Latest / Inside Country with Wayne D / Dan + Shay Get Very Personal

Transcript

Dan + Shay Get Very Personal · Inside Country with Wayne D

0:01
Speaker 1: Make sure nobody sees the first part of that.
0:05
Speaker 2: Hanging in studio with guys that like I just love
0:09
Speaker 2: like brothers, which how could you not?
0:10
Speaker 1: Dan and Shay, Welcome back.
0:12
Speaker 3: Man, dude, So good to see you. Man, been a minute, it.
0:14
Speaker 2: Has he all just walked down Broadway casually. You're first
0:18
Speaker 2: of all, shout out to your record label for parking
0:20
Speaker 2: in Antioch.
0:21
Speaker 3: You know I couldn't.
0:23
Speaker 4: We walked across the river as a seven mile hike.
0:25
Speaker 4: We left at seven this morning to get here.
0:28
Speaker 1: It's about this.
0:28
Speaker 2: That was their way of saying, Hey, you haven't put
0:30
Speaker 2: out a song a little bit, so you haven't been
0:32
Speaker 2: paying the bills so long.
0:35
Speaker 5: That's why we're here, brother, That's why we get the
0:37
Speaker 5: song on the air. Next up is their new song,
0:40
Speaker 5: and then the rest of their songs.
0:41
Speaker 2: As well, all of the songs because dogs, children need
0:45
Speaker 2: to eat, and Tom Martins has to pay for his
0:47
Speaker 2: ninety two Cutlass zero.
0:49
Speaker 5: Parking ain't cheap in Nashville anymore, man, ridiculous, crazy.
0:52
Speaker 1: But there.
0:53
Speaker 2: The rumor is that they're about to start like a
0:55
Speaker 2: locals discount, where the more you park with them, the
0:58
Speaker 2: cheaper it gets.
0:58
Speaker 3: That's what they say here. That another thing.
1:00
Speaker 5: I'm not trying to bash this company, but I kind
1:02
Speaker 5: of am. This is a big platform here that I'm
1:04
Speaker 5: saying this on. The company is called park Happy, Yeah,
1:07
Speaker 5: and they just ticket you like crazy and they charge
1:09
Speaker 5: you in astronomical costs.
1:11
Speaker 3: That ain't happy to me. It's park sad. If you
1:13
Speaker 3: know what I'm saying, like park just change it to
1:16
Speaker 3: park yeah. If it's park happy, it should be free.
1:18
Speaker 3: That's what's going to make me happy. Man.
1:20
Speaker 5: I'm just like, I will walk five miles before paying
1:22
Speaker 5: one dollar for parking twelve south Man. There's a garage
1:25
Speaker 5: like connected to the restaurant. If they ain't validating, I'm
1:27
Speaker 5: parking in the residential section, risking getting ticketed, not having
1:31
Speaker 5: a residential pertmit.
1:32
Speaker 3: It's a principal thing for me that heated about that would.
1:35
Speaker 1: Go more viral than the justin Timberlake.
1:39
Speaker 3: The tour. It's also their logo is absolutely wild.
1:43
Speaker 4: I don't understand what they're really going for. Like park Happy,
1:45
Speaker 4: it's all jovial, and then they've got like a policeman
1:48
Speaker 4: from like the nineteen fifteen that's not.
1:52
Speaker 3: That's from one hundred.
1:53
Speaker 5: Yeah.
1:54
Speaker 1: I'm like Walmart Reader didn't work so you're here booting cars.
1:56
Speaker 3: Yeah, I feel it's a tough name for a company
1:59
Speaker 3: that gives you take.
2:00
Speaker 1: That's right, speaking happy.
2:02
Speaker 2: Last time we got together, y'all had shared details about
2:05
Speaker 2: a new level of happy that you guys have found personally,
2:08
Speaker 2: that it made you stronger musically, it's been a minute
2:12
Speaker 2: since we've heard some new tunes. How is that new
2:16
Speaker 2: mindset kind of helped you, you know, continue to stay
2:19
Speaker 2: on that path?
2:21
Speaker 3: Man?
2:21
Speaker 5: Honestly, like, if you follow our socials, we haven't been
2:24
Speaker 5: posting much on social media recently, which we're just in
2:27
Speaker 5: here bashing everything today.
2:28
Speaker 3: I'm not trying to.
2:28
Speaker 5: Bash socials, but I just I don't know, man, I
2:31
Speaker 5: feel like I kind of got carried away on socials
2:33
Speaker 5: for a few years where I was like spending my
2:34
Speaker 5: entire life digitally.
2:36
Speaker 3: I was online all the time.
2:38
Speaker 5: The algorithm starts feeding you stuff, and I don't know,
2:40
Speaker 5: I feel like the algorithm knows what to feed you
2:41
Speaker 5: to keep you on there, and I just found myself
2:44
Speaker 5: like in a I don't know, kind of a dark
2:46
Speaker 5: place like I tried to. I'm just being proactive about community,
2:50
Speaker 5: being with my friends in real life, hanging with people,
2:52
Speaker 5: going and getting a drink with somebody, grabbing dinner, grabbing
2:54
Speaker 5: a coffee with somebody calling somebody on the phone.
2:56
Speaker 3: I just think that's that's what we're here for.
2:58
Speaker 5: Man, that's life giving, that's the human condition, and that's
3:00
Speaker 5: the human experience. And I think a lot of that's
3:02
Speaker 5: translating into our music. I think, you know, we're getting
3:05
Speaker 5: older now and I've I've had this like midlife crisis
3:08
Speaker 5: about AI and I know.
3:10
Speaker 3: It's you know, it's here to stay, it's.
3:12
Speaker 5: In our lives, and I'm not you know, it's AI
3:17
Speaker 5: is a crazy thing. When we start thinking about as
3:19
Speaker 5: AI coming for our jobs, we're really getting into it here.
3:21
Speaker 3: But as musicians and creatives, it is.
3:23
Speaker 5: I mean, things you can create on AI with the
3:25
Speaker 5: click of one button is pretty surreal. The thing AI
3:28
Speaker 5: can't recreate is human emotion, human connection and authenticity. And
3:33
Speaker 5: I think we kind of just were chasing something, you know,
3:35
Speaker 5: for a little while, for a few months, trying to
3:36
Speaker 5: make songs that I don't know, maybe sounded like hits
3:39
Speaker 5: or we're catchy or whatever, but it's like it just
3:42
Speaker 5: didn't feel authentic to us, or didn't feel real or
3:44
Speaker 5: from our hearts or from our souls and uh, man,
3:47
Speaker 5: we just kind of went back to the drawing board
3:48
Speaker 5: and we're like, man, that's the thing that can take
3:50
Speaker 5: down AI. That's the thing that can combat it. And
3:52
Speaker 5: if at the end of the day, that's what we're here,
3:54
Speaker 5: that's our purpose is to make those songs. Because if
3:57
Speaker 5: we don't believe in it, why should anyone else. You know,
3:59
Speaker 5: we can't walk in here and get on this mic
4:01
Speaker 5: and say like, man, that is me, and when people
4:03
Speaker 5: listen to it and they look at us they can't
4:05
Speaker 5: make that connection, then we're not doing the right thing.
4:07
Speaker 5: We had cold feet about, you know, the direction that
4:09
Speaker 5: we were kind of going down for a little while,
4:10
Speaker 5: and we were like, let's pivot.
4:11
Speaker 3: Let's get back to it.
4:12
Speaker 5: You know, that's the only thing we can do here, man,
4:14
Speaker 5: And we went back into you know, back to the
4:16
Speaker 5: drawing board, kind of wiped slate clean and just started
4:19
Speaker 5: writing about stuff that was pertinent into our lives. Right
4:22
Speaker 5: now in this moment, I'm thirty eight years old, you know,
4:24
Speaker 5: just what's going on in my life right now, what's
4:26
Speaker 5: going on in Shay's life right now?
4:27
Speaker 3: What does his household look like? What does my household
4:29
Speaker 3: look like?
4:30
Speaker 5: What are some real concepts and topics that might be
4:33
Speaker 5: uncomfortable to talk about. And you know, the first single
4:35
Speaker 5: off this record, say So, is that man. It's about
4:39
Speaker 5: one of our good friends, Ben who took his life
4:42
Speaker 5: and it just hit us like a train.
4:45
Speaker 3: Man. It was just like brutal, brutal realization.
4:47
Speaker 5: You know, just from the outside was just always the happiest,
4:50
Speaker 5: most positive guy, or so it seemed. And you know,
4:53
Speaker 5: it's a big part of our story. You know, when
4:55
Speaker 5: Shaye and I met, we were two songwriters, nothing to
4:57
Speaker 5: our name, no money, nothing couldn't afford to eat. I
4:59
Speaker 5: was sneaking into the Hampton in on on West End,
5:02
Speaker 5: stealing connin On breakfast every day just to survive and
5:04
Speaker 5: to get to sessions. But he believed in us early
5:07
Speaker 5: and we're still sign of that publishing company today. Is
5:10
Speaker 5: a big part of the reason we're signing Warner Records Nashville.
5:12
Speaker 5: And he marched us upstairs and said, you got to
5:14
Speaker 5: meet Jonasposito, the president of the label at the time,
5:16
Speaker 5: and big part of our journey, close, close personal friend
5:19
Speaker 5: and just one of those things that like just really
5:22
Speaker 5: shook our worlds. It shook a lot of people in
5:23
Speaker 5: Nashville's Worlds. We're just writing songs for this album. And sorry,
5:28
Speaker 5: I'm ranting right here. It's just this, I don't know,
5:30
Speaker 5: it's just very personal to us and get a little emotional.
5:33
Speaker 3: Talking about it.
5:34
Speaker 5: But we were just sharing stories that day. This is
5:37
Speaker 5: like the song meant was meant to be written that day.
5:39
Speaker 4: You know.
5:40
Speaker 5: Again, he was a big part of our songwriting journey
5:42
Speaker 5: as a song champion for us, Thomas, Rhett Stapleton, all
5:45
Speaker 5: these these artists that are you know on the radio now,
5:48
Speaker 5: but he's just was there early for all of them
5:50
Speaker 5: and was just a close friend.
5:51
Speaker 3: You know, he was at my house.
5:52
Speaker 5: We were all there celebrating bigger houses going number one
5:54
Speaker 5: before this all happened like two weeks before and just
5:56
Speaker 5: no one suspected anything. And we're just sharing stories about
6:00
Speaker 5: then and how much we love him and how much
6:01
Speaker 5: he meant to us. And you know this, this concept
6:04
Speaker 5: of depression and anxiety and mental health is something that's
6:09
Speaker 5: like maybe you would think of Dan and Shay'd be like, ah,
6:11
Speaker 5: this is just a freaking wedding.
6:13
Speaker 3: Guys.
6:13
Speaker 5: You know, they sing love songs about their wives. That's
6:15
Speaker 5: just not a topic we would normally cover. Or tackle,
6:19
Speaker 5: and we were like, you know what, this song there's
6:22
Speaker 5: it needs to be written today.
6:24
Speaker 3: It's on our hearts.
6:24
Speaker 5: We need to see this one through to the finish line.
6:26
Speaker 5: And I think again, not to get too spiritual, it's
6:29
Speaker 5: just like Ben was in the room with us that day.
6:31
Speaker 5: It was meant to be written. We're talking about him.
6:35
Speaker 5: We're like, let's write a song for Ben. You know,
6:36
Speaker 5: this song is heavy, it's tough subject matter, but like,
6:40
Speaker 5: let's write it.
6:41
Speaker 3: Even if it never comes out. It's just a demo
6:43
Speaker 3: on our phones.
6:43
Speaker 5: Like it's cathartic and therapeutic for us to write the
6:46
Speaker 5: song and put those worlds words into the world that day.
6:48
Speaker 3: And we did, and it was just the craziest thing.
6:51
Speaker 4: Man.
6:51
Speaker 5: I came home and played the demo for my wife
6:53
Speaker 5: Abby and she was like, you know, it's incredible, like amazing,
6:57
Speaker 5: beautiful song.
6:58
Speaker 3: Did you guys write that about Ben?
6:59
Speaker 5: And I was like, of course, you know, it's pretty
7:00
Speaker 5: obvious if if you know us and you know Ben,
7:02
Speaker 5: And she was like, that's beautiful that you guys made
7:05
Speaker 5: a beautiful tribute to him on his birthday. We didn't
7:08
Speaker 5: know it was his birthday that day. It would have
7:09
Speaker 5: been his fiftieth birthday. And that's that's more than coincidence
7:13
Speaker 5: to me, man, That's that was a sign this song
7:16
Speaker 5: needed to be written in, this song needed to be heard. Yeah, man,
7:19
Speaker 5: I put up Facebook and sure enough it was like,
7:21
Speaker 5: would you like to wish Ben a happy birthday? And yeah,
7:23
Speaker 5: like I said, it would have been his fiftieth birthday
7:25
Speaker 5: that day, And we had no idea at the time
7:27
Speaker 5: we were writing it. And it's just when it came
7:29
Speaker 5: time to We've got a lot of stuff We're really
7:31
Speaker 5: proud of that that we tapped into. I feel like
7:33
Speaker 5: we hit this creative streak. This just felt like we
7:35
Speaker 5: haven't felt that since the first album. It just was
7:37
Speaker 5: like every day we're writing songs for us, We're popping
7:40
Speaker 5: in with our buddy Brandon Lake writing stuff for his project.
7:43
Speaker 5: Just it was crazy, like two weeks of just like
7:45
Speaker 5: knocking all these tunes out and I don't know, I
7:47
Speaker 5: feel like songs sometimes are in the atmosphere and you
7:49
Speaker 5: just have to be there and you're the conduit in
7:51
Speaker 5: the vehicle that these songs come through. And I just think,
7:54
Speaker 5: I think this song is bigger than Dan and Shay,
7:56
Speaker 5: It's bigger than us It's a song that.
7:58
Speaker 3: We want the world to hear and know.
8:00
Speaker 5: We're proud of the way it sounds and turned out. Everybody,
8:02
Speaker 5: you know, it's like, oh, it sounds like a hit
8:03
Speaker 5: or whatever, but it's to us, it's it's the message,
8:06
Speaker 5: and it's an important message for us to hear for
8:08
Speaker 5: ourselves as guys who've struggled with mental health over the
8:11
Speaker 5: last few years, who've battled it. Whether people know it
8:13
Speaker 5: or not, this is a good opportunity for us to
8:15
Speaker 5: share that, to make it okay, to normalize that. You know,
8:19
Speaker 5: we're open about that, we go to therapy. I mean,
8:21
Speaker 5: I as men, we pushed that down, we bottled up inside,
8:25
Speaker 5: and I think that's an issue, you know. I feel
8:26
Speaker 5: like growing up in Pennsylvania and Pittsburgh blue collar, hard nose,
8:30
Speaker 5: I was like, screw that, man, I'm too tough to
8:31
Speaker 5: get you know. And it took me a lot of
8:33
Speaker 5: years of My wife and people were like, dude, you
8:36
Speaker 5: should go talk to somebody, and I did and it
8:37
Speaker 5: changed my world. With this song, knock on Wood, it
8:41
Speaker 5: goes number one and becomes a big song for us.
8:43
Speaker 5: We love that, but like, if it doesn't, if it whatever,
8:47
Speaker 5: if it a fall it ever does is helps one person.
8:49
Speaker 3: Or saves one life.
8:50
Speaker 5: It was worth it for us and that's I don't know,
8:52
Speaker 5: that's a conviction we have on this thing. And man,
8:54
Speaker 5: I'm proud of it. I feel like, you know, we've
8:56
Speaker 5: made a lot of songs that meant something to us
8:58
Speaker 5: in our career, but this song song means more and
9:00
Speaker 5: I think it's just it's an important song for us
9:02
Speaker 5: to put out there.
9:03
Speaker 2: Early in your career, everything was fun and light and lovy.
9:06
Speaker 2: Now that you guys have experienced life and obviously you
9:08
Speaker 2: were very vocal about, you know, difficulties you had a
9:11
Speaker 2: couple of years ago.
9:13
Speaker 1: Does music need to have more purpose now than it did?
9:16
Speaker 2: Because obviously the hey, this is fun, let's you know early,
9:19
Speaker 2: but now like to fulfill where you're at life wise
9:21
Speaker 2: and career wise, do does the music need a little
9:23
Speaker 2: more purpose behind it for you to to keep you
9:25
Speaker 2: excited and engaged?
9:26
Speaker 3: Absolutely? Man, you know, and I think you you know,
9:28
Speaker 3: you hit the nail on the head.
9:29
Speaker 4: Like early on, like we had a lot of fun songs,
9:31
Speaker 4: we were talking about these things and like that's where
9:33
Speaker 4: we were in our life at the time, you know,
9:35
Speaker 4: and looking around at our lives now, Like I think
9:38
Speaker 4: the word that I would use is there's just more
9:40
Speaker 4: depth to it, Like things mean more to us because
9:44
Speaker 4: we've gone through time.
9:45
Speaker 3: Like that's what time does.
9:46
Speaker 4: Like I always love to you know, the saying you
9:48
Speaker 4: can't make old friends, like we've been friends with you
9:50
Speaker 4: now for a very long time. And what you what
9:52
Speaker 4: you build over time, it's you know, it's trust, it's
9:55
Speaker 4: it's community, and it's love that only can be you
9:59
Speaker 4: can fake that.
10:00
Speaker 3: It's something that has to be.
10:01
Speaker 4: Built, you know, with time, and something that has earned
10:05
Speaker 4: And I look at that in our lives like now
10:07
Speaker 4: I have you know, four kids, and Dan and I's
10:10
Speaker 4: relationship we've known each other now for like twelve or
10:12
Speaker 4: thirteen years, and we've it's blood, sweat and tears of
10:15
Speaker 4: like time and sleepless nights like that we have gotten
10:18
Speaker 4: to experience together. You can't fake that until actual time
10:22
Speaker 4: goes by. And I feel like that's a common thread
10:25
Speaker 4: of this music is it's kind of an exploration of
10:27
Speaker 4: what time is and why it's important that we take
10:31
Speaker 4: a second to be like, hey, this is uh, this
10:34
Speaker 4: this means something, you know, like to be able to
10:36
Speaker 4: be creative and being open and honest, you know, with
10:38
Speaker 4: each other and with like our lives.
10:40
Speaker 3: It's a very important thing. We don't know how much.
10:42
Speaker 4: Time we have on this earth, which is a very
10:44
Speaker 4: scary thing. And back in twenty twenty was probably the
10:47
Speaker 4: source of my anxiety and panic attacks for the very
10:50
Speaker 4: first time, like a fear of death, fear of like
10:53
Speaker 4: the fact that you know, one of these days, like
10:55
Speaker 4: I'm not going to have any more time.
10:56
Speaker 3: And it was a very scary thing.
10:58
Speaker 4: And I think, as you know, I worked through that
11:00
Speaker 4: and saw a therapist and talking with my wife and
11:02
Speaker 4: talking with Dan, like you know, having a community around me,
11:05
Speaker 4: you realize, like that is the most important thing.
11:07
Speaker 3: About life, is that it is fragile.
11:09
Speaker 2: You know.
11:09
Speaker 4: I look at my kids and like it's devastating to
11:11
Speaker 4: me that you know, back in twenty twenty when we
11:14
Speaker 4: played our first big arena show right across the street
11:16
Speaker 4: over here, that you know, my oldest was two years
11:18
Speaker 4: old and now he's nine, and the fact that time.
11:20
Speaker 3: Has just flown by.
11:22
Speaker 4: And if there's anything that I've learned as a dad
11:24
Speaker 4: and as a friend and all these things, is that
11:26
Speaker 4: we have to find ways to capture these moments of
11:30
Speaker 4: magic in our life. And even with the sad things
11:33
Speaker 4: that we go through, like being able to have a
11:34
Speaker 4: community to get through those things. On the other side
11:37
Speaker 4: of that, there's a lot of weight and heaviness, not
11:40
Speaker 4: necessarily in a bad way, like I have. Me and
11:43
Speaker 4: my wife have been through a lot of hard things
11:45
Speaker 4: now and we've built something together. Me and Dan been
11:47
Speaker 4: through a lot of hard things together, our wives, like
11:50
Speaker 4: our whole you know, friend group, Like we've all been
11:52
Speaker 4: through a lot of stuff us as a community.
11:54
Speaker 3: I mean, it's been a really tough few years. But
11:57
Speaker 3: what's on the other.
11:57
Speaker 4: Side of that is is really a to me because
12:01
Speaker 4: even though there's a lot of heartbreak, you know, and
12:03
Speaker 4: all these things that have happened, you know, in our life,
12:05
Speaker 4: on the other side of that was something really special
12:08
Speaker 4: where it was like it's time that we've spent. It's
12:11
Speaker 4: the people that we've shared these moments with, and it's
12:13
Speaker 4: just weighty. And I feel like our music kind of
12:15
Speaker 4: feels like that. It's exactly where we're at in our
12:17
Speaker 4: life right now. And when I say weighty, it's not
12:19
Speaker 4: all you know, sad songs. There's a lot of hope
12:23
Speaker 4: and happiness and all this music and it's a discovery
12:25
Speaker 4: of time and since we only have a certain amount
12:28
Speaker 4: of time on this earth, that's what's beautiful about it
12:30
Speaker 4: is that we have to take each moment for captive
12:32
Speaker 4: and make sure that we are enjoying these things. But
12:35
Speaker 4: I think with a song like say So, it even
12:38
Speaker 4: captures that too, like with this little amount of time
12:40
Speaker 4: that we have here on earth, like make sure that
12:42
Speaker 4: we're taking each you know, don't take a second for
12:44
Speaker 4: granted because somebody might be going through something and having
12:48
Speaker 4: that community like us, creating a culture that inspires people
12:52
Speaker 4: to talk about, you know, their feelings is important because
12:55
Speaker 4: I think that just encouraging that could save one person's life.
12:59
Speaker 4: And if it that, I think it's it was more
13:01
Speaker 4: than worth it to be able to kind of open
13:03
Speaker 4: up this conversation. And I know that we I feel
13:05
Speaker 4: like I've been rambling when I talk about this, because
13:08
Speaker 4: it really is just it's a realization that we've come
13:10
Speaker 4: to through a lot of hard work, you know, and
13:13
Speaker 4: talking about it. But I think that it's so important
13:15
Speaker 4: that we put out a song like this because it
13:17
Speaker 4: is so much bigger than us, and you know, like
13:20
Speaker 4: Dan said, and I think it's a it's an important
13:22
Speaker 4: message it's a timely message, and I hope that we're
13:25
Speaker 4: able to contribute to that in a way that maybe
13:27
Speaker 4: someone else couldn't. You know, there's there's other people who've
13:29
Speaker 4: tackled this subject before, and there's a lot of amazing
13:31
Speaker 4: resources for people out there. But I think that when
13:35
Speaker 4: it's someone like us, I think that people that maybe
13:39
Speaker 4: wouldn't listen to somebody else, they might listen to us,
13:42
Speaker 4: because I think that there's this kind of stigma of
13:44
Speaker 4: like people who are dealing with mental health look a
13:47
Speaker 4: certain way or they have you know, you would just
13:49
Speaker 4: think it's these people, And more times than not, it's
13:51
Speaker 4: always the people you least expect it.
13:53
Speaker 3: Like our friend Ben.
13:54
Speaker 4: You would never look at that guy from the outside
13:56
Speaker 4: and say he's dealing with something very difficult. And I
13:58
Speaker 4: think that that's usually the case. I mean for us,
14:01
Speaker 4: people would look at from the outsides like these guys
14:03
Speaker 4: are doing great, they're having success, you know, they've got
14:05
Speaker 4: a family, like all these things are good.
14:07
Speaker 3: But sometimes that's the weight of that will get you.
14:10
Speaker 4: And I think it's a thing that we need to
14:13
Speaker 4: make sure that we create this community that is a
14:15
Speaker 4: safe place and encourages especially men to like, hey, say something,
14:18
Speaker 4: there's always somebody on the other line, and it's just
14:21
Speaker 4: a I think it's a really important message that I'm
14:23
Speaker 4: so proud to be a part of and a lot
14:25
Speaker 4: bigger than just us.
14:26
Speaker 1: And I didn't know this.
14:27
Speaker 2: I liked this song before and the message was so
14:30
Speaker 2: good before, but now to hear a story behind it,
14:33
Speaker 2: it's like, I mean, I have goosebumps knowing how what
14:37
Speaker 2: this song could mean. And that's one thing y'all have
14:39
Speaker 2: always done well, is like, here's what the song means
14:41
Speaker 2: to us, But like.
14:43
Speaker 1: You let whoever hears it own and how they have to.
14:46
Speaker 2: Is it tough? Because now knowing more story behind the song?
14:51
Speaker 2: You guys are great entertainers, you're great performers, you're great songwriters.
14:54
Speaker 1: But to do something like this, man, you've got to
14:56
Speaker 1: be vulnerable. Was that tough?
15:00
Speaker 2: Not that you haven't been vulnerable songs before, but man,
15:02
Speaker 2: this this is a whole new level of that.
15:04
Speaker 3: Big time.
15:04
Speaker 5: I mean, this is maybe too personal, and I'm going
15:06
Speaker 5: to just air it out here anyways because we're buds,
15:09
Speaker 5: but talk about it with my therapist. I was dealing
15:11
Speaker 5: with a lot of you know, just anxiety and imposter
15:15
Speaker 5: syndrome and just things that we all go through, you know,
15:17
Speaker 5: And he was like, you should have an open conversation
15:21
Speaker 5: with your fans at some point, like whether it's on
15:23
Speaker 5: social post one story or go on stage and be like, hey, guys,
15:27
Speaker 5: I just want to clear the air right now. I'm like,
15:29
Speaker 5: I'm dealing with some I'm anxious, I'm dealing with like
15:31
Speaker 5: break that fourth wall with the fans. And I was like, oh, dude,
15:33
Speaker 5: what am I I'm not going to say that.
15:35
Speaker 3: And this song is called Speechless. It doesn't make any sense,
15:37
Speaker 3: you know what I mean.
15:38
Speaker 5: Like that was hard for me trying to minimize the
15:40
Speaker 5: gap between the guy that I am off stage and
15:42
Speaker 5: the guy that I am on stage, because I think
15:44
Speaker 5: when you can minimize that gap and you can really
15:46
Speaker 5: perfect that, that's when people.
15:48
Speaker 3: Love you for you, and I think they do. It's
15:50
Speaker 3: just we convince ourselves.
15:51
Speaker 5: I have to go on stage and be like stone
15:53
Speaker 5: cold Steve Auston, I'm going crazy up here, you know,
15:55
Speaker 5: still good at that, because that's fun, you know. That's like,
15:57
Speaker 5: that's what we want to do since we were little kids.
15:59
Speaker 5: But I think we get caught up sometimes and trying
16:02
Speaker 5: to present who we think that the people want us
16:04
Speaker 5: to present to them, you know who we think that
16:06
Speaker 5: they think that we should be. And it was just
16:09
Speaker 5: like we had this conversation about trying to minimize that
16:11
Speaker 5: gap and breaking that wall. And I think, selfishly, this
16:14
Speaker 5: song is that for me, you know. I mean it's
16:16
Speaker 5: hard to do in the same way it was hard
16:18
Speaker 5: for me as a tough man or whatever to like
16:23
Speaker 5: say I need help, I need to go to therapy.
16:25
Speaker 5: But I think being able to stand on stage every
16:27
Speaker 5: night and say, like, hey guys, I'm I'm probably gonna
16:30
Speaker 5: take more than a minute of their time.
16:31
Speaker 3: You hear me rambling about it right now. You hear
16:33
Speaker 3: how passionate we are.
16:33
Speaker 5: But to just be able to say that on stage,
16:36
Speaker 5: to break that wall, to have that open line of
16:38
Speaker 5: communication with the fans, I feel such a cloud lifted
16:41
Speaker 5: in my own personal world. So maybe that's selfish, but
16:44
Speaker 5: I think it's important. I think it's just a necessary
16:46
Speaker 5: step for healing or getting better as a person, as
16:49
Speaker 5: a man. And I don't know, I just really look
16:51
Speaker 5: forward to that moment in the set. It's a heavy moment,
16:53
Speaker 5: it's serious, But I do think if we can be
16:55
Speaker 5: as vulnerable as humanly possible in that moment, it might
16:58
Speaker 5: make somebody out there in the crowd who may not
17:00
Speaker 5: have otherwise reached out, may not have otherwise whether it's
17:03
Speaker 5: you know, whether it's you're in such a severe place
17:06
Speaker 5: that you're suicidal, or whether it's that you're just going
17:08
Speaker 5: through some stuff like, both of those matter. You know,
17:12
Speaker 5: whether you need to call the Suicide and Crisis Hotline
17:14
Speaker 5: nine eight eight, or whether you're just dealing with some
17:16
Speaker 5: anxiety and you need to ask somebody like, hey man,
17:19
Speaker 5: can we grab a coffee or something? Those are both matter,
17:22
Speaker 5: and this song is going to both of those people.
17:24
Speaker 2: And I think as much as you both have said,
17:26
Speaker 2: you know, I'm rambling or I'm sorry, I'm going on
17:29
Speaker 2: and on what I think that you might not see,
17:32
Speaker 2: like from your point of view, but as a fan
17:34
Speaker 2: and as somebody who's going to the show, as you're
17:36
Speaker 2: talking about, if you stop down like that, you're giving
17:39
Speaker 2: a parent a chance of connected with a kid. Sure
17:41
Speaker 2: on the top, you may have just broke the ice
17:43
Speaker 2: for them. Not only that, they'll talk about that moment
17:46
Speaker 2: in the car the whole ride home, more than the Pyro,
17:49
Speaker 2: more than the hits, more than because you were you
17:52
Speaker 2: weren't Dan and Shaye.
17:54
Speaker 3: We were Dan and Jan and shit exactly.
17:57
Speaker 2: So that's that's as a as a fan who's going
18:00
Speaker 2: to go to shows to see something like.
18:02
Speaker 1: That would be mind blowing. I love that.
18:04
Speaker 2: So how do you keep when you guys have worked
18:09
Speaker 2: with like Saint Jude's obviously huge a country music You've
18:12
Speaker 2: done stuff with them before. You guys are involved with
18:15
Speaker 2: the animal rescue in town here, when you were a
18:18
Speaker 2: part of a mission, it doesn't just end there, right,
18:20
Speaker 2: It's about keeping the mission alive past that. If you
18:24
Speaker 2: lose a friend, it's not just about this song, right.
18:27
Speaker 2: How So have you guys thought of how do you
18:30
Speaker 2: somebody who is so close to you, so close to
18:32
Speaker 2: the foundation of why you are where you are today,
18:34
Speaker 2: how do you keep his memory alive past this song?
18:38
Speaker 4: I think that you know, obviously it started really for us.
18:41
Speaker 4: Obviously we've had internal conversations and you know this town.
18:45
Speaker 4: He was a very revered guy in this town and
18:47
Speaker 4: was made a big impact on a.
18:49
Speaker 3: Lot of people's careers because.
18:52
Speaker 4: He cared, you know, And I think that us talking
18:54
Speaker 4: about Ben, you know, and obviously this song we're going
18:58
Speaker 4: to be talking about Ben a lot. But I think
19:00
Speaker 4: there's having this conversation and finding ways. I think it's
19:04
Speaker 4: going to be an ever changing thing. I think the
19:06
Speaker 4: best thing that we could do in Ben's honor is
19:09
Speaker 4: to do exactly what we're doing, you know, with putting
19:11
Speaker 4: this song out and trying to champion people speaking up
19:15
Speaker 4: and saying something.
19:17
Speaker 3: And we're we've we're going to do a lot of
19:19
Speaker 3: different things.
19:21
Speaker 4: There's a lot of amazing resources that currently exist. And
19:24
Speaker 4: I think, you know, for us, it doesn't matter what
19:26
Speaker 4: that looks like, whether it's partnering with other people, We're
19:28
Speaker 4: going to do that, whether it's starting some sort of foundation,
19:31
Speaker 4: you know with Porter's call in town here, whatever that
19:33
Speaker 4: looks like, we want to do as much as we
19:36
Speaker 4: possibly can to you know, not only you know, hold
19:40
Speaker 4: hold Ben's you know memory, you know, close to our
19:43
Speaker 4: hearts and to make sure to share you know, his message.
19:45
Speaker 4: But I think for for other people, there's when you
19:48
Speaker 4: start talking about something like this, there's one million stories
19:51
Speaker 4: that start to you know that you start to hear
19:54
Speaker 4: everybody has a story about some either whether it's themselves
19:57
Speaker 4: going through anxiety or you know, depression or whatever it is,
20:00
Speaker 4: someone has dealt with that or someone has lost someone
20:03
Speaker 4: you know to suicide and has dealt with this in
20:06
Speaker 4: some sort of way, and I think the best way
20:07
Speaker 4: we can honor his memory is making sure that we
20:09
Speaker 4: make sure those people are heard and that they are
20:12
Speaker 4: you know, inspired to say something or to talk about
20:14
Speaker 4: with them. And I think what's interesting about this song too,
20:17
Speaker 4: is it's not just the people who have dealt with
20:21
Speaker 4: mental health issues.
20:22
Speaker 3: I think that there's there's also.
20:23
Speaker 4: A lot of other scenarios where people that this song
20:26
Speaker 4: can bring them hope, because even though this song is
20:28
Speaker 4: a heavy topic, the song as a whole like it
20:31
Speaker 4: it is a message of hope. It's a message of
20:33
Speaker 4: hope to say something, you know before it is too late.
20:35
Speaker 4: And I think that you know, whether it's dealing with
20:39
Speaker 4: with you know, mental health issues, or someone who is
20:42
Speaker 4: you know, battling cancer, has someone who has you know,
20:45
Speaker 4: lost the fight to cancer, I think there's a lot
20:47
Speaker 4: of different people who can that have heard this song
20:49
Speaker 4: already and said, hey, like, when I heard this, this
20:51
Speaker 4: is what I thought of. And I think that a
20:53
Speaker 4: lot of people will take this song and kind of
20:55
Speaker 4: make it their own. And I think that's the whole
20:57
Speaker 4: point that we want to be able to open up
20:59
Speaker 4: this conversation, and however someone hears it and receives that
21:03
Speaker 4: with it being one hundred percent honest from our story,
21:06
Speaker 4: I think it'll even it'll touch them even deeper because
21:09
Speaker 4: they know it's it's from a place of like this
21:11
Speaker 4: song was supposed to be written, Like I think that
21:13
Speaker 4: this song is that message of hope that was just
21:15
Speaker 4: a gift from above, Like this is supposed to be
21:17
Speaker 4: out in the world and what happens after that, Like
21:20
Speaker 4: that's not all on you guys, Like do this part
21:21
Speaker 4: of it?
21:22
Speaker 3: And I think you know that. I think it'll take
21:25
Speaker 3: care of itself.
21:25
Speaker 4: And I think as long as we're doing our job
21:28
Speaker 4: to maybe encourage people to just have these kind of
21:31
Speaker 4: conversations like hey, how are you going to do this?
21:33
Speaker 4: Like we don't really know all the ways that this
21:35
Speaker 4: song's going to touch people. And I think as long
21:38
Speaker 4: as we're really pursuing that with an open heart and
21:40
Speaker 4: our hearts are in the right place of trying to
21:42
Speaker 4: make sure that as many people can hear this song
21:45
Speaker 4: in particular as they can, because I know that this
21:48
Speaker 4: is going to touch somebody's life. You know, it already
21:50
Speaker 4: has just internally of people hearing this song, it's really
21:53
Speaker 4: affected them.
21:53
Speaker 3: It's affected us first.
21:56
Speaker 4: But yeah, man, I'm excited to see the ways that
21:58
Speaker 4: this song is used to help you people. And you know,
22:00
Speaker 4: like Dan said earlier, like putting out this song, if
22:03
Speaker 4: it helps one person, like, what an amazing thing to
22:06
Speaker 4: be a.
22:06
Speaker 3: Part of that.
22:07
Speaker 4: We get to be the voices that bring awareness to
22:10
Speaker 4: this and there's a lot of people that are doing
22:12
Speaker 4: that in an amazing way. And whether it's partnering with them, like,
22:15
Speaker 4: this is all whatever we can possibly do, and I'm
22:18
Speaker 4: excited to see what comes out of this. You know,
22:20
Speaker 4: what kind of partnerships come out of this, and that
22:22
Speaker 4: we we just want the most amount of people to hear, like, hey,
22:25
Speaker 4: there's always somebody listening, there's always somebody on the other
22:27
Speaker 4: end of that line, and we want to make sure
22:29
Speaker 4: to be that that voice that encourages people to do that.
22:31
Speaker 2: You guys are creating NonStop and I'm sure texting NonStop
22:35
Speaker 2: about ideas and whatnot. Did this kind of just pop
22:40
Speaker 2: in the middle of ideas that we're already brewing or
22:43
Speaker 2: was this kind of like, hey, we knew this was
22:45
Speaker 2: going to be our next offering, whether it's country radio
22:48
Speaker 2: single or something we just put out on our own
22:50
Speaker 2: before the next the next full project. Did this kind
22:54
Speaker 2: of hop in front of the line, or was this
22:56
Speaker 2: already in the works this song?
22:57
Speaker 5: No, man, we hit this streak of a couple of weeks,
22:59
Speaker 5: just like creative wild inspiration, just writing a bunch of songs,
23:03
Speaker 5: and a lot of songs will come from a title
23:04
Speaker 5: that's in somebody's phone and it's like, yeah, that's going
23:07
Speaker 5: to be a good hook or whatever, you know, but
23:09
Speaker 5: this one. Sometimes the most beautiful songs come from just
23:12
Speaker 5: a conversation in the room.
23:13
Speaker 3: We started writing the song.
23:15
Speaker 5: And didn't have like, you know a lot of times
23:16
Speaker 5: you got that bluebird moment that you tee up, you
23:19
Speaker 5: rhyming with the last whatever the title is, and it's like, well,
23:21
Speaker 5: that's okay, that's how we land that hook. This one, actually,
23:24
Speaker 5: a lot of the songs came from that. We were
23:26
Speaker 5: just singing in the room or just saying what was
23:29
Speaker 5: on our heart, and then we figured out how to
23:30
Speaker 5: get to what the title was, you know. And it
23:33
Speaker 5: was one of those ones that didn't come in a
23:34
Speaker 5: notes document that was like, say so, we should write
23:36
Speaker 5: a song called say so today. It was from a
23:38
Speaker 5: conversation about our friend, and that was kind of just
23:41
Speaker 5: where we landed. We thought that was a powerful way
23:43
Speaker 5: to say it. No pun intended. It's just like, man,
23:45
Speaker 5: if you're going through hell, you're not alone. If you
23:47
Speaker 5: need somebody, say so. And whether that's picking up the
23:50
Speaker 5: phone and calling somebody on the other line or just
23:51
Speaker 5: in the room with your buddy asking for help. I mean,
23:53
Speaker 5: we just want to make that, We want to normalize that,
23:55
Speaker 5: make it okay.
23:57
Speaker 3: Yeah.
23:57
Speaker 5: Man, this is a song that I don't know, we've
24:00
Speaker 5: said a million times, just needed to be written that
24:01
Speaker 5: day and it was a special week of creativity. Every
24:05
Speaker 5: song that we wrote, I feel like help tell the
24:08
Speaker 5: story of the next one that we wrote.
24:10
Speaker 3: We got a lot of stuff.
24:11
Speaker 5: You know, there's a lot of songs in there that
24:13
Speaker 5: I think like sound like hits that feel amazing, they
24:15
Speaker 5: still feel personal. But this one, for some reason, just
24:18
Speaker 5: felt like it needed to come out first. You know,
24:20
Speaker 5: it sets the tone for the record. It's I would
24:21
Speaker 5: say this stuff that we're working on this batch of
24:24
Speaker 5: music is it's not like it's not all heavy, it's
24:26
Speaker 5: not all weighty, it's not all sad, but I would
24:28
Speaker 5: say it's serious. It's like reflective of where we are
24:30
Speaker 5: in our lives. As I'm a little older than Shay,
24:33
Speaker 5: but a thirty eight year old man, you know what
24:34
Speaker 5: I'm saying. It's like, it's not We're not parking up
24:36
Speaker 5: at the tin roof and party until three in the morning.
24:38
Speaker 5: As much as we use I'm saying never, but I
24:40
Speaker 5: said as much as we used to. You know, we
24:42
Speaker 5: can still pop it off.
24:43
Speaker 2: Oh sorry, exactly, exactly, yeah, exactly.
24:48
Speaker 3: I all had this Sonsea at four pm, you know,
24:51
Speaker 3: which is true? Anyways, I don't.
24:54
Speaker 5: Know, man, life is real, and I just worded a
24:56
Speaker 5: little bit of a different spot now than we were
24:57
Speaker 5: when we got started here, So I think subject matter
25:00
Speaker 5: reflects that, and I don't know.
25:02
Speaker 3: I'm proud, man, I'm proud of this stuff that we're making,
25:04
Speaker 3: especially this song.
25:05
Speaker 5: It feels like just coming in here talking about it,
25:07
Speaker 5: talking to you about it, like listening to when you
25:10
Speaker 5: played it on your phone just there, I'm like, man's
25:12
Speaker 5: that's cool.
25:13
Speaker 3: I think that song is gonna live on for a
25:14
Speaker 3: long time.
25:15
Speaker 1: It feels it feels great, And the thing is.
25:19
Speaker 2: Not to I'd compliment you NonStop when you're in here,
25:22
Speaker 2: but it's the song. The song is so good, and
25:25
Speaker 2: it tells the story you needed it to tell. But like,
25:28
Speaker 2: I didn't know anything about Ben. I didn't know his
25:30
Speaker 2: tide to the song, or his story or even his
25:33
Speaker 2: chapter in your guy's story, right, So I got to
25:36
Speaker 2: hear the song the way my ears needed it. So
25:40
Speaker 2: you still got what you needed right therapeutically and then
25:43
Speaker 2: to share. But like I heard it the way like
25:46
Speaker 2: my mind needed to hear it. So it's cool because
25:48
Speaker 2: you got what you needed out of it, right, and
25:51
Speaker 2: now it gets to serve the world however it needs to.
25:53
Speaker 3: That's the beautiful thing about music, you know.
25:56
Speaker 5: I think everybody can have their own interpretation of songs,
25:58
Speaker 5: and it's crazy as it sounds. We've had people come
26:01
Speaker 5: off to us and be like, man, your song Tequila,
26:03
Speaker 5: Like that song saved my life or whatever, you know.
26:05
Speaker 5: I mean, it's like it's that's beautiful, like whatever it means.
26:08
Speaker 5: That's a heartbreak song, you know. But I've also had
26:10
Speaker 5: people say that was my wedding song. What kind of
26:12
Speaker 5: wedding is that we first danced in Tequila? Well, you
26:16
Speaker 5: guys are doomed through Chaplin, Vegas. That's where they pay
26:19
Speaker 5: out exactly. Yeah, man, I mean, but I think, you know,
26:23
Speaker 5: having this platforms, thank you always for letting us come
26:26
Speaker 5: on here and you know, share our truth. But I
26:28
Speaker 5: think it's important to give it context. But I do
26:30
Speaker 5: also think it's important for people to put their own
26:32
Speaker 5: message and put their own spin on it as well,
26:34
Speaker 5: because I think the end of the day, it is hopeful,
26:36
Speaker 5: it is optimistic. You know, those kind of songs that
26:38
Speaker 5: carry a lot of weight. Sometimes could be the real sad,
26:41
Speaker 5: depressing piano ballad that's tracked ten on the record that
26:44
Speaker 5: doesn't ever see the light of day, and it's very personal.
26:46
Speaker 3: But this I think combines all the things. It's hopeful.
26:48
Speaker 3: It's still bangs on the radio.
26:50
Speaker 5: You know, it's one of those those vibes, but I
26:52
Speaker 5: just I think it carries a lot of weight. And
26:54
Speaker 5: when you find one of those songs, you gotta roll
26:56
Speaker 5: with it. And that's what we're doing. Man, We're going
26:58
Speaker 5: We're diving in head first, and I don't know, we're
27:01
Speaker 5: not afraid of it. We're not afraid to come on
27:02
Speaker 5: here and talk. As you know, it's an important subject
27:05
Speaker 5: for us.
27:07
Speaker 2: Last thing I'm gonna ask you and don't make me
27:10
Speaker 2: fight on Wednesday morning, But you're not leaving without saying
27:13
Speaker 2: when the album's coming out.
27:16
Speaker 4: It came out last night, we'll tell you as soon
27:21
Speaker 4: as the as soon as the we go off there.
27:24
Speaker 2: But is there pressure to get that stuff done like
27:28
Speaker 2: in a timely fashion obviously early?
27:30
Speaker 3: Yeah, we moved the date up.
27:31
Speaker 2: Actually, yeah, we wade up because of because of these
27:36
Speaker 2: clowns over there, the clowns on the left, not that
27:39
Speaker 2: it was.
27:39
Speaker 5: Kind of like my bad combined with some other people's bad.
27:42
Speaker 3: Well, I can't give a date yet, but it was
27:44
Speaker 3: gonna be later. And we've got the songs.
27:47
Speaker 5: I mean that we think we have a song, we're
27:49
Speaker 5: excited about them, but it was like the passion and
27:52
Speaker 5: excitement that we felt behind the scenes for this song
27:54
Speaker 5: already is like we don't want to spread out the
27:57
Speaker 5: distance between when this song comes out and when the
27:59
Speaker 5: album was supposed to come out, and if we're ready,
28:02
Speaker 5: like let's go, you know, let's go these songs. We
28:05
Speaker 5: feel like the world needs to hear these songs. We've
28:07
Speaker 5: kind of made them wait long enough. It's been three
28:08
Speaker 5: years since our last one, so we haven't posted on
28:11
Speaker 5: socials in a long time either.
28:12
Speaker 1: Yeah, No, it's I know almost unfollowed, I'm like, God, yeah,
28:16
Speaker 1: what are you doing?
28:17
Speaker 3: I would if I were you.
28:18
Speaker 5: Honestly, I've nothing that compelling here you are, guys.
28:22
Speaker 3: I appreciate the time.
28:23
Speaker 2: Thanks for carving out, and we can't wait to share
28:26
Speaker 2: Ben's legacy on the radio with the song.
28:28
Speaker 3: Dude, You're the best man. We love you, Love you
28:30
Speaker 3: to your boys.
28:30
Speaker 2: Thanks.
28:31
Speaker 3: Thanks man,