March 20, 2026 • 21 mins
Emerging singer/songwriter Timothy Wayne didn't hide it - he just didn't flaunt it. His famous uncle (just announced as the newest inductee into the Country Music Hall of Fame!) is legendary hitmaker Tim McGraw. Hear how Timothy is forging his own musical path while accepting "a line in the sand" laid down by Uncle Tim.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hello, Welcome in to Cook and Chase, Nashville.
Speaker 2 (00:03):
Chats.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
Lori, Anne and Charlie here today entering the studio emerging
artist Timothy Wayne. Gosh, Charlie, we started noticing his music
what about a year ago or so. But this is crazy.
We're so busy, you know, doing all kinds of things.
We had no idea that Timothy Wayne had a secret. Now,
(00:24):
it wasn't that he was deliberately hiding anything, right, he
just wasn't doing any bragging about the truth.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
Yeah, that's one way of putting it.
Speaker 1 (00:35):
Well, okay, let me saying. Well, the truth, first of
all is that Timothy Wayne is an incredibly gifted singer songwriter.
But the underlying truth is his uncle is legendary superstar
Tim McGrath. Now Tim's sister, Sandy is Timothy's mom, and
she's also been coordinating and managing Timothy's career through his
(00:56):
high school years and now at college at LSU.
Speaker 2 (00:59):
Now, of course, we have known because of our business here.
We have known Tim McGraw and his sister Sandy forever.
So when Timothy landed in our studios, we're quick to
say Timothy and not Tim. Just not to confused Anyway,
when Timothy landed in our studios recently, it was kind
of like Old Home Week. Sandy was here as well,
and all I was talking about Tim McGraw's recovery from
(01:21):
his recent back and knee surgeries caused by I guess
a long string of stage injuries.
Speaker 1 (01:26):
Now he fell down a few times, I know.
Speaker 2 (01:28):
So that's where our conversation with Timothy Wayne begins. Let's
join him.
Speaker 1 (01:34):
This is what I want to know as we welcome
Timothy Wayne to Crook and Chase.
Speaker 2 (01:38):
It's so great to see you.
Speaker 3 (01:40):
It's great meeting y'all. Thanks for having me.
Speaker 1 (01:42):
Okay, so, how has this world at your young age
beat you up? What kind of surgeries are you looking for?
Speaker 3 (01:47):
Lord?
Speaker 4 (01:47):
Well, I've had I've had an appendectomy. It's about the
only thing. That about the only surgery that I've actually had.
But I've broken my hand, both hands. Actually I broken
my foot a couple of times, but doing what I
think the hands, if I remember correctly, were both soccer
and then the foot of foot with soccer too. And
then I think the second time I broke my foot
(02:08):
was horse dump.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
No, no, no, the proper answer is bar fight.
Speaker 3 (02:11):
Bar fight. We're talking it was all bar fights. There
was no horses fight.
Speaker 2 (02:19):
Hey, I'm going to put you to the test if
you don't mind. I know you brought your guitar with
you and everything. Free Bird, Free Bird.
Speaker 4 (02:27):
Oh you know, ever since I broke my hand, it's
just been hard to marry.
Speaker 3 (02:33):
Yeah, that bar fight ended my free Bird career.
Speaker 1 (02:35):
Well with that broken hand, can you flip a bird
to charges?
Speaker 3 (02:38):
Possibly? No, I'm just kidding.
Speaker 2 (02:42):
I'm just kidding.
Speaker 1 (02:43):
So what tell us what life has been like for
you the past year. This is so amazing. As we
watched you coming along on social media, we didn't even
know your backstory.
Speaker 2 (02:55):
We didn't even know.
Speaker 1 (02:56):
Who your famous uncle was. We're like, yeah, this guy's great.
And then all of a sudden we started digging in
and we had Holy cow, how did we miss that?
So maybe that's good in a way.
Speaker 4 (03:07):
You know, I'm very proud of where I come from
and who I'm related to, that's no secret. But I
wanted to kind of and my uncle had the exact
same idea of kind of do this on my own
as much as I can. When we first had to
talk about me getting into music, he said, I'll be
your producer, but that's that's where the buck stops. Like,
you've got to do your own You've got to ford
(03:28):
your own path. He said, I'll produce your music, but
you've got to ford your own path. And so I
don't usually draw much attention to it, mostly because half
the time I don't really ever think about it.
Speaker 3 (03:39):
He's my uncle. I mean, it's like having a regular uncle.
Speaker 4 (03:42):
So I never really think that much about it or
really draw that much attention to it. And then every
once in a while, I'm reminded somebody will bring it up.
They're like, well, you know, we read this, and I'm like, well, yeah,
that is true.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
Well so Tim McGraw's your uncle. Don't let that bother you.
But I'm just curious what you may have picked up
from Tim in the studio that surprised you. I mean,
he is a producer, not your uncle.
Speaker 1 (04:10):
And can I just add on pile onto that even
on stage as well, because you've been touring with him
as well. So there's a lot of things that you
can glean from all of that.
Speaker 3 (04:18):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (04:18):
We So what was cool in the studio was I'll
tell you the story the first time I ever recorded,
so I can barely say regular words. I barely talk
English on a good day and without slurring words. And
we're in the studio and we're doing my very first
song and he comes over to me and starts jabbing
(04:39):
me in the ribs very lightly, but he starts jabbing
me in the ribs. He goes, annunciate, enunciate, and I'm like, okay, okay, okay, wait,
wait a minute, what does nunciate mean? So I got
cut my phone out of Tim doesn't know either, So
I'm like, man, I'm gone to this high school. I'm like,
I gotta look, I gotta I pulled my dictionary out
and I'm like, what's the nut. I'm like, all right,
(05:00):
pronounce it, proper pronunciation of words? All right, got it?
So I'm like making sure I get everything right. And
then Byron comes in and goes, why are you over
You're over enunciating now stop over enunciating.
Speaker 2 (05:12):
Is Tim's longtime producer who's joined you on.
Speaker 4 (05:14):
Their co producing, which is really cool to have Byron
on the team too. So I've learned to enunciate when
I sing so people actually understand what I say, and
that's a really important part of people understanding the message
behind each song. And getting to enjoy the story behind
each song, just making sure that you enunciate properly and
so they can understand you.
Speaker 1 (05:34):
Thank you for saying, didn't we just had this conversation
with Zach Topp. Yeah, no kidding, because you know, we
get singles nearly every day from all the record labels,
call Charlie on the phone constantly, and I mean these
are artists we know and love, that we've loved for years.
I'm like, do you have any idea what this song
is about? I can't understand any of the words, or
(05:56):
the production is so on top of them you can't
even hear their voice. So thank you for enunciating.
Speaker 2 (06:04):
Let's talk about the current release and specifically the inspiration
behind it, which I believe is your girlfriend. Yeah, okay,
all right now, any guy would have given him some
jewelry or maybe a dozen eggs or something like that,
but no, you write her a song. Very impressive.
Speaker 4 (06:20):
Well, you know, it goes back to that Waylon Jennings
and Willie Nelson, Mamas, don't let your babies grow to
be cowboys. They'd rather give you a song than diamonds
or gold. But it was quite it was quite a
cool little timeline. So I was the weird kid that
played guitar and sang at about from twelve pm to
four pm every day in the stairwell of our dorm.
Speaker 3 (06:43):
So we had a co ed norm.
Speaker 4 (06:44):
She lived on the floor right above me, and I
would sit in the stairwell every day and play guitar
and sing. And she actually told me, she's like I
usually didn't go up that stairwell. I went up the
other one, but for some reason that day I happened
to go up that one and you were playing, and
after a couple of passes by, she finally stopped and
asked me for my number, which I was like, all right, cool,
(07:07):
And then a couple of weeks later.
Speaker 1 (07:08):
I did not know just this random girl.
Speaker 4 (07:11):
Yeah, I was brand new to l s U. I
didn't know anybody except my fraternity. I didn't know anybody yet,
so certainly not any girls yet. I hadn't even I
mean we were maybe a month in the school, so
I was still very much buried in schoolwork. Yeah, I know, right, Hey,
it takes all my work away from it.
Speaker 2 (07:34):
Did you freak out a little bit?
Speaker 1 (07:35):
I mean, girls, most girls I know are more like
the Southern bell which I don't think is derogatory. No,
but we kind of feel like, oh, we should wait
for the guy to ask us, so, how did you
feel about Oh?
Speaker 3 (07:47):
I thought it was really cool.
Speaker 4 (07:49):
But I usually I feel like girls avoid me, so
I thought it was pretty cool.
Speaker 3 (07:55):
I thought it was pretty cool.
Speaker 2 (07:56):
The girl asked me I would feel used.
Speaker 3 (08:01):
I felt yeah, well no, I feel like trash myself,
but I.
Speaker 4 (08:06):
Thought I thought it was just cool, just because I
was in the stairwell. And then like a week after that, actually,
I don't even think it was a week totally. I
think it was like four days. Right after that, I
had called Mark Colley. Before that, I'd called Mark and said, hey,
I've got this idea for a song. I've got this melody,
but I need help with lyrics. I'm really good at melodies,
but lyrics is still an issue for me coming up
(08:28):
with lyrics.
Speaker 3 (08:28):
And so, yeah, this is that'd be you.
Speaker 4 (08:31):
So Mark's like, I've got the perfect person that we're
going to write it with, mister Jamie Moore. So let's
let's go in. And so I flew back home. Mom
dropped me off at the studio or not the studio,
but the I think it's dark Horse. It's a dark
Horse productions. But uh, we get there and meet Jamie
(08:51):
and then we sit down. I'm like, all right, well,
here's the melody. I'm here, and so I pick out
this melody and Jamie's like, oh, I'm digging that.
Speaker 3 (08:56):
I'm digging that. Marx like I'm digging it.
Speaker 4 (08:59):
And that song took us three days to write, I
think somewhere thereabouts, just because we kept going back and
forth on whether it should be a tempo song or
ballad song, and where we settled was really somewhere in between.
It's not quite a ballad yet, but it's definitely not
a tempo song.
Speaker 3 (09:17):
But it wound up being a really, really cool little groove.
Speaker 4 (09:22):
And Mark was actually the one that suggested that we
add in the part about Lsu, since I had just
just met this girl and I was telling him about
this girl, and he's like, all right, well you've met
this girl, let's add in this little part. And I
was like, well, you know, I hadn't really talked to
this girl much. And he goes, no, well, we're going
to add this part. And I was like, all right, fine,
(09:43):
you've convinced me.
Speaker 3 (09:44):
We're going to add this part.
Speaker 4 (09:45):
In, so we add in straight from LSU right at
the end of the last chorus and worked out because
we've been dating for two years now, so it worked out.
Speaker 2 (09:54):
Okay, what's your name? K Yeah, because I was going.
Speaker 1 (09:58):
To say, when I saw the the video you did
and recreating the stairwell scene, it looked like when you
were singing to her and then you know some of
the scenes where you're dancing together, it's like, my gosh,
it's like this couple has been in love for years,
so you really.
Speaker 3 (10:13):
Have it was, Yeah, it was. It was a really
cool just the whole series of events, just.
Speaker 2 (10:17):
You end of singing in the in the stairwell because
of the acoustics.
Speaker 3 (10:20):
Right, yeah, absolutely, it was.
Speaker 4 (10:23):
So it was one of the only places I could
actually go, believe it or not. I was shy still
I am a little shy from time to time. So
it was really the only place I could go and
be alone because if I play in my dorm room,
I get noise complaints. But you can't really give noise complaints.
And we I mean, we did have a music room
(10:45):
in the bottom of our dorm for people that people
could go, but it was right next to a classroom.
So you could really only go in there for a
certain amount of time at a certain period in the day.
So I was like, all right, Stairwell's my best option,
and it has the best acoustics, so I just that's
why I just always played, Oh.
Speaker 2 (11:04):
What k do you think of the song? When she
first heard it completed, she liked it.
Speaker 4 (11:07):
I didn't show it to her for a while, and
then once we laid I didn't even show her the demo.
I remember it correctly. I remember just telling her I
wrote this really cool song. You're a part of it,
and she was like, Oh, that's that's cool. I guess
that's pretty cool. Then she heard it and she goes,
that's really cool. That's awesome. I actually think that the
first time she really heard the song and not just
(11:29):
a snippet of it, was actually we just played.
Speaker 3 (11:33):
The Texas Club.
Speaker 4 (11:35):
Back in January, and that was one of the songs
I ended on and I was like, this is our
this is the next song that's coming out. It's called
that BEU and it was written about Miss Katie here
in the front row, and we sang the entire song
out and I sang it to her while I was
on stage and It was a really cool moment.
Speaker 3 (11:50):
But I think that was the first.
Speaker 4 (11:52):
Time that it really hit her that it was that
it was about her. It was it was kind of
a cool little ordeal.
Speaker 1 (12:00):
We know about your girlfriend and some of your early music. Here,
what do we need to know about mom?
Speaker 4 (12:07):
She helped me with absolutely everything. I always get questions
about how I do school and music, because they're both.
I do both of them pretty much full time. Yes, sir,
I've only got after this semester. I'll have one full
year left.
Speaker 3 (12:22):
What do you study history?
Speaker 4 (12:23):
I'm a history major, broad spectrum. I've studied everything from
ancient Mesopotamia.
Speaker 3 (12:29):
All the way to the Aztecs.
Speaker 2 (12:32):
And well, you may have run across something we just
featured on our last show, Our Crook and Chase contdown
Happy New Beers Eve.
Speaker 1 (12:41):
New Beers Eve.
Speaker 3 (12:42):
No, I've never heard of that of that at all.
Speaker 1 (12:44):
Goodness who instituted it as a law?
Speaker 2 (12:47):
Roseveltree?
Speaker 3 (12:48):
No kidding?
Speaker 2 (12:49):
He you know, when they repeal the band on booze,
he said, I think everyone should have a drink, And
that was okay. The day the booze went back for sale, okay,
that night before it was called New Beer's Eve and
everybody's standing outside the bars waiting for them to open
the next day.
Speaker 3 (13:06):
That's pretty cool. I've never heard of that before.
Speaker 1 (13:08):
The law you have to drink beer.
Speaker 2 (13:10):
Yeah okay, in country music it's required. You don't want
to break the laws.
Speaker 3 (13:13):
Yeah yeah, yeah, not right.
Speaker 1 (13:14):
And by the way, I'm impressed because you just perfectly
enunciated Mesopotamia Mesopotamia.
Speaker 3 (13:20):
I've had a lot of practice.
Speaker 4 (13:21):
Knowing that, I've had to give a lot a lot
of verbal dissertations for them.
Speaker 2 (13:26):
I'm not going to ask you to spell it.
Speaker 3 (13:28):
I couldn't spell it.
Speaker 2 (13:32):
Where's my Google?
Speaker 3 (13:34):
Where's my dictionary?
Speaker 2 (13:36):
The fact that you're doing music, I mean, we know
your background, the family, the McGrath family, the whole thing.
Is it just in your blood? You think what really
inspired you to get involved with the music? Man?
Speaker 4 (13:50):
You know, I've always I've been asked that question a
few times now. I've always wanted to do it. But
when you grow up and you watch these giants at
our Faith Hill and Tim mcgrong stage, and you see
how they move a crowd, how they tell a story
with their voice, and how they make people feel these
emotions through their words, it's daunting. So I never really
(14:13):
thought that I could do it. Before music, I was
going to join the Marine Corps. That was my only
ambition in life. I wanted to join the United States
Marine Corps. I wanted to try my hardest, and I
wanted to go Mars Marine Special Operations Command. I wanted
to be a marine rader. That was my dream, one
of my dreams and one of my aspirations. I just
never thought that I could do music. And then one day, somehow,
(14:35):
maybe it's the lady sitting over here behind me, a
video of me singing got to my uncle.
Speaker 1 (14:41):
Oh, just accidentally right.
Speaker 4 (14:43):
Yeah, and he wound up. He wound up showing it
to my aunt. My aunt fell in love, and then
I started fell in love. And then they started encouraging me.
And then my mom and dad started encouraging me, and
my friends started encouraging me. And then before I knew it,
I was playing guitar and was doing karaoke contest in
high school and I was going to little pubs. We
(15:05):
went to Plantation Pub, was doing karaoke there, and I
got to go to Legend's Corner. Mom got me at
Legend's Corner with a friend of ours.
Speaker 2 (15:12):
So what was the song.
Speaker 4 (15:13):
What was the song that you sang not looking Back Texas?
It was Mama, don't let your babies go to the cowboys?
Speaker 3 (15:19):
Do it? Oh goodness, I.
Speaker 1 (15:21):
Want to make him do it now.
Speaker 2 (15:22):
We want to go back to the very beginning. Timothy Wayne.
Speaker 4 (15:25):
Yeah, this was my This was the one of the
very first songs that I ever learned to play on guitar.
Speaker 3 (15:32):
Okay, I mis skewed up here. I hope this thing
is into.
Speaker 2 (15:36):
Raw easy learned guitar method or doesn't excess.
Speaker 3 (15:41):
No, I wound up.
Speaker 4 (15:44):
My client actually needed an art credit. So here's how
this came about. I actually had an art credit that
I needed in high school junior year, sophomore year, I
think it was junior year of high school. So I
had already taken photography, and I'd already taken like a
physical art like painting and drawing. It's like, okay, I
want to try something else. Well, there was a guitar class.
It's like, all right, well, I have an acoustic guitar
that I don't know how to play. I want it
(16:07):
in a clay shooting competition. So it's like I have
no idea how to play guitar. Well, let me you
know what, let me, let me, let me learn. So
I go and I do this class, and everybody in
the class had already had previous contact with acoustic guitar
learning in some in some way, shape or form. So
I was really behind, and I kept going. Every day
(16:28):
I would go home, I would work out, do homework,
and then for about three four hours every single night
I would play d C G just to catch up
and over and over again. And then I started playing
full songs. With the very first song and one of
the easier songs to learn, and Mama's Don't let your
Babies Go to the Cowboys is just.
Speaker 3 (16:55):
It's just G. It's d G.
Speaker 4 (16:57):
And then like I think it's an A seven is
what it's called. And so I learned how to play it,
and I actually got bad to the point where I
came in and my guitar teacher says, you know, you
don't have to practice that much every night. I said, yeah,
I do, but I'm getting to the level now where
I'm catching up with everybody and I can play full songs.
And so now when you talk to him, shout out
(17:18):
mister Ravinie. He'll tell people who goes The best thing
I did was just leave that kid alone, because he
would he would send us out to go learn these songs,
and he would just leave me to do my own thing.
And I would sit in the back corner of the
class or outside in the courtyard, and I would learn
Waling Jennings and Willie Nelson or the highwaymantor Johnny Cash,
and I would teach myself these songs and try to
(17:40):
get the chords down and then get the transitions down.
And then of course after that came bar chords and
everything else. And I'm not the best guitar player by
any means, but I worked hard to do.
Speaker 2 (17:49):
You realize the advanced technology you're thinking about here, because
most everybody starts with Louis.
Speaker 3 (17:54):
Louis, you know, Oh my goodness.
Speaker 4 (18:02):
I always tell people, once everybody else started believing in me,
I had the courage and the belief in myself to
run with it. And then once I started really getting
good at it and realizing how much hard work it
was going to be, I fell in luck because I
don't shy away from hard work at all, and so
it just all the hard work that's that it's going
to take, and that it's been taken just makes me
(18:23):
fall in love with it even more every single day.
Speaker 1 (18:26):
So are the Marines probably out of luck right now? Then?
Speaker 3 (18:30):
Yeah? Probably?
Speaker 2 (18:34):
Sorry?
Speaker 4 (18:35):
No, will I still I'm still trying to have a
little bit like I'm hoping one day that I get
to do a show at a couple of the bases.
I still have family that's in the Marine Corps and
that they still hold because a lot of my ideals
and values I get are from when I was preparing
to join, and I still try still try to live
(18:56):
live the best I can, and a lot of those
ideas from Marine Corps I stole from the Marine Corps
and I try to live as close to those as
they can.
Speaker 2 (19:06):
Rest of the project finished or are you're close to it?
Speaker 4 (19:08):
Or what close to it? I don't really talk about
the project yet. Y'all know how that y'all know how
the we get it, how it all goes, how twist
and turn.
Speaker 2 (19:19):
Got a good calling card with this for a seventh.
Speaker 4 (19:21):
Yeah, absolutely, Yeah. I've had so much fun in the studio.
That's that's honestly. Touring in the studio are my two
favorite parts of this is because touring I get to
meet all the fans and I get to see the
hard work payoff, and I get to see that the
people that pay, they spend their harder and time, they're
(19:43):
harder money and they come to see you perform, and that's.
Speaker 3 (19:47):
So amazing to me.
Speaker 4 (19:49):
And I get to in that duration of my set,
I get to take them someplace else where they've never been,
so they don't have to necessarily worry about what's happening
outside the arena or outside the amphithy or outside the
festival wherever we're playing.
Speaker 3 (20:03):
They get to focus on what's there and they just get.
Speaker 4 (20:06):
To live not I don't want to say care free,
but they just get to say, oh, weight off the shoulders.
Speaker 1 (20:12):
Well, hey, Timothy Wayne is on top of that goal
in a very big way. He is opening in stadiums
and arenas for Uncle Tim McGraw this summer on the
Pawnshop Guitar Tour.
Speaker 2 (20:24):
On Shop Guitarist that's pretty big.
Speaker 1 (20:27):
So it'll be interesting to see if that shyness that
Timothy Wayne admits to kind of disappears on those huge stages,
or maybe Charlie, maybe he uses shyness to his advantage.
I mean it works for George straight.
Speaker 2 (20:42):
Yeah, when's the last time we saw George, he hides
all the time. Yeah, get off. I admire the fact
that Timothy made his way into the mainstream of country
music on his own without playing the uncle card, I
guess you could say. And of course he learned what
enunciate means. Now, let's point out here. In addition to
the song That'd Be You, he has just released a
(21:03):
new single. It's called get a Load of This garn
damtiya Okay, and it's a love song. It's a love
song too, just a different way of expressing that. I
guess so Big Tour New Music twenty twenty six clicks
to be the breakthrough Year four new artist Timothy Wayne.
Speaker 1 (21:18):
Indeed, folks, we have your country covered. Listen to the
Crooked Chase Countdown every weekend on hundreds of radio stations
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Speaker 2 (21:29):
And don't forget to follow us on Facebook, X and
Instagram at Crooked Chase
Hello, Welcome in to Cook and Chase, Nashville.
Speaker 2 (00:03):
Chats.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
Lori, Anne and Charlie here today entering the studio emerging
artist Timothy Wayne. Gosh, Charlie, we started noticing his music
what about a year ago or so. But this is crazy.
We're so busy, you know, doing all kinds of things.
We had no idea that Timothy Wayne had a secret. Now,
(00:24):
it wasn't that he was deliberately hiding anything, right, he
just wasn't doing any bragging about the truth.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
Yeah, that's one way of putting it.
Speaker 1 (00:35):
Well, okay, let me saying. Well, the truth, first of
all is that Timothy Wayne is an incredibly gifted singer songwriter.
But the underlying truth is his uncle is legendary superstar
Tim McGrath. Now Tim's sister, Sandy is Timothy's mom, and
she's also been coordinating and managing Timothy's career through his
(00:56):
high school years and now at college at LSU.
Speaker 2 (00:59):
Now, of course, we have known because of our business here.
We have known Tim McGraw and his sister Sandy forever.
So when Timothy landed in our studios, we're quick to
say Timothy and not Tim. Just not to confused Anyway,
when Timothy landed in our studios recently, it was kind
of like Old Home Week. Sandy was here as well,
and all I was talking about Tim McGraw's recovery from
(01:21):
his recent back and knee surgeries caused by I guess
a long string of stage injuries.
Speaker 1 (01:26):
Now he fell down a few times, I know.
Speaker 2 (01:28):
So that's where our conversation with Timothy Wayne begins. Let's
join him.
Speaker 1 (01:34):
This is what I want to know as we welcome
Timothy Wayne to Crook and Chase.
Speaker 2 (01:38):
It's so great to see you.
Speaker 3 (01:40):
It's great meeting y'all. Thanks for having me.
Speaker 1 (01:42):
Okay, so, how has this world at your young age
beat you up? What kind of surgeries are you looking for?
Speaker 3 (01:47):
Lord?
Speaker 4 (01:47):
Well, I've had I've had an appendectomy. It's about the
only thing. That about the only surgery that I've actually had.
But I've broken my hand, both hands. Actually I broken
my foot a couple of times, but doing what I
think the hands, if I remember correctly, were both soccer
and then the foot of foot with soccer too. And
then I think the second time I broke my foot
(02:08):
was horse dump.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
No, no, no, the proper answer is bar fight.
Speaker 3 (02:11):
Bar fight. We're talking it was all bar fights. There
was no horses fight.
Speaker 2 (02:19):
Hey, I'm going to put you to the test if
you don't mind. I know you brought your guitar with
you and everything. Free Bird, Free Bird.
Speaker 4 (02:27):
Oh you know, ever since I broke my hand, it's
just been hard to marry.
Speaker 3 (02:33):
Yeah, that bar fight ended my free Bird career.
Speaker 1 (02:35):
Well with that broken hand, can you flip a bird
to charges?
Speaker 3 (02:38):
Possibly? No, I'm just kidding.
Speaker 2 (02:42):
I'm just kidding.
Speaker 1 (02:43):
So what tell us what life has been like for
you the past year. This is so amazing. As we
watched you coming along on social media, we didn't even
know your backstory.
Speaker 2 (02:55):
We didn't even know.
Speaker 1 (02:56):
Who your famous uncle was. We're like, yeah, this guy's great.
And then all of a sudden we started digging in
and we had Holy cow, how did we miss that?
So maybe that's good in a way.
Speaker 4 (03:07):
You know, I'm very proud of where I come from
and who I'm related to, that's no secret. But I
wanted to kind of and my uncle had the exact
same idea of kind of do this on my own
as much as I can. When we first had to
talk about me getting into music, he said, I'll be
your producer, but that's that's where the buck stops. Like,
you've got to do your own You've got to ford
(03:28):
your own path. He said, I'll produce your music, but
you've got to ford your own path. And so I
don't usually draw much attention to it, mostly because half
the time I don't really ever think about it.
Speaker 3 (03:39):
He's my uncle. I mean, it's like having a regular uncle.
Speaker 4 (03:42):
So I never really think that much about it or
really draw that much attention to it. And then every
once in a while, I'm reminded somebody will bring it up.
They're like, well, you know, we read this, and I'm like, well, yeah,
that is true.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
Well so Tim McGraw's your uncle. Don't let that bother you.
But I'm just curious what you may have picked up
from Tim in the studio that surprised you. I mean,
he is a producer, not your uncle.
Speaker 1 (04:10):
And can I just add on pile onto that even
on stage as well, because you've been touring with him
as well. So there's a lot of things that you
can glean from all of that.
Speaker 3 (04:18):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (04:18):
We So what was cool in the studio was I'll
tell you the story the first time I ever recorded,
so I can barely say regular words. I barely talk
English on a good day and without slurring words. And
we're in the studio and we're doing my very first
song and he comes over to me and starts jabbing
(04:39):
me in the ribs very lightly, but he starts jabbing
me in the ribs. He goes, annunciate, enunciate, and I'm like, okay, okay, okay, wait,
wait a minute, what does nunciate mean? So I got
cut my phone out of Tim doesn't know either, So
I'm like, man, I'm gone to this high school. I'm like,
I gotta look, I gotta I pulled my dictionary out
and I'm like, what's the nut. I'm like, all right,
(05:00):
pronounce it, proper pronunciation of words? All right, got it?
So I'm like making sure I get everything right. And
then Byron comes in and goes, why are you over
You're over enunciating now stop over enunciating.
Speaker 2 (05:12):
Is Tim's longtime producer who's joined you on.
Speaker 4 (05:14):
Their co producing, which is really cool to have Byron
on the team too. So I've learned to enunciate when
I sing so people actually understand what I say, and
that's a really important part of people understanding the message
behind each song. And getting to enjoy the story behind
each song, just making sure that you enunciate properly and
so they can understand you.
Speaker 1 (05:34):
Thank you for saying, didn't we just had this conversation
with Zach Topp. Yeah, no kidding, because you know, we
get singles nearly every day from all the record labels,
call Charlie on the phone constantly, and I mean these
are artists we know and love, that we've loved for years.
I'm like, do you have any idea what this song
is about? I can't understand any of the words, or
(05:56):
the production is so on top of them you can't
even hear their voice. So thank you for enunciating.
Speaker 2 (06:04):
Let's talk about the current release and specifically the inspiration
behind it, which I believe is your girlfriend. Yeah, okay,
all right now, any guy would have given him some
jewelry or maybe a dozen eggs or something like that,
but no, you write her a song. Very impressive.
Speaker 4 (06:20):
Well, you know, it goes back to that Waylon Jennings
and Willie Nelson, Mamas, don't let your babies grow to
be cowboys. They'd rather give you a song than diamonds
or gold. But it was quite it was quite a
cool little timeline. So I was the weird kid that
played guitar and sang at about from twelve pm to
four pm every day in the stairwell of our dorm.
Speaker 3 (06:43):
So we had a co ed norm.
Speaker 4 (06:44):
She lived on the floor right above me, and I
would sit in the stairwell every day and play guitar
and sing. And she actually told me, she's like I
usually didn't go up that stairwell. I went up the
other one, but for some reason that day I happened
to go up that one and you were playing, and
after a couple of passes by, she finally stopped and
asked me for my number, which I was like, all right, cool,
(07:07):
And then a couple of weeks later.
Speaker 1 (07:08):
I did not know just this random girl.
Speaker 4 (07:11):
Yeah, I was brand new to l s U. I
didn't know anybody except my fraternity. I didn't know anybody yet,
so certainly not any girls yet. I hadn't even I
mean we were maybe a month in the school, so
I was still very much buried in schoolwork. Yeah, I know, right, Hey,
it takes all my work away from it.
Speaker 2 (07:34):
Did you freak out a little bit?
Speaker 1 (07:35):
I mean, girls, most girls I know are more like
the Southern bell which I don't think is derogatory. No,
but we kind of feel like, oh, we should wait
for the guy to ask us, so, how did you
feel about Oh?
Speaker 3 (07:47):
I thought it was really cool.
Speaker 4 (07:49):
But I usually I feel like girls avoid me, so
I thought it was pretty cool.
Speaker 3 (07:55):
I thought it was pretty cool.
Speaker 2 (07:56):
The girl asked me I would feel used.
Speaker 3 (08:01):
I felt yeah, well no, I feel like trash myself,
but I.
Speaker 4 (08:06):
Thought I thought it was just cool, just because I
was in the stairwell. And then like a week after that, actually,
I don't even think it was a week totally. I
think it was like four days. Right after that, I
had called Mark Colley. Before that, I'd called Mark and said, hey,
I've got this idea for a song. I've got this melody,
but I need help with lyrics. I'm really good at melodies,
but lyrics is still an issue for me coming up
(08:28):
with lyrics.
Speaker 3 (08:28):
And so, yeah, this is that'd be you.
Speaker 4 (08:31):
So Mark's like, I've got the perfect person that we're
going to write it with, mister Jamie Moore. So let's
let's go in. And so I flew back home. Mom
dropped me off at the studio or not the studio,
but the I think it's dark Horse. It's a dark
Horse productions. But uh, we get there and meet Jamie
(08:51):
and then we sit down. I'm like, all right, well,
here's the melody. I'm here, and so I pick out
this melody and Jamie's like, oh, I'm digging that.
Speaker 3 (08:56):
I'm digging that. Marx like I'm digging it.
Speaker 4 (08:59):
And that song took us three days to write, I
think somewhere thereabouts, just because we kept going back and
forth on whether it should be a tempo song or
ballad song, and where we settled was really somewhere in between.
It's not quite a ballad yet, but it's definitely not
a tempo song.
Speaker 3 (09:17):
But it wound up being a really, really cool little groove.
Speaker 4 (09:22):
And Mark was actually the one that suggested that we
add in the part about Lsu, since I had just
just met this girl and I was telling him about
this girl, and he's like, all right, well you've met
this girl, let's add in this little part. And I
was like, well, you know, I hadn't really talked to
this girl much. And he goes, no, well, we're going
to add this part. And I was like, all right, fine,
(09:43):
you've convinced me.
Speaker 3 (09:44):
We're going to add this part.
Speaker 4 (09:45):
In, so we add in straight from LSU right at
the end of the last chorus and worked out because
we've been dating for two years now, so it worked out.
Speaker 2 (09:54):
Okay, what's your name? K Yeah, because I was going.
Speaker 1 (09:58):
To say, when I saw the the video you did
and recreating the stairwell scene, it looked like when you
were singing to her and then you know some of
the scenes where you're dancing together, it's like, my gosh,
it's like this couple has been in love for years,
so you really.
Speaker 3 (10:13):
Have it was, Yeah, it was. It was a really
cool just the whole series of events, just.
Speaker 2 (10:17):
You end of singing in the in the stairwell because
of the acoustics.
Speaker 3 (10:20):
Right, yeah, absolutely, it was.
Speaker 4 (10:23):
So it was one of the only places I could
actually go, believe it or not. I was shy still
I am a little shy from time to time. So
it was really the only place I could go and
be alone because if I play in my dorm room,
I get noise complaints. But you can't really give noise complaints.
And we I mean, we did have a music room
(10:45):
in the bottom of our dorm for people that people
could go, but it was right next to a classroom.
So you could really only go in there for a
certain amount of time at a certain period in the day.
So I was like, all right, Stairwell's my best option,
and it has the best acoustics, so I just that's
why I just always played, Oh.
Speaker 2 (11:04):
What k do you think of the song? When she
first heard it completed, she liked it.
Speaker 4 (11:07):
I didn't show it to her for a while, and
then once we laid I didn't even show her the demo.
I remember it correctly. I remember just telling her I
wrote this really cool song. You're a part of it,
and she was like, Oh, that's that's cool. I guess
that's pretty cool. Then she heard it and she goes,
that's really cool. That's awesome. I actually think that the
first time she really heard the song and not just
(11:29):
a snippet of it, was actually we just played.
Speaker 3 (11:33):
The Texas Club.
Speaker 4 (11:35):
Back in January, and that was one of the songs
I ended on and I was like, this is our
this is the next song that's coming out. It's called
that BEU and it was written about Miss Katie here
in the front row, and we sang the entire song
out and I sang it to her while I was
on stage and It was a really cool moment.
Speaker 3 (11:50):
But I think that was the first.
Speaker 4 (11:52):
Time that it really hit her that it was that
it was about her. It was it was kind of
a cool little ordeal.
Speaker 1 (12:00):
We know about your girlfriend and some of your early music. Here,
what do we need to know about mom?
Speaker 4 (12:07):
She helped me with absolutely everything. I always get questions
about how I do school and music, because they're both.
I do both of them pretty much full time. Yes, sir,
I've only got after this semester. I'll have one full
year left.
Speaker 3 (12:22):
What do you study history?
Speaker 4 (12:23):
I'm a history major, broad spectrum. I've studied everything from
ancient Mesopotamia.
Speaker 3 (12:29):
All the way to the Aztecs.
Speaker 2 (12:32):
And well, you may have run across something we just
featured on our last show, Our Crook and Chase contdown
Happy New Beers Eve.
Speaker 1 (12:41):
New Beers Eve.
Speaker 3 (12:42):
No, I've never heard of that of that at all.
Speaker 1 (12:44):
Goodness who instituted it as a law?
Speaker 2 (12:47):
Roseveltree?
Speaker 3 (12:48):
No kidding?
Speaker 2 (12:49):
He you know, when they repeal the band on booze,
he said, I think everyone should have a drink, And
that was okay. The day the booze went back for sale, okay,
that night before it was called New Beer's Eve and
everybody's standing outside the bars waiting for them to open
the next day.
Speaker 3 (13:06):
That's pretty cool. I've never heard of that before.
Speaker 1 (13:08):
The law you have to drink beer.
Speaker 2 (13:10):
Yeah okay, in country music it's required. You don't want
to break the laws.
Speaker 3 (13:13):
Yeah yeah, yeah, not right.
Speaker 1 (13:14):
And by the way, I'm impressed because you just perfectly
enunciated Mesopotamia Mesopotamia.
Speaker 3 (13:20):
I've had a lot of practice.
Speaker 4 (13:21):
Knowing that, I've had to give a lot a lot
of verbal dissertations for them.
Speaker 2 (13:26):
I'm not going to ask you to spell it.
Speaker 3 (13:28):
I couldn't spell it.
Speaker 2 (13:32):
Where's my Google?
Speaker 3 (13:34):
Where's my dictionary?
Speaker 2 (13:36):
The fact that you're doing music, I mean, we know
your background, the family, the McGrath family, the whole thing.
Is it just in your blood? You think what really
inspired you to get involved with the music? Man?
Speaker 4 (13:50):
You know, I've always I've been asked that question a
few times now. I've always wanted to do it. But
when you grow up and you watch these giants at
our Faith Hill and Tim mcgrong stage, and you see
how they move a crowd, how they tell a story
with their voice, and how they make people feel these
emotions through their words, it's daunting. So I never really
(14:13):
thought that I could do it. Before music, I was
going to join the Marine Corps. That was my only
ambition in life. I wanted to join the United States
Marine Corps. I wanted to try my hardest, and I
wanted to go Mars Marine Special Operations Command. I wanted
to be a marine rader. That was my dream, one
of my dreams and one of my aspirations. I just
never thought that I could do music. And then one day, somehow,
(14:35):
maybe it's the lady sitting over here behind me, a
video of me singing got to my uncle.
Speaker 1 (14:41):
Oh, just accidentally right.
Speaker 4 (14:43):
Yeah, and he wound up. He wound up showing it
to my aunt. My aunt fell in love, and then
I started fell in love. And then they started encouraging me.
And then my mom and dad started encouraging me, and
my friends started encouraging me. And then before I knew it,
I was playing guitar and was doing karaoke contest in
high school and I was going to little pubs. We
(15:05):
went to Plantation Pub, was doing karaoke there, and I
got to go to Legend's Corner. Mom got me at
Legend's Corner with a friend of ours.
Speaker 2 (15:12):
So what was the song.
Speaker 4 (15:13):
What was the song that you sang not looking Back Texas?
It was Mama, don't let your babies go to the cowboys?
Speaker 3 (15:19):
Do it? Oh goodness, I.
Speaker 1 (15:21):
Want to make him do it now.
Speaker 2 (15:22):
We want to go back to the very beginning. Timothy Wayne.
Speaker 4 (15:25):
Yeah, this was my This was the one of the
very first songs that I ever learned to play on guitar.
Speaker 3 (15:32):
Okay, I mis skewed up here. I hope this thing
is into.
Speaker 2 (15:36):
Raw easy learned guitar method or doesn't excess.
Speaker 3 (15:41):
No, I wound up.
Speaker 4 (15:44):
My client actually needed an art credit. So here's how
this came about. I actually had an art credit that
I needed in high school junior year, sophomore year, I
think it was junior year of high school. So I
had already taken photography, and I'd already taken like a
physical art like painting and drawing. It's like, okay, I
want to try something else. Well, there was a guitar class.
It's like, all right, well, I have an acoustic guitar
that I don't know how to play. I want it
(16:07):
in a clay shooting competition. So it's like I have
no idea how to play guitar. Well, let me you
know what, let me, let me, let me learn. So
I go and I do this class, and everybody in
the class had already had previous contact with acoustic guitar
learning in some in some way, shape or form. So
I was really behind, and I kept going. Every day
(16:28):
I would go home, I would work out, do homework,
and then for about three four hours every single night
I would play d C G just to catch up
and over and over again. And then I started playing
full songs. With the very first song and one of
the easier songs to learn, and Mama's Don't let your
Babies Go to the Cowboys is just.
Speaker 3 (16:55):
It's just G. It's d G.
Speaker 4 (16:57):
And then like I think it's an A seven is
what it's called. And so I learned how to play it,
and I actually got bad to the point where I
came in and my guitar teacher says, you know, you
don't have to practice that much every night. I said, yeah,
I do, but I'm getting to the level now where
I'm catching up with everybody and I can play full songs.
And so now when you talk to him, shout out
(17:18):
mister Ravinie. He'll tell people who goes The best thing
I did was just leave that kid alone, because he
would he would send us out to go learn these songs,
and he would just leave me to do my own thing.
And I would sit in the back corner of the
class or outside in the courtyard, and I would learn
Waling Jennings and Willie Nelson or the highwaymantor Johnny Cash,
and I would teach myself these songs and try to
(17:40):
get the chords down and then get the transitions down.
And then of course after that came bar chords and
everything else. And I'm not the best guitar player by
any means, but I worked hard to do.
Speaker 2 (17:49):
You realize the advanced technology you're thinking about here, because
most everybody starts with Louis.
Speaker 3 (17:54):
Louis, you know, Oh my goodness.
Speaker 4 (18:02):
I always tell people, once everybody else started believing in me,
I had the courage and the belief in myself to
run with it. And then once I started really getting
good at it and realizing how much hard work it
was going to be, I fell in luck because I
don't shy away from hard work at all, and so
it just all the hard work that's that it's going
to take, and that it's been taken just makes me
(18:23):
fall in love with it even more every single day.
Speaker 1 (18:26):
So are the Marines probably out of luck right now? Then?
Speaker 3 (18:30):
Yeah? Probably?
Speaker 2 (18:34):
Sorry?
Speaker 4 (18:35):
No, will I still I'm still trying to have a
little bit like I'm hoping one day that I get
to do a show at a couple of the bases.
I still have family that's in the Marine Corps and
that they still hold because a lot of my ideals
and values I get are from when I was preparing
to join, and I still try still try to live
(18:56):
live the best I can, and a lot of those
ideas from Marine Corps I stole from the Marine Corps
and I try to live as close to those as
they can.
Speaker 2 (19:06):
Rest of the project finished or are you're close to it?
Speaker 4 (19:08):
Or what close to it? I don't really talk about
the project yet. Y'all know how that y'all know how
the we get it, how it all goes, how twist
and turn.
Speaker 2 (19:19):
Got a good calling card with this for a seventh.
Speaker 4 (19:21):
Yeah, absolutely, Yeah. I've had so much fun in the studio.
That's that's honestly. Touring in the studio are my two
favorite parts of this is because touring I get to
meet all the fans and I get to see the
hard work payoff, and I get to see that the
people that pay, they spend their harder and time, they're
(19:43):
harder money and they come to see you perform, and that's.
Speaker 3 (19:47):
So amazing to me.
Speaker 4 (19:49):
And I get to in that duration of my set,
I get to take them someplace else where they've never been,
so they don't have to necessarily worry about what's happening
outside the arena or outside the amphithy or outside the
festival wherever we're playing.
Speaker 3 (20:03):
They get to focus on what's there and they just get.
Speaker 4 (20:06):
To live not I don't want to say care free,
but they just get to say, oh, weight off the shoulders.
Speaker 1 (20:12):
Well, hey, Timothy Wayne is on top of that goal
in a very big way. He is opening in stadiums
and arenas for Uncle Tim McGraw this summer on the
Pawnshop Guitar Tour.
Speaker 2 (20:24):
On Shop Guitarist that's pretty big.
Speaker 1 (20:27):
So it'll be interesting to see if that shyness that
Timothy Wayne admits to kind of disappears on those huge stages,
or maybe Charlie, maybe he uses shyness to his advantage.
I mean it works for George straight.
Speaker 2 (20:42):
Yeah, when's the last time we saw George, he hides
all the time. Yeah, get off. I admire the fact
that Timothy made his way into the mainstream of country
music on his own without playing the uncle card, I
guess you could say. And of course he learned what
enunciate means. Now, let's point out here. In addition to
the song That'd Be You, he has just released a
(21:03):
new single. It's called get a Load of This garn
damtiya Okay, and it's a love song. It's a love
song too, just a different way of expressing that. I
guess so Big Tour New Music twenty twenty six clicks
to be the breakthrough Year four new artist Timothy Wayne.
Speaker 1 (21:18):
Indeed, folks, we have your country covered. Listen to the
Crooked Chase Countdown every weekend on hundreds of radio stations
across America, also streaming on iHeartRadio
Speaker 2 (21:29):
And don't forget to follow us on Facebook, X and
Instagram at Crooked Chase
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