Latest / Happy Hour with Deb / J Edwards Shares His Country Music Journey, Touring & AI in Music Ep121

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J Edwards Shares His Country Music Journey, Touring & AI in Music Ep121 · Happy Hour with Deb

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_01: I just go ahead and tell them I'm old and mean and get used to it, you know.
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, I think you're kind of look you're rocking a Santa look a little bit.
• 0:07
  SPEAKER_01: Ah, see, now this mean part's gonna come out in the joke.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_03: Hey, it's Deb.
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_03: It's Happy Hour Deb, and this is the best happy hour ever.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_03: I got some of my dear friends, and I have Jay Edwards.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_03: Welcome to Happy Hour.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you, thank you.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_01: We're glad to be here.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_03: It's so good to have you here.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_03: You have quite the extensive resume, although, from what I'm understanding, you've been flying under the radar your whole life.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_01: Sure.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_03: How'd that go?
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_03: Like, how'd you get started in this great industry and how'd you build your brand?
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I mean, I I've been in this forever, music forever.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_01: So I started out as a little kid uh traveling with my family, playing Christian music, gospel music, and uh played all kinds of instruments.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_01: My dad was an evangelist, and my mom played accordion or piano.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_01: Where are you from?
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_01: Uh South Arkansas.
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_03: Arkansas, that's very northeastern Louisiana.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_01: I get to claim both states, but uh mostly South Arkansas.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_03: Amen.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, I claim Nashville, I don't live here.
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_06: My mom was born in Baton Rouge.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_03: Was she really?
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_01: That's that's a cool play, cool area.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not from that area at all.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm from the white trash section of Louisiana.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_03: It's not white trash, it's a dive bar.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_03: That's what we start calling it.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_03: We don't want to we don't want to offend the white trash, but we're just gonna say dive bar.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_03: We were just talking about the power of a dive bar earlier.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_03: When did you start playing by yourself?
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_03: Like when did you break out from the family?
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_03: Oh evangelists.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, I would love to have an evangelist in my life.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I uh I think um good gracious when I was in the teens, so yeah, I started traveling.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_01: Um I started traveling when I was 16 or 17 out doing churches and stuff.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_03: That's incredible.
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_03: You've been doing this quite the long time.
• 1:58
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, yeah, yeah, I'm old.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_03: You're not old, sir, you're well seasoned.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_03: That's what I say.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_03: I tell the entire world, everybody knows this on this show and everybody in this room.
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_03: I tell everybody I'm 29.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_04: Right?
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_04: I do.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_04: Timmy knows.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_03: I'm like, oh wow, it's good to be there.
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_03: Age is just a number.
• 2:13
  SPEAKER_03: That's all I just resonate as a 29-year-old, and I'll I'll just keep it.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_01: I just go ahead and tell them I'm old and mean and get used to it, you know.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, I think you're kind of look, you're rocking a Santa look a little bit.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, see, now this mean part's gonna come out everything.
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_01: No, I haven't.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_03: Did you bring us toys?
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_03: That would be amazing.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_03: New guitar is for everybody.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_03: Timmy got a toy this morning.
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_03: We should all get a break.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna have to tell a few of them, hey, get your kid off my lap.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_01: I ain't him.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_01: Oh my gosh.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_03: I actually so I just became a grandmom um a few uh eight months ago, and they took the baby to see the grinch and not Santa.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_03: And her face was like like she was gonna throw up.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_03: I'm like, get that baby off the bridge.
• 2:53
  SPEAKER_03: But that's amazing.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_03: So you started moving into music when you were really young.
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_03: What was an inspiration when you were younger?
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_03: Who's your inspiration music?
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_01: Everything.
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_01: I I mean we could be here forever.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_01: I I started out, of course.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, we can be here.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, okay.
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_03: Once you get to know me, you're like just a little Susie talks a lot.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I'm the same way.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_01: I like to play music and I like to tell stories and talk too.
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_01: So yeah.
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I uh I started out doing music and uh and in the church, and so it was um a lot of gospel influence.
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_03: There's nothing like a Southern Baptist church.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, I we go deeper than that, though.
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_01: I get came up Pentecostal, so really we're totally road tripping one day to go to this church, all of us.
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_01: We're getting in a car.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_01: I've jumped a pew and all the other stuff, so yeah, that's crazy.
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_01: Oh man, yeah.
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_01: And I we just came up romping and stomping, and I influences though.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_01: I mean I came up in the 80s, so there was a lot of that 80s rock stuff that was.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_01: And uh I got an old Torah voice, and and uh I leaned more into the blues and an old.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_03: You got a blues voice.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_03: You got a blues voice.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_01: I know that's what they told me when I came to Nashville in 2009.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_01: The guy just, I mean, I tell this story at the shows, and this guy just leaned on the desk and he said, No, no, you just need to keep on going to Memphis, man.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_01: He said, Don't even stop here in Nashville.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_01: Really?
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, yeah.
• 4:15
  SPEAKER_01: How even in Nashville?
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_01: I came in 2009.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, and uh I I didn't move here in 2009, but I was here for a couple of years until I got a place in and out from I was living in South Carolina at that time.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_03: So I love South Carolina, it's a great place.
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_01: It's a good place to to be from.
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_01: It is, yeah.
• 4:33
  SPEAKER_01: So what was that?
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_01: What was it like?
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_03: What the transition moving and you've seen a lot of changes in this city.
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, yeah.
• 4:40
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, this is not the city that it was even ten years, even five years ago.
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_01: I came I came right at the end of um of that era.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_01: Um I don't know what to describe it, but it was um, you know, when uh uh there were record deals and there were publishing deals and and um songwriters and right before the big songwriting boom of sync deals and all that kind of stuff.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_01: Where you know you've never written a song before in your life, and all of a sudden you wrote one and it's in a television show or a movie, and yeah, what's it like to see like to be watching a show or walking into a place and hear your own music?
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_01: Well, that's pretty awesome.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_01: That is uh that's a pretty awesome deal.
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_01: Um so I here's another thing is that I I started over ten years ago and was doing some shifts and and things downtown, and I just they gave me uh one of my own shifts at bootleggers and and uh and dock holidays.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_01: And so I said, you know, we're just gonna do this thing right.
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_01: I started doing original music down on Broadway and Second Avenue, and we've um we've had the we call it Nashville Uncovered.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_03: I love that.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_03: It's a great meeting.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_01: We've done I've done it for over ten years.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_01: I've had the only all-original show three and four hours still doing?
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_01: I do some.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, we'll be back at Bootleggers uh day after Christmas this year.
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_03: And we're gonna tell the we're gonna make it.
• 6:06
  SPEAKER_03: That's because you play real music.
• 6:08
  SPEAKER_03: Great, exactly.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_03: And you know, the day after Christmas, you can explain that Santa's exhausted.
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, he's all worn out.
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_01: So, but you know what?
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_01: I've never I don't have a lot of problem with the the things that most people say are a problem down there.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_01: I get to play in our music, and and uh folks walk up and ask for something.
• 6:26
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe there's a drunk that asks for a certain song or something.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_01: I say, hey, that's not what I do.
• 6:31
  SPEAKER_01: I do this.
• 6:31
  SPEAKER_01: They're like, oh, that's cool.
• 6:33
  SPEAKER_01: It's cool, but it's all covers.
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_03: But I mean what we get the the reason why it's covers.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_03: People come here to sing along with the music, right?
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_03: And I I don't think go to your own beat, my friend.
• 6:44
  SPEAKER_03: That's my that's my stick.
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_06: People don't know they want originals until they hear the originals, and then they're like, oh, wait.
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_01: There you go.
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, here's the deal.
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, my wife told me not to get on any soapboxes, but here we go.
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_02: Get on any soapbox you want to.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_01: You're exactly right.
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_01: So then they the tourists, and what they've been called for years, is the drunk tourists.
• 7:05
  SPEAKER_01: Well, the drunk tourists, well, the tourists do spend a lot of money coming down here.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_01: Amen.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_01: That's who pays you.
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_01: And they come in expecting to see somebody that's an up-and-coming, or maybe an established artist, or some new songwriter that wrote the song that they want to hear, or a new songwriter.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_01: And they spend a lot of money and they come in and they sit down and somebody says, What do you want to hear?
• 7:27
  SPEAKER_01: What do you want to hear?
• 7:28
  SPEAKER_01: And they say, Well, we'll try some originals.
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_01: And the guy says, Oh, okay, I've written two in my whole life, and here they go.
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_01: And then they get done.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_01: And like you said, I didn't say this.
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_01: So I want my wife to know that I didn't say this.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_01: You said this.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_03: What's your wife's name?
• 7:39
  SPEAKER_01: Diana.
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_03: Diana, we got you, girl.
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_03: We got you.
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_01: But like he said, is they play their original music and they're not ready to be out there doing original music yet.
• 7:50
  SPEAKER_01: And so the tourists are like, yeah, that's not really what I was looking for.
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 7:55
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, um, I just wish more established songwriters and stuff would try it and do it.
• 8:02
  SPEAKER_03: I think that's how we're introduced to music.
• 8:04
  SPEAKER_03: Like, you know, you become popular through that, and and the bachelorette party, capital of the universe, and whatever, and that's how you get your name out there.
• 8:12
  SPEAKER_05: Right.
• 8:13
  SPEAKER_05: People are people.
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_01: People are people, amen.
• 8:15
  SPEAKER_01: In 2016, over 13 million people came to Nashville, and there wasn't that all of those weren't bachelorette parties.
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_01: And all of those weren't for the Titans or the Predators.
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_03: The Titans got a little, they they need some work.
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_01: Well, they but I mean they bring in some people, but people are still coming from all over the world to Nashville because it's Music City.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_06: I saw stat okay.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, yeah.
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_03: I think we probably saw a couple billion dollar industry.
• 8:40
  SPEAKER_06: It's like a third of Tennessee's revenue is from Davidson County tourism.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_06: I think it's nuts.
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_03: And also, it is now bigger than Vegas than going.
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_03: Nashville has become like the industry to but it is the the vibe in this city is incredible.
• 8:55
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_01: But I mean, there's still people walk up to me every day and that we're out and playing or doing anything, and they're like, man, where where can we go to hear the real music?
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_03: And so take my hand, follow me.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_03: Take my hand, follow me.
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_03: What's uh go ahead?
• 9:15
  SPEAKER_03: Susan and Sam talk about it.
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_03: It comes in our blood.
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_03: It's totally when you're from Philly, it's a survival.
• 9:21
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_03: What's like some shit?
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_06: What's like been one of the coolest fan experiences on Broadway?
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_06: Because you know, you get all characters, right?
• 9:30
  SPEAKER_06: There's all sorts of people.
• 9:32
  SPEAKER_06: Do you have like a story that sticks out in your mind that was really memorable?
• 9:35
  SPEAKER_01: Just yeah, tons of them, tons of them.
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_01: It's the craziest thing.
• 9:40
  SPEAKER_01: Um, we had a we had a lady one time sent me a message, and um, and so I was one of the first people to put the speakers in the in the doors and the windows and and face them out to the outside people here.
• 9:53
  SPEAKER_03: You are totally interested in the guy that's thank you for all the beach parties you have told people.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_03: Like, amen to you for getting that started.
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_01: But um, and it used to be you'd if you're at bootleggers, you just turn the speaker and it'd run right up Second Avenue, man, and all those places, and then you could hear it, and it would bounce off of um right before Redneck Riviera came in there, and uh and then the Redneck Riviera is a great name.
• 10:18
  SPEAKER_01: And uh that's uh John Rich's place there.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_01: But um, we it bounce off and up and down the street, and I'd have people come in and say, Man, I was walking my dog three blocks away from here, and I I heard you and I was like, I know that guy.
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_01: And but the coolest thing, one of the coolest things was is I got an Instagram message or something, and somebody, uh a girl said, I was getting into my Uber to go to the airport to go home to Florida, and I heard this music coming out of this bar.
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_01: And so I took a picture of the bar, which was bootleggers, and she said, and then on the way to the airport, I called the bar and said, Who is playing right now?
• 11:02
  SPEAKER_01: And they said, Well, that's Jay Edwards, and they she said, you know, got the information, and she said, and then as we were getting to the airport, she said, I downloaded everything on my phone that you have out, and uh and she said, and that's what I listened to all the way back to Florida.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_01: Whoa! So that's she said, I come twice a year.
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_01: She said, I'll catch you next time.
• 11:22
  SPEAKER_01: But that was the funniest thing.
• 11:24
  SPEAKER_01: I was getting in the Uber and she's like, Well, I gotta go to the airport, but I'm gonna take a picture of this.
• 11:29
  SPEAKER_01: Multitasking.
• 11:30
  SPEAKER_01: Went through that whole that whole system.
• 11:31
  SPEAKER_06: That's a big compliment that goes a long way, like how one person can make such an impact, and you remember that for a long time.
• 11:38
  SPEAKER_06: That's cool.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, that is incredible to have you know the power of fans moving.
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_03: Tell me how like pivotal your fans are in your career.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_01: Um, well, you know, I it it's uh like I said, we're flying under the radar because a lot of folks don't know about it, but um uh and I'm I'm a little older than most of the folks out here in the game nowadays.
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_01: 29, sir.
• 11:58
  SPEAKER_03: Nobody's over the Miragle of Botox and birthday cake.
• 12:02
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that's that's 10 years older than most of the people in the game now.
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_01: Um uh yeah, it's uh the the fans are what keeps us going.
• 12:13
  SPEAKER_01: So we went in and we started playing, and people were coming from all over the country, and then I started getting calls that said, would you come to Boston?
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_01: Would you come to um would you come to Pittsburgh?
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_01: Would you come to um uh Miami and uh Houston?
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_01: And so I said, sure.
• 12:29
  SPEAKER_03: Why not?
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_01: And we just jumped in the car, and so I travel, still do probably um you know 150 to 200 dates out on the road in different places, and but but again, the drawback of that is is that you go to a place where you know five people and and then you you have to go and do the work to get the rest of the room.
• 12:51
  SPEAKER_03: Does your wife travel with you?
• 12:53
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, yeah, she does now.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah.
• 12:55
  SPEAKER_03: I'm sure that's that's a blessing.
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_03: Amen.
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_03: Amen.
• 13:00
  SPEAKER_03: Every somebody's gotta be in charge of the crazy.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_01: Make sure you edit that part out.
• 13:06
  SPEAKER_01: She thinks she's in charge.
• 13:09
  SPEAKER_00: So so you're playing all over.
• 13:11
  SPEAKER_00: What's your favorite spot that you've ever been able to perform at?
• 13:16
  SPEAKER_01: Man, again, it's all over the place.
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_01: Um uh, of course, Bucks in uh in outside of Omaha, Nebraska is a fantastic place.
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_01: Um my buddy Jeb has a place in um outside of um it's in Riverton, Illinois, called The Room.
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_01: And uh I'm sorry, I'm sorry, that's the backroom lounge.
• 13:39
  SPEAKER_01: It's in the back of a liquor store.
• 13:41
  SPEAKER_01: That's an amazing place to be able to do that.
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_03: Tell me they sell like chips in there and sandwiches.
• 13:47
  SPEAKER_03: That'd be the best.
• 13:49
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I think it's just liquor.
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_01: But maybe some chips, yeah.
• 13:52
  SPEAKER_01: Um, man, it there's a uh we just played the bird's nest out in North Carolina, Dunn, North Carolina.
• 13:59
  SPEAKER_01: Fantastic place to play.
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_01: And uh just there's there's tons of them, man.
• 14:05
  SPEAKER_01: Big yeah, we do some big, big honky tonks, and and um I spent a lot of time out in Texas.
• 14:11
  SPEAKER_03: And so did you play in Fort Worth?
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_01: I played in Fort Worth, Dallas, Fort Worth, Arlington.
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_01: Uh we just did um a really cool couple of shows at the real nice Hotel Ven in Great Vine, Texas.
• 14:25
  SPEAKER_01: That was that was amazing.
• 14:27
  SPEAKER_01: Got to meet the owner.
• 14:28
  SPEAKER_03: It's a great area.
• 14:29
  SPEAKER_03: It's a beautiful area.
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_01: That's fantastic.
• 14:31
  SPEAKER_03: And I think Billy Bob's is just like a bucket list thing.
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_03: Everyone's got to go to Billy Bobs.
• 14:35
  SPEAKER_03: I know.
• 14:35
  SPEAKER_03: Like if you haven't literally been to Billy Bobs.
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_01: I have uh I haven't played Billy Bob's, but I've played all around it and up the street.
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_03: Fort Worth is amazing.
• 14:43
  SPEAKER_01: Filthy McNasties, of course, you know.
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_03: Have you guys been to Fort Worth?
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_06: I you know what?
• 14:48
  SPEAKER_06: I have not.
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_06: I've only been to Dallas and Frisco for the ACMs.
• 14:53
  SPEAKER_06: Yeah.
• 14:53
  SPEAKER_06: I oh you was only there for two days.
• 14:56
  SPEAKER_06: I wish I went.
• 14:57
  SPEAKER_00: I have been to Fort Worth because a bunch of my best friends from high school go to TCU.
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, they do still cattle drive.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_06: Yeah, I gotta get out there.
• 15:08
  SPEAKER_06: I can't I can't I won't wear green.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_06: I'll be respectful.
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_06: It's an Eagles thing.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_01: It's cool.
• 15:13
  SPEAKER_01: I'd say really get down and um get down in uh new Ronfels outside of San Antonio.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, yeah.
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, green hall is legendary.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_06: Are you traveling with your band or yourself, or how do how do you I usually I usually do the herding herding cats, you know?
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, and uh um talent.
• 15:32
  SPEAKER_03: You are flying, are they?
• 15:34
  SPEAKER_01: They'll hear this, yeah.
• 15:34
  SPEAKER_01: They'll hear this and they'll um we we're uh we're actually taking a little break now.
• 15:38
  SPEAKER_01: I'm doing more acoustic stuff this year.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_01: Nice.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, that's awesome.
• 15:41
  SPEAKER_01: Acoustic's my favorite.
• 15:42
  SPEAKER_06: Sometimes acoustic pays more, man.
• 15:44
  SPEAKER_06: That's a game.
• 15:45
  SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_01: It does.
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_01: And I I totally agree.
• 15:47
  SPEAKER_01: I'd love to be there.
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_01: I love doing that, but I also, you know, if you're if you're playing festivals and competing on a Friday and Saturday night with with Billy Bobs, you're down the street.
• 15:56
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you really need a drummer and a bass player.
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, we put on a heck of a show as a three-piece, you know, band.
• 16:04
  SPEAKER_03: I can't wait to see you to see you perform.
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_01: I tell you, it's gonna blow your mind.
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_01: Don't blow you out.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_03: Don't tempt this.
• 16:11
  SPEAKER_03: We will be in a bit of Uber for the next show.
• 16:16
  SPEAKER_03: You don't have to tell this group.
• 16:19
  SPEAKER_03: They'll totally do it.
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_03: It's quite no, these guys are young.
• 16:22
  SPEAKER_03: You they're like, you gotta all you gotta carve out time.
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_03: It's like trying to book the presidents.
• 16:26
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I got you.
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_01: I got you.
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_01: It's well, that was one of the first things that we we learned when we came to Nashville to play too was um folks gotta go somewhere.
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_01: Sometimes they gotta catch a plane, like the girl will catch a plane.
• 16:38
  SPEAKER_01: Sometimes you're at a place that don't have any food, so they gotta go get up something to eat, and they're like, I'll be right back.
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_01: I just we gotta go eat, and sometimes you gotta go put the dogs out.
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I know.
• 16:49
  SPEAKER_06: Um folks gotta go somewhere.
• 16:55
  SPEAKER_06: We always gotta get some.
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, do you have a dog?
• 16:58
  SPEAKER_03: Because you all right.
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_01: I couldn't have a dog.
• 17:01
  SPEAKER_03: It becomes your entire right, we're gonna take the dog on the road.
• 17:04
  SPEAKER_03: It becomes your entire life.
• 17:06
  SPEAKER_03: Like, who's gonna watch the dog?
• 17:07
  SPEAKER_03: How's the dog gonna get her medicine?
• 17:09
  SPEAKER_03: It's like it literally, it's like having a child.
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_03: I love my dog, she's the best, and I've she's been on the road, it's hot, but I can tell you, like, it's like a lot of responsibility.
• 17:20
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yep, yep.
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_03: It's not easy.
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_03: I think it was easier raising kids than a dog.
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_06: I thought about getting a dog, but I I travel a lot too.
• 17:28
  SPEAKER_06: So you're such a dog guy.
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_06: I don't know.
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_06: I'm a dog and I'm like I well I don't like the hair, that's the thing.
• 17:34
  SPEAKER_06: So I'm gonna see the benefits of gentlemen and have some food.
• 17:40
  SPEAKER_06: Yeah, the I feel like dogs shed way more than a girlfriend, but I feel like I'm just not a hair doodle though, like doodles don't shed, right?
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_06: They got the poodle in them.
• 17:51
  SPEAKER_06: So I can maybe do that, but I travel so much, so I'm like, I don't know.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_06: So kudos to you for being able to do that.
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna have to give up my dogs, man.
• 18:01
  SPEAKER_01: I I'm I like dogs too, but I am OCD.
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_01: If I pet one, you know, I kiss them in the mouth, I guess, but then I gotta go wash my hands and everything.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_03: So I know it is really funny.
• 18:11
  SPEAKER_03: When people come into your house too that aren't dog people, I have a my dog's like a throw pillow, and they come in and you can just tell people that aren't and dogs sense it when they're not, you know.
• 18:23
  SPEAKER_03: Tell me about the quality of life of being on the road all the time.
• 18:27
  SPEAKER_03: How do you maintain holidays and normalcy?
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_03: And where do you get your mail?
• 18:31
  SPEAKER_01: Well, um, well, I live right here in Hermitage, so yeah.
• 18:34
  SPEAKER_01: It's uh does it stack up at your house, the mail, and you're like, oh, that's it does a little bit from all these yes, but we have um we have really tried over the past few years um to to narrow it down so that we're out two weeks and we come home for at least at least a week or uh five days.
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_01: And uh and and and doing the Nashville Uncovered thing.
• 18:58
  SPEAKER_01: Well I'd I could come home and still keep a band happy by playing some places around here and play within two hours and and so you can come in.
• 19:07
  SPEAKER_01: We could do uh we could do we did uh a while back we did three to three and a half weeks on the road.
• 19:14
  SPEAKER_01: And uh that was a lot of a lot of time in a nation.
• 19:19
  SPEAKER_03: Timmy's gonna be touring very soon.
• 19:20
  SPEAKER_03: He's going from March to May.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so February to May.
• 19:24
  SPEAKER_00: February to May.
• 19:25
  SPEAKER_03: I'm gonna miss you.
• 19:26
  SPEAKER_03: I know he got to you.
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_03: I'll come see your show.
• 19:30
  SPEAKER_03: Every time I come to to Nashville, Timmy and Holden are Holden is from Philly, so I get to see him perform uh on the Jersey Shore a lot.
• 19:38
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 19:38
  SPEAKER_03: So because it's very close.
• 19:39
  SPEAKER_03: And and now Timmy's become like all my friends are like, Can you?
• 19:42
  SPEAKER_03: I'm sorry, Holden.
• 19:43
  SPEAKER_03: I'm they're like they're like, Can you tell Holden I said hi?
• 19:45
  SPEAKER_03: I'm like, sure.
• 19:47
  SPEAKER_03: Like he's become like the the the favorite, you know.
• 19:50
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, good.
• 19:51
  SPEAKER_03: But it is, it takes a little, it takes a lot.
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_03: What about holidays and stuff?
• 19:55
  SPEAKER_03: Do you work on the holidays?
• 19:56
  SPEAKER_01: Well, um, yes, I will and and do.
• 19:59
  SPEAKER_01: It's um we have to work out a system.
• 20:01
  SPEAKER_01: Like I'm leaving here today and going to Arkansas, um, and we are um doing what they call Thanksmas.
• 20:11
  SPEAKER_01: So thanks.
• 20:12
  SPEAKER_01: That's cool.
• 20:12
  SPEAKER_01: I like that.
• 20:13
  SPEAKER_01: That's cool.
• 20:13
  SPEAKER_01: Mix of Christmas and Thanksmus.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_01: I love that.
• 20:16
  SPEAKER_03: Thank Kitty's the best holiday ever.
• 20:18
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, with my my brother and sister have all kind of spread out, and so we we'd um we take the time in between the two holidays and get back together with my mom and dad.
• 20:26
  SPEAKER_03: That oh, that's so fabulous.
• 20:28
  SPEAKER_03: I love that.
• 20:29
  SPEAKER_03: The importance of family.
• 20:30
  SPEAKER_03: We talked about that many times in the show, the importance of family and the importance of being able to take it down, you know.
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_03: I think from the outside looking in, they think you guys are just going 24-7, and the importance of like you're connecting with your wife and having some downtime.
• 20:46
  SPEAKER_03: And I think, you know, because we would just assume as fans that you're all available at 24-7.
• 20:53
  SPEAKER_01: You know.
• 20:53
  SPEAKER_01: Well, yeah, and if you're gonna a lot of times it is almost like that.
• 20:57
  SPEAKER_01: If you're gonna if you're gonna be in the game, you gotta be in it to win it, you know.
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_03: Absolutely, absolutely.
• 21:02
  SPEAKER_03: Tell the younger viewers why it's so important to make a move to Nashville.
• 21:06
  SPEAKER_01: Um I I believe it is when you're ready for it.
• 21:10
  SPEAKER_01: I believe it is when you're ready for it.
• 21:12
  SPEAKER_01: I I'm probably one of the only ones that says that everybody says that, and like we say, you gotta be in it to win it.
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_01: But if you move here too early, um, it's a shock to the system and you and you're taken advantage of.
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_01: And um, and it's it's if you're not ready, if you're not, if you can't really if you don't have the experience of at being at home and knowing how to move a crowd, and if you know that's what you're gonna do, then uh learn your learn your craft, start learning your craft at home.
• 21:43
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 21:43
  SPEAKER_01: And uh and that's that's probably just the old dude coming out anyway.
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_01: But it's there's really there's just I've seen it over the years, there's just too many people moving here and some of them, you know, they have they have their expenses paid and taken care of, but um
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_03: How do I get that gig?
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_03: I want somebody to show this.
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_01: I've always said this about Nashville is that there's sharks in the water, and everybody's oh yeah, yeah, you know, there's these big corporates.
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_01: Oh man, there's these little bitty tiny sharks.
• 22:13
  SPEAKER_01: And they just bite you in the ankle and you're dead in the water.
• 22:15
  SPEAKER_03: Well, where there's good, there's bad.
• 22:17
  SPEAKER_03: You know, the bad will eventually move itself in.
• 22:20
  SPEAKER_03: And I think that, you know, Holden went to Belmont and Timmy's whole family moved from California to Nashville.
• 22:26
  SPEAKER_03: So I I think the importance of knowing the craft and knowing, you know, I hear so many stories of, you know, 16-year-old, seventh-year-olds coming here with a guitar in a dream.
• 22:35
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 22:36
  SPEAKER_03: But I mean, no one is prepared at 17 to navigate the waters of a huge industry.
• 22:43
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 22:43
  SPEAKER_01: I'll tell you, I'll tell you something.
• 22:46
  SPEAKER_01: I just I wrote a song here recently, and uh and it's got a line in it that says, I spent my life believing I'd win that fiddle made of gold.
• 22:53
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 22:54
  SPEAKER_01: And uh, you know, and and then I my dad is a minister, and so I I told him, I said, I got a message for you.
• 23:01
  SPEAKER_01: I said, somebody asked the devil, said, I had, you know, talking about Charlie Daniels.
• 23:05
  SPEAKER_03: It's a great song.
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_01: And uh somebody asked the devil, said, What um, you know, what what was the deal?
• 23:12
  SPEAKER_01: I thought you were way better than that.
• 23:14
  SPEAKER_01: You know, and he said, All I had to do is let one of them win.
• 23:18
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 23:18
  SPEAKER_01: And then everybody thought they could beat me.
• 23:20
  SPEAKER_01: So they're collecting them souls.
• 23:22
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 23:23
  SPEAKER_01: And that's kind of, I mean, that to me that kind of puts it in perspective.
• 23:25
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's uh it's a deal.
• 23:28
  SPEAKER_01: A lot of people come thinking they're you know, oh, I can do that.
• 23:31
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I can do that.
• 23:32
  SPEAKER_01: And it's and there's uh they're just waiting with my arms wide open for folks coming in and taking away.
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_03: Well, you know, it's like any job, you know, it's a job.
• 23:41
  SPEAKER_03: This is what you people do for money and your careers, and there's never a plan B.
• 23:46
  SPEAKER_03: And I think like any job, you, you know, I had to go to college to do what I did and go get a master's program.
• 23:53
  SPEAKER_03: But you know, it's really, I think it's so important.
• 23:56
  SPEAKER_03: One, thank God, you know, you've got a strong marriage and family and faith, but it's it's it's it's rough to rough town if you decide.
• 24:05
  SPEAKER_06: I always tell my friends, like, because I have friends that have lived here a while, some have left town, some have are just coming to town, and like you just have to go off your gut and your intuition, like it like I always say like Nash, you don't choose Nashville, Nashville chooses you.
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_06: Right.
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_06: And if you have that in your heart, it's like you feel like this is home and where you belong and country music, it's like you you can't like people can't argue that, you know, it's like you're either you're here or you're not, and and it's um it's cool, man.
• 24:36
  SPEAKER_06: I I always think like as long as you just trust God and your intuition, like you're you're gonna be led the right way.
• 24:43
  SPEAKER_06: You know, and you're you're doing that.
• 24:44
  SPEAKER_01: Totally.
• 24:45
  SPEAKER_01: Sure.
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_01: You know, when I came to the uh when I came to Nashville, I wrote my first song, my first gospel song when I was nine years old.
• 24:53
  SPEAKER_01: That's awesome.
• 24:54
  SPEAKER_03: So it's it's in your DNA, so I agree with that.
• 24:58
  SPEAKER_06: I I can't wait to listen to your music.
• 25:00
  SPEAKER_03: I know, yeah.
• 25:01
  SPEAKER_01: But um, but I'd been writing songs and I didn't come until I was 40, I think it was 40 years old.
• 25:08
  SPEAKER_01: And uh That's the new 29.
• 25:10
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and so when I got here, man, it was just deny, deny, deny.
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_01: And they were like, no, man, your songs are not ready.
• 25:17
  SPEAKER_01: And I said, I've been writing for before you've been here.
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_01: 30 something years I've been writing songs.
• 25:24
  SPEAKER_01: And at that time, it was that's what it was.
• 25:26
  SPEAKER_01: You had to go back and you you had to take what you had and you had to pound it, and they everybody was rewrite, rewrite, rewrite, and all this.
• 25:33
  SPEAKER_03: How do you feel when somebody says that to you?
• 25:35
  SPEAKER_03: Like, how do you as an artist and you guys your experiences, your your heart, your soul, like country music moves humans, and like how's it feel to hear that?
• 25:44
  SPEAKER_01: Well, um it was it was rough.
• 25:47
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, uh, like I said, the guy saying, no, you just need to keep on going to Memphis because he said you can't even write a country song.
• 25:54
  SPEAKER_01: And um and and and what's he doing now?
• 25:58
  SPEAKER_01: I don't bring his name up on the side.
• 25:59
  SPEAKER_01: Did Uber driver not much now?
• 26:01
  SPEAKER_01: I love Uber.
• 26:03
  SPEAKER_01: He's still doing a little bit.
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_01: I I'm the funny thing about that, the cool thing was that we had a song that we got a second listen from Merle Haggard on.
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_01: No, no holes, no cuts, or anything like that.
• 26:14
  SPEAKER_01: No, it wasn't that exciting.
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_01: It was, but it was uh just a second listen, and it was chosen, and and some people, you know, the Merle went on the back of the bus, smoked a little bit, and listened to it again.
• 26:24
  SPEAKER_01: Um I'll take that.
• 26:26
  SPEAKER_03: Solve every problem in America.
• 26:27
  SPEAKER_01: And I was so excited about it that I posted that some years ago on on Facebook, and the guy that said naw actually commented, I don't think he remembered who I was.
• 26:37
  SPEAKER_01: Job it! And he said, And that's funny how that works.
• 26:39
  SPEAKER_01: He said, That's a good old school country song right there.
• 26:43
  SPEAKER_01: And uh but back to the thing, I think the thing that gets me the most, and again, man, all these soapboxes.
• 26:50
  SPEAKER_01: Um, the thing that gets me the most is that when I came to Nashville, that's what it was.
• 26:56
  SPEAKER_01: That was it was perfect your your craft, work on that, work on that.
• 27:01
  SPEAKER_01: And you could have a song that was 99%, and it just believed in it, and somebody say, Well, I don't like that phrasing right there, just this last line, and you're and you it's back to the drawing board.
• 27:16
  SPEAKER_03: I feel like that would crush my soul.
• 27:18
  SPEAKER_01: And it was but it was you had to know that it was denied, denied.
• 27:21
  SPEAKER_01: It was just like the insurance, you know, companies deny, deny, deny.
• 27:25
  SPEAKER_03: And I think that factual.
• 27:28
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 27:28
  SPEAKER_01: But the thing that's really come around, the thing you're talking about that's frustrating, that kills you, is the fact that we're seeing now that the things have changed and it's a producer's market.
• 27:40
  SPEAKER_01: And so you don't have to go through the label anymore.
• 27:43
  SPEAKER_01: You don't have to, you don't have to play the label songs anymore.
• 27:46
  SPEAKER_04: That's right.
• 27:47
  SPEAKER_01: That was one thing.
• 27:47
  SPEAKER_01: When you'd come to town, I in 2018 I had a I sat down, I had a record coming out in two weeks, and I sat down with a major label, and uh, and the guy said, Well, here's what we want you to do.
• 28:02
  SPEAKER_01: We want you to sing four or five of our songs, and we're gonna put these through a test thing.
• 28:07
  SPEAKER_01: And I said, Man, I got a record coming out in two weeks.
• 28:10
  SPEAKER_03: What are you promoting that record?
• 28:11
  SPEAKER_01: Let's put that on hold, and you sing our songs, and I was like, I'm not gonna do it.
• 28:16
  SPEAKER_01: And I gave up a chance to sign with with uh a major label because uh they wanted again, they wanted to change everything.
• 28:23
  SPEAKER_01: But nowadays somebody comes to town, they've only written two songs, and um they walk in and a producer that you know, which is the guy now that produces beats.
• 28:34
  SPEAKER_01: That's what that's what a producer it's changed to.
• 28:36
  SPEAKER_01: A producer is the guy that puts all the you know the music down on the laptop, and and uh and then they say, Oh, that's a great song.
• 28:45
  SPEAKER_01: Give me this amount of money, and we'll run that up the you know, flagpole of Spotify and Apple Music, man.
• 28:51
  SPEAKER_01: That's awesome.
• 28:52
  SPEAKER_01: And it's not.
• 28:53
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so there's nobody, there's nobody saying, No, you need to go back and and work on your music, or you need to use our music.
• 29:01
  SPEAKER_01: They're not even saying that anymore.
• 29:02
  SPEAKER_01: Right, you know, they're just saying, yeah, give me some money for your music.
• 29:06
  SPEAKER_01: And right, you know, and it's it's repeating the same word 25 times in a in a you can only say truck so many ways.
• 29:16
  SPEAKER_01: Right, you know, truck this, truck that, you know, big old truck, big red truck.
• 29:21
  SPEAKER_01: And I've been guilty of this too, but I love you so, you know.
• 29:25
  SPEAKER_01: Putting so on the end of a thing to rhyme with go from the work and the line before it, and just simple stuff like that that really, you know, somebody.
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_03: Well, artists are creative, you know.
• 29:36
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, they're that's what you're here.
• 29:38
  SPEAKER_03: You're here to be creative.
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_06: One thing I would love to see, and I think there's a lot of artists like Zach Topp, I think Laney Wilson, I think there's a lot of modern artists that are starting to fall into more of like a traditional kind of approach to country, and uh it's it's cool to see, you know the music and the the neo-traditional country elements come back.
• 30:01
  SPEAKER_06: Like Paul Franklin, I think, played all on Zach Top's record.
• 30:05
  SPEAKER_06: I could be very wrong, but but and Brent Mason like all like that's the A team, right?
• 30:11
  SPEAKER_06: And that's like I feel like in today's world it'd be so cool to see an artist take I I think where the discord happens is there's a lot of new music, and I think if the artists can appreciate and and show their fans hey, I also love how I grew up listening to these artists, and like I think the respect still needs to be there.
• 30:33
  SPEAKER_06: I think that's where the disconnect happens, and I think I think a lot of times there's a lot of new artists that are misunderstood, and but there's some artists that shouldn't be there at all.
• 30:42
  SPEAKER_03: You know, it's like and um I'm sure you've all seen that too.
• 30:46
  SPEAKER_06: Like it's a respect thing, like, and I think I think if new I think when people move to town, I think and you you validated this, like you know, it's just hey, just you know, music evolves.
• 30:58
  SPEAKER_06: I mean people thought I was in a record store, this is the craziest thing here.
• 31:01
  SPEAKER_06: I was in a record store last week going through, they had like a deal, take as many records for five bucks.
• 31:06
  SPEAKER_06: They were trying to clear out their inventory.
• 31:07
  SPEAKER_06: And they're pop country hits.
• 31:11
  SPEAKER_06: Wow.
• 31:12
  SPEAKER_06: And Merle Haggard was on it.
• 31:14
  SPEAKER_06: What?
• 31:14
  SPEAKER_06: And I'm like, music has always been, yeah, music has always been people have always said, oh, that's pop country.
• 31:22
  SPEAKER_06: That's just it's like I think it just comes down to like just the respect, like respect the people who came before, and you know it paid the way for a lot of artists.
• 31:33
  SPEAKER_01: Well, um, that would be cool.
• 31:36
  SPEAKER_01: You have, I mean, that's incredible.
• 31:38
  SPEAKER_06: But Mobgard is pop country.
• 31:40
  SPEAKER_06: I just thought that was the strangest thing ever.
• 31:42
  SPEAKER_01: But I mean, you gotta think that too.
• 31:44
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I'm not I'm not doubting that, but it because that one that was they're like, no, that ain't that ain't what we do.
• 31:51
  SPEAKER_01: And that was, you know, that what's kind of what founded the outlaw mutant movement was because that wasn't exactly what they had done 20 years before that or 10 years before that.
• 32:01
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but I think also, because I've done the same thing, I've gone on Spotify and I do a search and do a search for outlaw music, and you know, stuff starts popping up that they call outlaws.
• 32:13
  SPEAKER_01: Like, what is wrong with this?
• 32:17
  SPEAKER_03: Well, I mean, you know, believe me, Rhapsody's on that list.
• 32:20
  SPEAKER_06: Now they've got AI artists on the charts.
• 32:23
  SPEAKER_06: What do you think of that?
• 32:29
  SPEAKER_03: I love it.
• 32:30
  SPEAKER_03: I love it.
• 32:31
  SPEAKER_03: I love that.
• 32:32
  SPEAKER_01: But you know why?
• 32:33
  SPEAKER_01: Because it's gonna, because it is already the I mean, you the end is coming, man.
• 32:38
  SPEAKER_01: That's gonna be the end all.
• 32:40
  SPEAKER_01: There, it's gonna crash, that's gonna crash the system.
• 32:43
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, in my opinion.
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_01: In my opinion, you but you know, you do like whatever you think, and and come back to this in in just five years and say, I dude was right.
• 32:54
  SPEAKER_00: Um what do you think?
• 32:55
  SPEAKER_00: It's uh it's I think that like whole that whole topic is very scary to me.
• 33:01
  SPEAKER_00: But I think it's like I I was looking at some stat the other day that I think it's I could be like completely false, but I'm pretty sure that it's like the amount of songs getting uploaded every day to Spotify has doubled.
• 33:12
  SPEAKER_00: Wow.
• 33:13
  SPEAKER_00: Like it used to be, I I think it was like 50,000, now it's like a hundred or something like that.
• 33:17
  SPEAKER_00: And it's crazy and majority of it is these AI people because you can just go in Suno and make a song and scary five people can't tell you.
• 33:24
  SPEAKER_00: You can just upload it for five bucks using DistroKid straight to Spotify.
• 33:30
  SPEAKER_01: I'll tell you what um what was told to me.
• 33:32
  SPEAKER_01: I I'm just repeating this, so you I'm we got no fact check.
• 33:36
  SPEAKER_02: We have there's nobody's out there fact checking.
• 33:39
  SPEAKER_01: But I I do trust the the the system because the guy is is in the industry and does this and and um is that like we talked about earlier, the labels are it's a producer's market, so the new people come into town, they're bringing their songs, the few songs that they have or that they just put together, which I think sometimes sounds like AI, because it's there it's there's no craft there, it's just let me get this phrase, that phrase, and you know, from off of my computer here, and I'll shove that into whatever the last one was, that's the hook.
• 34:11
  SPEAKER_01: And I feel like that that's already been out there, and people are like, man, this is this is like computer generated.
• 34:18
  SPEAKER_01: But since the labels don't have to um since they don't have to pitch their songs to new artists, or we're not working on development deals like we were before, and they have this.
• 34:30
  SPEAKER_01: Um it was told to me that they are the labels are taking those songs that they have written and they've had in their vaults for years and running them 50 to 100 times through an AI program and then uploading that.
• 34:45
  SPEAKER_01: So it's the same song, and they have millions of songs done a hundred times in different variations, all uploaded to Spotify, and it's all it's it's it's just like a huge machine that's just spinning, spinning.
• 34:58
  SPEAKER_01: And I may be crazy, but it's uh it made sense to me when the guy told me about it.
• 35:02
  SPEAKER_01: And so they're making pennies but a million pennies at a time, all of this, all this going on.
• 35:10
  SPEAKER_01: So I just think the only way, you know, the only thing that that's gonna happen there is it's gonna crash the system.
• 35:16
  SPEAKER_01: Because I'm I'm traveling the country already, and I'm seeing people that they're like, man, I am so sick, so sick of of um syndicated radio.
• 35:26
  SPEAKER_01: We we listen to our little AM station out here in the country that plays what we want, and uh, and you know, we love that.
• 35:33
  SPEAKER_01: We love secondary radio.
• 35:35
  SPEAKER_01: Uh they're they're sick of the the the ticket prices, they're sick of going to the stadiums, sitting in nosebleed section, watching the jumbotron, and you know, fireworks and blow it up, and then it's and it's nothing.
• 35:50
  SPEAKER_01: I was um I was at uh Floribama um just a few weeks ago for the Frank Brown Songwriters Festival.
• 35:58
  SPEAKER_01: And uh and I I wasn't uh it was not my round.
• 36:02
  SPEAKER_01: I was sitting off the stage and watching Trent Tomlinson.
• 36:06
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I don't know if you remember Trent.
• 36:08
  SPEAKER_01: So Trent was sitting there and he he told his story about his dad and went and sang um uh the angel with no halo and one ring in the fire.
• 36:19
  SPEAKER_01: And when he hit that line from the chorus, when he hit that hook and he sang that, I mean people just got up out of their seats and went to clapping their hands, and I just punched my wife.
• 36:28
  SPEAKER_03: I didn't punch her, I nudged her and I said Sir, I think your bark is a lot worse than your wife.
• 36:35
  SPEAKER_01: So I tell I nudged my wife and I said, AI will never do that.
• 36:40
  SPEAKER_01: Never it'll never do that.
• 36:41
  SPEAKER_01: And we go all over the country, and people people are so sick of that, they're ready for grassroots concerts.
• 36:47
  SPEAKER_03: Totally, and I think like the connection with artists to music, I mean your fans are your life, you know, and I think how do you connect with an AI?
• 36:55
  SPEAKER_00: And that that's my one prediction with like the whole AI thing is I think people are getting very tired of like overly processed stuff.
• 37:03
  SPEAKER_00: And I think there's a lot more movement towards more natural sounds because and I think it's like there's something to be said about imperfection because when you listen to an AI song, there's zero errors when it comes to the music, like the music in it, and it's too perfect.
• 37:18
  SPEAKER_00: You don't want to hear every single thing perfectly on pitch, you want to hear something you want to hear the mess, like the mistakes because that's what it is.
• 37:24
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, absolutely.
• 37:26
  SPEAKER_02: Humans do that, that are human beings.
• 37:28
  SPEAKER_06: I think I mean there I forget what record it was, old 80s record, famous, I forget what it was, but there were errors.
• 37:35
  SPEAKER_06: I remember like there's errors in a lot of famous albums, and there's errors and stuff, and that, but that almost makes it special and authentic.
• 37:44
  SPEAKER_06: Like, I think there was a Beatles record, or I forget what it was, but like there's a note that was sang off or different, but like that became a focal point for the ear for fans.
• 37:54
  SPEAKER_06: It's like music, we're just humans playing.
• 37:56
  SPEAKER_06: We just we're selling emotions, right?
• 37:58
  SPEAKER_06: And and I think a robot doesn't have emotions.
• 38:02
  SPEAKER_06: That's true, it's just the principle.
• 38:03
  SPEAKER_06: It's like it doesn't have a soul, it's not like a robot can't do what you're doing and play 150 shows a year, right?
• 38:09
  SPEAKER_06: And like there's this Kane Walker AI dude on the charts right now that's like it kind of sounds cool, but he's got two songs, iTunes top ten right now.
• 38:18
  SPEAKER_06: It's like but it's I say he, it's not a he, it's a a computer.
• 38:22
  SPEAKER_06: And I think what I think the problem, I think AI can be an awesome thing because you can use it as a tool.
• 38:30
  SPEAKER_06: I think it can give you ideas that you could have never thought of.
• 38:33
  SPEAKER_06: Right.
• 38:34
  SPEAKER_06: You shouldn't use it for make it sound like it.
• 38:37
  SPEAKER_03: I think that you know we think we're all using it so much, you know, that that it gives you a base and then you personalize it from there.
• 38:44
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's so obvious when it's you know we just we well I've I've got some songwriter friends that some of the songs that we've been doing lately, they've been like, let's see what that sounds like through AI.
• 38:54
  SPEAKER_01: And we roll it out.
• 38:55
  SPEAKER_01: I got one on my phone right now that we just wrote with CJ Soler and Galen Griffin, and and it came back sounding amazing, and the vocals are amazing, and the the music is amazing.
• 39:07
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's a great tool for something like that.
• 39:09
  SPEAKER_01: You could pitch that, you know, pitch that out there, and somebody say, Oh, that's what I could do, but it still doesn't have the life in it.
• 39:15
  SPEAKER_01: And um and and and it's it's not gonna people they're just not into that.
• 39:20
  SPEAKER_03: I agree.
• 39:21
  SPEAKER_03: And people I think we're already burnt out, it just started.
• 39:24
  SPEAKER_03: Like a burnout.
• 39:25
  SPEAKER_06: What's the sad part for me is uh is that people can't tell the difference either.
• 39:31
  SPEAKER_06: So they're gonna be on a playlist, right?
• 39:33
  SPEAKER_06: And all these songs are half could be AI, half could be humans, and they're spending their day with these artists now, these AI artists, and it it's not a human.
• 39:43
  SPEAKER_06: That's money that that's attention that should have been given to an artist like us trying to build ourselves, you know, new artists that are just coming on the scene that like now they're paying attention to a computer instead of people who are busting their butt like yourself that are deserving of human attention.
• 40:01
  SPEAKER_06: Like they don't even know they're streaming a robot.
• 40:03
  SPEAKER_06: Right.
• 40:03
  SPEAKER_06: And if they knew that, maybe they wouldn't, you know.
• 40:05
  SPEAKER_06: Like, I I saw uh there was an AI artist on Facebook.
• 40:09
  SPEAKER_06: I commented literally the other day in the comments.
• 40:11
  SPEAKER_06: I'm like, they're like, oh my god, I love this.
• 40:13
  SPEAKER_06: Can't wait for more.
• 40:14
  SPEAKER_06: I'm like, do you guys know this is a robot?
• 40:16
  SPEAKER_06: He's not listening to your comments.
• 40:18
  SPEAKER_06: There's no being like that's amazing.
• 40:22
  SPEAKER_06: And there's like Karen in the comments being like, this guy's awesome.
• 40:25
  SPEAKER_06: What are you talking about?
• 40:25
  SPEAKER_06: I'm like, it's not a guy.
• 40:28
  SPEAKER_06: This guy is fake.
• 40:30
  SPEAKER_06: I'm like, turn on, turn on something else that a human made.
• 40:34
  SPEAKER_06: Like I don't know.
• 40:35
  SPEAKER_01: There's gonna be that that element, there's gonna be that element of people that just follow along.
• 40:40
  SPEAKER_01: You know, the I think one of the biggest things the the biggest examples of that, and I tell this to people all the time, and uh, some people don't remember it, but this is 20 years ago.
• 40:51
  SPEAKER_01: The the comedian Tim Wilson who played that used to play the guitar and do all the the songs he'd written that were so funny and and stuff.
• 40:58
  SPEAKER_01: He had a song called The Booty Song.
• 41:01
  SPEAKER_01: And it was nothing more but you got the booty, I got the booty, we got the booty, here's the booty.
• 41:06
  SPEAKER_01: Then it just said booty.
• 41:07
  SPEAKER_03: Like we were in industry party last night and saw somebody perform, and the entire song was the one lyric.
• 41:15
  SPEAKER_03: Like, wasn't it over and over and over and over?
• 41:18
  SPEAKER_01: And we were like, Well, Tim could drink it.
• 41:21
  SPEAKER_01: Tim did this song, and it hit the radio, man.
• 41:24
  SPEAKER_01: And I was living in Columbia, South Carolina at that time, and I have heard the DJs on the radio say, okay, listen, I want everybody to hear this.
• 41:36
  SPEAKER_01: We're gonna play the booty song at 7 o'clock, eight o'clock, and nine o'clock.
• 41:43
  SPEAKER_01: But please stop calling in requesting the booty song.
• 41:48
  SPEAKER_01: We are not gonna play it that many times.
• 41:51
  SPEAKER_01: And you gotta look that up.
• 41:53
  SPEAKER_01: You don't even have to request it anymore.
• 41:55
  SPEAKER_01: Stop and auto.
• 41:57
  SPEAKER_01: It's on one nine, that was back, you know, cell phones were just coming along.
• 42:02
  SPEAKER_01: And uh, so man, I mean, these kids were getting their mom's cell phones at the uh on the way to school in the morning and like sneaking in the booty song.
• 42:12
  SPEAKER_03: Request the booty song, yeah, yeah.
• 42:14
  SPEAKER_03: I'm gonna be honest.
• 42:15
  SPEAKER_03: God bless America that you wrote a simple booty song and you have you're a legend from that.
• 42:23
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, only in America, God bless America.
• 42:26
  SPEAKER_01: But but people are gonna be led, and and they're gonna there's gonna be a lot of people that'll fall for that, and a lot of people, because I mean, people still go to the to the coliseums and they still pay hundreds of dollars.
• 42:37
  SPEAKER_03: And fans are fans, and I, you know, I think, and I learned this from the first time I interviewed you, um, the importance, like they're taking away from something else to pay to see you, to buy the merch, to, you know, it's a you gotta go into the stadium or you gotta go into the bar, you gotta spend money, you gotta eat.
• 42:56
  SPEAKER_03: Like, it's a big like it's a huge honor for somebody who's not in country music other than this to be sitting next to a legend.
• 43:05
  SPEAKER_03: And I think that's what people need.
• 43:07
  SPEAKER_03: We need human, we're humans, we need human connection.
• 43:10
  SPEAKER_01: Well, you have to you have to remember that um in in the any industry, uh whether it's film or television or music or or whatever, even sports, that there is a conglomeration in the back.
• 43:22
  SPEAKER_01: And uh, this is not conspiracy theory, this is just telling how it is.
• 43:25
  SPEAKER_01: There's a machine, right?
• 43:26
  SPEAKER_01: And that machine is pushing this and say, Oh, nobody does it like that anymore.
• 43:31
  SPEAKER_01: Let's take CDs for example.
• 43:33
  SPEAKER_01: Nobody's buying CDs anymore.
• 43:35
  SPEAKER_01: Oh no, the kids, they just want to download it.
• 43:37
  SPEAKER_01: Well, they don't want to download it now, they want to pay$10 a month, or everybody paid$10 a month to Spotify so that they can stream it and not get paid.
• 43:47
  SPEAKER_01: I travel all over the country and sell CDs out of the back of my.
• 43:50
  SPEAKER_03: So I had an artist yesterday say the same thing.
• 43:52
  SPEAKER_03: Like, and there's a certain thing about an album and an album cover, and you know, it is.
• 43:58
  SPEAKER_03: It's just a different, and I think with the AI too, is this is a business, this is an industry.
• 44:04
  SPEAKER_03: It's not just you.
• 44:06
  SPEAKER_03: It's you've got a team that's working with you, and and we're just doing that.
• 44:10
  SPEAKER_03: You're taking we're taking jobs away from these people, you know.
• 44:12
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, be for every one of you fabulous artists, there's a team that made you, you know, helped you be fabulous.
• 44:20
  SPEAKER_03: All right, I gotta wrap this up.
• 44:22
  SPEAKER_03: I can't, I gotta tell you.
• 44:23
  SPEAKER_01: We went down a rabbit hole there we go.
• 44:25
  SPEAKER_01: I know.
• 44:25
  SPEAKER_03: First of all, when men do this to me, I'm like, all right, it's a miracle I wasn't like you're a delight.
• 44:30
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, we're gonna be able to do that.
• 44:31
  SPEAKER_03: You're such a delight.
• 44:32
  SPEAKER_03: Jay, will you come back?
• 44:33
  SPEAKER_03: Sure.
• 44:34
  SPEAKER_03: We would love to have you back.
• 44:35
  SPEAKER_01: I said I just leave right over there.
• 44:37
  SPEAKER_03: Right, perfect, right.
• 44:38
  SPEAKER_03: We'll bring it up.
• 44:39
  SPEAKER_03: We'll walk back home.
• 44:40
  SPEAKER_03: Right, exactly.
• 44:40
  SPEAKER_03: Let's go over to his house for lunch.
• 44:43
  SPEAKER_03: Where can the viewers find you?
• 44:45
  SPEAKER_03: How can they find your music?
• 44:46
  SPEAKER_01: Best thing to do is is to go to the website j edwardsmusic.net, and that's just the letter Jay.
• 44:52
  SPEAKER_03: Okay.
• 44:52
  SPEAKER_01: So j edwardsmusic.net or dot com.
• 44:55
  SPEAKER_01: I've finally got both of them.
• 44:57
  SPEAKER_01: Good, right.
• 44:58
  SPEAKER_01: And there's what link trees and everything else that points you there, and we're always trying to update it.
• 45:05
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 45:05
  SPEAKER_03: If you're in Nashville, go see this man.
• 45:07
  SPEAKER_03: He is a rock star.
• 45:09
  SPEAKER_06: What's your weekly show schedule typically?
• 45:12
  SPEAKER_01: Um, we have we don't have any residents.
• 45:14
  SPEAKER_01: I am starting to play more down at uh Big Machine recently.
• 45:18
  SPEAKER_01: I mean soon we're starting to get something uh going down there.
• 45:22
  SPEAKER_01: Great.
• 45:22
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but it's it's hit or miss.
• 45:24
  SPEAKER_01: Um you kind of have to stick with the social media.
• 45:28
  SPEAKER_01: And um I I'm gonna come rock.
• 45:31
  SPEAKER_06: Me too.
• 45:31
  SPEAKER_01: Me too.
• 45:32
  SPEAKER_01: Man, we have a blast.
• 45:33
  SPEAKER_01: I promise you, it's and and there's so many, we didn't get so many influences we from the first question you asked me.
• 45:39
  SPEAKER_01: Influences, and um that I can say this is that you I'm gonna we're gonna play something, even though it's gonna be original, it's gonna be something that's like, oh yeah, man.
• 45:49
  SPEAKER_01: I like that.
• 45:50
  SPEAKER_01: That's a style I like.
• 45:51
  SPEAKER_01: So we're gonna be.
• 45:53
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, thank you.
• 45:54
  SPEAKER_03: We're 100% coming.
• 45:55
  SPEAKER_03: You were an absolute delight.
• 45:57
  SPEAKER_03: I can't wait to have you back.
• 45:59
  SPEAKER_03: And we'll we'll keep it.
• 46:00
  SPEAKER_03: Nobody ever leaves it isn't a friend.
• 46:01
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 46:02
  SPEAKER_03: Ask these people.
• 46:03
  SPEAKER_03: That's right.
• 46:03
  SPEAKER_03: My wife.
• 46:05
  SPEAKER_01: You can't go to the salad bar without meeting some people.
• 46:08
  SPEAKER_03: This is well, we when I'm like walking into a restaurant, my husband's like, you can pick one friend.
• 46:14
  SPEAKER_04: That's right.
• 46:14
  SPEAKER_03: You cannot leave with ten people.
• 46:16
  SPEAKER_03: You can have you're allowed to leave because I ever I've been to two weddings of complete strangers I've met on planes.
• 46:22
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 46:22
  SPEAKER_03: What an honor.
• 46:23
  SPEAKER_03: That's awesome.
• 46:24
  SPEAKER_03: They're like, I would love for you to come.
• 46:25
  SPEAKER_03: I'm like, I feel so honored for that.
• 46:28
  SPEAKER_03: It was a delight.
• 46:29
  SPEAKER_03: I wish you the best happy holiday season.
• 46:32
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
• 46:33
  SPEAKER_03: And to your parents, God bless them, you're a joy.
• 46:36
  SPEAKER_03: We can't wait to have you back.
• 46:37
  SPEAKER_01: Awesome.
• 46:37
  SPEAKER_01: Look forward to it.