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September 1, 2023 • 49 mins

Part 1 of Carlos's conversation with Brad Warren, half of the hit-writing duo The Warren Brothers. Get ready to be captivated by the life and journey of none other than Brad Warren, the multi-number one writing and Grammy-nominated songwriter from Nashville. This chat with Brad is nothing short of a rollercoaster ride. Starting from his initial dream of pursuing a rock star career, forged by the powerful chords of classic rock, to his battles with addiction, and his rise as a successful songwriter, Brad's story is an inspiration.

Experience the power of mentorship through the tales of Brad's mentor, Tom Douglas. Learn about Tom's distinctive writing style, his vast vocabulary, and his heart full of dreams. Brad doesn't shy away from discussing the profound influence of young songwriters and how their seemingly rule-less writing often leads to extraordinary work. This conversation also uncovers how Brad incorporates his personal experiences and truth-telling to connect with his audience.

Finally, don't miss out as we journey into Brad's creative process. He stresses the importance of understanding one's writing style and shares how he overcame the pressures of the songwriting industry. From using advice given by friends in shaping his writing to putting words on paper to unlock creativity.

Check out Brad's podcast, The Good Grief Good God Show: https://goodgriefgoodgodshow.com

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Episode Transcript

Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey guys, this is Carlos.
This is part one of a chat Ihad with my very good friend,
brad Warren, who is multi numberone writing and Grammy
nominated songwriter here inNashville.
Hope you like it and we're here, alright, man?
Well, I already did the intro,so I don't need to introduce you
, so we'll just.
We'll just go right into it, asif you and I are over at Smith

(00:23):
Park walking.
I told the story.
I was talking to mutual friendGreco yesterday and we obviously
have long talks and I told himand you and I laughed about this
we go on a hike and it's 45minutes and I we get done and
I'm like, dude, what justhappened Was that three?

Speaker 2 (00:38):
steps.
How do we?
I gotta be honest, that is agreat way to exercise, because
you completely forget thatyou're exercising.

Speaker 1 (00:47):
Except that one hill, when one of us is talking and
the other one's huffing andpuffing as we're going up the
hill.

Speaker 2 (00:54):
Yeah, that's like the only time we're quiet.
That one hill is like yeah,quiet.
That proves how much we like tohear ourselves talk.

Speaker 1 (01:00):
Oh my gosh, are you kidding?
Usually I'm a really goodlistener, but with certain
people like I actually do liketo talk.

Speaker 2 (01:06):
No, I mean, that's a good conversation requires both.

Speaker 1 (01:10):
It really does.
So I've been looking forward tothis for a long time.
We had to reschedule becauseyou went out of town and you're
doing, you know, fancy rock starstuff and I'm probably not I'm
gonna be more than a little shitfor that, just being a rock
star.
But you know there are about athousand questions that I could
ask you.
I come into these things Inever have anything prepared
because who knows where theconversation is gonna go.

(01:31):
I know with you and me that'snever an issue.
You know.
I kind of want to go back tobecause you've been sharing with
me.
You've been doing some writingabout your past and where you
came from.
Like you know you are, you're asongwriter now, right, like is
that when you meet people, isthat when you know, like, say,
say, person wanted, wants toknow what you do for a living,

(01:51):
what are you telling them?

Speaker 2 (01:52):
You're an author, I'm a songwriter.

Speaker 1 (01:53):
Yeah, yeah, and that's it.

Speaker 2 (01:54):
That is yeah, and even the other things that I do
are spin-offs of being asongwriter.
We play live a lot, but we playsong writer shows, yeah, and I
do a podcast on grief, but it'sbased on me being a songwriter
and a lot of my first guests, ofcourse, were songwriters many
of them.
And then so everything I do andthe little writing, which we

(02:16):
definitely want to get to that,because now I have you, I have
you one-on-one, I'm gonna pickthe out of your brain.

Speaker 1 (02:21):
Good, because I always learned something when
you asked me because I'm like ohyeah, I forgot I forgot that I
used to do that and now I don't.
Why did I stop doing that?
But I want to know, like youknow, give us kind of the brief
history of how you became whatyou are now as far as a
songwriter We'll get to thepersonal stuff later.
But, like, like you know,because I've read your story, I
think it's so interesting.

(02:42):
I've read enough memoirs andI'm like man, there's some
complete gems in there and, likeI, your story is fascinating to
me.
So so, give me like, give melike the commercial.

Speaker 2 (02:51):
Alright, the commercial is I was like 11
years old.
We were super Baptist, superstrict, fundamental but
charismatic.
So we spoke in tongues but wentto a Baptist church really
almost cult-like and I was thelittle kid and bad clothes that
my mom made and bad haircutsthat my mom gave us with paper
scissors, and I just wanted tobe cool and I heard Leonard

(03:13):
Skinnerd.
I mean, I heard we weren'tallowed to listen to
non-Christian music, so I'dheard things in stores before.
But we went to some church,family's house, and I heard this
kid playing electric guitar andhe played Sweet Home Alabama
and I was like, oh my god,that's what I want to do for the
rest of my life.
So I started learning how toplay guitar at 11 years old and

(03:35):
I want to be a rock star, whichmeans in my family that if you
are ridiculous, it's not gonnahappen that you're gonna be,
you're gonna be the loser downthere playing the bars and pizza
parlors and you can't do that.
A lot of negativity is actuallykind of helpful sometimes.
And so my brother and I formeda band and we played around
Tampa where we were from, andyou know we got little bits of

(03:56):
wins and we've got local radiostuff.
But we just at some pointdecided to move to Nashville.
So we moved to Nashville and Idon't know if we were.
We did sign a record, did?
We were artists.
So we signed a record deal withRCA records.
In two years we played hard, wegrinded, we were also budding
alcoholics, so that was all apart of it and we were full of
promise and then it just didn'thappen.

(04:18):
As an artist and as that wasnot happening, we were getting
to a drug and alcohol problemthat was significant enough to
where we had to make somechoices.
And like the very same timethat my brother and I both got
sober, we had our first hit withsomeone else.
Really we never had any hits byourselves.
We had a lot of songs thatwould die it.

(04:39):
Like we said, we're gonna havelike 20, number 28, so
everything died at 28 for us andwe had our first kind of.
We had a song that we hadwritten at Faith Hill recorded,
and so that was all a newexperience.
And as we were getting soberand as we were enjoying being
home with our families andraising our kids, and just that
moment we had a song on thecharts with somebody else.

(05:01):
And we got a check in the mailand I called my brother.
I said dude, we get paid a lotmore when someone besides you.
Things are so hot.
And from that moment on we'vebeen on count of 5 Giggles
thumbries, Really yeah.
So I didn't.
Even when I moved here I'm notsure I knew that it was a job.
I knew there were some old guysthat sat in rooms with with
khaki pants and smokingcigarettes all day,
pontificating over coffee.
I'm now that guy, Right.

(05:22):
But um, and it didn't lookattractive to me at first.
But life happened and yeah, sosome, I'm a songwriter.
I always wanted to just say Iwas a musician, but the truth is
I'm a songwriter and I couldcut my arms off and still write
songs.

Speaker 1 (05:36):
Oh, you know, what's funny is I think I think it's on
your podcast that I've heard acouple other of your buddies say
the same thing that they didn'teven know that songwriting was
like a career, that that'ssomething that you were allowed
to do, right you?
And it's not unlike my worldwhere I tell people I'm a writer
, I'm an author.
Oh, did you go to school forthat?
Like no, in fact.
Yeah, in fact.

(05:56):
I almost failed out of APEnglish my senior year of high
school because I hated it somuch.
Wow, yeah, moby Dick for anentire year.

Speaker 2 (06:03):
But you were in AP English.
Yes, I was.

Speaker 1 (06:05):
I was a smart kid.
Here's the thing is I was asmart kid, I never had to try.
I never had to try.
And then I got to college and Isaw, through all the bullshit,
I was like I am never going touse this stuff in my entire life
.
The best class I ever tookthere was public speaking,
because I was a shy kid.
And but in the moment and it'sfunny because now I can look
back and I understood that'svery much who I am I saw that I

(06:27):
could use what I learned thatday as soon as I left that
classroom, whereas everythingelse was theory and history, and
I love here.
I love history theory, not asmuch theories.
Fun, you know, to talk andbullshit with your friends, I
think.
But a lot of it to me justdidn't make sense and I didn't
know how to apply it in the realworld.
You know, since I've had alittle, you know, more

(06:47):
experience, I understand howschool can help you, especially
the social aspect, but I didn'tget that at the time.
I totally didn't understand.
So, yeah, qualifying to be asongwriter and or an author,
like so many people think thatyou need a degree or a checkmark
or somebody pat you on the backand go.

Speaker 2 (07:02):
Okay, you're right, you're right.
You know it's ironic, and thisis I am not blowing smoke at you
, because you know I'm not asmoke blower but I have always
been mesmerized by authors andby book writing.
I'm like how can you have thediscipline to put all that
together?
It's just just fascinated me.
So when I met you, we were at acertain kind of meeting and we

(07:23):
can talk about that.

Speaker 1 (07:23):
I'm not doing it.
I hate meeting you All right.

Speaker 2 (07:26):
Well, you're a cool guy.
We had a similar, a couple offriends in common, and we're
talking one day and I wanted toget to know you because I like
the stuff that you shared in.
But anyway, you said, oh.
I said what are you doing?
You said I'm an author.
I'm like, oh, my God, I got toget to know this guy and by
spending time with you andtalking about it, literally, and

(07:46):
actually you didn't want itforcing me like I'm writing a
forward for your book, you'regoing to write this book and if
it hadn't been for that, Iwouldn't be doing this.
But I was like, okay, you madeit tangible.
And then I read like three ofyour books in a row that you
would give me and I'm like, okay, I see, and then you told me
it's crazy things.
Like I know, you don't know theending when you start.
It's insane to me, but Istarted realizing, just like

(08:10):
everything else, it's a muscleand it's funny, because I know
people that have a great ideaand they can write a song, but
they're not songwriters.
I think I can write a book, butI'm not an author, but I do.
I think understanding that willallow me to do something.
The book that I'm writing canbe good because I understand I
don't have to be able to come upwith fictional characters and

(08:30):
do things.
I need to be able to tell mystory in an interesting way
where people are interested init, and that's going to be my
thing.
I don't, I wouldn't.
It's funny.
At some point someone will.
If I release this book, someonewill say author in the line of
things, and I will call bullshiton myself.

Speaker 1 (08:44):
I don't know when you , you know, and I pushed you, I
did, and it wasn't.
It wasn't because I'm trying,you know this, I'm not trying to
get anything out of it, I justyou started telling me a couple
little things and I felt we'relucky in the program that we're
in now that we've learned tolisten to something else that we
don't understand Right For me,that's God and to start

(09:06):
listening to that voice.
It says you know what.
Maybe you should nudge yourbuddy a little bit, because
because one, I'm genuinelycurious about where you came
from.
Two, I think it could, it couldtouch and help a lot of people,
not unlike your podcast.
So I wrote that thing on myphone and I sent it to you.
You know I wrote in like fiveminutes, it came straight from
the heart.
And then and you were like waitI know you were probably

(09:28):
thinking like it's funny,because I pressed send and I'm
like he's either going to hateme or love me and I'm not sure
it was exactly it was.

Speaker 2 (09:35):
And here's another thing about getting older and
more sober and where I am inlife and some things that have
happened to me that I'm surewe'll get to, but I just pushed
it in now.
Yeah, just just do a call, makethe call, make the text.
I needed that thing because Iwhat's funny is over the years
that I mean like 20 years ormore I have written the forward
to books and or first chapterand never gotten beyond it.

(09:58):
Hey, you know, god knows whathe's doing.
It wasn't time.
When you sent that to me I waslike, okay, it's time.
And there's a lot of things inthe last two years that I have
just grown the balls to start,even with the idea that I might
not be good at this.
There's one reason I don't playgolf I like to be good at the
shit I do.
You know what I mean.
And I'm like man, I haven'tplayed and all my buddies play.

(10:19):
I'm like I'm not starting offbeing that guy we have to wait
for all day.
I'm just not playing.
But I tend to do that with withthings.
If it's just out of my purview,talk about doing it but not do
it.
But when I commit to doingsomething and I get into chapter
.
Once I got into chapter two.
We got 20 chapters, you knownow, and that started with that
day when you sent me that.

(10:39):
I'm so grateful for it.
I see a push send.

Speaker 1 (10:42):
Well, you know, unless it's a, unless it's an
angry email I've learned thatlesson the hard way to what's
funny and I'm not blowing smokeeither.
You sent me back that firstchapter to and I was, and I, you
know, you just intuitively know, because obviously I had
listened to some of your music,I had read some of your lyrics,
you and I had talked plenty.

(11:03):
You're very eloquent, right andso I knew, I, just I
intuitively knew that you knewhow to tell a story.
Obviously is a countrysongwriter you have to be, which
I didn't grow up listening tothe country, so I didn't know
that until I moved here.
I mean, I still don't, I don'treally listen to country, but
when I do, there's a fuckingstory.

(11:24):
Yeah, that was the other thingtoo I'll tell that story later
of when I realized you don'tlisten to music really anymore.

Speaker 2 (11:31):
You want to, you want to you want to not like
something anymore.
You want to ruin one of yourhobbies.
Do it for a living.

Speaker 1 (11:37):
Oh, dude, I said that .

Speaker 2 (11:38):
I don't love it.
I love it I just don't like it.

Speaker 1 (11:40):
There's a difference.
I could not read fiction foryears.
Yes, exactly I could not.
And that's what got me intoaudiobooks, because I realized,
as a passive listener, I wasn'tdoing the work.
I was just sitting back andlistening to the story again and
it made me fell in love withfiction again.
But for you, you are a naturalstoryteller and you started
telling.
You know, I tell the brown,brown, brown story to my closest

(12:02):
friends about the way youdescribed your childhood and it
was so vivid.
But that comes from experience.
It comes from you're a naturalstoryteller, it comes from the
fact that you are a songwriter.
It comes from the fact that youstand up on stage and tell
stories.
You know, I've seen you acouple of times up on stage and
you and your brother areconstantly telling stories, so

(12:24):
that naturally lends itself tositting down and putting pen to
paper or typing something onyour phone or on a screen.
But a lot of people they getstuck because they think they're
either not qualified or oh myGod, the blank screen right, and
I know songwriters do the samething right, they have a pad of
paper and they're going I don'tknow what the first word is or

(12:45):
the first lick or whatever it is, but like when you first
started writing, what did thatfeel?

Speaker 2 (12:49):
like it's interesting because now getting past that
first page would get into yourthing later.
But that's just.
That was daunting, like, oh myGod, I'm not writing a three
minute song here, I'm writinglike a book.
That's daunting to me when wewrite.
Now I co write because mybrother and I have written
almost everything together.
He's been writing songs withoutme because I leave town more

(13:10):
often.
I'm just not going to write asmany songs currently, but 3000
songs we've written together.
3000 songs we've writtentogether.
We've had 300 songs recorded, alittle more, I mean give or
take, give or take a few hundred.
But we've had about 300 songsrecorded by national artists.
About 20 of them have made allthe money, to be honest, and

(13:31):
we've written 3000.
That shows you the odds.
So we write a lot.
When I first started writing Ijust did it.
I didn't know any better thannot to.
I didn't have that trepidationof going oh, I can't do this.
Because I was like well, I playguitar and I want to be in a
band and there were certainsongs.
I don't know if you rememberthe song.
It would be way old for you, itwould have been like three, but

(13:53):
it was called Nobody.
It was by Sylvia, you're Nobodycalled today.
She hung up when I asked hername.
Okay, I wonder if she thinksshe's being clever.
You say Nobody's after you.
That's what you say is true.
But I can love you like Nobodycan, even better.
Yeah, it's an old Sylvia songand I did not like it.
It was like pop country and Ididn't like that kind of stuff
and I like Van Halen.
But when I heard that song I'mlike, oh, that's brilliant.
They used Nobody as the personand the you know the imagery in

(14:17):
it.
Just I don't know why that songhad such an effect on me.
So I got interested in thewriting portion.
So I was like 12 years oldputting a band together with my,
my buddy at school, darren.
We needed a singer and adrummer.
So we just told my littlebrother you're doing both,
you're the singer and thedrummer, because he could do
anything.
He could play anything, alwaysplay any instrument.

(14:38):
And we we did that.
And so I wrote all the songsfor our bands all growing up,
the rock bands, whatever.
And then it I never thoughtabout it and then my little
brother started writing songsand that was like what you can't
write songs, it's too young,it's my thing yeah, whatever
You're, my little brother, youcan't.

(15:00):
And then I started realizingthis kid's really good at this
and we started writing songstogether as teenagers and
decided that we were going towrite together instead of apart,
so that we wouldn't competewith which songs to record.
And for the next 30 years wewrote songs only together.
Really, we would turn downsessions with other people with.
Both of us couldn't be there.
Last couple of years we weredoing some writing on our own

(15:21):
very little for me, a little bitwith him, but we just a synergy
came about and we, we wound up.
There is definitely somethingabout our writing.
I don't know if it's good orbad, but I have friends from out
of town that live in New Yorkor something that'll call and
get hey, is this song?
You and I'm like yeah, and Imean not not currently, but like
in the past 15 years or so.
And then I could tell, I couldtell you, I could feel your

(15:44):
writing on it, both of you, andthat's the biggest compliment I
could get, I guess, as a writer.
I think that you know, andthere's plenty of people way
better, plenty of people waymore successful, but if you have
something that's recognizableenough for for one of your
friends or fans to recognizethat you and you can make a
living doing it you're a writer,yeah, it's like.

Speaker 1 (16:01):
It's like you know our mutual friend, tom Douglas,
right, same sort of thing Like I.
You know I'm not in the musicworld but I love music and I
love words and there was a timewhen you know especially I can't
remember what year that was hehad kind of like hit after hit,
after hit and you could feel Tomin those songs Like really I

(16:21):
mean very.

Speaker 2 (16:22):
He's my mentor, by the way.
When we moved to Nashville.
He's the first guy we met andwe're like God does everyone
hear this good.
By the way, everyone is not noexactly.

Speaker 1 (16:30):
He's a freak when it comes to that, but yeah, I can.

Speaker 2 (16:33):
I can hear Tom Douglas all in a song.
I can hear just by theadjectives no one else would say
the amount of words he can fitinto a sentence.
And he can fit more words intotwo bars of music without
rapping than Lil Wayne can.
It's amazing, but he's such apoet.

Speaker 1 (16:48):
Absolutely, that's what he.
I mean.

Speaker 2 (16:50):
he is a songwriter, but I think, beneath it all, he
is a true poet, as being able torecognize someone's writing
when you hear it on the radiowith a different interpretation,
production, a different artistsinging it.
Tom is the most recognizablewriter that I know.

Speaker 1 (17:03):
Yeah, period it's, it's it's fun to hang out with
him because he is, you know, Ikind of think of him whenever,
whenever he and I hang out, thathe's kind of like maybe a, a
more sane hemming way.
You know what I mean.
Like, like, like somebody whois very grounded but at the same
time like lives in the clouds alittle bit too right.

(17:24):
Like is a dreamer and and hasthese ethereal moments where
everything seems to be swirlingaround in his head.
And and I've been in a roomwith him and I know you
definitely have way more timesthan I have where it's like,
it's almost like he's got somany ideas going on and you can
visibly see him which ones he'strying to pick out of the air
and put on the table.

Speaker 2 (17:43):
Yeah, yeah, and another thing about writing with
Tom is that he, he goes for it,he goes for it.
He's got a big vocabulary andhe will go to the.
You're like what?
You can't say that in a song?
And then you hear it on theradio three months and I'm like,
damn he got it in there he hadthis thing where he wanted to
get flock of peacocks in a song.
And I had three times with itand it was like I'm like Tom,

(18:05):
that's the third time youbrought up flock of peacocks in
the last month and he wantedthat in a song so much and he's
visible in his head.
But he's a guy that when hedoesn't hit it he is a home run
hitter.
Yeah, because he strikes out.
When he sometimes I'm like areyou insane?
This is, this is a terribleidea, and he's it's just

(18:27):
nonsense.
And then at some point thenonsense always takes a turn to
oh, son of a bitch, thatnonsense is genius.
That's what he's doing.
On the wrong day.
It's like you're like this guyis crazy.
He's a very hemming way crazyand he, like he will die with
the pen and set.
Because Tom is, I start tothink how much do I have riding

(18:48):
wise?
I'm riding less, trying towrite more quality try to trophy
fish, a trophy hunt was riding,but Tom's and I wonder how much
riding I'm going to do, as I'mat 54 years old, I'm better
health than I was when I was 34,and far better actually because
I was still drinking and using.
But wondering how longsomeone's going to do it and
Tom's in his mid 60s.

(19:09):
He's no plans to.

Speaker 1 (19:11):
No, not at all, in fact.
I mean, in fact, I gotta get onthe phone and call him at some
point and go go have lunch withhim.
But you know, the last time Iwas with him he made it a point
to say that he's trying to spendmore time with younger
songwriters because they givehim energy and they bring
something else to the room.
And I'm sure part of it and youknow we could probably talk

(19:31):
about the book what was strength?
Of strength right, that thatyou move into that different
part of your life where youbecome this mentor, and he's
definitely been part of that.
You know, I've I've met peoplewho are brand new to town and
somehow his name comes up andtheir eyes just like light, like
he's God, and I can't imaginebeing a brand new songwriter and

(19:53):
getting invited to his housebecause he does a majority of
his stuff there.
I think, still right.

Speaker 2 (19:58):
Yeah, he does.

Speaker 1 (19:59):
Like in his converted garage.

Speaker 2 (20:00):
He's a dine.

Speaker 1 (20:01):
Yeah, and being invited into the sanctum of Tom
Douglas and I've been very luckythat obviously I look up to him
, I consider him a friend.
But maybe it's because of who Iam and maybe who I put very few
people on pedestals that when Igo in there I feel not like an
equal but something like that.

(20:21):
Right, we're both artists andto be able to come at it from a
different angle, but going inthere and being a new kid and
just like looking at somebody inall who's had all these hits,
is in the Songwriters Hall ofFame, all these things, I mean
what he won in Oscar and Emmysand you know, I don't know
probably he's been in all thatshit and whatever he has it on
is BS because it should have.

(20:41):
Yeah, absolutely, I don't knowwho votes for those things.
But when you came to town, Istill think, well, that part of
your story that you shared withme and I can't wait until it
comes out in book form where Ican actually read the words.
But for me, the visuals that Iremember in my head, of the
words that you sent me via note,were you guys coming to town, I

(21:04):
think going to Bennegan's, andwho was it?
Shane McEnally was waitingtables there and then, visually,
I see you and Brett literallyknocking on door saying, hey,
we're here, what can we do?
You know what I mean?
And that was the visual for me.
Like, what was it like for realwhen you guys first came here?

Speaker 2 (21:23):
I mean, it was that we moved.
Ok, so you're Ignorance's Bliss.
So we moved here.
Ok, we're going to do something.
And, to tell the truth, I don'tknow what our delusion might
have been, but we came from amom who said you can't do
anything.
She should have been amotivation.
I think she was amazing Reversemotivation.
Reverse motivation because wewere like I'm going to do

(21:45):
something.
So we moved here with lowexpectations but high hopes, and
we had one friend.
He was a host at Bennegan's.
We went into Bennegan's.
The first person we met inNashville was Shane McEnally,
this redheaded kid waitingtables.
So that's my friend, shane.
He writes songs too, oh great.
So we became, you know, I meancasual friends.
Anyway, for those of you whodon't know, shane McEnally is

(22:05):
maybe the single most successfulcombo of writer publisher in
the history of Nashville and heactually there's guys with more
hits than him, but there are notbetter writers.
He's as good a songwriter asyou.
So I've been in a room with it.
I've been in a room witheverybody Taylor Swift, steven
Tyler, tom Douglas and as greatas Tom Douglas is as a poet, the
person crafting a song, knowinghow to get the audience and

(22:27):
still not being a selloutbecause there's some guys with
tons of hits and I respect them.
I respect them I don't evenknow if I'm a pimple on there
but they the gravitas of whatthey're doing, it's just they're
in ankle deep water.
Shane man, he's a little.
If you listen to the words ofhis songs there's more there.
Anyway, first guy we met inNashville was literally became

(22:49):
maybe the best songwriter thetown's ever seen.
The first guy we met we had afriend of a friend, brett Lictis
girl, who has formerly datedone of the guys in the band
Warrent, the rock band Warrent.
They were managed by a guynamed Eddie Winnrich and Eddie
Winnrich had a business partnerand another venture named
Charlie Smithers.
Charlie Smithers had a venturein another business with a guy

(23:12):
named Buzz Kasen who's an oldguy that owned a studio here and
he introduced us to Buzz Kasenand Buzz Kasen was co-producing
Tom Douglas's solo album thatnever came out Really, and that
is how we met Tom Douglas.
Now you tell me there's thatdivine intervention there.

Speaker 1 (23:28):
Oh my gosh, I don't know if you followed all those
names.
That's too many, that's toomany connections for you to do
on your own.

Speaker 2 (23:33):
So we come to town, we meet Buzz Kasen, who he wrote
Everlasting Love, the songthat's been cut and it's been a
top 40 hit in five straightdecades, god, really Cut by
everyone from you two to theGloria Estefan to the Rolling
Stones.
I mean it's a total classicAnyway.
So we're kind of in all of Buzz.
He had this studio and then wemeet Tom, but Tom is currently a

(23:54):
real estate salesman in Texasand he's got one hit and it's on
the radio or it just had gonenumber one, and it was the song
Little Rock for Colin Ray.
And I mean, if you listen, tothat song.
There's a lot of stuff on theradio that's good, man.
Lyrically they don't get muchbetter than that.
The song didn't have an ounceof fat on it.
It told a great story.

(24:15):
It had pictures that it'sselling DCRs in Arkansas and to
Walmart man, you were there, youwere in the parking lot, like
he put you there.
It's brilliant, colin RayLittle Rock.
If you haven't listened tocountry music in a while, it's
brilliant.
And so we knew he was good.
But we meet to him and we'relike rock and roll kids, we're
smoking cigarettes or tattoos,and we meet this guy with a

(24:35):
button-up shirt and a reallybeautiful, sweet wife in a nice
big house, because he used tosell real estate and he had
small children, and we're likeyou're inviting us to your home,
are you sure you know?
And this unlikely friendshipwas born.
It's crazy about songwriting.
As you could, tom could seesomething in us that I don't
think anyone else could have.
Yeah, and we will.

(24:58):
I'll never be as poetic as TomDouglas, but we gave him
something musically that was anedge that he didn't have, and he
gave us something lyricallythat we would never, ever have
gotten where we are without.
And it was always don't settlefor the line that works.
Dig for the line that meanssomething.
Push a button, and even towriting the dumbest song on

(25:18):
Earth Red Solo Cup.
We learned from Tom Douglas howto push a button.
If you're not pushing a buttonin someone, what are you writing
for?
You know anybody else will sayla la, la.

Speaker 1 (25:27):
I don't know if I ever told you the story.
So my brother-in-law and Tomlive in the same neighborhood.
Oh, okay, he's like, yeah, yeah,so that's how I met Tom
initially and I remember becauseI think Tom was walking and his
daughter was like riding ahorse through the neighborhood
or something weird.
Anyway, so I meet him and it'sat my brother-in-law's house and

(25:49):
I just kind of spark up aconversation.
He's the one I don't even knowif I've I think I've told him
this.
So he told me the story aboutat the time I was in commercial
real estate and so he had beenin commercial real estate down
in Texas and then he told me thestory about.
I asked him how did he get toNashville?
And he told me the story thathe had written and then he had

(26:09):
left and gotten in commercialreal estate and then come back.
It was like a contest.

Speaker 2 (26:14):
Yeah, it was so contested.

Speaker 1 (26:15):
And what he was in his early 40s.
So basically, he did not findhis way until he was in his 40s
and I will never forget thatthat gave me permission to
become a writer later on,because I remember that, first
of all, I didn't have to ask forpermission and, second, I was
like who else that I know hasdone this like later on in their

(26:36):
lives?
And Tom Douglas just like keptcoming up, kept coming up in my
head and so for me he's beenjust kind of one of those
pinnacles in my life of likesomebody who made that change
later on and now come to findout a lot of people do that in
their 40s and 50s and theyreally don't find their way
until now.
How old were you when you wroteyour first book?

(26:57):
I was what.
So that was.
What year was that?
2011, 2010, 11.
So that was what?
12 years ago?
So I was 34, 34 at the time, soclose to his 40, right and I
was having a I guess at the timewould be kind of like a midlife
crisis.

(27:18):
I owned a property managementcompany at the time, hated what
I was doing.
It had nothing to do with thelike renters, it actually had to
do with some of the clientswe're just to this day I won't
have my phone on ring.
I always have it on silentbecause of that.
Time Almost drove me to PTSDthe rare.
Oh yeah, absolutely.
I almost had a nervousbreakdown, ended up selling the

(27:41):
company and really just forenough money to pay off the debt
that we had, and then I left.
I went and worked for a buddyfor like a month, knew that
wasn't gonna work out, so I quitand I went to my wife and I
said, hey, I wrote this book.
I'd written my first book on mylunch breaks Learn how to do
stuff on my own Cause.
I'd written a commercial realestate book, like to kind of

(28:02):
give to people as I was coldcalling, and that was the first
book.
That was the very first bookwas a commercial real estate
book.
The first fiction novel I wrotewas called Back to War and it
was written.
I've told this story a bunch oftimes.
We were at Disney World I thinkit was 2010.
We had two kids at the time.
We had just had a big day atDisney World and we came back,

(28:26):
my wife and my kids laid downfor a nap, and I had this idea
in my head that I just wouldn'tgo away About this character.
Second Avenue, downtown.
He gets attacked with hisfiance.
His fiance gets killed.
He's a marine.
What happens next?
And that started my writingcareer.
So I learned how to publish iton my own as a self-published

(28:49):
author.
Now we call ourselves Indies tosound a little more important.
And one month I'd sell twocopies and then the next month
I'd sell 25.
So I'm watching this for sixmonths as I'm going through the
last bits of my propertymanagement career Sell the
company, get out and I asked mywife.
I said can I have six months totry this?

(29:09):
I'll stay home, I'll be astay-at-home dad.
I'll watch the kids whenthey're asleep, I'll work on
what I need to work on.
And so during that six months Ithink I wrote three more books.
I stayed home with the kids.
I'd stay up till like three inthe morning reading everything I
could about publishing,learning everything.
And at the time there was a guynamed Joe Conrath who was like

(29:33):
he blogged almost every dayabout.
You know, he'd beentraditionally published and then
he'd gotten in this new world.
He was just making a killing atthe time and he was documenting
everything.
So I was really lucky becausetwo years before that I wouldn't
have had anybody to read.
I would spend hours and hoursand days just reading all his
posts.
I mean, I went back to the verybeginning and just started

(29:54):
reading and that's how I learnedand I started experimenting.
And then I met some people andI started making more money,
right, and I remember at thetime my goal was I could just
make $3,000 a month.
If I could just make $3,000,that was my number $3,000.
I will have made it, becausemost people, most authors, don't
make money, like a lot ofpeople don't know that Most

(30:15):
authors don't make any.
I was not in it for vanity.
I was in it to make money andnot to be famous, to support my
family.
That was my dream and it'sfunny because now I have a big
thing, a big flag on my wall inmy office that says remember why
you started and I started totake care of my family period
that was it.

(30:36):
I didn't want to be famous, noneof that.
There have been points in mycareer where I wanted to be that
guy.
I wanted to be the next JohnGrisham In fact I do as a joke,
I own the domain Juan Grisham,because one time I was in an
Uber and this guy kept asking mewhat do you do?
And I made the mistake of sayingI was an author.
And he's like oh, what are youright under?

(30:57):
And I said Juan Grisham.
So, yes, it's a joke between meand some of my friends.
So, anyway, you know, I startwriting and learning and then I
start meeting some people, whoit was actually my cohost of
this podcast.
He wrote a blog post in Januaryof the year after that I read

(31:17):
that changed everything for me.
So he outlined everything thathe had done in his career and
different tactics that he wasusing that were really bold and
not a lot of people were doing.
And I did it.
I started doing it and itchanged everything.
I found a new readership and Iwas doing a lot of things like I
was.
I've always been an action guy.

(31:37):
You know that about me.
So I was.
I was figuring out how does Iget?
I screwed up a lot of things,but I did a lot of things right
and the things that were doingit going right were going really
well.
So I just kept growing andgrowing and then and how did you
?
find your audience.
So in the beginning, this wasthis was right after Kindle

(31:58):
started.
So 2011, 2012, freebies likeKindle freebies were a big deal.
So free, free ebooks.
So not a lot of people knowthis.
Back then there were like a fewwebsites that you could post
your your ebooks and so thatpeople that wanted to find free
books could get them anddownload them right and that

(32:19):
could really drive you up in therankings and just help find new
readers and all that.
Well, I would go on a couple ofthose, but it was hard because
they were being more and moreselective.
So I started my own website.
It was called I Love ebooks andI started posting, like I was
just going on Amazon and like,grabbing stuff that was free and
making it look good.
And I had a Facebook page and Iwe had, you know, there was a

(32:43):
daily newsletter that went out.
Nobody knew that.
I ran it, but then I would alsothrow in my books every once in
a while, like, and that's how Ifound my first readership and I
think that's part of why I havea very high female readership as
well, because those were mostlywomen looking for free books,
because they read voraciously.

(33:03):
I mean, I've met people thatread three books a day, like
that kind of stuff.
So that's how I built.
I mean, it was very grassroots.
It was very like you know, hey,what's working today, what's
working tomorrow, and then youknow Amazon started introducing
more tools, but really it was.
That was the beginning of it,and then, probably not unlike
you, figuring out what storiesresonate with people and which

(33:27):
ones I enjoyed writing to andwriting more of that.
Right, like like beingstrategic but not overthinking
it.
Yeah, because I was.
There was a period in my careerI overthought way too much and
it became not fun anymore.

Speaker 2 (33:40):
Is there a point when you, when you read your early
books, is there something therethat you miss now?
Because I'll tell you this, myvery first song as a kid you
were, you were writing inEnglish.
That was your English classwhen I was.
But our first hits, yeah, meanmore to.
There's something, man.
We we learned how to write ahit.
It's just there's somethingmissing.

(34:02):
When I look back at 20, there'ssome 20 years ago stuff and I
go that guy didn't, he didn'tknow any better.
Yeah that was awesome.

Speaker 1 (34:07):
Yeah, I didn't care.
I didn't care and I didn't.
I didn't know enough of therules to understand that I was
breaking them Right Now, like Itell my kids know the rules, so
you know how to break them, soyou understand what the limits
are and then go break them.
I know the rules now and partof it is that takes some of the
wonder out of it, because in thebeginning it was just, it was

(34:29):
exciting and like I'm puttingwords and then I go back and
read them like, wow, this what?
And in I mean looking back.
We've gone back and edited acouple times, especially my
first book, but it was, it wasdirty and it was rough, but I
can still go to the core of itand see it was a story about a
guy in pain and utilizing hisskills, but that he was also and

(34:53):
you'll appreciate this he wassurrounded by people, guys,
manly warriors who cared for himand would do anything for him,
and so I didn't realize that foryears I was writing about what
I wanted in my life before I hadit Right.
And of course, I had to realizeI was an alcoholic and go to AA

(35:14):
before I found my people.
You know that's how I met youand so now I have my people.
Lo and behold, I was writingabout it for six years before I
found it, especially my spin offseries.
So I have a spin off of one ofmy favorite reader, favorite
characters and mine and I wasreading it.
I was writing about myself, somy characters tend to be either

(35:37):
part of who I am or who I was orwho I want to be, and this
character was who I was and whoI wanted to be all rolled into
one and my readers love this guy, absolutely love him, which is
funny, because now I'm throwinghim all kinds of shit and he's
going, he's, he's, he'semotionally relapsing.
Right now.
People are like, wait, what hewas, an alcoholic, what I'm like

(35:59):
, did you not read the otherbooks?

Speaker 2 (36:02):
So yeah, but yeah, that's why they love it.
I'm just guessing, but it's aneducated guess, because the more
authentic we write, the morethere it's.
In songs and in this book thatI'm trying to write, there have
been moments where I kind ofcurved my language.
I went wait a minute, wait aminute.
There's going to be profanityin this book.
My mom's, like in life, likeall of this, write this shit how

(36:23):
you feel it right now and tellthe truth.

Speaker 1 (36:26):
About tell the truth.

Speaker 2 (36:27):
Everything.
By the way, it doesn't meandragging anyone's dirty laundry
in.
I think I did a pretty good jobof dragging my own dirty
laundry in and not includinganyone else in the trip, because
it's not my job to tell whateveryone else did.
But there's something aboutthose early things where you
didn't know the rules that it'sjust grimey or it's like there's

(36:48):
a kid, there's a kid in thatand he's a new songwriter.
His name's Preston James andhe's really talented.
He's 22 years old and the firsttime we met him he's like oh,
there's the Warren Brothers andwe're in Warren Chapel.
He's really talented new youngguy and he writes for the same
publisher we do and he just goesNew Mexico, new Diet Coke, new
taxes on the same pack of smokes, new president, new precedents,

(37:11):
new music ain't got the samesoul and I'm like, oh my god,
that was lyrics and a song fromour indie record that was, and
I'm like, and so he has a littletext chain with us on it when
we write it he calls it New DietCoke, cause we and I'm like, oh
my god, this kid was and wewere that's just not country
songwriting and we were likebeing an indie rock band.

(37:31):
It was after our record deal,before we got sober.
It was in that time shit wasnot good and this kid was like
he goes, man, I listened.
So he was like eight or ninewhen that case and I listened to
that CD so much my mom said, ifyou listen to that Warren
Brothers CD again, I'm going tothrow it away.
It was that irritating how muchhe goes.
I was raised on this album andI'm like, oh my god, you just,
and I'm telling you our earlyrecords didn't sell anything.

(37:53):
This really didn't sell.
I mean you're talking, you know, 20, 30,000 copies and it's not
like books.
That would be a lot of books,but something like that.
Not a lot of CDs, but there wasenough of them out there and you
just never have any idea whatthe ripple is, and I always
loved somebody's early stuffbecause they didn't get to think
about it or pretty it up toomuch, not polished, I mean.

Speaker 1 (38:16):
So you just quoted your own lyrics.
This is a question I've beenwanting to ask you for a long
time.

Speaker 2 (38:22):
That was terrible.
By the way, I didn't just quotethem all At least you remember
most of it.

Speaker 1 (38:29):
How do you do that?
I've heard you quote people.
I've heard you quote quotes.
I've heard you pull fullpassages from books that you've
read months before.
Is that just?
Is that you?
Is that being a songwriter?
Is that being an entertainer?
Like how the I can't memorizeanything.

Speaker 2 (38:47):
For me, that's being a songwriter, because we're
nugget oriented.
The thing is that's you're thelong play which amazes me.
I'm like, how do you do that?
How do you do that?
We're the short play.
I do not let a nugget pass mybrain without a lot to get in
there.
And you know, what's funny issome things I had to.
I'm like researching where didI get that?
Where did I get them?
Like, oh, I said that.
Or thinking I said somethingand realized seeing it on a you

(39:08):
know.
No, mike Tyson said everybody'sgot a game plan till they get
hit in the mouth.
You didn't say that Because ofthe songwriter brain, everything
that comes across that hits you.
I mean we probably talked aboutit.
But I have a note list ofquotes in my phone and I mean
there's hundreds.
I love quotes so I don't everlet one pass.
And then if it's stories thatare that you could get in a

(39:29):
little nugget, the way that youthink in long form, which you
can't possibly memorize thatmuch, my job is to do that in
short form and it's much easierto remember those little, those
little nuggets I mean in my mind.
I couldn't believe that thiskid knew this growing up.
But if you went back to thesongs you grew up on, do you
remember the?

Speaker 1 (39:48):
words to Very true.
Very true, you know, and Iprobably do weird stuff in my
own right.
So I probably told you and Iknow I've mentioned this on here
that I read like 20 books at atime.
Yes, and I have a placeholderin my head so I can put it away
for a year and come back to itand I don't need to go back.
And it's not.

(40:08):
I do not have a photographicmemory.
It has nothing to do with that.
It has everything to do, Ithink, with story right, because
I live in story and you live insong, so we immerse ourselves
in those worlds and that shitjust sticks, and it probably
will forever and ever.
I can't write.

Speaker 2 (40:23):
I can't read two books at a time when I am in
this mode.
I have to stay in that modetill that's done, because you
tell me like you write on thetreadmill, I'm like what?
And it's funny because I wasgoing to try to write while like
talking.
But I can't do that.
I have to type it and then lookat it and go, okay, yeah, that
makes I could.
It took a while.
I mean, there are just tricks ofthe trade and things that we do

(40:45):
after.
It's funny because after youknow 25 years of doing this for
a living, I don't even thinkabout it anymore.
But when something I hearsomething interesting whether
it's an AAMini or a movie or I'mat the mall and I overhear
something, it goes in my phone,goes in my phone, goes in my
phone and I just and I don'thave them all memorized, but if

(41:06):
you said the first three wordsof all of them, I would, because
that nugget is that's my placemarker.

Speaker 1 (41:11):
Yeah, it's funny.
The last episode when I waswith Robert, my co-host, we were
talking about that.
So I came into his house oneday and there's just papers
stacked everywhere.
I'm like, what are you doing?
And he was going back throughhis old files and just getting
rid of a bunch of stuff and itjust it reminded me we had this
whole conversation about when Iwas.

(41:33):
Everybody has their own process,right, you have your notes on
your phone.
I used to take copious notesand if an idea I would put it, I
would take it and put it in afile folder and all that.
What I found for me is I can'tdo that because all of a sudden
that's felt like pressure, likeanother job, that oh my God, I'm
going to miss something.
So I was stressing out aboutmissing shit and then I read

(41:57):
something again.
It's to each his own, everybodyhas their own process that if
it's a great idea, it's going tostick in your head and that
works for me, whereas for yougoing in and you know, because
I've seen you, I've seen you gothrough that list and whether
it's you know song names orwhatever it is and going and
finding something, and you know,you've kind of talked about
your songwriting and how you dothat as well.

(42:18):
But, like for me, I've justfound and I think part of it is
the person that I am now I givein myself enough grace that I
know the things that I'm notgood at, and one of the things
I'm not good at is just havingthis whole compilation of stuff
sitting in the corner waitingfor me to dig into it again.
I can't do that.
Like I have to be struck byinspiration, but like we talk
about, inspiration strikes everytime I go sit down and write

(42:42):
right and I have to do that.
I have to.
But it's funny where that shitpulls from.
You know, sometimes it's aconversation you and I had,
sometimes it's a news articlethat I read.
I don't save these thingsanywhere anymore but intuitively
my brain knows to latch ontosomething and then bring it in
when it needs to come out.

Speaker 2 (43:00):
When I started writing.
I've another friend of mine,another songwriter, that had
written a book it's really goodand he gave me this book, that
from a writer, the guy thatwrote Fight Club, I can't
remember his name, and it wasthis instruction book.
So I'm, I'm talking to you andI'm giving you some of this
stuff and you said, take it witha grain of salt, every writer's
got their own.
Cause, honestly, it was kind ofmessing my head up because it

(43:21):
was giving me rules that I wasable to say, and you and you,
I'm like thank God you told me,cause there's, there's a book
called Toon Smith by oh, what'sthe guy's name he wrote.
He wrote what's the title?
I'm, anyway, great songwriterand I read his book many 20
years ago, but it was like therewas, you know, you can't have
not imperfect rhymes, right?
I'm like, well, man, I'm glad Ididn't fall in that role.
You can have imperfect rhymes,you can have no rhymes.

(43:44):
There are no rules and gettingoutside of those rules is
freeing, as it can be, and everyjob has certain constants.
So, um, the way you collectinformation, the way I collect
information, we haveaccidentally learned that to
survive and what we do, you knowGarrett headlin is.
He's an actor, yeah, and he wasin.

(44:04):
Well, he's in Friday nightlights.
I met him years ago because hewas the Tim McGraw son in the
movie Friday night lights and ohhe's been a bunch of stuff and
I, we see each otheroccasionally and he and my
brother he's he's pretty goodfriends of my brother and Me and
Breton and him were at we're atlunch and we were talking about

(44:24):
the.
I'm like, how do you, do youmemorize that, all that stuff?
And he's like man, I memorizedthe whole script.
Oh my gosh, everybody's partlike, oh my, he's like I know,
because I just, I just he goes,but I first thing I do.
It's funny.
I always told my kids this,right, growing up in school use
I write it, yeah, the wholething.
And then I get done and I writeit again, oh, immediately.

(44:46):
And then I read what I'vewritten and I hear it's this
whole process.
I would now I would getinaccurate if I went in, but he
wrote the whole script down, hememorizes the whole script, so
he knows it's like second nature, what's there?
There are no accidents in.
Like.
You know, it would be easy tobe an actor if you just had the
ability not true, not true to bean author, not true, being a
songwriter.
There's hours, ten thousandhours, is a joke.

(45:09):
Oh, yeah, you know what I mean.
Absolutely the amount of timewe think about these things and
the reason that it's fun for meto try to get Literary and for
you.
At some point you're probablygonna wind up writing a song, or
maybe a bunch of them, becausethey're shorter.
The creative thing is part ofwho I am but you just get burnt
out on the, the process.

(45:31):
We, yeah, it's the process,music grow that.
I've been going down there for25 years.
You know, some days I'm likeI'm mental ditch digging.

Speaker 1 (45:38):
Today it's.
It's funny you say that becauseI'm writing a book right now
and that's how it feels, dude.
And I keep telling myself justshow up, just show up, you know
what.
If it sucks, who cares?
Just say the words will putthem on paper.
And it's funny because, youknow, every day before I start I
just I have to clean up what Idid the day before, just
formatting wise, so I got a readthrough it anyway.

(45:59):
I'm like, okay, this is not asbad as you think, it is right,
like, and definitely, once itgets through editing, I know how
to tell a story, just like youknow how to write a song, and so
we know these thingsintuitively.
So most times when we just showup, it's gonna be okay.
But, man, I, we were, we werehanging out what a week or two
ago and you were mentioning.

(46:20):
You know, some days it justseems like a grind when you go
to work and for some reason lastweek and a half at work, for me
writing has been a grind andmark part of this.
Maybe the kids just went backto school, so there's a lot
going on, there's activities,I'm doing other stuff in my
business, I don't know, maybethere's just more distractions
or I'm just maybe I'm heading.
The thing that I always thinkabout, you know, on the side is

(46:43):
maybe I'm heading into a newphase of my career.
I don't know, I may be, I maybe I may be taking a different
role.
That being said, you know youmentioned, I've told you before
one of my pipe dreams is I wouldlove to write songs.
You know I'm not a yeah, Iplayed saxophone, you know, when
I was in middle school.
So I understand music, but Ilove, I just love music.

(47:07):
I just do, and I don't knowwhat that looks like and we've
talked about it before.
And you're like, maybe you cango in and do this and I'm like
Do you know how bad that scaresme to go in the room with
somebody who's been doing it for25 years and not know the rules
?
That's my thing.
I does this?
Bother you at all to like?
You kind of said a minute agothat I need to know the rules
before I step into something?

Speaker 2 (47:29):
Yeah, yeah, and that's the by the way.
That's bad, I don't need toscare the shit out of me.
I don't need to know the rules,but that's why I never started
writing a book, you know okay?
So after we're gonna write asong, after this, we will write
a song, just and honestly.
Since we're close enough, it'lljust be the two of us, and then
we can venture into otherthings later, just to, and if it
sucks, we don't have to playfor anyone.

Speaker 1 (47:47):
I would go through the process.

Speaker 2 (47:48):
Let's do it.
That's absolutely would love todo that.
Yeah, yeah, we'll just, we'lljust.
We'll just write a song.
I mean for sure, because thereis.
It is a little adventure.
You like cool and it's funny.
With my brother We've beenwriting together the whole the
whole time.
We argue almost every day, but,but with respect, usually.
But man, there's a friend,Lance.

(48:09):
He's a great, he writes with usand he's such a great
cheerleader of it.
He goes, man, just when youguys hit it, when it gets on, he
said you're like DobermanPinterest with chicken gizzards,
but you're just tearing it,like it just.
But that's actually probably areally violent Way to look at it
.
But he said man, it just flowsand it just comes out and it's

(48:29):
amazing when the two of you hitit, you don't even realize it.
So a lot of times when we writewith someone early Me, brett and
I, and a third person and belike, oh, my god, you guys can
finish each other's thoughts,can't you?
There's a groove that you hit,that's good and and that stuff
is special and those are cool.
But when you were sayingearlier that you, you know, it's
not as bad as you thought itwas, I don't think it's ever as

(48:49):
good or bad as I perceive it tobe in that day.
Totally Unfortunately, it's allcloser to the middle that I'd
like for it to be.
Yeah, there are no rules and andthe I honestly I would love to
just there'll be fun to justventure into a song with you To
let you see how a how, oh, howbasic it is and then be how

(49:10):
Unbelievable it is that you haveto.
First of all, this has to go tomelody and music and we have to
have an idea that meanssomething or where I get there.
It's kind of brilliant and it'skind of really simple.
And then it's kind of a miraclethat any of these little
Recordings ever take the trekthat it has to take to become a
hit.
Because, yeah,
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