Terri Clark drops by Get Real with Caroline Hobby to reflect on her 20+ year career in country music. She discusses getting disqualified from one of her very first talent shows in Canada that would’ve resulted in a record deal and changed the entire trajectory of her career. After that loss, she and her mom packed up the car and drove down to Nashville from Canada. Terri shares about her early days living in Nashville alone as a teenager without a green card or a car and some very sketchy situations she found herself in. She somehow found herself a job singing at Tootsie’s for $15 dollars a day. After going on to reach massive success, Terri shares about the pressures in the industry to remain relevant and trying not to play the comparison game. Caroline and Terri connect on Terri’s close relationship with her mom and tragically losing her to cancer. They also discuss Terri having Toby Keith as a mentor early in her career, how she has processed his passing and so much more.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
At carl line. She's a queen and talking to him, so.
Speaker 2 (00:16):
She's getting me not afraid the fingers, so so just
let it flow.
Speaker 1 (00:21):
No one can do me quiet. Caryl Lone is sounding Caroline.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
I'm so excited to be here on Getting Real podcast
with Terry Clark. Hi. Who would have ever thought my
younger self that I would be sitting down with you.
You are like truly one of the artists that And
I'm not saying this to be like, cause you came
out when I was probably in.
Speaker 3 (00:48):
High school, and you look like you're still in high school.
So when you're saying your younger self, I'm like, well,
you have an agdither. Terry.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
You look the same as you do when you came out,
Like was it almost thirty years ago when he.
Speaker 3 (01:00):
Was nineteen ninety five, so twenty nine years ago.
Speaker 2 (01:03):
With your very first single, and oh my gosh, so
almost twenty nine years ago, you look the same. You
look exactly the same. What is your secret day?
Speaker 3 (01:11):
My mom her jeans my mom's family and like my grandmother,
And thank you for saying that's very sweet, but I
blame I blame my mom's family on that. And you
know it's funny because I had an injury in the
orthopedic search and said, You've got a lot of elasticity
to your joints and your skin, which will keep you
looking young. But don't do anything crazy with your arms
(01:32):
and legs or you could really hurt yourself and just
dislocate very easily.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
But you do do a lot of crazy things like
and I was watching your Instagram, which also I'm super
impressed with you because Okay, like I said, you kind
of came out when you came out thirty years ago
when I was in high school, you were like the
queen of the airways. You have maintained that queen status,
your beauty, your talent, your presence in country music, and
(01:58):
now it's like everyone's repeating your fashion too. You know
they say trans repeat like every thirty years. Laney Wilson
with a cowboy hat accepting her Grammy are you like
You're welcome? Lany, Well, you know what I.
Speaker 3 (02:09):
Saw that, and I've seen a lot of Beyonce was
wearing Beyonce like and I'm not taking credit for it,
but yeah, I might have been the first one to
kind of do that, but you're, yeah, it's really cool,
and I love seeing these women wearing like the authentic
felt Texas cattleman style, actual cowboy hat and it's totally
(02:32):
made a comeback and everybody's doing it. I feel like
I feel like people are actually going to think that
I'm chasing a fashion.
Speaker 2 (02:38):
Oh no, no, no, no, no. Everyone knows you're the original.
You're the og. So you started when you were a teen,
started entering competitions like it's seventeen. You're entering a talent
competition in Canada. Yeah, and I saw that you actually
want it, but nobody told you. You thought you lost
because you're under age.
Speaker 3 (02:57):
Yeah, it's It's an interesting story because I was. I
was in this talent contest that started at a local level,
and I wasn't old enough to even be in the
bar where I was supposed to be competing for this,
so I had to wait in the alley to hear
the results with my mom and my guitar, and so
then they told me I won. And then I went
to a provincial talent contest, which is the same as
a state for those of you who don't know. So
(03:20):
I competed on that level and won that one, and
I was the youngest one in that competition. These were
all like people in their thirties forties playing clubs and stuff.
And then the CCMA, which is the equivalent of the cmas,
you know, was a national thing, and I went to
the national contest. I'm still underage. I compete well. First
of all, at sound check it was a house band.
(03:40):
All the other contestants and the band that was playing
were all telling me that I had it in the
bag and I was going to win it. They were
all so sweet. The other competitors were like, oh my god,
I'm just gonna go home now and stuff like that.
Speaker 2 (03:51):
So I think you're awesome from the beginning. Well, you
knew that you were. This is what you were supposed
to do.
Speaker 3 (03:57):
Well, I knew I wanted to do it. I was
very driven and I'm so passionate about it and so
but yeah, they were all patting me on the back
and saying we'll buy you a burger after or whatever.
And when it came time to name off who had won,
they named third place and then second place. My mom
are standing and I are standing in the wings, and
we're thinking that it's wow. I actually once she could win,
(04:19):
and then first place, and it wasn't I was nowhere
in any of the places, and you knew.
Speaker 2 (04:25):
You crushed it.
Speaker 3 (04:26):
Yeah, everybody was telling it and everybody knew you crushed it.
So I went from crushing it to being crushed really quick.
And my mom and I have the.
Speaker 2 (04:34):
Music industry, right.
Speaker 3 (04:35):
Yeah, But you know, there's it's interesting because if you
look at things like building blocks instead of roadblocks. What
I found out ten years later when I was winning
awards up there at the Canadian Country Music Awards, one
of the judges who had been at that talent contest
came to me at the party after, and you said,
there's something you probably don't realize. I was a judge
in that contest ten years ago when you were, you know,
(04:57):
seventeen years old, and you lost because it sponsored by Budweiser,
and they couldn't have an underage contestant winning, like you
couldn't even be in it. You technically won, but they
had to disqualify. I got disqualified.
Speaker 2 (05:09):
Shouldn't they have let you know how to take that
you couldn't have even been in it. That would have
been good information. Yeah, the politics of it all, you know,
that's so much of it as politics.
Speaker 3 (05:18):
Right, it really is. But I would have won a
Canadian record deal, I would have probably not have come
to Nashville when I did, which could have changed the
entire tragedy, changed of my entire career. So you look
at things like in the moment, like it's this is
the worst thing. It's gonna here, I'm just gonna die crying, falling,
and it was it was really for the best, and
(05:38):
that it was meant to be that.
Speaker 2 (05:40):
Way, Isn't that The crazy little mystery about life is like,
like you said, when you're in the moment, especially when
you're young, in the moment like that, and it's the
first time you've had like these crushing blows to your soul,
but then you find out the rabbit trail leads you
to the clue later that finally you get the golden nugget,
and you're like, oh, you.
Speaker 3 (06:01):
Don't know that when you're young, though, because you're so
in the moment, which I wish I could be more.
I mean all of us as adults, I think we
wish we could be more present in the moment. But
when you're young, your whole future is ahead of you
and that's all you can think about. But you're also
not playing the tape forward to like this, maybe this
is meant to be just not that philosophical at seventeen, because.
Speaker 2 (06:20):
You're not sure anything's gonna happen, right, I.
Speaker 3 (06:22):
Just want it now, I want everything right now. Yeah,
I know. Okay.
Speaker 2 (06:26):
So then because you lost, is that what catapulted you
to move to Nashville next year?
Speaker 1 (06:31):
Well?
Speaker 3 (06:31):
Yeah, my mom, who was very you know, very instrumental
in all of.
Speaker 2 (06:35):
This, she is tell me about your mom.
Speaker 3 (06:37):
Well, my mom passed away ten years ago or thirteen
years ago now, and she was thank you.
Speaker 2 (06:43):
But she was a great mom. Oh god, yeah, she
inducted you into the opry too. She was on the stage.
Speaker 3 (06:49):
Yeah, she was amazing. And cancer, you know, it just
it's so many, so many people have been lost to that,
and she.
Speaker 2 (06:56):
Your biggest year later.
Speaker 3 (06:57):
She was.
Speaker 2 (06:58):
She the reason you had all the courage she keep
doing this.
Speaker 3 (07:00):
Yeah she did. And she was a young mother, Like
she was only sixty when she passed away. But I mean,
when I look at how old she was when I
was seventeen, she was in her thirties, you know, and
she was almost she was in her thirties, I know, right, Yeah,
she was almost as naive as she was in her
early thirties.
Speaker 2 (07:15):
So she was right there in the middle of it
all with you, like your dream was her.
Speaker 3 (07:18):
Dream, it was. And she played guitar. She taught me
in my first few chords, and she she kind of
coached me.
Speaker 2 (07:24):
You know.
Speaker 3 (07:24):
I'd sit in the kitchen and sing and she'd be like, oh,
you need to raise her lord the key on this
and that, and she'd be like yeah, and she was
sort of I bounced everything off of her. Yeah. So yeah,
we when we went to that contest and I lost,
and all the way we drove home from there, and
it was like a three hour drive. It was in Alberta,
(07:45):
and I was crying my eyes out, and you know,
there's nothing worse than seeing your kid broken hearted like that.
Speaker 2 (07:51):
I can't imagine.
Speaker 3 (07:52):
I thought, if I can't win, how am I going
to make it in Nashville? How am I going to
ever make it? And she was so she was angry
because she didn't understand what it happened.
Speaker 2 (08:00):
She knew you should have worn too.
Speaker 3 (08:01):
She yeah, and she said, I'm taking you to Nashville.
Just get all of this. We's just going to Nashville. Yeah,
just let's bypass all of this and go to Nashville.
Stop it.
Speaker 2 (08:10):
Yeah, so teary.
Speaker 3 (08:12):
It's pretty cool. Yeah, and we I moved to Nashville
without without any way of working. I wasn't, yeah for
a week, oh only for a week. We drove down.
It's a long story, you know. It was about a
year and a half, two years after that that I
finally got here. But we drove down in a Honda
Civic with one of her best friends of her whole life,
(08:32):
who'd known me since I was a baby. The three
of us loaded the car and drove across the border
and told the border official we were going to the
Grand Ole Lopery because he saw the guitar in the
back seat. But that was when I could fit everything
I owned in a trunk and a back seat of
the Honda Civic. And they drove me down. And my
little brother was five years old at the time, so
my mom was like, I can We're going to get
(08:52):
you set up. We'll figure it out when we get there.
I mean, we didn't. I didn't. I couldn't get a job,
I didn't a green card, I didn't have a Social
Security number, I didn't have a car.
Speaker 2 (09:04):
Were you terrified?
Speaker 3 (09:05):
It was so stupid?
Speaker 1 (09:09):
Hell.
Speaker 2 (09:10):
It was so scared. I would have been petrified. I mean,
actually I moved to Nashville, was nineteen, but like at
the same time, it's like I had my parents still
the United States.
Speaker 3 (09:18):
Yeah, oh yeah, this was It wasn't like I could
go go to Arkansas or Alabama or Mississippi for like
on Sunday or drive home. This was two thousand miles.
Speaker 2 (09:29):
In a live What did you do in a foreign country, well,
a very foreign not only a foreign country, but the
southern United States.
Speaker 3 (09:36):
Like there were things that I'd never experienced in Canada.
On the prairies of Canada, just on.
Speaker 2 (09:41):
The prairies, just like there are a lot of prairies
in Canada.
Speaker 3 (09:44):
Yes, we also celebrate Christmas.
Speaker 2 (09:48):
We also celebrate Christmas, but what do you mean do
you have.
Speaker 3 (09:52):
Prairies in Canada? Normal? Like there's grass.
Speaker 4 (09:57):
Okay, I'm on terry, Okay, I know I'm teasing, but seriously,
I was terrified and it was just Okay, the climate
first of all, I mean the humidity just in Canada.
Speaker 3 (10:13):
There's just differences. There's cultural differences. And I was a kid,
I didn't know anything like I was I was so
I was just so green, really Green, So I experienced
things and wound up on playing at Tootsy's Orchid Lounge
on Lower Broadway.
Speaker 2 (10:33):
A great place to wind up back in the day
that was kind of a golden ticket a little bit, well.
Speaker 3 (10:38):
Not that day nineteen eighty seven on Lower Broadway. Has
anybody do you know what no Lower Broadway was like
in nineteen eighty seven?
Speaker 2 (10:47):
Was it a little like a little risk, a not risk,
a little scary, a scary sketchy, like some scary stuff
went down like it was skid row?
Speaker 3 (10:58):
It was. It was like, okay, lot of the lot
of these bars that are now have country stars names
on that they were boarded up like there was plywood on.
Speaker 2 (11:05):
So Nashville was not hopping so much, No, not at all.
Speaker 3 (11:09):
And uh so me and my mom and her friend
Pat went into Tootsie's Orchid Lounge just as tourists.
Speaker 2 (11:15):
Your mom's like, Okay, I'm gonna drop you off here
and you're gonna work here every day and buy you
got this carry light.
Speaker 3 (11:19):
How it happened. But we went in and like we
were trying to figure out how I was gonna pay
rent and make money, and they had found a place
for me to live in Tusculum, which is like Bell
Road and Nolansville Road. But you didn't have a car.
I didn't have a car, So how are you going
to I got a bus pass? Okay, gosh, I love.
Speaker 2 (11:36):
You had to hunger so hard for your dream.
Speaker 3 (11:40):
I had a bus pass. Yeah, and you had a
bus pass. But before they left to go back to Canada,
and my mom could only stay for so long. My
brother was five years old, and she had a family
back there, and so we found a place for me
to live. I rented a room from a woman who
had who worked the night shift at a factory, and
she had a two year old son, and she was
separated from her husband, who was temporarily moved out and
(12:01):
ended up moving back in at some point. And that's
a whole other story.
Speaker 2 (12:04):
Is it a bad situation?
Speaker 3 (12:06):
It was not good. So, yeah, they were throwing things
at each other in the middle of the night and stuff,
and I've feared for my life at.
Speaker 2 (12:13):
One Then you're like, am I supposed to take the two?
Speaker 3 (12:16):
I've never gone into that kind of detail. Yeah, really,
but that's where you started off. Yeah, it was. It
was a rough beginning in professionally and personally.
Speaker 2 (12:26):
So you're in the same house with this woman and
her son.
Speaker 3 (12:29):
Yeah. So but that's I got a break on rent,
which cost me. I think my rent was three hundred
dollars a month, and I baby sat when she worked, Okay,
So we traded off like that, and and then I
would I would go and take the city bus down
to Tootsy's Orchid Lounge to play at ten in the
morning till two in the afternoon because I wasn't allowed
to be there in the dark at night time. My
(12:50):
mom said, if I find out you did a shift
there at night, because so the story is I go
into Tutsy's Orchid Lounge with my mom and Pat and
there's a guy singing. There's nobody in there, and they're like,
can she get up and sing? Oh your mom's days?
Oh my god, your mom. Your mom was a stage Yeah,
Harney met my mom. Yeah, and so i'm you know, yeah,
(13:14):
I said, okay, I'll get up and sing. And then
the place fills up and it's just people start shuffling
in and they offered me a job playing for tips.
So I got made fifteen dollars.
Speaker 2 (13:23):
Because your mom said, can you get up and sing? Yeah,
you got the job. I got the job being ballsy
goes along way people.
Speaker 3 (13:28):
She she definitely was that. And so I got the job.
And then now we're going, okay, well there's you can
make some cash doing that.
Speaker 2 (13:36):
The first step covered, first step covered, first day, you're there,
you get the job.
Speaker 3 (13:41):
I got the job. Yeah, the place filled up and
everybody was you know, and there were the local musicians
who were you know, some of these characters back then
they were living in their cars in the alley, and yeah,
it was just it was a different do you scared
a little bit a little bit? But I was also
enamored and very excited because I was in Nashville, like
when I was growing up in Medicine Hat, Alberta, like
(14:02):
I was fascinated with Nashville and anything about Nashville and
Tutsi's Orchid Lounge and the Rhymen and all of these
things that it was like the Land of Oz to me.
Speaker 2 (14:10):
Will you get here? And you're like, it's Oz, but
it's also super scary.
Speaker 3 (14:13):
Right, Well, I didn't know to be scared though. I
saw the pictures all over the walls and tootsies, and
I saw Patsy Klein's picture, and I saw all the
scenes I saw in coal miner's daughter and everybody.
Speaker 2 (14:23):
You're like, I'm protected by the energy of country music.
Yeah they were.
Speaker 3 (14:27):
I thought so. But then this local dude comes up
to my mom and you know, this is the day
they offered me the job, and he's he says, she's
real good. But let me tell you something, ma'am. Don't
let your daughter come down here after dark. They'll find
her body in a dumpster in the alley. What So,
my mom's about to get in the car and drive
back to Canada with Pat right.
Speaker 2 (14:44):
After you just got this job where your dark body
could be in the dumpster at an alley.
Speaker 3 (14:47):
And she's gonna tell me I can't do this. No,
she's not going to say that. She's like, what do
I tell her? And so the deal was, here's the deal.
You can take this job, but you can't do this
at night.
Speaker 2 (14:56):
So did you follow the instructions?
Speaker 3 (14:58):
I did? And if they wanted me to cut for
somebody's night shift, they had to drive me there and back.
And like they want somebody from the bar that we
trusted and do like.
Speaker 2 (15:06):
Little bouncers or so he wasn't drunk.
Speaker 3 (15:08):
I had to get in his car and try come
and get me and take me down there. Like I
couldn't be standing at a bus stop on Lower Broadway
at midnight trying to get back to part of town
with my guitar. I knocked some old ladies over with
that guitar, just because I'm not graceful. Like I can't
tell you how many times I'd turn around on the
bus and bang bang it into somebody.
Speaker 2 (15:28):
And I just mean at eighteen years old, I mean
because yes, you're legally an adult, but like you're just
coming into your adulthood.
Speaker 3 (15:44):
You know, you're coming out of being a child.
Speaker 2 (15:46):
You've had this childlike dream that's blossomed now and now
you are an adult, but you're still so young, and
it's like now you're in this brand new place with
all these this potential opportunity and in front of you.
But it's like, gosh, I have a daughter who's four,
and I'm thinking about like that would be in fourteen
years and right now she's like, you know, she's just
(16:07):
learning how to like come into the world, and like
only fourteen years from now she could be you pursuing
this dream. And it's like I just see, like your
will and your spirit and your hunger and your passion
and your dedication and the belief you had. That just
takes so much heart to do something.
Speaker 3 (16:25):
That big when you're younger, though, it's almost like ignorance
is bliss.
Speaker 2 (16:31):
It works in your favor.
Speaker 3 (16:32):
It does, because I don't know that I would have
the gonads to do some of that now, like taking
that kind of risk, and it's like I had nothing
to lose and everything to gain almost you know, it's
like you knew this was what you had to do. Yeah,
I was. Oh, I was so passionate and so determined,
and I prayed every night to God for five minutes
(16:54):
every night because that's what my pastor told me to do.
Five minutes was a lucky number, it was, Yeah, it's
a magic number. You can just do this every night
for five minutes. But what I prayed for was like,
of course, world peace, and like every kid prays for
mom and dad and everybody. I prayed for the determination
and tenacity to not give up. It was always about
not giving up. And I feel like ever since, it's
(17:14):
just been like I can't betray that little girl, you
know what I mean. There have been times during my
career where I've felt, you know, and I think we
all go through these, through these these moments of feeling
irrelevant or of being forgotten or you know, those big
insecurities that every artist has, and and and those thoughts
of maybe I just you know, maybe I should just
fade off into the sunset. And then I go, I
(17:36):
can't do that to her. I can't do that to her,
So and don't make me cry by doing that. I
can't tell you what you're doing.
Speaker 2 (17:43):
So I came a mom. Like all this stuff just
like hits my heart so hard because to have a
dream and to follow through it and to like not
give up on your little girl, that is so brave.
Speaker 3 (17:52):
And that's and and that's the thing that has kept
me here is your little girl. And you yeah, and
and and uh, you know it's it's so true because
you can't you evolve your your interests, change your tastes,
change your life changes. But boy, it's it's hard to
just it's hard to just abandon that person you once
(18:15):
were that wanted this more than anything, and you actually
got it, you got it, and then you start you
start focusing on what you didn't get. That's when you've
got to start you've got to realign yourself and realize that.
And I've been so grateful and I'm so lucky, and
I've achieved so.
Speaker 5 (18:34):
Much, so much, and achieved so much, and and it's
easy to forget that when you start playing the comparison
game compared to this one, compared to that, And I
do it.
Speaker 3 (18:46):
I do it. I did it today. You didn't do
it as a manager. I do it constantly. You just
you go, well, it's not anything in particular. You just go, well,
this person got three played three times on this radio station.
I've only heard myself once in the last twenty four hours.
It's just whatever, it's so stupid. It's not though, because
(19:07):
your brand is you. But you do you. You you
get into that. It's it's into that way of rabbit
hole of negativity, and you've got to pull yourself back out,
and then you start going down these paths of well
maybe maybe I should just you know, but you can't
pay it up. Yeah, but I think everybody goes through
that absolutely very vulnerable with you.
Speaker 2 (19:27):
Thank you for sharing with me, Terry, my god. I
know every time everyone leaves my interview, and I think
they have a vulnerability hangover they're like, I just want
to share my whole life.
Speaker 3 (19:38):
Why didn't I just go into therapy. I'll pay you
for this next time.
Speaker 2 (19:41):
I've done so much therapy terry, you don't even I
think you're good.
Speaker 3 (19:44):
That's why you're good.
Speaker 2 (19:45):
I think it's because I have gone down to the well,
the bottom of the drain. I live at the bottom
of the drain in my emotions. So it's fine. I've
done a lot of healing. It's great towns of therapy.
But it's like, we're all humans, you know, we're all
like struggling with this, and especially as an art artist
when you're putting yourself out there for people just to
have decisions about you and thoughts about you and weigh
(20:05):
in about you, and then like someone new comes out
and it's like so much is happening behind the scenes
that has nothing to do with you as a human being.
But yet as an artist, you feel like it's all
about you personally.
Speaker 3 (20:16):
Right, Yeah, you can and you can get caught up
and bogged down by that kind of stuff. But you know,
I think I think there was a time when I
worried what people were thinking about me a lot. Now
I just want to know they're thinking about, isn't a
great Ass's the quote of the day right there. Perspective? Sure,
(20:39):
I mean time change is everything proscriptive? What they think?
I just want to know they're thinking.
Speaker 2 (20:46):
Oh god, you so you don't care what they say?
Speaker 3 (20:49):
No, I really don't know. Well that's also that's also
part of like being over thirty five. That's all you get. Man.
The last ten years has gone by fast. It was
my faster and faster each year, it really does. And
you know, I do think since since I, I, you know,
got off of the major labels in Nashville and like
twenty ten, ish, I've also been putting out records like
(21:13):
one after the other, like every three years, and as
you wish, Yes and one won the Juno for Country
Album of the Year in Canada in twenty twelve. And
then I put out a covers record that I'm so
proud of a class. It's called Classic. It's got all
these country covers on it of old classic songs.
Speaker 2 (21:28):
And there probably was like a soulful moment, Yes, you
picked all the ones you wanted?
Speaker 3 (21:32):
Yes, and who else came saying Dirk Bentley saying one,
Riba saying one with Tanya Tucker did Delta Don with me?
Stop it? How many people don't know about that record?
How you had to know about.
Speaker 2 (21:42):
Tanya Zucker do Delta Don on an album with this?
Speaker 3 (21:44):
Was? It was crazy. It was just oh my say,
And this is a thing, miss is cry.
Speaker 2 (21:49):
This is a thing about artists. You like yourself, You're
so phenomenal, You've had so many bucket list moments like this,
but like artists don't remember that, Like you've done this
album with He's Classics, You're seeing Delta Dawn with Tanya Tucker.
Speaker 3 (22:02):
It's cool, you know, but you know a lot of
people don't know about it because it's not it's it's
it flies under the radar a bit when you're not
on a major label in Nashville and you're not getting
all that press, and you're not you know, in the
in everybody's crosshairs like you used to be, so a
lot of that stuff gets lost and people don't know
about it. It's so funny because Ashley McBride just randomly
(22:24):
brought that album up to me. I'm like, you know
about that album? She goes, oh, that was phenomenal, and
I'm like, oh cool, okay. Well, I was like well,
somebody knows about the records is good.
Speaker 1 (22:34):
You know.
Speaker 3 (22:35):
It's like you kind of you have those doubts, those
self doubts creep in and like, and then you make
another record and you just do it anyway and you
start just doing it because you want to do it,
but you also want people to know about it. If
you're putting that much time and energy and financial you
know risk, you know, going into this stuff, you want
people to know about it. But yeah, I've always just
(22:57):
I've kept writing and putting music out and producing most
of it myself for since twenty ten, since you know,
since a lot of people maybe thought that I don't know,
went and just went on a fishing trip or something.
You love it.
Speaker 2 (23:10):
I know you're on a major fisher I am.
Speaker 3 (23:12):
Yeah, I love fishing. It's so much fun.
Speaker 2 (23:15):
I see, I need to find that love.
Speaker 3 (23:17):
I was finding a little boring.
Speaker 2 (23:18):
You know. It's still waiting game. You're patient, you have patients,
and it's like the finesse of catching the fish.
Speaker 3 (23:24):
Right. There's such techniques, yes, oh, there's there's techniques and
knowing where to go and what to use and how.
Speaker 2 (23:29):
Do you know the right spots to go? It's a
lot of practice, Like do you only fish in certain
rivers because you are not well?
Speaker 3 (23:35):
I fish on Lake Erie. I have a lake house
in Cannon, on the Canadian side of Lake Erie, and
so I've spent you know, COVID. I really got into
it because I had time, you know. So I spent
like three months solid up there, just learning about pike fishing.
And then I've recently become even more into large mouth
bass fishing, which first I can do down here too
if I find the right spots. But you know, it's
(23:57):
right out my back door there, so it's just easy
for me to disappear for hours on end and never
be heard from again.
Speaker 2 (24:03):
Do you solve a lot of your problems out there fishing?
Speaker 3 (24:05):
I don't think about anything. That's the only thing I
do where, honest to God. Managers called because I got
nominated for a CMA Radio Personality of the Year a
couple of years ago, and they were trying to call
me to tell me I got the nomination, and I
was nowhere to be found on fishing, and Marni's Marnie
(24:25):
says she better be fishing right now, and that's exactly
where I was. But no, I don't I don't think
about anything. It's the only thing I can do, honestly
where I'm not questioning your entire existence, my entire existence,
the future of the past, the president, what's going on
in my career, what's not going on in my career.
I really, I really am very very present, And it's
(24:46):
a meditative just casting over and over again, it's just
a meditative presence. It's it's it's in the moment, completely
in the moment.
Speaker 2 (24:54):
I think that is the whole point of meditation, because
like I used to get stressed out trying to like
just sit and meditate hate in things. But like you
have to find the practice where your brain can stop,
because you have to let your brain have a moment
to just like stop thinking. So then like whatever thoughts
you were on the hamster will looping, looping, looping, looping,
they all go away. So then it's like they don't
(25:16):
they're not with such strength anymore. You know, they lose
their power because you've let them all go. And so
then when you come out of your vortex of fishing
or whatever the meditative state is for me it's yoga,
it's like, oh, then you don't pick back up every
single one of those obsessive thoughts. Only a few come
back in exactly maybe only the ones that needed you
come back, right.
Speaker 3 (25:36):
They still come back. And then I'm like, when can
I go fishing in I gotta get back out there. Yeah,
I mean, And unfortunately that's a summer. It's very seasonal.
So the rest of the year, I'm crazy, pretty much certifiable,
aren't we all that I'm the most sane in the summer.
Speaker 2 (25:57):
Should you get into ice fishing?
Speaker 3 (25:58):
Oh god, I'm sure most of the people in my
life wish I would, But no, I'm a fair weather
fisher woman. Okay, So, but the fun thing about fishing
is like I've actually now got some affiliations with tackle companies.
They're they're putting me on their pro page and sending
me free stuff and like I'm tagging them and posts
(26:21):
and stuff. So I feel like I'm like into the
fishing world. Now look at you, Spro and Yamamoto and
Reaction Tackle and some companies like that are like a
fishing show coming your way. Well you know what, I
could actually maybe in the future do that.
Speaker 2 (26:37):
Not this year, bring all your famous friends and go
fishing with them.
Speaker 3 (26:41):
All my famous friends, because I hang out with so
many famous people.
Speaker 2 (26:45):
You well or just bring yourself, bring your dog. Seriously though,
speaking of famous friend Zoe, I mean, it's like you've
toured with Reba, You've done stuff with Dolly, You've been
on tour George Straight. Like Toby Keith, your post to
him made me, Oh.
Speaker 3 (26:58):
Toby, I can't you know. I think we knew he
was sick, but then he did Vegas in December. And
then I woke up that morning and I had a
text from somebody, and then I turned on the TV.
I was like, no, like we I didn't know he
was that close to gone. And I said that to
(27:18):
a mutual friend. And Toby and I toured together for
an entire year. What was that like? He felt like
a big brother to me, you know, and he was
so he was such a good conversationalist, Like you could
ask him anything and he would always give you an
honest answer. And I was, I I was ballsy about
(27:39):
some stuff I asked him back then. I can't tell you.
I didn't have to shoot him, I tell you, but
you know what he gave me honest answers to everybody. Yeah,
we talked a lot about that, and you know when
when he he hadn't hand picked his opening acts like
he would pick them, and he said uh publicly and
(28:00):
at some media outlet when he was talking about is
it was the Big Throwdown tour and he said Terry
Clark's the most underrated artist out there. And I was like,
oh my god, you said that about I mean, that's
so sweet. He was just very He was just a
really good guy and I think one of the best
songwriters we've ever had. Truly. His shows were fun. We
(28:22):
had a lot of fun out there. We played practical
jokes on each other. He was always playing basketball with
the band and crew. My band and crew and I
have the same drummer I had on that tour to
this day. And so you know, we're reminiscing a lot
about Toby and seeing the posts coming in and the things.
That's where I do like social media is the tributes
(28:42):
that you can pay to somebody when you know they
pass on, and it you all of the love that
you can feel from everywhere in the world for them,
and it's just sad, way too young. It goes so fast. Yeah,
like life just flies by, it does flies by. But
what I loved he was his spirit was him right
(29:04):
to the end, like him getting up in Vegas and
seeing him hold his guitar up and saying, we're gonna
crush it. You know, this is two months ago. I'm like, Yeah,
that's his spirit and it's soaring somewhere now. And Yeah,
he was the epitome of just honest and unabashedly who
he is, but unapologetically who he is, and patriotic. He
(29:29):
was so everything everybody's been saying is never scared.
Speaker 2 (29:33):
To take a stand for what he believed in either,
which is hard to do.
Speaker 3 (29:35):
Yeah, and I loved Kicks and Ronnie's post about him
because they each had something to say. And I've never
I didn't hear anybody as eloquent as they were, and
how they.
Speaker 2 (29:44):
Described who he was.
Speaker 3 (29:45):
They just talked about how he was never afraid to
be honest, tell the truth. He never backed down, he
never wavered about anything. He was just very solid and
everything he stood for.
Speaker 2 (29:56):
How is someone like that? I've aim to be like
that a minute, But my emotions get the best of me,
and my like fear of like people hating me gets
the best too.
Speaker 3 (30:06):
Like God, somebody's gonna hate me. I know I can't
say this.
Speaker 2 (30:11):
I know where it's like you just got to be yourself,
which you are terry.
Speaker 3 (30:15):
I think you are so yourself. I'm also very politely
Canadian in a lot of ways too, like we talked
about before, you know, yeah yeah, And that was like
part of like the culture shock for me was just
coming to America where people were just more It's a
more aggressive culture, like as far as how people, people
are just more a little more you know, opinionated and
(30:38):
stuff like that, or angry more, the angry Americans and
like the southern culture. Like I had never had grits before,
Like just walking into like a cracker barrel, I was like,
I've never had any of this food before.
Speaker 2 (30:51):
What do you think?
Speaker 3 (30:53):
I still am not really, I'm not. I don't eat grits.
What do you like to eat? Biscuits are good?
Speaker 2 (30:59):
Do you like butter and grave?
Speaker 3 (31:00):
I got into the white gravy with the sausage in
it because it's not a Canadian thing I grew up
on eating perogis.
Speaker 2 (31:07):
Do we all wonder why we have heartburn?
Speaker 3 (31:09):
Right? I know?
Speaker 2 (31:10):
Is that a sandwich?
Speaker 3 (31:11):
No? You don't know what a well it's Ukrainian, but
we eat them a lot in Canada do you eat
gravy on your fries?
Speaker 2 (31:19):
Not really not brown gravy.
Speaker 3 (31:20):
That's a Canadian.
Speaker 2 (31:20):
I'm not a brown You're not.
Speaker 3 (31:22):
No, we just tried dipping it in that white gravy.
Speaker 2 (31:25):
I just don't.
Speaker 3 (31:26):
I'm not really even like gravy.
Speaker 2 (31:28):
Like when I think about like what's in the gravy,
it's like all the bits and stuff. When people say,
like bits are in gravy, Like what bit?
Speaker 3 (31:34):
Do you eat meat?
Speaker 2 (31:36):
I do eat meat, but I don't like to think
I don't like to eat meat, but I don't eat me.
Speaker 3 (31:40):
I got you. I'm just like she doesn't even want
the bits from the meat and the gravy.
Speaker 2 (31:44):
Do you like the bits?
Speaker 3 (31:45):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (31:45):
You like to eat the bits?
Speaker 3 (31:46):
Oh god, I'll eat the fat. I'll eat my fat.
You're fat. You gotta have that bone. I'll just gnaw
on that too. You love all the extra person that.
I'm like, are you gonna eat that? Because put it
on my plate? If you're not, my cholesterol is not good.
Do you eat uh giblets? No? I will not eat that.
Or liver really, oh, liver like organs. I'm kind of
(32:07):
off the organs.
Speaker 2 (32:07):
Okay, yeah, yeah, like a liver like people like love
a liver. I'm like, that's what's processing all the shit
out of your body.
Speaker 3 (32:13):
I will donate an organ, but I do not want
one of you know, to ingest one.
Speaker 2 (32:18):
Say not interested. Everybody in this room is going now
everyone's happened, going to the bathroom to throw out.
Speaker 3 (32:25):
I think we lost Marnie.
Speaker 2 (32:35):
Okay, So when was the moment you have all your
whole life has been geared up for your life that
you're living like you're one of those people that it's like,
on the second you had thoughts about who you are
as a human being to you knew you want to
be a country singer, and you started putting steps in
(32:56):
play to make that happen. You had a mother to
support you. But like, as as soon as you had
real thoughts, this was your destiny. So it's like, what
is it like your whole life has been this, and
it has been this has been your whole dream and
it's come true. What is it like the when did
you said you've been in your dream your whole life.
(33:17):
When did you know that your dream had come true?
Speaker 3 (33:24):
I think after Better Things to Do became a hit.
Speaker 2 (33:28):
The first single was a hit straight out of the Gate. Yeah,
how does that feel?
Speaker 3 (33:32):
Oh, I was. It was surreal. It was just it
was just like all of this planning and all of
this all of the sacrifice and the starving literally literally going.
You know, Lon, and I was, I got married when
I was twenty. You met someone in National Guess Mary?
Speaker 2 (33:50):
Yeah, and did you married.
Speaker 3 (33:51):
A fiddle player? And to protect the names of the
innocent of I call him starter Kit during my show
because I don't want to start kit marriage. Yeah. Yeah,
you know, he was more than a starter kid. We
were married for quite a while, seven years, I think
six or seven years. Was it a nice marriage, Yes,
it was fine. We were just young, too young, very young,
and we you know, and when things started happening in
(34:14):
my career, we really grew apart. And we were having
some difficulties with communication and things leading up to that.
Speaker 2 (34:19):
So who doesn't when they're in their twenties.
Speaker 3 (34:21):
Yes, that's if I were you. The song I wrote
was about my marriage at that time, and I was
talking to my friends about it and they were like,
I would go to my friends for marriage counseling. It
was free marriage counseling, So I would always call them
when I was complaining and some had good advice, some
had bad advice. And I wrote that song about talking
to my friends, what is the best advice.
Speaker 2 (34:41):
I actually have a friend who's struggling with her marriage
right now, and I don't feel like I've been giving
good advice to her because I've just got a kid,
and I'm like, you gotta gotta fight for the marriage.
You got to fight for the kid. But like, maybe
that's not what you're supposed to do as a friend.
Speaker 3 (34:53):
I think, I think, I think asking your whoever you're
talking to you to put put yourself in your significant
other shoes. Put wait, okaya, put yourself in that other
person's shoes for a minute, like me, trust my friend, No, you,
if you're having trouble with your spouse, put yourself in
his shoes just for a minute, and honestly try and
(35:15):
just look at it from that person's point of view.
And then you can kind of not just be so
insular in how you're thinking about because the relationship is
fifty to fifty, Like you're responsible for one hundred percent
of your fifty percent, and yeah, you're responsible for a
hundred math right there, fifty percent. I failed at math.
I don't know why I'm bringing numbers into this.
Speaker 2 (35:36):
You are one hundred percent. You are one hundred percent
responsible for your fifty percent of the marriage.
Speaker 3 (35:41):
The marriage, So if you're going to end.
Speaker 2 (35:43):
The marriage, you got to end it as best you can.
Speaker 3 (35:45):
But you also need to put yourself in your spouse's
shoes and make sure you're looking at it from every
angle instead of just your own.
Speaker 2 (35:51):
But what if you just don't love them anymore but
you are spect as a human?
Speaker 3 (35:55):
Yeah, that's hard. That's that's the tough thing. When that goes,
It's it's hard to salvage that.
Speaker 2 (35:59):
Can you love that?
Speaker 3 (36:01):
Some people do with a lot of therapy in those
whatever I mago things they call them, and.
Speaker 2 (36:07):
Workshops of some sort, I guess, But how do you
know what it's time to let it go?
Speaker 3 (36:11):
Though?
Speaker 2 (36:12):
Are you glad you did?
Speaker 3 (36:13):
I think if you've exhausted everything, I think I wouldn't
be who I am today if if I stayed in that.
And I don't think it wasn't abusive. He was a
lovely person. I can't. I have nothing bad to say
about him at all.
Speaker 2 (36:26):
It probably was nice to have that comfort when you
were that young.
Speaker 3 (36:29):
Him and his family. I might have wound up moving
back to Canada and given up if it weren't for them,
because I felt so lonely, so alone, so isolated from
any anything that I knew everyone, my whole family, I
was alone.
Speaker 2 (36:42):
Here were country person.
Speaker 3 (36:45):
Yeah, I very good person, and it just we just
we just parted ways and grew apart. And when my
career took off, it was kind of the nail in
the coffin that was already it was. It was a
bit of a sinking ship and it sort of was
like somebody just you know, threw a three ton weight
on on that ship, and that was my career. It
just sank it. And I don't blame my career. I
just think that we it just sped that process up.
Speaker 2 (37:08):
What so I for me as a friend who I
have someone going through this situation you were in, what
kind of support do you want from your friends when
you are going through a divorce? Like what you don't
want your friend telling you what to do? Right, because
I've been their friend Roe, I'm like, you need to
get therapy, you need to try to like salvage it
for the kid.
Speaker 3 (37:27):
You need to work. But I don't think that's working well.
I don't think telling them what to do is the answer.
I think letting them process with you and you have
to be relly, they will figure it out. They sometimes
people just have to say something out loud, just a
trusted source that they they can count on not to
judge them or try to fix it. They just want
you to listen and they will start saying things and
they'll be ome like, oh, what did I just say? Well,
(37:48):
I just answered my own question. And it's free therapy.
A lot of times you got to pay a therapist
to tell you these same things when you just have
a You know, it's hard for friends to be by
unbiased though, because they love you and they're on your
side always. They've always got your back, so that's the
only thing you know they're emotionally invested in, where a
therapist isn't. Oh we're going deep here.
Speaker 2 (38:08):
I thought you've been surrounded by great people though, like
you've picked great people.
Speaker 3 (38:12):
My friends, my core group of friends that I have
to this day, the ones that would help me bury
the body, the ones that I would call in the
middle of the night, are mostly people that I have
known for thirty plus years. Wow, that says a lot
about you. That I've known since I was in junior
high with like since I was twelve, And wow, yeah, really,
(38:35):
so you're true blue? Oh for sure. They're not in
any way, shape or form associated with the music business.
Speaker 2 (38:42):
I mean she's your best I mean she's kind of associated.
Speaker 3 (38:45):
I love Riba and I consider her a true friend.
Speaker 2 (38:48):
I know I do, and I do grow out.
Speaker 3 (38:50):
But let me tell you something, Riba is no different
than those girls that I've known my whole life. She's
a true person. She is just not affected by any
any of that fame and that you can tell a lot.
She's so grounded.
Speaker 2 (39:03):
She's like Toby Keith too though, and like she's just real.
She just is who she is. To the chase, cuts
to the chase.
Speaker 3 (39:09):
There's no bs, there's no like, you know, floating around
a subject. She'll just cut to the chase. And those
are my friends. They're honest, and I just want honest friends.
I want people who don't look at me and want
anything or think that I can help them do anything
for their own career. It's opportunistic or people that I
feel like, are you know, hangers on for any reason
(39:31):
other than that they just like being around me because they
like me as a person. I make them laugh for
some reason, or we have a good time, or we'll
have a bottle of wine and get down to the
nitty gritty of life. And you know, those are true friends.
You know you help each other. I've asked Riva for
a lot of advice too, and you know, and Susie
Bogas is another one that I consider like a sister.
Pam Tillis. There are a few women in the industry
(39:53):
that are friends, but I'm not friends with them because
of what they do. I just really like them.
Speaker 2 (40:00):
Nice though, that you'll have this career in common though.
Speaker 3 (40:03):
Yes we can. We can navigate together. We can kind
of try and dissect it a little bit together and
try to and say things around each other that we
can trust it's a vault and that it doesn't go
any further. So don't ask me what we talk about, Okay.
Speaker 2 (40:17):
I mean, I just love it. I won't, but I
just love it. I think it's so great.
Speaker 3 (40:21):
You're so awesome, Terry.
Speaker 2 (40:23):
I'll wrap up because I know you have so much
puss to do and you're looking fine. And I know
when you say you look fine all day, you got
to be showing it off and you got more stuff
to do later we got oh yeah, oh, oh my gosh.
Speaker 1 (40:35):
Let's talk about the point of this whole podcast.
Speaker 3 (40:38):
Really faster therapy, all right.
Speaker 2 (40:40):
I mean, I'm just talking about, like, if you have
Terry Clark Take two happening, where you have an eight
song duett project featuring special guests. Let's not forget Laura Lena,
Paul Brant, Kelly Clarkson, Cody Johnson, Ashley McBride, Carly Pierce,
Ben Rector and Lanny Wilson's. This is also your twentieth
year celebrating the Opry. Because you're inducted in two thousand
and four and that it's twenty twenty. You have big
(41:03):
shows coming up this year, so I.
Speaker 3 (41:04):
Lot of touring, Yeah, a lot of t razy year.
Speaker 2 (41:07):
Talk about Terry Clark Take too though, really fast for
your wrap of this interview, because that's why we're here.
Speaker 3 (41:12):
Take two. Oh well, you know what, I talked to
my manager, Clarence Spaulding about this project about five years ago.
He had been talking on some stuff with Brooks and Done.
You know, they've done reboot and stuff like that, and
a couple of artists have sort of done some things
with newer artists and then COVID happened and I had
a Christmas record that came out in twenty twenty, and
(41:35):
everything sort of got pushed by a couple of years,
all these ideas we were talking about. So about a
year and a half ago we picked back up and
started and went back in the studio and you know,
just started re recording, reimagining my hit songs, you know,
with some newer artists and people that I wanted to
work with and asked if they wanted to do it,
(41:57):
And so Ashley McBride was, She's so awesome. First one,
she's a very good friend, so she of course is
on better things to do, which is was my very
first single. So yes, oh that's great. And Ashley's one
of these people who's always talked about you know, she's
been a champion for me publicly and talking about how
(42:19):
she was a teenager growing up and she said, you know,
I always felt different and you know, I wasn't like
all the other girls. And I looked to you, you know,
this girl in this rolled up T shirt, sleeves and
a cowboy hat, and you know that I want that
she can do that and I can do that too,
you know, And so it was so heartwarming to hear
that I had some sort of an inspiration in her
(42:41):
path and we became friends. So she did a great
job on it. We we went in and we re
recorded these and some of them. You know, the spirit
of the song is hard to make it a whole
lot different from what it is musically, but we we
reworked and reimagined them. Their arrangements a little bit different.
I did Poor pitif Me with Landy Wilson. It's super fun.
(43:02):
How was that? It's super fun?
Speaker 2 (43:04):
I mean, and Lenda, he.
Speaker 3 (43:05):
Just came in and nailed it. She's so good.
Speaker 2 (43:07):
She's so good.
Speaker 3 (43:08):
She knew I was going to be doing this song.
Speaker 2 (43:12):
I'm sure she said that.
Speaker 3 (43:13):
She said that. I said five.
Speaker 2 (43:15):
She's like, I'm a manifest that since.
Speaker 3 (43:16):
I was five. She's so sweet, Oh and this sweet
like you.
Speaker 2 (43:19):
This has been her vision from the start.
Speaker 3 (43:21):
You know, yeah, you got it. You gotta it's you
gotta want it worse than anything else in the world.
And truly, look at her now. I'm glad we recorded
her a year over a year ago, because I don't
know what it would take to get her to show
up now. She's so busy, so I think the timing
was right with that one. And she and I text
back and forth from time to time. Every time she
wins something, I congratulate her. So I'm texting her quite
(43:42):
a bit. She's winning quite a bit, quite a bit.
Speaker 2 (43:45):
And Laura Lena, Oh my god, who could not love
Laura Lena. I know she's the cutest, funniest sweet.
Speaker 3 (43:53):
Put her in my pocket. I love her so much.
She's so sweet.
Speaker 2 (43:56):
I love her.
Speaker 3 (43:56):
The first time I worked with her was when Ashley
and she and I did the op when COVID was
going on. There was no audience. We were one of
the first ones to do that and we showed up
and we had never sung together. And it was right
after Joe Diffy had passed and we did John dear Green.
We're out in the parking lot in pickup trucks, like practicing.
We couldn't practice in a dressing room together, so we
(44:17):
were out in the parking lot at the opry rehearsing
harmonies and stuff, and we were about to do this
thing and it was like, oh my god, but she
was just she's just lovely. She's just she'll just blurt.
She's got no filter. I love it's my favorite thing.
Speaker 2 (44:29):
I love her so much. And then Ben Rector, he
might be one of the funnier people.
Speaker 3 (44:34):
Have you seen his Instagram?
Speaker 2 (44:36):
I watch it just for his commercials.
Speaker 3 (44:38):
He knowing Ben Rector because not everybody in the country
format knows him. But he's great, freakishly talented, Like I'm talking,
freaking genius.
Speaker 2 (44:46):
Did you see his latest project he put out with
like the Red Monster and stuff?
Speaker 3 (44:49):
Oh oh yeah, yeah, The Joy Yeah, The.
Speaker 2 (44:51):
Joy of music so good, so creative and fan giving song.
Speaker 3 (44:54):
Have you heard his Thanksgiving song? Maybe? Oh gosh, it's huge.
He's a genius, a genius and and he's him, him
and Kelly Clarkson, like the two of them as singers
and having two of both of them on this project
and like, don't make me stand next to them and
ever sing anything? Because how is it with Kelly? Well,
she hasn't done her part yet with comment finishing it,
(45:15):
but I cannot wait to hear what she does. She
wanted to do it if I were you and we
re recorded it. That one's a little bit of a
different approach. I could do more that more with ballads
than you kind up tempted. Do you change some of them. Yeah,
like the the Kelly clarkson If I were you track
is it kind of is like a country John Mayer
kind of feel. Now it's got a little a little
(45:36):
bit more of that. It doesn't feel as ballady, but
it's Yeah. But it didn't go completely off the rails either,
like some some people are re recording stuff and it's
just a complete departure on your take two.
Speaker 2 (45:48):
Yeah, it's departed.
Speaker 3 (45:49):
It's not. It's not. It's not like you won't recognize
the song.
Speaker 2 (45:52):
Which that's kind of fun though to reimagine, like.
Speaker 3 (45:54):
Better things to do. I want to do it all?
Some of those are what they are? Do we say,
who's doing I want to do it all? Lauren is
doing Laura Yeah, Cody Johnson's on I just wanted to
be mad, And what a duet that makes me? It's
it could have been a duet from the start, like
it's a conversation about fighting your significant other. Yeah, And
he chose that one. We were going back and forth
(46:14):
between a couple of songs and he chose that one
and he said, who hasn't been there? And I'm like, yeah,
this is this is going to make a really cool duet.
Speaker 2 (46:20):
That's so awesome. Which one do you feel like is
the most reimagined?
Speaker 3 (46:24):
Hmm, I'd say If I Were You and I Just
Want to be Mad maybe the two most reimagined, just
because of the duet, the musical nature of If I
Were You and the duet nature of the guy girl
thing with with I Just Want to Be Mad because
(46:47):
it is such a relationship song. Now that I found
you with Ben is great. It's now that I found
you with Ben to me, sounds like it could be
a hit right now. It sounds it sounds like a
whole new like a like of Valentine's Day favorite, because
it's just it's such a love song and it's a
nice do it. It makes a really nice to it,
(47:07):
like that one and the one with Cody or a
guy girl, they sound like very natural that way. How
much fun did you have? I'm having so much fun.
I'm not done. I'm still in the midst of doing it.
And you know, it's it's it's a blast. It's a
blast being creative with something that's already lived out there
so long and trying to it's a puzzle, trying to
figure out how how do we how do we freshen
(47:27):
this up without you know, pissing everybody off by changing
it too much, because I don't want to do that either.
Speaker 2 (47:32):
We don't want to We don't want to piss everybody off.
Speaker 3 (47:34):
Right, well, just some people because somebody's going to say something.
You've ruined that song for me?
Speaker 2 (47:39):
Okay, but remember as long as they're talking, as long
as they as long as they're.
Speaker 3 (47:43):
Talking, what was it? I said, I don't care what
I talk about.
Speaker 2 (47:45):
It what they're talking about.
Speaker 3 (47:48):
I said. I used to worry about what people were
thinking about me. Now I worry about whether whether they're
thinking about me or so, hey, stir.
Speaker 2 (47:55):
Up, Terry. That's amazing, Terry Clark take two. Okay, So
that'll come out later.
Speaker 3 (48:00):
It's going to be the end of May. Oh my gosh,
this is so exciting.
Speaker 2 (48:04):
What touring? Can we look forward to?
Speaker 3 (48:06):
Lots of touring this year. They're did a.
Speaker 2 (48:08):
Big Canada tour last year and it's amazing. Home can
we tour?
Speaker 3 (48:11):
Then it took the summer off. I didn't do any
any of the outdoor break I did. I took the
summer off fishing and I did. And this year not
as much fishing, more touring and we have some really
great shows on the books, a lot of fun stuff
lined up. I can't wait to get out there. It's
going to be it's probably going to be my biggest
touring year since nineteen ninety eight this year. Yeah, I was.
(48:35):
Are you tired through the schedule this year? It's not
that it's going to be so much, it's just going
to be good quality stuff. Oh so you're fired to
be really nice? Yeah, I'm really really fired up about it.
And we're only halfway through booking it. So it's and
I'm already excited. It's going to be.
Speaker 2 (48:48):
Thirty plus years in and you're hotter than ever, Terry
in every sense of the word. Yeah, and every sense
of the word. You're on fire.
Speaker 3 (48:57):
Look at you.
Speaker 2 (48:59):
What's the keys the key to like keeping it going?
And then we'll wrap up because I know you got
to go. What's the key to keeping it going?
Speaker 3 (49:04):
Keep had it fresh? Yeah, it's like a relationship. You
have to you have to keep it fresh. You have
to do things that that you feel passionate about. You
have to remind yourself how grateful you are, how lucky
you are that you and when somebody comes up to
you and says your music saved my life, or it
made such a difference. Just take that in and realize
that you're bringing people together, You're making a difference just
(49:27):
showing up and doing a show that makes them happy,
that mends their broken heart for an hour and a half.
That the last time I saw you was with my
husband and he passed away, or we met at your
show thirty years ago, when he's not here anymore, but
and I'm like, oh, yeah he is, he's going to
be sitting in that chair next to you. You know,
you've got to realize that you're It's bigger than music,
(49:48):
and if you can find that purpose in it and
know that you're making a difference, I think that that's
the stuff that keeps me fueled and keeps me going too.
You know, as long as I feel like it matters
and somebody's really getting something meaningful from it, I'm going
to keep doing it. It's not so much about oh me, me, me,
(50:10):
I want number one records, I want more money, I
want more of this, I want that, I want all
the accolades. It's I want to making a difference. Yeah yeah,
And as long as they're showing up, I'm going to
show up. And if that ever changes, then that's my
cue to go get in the boat and take my
rods and reels and go do I do catch the fit,
scare all the fish in Lake Eury, just scare them all.
Speaker 2 (50:32):
I love it so much. I always wrap up with
leave your light, which you've left so much inspiration, But
it's basically, what do you want people to know? Just
a little touch of inspiration, a nugget of inspo for
everyone listening.
Speaker 3 (50:48):
Just never be afraid to be who you are. There's
only one you. God made you just the way you are.
Don't don't follow anybody else's path, anybody else's image, anybody
else's light. Follow your own and I think that the
rest will follow. Authenticity.
Speaker 2 (51:08):
He love it, Terry Clark, thank you so much for
coming on my podcast.
Speaker 3 (51:11):
This is a dream countrue for me. So thanks for
making my dreams come true. Oh you're so sweet. Thank
you for having me. Thank you so much. One Y
At carl line. She's a queen and talking to him, so.
Speaker 2 (00:16):
She's getting me not afraid the fingers, so so just
let it flow.
Speaker 1 (00:21):
No one can do me quiet. Caryl Lone is sounding Caroline.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
I'm so excited to be here on Getting Real podcast
with Terry Clark. Hi. Who would have ever thought my
younger self that I would be sitting down with you.
You are like truly one of the artists that And
I'm not saying this to be like, cause you came
out when I was probably in.
Speaker 3 (00:48):
High school, and you look like you're still in high school.
So when you're saying your younger self, I'm like, well,
you have an agdither. Terry.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
You look the same as you do when you came out,
Like was it almost thirty years ago when he.
Speaker 3 (01:00):
Was nineteen ninety five, so twenty nine years ago.
Speaker 2 (01:03):
With your very first single, and oh my gosh, so
almost twenty nine years ago, you look the same. You
look exactly the same. What is your secret day?
Speaker 3 (01:11):
My mom her jeans my mom's family and like my grandmother,
And thank you for saying that's very sweet, but I
blame I blame my mom's family on that. And you
know it's funny because I had an injury in the
orthopedic search and said, You've got a lot of elasticity
to your joints and your skin, which will keep you
looking young. But don't do anything crazy with your arms
(01:32):
and legs or you could really hurt yourself and just
dislocate very easily.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
But you do do a lot of crazy things like
and I was watching your Instagram, which also I'm super
impressed with you because Okay, like I said, you kind
of came out when you came out thirty years ago
when I was in high school, you were like the
queen of the airways. You have maintained that queen status,
your beauty, your talent, your presence in country music, and
(01:58):
now it's like everyone's repeating your fashion too. You know
they say trans repeat like every thirty years. Laney Wilson
with a cowboy hat accepting her Grammy are you like
You're welcome? Lany, Well, you know what I.
Speaker 3 (02:09):
Saw that, and I've seen a lot of Beyonce was
wearing Beyonce like and I'm not taking credit for it,
but yeah, I might have been the first one to
kind of do that, but you're, yeah, it's really cool,
and I love seeing these women wearing like the authentic
felt Texas cattleman style, actual cowboy hat and it's totally
(02:32):
made a comeback and everybody's doing it. I feel like
I feel like people are actually going to think that
I'm chasing a fashion.
Speaker 2 (02:38):
Oh no, no, no, no, no. Everyone knows you're the original.
You're the og. So you started when you were a teen,
started entering competitions like it's seventeen. You're entering a talent
competition in Canada. Yeah, and I saw that you actually
want it, but nobody told you. You thought you lost
because you're under age.
Speaker 3 (02:57):
Yeah, it's It's an interesting story because I was. I
was in this talent contest that started at a local level,
and I wasn't old enough to even be in the
bar where I was supposed to be competing for this,
so I had to wait in the alley to hear
the results with my mom and my guitar, and so
then they told me I won. And then I went
to a provincial talent contest, which is the same as
a state for those of you who don't know. So
(03:20):
I competed on that level and won that one, and
I was the youngest one in that competition. These were
all like people in their thirties forties playing clubs and stuff.
And then the CCMA, which is the equivalent of the cmas,
you know, was a national thing, and I went to
the national contest. I'm still underage. I compete well. First
of all, at sound check it was a house band.
(03:40):
All the other contestants and the band that was playing
were all telling me that I had it in the
bag and I was going to win it. They were
all so sweet. The other competitors were like, oh my god,
I'm just gonna go home now and stuff like that.
Speaker 2 (03:51):
So I think you're awesome from the beginning. Well, you
knew that you were. This is what you were supposed
to do.
Speaker 3 (03:57):
Well, I knew I wanted to do it. I was
very driven and I'm so passionate about it and so
but yeah, they were all patting me on the back
and saying we'll buy you a burger after or whatever.
And when it came time to name off who had won,
they named third place and then second place. My mom
are standing and I are standing in the wings, and
we're thinking that it's wow. I actually once she could win,
(04:19):
and then first place, and it wasn't I was nowhere
in any of the places, and you knew.
Speaker 2 (04:25):
You crushed it.
Speaker 3 (04:26):
Yeah, everybody was telling it and everybody knew you crushed it.
So I went from crushing it to being crushed really quick.
And my mom and I have the.
Speaker 2 (04:34):
Music industry, right.
Speaker 3 (04:35):
Yeah, But you know, there's it's interesting because if you
look at things like building blocks instead of roadblocks. What
I found out ten years later when I was winning
awards up there at the Canadian Country Music Awards, one
of the judges who had been at that talent contest
came to me at the party after, and you said,
there's something you probably don't realize. I was a judge
in that contest ten years ago when you were, you know,
(04:57):
seventeen years old, and you lost because it sponsored by Budweiser,
and they couldn't have an underage contestant winning, like you
couldn't even be in it. You technically won, but they
had to disqualify. I got disqualified.
Speaker 2 (05:09):
Shouldn't they have let you know how to take that
you couldn't have even been in it. That would have
been good information. Yeah, the politics of it all, you know,
that's so much of it as politics.
Speaker 3 (05:18):
Right, it really is. But I would have won a
Canadian record deal, I would have probably not have come
to Nashville when I did, which could have changed the
entire tragedy, changed of my entire career. So you look
at things like in the moment, like it's this is
the worst thing. It's gonna here, I'm just gonna die crying, falling,
and it was it was really for the best, and
(05:38):
that it was meant to be that.
Speaker 2 (05:40):
Way, Isn't that The crazy little mystery about life is like,
like you said, when you're in the moment, especially when
you're young, in the moment like that, and it's the
first time you've had like these crushing blows to your soul,
but then you find out the rabbit trail leads you
to the clue later that finally you get the golden nugget,
and you're like, oh, you.
Speaker 3 (06:01):
Don't know that when you're young, though, because you're so
in the moment, which I wish I could be more.
I mean all of us as adults, I think we
wish we could be more present in the moment. But
when you're young, your whole future is ahead of you
and that's all you can think about. But you're also
not playing the tape forward to like this, maybe this
is meant to be just not that philosophical at seventeen, because.
Speaker 2 (06:20):
You're not sure anything's gonna happen, right, I.
Speaker 3 (06:22):
Just want it now, I want everything right now. Yeah,
I know. Okay.
Speaker 2 (06:26):
So then because you lost, is that what catapulted you
to move to Nashville next year?
Speaker 1 (06:31):
Well?
Speaker 3 (06:31):
Yeah, my mom, who was very you know, very instrumental
in all of.
Speaker 2 (06:35):
This, she is tell me about your mom.
Speaker 3 (06:37):
Well, my mom passed away ten years ago or thirteen
years ago now, and she was thank you.
Speaker 2 (06:43):
But she was a great mom. Oh god, yeah, she
inducted you into the opry too. She was on the stage.
Speaker 3 (06:49):
Yeah, she was amazing. And cancer, you know, it just
it's so many, so many people have been lost to that,
and she.
Speaker 2 (06:56):
Your biggest year later.
Speaker 3 (06:57):
She was.
Speaker 2 (06:58):
She the reason you had all the courage she keep
doing this.
Speaker 3 (07:00):
Yeah she did. And she was a young mother, Like
she was only sixty when she passed away. But I mean,
when I look at how old she was when I
was seventeen, she was in her thirties, you know, and
she was almost she was in her thirties, I know, right, Yeah,
she was almost as naive as she was in her
early thirties.
Speaker 2 (07:15):
So she was right there in the middle of it
all with you, like your dream was her.
Speaker 3 (07:18):
Dream, it was. And she played guitar. She taught me
in my first few chords, and she she kind of
coached me.
Speaker 2 (07:24):
You know.
Speaker 3 (07:24):
I'd sit in the kitchen and sing and she'd be like, oh,
you need to raise her lord the key on this
and that, and she'd be like yeah, and she was
sort of I bounced everything off of her. Yeah. So yeah,
we when we went to that contest and I lost,
and all the way we drove home from there, and
it was like a three hour drive. It was in Alberta,
(07:45):
and I was crying my eyes out, and you know,
there's nothing worse than seeing your kid broken hearted like that.
Speaker 2 (07:51):
I can't imagine.
Speaker 3 (07:52):
I thought, if I can't win, how am I going
to make it in Nashville? How am I going to
ever make it? And she was so she was angry
because she didn't understand what it happened.
Speaker 2 (08:00):
She knew you should have worn too.
Speaker 3 (08:01):
She yeah, and she said, I'm taking you to Nashville.
Just get all of this. We's just going to Nashville. Yeah,
just let's bypass all of this and go to Nashville.
Stop it.
Speaker 2 (08:10):
Yeah, so teary.
Speaker 3 (08:12):
It's pretty cool. Yeah, and we I moved to Nashville
without without any way of working. I wasn't, yeah for
a week, oh only for a week. We drove down.
It's a long story, you know. It was about a
year and a half, two years after that that I
finally got here. But we drove down in a Honda
Civic with one of her best friends of her whole life,
(08:32):
who'd known me since I was a baby. The three
of us loaded the car and drove across the border
and told the border official we were going to the
Grand Ole Lopery because he saw the guitar in the
back seat. But that was when I could fit everything
I owned in a trunk and a back seat of
the Honda Civic. And they drove me down. And my
little brother was five years old at the time, so
my mom was like, I can We're going to get
(08:52):
you set up. We'll figure it out when we get there.
I mean, we didn't. I didn't. I couldn't get a job,
I didn't a green card, I didn't have a Social
Security number, I didn't have a car.
Speaker 2 (09:04):
Were you terrified?
Speaker 3 (09:05):
It was so stupid?
Speaker 1 (09:09):
Hell.
Speaker 2 (09:10):
It was so scared. I would have been petrified. I mean,
actually I moved to Nashville, was nineteen, but like at
the same time, it's like I had my parents still
the United States.
Speaker 3 (09:18):
Yeah, oh yeah, this was It wasn't like I could
go go to Arkansas or Alabama or Mississippi for like
on Sunday or drive home. This was two thousand miles.
Speaker 2 (09:29):
In a live What did you do in a foreign country, well,
a very foreign not only a foreign country, but the
southern United States.
Speaker 3 (09:36):
Like there were things that I'd never experienced in Canada.
On the prairies of Canada, just on.
Speaker 2 (09:41):
The prairies, just like there are a lot of prairies
in Canada.
Speaker 3 (09:44):
Yes, we also celebrate Christmas.
Speaker 2 (09:48):
We also celebrate Christmas, but what do you mean do
you have.
Speaker 3 (09:52):
Prairies in Canada? Normal? Like there's grass.
Speaker 4 (09:57):
Okay, I'm on terry, Okay, I know I'm teasing, but seriously,
I was terrified and it was just Okay, the climate
first of all, I mean the humidity just in Canada.
Speaker 3 (10:13):
There's just differences. There's cultural differences. And I was a kid,
I didn't know anything like I was I was so
I was just so green, really Green, So I experienced
things and wound up on playing at Tootsy's Orchid Lounge
on Lower Broadway.
Speaker 2 (10:33):
A great place to wind up back in the day
that was kind of a golden ticket a little bit, well.
Speaker 3 (10:38):
Not that day nineteen eighty seven on Lower Broadway. Has
anybody do you know what no Lower Broadway was like
in nineteen eighty seven?
Speaker 2 (10:47):
Was it a little like a little risk, a not risk,
a little scary, a scary sketchy, like some scary stuff
went down like it was skid row?
Speaker 3 (10:58):
It was. It was like, okay, lot of the lot
of these bars that are now have country stars names
on that they were boarded up like there was plywood on.
Speaker 2 (11:05):
So Nashville was not hopping so much, No, not at all.
Speaker 3 (11:09):
And uh so me and my mom and her friend
Pat went into Tootsie's Orchid Lounge just as tourists.
Speaker 2 (11:15):
Your mom's like, Okay, I'm gonna drop you off here
and you're gonna work here every day and buy you
got this carry light.
Speaker 3 (11:19):
How it happened. But we went in and like we
were trying to figure out how I was gonna pay
rent and make money, and they had found a place
for me to live in Tusculum, which is like Bell
Road and Nolansville Road. But you didn't have a car.
I didn't have a car, So how are you going
to I got a bus pass? Okay, gosh, I love.
Speaker 2 (11:36):
You had to hunger so hard for your dream.
Speaker 3 (11:40):
I had a bus pass. Yeah, and you had a
bus pass. But before they left to go back to Canada,
and my mom could only stay for so long. My
brother was five years old, and she had a family
back there, and so we found a place for me
to live. I rented a room from a woman who
had who worked the night shift at a factory, and
she had a two year old son, and she was
separated from her husband, who was temporarily moved out and
(12:01):
ended up moving back in at some point. And that's
a whole other story.
Speaker 2 (12:04):
Is it a bad situation?
Speaker 3 (12:06):
It was not good. So, yeah, they were throwing things
at each other in the middle of the night and stuff,
and I've feared for my life at.
Speaker 2 (12:13):
One Then you're like, am I supposed to take the two?
Speaker 3 (12:16):
I've never gone into that kind of detail. Yeah, really,
but that's where you started off. Yeah, it was. It
was a rough beginning in professionally and personally.
Speaker 2 (12:26):
So you're in the same house with this woman and
her son.
Speaker 3 (12:29):
Yeah. So but that's I got a break on rent,
which cost me. I think my rent was three hundred
dollars a month, and I baby sat when she worked, Okay,
So we traded off like that, and and then I
would I would go and take the city bus down
to Tootsy's Orchid Lounge to play at ten in the
morning till two in the afternoon because I wasn't allowed
to be there in the dark at night time. My
(12:50):
mom said, if I find out you did a shift
there at night, because so the story is I go
into Tutsy's Orchid Lounge with my mom and Pat and
there's a guy singing. There's nobody in there, and they're like,
can she get up and sing? Oh your mom's days?
Oh my god, your mom. Your mom was a stage Yeah,
Harney met my mom. Yeah, and so i'm you know, yeah,
(13:14):
I said, okay, I'll get up and sing. And then
the place fills up and it's just people start shuffling
in and they offered me a job playing for tips.
So I got made fifteen dollars.
Speaker 2 (13:23):
Because your mom said, can you get up and sing? Yeah,
you got the job. I got the job being ballsy
goes along way people.
Speaker 3 (13:28):
She she definitely was that. And so I got the job.
And then now we're going, okay, well there's you can
make some cash doing that.
Speaker 2 (13:36):
The first step covered, first step covered, first day, you're there,
you get the job.
Speaker 3 (13:41):
I got the job. Yeah, the place filled up and
everybody was you know, and there were the local musicians
who were you know, some of these characters back then
they were living in their cars in the alley, and yeah,
it was just it was a different do you scared
a little bit a little bit? But I was also
enamored and very excited because I was in Nashville, like
when I was growing up in Medicine Hat, Alberta, like
(14:02):
I was fascinated with Nashville and anything about Nashville and
Tutsi's Orchid Lounge and the Rhymen and all of these
things that it was like the Land of Oz to me.
Speaker 2 (14:10):
Will you get here? And you're like, it's Oz, but
it's also super scary.
Speaker 3 (14:13):
Right, Well, I didn't know to be scared though. I
saw the pictures all over the walls and tootsies, and
I saw Patsy Klein's picture, and I saw all the
scenes I saw in coal miner's daughter and everybody.
Speaker 2 (14:23):
You're like, I'm protected by the energy of country music.
Yeah they were.
Speaker 3 (14:27):
I thought so. But then this local dude comes up
to my mom and you know, this is the day
they offered me the job, and he's he says, she's
real good. But let me tell you something, ma'am. Don't
let your daughter come down here after dark. They'll find
her body in a dumpster in the alley. What So,
my mom's about to get in the car and drive
back to Canada with Pat right.
Speaker 2 (14:44):
After you just got this job where your dark body
could be in the dumpster at an alley.
Speaker 3 (14:47):
And she's gonna tell me I can't do this. No,
she's not going to say that. She's like, what do
I tell her? And so the deal was, here's the deal.
You can take this job, but you can't do this
at night.
Speaker 2 (14:56):
So did you follow the instructions?
Speaker 3 (14:58):
I did? And if they wanted me to cut for
somebody's night shift, they had to drive me there and back.
And like they want somebody from the bar that we
trusted and do like.
Speaker 2 (15:06):
Little bouncers or so he wasn't drunk.
Speaker 3 (15:08):
I had to get in his car and try come
and get me and take me down there. Like I
couldn't be standing at a bus stop on Lower Broadway
at midnight trying to get back to part of town
with my guitar. I knocked some old ladies over with
that guitar, just because I'm not graceful. Like I can't
tell you how many times I'd turn around on the
bus and bang bang it into somebody.
Speaker 2 (15:28):
And I just mean at eighteen years old, I mean
because yes, you're legally an adult, but like you're just
coming into your adulthood.
Speaker 3 (15:44):
You know, you're coming out of being a child.
Speaker 2 (15:46):
You've had this childlike dream that's blossomed now and now
you are an adult, but you're still so young, and
it's like now you're in this brand new place with
all these this potential opportunity and in front of you.
But it's like, gosh, I have a daughter who's four,
and I'm thinking about like that would be in fourteen
years and right now she's like, you know, she's just
(16:07):
learning how to like come into the world, and like
only fourteen years from now she could be you pursuing
this dream. And it's like I just see, like your
will and your spirit and your hunger and your passion
and your dedication and the belief you had. That just
takes so much heart to do something.
Speaker 3 (16:25):
That big when you're younger, though, it's almost like ignorance
is bliss.
Speaker 2 (16:31):
It works in your favor.
Speaker 3 (16:32):
It does, because I don't know that I would have
the gonads to do some of that now, like taking
that kind of risk, and it's like I had nothing
to lose and everything to gain almost you know, it's
like you knew this was what you had to do. Yeah,
I was. Oh, I was so passionate and so determined,
and I prayed every night to God for five minutes
(16:54):
every night because that's what my pastor told me to do.
Five minutes was a lucky number, it was, Yeah, it's
a magic number. You can just do this every night
for five minutes. But what I prayed for was like,
of course, world peace, and like every kid prays for
mom and dad and everybody. I prayed for the determination
and tenacity to not give up. It was always about
not giving up. And I feel like ever since, it's
(17:14):
just been like I can't betray that little girl, you
know what I mean. There have been times during my
career where I've felt, you know, and I think we
all go through these, through these these moments of feeling
irrelevant or of being forgotten or you know, those big
insecurities that every artist has, and and and those thoughts
of maybe I just you know, maybe I should just
fade off into the sunset. And then I go, I
(17:36):
can't do that to her. I can't do that to her,
So and don't make me cry by doing that. I
can't tell you what you're doing.
Speaker 2 (17:43):
So I came a mom. Like all this stuff just
like hits my heart so hard because to have a
dream and to follow through it and to like not
give up on your little girl, that is so brave.
Speaker 3 (17:52):
And that's and and that's the thing that has kept
me here is your little girl. And you yeah, and
and and uh, you know it's it's so true because
you can't you evolve your your interests, change your tastes,
change your life changes. But boy, it's it's hard to
just it's hard to just abandon that person you once
(18:15):
were that wanted this more than anything, and you actually
got it, you got it, and then you start you
start focusing on what you didn't get. That's when you've
got to start you've got to realign yourself and realize that.
And I've been so grateful and I'm so lucky, and
I've achieved so.
Speaker 5 (18:34):
Much, so much, and achieved so much, and and it's
easy to forget that when you start playing the comparison
game compared to this one, compared to that, And I
do it.
Speaker 3 (18:46):
I do it. I did it today. You didn't do
it as a manager. I do it constantly. You just
you go, well, it's not anything in particular. You just go, well,
this person got three played three times on this radio station.
I've only heard myself once in the last twenty four hours.
It's just whatever, it's so stupid. It's not though, because
(19:07):
your brand is you. But you do you. You you
get into that. It's it's into that way of rabbit
hole of negativity, and you've got to pull yourself back out,
and then you start going down these paths of well
maybe maybe I should just you know, but you can't
pay it up. Yeah, but I think everybody goes through
that absolutely very vulnerable with you.
Speaker 2 (19:27):
Thank you for sharing with me, Terry, my god. I
know every time everyone leaves my interview, and I think
they have a vulnerability hangover they're like, I just want
to share my whole life.
Speaker 3 (19:38):
Why didn't I just go into therapy. I'll pay you
for this next time.
Speaker 2 (19:41):
I've done so much therapy terry, you don't even I
think you're good.
Speaker 3 (19:44):
That's why you're good.
Speaker 2 (19:45):
I think it's because I have gone down to the well,
the bottom of the drain. I live at the bottom
of the drain in my emotions. So it's fine. I've
done a lot of healing. It's great towns of therapy.
But it's like, we're all humans, you know, we're all
like struggling with this, and especially as an art artist
when you're putting yourself out there for people just to
have decisions about you and thoughts about you and weigh
(20:05):
in about you, and then like someone new comes out
and it's like so much is happening behind the scenes
that has nothing to do with you as a human being.
But yet as an artist, you feel like it's all
about you personally.
Speaker 3 (20:16):
Right, Yeah, you can and you can get caught up
and bogged down by that kind of stuff. But you know,
I think I think there was a time when I
worried what people were thinking about me a lot. Now
I just want to know they're thinking about, isn't a
great Ass's the quote of the day right there. Perspective? Sure,
(20:39):
I mean time change is everything proscriptive? What they think?
I just want to know they're thinking.
Speaker 2 (20:46):
Oh god, you so you don't care what they say?
Speaker 3 (20:49):
No, I really don't know. Well that's also that's also
part of like being over thirty five. That's all you get. Man.
The last ten years has gone by fast. It was
my faster and faster each year, it really does. And
you know, I do think since since I, I, you know,
got off of the major labels in Nashville and like
twenty ten, ish, I've also been putting out records like
(21:13):
one after the other, like every three years, and as
you wish, Yes and one won the Juno for Country
Album of the Year in Canada in twenty twelve. And
then I put out a covers record that I'm so
proud of a class. It's called Classic. It's got all
these country covers on it of old classic songs.
Speaker 2 (21:28):
And there probably was like a soulful moment, Yes, you
picked all the ones you wanted?
Speaker 3 (21:32):
Yes, and who else came saying Dirk Bentley saying one,
Riba saying one with Tanya Tucker did Delta Don with me?
Stop it? How many people don't know about that record?
How you had to know about.
Speaker 2 (21:42):
Tanya Zucker do Delta Don on an album with this?
Speaker 3 (21:44):
Was? It was crazy. It was just oh my say,
And this is a thing, miss is cry.
Speaker 2 (21:49):
This is a thing about artists. You like yourself, You're
so phenomenal, You've had so many bucket list moments like this,
but like artists don't remember that, Like you've done this
album with He's Classics, You're seeing Delta Dawn with Tanya Tucker.
Speaker 3 (22:02):
It's cool, you know, but you know a lot of
people don't know about it because it's not it's it's
it flies under the radar a bit when you're not
on a major label in Nashville and you're not getting
all that press, and you're not you know, in the
in everybody's crosshairs like you used to be, so a
lot of that stuff gets lost and people don't know
about it. It's so funny because Ashley McBride just randomly
(22:24):
brought that album up to me. I'm like, you know
about that album? She goes, oh, that was phenomenal, and
I'm like, oh cool, okay. Well, I was like well,
somebody knows about the records is good.
Speaker 1 (22:34):
You know.
Speaker 3 (22:35):
It's like you kind of you have those doubts, those
self doubts creep in and like, and then you make
another record and you just do it anyway and you
start just doing it because you want to do it,
but you also want people to know about it. If
you're putting that much time and energy and financial you
know risk, you know, going into this stuff, you want
people to know about it. But yeah, I've always just
(22:57):
I've kept writing and putting music out and producing most
of it myself for since twenty ten, since you know,
since a lot of people maybe thought that I don't know,
went and just went on a fishing trip or something.
You love it.
Speaker 2 (23:10):
I know you're on a major fisher I am.
Speaker 3 (23:12):
Yeah, I love fishing. It's so much fun.
Speaker 2 (23:15):
I see, I need to find that love.
Speaker 3 (23:17):
I was finding a little boring.
Speaker 2 (23:18):
You know. It's still waiting game. You're patient, you have patients,
and it's like the finesse of catching the fish.
Speaker 3 (23:24):
Right. There's such techniques, yes, oh, there's there's techniques and
knowing where to go and what to use and how.
Speaker 2 (23:29):
Do you know the right spots to go? It's a
lot of practice, Like do you only fish in certain
rivers because you are not well?
Speaker 3 (23:35):
I fish on Lake Erie. I have a lake house
in Cannon, on the Canadian side of Lake Erie, and
so I've spent you know, COVID. I really got into
it because I had time, you know. So I spent
like three months solid up there, just learning about pike fishing.
And then I've recently become even more into large mouth
bass fishing, which first I can do down here too
if I find the right spots. But you know, it's
(23:57):
right out my back door there, so it's just easy
for me to disappear for hours on end and never
be heard from again.
Speaker 2 (24:03):
Do you solve a lot of your problems out there fishing?
Speaker 3 (24:05):
I don't think about anything. That's the only thing I
do where, honest to God. Managers called because I got
nominated for a CMA Radio Personality of the Year a
couple of years ago, and they were trying to call
me to tell me I got the nomination, and I
was nowhere to be found on fishing, and Marni's Marnie
(24:25):
says she better be fishing right now, and that's exactly
where I was. But no, I don't I don't think
about anything. It's the only thing I can do, honestly
where I'm not questioning your entire existence, my entire existence,
the future of the past, the president, what's going on
in my career, what's not going on in my career.
I really, I really am very very present, And it's
(24:46):
a meditative just casting over and over again, it's just
a meditative presence. It's it's it's in the moment, completely
in the moment.
Speaker 2 (24:54):
I think that is the whole point of meditation, because
like I used to get stressed out trying to like
just sit and meditate hate in things. But like you
have to find the practice where your brain can stop,
because you have to let your brain have a moment
to just like stop thinking. So then like whatever thoughts
you were on the hamster will looping, looping, looping, looping,
they all go away. So then it's like they don't
(25:16):
they're not with such strength anymore. You know, they lose
their power because you've let them all go. And so
then when you come out of your vortex of fishing
or whatever the meditative state is for me it's yoga,
it's like, oh, then you don't pick back up every
single one of those obsessive thoughts. Only a few come
back in exactly maybe only the ones that needed you
come back, right.
Speaker 3 (25:36):
They still come back. And then I'm like, when can
I go fishing in I gotta get back out there. Yeah,
I mean, And unfortunately that's a summer. It's very seasonal.
So the rest of the year, I'm crazy, pretty much certifiable,
aren't we all that I'm the most sane in the summer.
Speaker 2 (25:57):
Should you get into ice fishing?
Speaker 3 (25:58):
Oh god, I'm sure most of the people in my
life wish I would, But no, I'm a fair weather
fisher woman. Okay, So, but the fun thing about fishing
is like I've actually now got some affiliations with tackle companies.
They're they're putting me on their pro page and sending
me free stuff and like I'm tagging them and posts
(26:21):
and stuff. So I feel like I'm like into the
fishing world. Now look at you, Spro and Yamamoto and
Reaction Tackle and some companies like that are like a
fishing show coming your way. Well you know what, I
could actually maybe in the future do that.
Speaker 2 (26:37):
Not this year, bring all your famous friends and go
fishing with them.
Speaker 3 (26:41):
All my famous friends, because I hang out with so
many famous people.
Speaker 2 (26:45):
You well or just bring yourself, bring your dog. Seriously though,
speaking of famous friend Zoe, I mean, it's like you've
toured with Reba, You've done stuff with Dolly, You've been
on tour George Straight. Like Toby Keith, your post to
him made me, Oh.
Speaker 3 (26:58):
Toby, I can't you know. I think we knew he
was sick, but then he did Vegas in December. And
then I woke up that morning and I had a
text from somebody, and then I turned on the TV.
I was like, no, like we I didn't know he
was that close to gone. And I said that to
(27:18):
a mutual friend. And Toby and I toured together for
an entire year. What was that like? He felt like
a big brother to me, you know, and he was
so he was such a good conversationalist, Like you could
ask him anything and he would always give you an
honest answer. And I was, I I was ballsy about
(27:39):
some stuff I asked him back then. I can't tell you.
I didn't have to shoot him, I tell you, but
you know what he gave me honest answers to everybody. Yeah,
we talked a lot about that, and you know when
when he he hadn't hand picked his opening acts like
he would pick them, and he said uh publicly and
(28:00):
at some media outlet when he was talking about is
it was the Big Throwdown tour and he said Terry
Clark's the most underrated artist out there. And I was like,
oh my god, you said that about I mean, that's
so sweet. He was just very He was just a
really good guy and I think one of the best
songwriters we've ever had. Truly. His shows were fun. We
(28:22):
had a lot of fun out there. We played practical
jokes on each other. He was always playing basketball with
the band and crew. My band and crew and I
have the same drummer I had on that tour to
this day. And so you know, we're reminiscing a lot
about Toby and seeing the posts coming in and the things.
That's where I do like social media is the tributes
(28:42):
that you can pay to somebody when you know they
pass on, and it you all of the love that
you can feel from everywhere in the world for them,
and it's just sad, way too young. It goes so fast. Yeah,
like life just flies by, it does flies by. But
what I loved he was his spirit was him right
(29:04):
to the end, like him getting up in Vegas and
seeing him hold his guitar up and saying, we're gonna
crush it. You know, this is two months ago. I'm like, Yeah,
that's his spirit and it's soaring somewhere now. And Yeah,
he was the epitome of just honest and unabashedly who
he is, but unapologetically who he is, and patriotic. He
(29:29):
was so everything everybody's been saying is never scared.
Speaker 2 (29:33):
To take a stand for what he believed in either,
which is hard to do.
Speaker 3 (29:35):
Yeah, and I loved Kicks and Ronnie's post about him
because they each had something to say. And I've never
I didn't hear anybody as eloquent as they were, and
how they.
Speaker 2 (29:44):
Described who he was.
Speaker 3 (29:45):
They just talked about how he was never afraid to
be honest, tell the truth. He never backed down, he
never wavered about anything. He was just very solid and
everything he stood for.
Speaker 2 (29:56):
How is someone like that? I've aim to be like
that a minute, But my emotions get the best of me,
and my like fear of like people hating me gets
the best too.
Speaker 3 (30:06):
Like God, somebody's gonna hate me. I know I can't
say this.
Speaker 2 (30:11):
I know where it's like you just got to be yourself,
which you are terry.
Speaker 3 (30:15):
I think you are so yourself. I'm also very politely
Canadian in a lot of ways too, like we talked
about before, you know, yeah yeah, And that was like
part of like the culture shock for me was just
coming to America where people were just more It's a
more aggressive culture, like as far as how people, people
are just more a little more you know, opinionated and
(30:38):
stuff like that, or angry more, the angry Americans and
like the southern culture. Like I had never had grits before,
Like just walking into like a cracker barrel, I was like,
I've never had any of this food before.
Speaker 2 (30:51):
What do you think?
Speaker 3 (30:53):
I still am not really, I'm not. I don't eat grits.
What do you like to eat? Biscuits are good?
Speaker 2 (30:59):
Do you like butter and grave?
Speaker 3 (31:00):
I got into the white gravy with the sausage in
it because it's not a Canadian thing I grew up
on eating perogis.
Speaker 2 (31:07):
Do we all wonder why we have heartburn?
Speaker 3 (31:09):
Right? I know?
Speaker 2 (31:10):
Is that a sandwich?
Speaker 3 (31:11):
No? You don't know what a well it's Ukrainian, but
we eat them a lot in Canada do you eat
gravy on your fries?
Speaker 2 (31:19):
Not really not brown gravy.
Speaker 3 (31:20):
That's a Canadian.
Speaker 2 (31:20):
I'm not a brown You're not.
Speaker 3 (31:22):
No, we just tried dipping it in that white gravy.
Speaker 2 (31:25):
I just don't.
Speaker 3 (31:26):
I'm not really even like gravy.
Speaker 2 (31:28):
Like when I think about like what's in the gravy,
it's like all the bits and stuff. When people say,
like bits are in gravy, Like what bit?
Speaker 3 (31:34):
Do you eat meat?
Speaker 2 (31:36):
I do eat meat, but I don't like to think
I don't like to eat meat, but I don't eat me.
Speaker 3 (31:40):
I got you. I'm just like she doesn't even want
the bits from the meat and the gravy.
Speaker 2 (31:44):
Do you like the bits?
Speaker 3 (31:45):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (31:45):
You like to eat the bits?
Speaker 3 (31:46):
Oh god, I'll eat the fat. I'll eat my fat.
You're fat. You gotta have that bone. I'll just gnaw
on that too. You love all the extra person that.
I'm like, are you gonna eat that? Because put it
on my plate? If you're not, my cholesterol is not good.
Do you eat uh giblets? No? I will not eat that.
Or liver really, oh, liver like organs. I'm kind of
(32:07):
off the organs.
Speaker 2 (32:07):
Okay, yeah, yeah, like a liver like people like love
a liver. I'm like, that's what's processing all the shit
out of your body.
Speaker 3 (32:13):
I will donate an organ, but I do not want
one of you know, to ingest one.
Speaker 2 (32:18):
Say not interested. Everybody in this room is going now
everyone's happened, going to the bathroom to throw out.
Speaker 3 (32:25):
I think we lost Marnie.
Speaker 2 (32:35):
Okay, So when was the moment you have all your
whole life has been geared up for your life that
you're living like you're one of those people that it's like,
on the second you had thoughts about who you are
as a human being to you knew you want to
be a country singer, and you started putting steps in
(32:56):
play to make that happen. You had a mother to
support you. But like, as as soon as you had
real thoughts, this was your destiny. So it's like, what
is it like your whole life has been this, and
it has been this has been your whole dream and
it's come true. What is it like the when did
you said you've been in your dream your whole life.
(33:17):
When did you know that your dream had come true?
Speaker 3 (33:24):
I think after Better Things to Do became a hit.
Speaker 2 (33:28):
The first single was a hit straight out of the Gate. Yeah,
how does that feel?
Speaker 3 (33:32):
Oh, I was. It was surreal. It was just it
was just like all of this planning and all of
this all of the sacrifice and the starving literally literally going.
You know, Lon, and I was, I got married when
I was twenty. You met someone in National Guess Mary?
Speaker 2 (33:50):
Yeah, and did you married.
Speaker 3 (33:51):
A fiddle player? And to protect the names of the
innocent of I call him starter Kit during my show
because I don't want to start kit marriage. Yeah. Yeah,
you know, he was more than a starter kid. We
were married for quite a while, seven years, I think
six or seven years. Was it a nice marriage, Yes,
it was fine. We were just young, too young, very young,
and we you know, and when things started happening in
(34:14):
my career, we really grew apart. And we were having
some difficulties with communication and things leading up to that.
Speaker 2 (34:19):
So who doesn't when they're in their twenties.
Speaker 3 (34:21):
Yes, that's if I were you. The song I wrote
was about my marriage at that time, and I was
talking to my friends about it and they were like,
I would go to my friends for marriage counseling. It
was free marriage counseling, So I would always call them
when I was complaining and some had good advice, some
had bad advice. And I wrote that song about talking
to my friends, what is the best advice.
Speaker 2 (34:41):
I actually have a friend who's struggling with her marriage
right now, and I don't feel like I've been giving
good advice to her because I've just got a kid,
and I'm like, you gotta gotta fight for the marriage.
You got to fight for the kid. But like, maybe
that's not what you're supposed to do as a friend.
Speaker 3 (34:53):
I think, I think, I think asking your whoever you're
talking to you to put put yourself in your significant
other shoes. Put wait, okaya, put yourself in that other
person's shoes for a minute, like me, trust my friend, No, you,
if you're having trouble with your spouse, put yourself in
his shoes just for a minute, and honestly try and
(35:15):
just look at it from that person's point of view.
And then you can kind of not just be so
insular in how you're thinking about because the relationship is
fifty to fifty, Like you're responsible for one hundred percent
of your fifty percent, and yeah, you're responsible for a
hundred math right there, fifty percent. I failed at math.
I don't know why I'm bringing numbers into this.
Speaker 2 (35:36):
You are one hundred percent. You are one hundred percent
responsible for your fifty percent of the marriage.
Speaker 3 (35:41):
The marriage, So if you're going to end.
Speaker 2 (35:43):
The marriage, you got to end it as best you can.
Speaker 3 (35:45):
But you also need to put yourself in your spouse's
shoes and make sure you're looking at it from every
angle instead of just your own.
Speaker 2 (35:51):
But what if you just don't love them anymore but
you are spect as a human?
Speaker 3 (35:55):
Yeah, that's hard. That's that's the tough thing. When that goes,
It's it's hard to salvage that.
Speaker 2 (35:59):
Can you love that?
Speaker 3 (36:01):
Some people do with a lot of therapy in those
whatever I mago things they call them, and.
Speaker 2 (36:07):
Workshops of some sort, I guess, But how do you
know what it's time to let it go?
Speaker 3 (36:11):
Though?
Speaker 2 (36:12):
Are you glad you did?
Speaker 3 (36:13):
I think if you've exhausted everything, I think I wouldn't
be who I am today if if I stayed in that.
And I don't think it wasn't abusive. He was a
lovely person. I can't. I have nothing bad to say
about him at all.
Speaker 2 (36:26):
It probably was nice to have that comfort when you
were that young.
Speaker 3 (36:29):
Him and his family. I might have wound up moving
back to Canada and given up if it weren't for them,
because I felt so lonely, so alone, so isolated from
any anything that I knew everyone, my whole family, I
was alone.
Speaker 2 (36:42):
Here were country person.
Speaker 3 (36:45):
Yeah, I very good person, and it just we just
we just parted ways and grew apart. And when my
career took off, it was kind of the nail in
the coffin that was already it was. It was a
bit of a sinking ship and it sort of was
like somebody just you know, threw a three ton weight
on on that ship, and that was my career. It
just sank it. And I don't blame my career. I
just think that we it just sped that process up.
Speaker 2 (37:08):
What so I for me as a friend who I
have someone going through this situation you were in, what
kind of support do you want from your friends when
you are going through a divorce? Like what you don't
want your friend telling you what to do? Right, because
I've been their friend Roe, I'm like, you need to
get therapy, you need to try to like salvage it
for the kid.
Speaker 3 (37:27):
You need to work. But I don't think that's working well.
I don't think telling them what to do is the answer.
I think letting them process with you and you have
to be relly, they will figure it out. They sometimes
people just have to say something out loud, just a
trusted source that they they can count on not to
judge them or try to fix it. They just want
you to listen and they will start saying things and
they'll be ome like, oh, what did I just say? Well,
(37:48):
I just answered my own question. And it's free therapy.
A lot of times you got to pay a therapist
to tell you these same things when you just have
a You know, it's hard for friends to be by
unbiased though, because they love you and they're on your
side always. They've always got your back, so that's the
only thing you know they're emotionally invested in, where a
therapist isn't. Oh we're going deep here.
Speaker 2 (38:08):
I thought you've been surrounded by great people though, like
you've picked great people.
Speaker 3 (38:12):
My friends, my core group of friends that I have
to this day, the ones that would help me bury
the body, the ones that I would call in the
middle of the night, are mostly people that I have
known for thirty plus years. Wow, that says a lot
about you. That I've known since I was in junior
high with like since I was twelve, And wow, yeah, really,
(38:35):
so you're true blue? Oh for sure. They're not in
any way, shape or form associated with the music business.
Speaker 2 (38:42):
I mean she's your best I mean she's kind of associated.
Speaker 3 (38:45):
I love Riba and I consider her a true friend.
Speaker 2 (38:48):
I know I do, and I do grow out.
Speaker 3 (38:50):
But let me tell you something, Riba is no different
than those girls that I've known my whole life. She's
a true person. She is just not affected by any
any of that fame and that you can tell a lot.
She's so grounded.
Speaker 2 (39:03):
She's like Toby Keith too though, and like she's just real.
She just is who she is. To the chase, cuts
to the chase.
Speaker 3 (39:09):
There's no bs, there's no like, you know, floating around
a subject. She'll just cut to the chase. And those
are my friends. They're honest, and I just want honest friends.
I want people who don't look at me and want
anything or think that I can help them do anything
for their own career. It's opportunistic or people that I
feel like, are you know, hangers on for any reason
(39:31):
other than that they just like being around me because they
like me as a person. I make them laugh for
some reason, or we have a good time, or we'll
have a bottle of wine and get down to the
nitty gritty of life. And you know, those are true friends.
You know you help each other. I've asked Riva for
a lot of advice too, and you know, and Susie
Bogas is another one that I consider like a sister.
Pam Tillis. There are a few women in the industry
(39:53):
that are friends, but I'm not friends with them because
of what they do. I just really like them.
Speaker 2 (40:00):
Nice though, that you'll have this career in common though.
Speaker 3 (40:03):
Yes we can. We can navigate together. We can kind
of try and dissect it a little bit together and
try to and say things around each other that we
can trust it's a vault and that it doesn't go
any further. So don't ask me what we talk about, Okay.
Speaker 2 (40:17):
I mean, I just love it. I won't, but I
just love it. I think it's so great.
Speaker 3 (40:21):
You're so awesome, Terry.
Speaker 2 (40:23):
I'll wrap up because I know you have so much
puss to do and you're looking fine. And I know
when you say you look fine all day, you got
to be showing it off and you got more stuff
to do later we got oh yeah, oh, oh my gosh.
Speaker 1 (40:35):
Let's talk about the point of this whole podcast.
Speaker 3 (40:38):
Really faster therapy, all right.
Speaker 2 (40:40):
I mean, I'm just talking about, like, if you have
Terry Clark Take two happening, where you have an eight
song duett project featuring special guests. Let's not forget Laura Lena,
Paul Brant, Kelly Clarkson, Cody Johnson, Ashley McBride, Carly Pierce,
Ben Rector and Lanny Wilson's. This is also your twentieth
year celebrating the Opry. Because you're inducted in two thousand
and four and that it's twenty twenty. You have big
(41:03):
shows coming up this year, so I.
Speaker 3 (41:04):
Lot of touring, Yeah, a lot of t razy year.
Speaker 2 (41:07):
Talk about Terry Clark Take too though, really fast for
your wrap of this interview, because that's why we're here.
Speaker 3 (41:12):
Take two. Oh well, you know what, I talked to
my manager, Clarence Spaulding about this project about five years ago.
He had been talking on some stuff with Brooks and Done.
You know, they've done reboot and stuff like that, and
a couple of artists have sort of done some things
with newer artists and then COVID happened and I had
a Christmas record that came out in twenty twenty, and
(41:35):
everything sort of got pushed by a couple of years,
all these ideas we were talking about. So about a
year and a half ago we picked back up and
started and went back in the studio and you know,
just started re recording, reimagining my hit songs, you know,
with some newer artists and people that I wanted to
work with and asked if they wanted to do it,
(41:57):
And so Ashley McBride was, She's so awesome. First one,
she's a very good friend, so she of course is
on better things to do, which is was my very
first single. So yes, oh that's great. And Ashley's one
of these people who's always talked about you know, she's
been a champion for me publicly and talking about how
(42:19):
she was a teenager growing up and she said, you know,
I always felt different and you know, I wasn't like
all the other girls. And I looked to you, you know,
this girl in this rolled up T shirt, sleeves and
a cowboy hat, and you know that I want that
she can do that and I can do that too,
you know, And so it was so heartwarming to hear
that I had some sort of an inspiration in her
(42:41):
path and we became friends. So she did a great
job on it. We we went in and we re
recorded these and some of them. You know, the spirit
of the song is hard to make it a whole
lot different from what it is musically, but we we
reworked and reimagined them. Their arrangements a little bit different.
I did Poor pitif Me with Landy Wilson. It's super fun.
(43:02):
How was that? It's super fun?
Speaker 2 (43:04):
I mean, and Lenda, he.
Speaker 3 (43:05):
Just came in and nailed it. She's so good.
Speaker 2 (43:07):
She's so good.
Speaker 3 (43:08):
She knew I was going to be doing this song.
Speaker 2 (43:12):
I'm sure she said that.
Speaker 3 (43:13):
She said that. I said five.
Speaker 2 (43:15):
She's like, I'm a manifest that since.
Speaker 3 (43:16):
I was five. She's so sweet, Oh and this sweet
like you.
Speaker 2 (43:19):
This has been her vision from the start.
Speaker 3 (43:21):
You know, yeah, you got it. You gotta it's you
gotta want it worse than anything else in the world.
And truly, look at her now. I'm glad we recorded
her a year over a year ago, because I don't
know what it would take to get her to show
up now. She's so busy, so I think the timing
was right with that one. And she and I text
back and forth from time to time. Every time she
wins something, I congratulate her. So I'm texting her quite
(43:42):
a bit. She's winning quite a bit, quite a bit.
Speaker 2 (43:45):
And Laura Lena, Oh my god, who could not love
Laura Lena. I know she's the cutest, funniest sweet.
Speaker 3 (43:53):
Put her in my pocket. I love her so much.
She's so sweet.
Speaker 2 (43:56):
I love her.
Speaker 3 (43:56):
The first time I worked with her was when Ashley
and she and I did the op when COVID was
going on. There was no audience. We were one of
the first ones to do that and we showed up
and we had never sung together. And it was right
after Joe Diffy had passed and we did John dear Green.
We're out in the parking lot in pickup trucks, like practicing.
We couldn't practice in a dressing room together, so we
(44:17):
were out in the parking lot at the opry rehearsing
harmonies and stuff, and we were about to do this
thing and it was like, oh my god, but she
was just she's just lovely. She's just she'll just blurt.
She's got no filter. I love it's my favorite thing.
Speaker 2 (44:29):
I love her so much. And then Ben Rector, he
might be one of the funnier people.
Speaker 3 (44:34):
Have you seen his Instagram?
Speaker 2 (44:36):
I watch it just for his commercials.
Speaker 3 (44:38):
He knowing Ben Rector because not everybody in the country
format knows him. But he's great, freakishly talented, Like I'm talking,
freaking genius.
Speaker 2 (44:46):
Did you see his latest project he put out with
like the Red Monster and stuff?
Speaker 3 (44:49):
Oh oh yeah, yeah, The Joy Yeah, The.
Speaker 2 (44:51):
Joy of music so good, so creative and fan giving song.
Speaker 3 (44:54):
Have you heard his Thanksgiving song? Maybe? Oh gosh, it's huge.
He's a genius, a genius and and he's him, him
and Kelly Clarkson, like the two of them as singers
and having two of both of them on this project
and like, don't make me stand next to them and
ever sing anything? Because how is it with Kelly? Well,
she hasn't done her part yet with comment finishing it,
(45:15):
but I cannot wait to hear what she does. She
wanted to do it if I were you and we
re recorded it. That one's a little bit of a
different approach. I could do more that more with ballads
than you kind up tempted. Do you change some of them. Yeah,
like the the Kelly clarkson If I were you track
is it kind of is like a country John Mayer
kind of feel. Now it's got a little a little
(45:36):
bit more of that. It doesn't feel as ballady, but
it's Yeah. But it didn't go completely off the rails either,
like some some people are re recording stuff and it's
just a complete departure on your take two.
Speaker 2 (45:48):
Yeah, it's departed.
Speaker 3 (45:49):
It's not. It's not. It's not like you won't recognize
the song.
Speaker 2 (45:52):
Which that's kind of fun though to reimagine, like.
Speaker 3 (45:54):
Better things to do. I want to do it all?
Some of those are what they are? Do we say,
who's doing I want to do it all? Lauren is
doing Laura Yeah, Cody Johnson's on I just wanted to
be mad, And what a duet that makes me? It's
it could have been a duet from the start, like
it's a conversation about fighting your significant other. Yeah, And
he chose that one. We were going back and forth
(46:14):
between a couple of songs and he chose that one
and he said, who hasn't been there? And I'm like, yeah,
this is this is going to make a really cool duet.
Speaker 2 (46:20):
That's so awesome. Which one do you feel like is
the most reimagined?
Speaker 3 (46:24):
Hmm, I'd say If I Were You and I Just
Want to be Mad maybe the two most reimagined, just
because of the duet, the musical nature of If I
Were You and the duet nature of the guy girl
thing with with I Just Want to Be Mad because
(46:47):
it is such a relationship song. Now that I found
you with Ben is great. It's now that I found
you with Ben to me, sounds like it could be
a hit right now. It sounds it sounds like a
whole new like a like of Valentine's Day favorite, because
it's just it's such a love song and it's a
nice do it. It makes a really nice to it,
(47:07):
like that one and the one with Cody or a
guy girl, they sound like very natural that way. How
much fun did you have? I'm having so much fun.
I'm not done. I'm still in the midst of doing it.
And you know, it's it's it's a blast. It's a
blast being creative with something that's already lived out there
so long and trying to it's a puzzle, trying to
figure out how how do we how do we freshen
(47:27):
this up without you know, pissing everybody off by changing
it too much, because I don't want to do that either.
Speaker 2 (47:32):
We don't want to We don't want to piss everybody off.
Speaker 3 (47:34):
Right, well, just some people because somebody's going to say something.
You've ruined that song for me?
Speaker 2 (47:39):
Okay, but remember as long as they're talking, as long
as they as long as they're.
Speaker 3 (47:43):
Talking, what was it? I said, I don't care what
I talk about.
Speaker 2 (47:45):
It what they're talking about.
Speaker 3 (47:48):
I said. I used to worry about what people were
thinking about me. Now I worry about whether whether they're
thinking about me or so, hey, stir.
Speaker 2 (47:55):
Up, Terry. That's amazing, Terry Clark take two. Okay, So
that'll come out later.
Speaker 3 (48:00):
It's going to be the end of May. Oh my gosh,
this is so exciting.
Speaker 2 (48:04):
What touring? Can we look forward to?
Speaker 3 (48:06):
Lots of touring this year. They're did a.
Speaker 2 (48:08):
Big Canada tour last year and it's amazing. Home can
we tour?
Speaker 3 (48:11):
Then it took the summer off. I didn't do any
any of the outdoor break I did. I took the
summer off fishing and I did. And this year not
as much fishing, more touring and we have some really
great shows on the books, a lot of fun stuff
lined up. I can't wait to get out there. It's
going to be it's probably going to be my biggest
touring year since nineteen ninety eight this year. Yeah, I was.
(48:35):
Are you tired through the schedule this year? It's not
that it's going to be so much, it's just going
to be good quality stuff. Oh so you're fired to
be really nice? Yeah, I'm really really fired up about it.
And we're only halfway through booking it. So it's and
I'm already excited. It's going to be.
Speaker 2 (48:48):
Thirty plus years in and you're hotter than ever, Terry
in every sense of the word. Yeah, and every sense
of the word. You're on fire.
Speaker 3 (48:57):
Look at you.
Speaker 2 (48:59):
What's the keys the key to like keeping it going?
And then we'll wrap up because I know you got
to go. What's the key to keeping it going?
Speaker 3 (49:04):
Keep had it fresh? Yeah, it's like a relationship. You
have to you have to keep it fresh. You have
to do things that that you feel passionate about. You
have to remind yourself how grateful you are, how lucky
you are that you and when somebody comes up to
you and says your music saved my life, or it
made such a difference. Just take that in and realize
that you're bringing people together, You're making a difference just
(49:27):
showing up and doing a show that makes them happy,
that mends their broken heart for an hour and a half.
That the last time I saw you was with my
husband and he passed away, or we met at your
show thirty years ago, when he's not here anymore, but
and I'm like, oh, yeah he is, he's going to
be sitting in that chair next to you. You know,
you've got to realize that you're It's bigger than music,
(49:48):
and if you can find that purpose in it and
know that you're making a difference, I think that that's
the stuff that keeps me fueled and keeps me going too.
You know, as long as I feel like it matters
and somebody's really getting something meaningful from it, I'm going
to keep doing it. It's not so much about oh me, me, me,
(50:10):
I want number one records, I want more money, I
want more of this, I want that, I want all
the accolades. It's I want to making a difference. Yeah yeah,
And as long as they're showing up, I'm going to
show up. And if that ever changes, then that's my
cue to go get in the boat and take my
rods and reels and go do I do catch the fit,
scare all the fish in Lake Eury, just scare them all.
Speaker 2 (50:32):
I love it so much. I always wrap up with
leave your light, which you've left so much inspiration, But
it's basically, what do you want people to know? Just
a little touch of inspiration, a nugget of inspo for
everyone listening.
Speaker 3 (50:48):
Just never be afraid to be who you are. There's
only one you. God made you just the way you are.
Don't don't follow anybody else's path, anybody else's image, anybody
else's light. Follow your own and I think that the
rest will follow. Authenticity.
Speaker 2 (51:08):
He love it, Terry Clark, thank you so much for
coming on my podcast.
Speaker 3 (51:11):
This is a dream countrue for me. So thanks for
making my dreams come true. Oh you're so sweet. Thank
you for having me. Thank you so much. One Y
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