the stuff that it. You
(27:28):
know that it takes to do that, and and yet, man,
I'll tell you my first gig out Bobby was what
did you still have a guitar? Though? Um? Yeah, yeah,
I had an old guitar and how was it? Is awful?
I still got it. Yeah, but it was good enough
to go and play the bar. And is that what
you did was good enough? Yeah? So what was what
was the first first per I won't even say show.
(27:48):
What was your first performance back after sitting out for
ten years? So, uh, we discussed the other day. I
mean you discussed my Buddies restaurant run my buddy round
dressed and Leslie Arkansas, and uh he offered to let
me come play up there. And it was a little
sooner than I expected, So I had to cram learning
(28:09):
a two hour set list. You know, hadn't done this
in TOLF thirteen years. And uh, I get up there
and I do pretty good my first set. Now the
town comes out. I mean, of course everybody knows I
can say, so people came wat. Yeah, so people came out.
I mean the place was packed and um, coming out
of retirement packing out Ryan's main Street grill baby. Um. Anyways,
(28:34):
to get up there and in my first set goes
goes pretty good for you know, first polished upe as
I am, which is not very uh. But the second set,
Now Ryan's got a mom and her name is Dicky,
and she's just she's this big sweetheart. You ever meet
in your laugh. But she's got a little lory set there.
Now what does that mean. I mean she's just got
a little she get a little meaneness center, you know,
but she just sweeties can beat. And she when I
(28:56):
come off for a break after my first set, she
walked up and she to me a Scotch glass full
of patron was fault in lime as she said there
and I turned it up, Bobby, and that was that
was the biggest mistake of playing them. He's a industry
to date. Because I got back up there and by
the time I got about my fourth song, that drone
(29:18):
hit me, and I think about a third of the
people left. I got it. No, I don't know if
you're being you know, facetious exaggerating a little bit. You
do you think that you were slurring your guitar playing
wasn't a goain? Yeah, I think I started probably missing
chords and slurring a little bit and uh yeah, and
(29:39):
the hometown was pretty disappointed to me. I'll come down
off the stage and and I told Ryan, I was like, dude,
I think this is I don't think this is for me, man,
I don't think this is from a period. Yeah, grand
opening grand clothes. I was drunk, Yeah, I was drunk,
but I was humiliated something something fierce. What do you
tell you? He's like, no, dude, no, you're meant to
do that. So it's next. What did you do after that?
(30:01):
You get there again? Yeah? Yeah, I ended up playing
rhymes a few more towns and the local VFW. There's
always the VFW. Man, Um, what will they give you
fifty bucks or anything? Yeah? Yeah, you know tips and
fifty bucks, or they charge a little cover and you
know a couple of three bucks and you make make
gas money. Man, That's really what what it was for me, dude.
It was all about by being able to buy my
(30:22):
launch at work, you know, gas money, and also some
sort of fulfillment, right like you had the bug, you
needed the bug to be fature. Yeah. Yeah, So at
what point did you make that video? Did you start
to play bars and make us start making a little
more money as you started to get better? Was there
like a scene near where you were and I saw
where you could play a bar They give you a
hundred hundred bucks though, that's really yeah, the crowds. Once
(30:44):
I stuck with it, the crowd started kind of turning
out and and local businesses. You know, words spreads pretty
fast in those little towns, and you know on Facebook
and stuff, and I think I had about five followers
from my Facebook, so um, word was getting out and
I started playing some restaurants and bars and and Conway
and Clinton and stuff, and um, yeah it was. It
was pretty wild, man. Look back on when I heard
(31:06):
you playing that that what bar was that you're playing in?
When I heard that clip the stable to one, I
was in my bedroom at my house. Oh that wasn't
I guess that's right. That's right. I was thinking of
another video of you playing at a bar somewhere that
someone had sent me. But that's right, it wasn't your bedroom.
What kind of places were you playing at that point,
same same stuff. Yeah, just little restaurants and little bars, man.
I mean mostly it was like like if I played
(31:28):
a bar in in Marshall likes a place like Ryan's.
You know, people came to listen. If I played a
bar in Conway, a third of the people came to listen,
and the other two thirds were just there to eat
their meal. And yeah, I was background noise. Did you
think that you had a career at all? Or you
the day you recorded that in your room, did you
have a just a sliver that you could do this
(31:49):
for a living? That's that's still being honest. Yea honest No, sir,
not not ever, not every one time that did it
ever cross my mind? Hey man, you might have a
chance in Nashville. You might have a chance with might
to live in doing this. Have you ever been up
here to Nashville. I've never seen the town. So one
night I'm on Facebook and a friend said, hey, you
(32:09):
see this guy heat Standers. He's from, you know, around
where we're from, obviously, And I was like, uh no,
let me watch it. And ever I get videos, good god.
I mean, if somebody sings, period, I'm tagged in it, dude,
any video, any video I comment on TikTok or Instagram,
Hey dude, can you tag Bobby and let so TikTok's
(32:29):
but Facebook, you know, people leave music on my car
if they know, you know. But it's I mean, that's
the tree that I grew. So I ain't hating the tree,
but sometimes trail dropping on and your head like that hurts,
but it's it's a great tree. But I was like,
all right, let me let me look it's because somebody
from where I'm from is gonna get a little more
of a look than somebody not, at least a first look.
(32:51):
And I was like, let me see this guy in
good And I heard you and I was like, wow, guy,
it's pretty good. Then I remember I messaged you on
Facebook and just said, hey, heats this by bone and
you didn't message me back for a little bit because
I think maybe you thought it was a spam account. No,
I was actually on the phone with me. Yeah, I
was on the phone with my tour manager because he's
the one that called me and told me you wrote
me because he wrote me on my music page and
(33:13):
he called me to music page or is he was
he he was part of it. Yeah, he was on
it and he saw me message. He saw he saw you.
I actually saw the message pop up after he had called.
I got off and the banner was still up. Um.
But I end up calling him back and I was like, man,
I don't think that's I think that's a spam account.
I think that. So then one of my producers, Morgan
(33:34):
or Elea was Morgan. So Morrigan now works with me
on my management team. But she message he was like, no,
that's really him. And so you and I talked and
I don't remember if I said hey it was was
it like hey, get to Nashville tomorrow or this week
or I don't remember. Man, that's such a blur. But
what's crazy. What's crazy is that when Morgan answered the phone,
(33:57):
or when I asked the phone, it was Morgan, like, dude,
I felt like I knew her. I've been listening, I dude,
I've been listening to you guys for five years. I'm
talking religiously every morning from six to ten. Dude, that
was it. I mean, it work by myself. It could
have been a person pranking you as me too, right, Yeah, yeah,
I get it. I get it. Yeah. And I remember
telling Markan, hey, let's get him in Nashville and you
drove overnight. If I remember, I don't think so. Here's
(34:18):
the deal. Here's why I don't think so, and I
don't remember it very well. But better story if you
say that. But well, I know it kind of is.
I know what it kind of is, and I like,
I don't want to kill it. But um, so here's
the deal. Here's the truth. Man. When my phone went
off and it was you, I was sitting down. I
was sitting there in my living room with my pin
in my hand and my guitar in my lap, rotting Bloodline,
(34:38):
Rotting Bloodline. I had a first verse and a half
of course written. When the that's the first song I
ever wrote, dude, Like, yeah, well, so I tried to
write a couple of songs in my early twenties, back
when I was doing the show thing and they were
so bad, dude, They're so bad that I did never
try again. I just thought it wasn't for me, and
I will. I think it was Sunday. I think it
(34:59):
was a sun you reach up because I woke up
that day like, man, I ain't got nothing to do.
Let's start, Let's try to write a song. Because the
video just went viral and it kind of inspired me
a little bit. And so that was crazy. The first
time I've ever picked up a pen in thirteen fourteen years,
phone goes off and it's the DJ that I listened
to every morning, the Morning show I listened to every
morning for five years. You know, it's like, I don't
(35:20):
know what kind of time and anyways, no listen. That's crazy, dude,
that's crazy. It could be some sort of divide something.
I just don't like to throw myself in the mix
with Yep, me and God. We worked that out. We
had a little talk. I knew it Bobby making phone
calls uhum. But but no, I ended up calling my
buddy Jamie Jones as soon as I got the phone
with you, um, the next day, because you invited me
(35:42):
down the same one of my songs, will do. I
didn't have a song. I have half a song, So
I freaked out. Dude, I agreed, but I was freaking
out and said I didn't know you didn't have a
bad dude, I didn't. Uh. And I call my buddy
Jamie Jones, which lives in Dardenell and I think we
spent a day on it. And because I think it
was only like two days you gave me to get
to Nashville. Um. But I that's why I say I
don't think it was over. Not because me and Jamie
(36:02):
finished the song like the next day. And then I
was sitting in the motel room the night before the
show learning how to play the Dying Thing and trying
to remember the words. You know, So what was that
was that bloodline? We'll get a clip of this here
here you going. He's the last name, County Ross, He's
(36:23):
got it, Challis tam Challis ton Nes seeing to its
fine jo away, trying to find a little reason. Who
das booth rocks over done such a good job. I
(36:46):
mean it sounds like a rock song. Yeah, sounds like
a cut your boy singing a rock song. So you're
in Nashville. Obviously you drove overnight. I was like, get on,
you jump in the car immediately, drow It's fast. You
could alway in Nahville. I think I'm gonna go with
that story, though Mike I was thinking of I think
I'm sticking with that. ConTroll with it, bro. Yeah, I
really felt that way that that was it. I could
just tell people that me and Jamie finished it over
(37:06):
not in the truck. Yes, I remember again, I'm gonna
tell you what I remember. It may not be as accurate, foggy,
but I remember thinking you were you were good. But
I wanted people to tell you if you were any
good or not like that, because again I was biased.
You grew up or I grew up and you were good.
(37:27):
I was like, superstar, just go ahead and get it
to him. So why brought in three people right, Brian
ratt Um, help me, brother, No, you're wrong guy. George,
Now George was George there? I think was there? It
was Brian Rott, somebody, a lady from Sony and then
(37:50):
um it was a guitar for was the guitar for
what's his name? Oh it's on tap my tongue. Man. Yeah,
I don't know. I don't even I don't remember. Lauren
Jo yeah, Laura, Okay. All I remember is I brought
in three people that were nice enough to come up
and and give you. Christian Bush. It was Christian Boys,
(38:12):
that's right, who's like a dear friend. That's why I
called him in. And he also has so many number ones. Yeah,
I was Christian. He was in town, which is which
was rare. Yeah, Christian Bush, somebody from Sony and who
else lt It was l LT and Brian. So you
come in, you perform, and didn't you leave with one
(38:33):
of them or like go somewhere with one of them? Yeah?
First I went and walked around Sony with with lt
UM and they liked you. They didn't have to do that. Yeah. No,
they introduced me all the staff and then and then uh,
Brian said to call him after we left there. So
we went hung with Brian at Universal and went up
to his office and sit and listen to a bunch
of uncut Chris Stapleton stuff and a bunch of uncut
Eric Church stuff and it was awesome. That's that's gotta
(38:54):
be cool, dude. It was crazy. I left left there
with a stack of vinyls. I could barely get out
the door. Man, it was soul killer. That my first
trip to Nashville and I get to go do that. Really,
that was crazy. So how did it? Because I've known
George for a long time, how did you guys get
into contact? Um? So I met my management pretty early on,
(39:16):
which is Pete Hartungue and L three and he managed
he manages Justin Moore. Go right, Um, Justin is on
George's label, and Pete had told George about me early on.
They didn't get too excited, man, really, Um, but George
did come out when we went out to cut five sides,
which Bloodline was was one of them, and then Proud
(39:37):
and Down the South, which we ended up releasing independently. Um,
when we went out to cut those at the Castle,
George ended up just popping up And I was like well,
who's that And he's like, oh, that's that's the head
of Valerie, and that's that's that's you know, that's that's
Justin's guy. And I was like, awesome, man. And uh
so Georgia ended up hainting out with the whole day.
And George has just kind of kept tabs on this
(39:58):
thing the whole time, you know, this whole time, he's
just always kind of been, you know, in the background. Um.
And then he got me a meeting with Borsheatow one
day and I had four songs total in my catalog. Man.
I played Borshetow three songs and he was like, well,
you got any more? And I was like, well I
got one more and he's like, well place your full catalog,
you know. But uh yeah, George has just always kind
(40:19):
of been there. Man. Did you get a publish your
deal first? Yeah? Yeah, at Sony I think they changed it.
They changed the name the other day to Sony Sony
Music Publishing or something. Um, so that's gonna be pretty cool.
At the pinion to write songs, hecky, you didn't write
a song until Oh no, dude, that's what's crazy. And
I told Pete, you know, man, I had you know,
being being established and having a life there in Arkansas
(40:40):
and having bills to pay and all that and not
being able to just jerk up and and move. Um,
you know, I told Pete, you know, man, I'm I'm
not some spring chicken. You know, I need a paycheck
before I make that leap. And sure enough, man, we
get the We got the pub deal before I even
had an address in Tennessee, which is which is something something.
And to be said for Sony there, how crazy was
(41:02):
it to quit your job like a work to come
and do music? It was terrifying, dude, Yeah, it was terrifying. Yeah,
that took a lot of soul searching, man, it really did,
because that's you don't walk away from a job like
that in Arkansas because once you once you leave it,
you never get it back. You've got a hundred guys
behind you that are that are just just dedicating, just
just hard working, that that are waiting to take your position. Um,
(41:24):
so I knew that there was there was no return,
if I know, if I jumped in it was it
was both feet first and but also how exciting it
was amazing? Right? Yeah? So but did you write songs
to drive back and forth for a while. Did you
come to Nashville in Arkansas? Yeah, a year and a half.
A year and a half. I would get up this
is my schedule. I'd get up on Sunday and I
drive was it about six and a half fires? Drive
(41:47):
six and a half fires to Nashville and I'd write Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday,
and typically Thursday morning, and then I would drive home
Thursday night and then we play show Friday and shows
Friday and Saturday, and then I drive back to nash
On on Sunday. Um. But it was just my buddy
Mark Allan Springer. He's from Wiener, Arkansas. And do you
know Mark? I know, well, yes, some New Jones Burro, um,
(42:14):
but Mark Mark wrote, Um, Mark wrote two Spars and
Hurricane Workcorn don't grow all that. And Mark kind of
took me under his wayne and um let me stay
at his place for for a while down in Summertown.
And so that that was a rough goal, man, I mean,
putting in all those hours and all that Winshield time
was it was, it was rough. But what was to move? Um?
(42:36):
I knew it had to be here. Man. You don't
make it, You don't make it. Nash without being here.
You just don't. I mean, you gotta be here because
when the you know, when the if you gotta if
you got a pub deal or you gotta you know,
you got a record deal man. When when it's just
like any other job, when they say they need something,
you gotta have it. You gotta be there. You gotta
do it. M big move man. Because you're right, you
(42:56):
weren't nineteen. Oh that's it, that's really all. You'd already
established what you had your life. Oh, I could already
see that. The I could already see the rest of
my life ahead of me. I really could just just
out there just growing old and watching the dogs and
the kids in the grass grow. Remember running into you?
Maybe it was in Northwest Arkansas. Justin was playing at
(43:19):
the JJ's beer garden. So it went to Justin and
I went to razorback game that day and Justin Moore
and he was like Hey, He's like, hey, come on
out and sing a song with me. I'm gonna be
at Jjay's. And I was like, I was gonna go
home that night, but I love Justin. Justin been for
a long time, and I was like all right, as
what do you mean to say. He goes, well, what
(43:41):
do you know? And I was like, what if we
do dust on the bottle? He's like perfect. So I
go out and I ran into you there, and I
think you were going about to move up there. Yeah.
Actually I'll never forget that because I walked her out
by you and you go, hey, dude, you're just gonna
walk by me. The dude. But yeah, the dude that,
the dude that had a hand and change in your
laugh forever for this now got you a pub bill.
(44:06):
Don't even know you anymore. So when did the record
deal come about? Like the artist deal? Um, I think
it was. I think it was about this time last
year or a little a little more. What what what
inspired that from them? Like? What do you think they
saw in you? What are they telling you? Like, this
is why we're gonna sign you to an artist? Honestly, honestly,
it was another video. I hate to just put it
(44:27):
all off on that, but uh, you know, because we
were we were buggets, Scott, you know, we we wanted
we wanted to be with Valerie and uh, you know
we're bugging George and and uh we kind of gave
him some room to breathe. After a couple a couple
of meetings and uh, I ended up doing a show.
I don't remember where it was, but um it was.
It was that a place was there was some really
good acoustics and really cool environment, and that buddy just
(44:47):
set a cell phone up and record me and my
guitar player, Casey doing Faithfully, and that video went viral. Um.
I think in two days we had over a million
views on it. And so I screenshot it and in
it over to Pete, my manager, and he's forwarded onto George,
which it eventually ended up in Scott's hands, and Scot's like,
all right, that's that's enough. I've seen. I've seen enough.
(45:08):
Let's let's pull him in. I'm I'm sitting in Uh,
I'm standing in my backyard actually with a post hole
digger in my hand, building the fence for my dogs
and phone rings and Peet's like, hey man, you gotta,
you gotta you're sitting down and I was like, no,
I need to and he's like, probably you just got
a record deal day, so damn it's awesome. Yeah. What's
funny too about Faithfully is that when you play the rhyman.
I was like he can play with the ryman. That's
(45:29):
what you did in the freaking crowd and melted. Yeah,
you killed that song. I gotta tell you that. Thanks
for having me there, because that's people when people ask
me the peak so far, that's the peak for me
so far. Yeah. That and and not only did I
play the rhyme? Did I standing ovation man? That that
I as about as out of body is I've ever came. Actually,
(45:50):
I'll never I'll never forget them stressing the point to
exit stage right. When we were done, exit stage right.
They told us like five times. And I was so
out of my mind from that crowd clapping for me
that accident stage left. I got shovel up by everybody
that was waiting to go on stage. Excuse me, excuse me,
excuse me, pardon me. I think you might be wrong,
(46:12):
but I think I've had you out twice because I
had you came in. You played at my little rock
theater show and then the rhyme and the only two times. Right, Um,
that's about right, Robin's Center, Yeah, no show, Yeah, that's it, right,
I guess. So my point is you're a hundred percent
of getting standing ovations because both crowds stood up. Oh yeah, dude,
(46:34):
oh wow, forget about that. Yeah, And I made the
joke before. I don't like to go after him. He
came to my three thousand seed Theater is my home crowd.
I was so pumped and they're like exhausted because he
just went on, that's awesome. Man. So you're you got
(46:55):
a place now, like you're here, this is home. Yeah.
I was talking about that with Todio folks today. Somebody
asked me today, like, what's what's been the greatest thing
about moving to Nashville. And the greatest thing about moving
to Nashville to me is man. You know, of course,
not to go too far into like how I was
raising stuff and you know the pennycost the world and
all that. But when you grow up like that, it
separates you. That's your whole goal in life is to
(47:17):
be separate from the world. And you tend to feel
like an outcast and you feel you never seem to
fit in or feel comfortable in your own skin. And uh,
you know, I'm not real big on small talk and
I never have been. I'm really bad to you know,
to uh to meet someone and then dig too deep
too early or or as Christ able to sit on
(47:38):
your show one time, pull the curtain back too far,
I think, um, right off the bat. And now that
I've come to Nashville and I've got to be around
songwriters and this industry, I think it all makes sense. Man.
I think I've always I didn't know it, but I
think I've always kind of seen the world through the
eyes of a songwriter, and uh they I think we
(47:59):
tend to overland over analyze things and and to really
look deeper into into the heart and into things. And uh,
it's it's oddly enough, man, moving from those dark mountains
to Nashville. I feel at home here. Man. It's weird.
You ever be out of work and have a great
song idea back in the day and then you just
(48:21):
held onto it or did all kind of stuck o
kind I sucked. I think I've always had I think
I've always had indecent ideas passed by my passed by
my you know, passed by me to grab out this guy.
But you know, I didn't have the knowledge back then
to write it down. And have you done any lessons
to learn how to not wear your voice out? No?
I actually, uh, I actually just started established my my
(48:43):
relationship with the folks of Vanderbilt. Um, I actually go
for my second appointment in in a couple of days
for them to start just just teaching me. I mean,
because that is my money, that's that's my that's my tool.
It's not And if there's no shame because you're not
going to hey, don't teach, You're not having to be
tired of sing. It's like teach, we had to sing
so I can sing for thirty years efficiently. Yes, Um,
(49:03):
that's just it, man. And I'm still at the point
in my career were Um, I'm still doing two our
shows a lot of times to two and a half
hour shows. And you know, most of your most of
your big acts and your openers don't have to sing
that long. Um. And so it's men. You do two
of those shows a weekend. It's rough on you, man,
especially you know the way I sang in my style
of saying, which has changed substantially. I've I've learned to
(49:24):
relax and not pushed so hard and all that, But um,
I definitely still need to help. I think I'll always
need to help you. Is it true that you don't
follow razorback football anymore? Man, I don't. I don't dude,
growing up like I did him out here, So where's
the door? Sir? Um Man, I tell you, growing up
like I did and not having sports in my life,
(49:47):
you know it just I was. My heroes were Fred Bear,
you know, the bow hunters and um you know guys
like that that were that really that really stood out
to me. Chuck Adams was another great bow hunter back
when I was a kid. Was like Bill Dance. Yeah. Yeah,
well build answers a fisherman? You know, yeah, say did
(50:10):
you have fisherman heroes too? Not necessarily, it was more
so because because back back then you had VH. My
uncle had a VHS uh like cabinet. He didn't know
I knew Bill Dancers. I'm sorry, brother, and I'm sorry.
I know where do you think I grew up? What's
wrong with you? No? Man? Bill Dance a Fisherman? Yeah.
(50:33):
I was making the point of was it just hunters
or did you also have Sorry, we watched Bill Dance
every Sunday. You moved so fast, I'll just try to
keep up all the day. Go ahead. I was trying
to keep up. So your your heroes because sports, sports
wasn't brought into your life, were people that were great
at things that were brought into your life. That's interesting.
(50:54):
I never you and your dad. You dad still alive,
You're still close? Not okay, So I never had a
dad right ever, and I had. I pursued sports because
other men liked sports, and I felt like that gave
me something to talk to them about and something to
bond over since when I had nobody to go. Because later,
(51:16):
hunting and fishing was very much a step dad thing
with me, who was like, that's all we did, right,
It was all I mean, depending on what season it was,
depending on if we were in a blind, if we
were in a tree stand, if we But for me,
I went after sports because I was just looking for
some sort of mail connection. You're right to man, because
like I'm sitting here the other day, and and Adam
(51:36):
Hambrigs here in Stales here and you guys are all
talking sports and I'm just kind of and and the
thing is, man, I love to watch football, like I
love college ball. I don't really watch the NFL, but
I love to watch college football. But I just I don't.
I don't put force the brain power to keep up
with them all. Well, and you never had to write
it's not ingrained in you at this point. Could trust me,
if I could at times not be a fan, I
(51:57):
wouldn't because it sucks. Man's that second half, dude. But
it's heartbreaking, you know, because you know, I lived in
Florida for a while and I was never Yeah, I
lived in Florida for a couple of years in my twenties,
and I was never as rabid a razorback fan as
I was when I moved to Florida and got surrounded
by Gator fans. I had to be. And also, it's
(52:19):
just home, right, like, that's that's from and that's all
we got, man, that that's it. Man. I have so
much pride where I'm from. I thought it too, man,
And I think that's man. I think that that Arkansas
kind of a little Texas in that way. They were
very proud of where we're from, especially if you're you know,
if you're from those little small towns, dude, there's that
place is special, dude. I mean I walk I step
(52:39):
into those art mountains, but and I'm on holy ground.
That place means something to me. That's been the hardest
part of the whole move is realizing how attached I
was to that geography there in that land. So you're
you're about to go to for radio ads, dude, march yates,
we're recording this on a Monday, right, so a week
from today Old school was in goes to radio. It's
(53:02):
been out for a bit. But then there's a concentrated
effort by your team. They only listen to team only
has so many so much time, and so many resources,
but they're gonna use their time and resources to try
to make this song a hit. So what is that?
This is the next step in your overall journey, Like
you're freaking having a song go to radio by real
life label. No, man, it's nuts. And I got a
(53:22):
team that do their beasts. I mean they are They're crazy.
I mean, dude, I get I'll wake up the emails
and I have emails coming in after i'd go to sleep.
Do you feel the support? Yeah? Yeah, I feel so.
Because here's the deal, man, and this is this is
just me being honest, dude. I think when they signed
me it was more like a single deal. Let's let's
(53:43):
cut a single, see how it does, and then we
decide whether we want to keep it or not. And
I think as we progressed and I got to do
in some some live performances in front of the staff
and stuff. You know, they ship me off to Cancoon
like two weeks after they after they signed us to
do the year and you would know what to do
the year and deal for Big Machine. You know, they
have a big left. Yeah, it was really cool. Man.
I've never been on the country obviously, and uh, I
(54:04):
got to go down there and do that. And I
remember when it all happened. Man, it was really cool
because I got up there and I sang old schools
in and then I sang them common ground um and
gotta standing old from them. And at the end of that,
I walked down and George walked over to me and
he's like, hey, man, Scott wants to talk to you.
And so Scott pulled me over the side and he's like, listen,
we're gonna we're gonna cut We're gonna cut four and
(54:26):
we're gonna give you any producer you want. We're gonna
do anything. You're fixing the priority And it all changed
right there, boom, just like that. And so now I
feel like I am a priority there and they are
really stepping up, stepping out, and working their butts off.
For me, here is a common ground from the common
ground DP. We're all we're all strong, we're all right,
(54:49):
we're all wrong, we all in common ground. Good one man,
Thank you sir. You wrote that, you wrote all four
of you. So that's that man, Yeah, calm ground? Was
that one that you stepped back from? Though? And you're like,
I can't believe I helped draft that. I can't believe.
(55:10):
Here is I can't undo? I do gain all the world?
Do you sit that? You never? Man? He's such fun.
Look at your bull. You're done, have done it again.
It's damn good bad. You won't gonna turn this truckle around.
(55:31):
You don't stay tr but we both know the truth.
You can't. Here is one more. This is love needs
making for his knees tick. Just like all the time
(55:52):
it's Wan sick, it's look knees making an So I
pulled up a post here February for February eleven. This
is by you, y'all. Exclamation exclamation, exclamation, exclamation. I just
(56:14):
got off the phone with Morrigan, the producer of the
Bobby Bone Show. I'm freaking out. Tune in tomorrow morning
at am kissing ninety six. If you're in arkansas'll be
speaking with Bobby. So maybe I talked to you on
the phone the next day and then I was like,
get here by Friday. That starts to see him, right, Huh, Yeah,
that was it. Listen, man, I couldn't be prouder, not
of you before you like you are. You know what
(56:35):
people call the American dream, and you're just right in
the middle of it. Yeah, if you ten years and
you if you're living a life that you feel like, man,
I feel good. I don't care if you're rich or not,
but it's like I feel good with what I've accomplished.
That's the American dream to come from wherever and go wherever, up, down, left, right.
But you get to make that call and you're living
it and you're in the middle of it, and I'm
(56:57):
just so proud to see someone like you because you're
You're everybody I grew up around. I know, have you
ever been to a barbecue? You've met me, you know
what it's like, and you know it's like me too.
When I go back home, I'm like, hey, you guys
can do whatever you want. If I can get out
of here because I chose to, or if you want
(57:18):
to stay here and you choose to, you can do
whatever you want as long as you make that decision
to pursue it. It may not be tomorrow. Something may
come to you five years and you have to make
a tough decision. You gotta make a tough decision. Like
I'm proud that you made decisions. I'm proud that you're
starting to feel like people care about you in this industry.
I'm proud that they're giving you a shot there, paying
(57:39):
bills for you. It's just it's just working out. Man.
I'll just appreciate you giving me a chance. Bobbly, I
really day, that's all I gave it, right, I said,
I just said, people open a little cracks for me,
and then I kicked a hole in the wall once
I had a crack. And that's what you're doing. Yeah,
I think it was. I was talking to somebody here
while back about about my story and how it's how
it's more than anything, it's really a story preparation, you know,
(58:01):
and so so you're ready, Just be ready. You know,
you may not be able to create create the opportunities
that you you need, but somebody else may be able
to and you may not be able to dictate the
time that it happens. Just be ready to do it, man.
And that's that's really what this this whole thing has
just been a series of small challenges and hills and
and getting over stage fright and nerves and you know,
(58:25):
swallowing the fear and dealing with it and and now
we're here, you know. But and that's really all it's
been is they they open the doors and I walk
through a man. But you just gotta be ready to
deliver when the time comes, and you gotta say yes,
you got to, man, because you won't get questions anymore,
you won't get asked anymore. Even if you don't feel
like you can do it, say yes, I figure it out.
(58:45):
That's right, That's right. I mean the last thing I
always said this man, even before I had the opportunity
to do this. I mean, it's I've never want, I
just want. I just my biggest fear in life is
sitting on my front porch when I'm a dy thinking well,
what if you know, what if I my debt decision
and decided to give that a shot and took that risk.
You know, that's That's really what it is for me. Man,
(59:06):
I just want to be proud of that. When I'm
when I'm sitting on the porch, we don't speak, you know,
I tell you I believe in you. Well, thanks, Bob.
I do Heat Sanders Music, follow him on Instagram Heat
Sanders Music, and hopefully get to know him now because
he'll walk right by you and forget who you are.
(59:26):
That's like that. I was like, dude, turn turn around.
I'm right, what's happening. I'll tell you what when I
get this. When I get this, these lockdowns lifted this
pandemic under control. I ain't walking by a soul, dude,
I'm hugging. I'm hugging every person that gets in arms
linked to me. Oh man, I'm proud. I'm proud and proud.
All right, we spent an hour here. I'm just probably
the longest interview've ever done. Yeah, probably, I mean, have
you done an hour interview with anybody? Straight up things?
(59:47):
So it's tough. You really got to be with the
pro you know, you really do know, you really got
to be with the Like, what's it like to be
on Bobby? It's like, I don't know. I just take
his hand and just kind of follow wherever it goes.
All right, you guys should get Calming Ground the EP. Uh,
it's got four songs on it. We played all four
of them here, you guys, if you if you hear
this months later, this is our podcast too. Uh. He'll
be out touring. Go see him. If he's in town
(01:00:09):
opening for somebody or doing a club show or um.
Just go see him. You will be impressed for sure.
All right. There he is at Heath Sanders Music, Heath Sanders.
Everybody
Host
Bobby Bones
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