January 15, 2024 • 34 mins
To anyone that has met them, Dan + Shay are two of the nicest guys. They are at a spot in thier careers where they are fianlly starting to "small the roses," and they're not afraid to tell you, they've missed a lot of moments ofer the years. They just celebrated a massive #1 song but for some reason, this one hits different.
Click to listen NOW & please make sur eyou subscribe.
Click to listen NOW & please make sur eyou subscribe.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
That's rock. They're good today.Got to make sure the angle is good.
You know, you got to geta good like shimmer Ron. So
you know we were just well,let me tell you it's funny. Is
this Mike Okay? Is it goodon this sun? Dude? I gotta
tell you, we're so excited tohave these guys in because number one,
we know how busy they are.Uh, they're hard dudes to nail down,
(00:22):
but we've made it happen again,Dan and Shay and studio with us.
How are you all? What's happening? Man? Good to see you,
dud. It better to see youbecause it's not usually we hear from
people like leading up to hope weget a number one. We're talking to
you guys fresh off of what feelslike and I'm gonna get personal feels like
the most important number one for youguys like you needed. Am I right?
That's a man. That's amazing tohear you say that, because it
(00:44):
really I'm glad that it's it's easyto see on our faces how excited we
are about this one. This isnumber ten, and it genuinely feels like
our first number one. I mean, I think that there's a new perspective
that we've had. You know,obviously we've talked about a lot on this
album, but there's just something differentabout this. Uh, we're extra excited
about it, and you know,kicking off this album that means so much
to us. To have all thesupport, you know, our biggest ad
(01:07):
day of our career and to haveit go all the way number one is
just it's wild, man. Itjust it genuinely feels like the first number
one. We're celebrating every bit ofthe number one too. Ah. We
celebrate the whole week, all theway till Saturday night, two am Central
time, when the chart closes atmidnight specific time. Every bit of it
we've been celebrating every single day.Man, We're so proud of that.
When it comes to number ones,you know, a lot of a lot
(01:29):
of conversations we have is it doesn'tnecessarily validate you as an artist or measure
the success of the song right becauseit's how people listen and how it impacts
their life and what it meant foryou to put it out. But something
about the number ones are important asyou look back, like knowing that you
shared, you know, the emotionaljourney to get this album together and to
(01:51):
be where y'all are at right.You needed it for that reason too,
write did you need it to kindof verify yourselves a little bit? Like
yeah, No, we're still yeahman, I mean, you know,
not making having a song go numberone doesn't mean that it's a big hit.
One of the biggest songs of ourcareer was nineteen You and Me,
the first single we put out.They peaked at eleven. So from a
fans perspective, a lot of times, it's just how much that song impacted
(02:14):
them emotionally, where they were whenthey first heard that song, what it
meant to their life. But asan industry here in Nashville, for us,
for our team, for our recordlabel, for radio, there's this
camaraderie when we get a song tothe top of the chart, to the
top of the mountain, it's anamazing celebration. Our team works their tails
off every single day to get thesesongs on the radio. Guys like you
will play our song sneak in acouple extra spins here and there. I'm
(02:36):
texting you, I'm like, heyman, it's gonna be close. Na,
It's not quite like that. Maybeit is, and he's like,
here's a gift card the puckets.Yeah, yeah, I can't do that
anymore. Nah, But it's areally cool accomplishment for the songwriters, for
everybody in the studio who worked tobring this thing to life. Man,
It's it's a special thing to getto have that party. You know.
We went through a lot of yearswhere we just kind of would brush over
(02:57):
these things. We would get anumber one song and like, all right,
well, what's the next one?And we still are hungry, we're
still competitive, we still want tokeep getting number ones. But you got
to stop. You've got to slowdown, and you got to appreciate him.
And I feel like that's kind ofa theme of this new album,
the Bigger Houses Album, which coincidentallyis the next single we're taking to radio.
But it's just about appreciating those moments, man, because we let a
lot of good stuff pass us byin the past, you know, looking
(03:20):
forward to what was next and notappreciating what we had in the moment,
when you get a little bit ofclarity, and I think COVID, honestly,
twenty twenty gave us that realization wherethe rug was pulled out from under
us. And we could step backand be like, dang, like,
now that we have a moment tobreathe, now that we get to be
home for a little while. Man, we did some really really cool stuff.
We've won Grammys, we sold outan arena tour, all these things.
(03:40):
We've got an incredible fan base.Radio supports us in a big way.
And when you're going a million milesan hour, sometimes you're moving too
fast to appreciate that. But nowI feel like this new perspective, we
have every dang minute of this numberone week. We've appreciated having a song
at the top of the chart.I want to go back to it.
You brought up a funny note aboutyour first single, but before I didn't
(04:01):
offer you do you want water?Like we started drinking water, Dude,
I'm off the sauce. I quitdrinking, and I was like, this
is going great. I'm gonna gowith water too. Yeah, I'm not,
and I'm not gonna thank you tequilajoke. After that, Are you
guys good? Do you want towater? I'm great, I'm great,
Thank you, thank you. It'sfunny because we caught up with Chris Stapleton
(04:25):
recently and we asked the importance ofa number one song, and he goes,
what do you think the biggest songof my career was? I mean,
I think anybody would say Tennessee Whiskey. He goes, it wasn't a
radio single, Yeah, but it'slingered at about forty on the for the
last ten years, Like we didit, but can you get it out
of the way. But it's weird. It's just weird to see, like
what feels successful. Like if somebodyloves a song ten years from now,
(04:48):
you're never gonna say to a fan, where did that finish on the chart?
Yeah? Right, I think that'simportant. You know, that's why
we love getting out on the road. Yeah, and being able to feel
those moments. You can feel thesongs that the fans are resonating with,
and especially on songs like our nextsingle, Bigger Houses, there's a you
know, you can look at thenumbers of any song, you know,
(05:09):
and obviously having a number one atradio is a huge mom marker and that's
a big, you know, bigthing, but it is crazy. You
can't look at numbers and judge,you know, how much people connected with
that. You know, you canlook at numbers on a song like ten
thousand hours just hit a billion onSpotify, which is an unbelievable concept.
But it's like there are other songsthat fans connect to on a deeper level.
(05:30):
It's obviously like there's that hit factorwhere they're singing along they know every
word, but then there's those songswhere like Dan you know, said like
nineteen yum Me where they really connectwith it. And we've seen that on
bigger houses where it's just it's notjust people being like, oh yeah,
hey, I like that song.They're telling us this entire, like very
passionate story about how they connect withthis song and how it affects their life.
And that's why I love get outon the road because you can really
(05:50):
see that and you can hear thosestories, and you just can't do that
when you're not face to face,you know, with our fans, we
don't get that. And obviously socialmedia gives us that unique thing that you
know, people haven't had in thepast of being able to really connect with
our fans. And since day one, we've tried to have that camaraderie and
you know, face to face ishthing with our fans through social media,
(06:10):
and that's why we still, youknow, control our social media because we
want to see those stories in ourinboxes and to be able to see when
people are connecting with a certain songor whatnot. And I don't know,
it's just really amazing to be ableto get out there. And I think
that's what I'm most excited about.And obviously I'm excited to go here Save
Me the Trouble and hear them singingthat song back, but I'm really excited
about those moments to really see whatpeople are genuinely connecting with. So knowing
(06:32):
that you guys were in a placewhere there was some uncertainty and now you've
talked about how the smell the rosesaspect of life has set in for both
of you. Guys, what didyou get out of these most recent run
of shows obviously not recent of thisyear, but ending twenty three. What
did you get that maybe you didn'tget before? Or what's something that you
(06:54):
like soaked in that maybe before youlike whatever sound check? Yeah, no,
go ahead, No, I gotto have my pre show pop or
whatever, you know what I mean? Like, what's something that you look
back now on these most recent datesand you're like, man, I never
I never took time for this.Man. Honestly, this sounds like a
lame answer, but I think wejust had fun. We were a little
worried. We were worried a littlebit less about perfectionism and making sure the
(07:16):
show is sure, the show isperfect. It was like, let's have
fun on stage, because if we'rehaving fun up there together with our band,
the people in the crowd are goingto have fun. And I feel
like the last time we did it, we were out on the arenas,
there were so many times we puton a great show. The crowd had
to blast. Our team was like, oh that was amazing. That was
the best show the tour. AndI'm like storming out, like throwing stuff
in the dressing room because I waslike, well, you know, like
(07:36):
there was one pixel out in thevideo wall and it sucked. You know,
stuff like that, but just likeappreciating it, having moments where it
goes unscripted, where we're supposed togo into the next song and we're just
like, hold on, I needto take a moment. Soak this in,
man, Cuz like the COVID thing, I hate to keep bringing that
up, but that was the firsttime that it introduced us to this thing
where it could go away at anygiven moment. So if you don't appreciate
(07:59):
it when you're on that stage,who knows. You could be out on
the road on a Friday night andsomebody calls on Saturday and says, hey,
the shows are canceled the rest ofthe year. You know, there's
a pandemic. That was how ithappened. So if you don't appreciate it,
man, it can go away reallyreally fast. And I think we
just we were soaking it in.Our shows got a lot longer because we
were looking at each other and ourfans are probably like, are these guys
serious. It's been they've been doingthis for ten years and they're up there
(08:20):
like they're doing it for the firsttime. But man, it's genuine.
We're enjoying it. We can't waitto get back on the road. We
can't wait to meet people, sayhey to our fans, play this new
music. It's gonna be awesome.That's one of my favorite things too about
shows, when when you know theartists will be like, hey, wait,
hang on, and then something happensthat's organic, or you know,
(08:41):
maybe a story comes up and youtell the band was like, oh,
we're going to play something, butyeah, no, tell your story.
It gives a fan almost like behindthe curtain, right, like Eryl,
They're almost like a part of theshow now versus like just watching it right,
And I think, I mean youhit the nail on the head.
I mean letting the fans be apart of the show. I think when
you're very mechanical about it, andobviously you have to have a certain you
know, professionalism about it. Youknow, we don't want to go out
(09:03):
there fully unprepared either. Our fansdeserve for us to you know, have
a prepared show and have a setlist that we think is going to you
know, really drive it home andto have you know, the optimum fun,
you know, like prepared. Butit's those moments of like letting them
be a part of the show andlooking around and really soaking in those moments.
When you do that and you allowthem in and you're making connections with
(09:24):
people in the audience, it justcompletely changes the vibe of the show.
Like Dan said, if we're havingfun, they're going to have fun.
You can't fake that kind of stuff. There's been shows where I've just been
so stressed. I mean on theArena tour last time. It was just
like, you're just thankful that you'relike just trying to get through the show,
because there was just so many anxietiesand things that we were dealing with
(09:45):
at that point in our lives thatyou didn't even mean to, but you
carried with you know, into theshow with you Yeah, and I think,
you know, even just the differencebetween that and the shows we played
at the end of twenty three,it was just like I just left all
of that and I allowed myself tohave a moment time and enjoy that moment
and not stress too much about youknow, all right, I can't forget
the words on this song because I'mI'm the worst with lyrics. That's like
(10:07):
one thing I'm stress about all thetime. And I found when I didn't
stress about it, I didn't forgetthe words, and all these things ended
up being better than I would havehoped. And you just kind of allow
the show to happen with those fans, because you're never going to have for
us. It might be like theseventh show on a run, and things
can get very monotonous, and youknow, you just kind of get this,
you know, get into this routineand kind of not realize like what
(10:28):
city you're in or what you're doing. But when you allow yourself to just
be there at that present time andbe in that moment with those fans,
you just open yourself up to thiswhole world of taking each moment as they
come, and you enjoy it somuch more. And it just brings this
new perspective of life of like,hey we can I can slow down and
enjoy this a little bit. AndI gotta say, like, this is
(10:48):
not like for interview stuff, thiswill end up cut out. I appreciate
interviewing you guys and like chatting becausenumber one, it feels like a conversation.
Number two, like the answers areit's not like an answer like yes
or no. Well, here here'sthe here's what I want to say,
here's the answer. Let's get tothe next question. So I appreciate how
in depth you guys get on someof your answers. We ramble, that's
a nice way. But the wayyou guys just keep talking, it's great.
(11:13):
Tay edits audio so she hates itall right, how does the set
list change? And I want toI want to talk about the album in
the single, the new single.How does the set list change when you
have a monster song, like themost recent tenth to number one song,
you open the show with it.I don't know. That's what we're working
(11:33):
on right now. We actually sothis is a crazy, like maniacal thing
that we do. I write everysong title. This is like how we
sequence an album too, and Ithink a lot of people do this.
You write all the song titles,then you cut them out into these little
strips so you can kind of pushand pull, like move them around a
little bit and try to figure outthe sequence of the album. I wrote
down every single song we've ever recorded, even like unreleased demos that our fans
(11:54):
love, wrote them down, putthem in a pile, and just like
threw them there. It was like, let's just we sat at my house
the other day for like eight hours, just moving things around, trying different
sequences. It's tough when you doyour first arena tour like that was kind
of something we'd been dreaming of ourwhole lives. You've got setless in mind
the production, then you have tokind of unlearn all those tendencies. We
(12:15):
did that Setless for like three orfour years in a row, you get
in that rhythm, you go out, you do it in arenas. Then
we went went and opened for Chesneyin the stadiums, so you're kind of
doing those same transitions, same songorders. And it was like, let's
just try to unlearn this because it'sgonna be a lot of the same fans
you saw that last tour. Tryto give them a little something different.
Like we're probably gonna close with tequila, you know, so you put that
at the end. Okay, that'sa starting point. You got to open
(12:39):
with something that gets the crowd engaged. But you don't like you don't want
to open with tequila. You gotto like leave that towards the end or
like speechless. We were talking aboutshould we open with speechless? And then
we were worried about like maybe therewas a couple who bought tickets just because
of that song because it was theirwedding song and they were running late because
parking lot was full, or theywere at dinner. It was a real
conversation we had. We were thereto say miss it by ten minutes,
(13:01):
and that was like the only reasonthat Yeah, but uh, it changes
a little bit. I think we'regonna play a lot of songs from the
new album. Usually we try tojust play a few, but this go
around, I think the reception ofthis album was really great. I feel
like it was kind of a returnto form for us sonically, so I
think those songs will sound great withour band. And I don't know,
there's just something about Saving the Trouble. I don't know, when you come
(13:22):
see the show when we played Bridgetownin a couple weeks, we might open
with something completely different, But rightnow, I feel like it would be
pretty sick to open with save Methe Trouble. Let's Shay just dropped that
mic after this song, get thehardest song to sing out of the way,
Yeah first, yeah, I we'llget that over one. And it's
one of my favorites. And it'sfunny because on the Big ninety eight,
what was it yesterday or the otherday, I was like, our stuff
(13:43):
is planned, like, okay,you'll say this and we'll kind of go
in this way. And so allof a sudden, we're promoting us about
to talk to you, and Ilike, go, oh, if you've
got a question, shoot us throughInstagram whatever, And I go, Tay,
what's the most underrated Dannis Jay songs, she goes uh and she goes
I don't know, like, butmy answer to that was, uh,
I should probably go to bed.Oh yeah, because it felt like it
(14:03):
had its moment, but I waslike, I feel like we should still
be playing that. So as youmake a set list and you've had massive
songs, ten number ones, butlike songs that have lived bigger and longer
than a number one song, what'sthe what's the first song that you're like,
Hey, maybe we rest this thistime. Oh man, I don't
(14:26):
know if that's going to make theset Listen. Honestly, it's like everybody
likes something different. Music is subjective, but I don't know. We're just
trying to change it up a littlebit where we're digging back and playing some
songs from our first album. We'recoming up on the tenth year anniversary of
releasing that album and just listen tothat album. We're like, damn,
there was some magic here. Man. We had just moved to Nashville,
we had just met for the firsttime, and we were writing. We
(14:46):
didn't have We weren't, you know, painting by the numbers. We weren't
staying within the lines. We werejust writing what was on our hearts,
having a blast doing it, andI think you can hear that in that
album. And we've had fans ridingwith us since the beginning. So we
want to play some of those songsthat we haven't gotten to play in five,
six, seven years. But yeah, we'll leave a few off.
You know, we've played them fora couple of years now. It's just
(15:07):
like we know at this point,I feel like we have so much history
with these songs, with playing themlive. We know which ones are going
to do well in the live show, we know which ones might not.
And then if you're not currently workinga song to radio that's not doing well
in the live show, you canlose it and no one will say anything.
Let's go back to the whole weddingsong thing, because somebody in here
(15:28):
is is a wedding song. Iwas gonna call him a victim. They're
not a victory. I don't knowwhere you're going at. She is a
wedding song, and I don't knowwhat that even means, but she she
was like, oh, Danny,say, I want to come in.
You know they were my wedding song. What does that mean to you?
I mean this is arguably the biggestmoment in people's lives and they lean on
something you guys created, likely likea lot of your music, maybe in
(15:50):
a bathroom, not in a bathroom, in a bedroom, dude, it's
an unbelievable honor. I don't knowabout the bedroom thing. I'll talk about
what we've had. Those two we'lltake them. But it's a huge moment
someone's life. I mean, weknow what our first dance songs were.
I mean everybody can say, like, all right, what was your first
dance? And we have had somany of those stories and gotten to be
(16:11):
a part of so many people's livesin that way. And it's it's not
a we have never seen it.I don't think anyone does see it as
a negative thing. Anytime you havea wedding song, and obviously at some
point people are probably like every weddingI go to, I hear this freaking
song, you know, and it'sit's unbelievable job security, it's a job
weary. If one of these days, you know, we have to have
to cut out and can't tourn themwhere we can always do weddings, it'll
(16:33):
be we'll have a solid wedding setlist. But it's amazing, man,
I mean hearing you know, allthe stories of people connecting with a bunch
of our songs. There's been peoplewho have used a lot of different I
feel like we've just are known aslike a good wedding band, Like it's
a pretty safe bet. We've hada lot of people use like tequila and
I'm like, what what in whatworld are you hearing that song and being
like this is what I want myhusband or how to dance to? This
(16:56):
is gonna be the one for longevity. It's like, you know what that
song's about at all, but weneed a song all forever, not a
song about the night. Yeah,exactly exactly with that. Do you guys
ever sing it? Obviously? Yousaying at Bobby Bone's wedding, right,
is that something normal that you'll dofor a friend if they ask. Let's
(17:17):
not say yes now that's rare,but price price for everything. So take
me to uh to the current wellthe new what's about to be the current
single? In bigger houses? Ifeel like that song is for people that
haven't heard on the ALB yet.It's going to connect. But like,
this isn't a song that like youhear slowly, like it hits you like
(17:41):
a ton of bricks. Did youhave to live this for this song to
come to life? If that makessense? One hundred percent, Man,
I feel like this is the mostgenuine, authentic song we've honestly ever put
out. It is exactly where weare in our lives right now. I
feel like everybody in this room canprobably feel that just the way we're talking
about everything from this current number onesaving the trouble, to the album to
the tour. Pretty much it's ourmantra we're living by right now. And
(18:04):
it was a song that like cameat the eleventh hour. That's how it
always goes speechless, you know,you hear that story all the time when
you think the album's done. Eventhough we didn't have an album title,
we thought it was done. Wehad turned it in, we had kind
of sequenced it with my little writtenout cutout strips, and that song just
kind of happened by accident at thelast minute. Our buddy Andy Albert,
I've probably told the story a milliontimes, but him and his wife had
(18:26):
just bought a house, and he'san amazing friend, amazing songwriter. We
actually moved to town together. Webought this or we rented this piece of
crap house that didn't have heat,didn't have ac and it's where Shane and
I met. We were doing aband together, and you know, we
went our separate ways and he becamean incredible, incredible songwriter. He's gonna
be one of the best songwriters toever do it on music Row. He's
unreal man. And him and hiswife had just bought a new house.
(18:48):
They had a newborn baby. Andmy wife Abby, who's like the most
optimistic, most positive person ever.She balances off my pessimism. We were
a good match. I'm being moreoptimistic now now that the Bigger Houses album
is out, changed my tune alittle bit. But uh, Abby was
over there seeing the house for thefirst time, and you know how it
is when somebody walks into a house, you're you're making apologies. Well,
you know, we're gonna paint thatwall, or we'll get rid of this,
(19:11):
we'll change it, we'll fix this, we'll update the kitchen. And
she didn't get a chance to cleanup after the kids exactly, and she
stopped him and was like, guys, you should be so proud of this
house, and you know all thatyou've accomplished, especially like the fact that
you did it by writing songs,by doing something you love, by making
music, and uh, she wasalways She said something like, you know,
I know we're always looking and we'realways talking about bigger houses, bigger
and better things, but we gotto appreciate what we have right now.
(19:33):
And they had this moment and Andywrote it in his phone, bigger houses,
and he came into the room thatday with us, and he was
like, I got this might soundweird, but like if I was going
to write it with anybody, itwas going to be with you guys,
because of something Abby said. Andhe said, the thing about happiness I've
found is that don't live in biggerhouses. And I was like, dang,
the song's already written, giving megoosebumps just to hear you say that,
yeah, man, And it justit was one of those songs that
(19:56):
we the words and the message ofthe song were so important, so we
didn't overproduce it. It was justan acoustic guitar and mandolin, dobro and
an upright bass and it was justall about that message. And you know,
a song like that traditionally doesn't geta shot on the radio. It's
always about tempo and we need tosound like big and like massive in the
live show. It's too slow.It's the spring is exactly exactly. We're
(20:18):
coming into summertime. We need tempo. It's the last song on the album.
It was an unlikely candidate, butit was just something about it.
Man. It connected with our hearts, connected with our fans, everybody around
us, and now we look atit and we're like, how could it
not be the single. I'm soexcited about it. I'm fired up.
I feel like, you know,whatever this song does knock on what We
hope it goes number one and it'sa big hit for us. But I
feel like this is a message that'simportant for us to say, and it's
(20:41):
an important message for our fans tohear. Does your wife have a writing
credit on the song? She's gettinghalf either way? Basically, well,
how instrumental are your wives? Obviouslyfamily, your life motivates you and inspires
you to do what you do,But how how instrumental are they? And
(21:03):
oh, let me hear the newsong? Yeah, hey, what do
you think? Give me feedback?Very instrumental? I mean in every aspect
of our lives. You know,It's like we've had so many hits that
we're written about our wives. Andthere's a reason for that, because we
believe every word that we sing aboutthem. I mean, they genuinely are
the best parts of us. Butyou know, we've we've really let ourselves.
I feel like, you know Dantalked about a while ago, Bigger
(21:25):
Houses is exactly where we're at inour lives. And that's the reason that
we connect so much with the song. I mean, every time that I
sing that song, it's very rarethat you get to have that and you're
you're singing a message that everything justkind of disappears, and I'm having like
a worship service, like every wordis like this matters to me, you
know the CMA. I'm like,you gotta have about a perspective of your
(21:49):
life, you know, And I'mgetting fired up, dude, I really
get goosebumps thinking about singing the songevery single time. And you know,
our wives are obviously, like Dansaid, they're much more pause of than
we are. We can get inthis. You know, we're anxious about
everything and we look forward in abad way to things like oh I gotta
go do this, and I gottago do this, And they remind us
all the time, like, hey, you get to go do that,
(22:11):
you get to go do these things, you get to have this career,
and I don't know, it's justan amazing place to be at in our
lives now that now Dan and Iare on We've never been closer as friends,
and it's just an amazing place that, like our wives, it just
feels like everything is in the rightplace of like, hey, we don't
have to try too hard to dothese things, like our successes, Like
obviously you want to have all thesuccess in the world, and we're gonna
try. We're gonna do everything possibleto make this band as successful as we
(22:33):
possibly can. But our wives remindus like, hey, slow down,
Like life is amazing, Like wehave another day, this is the end
of the day. You get tolive. You get to have this this
moment, Like what you do withit matters, you know, And it
just it brings this new perspective oflike happiness does not it's not found in
those grammy sitting on your shelf.I can tell you that because there was
a time during the pandemic when Ihad those and I was completely depressed and
(22:56):
like anxious and all these things andjust remind ourselves like it's the people around
us. It's that it's what weget to do, the things that you
love to do that bring you happiness, And that song just fully encapsulates it
for me. And so I justI get really passionate when I talk about
it, and I know that everynight before we sing that song, it's
just gonna be like, just playthe I'm gonna today, we gather people
(23:21):
are decided, like Jesus, singit for a minute. So this is
a peed break, it's a feedbreak. No, I get so excited
about it. To your original question, I mean, our wives are very
instrumental in that and keeping us grounded. And at this point in our career,
you know, I could never seeus. You know, people are
like, you know, make sureyou stay grounded and uh and stay humble.
There's no with our wives in thepicture, there's no way for us
(23:42):
to do that. They keep usin our place. And I mean that
in the best kinds of ways,because when your feet are on the ground
and you appreciate the people that youhave around you, and you know that
that is where you find your truepiece and your true joy, then things
can get really, really fun.You know. You bring up the Grammys
and I had a conversation about awardsrecently with somebody, and they're fantastic and
(24:06):
they can mean something to you.But if you chase them too much,
right, if they don't just become, you know, a part of what
you've done, not a part ofwho you are. You're just you win
one. Well, now what.You're always trying to fulfill whatever's next.
So if you put too much stockinto whether it's a Grammy and ACMCMA whatever,
it's like, well, now what, And you can't control the outcome.
(24:26):
You know, you control what youcan control. Pour your heart and
soul into things. Be good topeople around you, have fun in that
writing room, do the best youcan make music that you think is going
to matter to somebody. At theend of the day, the voting,
the politics, everything is out ofyour control. You win it, it's
awesome. You've got to celebrate it. Man, Congratulations to you. You've
won a bunch of awards. It'san amazing thing. It's validation for all
the hard work that we all putin. But you can't live and die
(24:48):
by it. One hundred percent takeme through. Let's say Dan and Shay.
You know, you put this albumout and something is fulfilling. You
go hit a bunch of more datesand you're like, we've done. I
think that was what we needed todo. You look back, give me
a handful of moments and it doesn'tneed to be like a top five or
anything, but you you look backand we were successful because of what.
(25:14):
Oh man, is this on ourentire career? Yeah? Yep, I
don't like family obviously supports some allthat, but like work that you created,
impacts you made. What would bethe ones you celebrate that first album?
Man, I would start there.I feel like, you know,
we met at that house that waswas a piece of crab and you know,
we got there and we had nothing. And yet it took me until
(25:37):
you know, later to realize this, but like we had everything right there
and we made that album. Theywere all demos. I mean, we
showed up to the record label andwe had turned in like these twenty three
songs and that you know, alot of those demos just became our album.
We didn't even really have time tolike re record them. It's just
things that like Dan had done thesolo. Back to the guitar solos,
I'm like, oh wow, onethe other day I was like, that
(26:00):
was I'm a bad guitar player.I'm hacking away. It was amazing because
we didn't think, you know,we didn't think too much about what we
were doing. We enjoyed the process. And I think that, you know,
my next would my next success,I would say, would be this
Bigger Houses album because of what itrepresents. And this is a little easter
egg. I'm sure that we've tolda story a million times. But the
(26:22):
house that is on the album Uof Bigger Houses album, that house was
representation of five oh seven Morton Avenue, where Dan and I met. There's
a little five oh seven underneath thedoorway. That's kind of going to ask
because I've seen that. I haven'tseen the house in person, but I've
seen the five oh seven. WhatI was going to text and ask,
that's where That's where it comes from. And so what this represents is just
reminding us like, hey, youknow, obviously we're in different places,
(26:45):
you know where we don't live atfive oh seven, uh, but we
are what we had there and whatthis album represents and reminding ourselves like,
stop chasing after the things that don'tmatter, take stock in the and the
people around you, and I'm justreally proud of of that. I think
I'm most proud of this album,not just because of the music, and
I think that it's, you know, musically, our best work, but
(27:06):
I just think that what it representsand where we are in our lives now,
I'm most proud of that. Ofanything we've done in our career,
over the Grammys, over the numberone songs, I'm most proud of where
we have gotten to on this album, and obviously since it is this timeframe
of putting out this album, I'mjust I'm so unbelievably proud of like where
we've gotten to and now it's justlike I'm just having so much fun.
(27:27):
It's like it just feels genuine likea new start. And what a thing
to have, you know, tobe living in a place where you don't
have regrets, you're thankful for allthose horrible times, and the lowest of
low is because now you're here andjust what that represents to me. I
would say the greatest accomplishment in mymind is the fact that after ten years,
(27:48):
we're still doing this. For onebut we're still best friends. Yeah,
being in a duo is the toughestconfiguration of a band. Being in
a trio, there's a tiebreaker.Being a solo act, you're out there
on an island by yourself. Beingin a group just chaos. Historically,
duos don't make it. Man,it's fifty to fifty. It's like a
marriage. It's if you're not Imean an example, No, I'm kidding,
you're giving me five. If you'renot communicating, if you're not being
(28:10):
open, if you're not working together, you'll go separate directions. We've seen
in a million times in our format. We've seen it in other formats.
It's rare that a duo can staytogether. And the place we're in after
ten years, we've been through highsand lows. But we did the work.
We've put in the work. Weknow what it takes to stay there,
and I'm just proud of that.Man. No matter what happens,
I want to keep getting number ones. I want to win more Grammys,
I want to do all that stuff. You've got to stay hungry. I
(28:32):
want to keep selling out arenas.But the fact that we're still having fun
doing this and we're still having fundoing this together is I think the number
one accommishment when it comes to countrymusic and collaborations. I mean, you
guys are every song you do isa collaboration essentially, right, But collaborations
in country are hotter than they've everbeen, like over the past, probably
(28:52):
like five years. Obviously you hada multi genre a big song with Justin
Bieber. Is there talks of like, hey, we should try and work
outside of us more other than justthe writing, but like as far as
the creating and recording, do youplan out what you want to do in
the future, and if so,who are some people that that might make
the next album. It's a reallygood question. I think. You know,
(29:14):
on this album it was I mean, for what it represented and kind
of how it came about, thatwasn't really on our mind. It was
this was very much an album forus and for our fans and of you
know, our representation of where wewant to go and where we are.
But beyond that, I think thatyou know, on our next project,
you know that we put together itwould be fun to we don't think too
(29:37):
much into that. We kind ofget in and we let the songs write
themselves and we sit around with ourbuddies and it's just kind of, you
know, we let things kind ofhappen, and after the song is finished,
sometimes we'll have we'll throw around ideasof like this person would be awesome.
I always throw out a dell.I've thrown it out for years.
It hasn't happened yet. Listen,We're gonna make it happen. We're gonna
(29:57):
make it happen. She listens.I know specifically to this show. I've
been talking to that. Yeah.She was like, oh, I like
the guy with the beard. Yeah, she's like yeah when she said I
like that, you guys, it'sawesome. That's yeah, that's pretty good.
You could just sing as her onthere. That's true. Range was
pretty good. You just created damncame up with that the other day.
(30:22):
I can't take credit for it.It's pretty good. What about you as
far as like, you know somebodythat you'd like to see on an upcoming
album our song? Oh, that'sthat's tough. We've done a lot of
amazing collaborations. We collaborated with Bieber, collaborated with Charlie Pooth, Like Charlie
is like he's so my musical nerd. Counterpart, you know what I mean,
(30:44):
Like we geeked out so much makingthat track so talented Kelly Clarkson,
Like for me to sit back andlisten to to of the greatest singers of
all time, Kelly Clarkson and Shaysinging back and forth was super special.
So our bar is pretty high.I don't know where we go from there,
but we're good buddies with Codyjohnson.We're huge fans of Cody. We've
always kicked around. We're on agroup text like yo, we should do
a song. It's always like weshould do a song. Like maybe one
(31:06):
of these days will do a songhis vocal delivery and yours mixed together.
That could be crazy, total yeahblast, because you know, I don't
think people would really expect that.And you know, Cody has always been
obviously a good buddy of ours,but I love he always says these things
about being genuine and he used tostay on the stage like, look,
if I tried to go out anddo what Dan and Shay does, I
would look like an idiot and itwouldn't work. And likewise, if we
(31:27):
try to go out and we tryto be Cody Johnson, like you can't
do that, but being one hundredpercent authentically yourself is an amazing thing.
And I just think Dan and Shayeand Cody Johnson collaboration would be absolute.
Flynn put us on the remix ofDirt Cheap. When it goes through it,
Yeah, if I talk up anotherautomatic number one, if I can
get through without crying, it'll beuh, it'll be solid. The last
(31:47):
thing I want to ask you isknowing that you're looking at your careers and
maybe life as a whole different thanyou ever have been. What does twenty
twenty four have to give you foryou to like it was successful? Absolutely
nothing. I mean, it's myhonest answer where I'm at right now in
my life and the things that we'vegotten to do, being able to genuinely
(32:10):
take time. I mean, Ithink the most fun that I've had in
a while. Dan and I andour buddy Jordan Reynolds sat down and wrote
a song the other day just forfun, and it was just like,
it reminded me that you can't controlthe outcome of anything. Obviously, we
want to have hit songs like SendMe the Trouble, but if you can
enjoy that process, it is somethingthat Dan, you know, talked a
(32:30):
lot about he had read, youknow, read a book about this of
just you know, if you cancontrol enjoy the process of something, it
was already a success. And Ijust love the idea of that. And
I was genuinely reminded of that acouple of days ago when we were writing
it, just like, man,this is it, Like this is where
I find the most joy in mylife, besides obviously my kids and my
wife, being able to sit downand write a song and complete it like
(32:52):
with my best friends, and weget to do it and we don't have
to have other jobs. Like unbelievable, you know, someone just fell over.
It's all good, just dropping likeknowledge. In fact, it's just
the truth. And I don't needtwenty twenty four to give me anything else,
because genuinely, like where I'm atin my life right now, I
don't need anything else. If Ican keep what I have right now,
(33:12):
that would be my prayer for twentytwenty four, of just to keep things
exactly like they are. Everything elsejust bonus. I feel bad for Dan
because he can't copy your answer.Well, he told me that answer right
before, and so I told themcars, bigger houses, bigger way,
bigger houses, the same deal.Man. We're so grateful to be doing
this. The fact that if wecan get through twenty four, twenty twenty
(33:36):
four, still be doing what welove, making songs, having people that
care to listen to them. Man, every day when we get in the
room, we always say, we'reso grateful at this point in our career.
We have a fan base, wehave an amazing relationship with country radio.
Whatever we write that day, that'sgot a shot at getting on the
radio. Man, what a dreamcome true. There's millions of people that
would kill to be in that position. We would have killed to be in
(33:57):
that position just a few years agowhen we were kids. If you would
have told us we'd have one numberone, we would have said, you're
a liar. Ten. I mean, come on, get out of town.
It's crazy. And the fact thatwe can still do it and have
fun in the process. Man,everything else is just gravy. You guys
are killing it. Thanks for takingthe time out to chat to thank you.
This is a nice therapy session.I feel fired up and resignated.
Couch in here for next time.The next time, I'm just we'll feed
(34:20):
the microphone over to that couch.There we go. It's there's one right
there. Didn't even realize. I'lltell me about your childhood. Yeah,
we don't want to go here.It was nineteen ninety one. I was
born and the world got a littleworse. You're born. I was born
than ninety one. Yeah, I'mforty eight years old with
That's rock. They're good today.Got to make sure the angle is good.
You know, you got to geta good like shimmer Ron. So
you know we were just well,let me tell you it's funny. Is
this Mike Okay? Is it goodon this sun? Dude? I gotta
tell you, we're so excited tohave these guys in because number one,
we know how busy they are.Uh, they're hard dudes to nail down,
(00:22):
but we've made it happen again,Dan and Shay and studio with us.
How are you all? What's happening? Man? Good to see you,
dud. It better to see youbecause it's not usually we hear from
people like leading up to hope weget a number one. We're talking to
you guys fresh off of what feelslike and I'm gonna get personal feels like
the most important number one for youguys like you needed. Am I right?
That's a man. That's amazing tohear you say that, because it
(00:44):
really I'm glad that it's it's easyto see on our faces how excited we
are about this one. This isnumber ten, and it genuinely feels like
our first number one. I mean, I think that there's a new perspective
that we've had. You know,obviously we've talked about a lot on this
album, but there's just something differentabout this. Uh, we're extra excited
about it, and you know,kicking off this album that means so much
to us. To have all thesupport, you know, our biggest ad
(01:07):
day of our career and to haveit go all the way number one is
just it's wild, man. Itjust it genuinely feels like the first number
one. We're celebrating every bit ofthe number one too. Ah. We
celebrate the whole week, all theway till Saturday night, two am Central
time, when the chart closes atmidnight specific time. Every bit of it
we've been celebrating every single day.Man, We're so proud of that.
When it comes to number ones,you know, a lot of a lot
(01:29):
of conversations we have is it doesn'tnecessarily validate you as an artist or measure
the success of the song right becauseit's how people listen and how it impacts
their life and what it meant foryou to put it out. But something
about the number ones are important asyou look back, like knowing that you
shared, you know, the emotionaljourney to get this album together and to
(01:51):
be where y'all are at right.You needed it for that reason too,
write did you need it to kindof verify yourselves a little bit? Like
yeah, No, we're still yeahman, I mean, you know,
not making having a song go numberone doesn't mean that it's a big hit.
One of the biggest songs of ourcareer was nineteen You and Me,
the first single we put out.They peaked at eleven. So from a
fans perspective, a lot of times, it's just how much that song impacted
(02:14):
them emotionally, where they were whenthey first heard that song, what it
meant to their life. But asan industry here in Nashville, for us,
for our team, for our recordlabel, for radio, there's this
camaraderie when we get a song tothe top of the chart, to the
top of the mountain, it's anamazing celebration. Our team works their tails
off every single day to get thesesongs on the radio. Guys like you
will play our song sneak in acouple extra spins here and there. I'm
(02:36):
texting you, I'm like, heyman, it's gonna be close. Na,
It's not quite like that. Maybeit is, and he's like,
here's a gift card the puckets.Yeah, yeah, I can't do that
anymore. Nah, But it's areally cool accomplishment for the songwriters, for
everybody in the studio who worked tobring this thing to life. Man,
It's it's a special thing to getto have that party. You know.
We went through a lot of yearswhere we just kind of would brush over
(02:57):
these things. We would get anumber one song and like, all right,
well, what's the next one?And we still are hungry, we're
still competitive, we still want tokeep getting number ones. But you got
to stop. You've got to slowdown, and you got to appreciate him.
And I feel like that's kind ofa theme of this new album,
the Bigger Houses Album, which coincidentallyis the next single we're taking to radio.
But it's just about appreciating those moments, man, because we let a
lot of good stuff pass us byin the past, you know, looking
(03:20):
forward to what was next and notappreciating what we had in the moment,
when you get a little bit ofclarity, and I think COVID, honestly,
twenty twenty gave us that realization wherethe rug was pulled out from under
us. And we could step backand be like, dang, like,
now that we have a moment tobreathe, now that we get to be
home for a little while. Man, we did some really really cool stuff.
We've won Grammys, we sold outan arena tour, all these things.
(03:40):
We've got an incredible fan base.Radio supports us in a big way.
And when you're going a million milesan hour, sometimes you're moving too
fast to appreciate that. But nowI feel like this new perspective, we
have every dang minute of this numberone week. We've appreciated having a song
at the top of the chart.I want to go back to it.
You brought up a funny note aboutyour first single, but before I didn't
(04:01):
offer you do you want water?Like we started drinking water, Dude,
I'm off the sauce. I quitdrinking, and I was like, this
is going great. I'm gonna gowith water too. Yeah, I'm not,
and I'm not gonna thank you tequilajoke. After that, Are you
guys good? Do you want towater? I'm great, I'm great,
Thank you, thank you. It'sfunny because we caught up with Chris Stapleton
(04:25):
recently and we asked the importance ofa number one song, and he goes,
what do you think the biggest songof my career was? I mean,
I think anybody would say Tennessee Whiskey. He goes, it wasn't a
radio single, Yeah, but it'slingered at about forty on the for the
last ten years, Like we didit, but can you get it out
of the way. But it's weird. It's just weird to see, like
what feels successful. Like if somebodyloves a song ten years from now,
(04:48):
you're never gonna say to a fan, where did that finish on the chart?
Yeah? Right, I think that'simportant. You know, that's why
we love getting out on the road. Yeah, and being able to feel
those moments. You can feel thesongs that the fans are resonating with,
and especially on songs like our nextsingle, Bigger Houses, there's a you
know, you can look at thenumbers of any song, you know,
(05:09):
and obviously having a number one atradio is a huge mom marker and that's
a big, you know, bigthing, but it is crazy. You
can't look at numbers and judge,you know, how much people connected with
that. You know, you canlook at numbers on a song like ten
thousand hours just hit a billion onSpotify, which is an unbelievable concept.
But it's like there are other songsthat fans connect to on a deeper level.
(05:30):
It's obviously like there's that hit factorwhere they're singing along they know every
word, but then there's those songswhere like Dan you know, said like
nineteen yum Me where they really connectwith it. And we've seen that on
bigger houses where it's just it's notjust people being like, oh yeah,
hey, I like that song.They're telling us this entire, like very
passionate story about how they connect withthis song and how it affects their life.
And that's why I love get outon the road because you can really
(05:50):
see that and you can hear thosestories, and you just can't do that
when you're not face to face,you know, with our fans, we
don't get that. And obviously socialmedia gives us that unique thing that you
know, people haven't had in thepast of being able to really connect with
our fans. And since day one, we've tried to have that camaraderie and
you know, face to face ishthing with our fans through social media,
(06:10):
and that's why we still, youknow, control our social media because we
want to see those stories in ourinboxes and to be able to see when
people are connecting with a certain songor whatnot. And I don't know,
it's just really amazing to be ableto get out there. And I think
that's what I'm most excited about.And obviously I'm excited to go here Save
Me the Trouble and hear them singingthat song back, but I'm really excited
about those moments to really see whatpeople are genuinely connecting with. So knowing
(06:32):
that you guys were in a placewhere there was some uncertainty and now you've
talked about how the smell the rosesaspect of life has set in for both
of you. Guys, what didyou get out of these most recent run
of shows obviously not recent of thisyear, but ending twenty three. What
did you get that maybe you didn'tget before? Or what's something that you
(06:54):
like soaked in that maybe before youlike whatever sound check? Yeah, no,
go ahead, No, I gotto have my pre show pop or
whatever, you know what I mean? Like, what's something that you look
back now on these most recent datesand you're like, man, I never
I never took time for this.Man. Honestly, this sounds like a
lame answer, but I think wejust had fun. We were a little
worried. We were worried a littlebit less about perfectionism and making sure the
(07:16):
show is sure, the show isperfect. It was like, let's have
fun on stage, because if we'rehaving fun up there together with our band,
the people in the crowd are goingto have fun. And I feel
like the last time we did it, we were out on the arenas,
there were so many times we puton a great show. The crowd had
to blast. Our team was like, oh that was amazing. That was
the best show the tour. AndI'm like storming out, like throwing stuff
in the dressing room because I waslike, well, you know, like
(07:36):
there was one pixel out in thevideo wall and it sucked. You know,
stuff like that, but just likeappreciating it, having moments where it
goes unscripted, where we're supposed togo into the next song and we're just
like, hold on, I needto take a moment. Soak this in,
man, Cuz like the COVID thing, I hate to keep bringing that
up, but that was the firsttime that it introduced us to this thing
where it could go away at anygiven moment. So if you don't appreciate
(07:59):
it when you're on that stage,who knows. You could be out on
the road on a Friday night andsomebody calls on Saturday and says, hey,
the shows are canceled the rest ofthe year. You know, there's
a pandemic. That was how ithappened. So if you don't appreciate it,
man, it can go away reallyreally fast. And I think we
just we were soaking it in.Our shows got a lot longer because we
were looking at each other and ourfans are probably like, are these guys
serious. It's been they've been doingthis for ten years and they're up there
(08:20):
like they're doing it for the firsttime. But man, it's genuine.
We're enjoying it. We can't waitto get back on the road. We
can't wait to meet people, sayhey to our fans, play this new
music. It's gonna be awesome.That's one of my favorite things too about
shows, when when you know theartists will be like, hey, wait,
hang on, and then something happensthat's organic, or you know,
(08:41):
maybe a story comes up and youtell the band was like, oh,
we're going to play something, butyeah, no, tell your story.
It gives a fan almost like behindthe curtain, right, like Eryl,
They're almost like a part of theshow now versus like just watching it right,
And I think, I mean youhit the nail on the head.
I mean letting the fans be apart of the show. I think when
you're very mechanical about it, andobviously you have to have a certain you
know, professionalism about it. Youknow, we don't want to go out
(09:03):
there fully unprepared either. Our fansdeserve for us to you know, have
a prepared show and have a setlist that we think is going to you
know, really drive it home andto have you know, the optimum fun,
you know, like prepared. Butit's those moments of like letting them
be a part of the show andlooking around and really soaking in those moments.
When you do that and you allowthem in and you're making connections with
(09:24):
people in the audience, it justcompletely changes the vibe of the show.
Like Dan said, if we're havingfun, they're going to have fun.
You can't fake that kind of stuff. There's been shows where I've just been
so stressed. I mean on theArena tour last time. It was just
like, you're just thankful that you'relike just trying to get through the show,
because there was just so many anxietiesand things that we were dealing with
(09:45):
at that point in our lives thatyou didn't even mean to, but you
carried with you know, into theshow with you Yeah, and I think,
you know, even just the differencebetween that and the shows we played
at the end of twenty three,it was just like I just left all
of that and I allowed myself tohave a moment time and enjoy that moment
and not stress too much about youknow, all right, I can't forget
the words on this song because I'mI'm the worst with lyrics. That's like
(10:07):
one thing I'm stress about all thetime. And I found when I didn't
stress about it, I didn't forgetthe words, and all these things ended
up being better than I would havehoped. And you just kind of allow
the show to happen with those fans, because you're never going to have for
us. It might be like theseventh show on a run, and things
can get very monotonous, and youknow, you just kind of get this,
you know, get into this routineand kind of not realize like what
(10:28):
city you're in or what you're doing. But when you allow yourself to just
be there at that present time andbe in that moment with those fans,
you just open yourself up to thiswhole world of taking each moment as they
come, and you enjoy it somuch more. And it just brings this
new perspective of life of like,hey we can I can slow down and
enjoy this a little bit. AndI gotta say, like, this is
(10:48):
not like for interview stuff, thiswill end up cut out. I appreciate
interviewing you guys and like chatting becausenumber one, it feels like a conversation.
Number two, like the answers areit's not like an answer like yes
or no. Well, here here'sthe here's what I want to say,
here's the answer. Let's get tothe next question. So I appreciate how
in depth you guys get on someof your answers. We ramble, that's
a nice way. But the wayyou guys just keep talking, it's great.
(11:13):
Tay edits audio so she hates itall right, how does the set
list change? And I want toI want to talk about the album in
the single, the new single.How does the set list change when you
have a monster song, like themost recent tenth to number one song,
you open the show with it.I don't know. That's what we're working
(11:33):
on right now. We actually sothis is a crazy, like maniacal thing
that we do. I write everysong title. This is like how we
sequence an album too, and Ithink a lot of people do this.
You write all the song titles,then you cut them out into these little
strips so you can kind of pushand pull, like move them around a
little bit and try to figure outthe sequence of the album. I wrote
down every single song we've ever recorded, even like unreleased demos that our fans
(11:54):
love, wrote them down, putthem in a pile, and just like
threw them there. It was like, let's just we sat at my house
the other day for like eight hours, just moving things around, trying different
sequences. It's tough when you doyour first arena tour like that was kind
of something we'd been dreaming of ourwhole lives. You've got setless in mind
the production, then you have tokind of unlearn all those tendencies. We
(12:15):
did that Setless for like three orfour years in a row, you get
in that rhythm, you go out, you do it in arenas. Then
we went went and opened for Chesneyin the stadiums, so you're kind of
doing those same transitions, same songorders. And it was like, let's
just try to unlearn this because it'sgonna be a lot of the same fans
you saw that last tour. Tryto give them a little something different.
Like we're probably gonna close with tequila, you know, so you put that
at the end. Okay, that'sa starting point. You got to open
(12:39):
with something that gets the crowd engaged. But you don't like you don't want
to open with tequila. You gotto like leave that towards the end or
like speechless. We were talking aboutshould we open with speechless? And then
we were worried about like maybe therewas a couple who bought tickets just because
of that song because it was theirwedding song and they were running late because
parking lot was full, or theywere at dinner. It was a real
conversation we had. We were thereto say miss it by ten minutes,
(13:01):
and that was like the only reasonthat Yeah, but uh, it changes
a little bit. I think we'regonna play a lot of songs from the
new album. Usually we try tojust play a few, but this go
around, I think the reception ofthis album was really great. I feel
like it was kind of a returnto form for us sonically, so I
think those songs will sound great withour band. And I don't know,
there's just something about Saving the Trouble. I don't know, when you come
(13:22):
see the show when we played Bridgetownin a couple weeks, we might open
with something completely different, But rightnow, I feel like it would be
pretty sick to open with save Methe Trouble. Let's Shay just dropped that
mic after this song, get thehardest song to sing out of the way,
Yeah first, yeah, I we'llget that over one. And it's
one of my favorites. And it'sfunny because on the Big ninety eight,
what was it yesterday or the otherday, I was like, our stuff
(13:43):
is planned, like, okay,you'll say this and we'll kind of go
in this way. And so allof a sudden, we're promoting us about
to talk to you, and Ilike, go, oh, if you've
got a question, shoot us throughInstagram whatever, And I go, Tay,
what's the most underrated Dannis Jay songs, she goes uh and she goes
I don't know, like, butmy answer to that was, uh,
I should probably go to bed.Oh yeah, because it felt like it
(14:03):
had its moment, but I waslike, I feel like we should still
be playing that. So as youmake a set list and you've had massive
songs, ten number ones, butlike songs that have lived bigger and longer
than a number one song, what'sthe what's the first song that you're like,
Hey, maybe we rest this thistime. Oh man, I don't
(14:26):
know if that's going to make theset Listen. Honestly, it's like everybody
likes something different. Music is subjective, but I don't know. We're just
trying to change it up a littlebit where we're digging back and playing some
songs from our first album. We'recoming up on the tenth year anniversary of
releasing that album and just listen tothat album. We're like, damn,
there was some magic here. Man. We had just moved to Nashville,
we had just met for the firsttime, and we were writing. We
(14:46):
didn't have We weren't, you know, painting by the numbers. We weren't
staying within the lines. We werejust writing what was on our hearts,
having a blast doing it, andI think you can hear that in that
album. And we've had fans ridingwith us since the beginning. So we
want to play some of those songsthat we haven't gotten to play in five,
six, seven years. But yeah, we'll leave a few off.
You know, we've played them fora couple of years now. It's just
(15:07):
like we know at this point,I feel like we have so much history
with these songs, with playing themlive. We know which ones are going
to do well in the live show, we know which ones might not.
And then if you're not currently workinga song to radio that's not doing well
in the live show, you canlose it and no one will say anything.
Let's go back to the whole weddingsong thing, because somebody in here
(15:28):
is is a wedding song. Iwas gonna call him a victim. They're
not a victory. I don't knowwhere you're going at. She is a
wedding song, and I don't knowwhat that even means, but she she
was like, oh, Danny,say, I want to come in.
You know they were my wedding song. What does that mean to you?
I mean this is arguably the biggestmoment in people's lives and they lean on
something you guys created, likely likea lot of your music, maybe in
(15:50):
a bathroom, not in a bathroom, in a bedroom, dude, it's
an unbelievable honor. I don't knowabout the bedroom thing. I'll talk about
what we've had. Those two we'lltake them. But it's a huge moment
someone's life. I mean, weknow what our first dance songs were.
I mean everybody can say, like, all right, what was your first
dance? And we have had somany of those stories and gotten to be
(16:11):
a part of so many people's livesin that way. And it's it's not
a we have never seen it.I don't think anyone does see it as
a negative thing. Anytime you havea wedding song, and obviously at some
point people are probably like every weddingI go to, I hear this freaking
song, you know, and it'sit's unbelievable job security, it's a job
weary. If one of these days, you know, we have to have
to cut out and can't tourn themwhere we can always do weddings, it'll
(16:33):
be we'll have a solid wedding setlist. But it's amazing, man,
I mean hearing you know, allthe stories of people connecting with a bunch
of our songs. There's been peoplewho have used a lot of different I
feel like we've just are known aslike a good wedding band, Like it's
a pretty safe bet. We've hada lot of people use like tequila and
I'm like, what what in whatworld are you hearing that song and being
like this is what I want myhusband or how to dance to? This
(16:56):
is gonna be the one for longevity. It's like, you know what that
song's about at all, but weneed a song all forever, not a
song about the night. Yeah,exactly exactly with that. Do you guys
ever sing it? Obviously? Yousaying at Bobby Bone's wedding, right,
is that something normal that you'll dofor a friend if they ask. Let's
(17:17):
not say yes now that's rare,but price price for everything. So take
me to uh to the current wellthe new what's about to be the current
single? In bigger houses? Ifeel like that song is for people that
haven't heard on the ALB yet.It's going to connect. But like,
this isn't a song that like youhear slowly, like it hits you like
(17:41):
a ton of bricks. Did youhave to live this for this song to
come to life? If that makessense? One hundred percent, Man,
I feel like this is the mostgenuine, authentic song we've honestly ever put
out. It is exactly where weare in our lives right now. I
feel like everybody in this room canprobably feel that just the way we're talking
about everything from this current number onesaving the trouble, to the album to
the tour. Pretty much it's ourmantra we're living by right now. And
(18:04):
it was a song that like cameat the eleventh hour. That's how it
always goes speechless, you know,you hear that story all the time when
you think the album's done. Eventhough we didn't have an album title,
we thought it was done. Wehad turned it in, we had kind
of sequenced it with my little writtenout cutout strips, and that song just
kind of happened by accident at thelast minute. Our buddy Andy Albert,
I've probably told the story a milliontimes, but him and his wife had
(18:26):
just bought a house, and he'san amazing friend, amazing songwriter. We
actually moved to town together. Webought this or we rented this piece of
crap house that didn't have heat,didn't have ac and it's where Shane and
I met. We were doing aband together, and you know, we
went our separate ways and he becamean incredible, incredible songwriter. He's gonna
be one of the best songwriters toever do it on music Row. He's
unreal man. And him and hiswife had just bought a new house.
(18:48):
They had a newborn baby. Andmy wife Abby, who's like the most
optimistic, most positive person ever.She balances off my pessimism. We were
a good match. I'm being moreoptimistic now now that the Bigger Houses album
is out, changed my tune alittle bit. But uh, Abby was
over there seeing the house for thefirst time, and you know how it
is when somebody walks into a house, you're you're making apologies. Well,
you know, we're gonna paint thatwall, or we'll get rid of this,
(19:11):
we'll change it, we'll fix this, we'll update the kitchen. And
she didn't get a chance to cleanup after the kids exactly, and she
stopped him and was like, guys, you should be so proud of this
house, and you know all thatyou've accomplished, especially like the fact that
you did it by writing songs,by doing something you love, by making
music, and uh, she wasalways She said something like, you know,
I know we're always looking and we'realways talking about bigger houses, bigger
and better things, but we gotto appreciate what we have right now.
(19:33):
And they had this moment and Andywrote it in his phone, bigger houses,
and he came into the room thatday with us, and he was
like, I got this might soundweird, but like if I was going
to write it with anybody, itwas going to be with you guys,
because of something Abby said. Andhe said, the thing about happiness I've
found is that don't live in biggerhouses. And I was like, dang,
the song's already written, giving megoosebumps just to hear you say that,
yeah, man, And it justit was one of those songs that
(19:56):
we the words and the message ofthe song were so important, so we
didn't overproduce it. It was justan acoustic guitar and mandolin, dobro and
an upright bass and it was justall about that message. And you know,
a song like that traditionally doesn't geta shot on the radio. It's
always about tempo and we need tosound like big and like massive in the
live show. It's too slow.It's the spring is exactly exactly. We're
(20:18):
coming into summertime. We need tempo. It's the last song on the album.
It was an unlikely candidate, butit was just something about it.
Man. It connected with our hearts, connected with our fans, everybody around
us, and now we look atit and we're like, how could it
not be the single. I'm soexcited about it. I'm fired up.
I feel like, you know,whatever this song does knock on what We
hope it goes number one and it'sa big hit for us. But I
feel like this is a message that'simportant for us to say, and it's
(20:41):
an important message for our fans tohear. Does your wife have a writing
credit on the song? She's gettinghalf either way? Basically, well,
how instrumental are your wives? Obviouslyfamily, your life motivates you and inspires
you to do what you do,But how how instrumental are they? And
(21:03):
oh, let me hear the newsong? Yeah, hey, what do
you think? Give me feedback?Very instrumental? I mean in every aspect
of our lives. You know,It's like we've had so many hits that
we're written about our wives. Andthere's a reason for that, because we
believe every word that we sing aboutthem. I mean, they genuinely are
the best parts of us. Butyou know, we've we've really let ourselves.
I feel like, you know Dantalked about a while ago, Bigger
(21:25):
Houses is exactly where we're at inour lives. And that's the reason that
we connect so much with the song. I mean, every time that I
sing that song, it's very rarethat you get to have that and you're
you're singing a message that everything justkind of disappears, and I'm having like
a worship service, like every wordis like this matters to me, you
know the CMA. I'm like,you gotta have about a perspective of your
(21:49):
life, you know, And I'mgetting fired up, dude, I really
get goosebumps thinking about singing the songevery single time. And you know,
our wives are obviously, like Dansaid, they're much more pause of than
we are. We can get inthis. You know, we're anxious about
everything and we look forward in abad way to things like oh I gotta
go do this, and I gottago do this, And they remind us
all the time, like, hey, you get to go do that,
(22:11):
you get to go do these things, you get to have this career,
and I don't know, it's justan amazing place to be at in our
lives now that now Dan and Iare on We've never been closer as friends,
and it's just an amazing place that, like our wives, it just
feels like everything is in the rightplace of like, hey, we don't
have to try too hard to dothese things, like our successes, Like
obviously you want to have all thesuccess in the world, and we're gonna
try. We're gonna do everything possibleto make this band as successful as we
(22:33):
possibly can. But our wives remindus like, hey, slow down,
Like life is amazing, Like wehave another day, this is the end
of the day. You get tolive. You get to have this this
moment, Like what you do withit matters, you know, And it
just it brings this new perspective oflike happiness does not it's not found in
those grammy sitting on your shelf.I can tell you that because there was
a time during the pandemic when Ihad those and I was completely depressed and
(22:56):
like anxious and all these things andjust remind ourselves like it's the people around
us. It's that it's what weget to do, the things that you
love to do that bring you happiness, And that song just fully encapsulates it
for me. And so I justI get really passionate when I talk about
it, and I know that everynight before we sing that song, it's
just gonna be like, just playthe I'm gonna today, we gather people
(23:21):
are decided, like Jesus, singit for a minute. So this is
a peed break, it's a feedbreak. No, I get so excited
about it. To your original question, I mean, our wives are very
instrumental in that and keeping us grounded. And at this point in our career,
you know, I could never seeus. You know, people are
like, you know, make sureyou stay grounded and uh and stay humble.
There's no with our wives in thepicture, there's no way for us
(23:42):
to do that. They keep usin our place. And I mean that
in the best kinds of ways,because when your feet are on the ground
and you appreciate the people that youhave around you, and you know that
that is where you find your truepiece and your true joy, then things
can get really, really fun.You know. You bring up the Grammys
and I had a conversation about awardsrecently with somebody, and they're fantastic and
(24:06):
they can mean something to you.But if you chase them too much,
right, if they don't just become, you know, a part of what
you've done, not a part ofwho you are. You're just you win
one. Well, now what.You're always trying to fulfill whatever's next.
So if you put too much stockinto whether it's a Grammy and ACMCMA whatever,
it's like, well, now what, And you can't control the outcome.
(24:26):
You know, you control what youcan control. Pour your heart and
soul into things. Be good topeople around you, have fun in that
writing room, do the best youcan make music that you think is going
to matter to somebody. At theend of the day, the voting,
the politics, everything is out ofyour control. You win it, it's
awesome. You've got to celebrate it. Man, Congratulations to you. You've
won a bunch of awards. It'san amazing thing. It's validation for all
the hard work that we all putin. But you can't live and die
(24:48):
by it. One hundred percent takeme through. Let's say Dan and Shay.
You know, you put this albumout and something is fulfilling. You
go hit a bunch of more datesand you're like, we've done. I
think that was what we needed todo. You look back, give me
a handful of moments and it doesn'tneed to be like a top five or
anything, but you you look backand we were successful because of what.
(25:14):
Oh man, is this on ourentire career? Yeah? Yep, I
don't like family obviously supports some allthat, but like work that you created,
impacts you made. What would bethe ones you celebrate that first album?
Man, I would start there.I feel like, you know,
we met at that house that waswas a piece of crab and you know,
we got there and we had nothing. And yet it took me until
(25:37):
you know, later to realize this, but like we had everything right there
and we made that album. Theywere all demos. I mean, we
showed up to the record label andwe had turned in like these twenty three
songs and that you know, alot of those demos just became our album.
We didn't even really have time tolike re record them. It's just
things that like Dan had done thesolo. Back to the guitar solos,
I'm like, oh wow, onethe other day I was like, that
(26:00):
was I'm a bad guitar player.I'm hacking away. It was amazing because
we didn't think, you know,we didn't think too much about what we
were doing. We enjoyed the process. And I think that, you know,
my next would my next success,I would say, would be this
Bigger Houses album because of what itrepresents. And this is a little easter
egg. I'm sure that we've tolda story a million times. But the
(26:22):
house that is on the album Uof Bigger Houses album, that house was
representation of five oh seven Morton Avenue, where Dan and I met. There's
a little five oh seven underneath thedoorway. That's kind of going to ask
because I've seen that. I haven'tseen the house in person, but I've
seen the five oh seven. WhatI was going to text and ask,
that's where That's where it comes from. And so what this represents is just
reminding us like, hey, youknow, obviously we're in different places,
(26:45):
you know where we don't live atfive oh seven, uh, but we
are what we had there and whatthis album represents and reminding ourselves like,
stop chasing after the things that don'tmatter, take stock in the and the
people around you, and I'm justreally proud of of that. I think
I'm most proud of this album,not just because of the music, and
I think that it's, you know, musically, our best work, but
(27:06):
I just think that what it representsand where we are in our lives now,
I'm most proud of that. Ofanything we've done in our career,
over the Grammys, over the numberone songs, I'm most proud of where
we have gotten to on this album, and obviously since it is this timeframe
of putting out this album, I'mjust I'm so unbelievably proud of like where
we've gotten to and now it's justlike I'm just having so much fun.
(27:27):
It's like it just feels genuine likea new start. And what a thing
to have, you know, tobe living in a place where you don't
have regrets, you're thankful for allthose horrible times, and the lowest of
low is because now you're here andjust what that represents to me. I
would say the greatest accomplishment in mymind is the fact that after ten years,
(27:48):
we're still doing this. For onebut we're still best friends. Yeah,
being in a duo is the toughestconfiguration of a band. Being in
a trio, there's a tiebreaker.Being a solo act, you're out there
on an island by yourself. Beingin a group just chaos. Historically,
duos don't make it. Man,it's fifty to fifty. It's like a
marriage. It's if you're not Imean an example, No, I'm kidding,
you're giving me five. If you'renot communicating, if you're not being
(28:10):
open, if you're not working together, you'll go separate directions. We've seen
in a million times in our format. We've seen it in other formats.
It's rare that a duo can staytogether. And the place we're in after
ten years, we've been through highsand lows. But we did the work.
We've put in the work. Weknow what it takes to stay there,
and I'm just proud of that.Man. No matter what happens,
I want to keep getting number ones. I want to win more Grammys,
I want to do all that stuff. You've got to stay hungry. I
(28:32):
want to keep selling out arenas.But the fact that we're still having fun
doing this and we're still having fundoing this together is I think the number
one accommishment when it comes to countrymusic and collaborations. I mean, you
guys are every song you do isa collaboration essentially, right, But collaborations
in country are hotter than they've everbeen, like over the past, probably
(28:52):
like five years. Obviously you hada multi genre a big song with Justin
Bieber. Is there talks of like, hey, we should try and work
outside of us more other than justthe writing, but like as far as
the creating and recording, do youplan out what you want to do in
the future, and if so,who are some people that that might make
the next album. It's a reallygood question. I think. You know,
(29:14):
on this album it was I mean, for what it represented and kind
of how it came about, thatwasn't really on our mind. It was
this was very much an album forus and for our fans and of you
know, our representation of where wewant to go and where we are.
But beyond that, I think thatyou know, on our next project,
you know that we put together itwould be fun to we don't think too
(29:37):
much into that. We kind ofget in and we let the songs write
themselves and we sit around with ourbuddies and it's just kind of, you
know, we let things kind ofhappen, and after the song is finished,
sometimes we'll have we'll throw around ideasof like this person would be awesome.
I always throw out a dell.I've thrown it out for years.
It hasn't happened yet. Listen,We're gonna make it happen. We're gonna
(29:57):
make it happen. She listens.I know specifically to this show. I've
been talking to that. Yeah.She was like, oh, I like
the guy with the beard. Yeah, she's like yeah when she said I
like that, you guys, it'sawesome. That's yeah, that's pretty good.
You could just sing as her onthere. That's true. Range was
pretty good. You just created damncame up with that the other day.
(30:22):
I can't take credit for it.It's pretty good. What about you as
far as like, you know somebodythat you'd like to see on an upcoming
album our song? Oh, that'sthat's tough. We've done a lot of
amazing collaborations. We collaborated with Bieber, collaborated with Charlie Pooth, Like Charlie
is like he's so my musical nerd. Counterpart, you know what I mean,
(30:44):
Like we geeked out so much makingthat track so talented Kelly Clarkson,
Like for me to sit back andlisten to to of the greatest singers of
all time, Kelly Clarkson and Shaysinging back and forth was super special.
So our bar is pretty high.I don't know where we go from there,
but we're good buddies with Codyjohnson.We're huge fans of Cody. We've
always kicked around. We're on agroup text like yo, we should do
a song. It's always like weshould do a song. Like maybe one
(31:06):
of these days will do a songhis vocal delivery and yours mixed together.
That could be crazy, total yeahblast, because you know, I don't
think people would really expect that.And you know, Cody has always been
obviously a good buddy of ours,but I love he always says these things
about being genuine and he used tostay on the stage like, look,
if I tried to go out anddo what Dan and Shay does, I
would look like an idiot and itwouldn't work. And likewise, if we
(31:27):
try to go out and we tryto be Cody Johnson, like you can't
do that, but being one hundredpercent authentically yourself is an amazing thing.
And I just think Dan and Shayeand Cody Johnson collaboration would be absolute.
Flynn put us on the remix ofDirt Cheap. When it goes through it,
Yeah, if I talk up anotherautomatic number one, if I can
get through without crying, it'll beuh, it'll be solid. The last
(31:47):
thing I want to ask you isknowing that you're looking at your careers and
maybe life as a whole different thanyou ever have been. What does twenty
twenty four have to give you foryou to like it was successful? Absolutely
nothing. I mean, it's myhonest answer where I'm at right now in
my life and the things that we'vegotten to do, being able to genuinely
(32:10):
take time. I mean, Ithink the most fun that I've had in
a while. Dan and I andour buddy Jordan Reynolds sat down and wrote
a song the other day just forfun, and it was just like,
it reminded me that you can't controlthe outcome of anything. Obviously, we
want to have hit songs like SendMe the Trouble, but if you can
enjoy that process, it is somethingthat Dan, you know, talked a
(32:30):
lot about he had read, youknow, read a book about this of
just you know, if you cancontrol enjoy the process of something, it
was already a success. And Ijust love the idea of that. And
I was genuinely reminded of that acouple of days ago when we were writing
it, just like, man,this is it, Like this is where
I find the most joy in mylife, besides obviously my kids and my
wife, being able to sit downand write a song and complete it like
(32:52):
with my best friends, and weget to do it and we don't have
to have other jobs. Like unbelievable, you know, someone just fell over.
It's all good, just dropping likeknowledge. In fact, it's just
the truth. And I don't needtwenty twenty four to give me anything else,
because genuinely, like where I'm atin my life right now, I
don't need anything else. If Ican keep what I have right now,
(33:12):
that would be my prayer for twentytwenty four, of just to keep things
exactly like they are. Everything elsejust bonus. I feel bad for Dan
because he can't copy your answer.Well, he told me that answer right
before, and so I told themcars, bigger houses, bigger way,
bigger houses, the same deal.Man. We're so grateful to be doing
this. The fact that if wecan get through twenty four, twenty twenty
(33:36):
four, still be doing what welove, making songs, having people that
care to listen to them. Man, every day when we get in the
room, we always say, we'reso grateful at this point in our career.
We have a fan base, wehave an amazing relationship with country radio.
Whatever we write that day, that'sgot a shot at getting on the
radio. Man, what a dreamcome true. There's millions of people that
would kill to be in that position. We would have killed to be in
(33:57):
that position just a few years agowhen we were kids. If you would
have told us we'd have one numberone, we would have said, you're
a liar. Ten. I mean, come on, get out of town.
It's crazy. And the fact thatwe can still do it and have
fun in the process. Man,everything else is just gravy. You guys
are killing it. Thanks for takingthe time out to chat to thank you.
This is a nice therapy session.I feel fired up and resignated.
Couch in here for next time.The next time, I'm just we'll feed
(34:20):
the microphone over to that couch.There we go. It's there's one right
there. Didn't even realize. I'lltell me about your childhood. Yeah,
we don't want to go here.It was nineteen ninety one. I was
born and the world got a littleworse. You're born. I was born
than ninety one. Yeah, I'mforty eight years old with
Popular Podcasts
1. The Podium
The Podium: An NBC Olympic and Paralympic podcast. Join us for insider coverage during the intense competition at the 2024 Paris Olympic and Paralympic Games. In the run-up to the Opening Ceremony, we’ll bring you deep into the stories and events that have you know and those you'll be hard-pressed to forget.
2. In The Village
In The Village will take you into the most exclusive areas of the 2024 Paris Olympic Games to explore the daily life of athletes, complete with all the funny, mundane and unexpected things you learn off the field of play. Join Elizabeth Beisel as she sits down with Olympians each day in Paris.
3. iHeartOlympics: The Latest
Listen to the latest news from the 2024 Olympics.