Latest / More Than Before / More Than a Voice: Clark Beckham on American Idol, Sports, Marriage & Becoming Who God Says You Are

Transcript

More Than a Voice: Clark Beckham on American Idol, Sports, Marriage & Becoming Who God Says You Are · More Than Before

• 0:00
  I found myself striving for acceptance by way of musical
• 0:03
  talent and ability, which built up a very unhealthy habit and
• 0:08
  paradox of if I want to be accepted, if I want to be liked,
• 0:12
  not just with girls but with status or popular circles.
• 0:16
  The better I am at something, the more people will accept me
• 0:21
  and appreciate me. And it didn't become poison
• 0:26
  until after American Idol, where that factor was multiplied by
• 0:31
  100. Some people chase fame, others
• 0:41
  chase purpose. My guest today has walked both
• 0:44
  paths. He is the American Idol season
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  14 runner up, a Nashville based songwriter, a multi
• 0:50
  instrumentalist whose soulful voice is taken from small church
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  stages to performing with the Nashville Symphony.
• 0:57
  He's toured internationally, coached developing artist and he
• 1:00
  just signed a brand new record deal with NCS Records.
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  But what stands out most is his authenticity, humility and his
• 1:08
  heart for what truly matters in life.
• 1:10
  Clark Beckham, welcome to more than before.
• 1:12
  Brothers soaking heavy on. Thanks so much.
• 1:14
  What a nice intro too. I hope that I hope to live up to
• 1:19
  what you just said. And I always, always try to, but
• 1:23
  great podcast and I'm very, I've been excited about this.
• 1:27
  Looking forward to it for a while.
• 1:28
  Yeah, you know, it's, it's interesting because I first came
• 1:31
  across your content. I think it's like a couple of
• 1:34
  years ago and I just started listening to your takes on some
• 1:38
  of the classic worship songs that I grew up with.
• 1:41
  And I would, I would just sit there so mad at you.
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  I was like, how does where are you coming up with these
• 1:48
  different modulations and like different chords?
• 1:51
  And I just sit there and I'm like, man, this guy's so good.
• 1:54
  I just, you hear people that are so good at their craft and
• 1:57
  you're like, man, I wish I could be that good.
• 1:59
  And you hate him for a moment and you're like, man, this guy's
• 2:01
  just this person is awesome. And you, you truly have an ear
• 2:05
  for music. And I, I, I know we're going to
• 2:08
  get into this, but I am curious what you, you just started, just
• 2:13
  signed this new record deal. What has been different this
• 2:18
  time around going into this record deal versus working with
• 2:23
  Quincy Jones? Couple of things there.
• 2:27
  I think that so with Quincy Jones, Quincy was such a artist
• 2:33
  1st art first kind of guy. And because of all of his
• 2:39
  success, he was able to take a chance on artists that maybe
• 2:48
  aren't blowing up or having a ton of commercial success, like,
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  you know, a, a, a pop star type of a person, but who he really
• 2:59
  believed in and loved their art. And that was something that he
• 3:04
  loved to do. And so I was one of those
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  artists that he took a chance on.
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  And that whole team, I would not be where I am today without
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  them. And they were.
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  So they were my management company.
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  And I did notice, though, every time we went to a label, every
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  time I went to a label before and after my term with Quincy
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  Jones Productions, I was just shot down every time.
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  And someone's I heard this said like on American Idol when I was
• 3:34
  watching as a kid and the kind of you hear all the time.
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  But they say, you know, if you can't handle rejection, then
• 3:41
  you're going to have a tough time in the music industry.
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  And buddy, that is no, no truer statement has been said.
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  I mean, in, in the entertainment industry in general, because I
• 3:56
  act as well like it's 95% rejection and then your career
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  is based on the 5% of people that say yes.
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  But with labels and most agencies that I would meet with,
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  it was a, it was a no every, every time.
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  And the difference within CS is they're, they're kind of this,
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  this mix between they care about the art and they're really
• 4:26
  passionate about their mission and what they're doing.
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  But at the same time, labels especially have to be good
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  stewards of their money like we all do.
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  And they have to make investments that make sense.
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  And the difference for me this time around is when I started
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  doing the household name church worship songs in a way that I
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  worship with them in my alone time with God, which some could
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  describe as like a soulful jazz take, for lack of better
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  descriptive term. That started blowing up on
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  Instagram. And then I made an acoustic EP
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  of full length versions of the of some of those songs.
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  Then I started going to labels. Instead of please believe in me
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  and give me a bunch of money, I came to labels saying hey, I was
• 5:32
  averaging 7000 views per real. And then I started doing this
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  Christian soul worship stuff and those are averaging 150,000
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  views are real over over nine months.
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  So not just a flash in the pan, but with a lot, a big sample
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  size. So I made this acoustic EP, it's
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  already done. You know, I paid for it, I'm
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  going to release it, but I wanted to see if you're
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  interested in jumping on board because then we could probably
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  put some more money into it and even plan another EP on the back
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  end of that and market it and do and do our thing.
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  But if not, that's OK. I'm going to release it anyway.
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  I just wanted to see if you wanted to jump in before I go
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  forward. That was a huge difference for
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  them, but also for me. I wasn't going in desperate for
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  acceptance of a gatekeeper to say like, you may enter, you
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  know, it was just I'm doing this with or without you, just giving
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  you the courtesy of you can jump in if you want, but if not, it
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  doesn't, it's I'm still going to release it.
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  And statistically speaking, I've faith that it's going to do
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  really well with or without you. But I would love for you to
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  join. It comes from a place of
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  confidence that you're, you're walking in confident in your
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  craft and what you're doing. And it's, it's interesting
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  because you're, you're coming in from a position of I'm, I'm
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  building this or I have built this.
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  And I want to give you an opportunity to join me in this
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  success versus Hey, I would you put your name and your cloud
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  behind me to make this bigger versus they hey, I want, I want
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  to invite you apart to be a part of this, which I think is, is
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  kind of fascinating with you because I think that you
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  naturally do that. You naturally want to bring
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  people around you and lift other people up.
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  That's definitely the mentality to have and a lot of times
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  artists are be my savior, come do this for me, believe in me.
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  I'm really talented and good, I promise.
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  Come on, just someone believe in me.
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  Instead of seeing it from their perspective and thinking, how
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  can I convince them that I am their best shot to provide for
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  their families and the job that they have.
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  And that changes everything. Because there's such a romantic
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  mentality of I'm going to be a big star and I just need someone
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  to believe in me and give me $100,000 to make this project.
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  Instead of thinking why would they give you $100,000?
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  You have no following. You have no fan base.
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  That and seeing like how dumb that would be for someone to
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  give me $100,000 as a record label doesn't make sense to me
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  business wise. I'm not.
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  You have to have the perspective of them and know that they're
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  doing a job and their job is to, especially at a big label where
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  they have people over them. Their job is to make as much
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  money as possible for that label.
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  And if they don't do a good job of that, they get fired.
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  And they have to find a new job to provide for their family.
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  So you have to serve them, you know, And that mentality makes
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  everything work. Yeah, yeah, I, I'm curious like
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  has there been any, any difference this time around like
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  psychologically signing with this, with this record label?
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  Yeah. You know, it's kind of like when
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  you're independent, you're just thinking like, man, if I could
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  just have a label which is basically equivalent to if I
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  could just have financial backing for these dreams that I
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  have, like for these projects. I would love to do this.
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  Cost too much money. I got to pay a mortgage, can't
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  do it on my own. So I have to scrape by and just
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  wait for a great gig to pay for a fraction of what I wish I
• 9:54
  could do. I want to label this as, OK, we
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  got the publicist, we have the marketing team, we've got the
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  money to make a full project where you don't have to cut
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  corners. Like you can have catering for
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  the band, like all those things. And you've got the machine in
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  place like, oh, I just want that so bad.
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  Well, now that I have that, another thought went in my head.
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  People kept telling me, oh, man, this is great.
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  This is just what you needed. Like, man, now it's just like, I
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  see you're just going to take off.
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  And I remember thinking, gosh, I hope so, because now I don't
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  have an excuse. As an independent artist, you
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  can kind of ride this like, you know, man, I'm just doing what I
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  can just grassroots, you know, independent and, and just making
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  it happen. And, you know, I'm, I'm not, I
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  don't have a big label or anything, but I do it for the
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  art and just trying to get by and it's all out of my own
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  pocket. And yeah.
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  All the reasons like why you haven't made it or why you
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  haven't made it to the the level that everyone thinks that you
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  should be at. And that's a, that's a like,
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  that's permission for mediocrity that everyone's like behind.
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  But now that I have a label, it's like, buddy, now you bet it
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  better work. Because if now it doesn't work,
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  there's no excuse. Now it's I can't go like, well,
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  man, if I just had a publicist, I got a publicist now.
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  Well, if I just had the, the, the money to actually get a good
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  band, I have the money to get the best band imaginable.
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  OK, well, if I, there's no excuses now, like it asked for
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  it. And if it doesn't, there are
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  some serious questions that have never, I've never had the
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  opportunity or privilege to have come up.
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  You know what I mean about my career, my future.
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  And it could. It's like high reward but also a
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  high risk of like, uh oh, Now what if it doesn't?
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  Yeah, that's, that's really fascinating because it's, it's
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  almost in a sense that because we all have these these things
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  internally where, where we can point to, well, this is the
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  reason why this didn't work out. Like I didn't have the financial
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  backing. I didn't have the people behind
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  me, you know, cheering me on or fill in the blank of whatever it
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  is. And so it's it's almost as if
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  you've been you've been written the blank check and now you now
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  you have to put everything in. There's there's no holding back
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  because the only way that it doesn't work out is if you
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  haven't pull poured all of yourself into what you're doing.
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  And so it's almost like another level of having to believe in
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  yourself that you actually have not necessarily what it takes,
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  but really maybe more that, you know, God has actually gifted
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  you with these things. And so it's, it's, it's funny
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  because I think even going back, which, which I want to do,
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  because I always love hearing kind of the, the beginning
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  stages of people's stories. But, you know, if you look at
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  your life and the history of where you've come from, it's no
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  surprise that this would be the trajectory of where you are and
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  what you're doing. You know, take, take us back to,
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  you know, White House, TN, where you grew up.
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  What was what was life like having two parents that sing,
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  that are instrumentalists that are good at what they do and
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  being in a, you know, a little threesome gospel group touring
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  around and and singing like, what was what was that like as a
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  child? Yeah, So my dad, my mom and dad
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  both are wonderful singers. And I grew up having my mom, you
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  know, sing Edelweiss to get me to go to sleep and this
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  beautiful Sopranos soft, like false falsetto voice that you
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  just die over. But that was just the normal,
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  you know, that's just, that's my mom.
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  And she's saying, like your mom doesn't sing like that.
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  Like I just, you know, that's just how I I grew up.
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  And then I listen to my dad sing in church.
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  My mom would sing solos in church as well.
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  And she would crush, and then my dad would sing and he would
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  crush. And he played in the band as
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  well. And I remember they're actually
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  doing a trio with this other lady.
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  She was an Alto, I think her name was Jenny.
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  And they were practicing in the car.
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  And I'd heard that. I was 6 at the time.
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  I heard the arrangement so many times that I picked up on the
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  Alto part. And so I just told them one day,
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  this is what they told me happened in the car.
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  They were practicing and I just said, hey, I'm going to sing
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  Jenny's part. And they're like, great.
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  Sure, that sounds great, son, You know, sure you will.
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  And it's kind of like when I would, my little cousin would
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  want to play video games with me, so I'd give him a remote
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  controller. That doesn't work.
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  And he'd, you know, tell him that he's.
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  Yeah, dude, that's great. Awesome.
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  You're doing great. And I just started singing it.
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  And it was the right part because I'd heard it enough.
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  And I caught on. And I just, I started singing
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  the Alto part. And they kind of looked at each
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  other and went. So we started singing in this
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  little gospel trio, mainly at our church, but then we would go
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  to like Portland, TN has a Strawberry festival where they'd
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  have like, you know, some gospel singers come up and sing to a
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  track. And so we became a kind of this
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  gospel trio that would sing random, random things like like
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  the Strawberry Festival in Portland, OR we would go sing at
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  nursing homes or hospitals or just different things like that
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  or in, in church. And so I, I, that's where I
• 16:12
  really, where I started singing. And you know what, to be honest,
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  I didn't, I didn't really like it.
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  I like singing in harmony, but boy, I hated practicing.
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  I hated learning parts. My mom would have the sheet
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  music and then she'd be teaching me and I was in misery.
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  I hated it so much. And but you know, when we'd
• 16:41
  sing, it was fun. And then my my dad, my mom and
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  dad noticed that I wanted to start playing guitar.
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  So they put me in lessons and I hated it.
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  I hated guitar lessons we learned.
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  I learned piano in like 3rd grade or something.
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  Like all of us had a keyboard class.
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  It's kind of like our band, which is everybody played the
• 17:06
  keyboard and you'll never guess, but I hated it.
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  I hate, just despised it. I cried before guitar lessons.
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  I just hated it. I didn't want to do it.
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  And the common denominator with all those things, even
• 17:21
  rehearsing with my mom and dad was sheet music.
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  I hated it and, and the, and the idea of trying to like figure it
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  out and make it, how scientific it was and how non ear it was.
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  And there's a way to do it. But for whatever reason, it was
• 17:39
  absolute torture to me. But so I I stopped and then
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  praise God for YouTube and Ultimate-Guitar.com before.
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  They started charging you for everything, yeah.
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  Yeah, yeah, good for them. You know it's business, they
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  trying to figure it. Out they have I mean, they have
• 18:02
  to make they have to make money, but.
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  Right. But anyway, so I, I just
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  started, I wanted to play and sing still.
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  So I just started going online and finding OK, I want to sing
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  Vienna waits for you. I want to sing Vienna by Billy
• 18:22
  Joel. What are the chords to that?
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  And it would show me the guitar chords.
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  And then I would, you know, just Google.
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  How do you play AB flat on guitar?
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  And then it would tell me where to put my fingers.
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  So I'd put my fingers there and I'd play the first chord and I'd
• 18:39
  sing the first couple notes. And then another chord would
• 18:42
  come. G minor, OK, how to play G minor
• 18:46
  and I and then I did the same thing on piano, how to play G
• 18:49
  minor on piano and show me and I just put my hands there.
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  And that's really how I learned to play and sing was doing that.
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  I started doing that. You're kind of told and you
• 19:01
  observe just through life that playing music and being good at
• 19:07
  it is really cool and people like that.
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  And so I just kept doing it. But I always wondered.
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  I was like, it's going to sound so sad, but I was wondering.
• 19:21
  I was like, yeah, but how come? Like, I'm not getting.
• 19:25
  How come none of the girls that I like like me back?
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  I thought, like, I've all these old ladies always told me how
• 19:32
  handsome I was when I was growing up.
• 19:35
  What the heck? You know Janice.
• 19:38
  What about the girls? My own name.
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  You. You told me I was going to have
• 19:43
  to, you know, beat the girls off with a stick.
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  I just have to keep them away from me.
• 19:47
  It's I, I don't, I'm not experiencing that.
• 19:50
  I'm singing, I'm playing guitar, you know, nothing.
• 19:54
  And So what happened is I found myself striving for acceptance
• 19:58
  by way of musical talent and ability, which built up a very
• 20:05
  unhealthy habit and and and paradox of.
• 20:14
  If I want to be accepted, if I want to be liked, not just with
• 20:17
  girls, but in, you know, with, with status or just in popular
• 20:24
  circles, the better I am at something, the more people will
• 20:31
  accept me and appreciate me. And it didn't become poison
• 20:38
  until after American Idol, where that factor of I like you
• 20:48
  because you're good at stuff was multiplied by 100 because yeah,
• 20:53
  OK, I'm a good, I'm a good singer and I could play
• 20:57
  instruments. But there are a lot of people
• 20:59
  who are good singers and who could play instruments.
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  Then I was second place on American Idol verified on
• 21:07
  Instagram before you could just pay for it.
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  And quote UN quote, famous relatively.
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  And then I kept getting these encounters with people that were
• 21:23
  very apathetic and then someone would whisper in their ear and
• 21:28
  then all of a sudden they were very, very interested in talking
• 21:32
  to me and excited and wanted my number and were asking to hang
• 21:37
  out. And I just would watch in real
• 21:40
  time them have 0 interest in me and then have the most interest
• 21:47
  in me that they've ever had in any person ever.
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  Just from someone being like, Hey, you know, he was runner up
• 21:53
  on American Idol, right? He's like really great.
• 21:55
  And so then I was like, oh, I actually, I don't like that at
• 22:00
  all. And then I then it went to is
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  anybody like me for me? You know, like if I could, if I
• 22:07
  stop singing, if all of a sudden couldn't sing a play anymore,
• 22:11
  how many friends would I have compared to what I have right
• 22:13
  now? And that got really scary
• 22:15
  because that went, I mean, that went across the board, not just
• 22:20
  people I was meeting, but friends that I had, my wife, my
• 22:27
  family, I mean, everything. It's like, how much do these
• 22:32
  people love me because of what I can do versus who I am?
• 22:36
  And that was its own, its own crisis.
• 22:40
  It's, it's interesting. It reminds me, I was listening
• 22:44
  to a, a worship leader. I think he might have been in a
• 22:46
  conference and he said, you know, don't attach your gifts
• 22:49
  that God has given you to your, to your mission that he's given
• 22:52
  you. Because as soon as you know, he
• 22:55
  was saying, you know, if, if, if I believe that my calling is to
• 22:59
  lead worship every time that I'm not leading worship, if I don't
• 23:03
  have a guitar in my hands, I'm not in my calling.
• 23:05
  I'm just empty. And he said, what we need to do
• 23:09
  is we need to come back to this place of understanding our
• 23:11
  identity, which is in Christ, that we are a son of God.
• 23:15
  We're we're sons and daughters of God.
• 23:17
  And so when we when we come out at it from that perspective of,
• 23:21
  you know, our identity, are we wrapped up in these different
• 23:24
  things? It really does shift and change
• 23:27
  the way that we perceive the world and the people around us.
• 23:30
  But I mean, you know, we've, I've talked to a number of
• 23:33
  people who've had a moderate to a lot of success.
• 23:38
  And it's true that when people see success or they hear about
• 23:44
  your success, they want to be close to you, they want to, they
• 23:46
  want to learn from you. And there's always that question
• 23:49
  of what's the motive behind it? Is there an ulterior motive to
• 23:52
  this? But there's something
• 23:54
  interesting about about you that you're kind of hungry for
• 23:59
  knowledge. Like you, you want to learn from
• 24:01
  people, I feel like, you know, from, you know, spending time
• 24:05
  with Quincy Jones and to, you know, learning from people that
• 24:10
  maybe no one else would want to learn from or that no one else
• 24:14
  would even see. Like, for example, there was
• 24:18
  there was a gentleman whom you met early on when you were
• 24:25
  singing on the corners and you you thought you were going to be
• 24:32
  making a ton of money and it it didn't quite work out that way
• 24:36
  the first time. Yeah.
• 24:38
  I think you said that you would made like a $1.50 / 2 hours.
• 24:43
  Yeah. Yeah.
• 24:45
  Homeless guy comes up to you and says, hey, don't sing those
• 24:49
  Sissy songs. You know?
• 24:50
  You got, you got to, you got to sing it differently.
• 24:54
  That story reminds me so much of your willingness to learn just
• 25:00
  to become better. Why?
• 25:02
  Why is that important? An important quality to have
• 25:06
  just in life, To be curious and want to learn and to learn from
• 25:10
  other people. Yeah, so the name of that guy?
• 25:13
  Cowboy. Cowboy.
• 25:16
  That's right. Which it's like, that's not a
• 25:19
  real name. That's why I couldn't think of
• 25:21
  it. Probably.
• 25:21
  But yeah, Cowboy. Honestly, it's a battle of pride
• 25:29
  that I face all the time. And I think it's Epictetus or or
• 25:42
  Marcus Aurelius or one of the Stoic like philosophers, I think
• 25:47
  said you know, you can. Every single man has wisdom for
• 25:52
  you. Like every single man or woman,
• 25:55
  child, every living person has wisdom that you don't have.
• 26:01
  And when we think we are above them or smarter them, even if we
• 26:06
  are smarter than them, like I hope I am smarter.
• 26:11
  I think I am smarter than a 10 year old, an average 10 year
• 26:16
  old. But if I neglect the idea that
• 26:19
  they could teach me anything, then I'm just going to know what
• 26:22
  I know. And I'll never know what they
• 26:23
  know. Never know those those
• 26:25
  perspectives. And especially when you grow in
• 26:29
  your influence or your success or your knowledge it there is a
• 26:35
  voice that you have to I'll speak for myself.
• 26:38
  There's a voice that I have to quell that says, Oh, you're, you
• 26:44
  don't need to listen to them. You're so much better than they
• 26:47
  are. You're so much smarter.
• 26:48
  And oh, look at them trying to be smart.
• 26:50
  They're not smart. You know, that voice of like the
• 26:55
  devil is there, but luckily my curiosity and my love for people
• 27:07
  will still allow me to learn from from from anyone.
• 27:12
  Someone who I think is smarter than me and wiser and more
• 27:14
  experienced and someone who doesn't necessarily fall into
• 27:18
  that category. And by far the number one
• 27:22
  component, the number one common denominator behind the most
• 27:28
  talented people I've ever met is curiosity and humility.
• 27:32
  No question. There's nothing else that that
• 27:36
  is as consistent, especially with musicians.
• 27:40
  Monster players are very humble and they're very curious.
• 27:46
  There's a guy named Bernie Hermes.
• 27:50
  He's a multi award-winning producer and one of the most
• 27:54
  beautiful piano players I've ever heard and a wonderful soul,
• 27:59
  even better soul and spirit and heart than he is a a player,
• 28:05
  which says a lot. And he was playing and I
• 28:09
  remember I was at his house and then I was playing a little bit
• 28:13
  and he was indulging me and, and was really interested in what I
• 28:18
  was doing. And then I remember him saying,
• 28:20
  like, man, yeah, like, we should get together, and like, you can
• 28:24
  teach me stuff that you're doing.
• 28:25
  And I laughed because it was so absurd, the idea of me teaching
• 28:31
  him that I thought he was joking.
• 28:35
  And I looked at him, and he was totally sincere and kind of
• 28:39
  confused by my laughter. And he really did want to learn
• 28:44
  from me. And it wasn't because I was
• 28:47
  really great. It was just because I was
• 28:48
  different. And so learning from someone who
• 28:51
  is different is the key to gaining knowledge, to gaining
• 28:56
  wisdom and an insight. And that will never, that will
• 29:01
  never change. I love that the the lifelong
• 29:06
  learners are people I love to be around because they do exactly
• 29:10
  what you you were just talking about is they just find people
• 29:13
  and they want to learn from them.
• 29:14
  And, you know, the world is full of so many different wonders
• 29:18
  just to take time and start to delve into them, you really
• 29:23
  start to see the depth of, of so many things that God has
• 29:26
  created. You know, I'm, I always marvel
• 29:28
  at a, at a really good cup of coffee.
• 29:30
  It seems really simple. But as you start looking at all
• 29:33
  the different ways that you can brew at, at, at, you know,
• 29:36
  different temperatures and different kinds of beans.
• 29:38
  And there's, there's such a a crazy chemistry and it's, it's
• 29:43
  fun because when you start to surround yourself with people
• 29:47
  that are truly just in love with a topic, you kind of want to
• 29:52
  fall in love with that topic too.
• 29:54
  You know, unless it's cars. I I still can't wrap my head
• 29:58
  around the car pace but. Same honest there.
• 30:03
  I, I'll, I know enough to probably, you know, not destroy
• 30:06
  a car, but there are certain things that just fascinated me,
• 30:11
  especially when you find someone that's truly passionate about,
• 30:14
  passionate about one of their interests or something that they
• 30:17
  do. I, I want to go back again to,
• 30:21
  you know, growing up, what, what got you into sports then?
• 30:24
  Because you, you did soccer, you did football, you did
• 30:28
  basketball. What what drew you towards
• 30:31
  athletics? My my family is a family of
• 30:36
  athletes. Like all the guys and girls were
• 30:39
  great athletes and I loved sports as soon as I was capable
• 30:48
  of playing any of them much more and much earlier than I loved
• 30:53
  music. Now I, I, I loved Stevie Wonder
• 30:57
  when I was like 4, like just immediately loved.
• 31:00
  But as far as practicing the thing, not just listening you,
• 31:03
  not just watching sports, but actually playing sports versus
• 31:07
  playing music. Sports was my first love.
• 31:10
  And my uncle played football for Georgia.
• 31:16
  My cousin had a bunch of offers to play in college as a, as a
• 31:21
  quarterback. My grandfather was a quarterback
• 31:24
  for like the premier high school in, in Tulsa, OK.
• 31:28
  And it was just like, that was just thing.
• 31:30
  And I grew up a huge football fan.
• 31:34
  My whole family's from Oklahoma. So I was, I grew up a huge
• 31:37
  Oklahoma fan, still am. My friends were playing
• 31:39
  football. And as soon as my mom let me
• 31:43
  play football, I started and fell in love.
• 31:46
  Love basketball, love soccer. I was awful through middle
• 31:52
  school. It was pretty terrible.
• 31:55
  I was OK at basketball pretty early on, but football and
• 32:01
  soccer, I was pretty garbage for the first couple of years.
• 32:06
  And soccer, I was a waste of space.
• 32:08
  I mean, I was a black hole. Like if you pass me the ball,
• 32:11
  you're not getting it back. Like I'm just I, I, I was awful.
• 32:17
  And then by my and it kind of came from that like OK sports.
• 32:20
  This is another opportunity for me to get approval and to get
• 32:24
  light because all the pop by like if you were really good at
• 32:28
  sports, you're really popular in school period.
• 32:31
  All the popular guys that were in in school were the best
• 32:37
  athletes, period. And no one who was really
• 32:41
  popular wasn't a good athlete. So there's another thing for me
• 32:44
  to strive for, you know, for acceptance for my peers.
• 32:47
  And so that's what but I think what not drew me to sports
• 32:55
  initially, but what developed me into who I am today.
• 33:00
  And I would not be where I am today in my career in music if I
• 33:07
  hadn't played sports. Because what sports can do for
• 33:11
  you is if you have a good coach. And if you're going hard, it
• 33:15
  will show you how wrong you are about your perception of your
• 33:21
  limitations. You think if I do one more, I
• 33:28
  can't do another Sprint. It's impossible.
• 33:31
  I'm too. My legs are gone, I'm heaving, I
• 33:34
  can't breathe. There's no way I can do another
• 33:38
  Sprint. And then they blow the whistle
• 33:40
  and everyone runs. It's like, what are you going to
• 33:42
  do? You have to.
• 33:43
  You have to. There's no option.
• 33:46
  You have to run. So you do.
• 33:49
  And then you go, whoa, I didn't think I could do another one,
• 33:52
  but I did. And then you think, well, now
• 33:55
  I'm toast. Now I can't do it anymore.
• 33:57
  And they blow the whistle again and you have to.
• 34:01
  So you go and it's 45 minutes later and you haven't stopped
• 34:04
  running. And then it's it's it's a lot of
• 34:07
  like, Oh my gosh, I'm dead. But it's also, oh, I can do so
• 34:14
  much more than I thought I could.
• 34:17
  And for me, because I was so bad in the beginning, my skill was
• 34:22
  so bad. The only way I was getting on
• 34:25
  the floor or the field was if I was a really good student.
• 34:31
  And if I listen to everything the coach said and was in the
• 34:35
  right position and did everything right.
• 34:40
  And that's what I that's what I did.
• 34:43
  So now when I have something to do, I think back to that looks
• 34:49
  really hard and is really hard because often the the right
• 34:53
  thing to do is the hard thing to do.
• 34:56
  I think back to all the times that I developed that muscle of,
• 35:00
  OK, you want to start as a freshman and you don't want to
• 35:07
  be a lineman anymore. Like you want the ball on your
• 35:09
  hands. You're probably going to have to
• 35:11
  run like a four, six or 4740, which means you're going to have
• 35:14
  to get way faster than you are. So what do you want to do?
• 35:19
  You want to just hope that happens while you sit on the
• 35:21
  couch all summer like everybody else or, or, or do you want to
• 35:26
  do something about it? And so the summer between my 8th
• 35:30
  grade to freshman year, or maybe it was freshman to sophomore,
• 35:33
  one of those summers, I went to the football field five days a
• 35:39
  week for three months with my uncle, and we practiced
• 35:45
  plyometrics and isometrics and speed drills and we ran and I
• 35:51
  barely touched the ball. We just ran and focused on form.
• 35:58
  And then I came back that season and we also practiced route
• 36:02
  running and the deception of a good route and all those things
• 36:06
  that no one else knew on my team.
• 36:09
  And then when I came back, I didn't tell anybody that I'd
• 36:12
  done all that. I just, I just, I was just doing
• 36:15
  that. And so then it was time first
• 36:16
  day of practice, I was in better shape than the end of the
• 36:20
  previous season. I was in the best shape of my
• 36:22
  life. First day.
• 36:23
  Usually the first day of practice is where everybody
• 36:25
  throws up because they've been eating junk food and hanging out
• 36:28
  and they're out of shape. I was in great shape and we were
• 36:33
  just doing these like little 10 yard sprints like as a warm up
• 36:37
  to start the practice. And the quarterback who was not
• 36:46
  really fast, but I was one of the slowest people on the team.
• 36:49
  I was the slowest person on our entire team.
• 36:52
  And then I was beating our quarterback in these little 10
• 36:55
  yard sprints and everyone was laughing like Brad, Oh my gosh,
• 36:59
  you're getting beat by Clark. And it was not hidden.
• 37:02
  It was a very out loud laughing verbatim.
• 37:07
  Brad, Oh my gosh, Clark just beat you and everyone is
• 37:11
  laughing because that was who I was.
• 37:13
  I was the slow guy. And then next time around he was
• 37:17
  like, oh, and then he went as hard as he could and I still
• 37:20
  beat him. And everyone was like hackling,
• 37:26
  holding their stomachs, bent over like, Oh my gosh, Brad,
• 37:29
  what's wrong with you? You're getting beat by Clark.
• 37:32
  And then we had a drill where we're doing like a 40 yard dash
• 37:35
  and we're just someone would kick the ball off and we would
• 37:39
  run and the first person to the ball, you know, wins.
• 37:42
  And I got the ball every single time I outrun the entire team
• 37:46
  and I became from slowest to probably the second fastest guy
• 37:51
  on the team. And I knew what it took to get
• 37:55
  there. And so even today when I think
• 37:58
  of, I have this idea of a tour where I make it like the best
• 38:05
  VIP experience you've ever seen you've you've ever witnessed,
• 38:11
  but that's everyone. And I cap it off at 30 people
• 38:14
  only. And I get everyone's names, I
• 38:19
  get pictures of them. I'd memorize everyone's names
• 38:23
  and I greet them by name the first time that I see them.
• 38:26
  And the 1st 30 minutes or so of the concert is me just talking
• 38:30
  to people and hanging out and connecting with them.
• 38:34
  And then I do the show. And then afterwards, I tell
• 38:38
  everyone goodbye and there's almost as much hangout talk time
• 38:42
  as there is music. And I want to travel the, you
• 38:47
  know, the country, eventually the world doing that.
• 38:50
  I know what it takes to make that happen.
• 38:53
  And the massive hill mountain that I have to climb to do that
• 38:57
  does not scare me. And that started in sports when
• 39:02
  I knew, OK, this is what it takes.
• 39:04
  And I've succeeded there. I've no problem.
• 39:06
  I'm not afraid of hard work. And I hold that to this day.
• 39:10
  There's really a just hearing you talk about it.
• 39:14
  There's like this and I know, I know this with people that
• 39:18
  really focus and have huge goals.
• 39:20
  And there's like there's like a switch that just kind of it
• 39:23
  flips where you just you finally just make the decision.
• 39:27
  I'm just going to do it. You know, it's it's going, it's
• 39:30
  working hard. Like even even you deciding to
• 39:36
  run a marathon on a whim, signing up and then six months
• 39:41
  later running it. And to me, I would say
• 39:44
  destroying it, you know, because you ran it in under 4 hours.
• 39:47
  I think. I don't, I don't even know if I
• 39:49
  probably finish in seven hours. But but you have you this just a
• 39:56
  switch that just kind of flips when you decide this is where
• 40:01
  I'm going. This is what I'm going to do.
• 40:03
  I'm curious, how has it been for you kind of overcoming?
• 40:08
  The objections from people like you were talking about it
• 40:11
  earlier about musicians that you know, pretty much any aspect of
• 40:16
  performance, you kind of have to get over yourself because you're
• 40:20
  going to fail over and over and over.
• 40:24
  You know, and you are a performer and not a like in a
• 40:28
  negative connotation by anyway, but like you, you look at things
• 40:33
  and you want performance to be the best.
• 40:36
  You want to give your best in all things.
• 40:39
  How do you, how do you overcome that, that constant rejection
• 40:45
  that you can feel when you don't feel like you're doing enough,
• 40:48
  that you don't feel like you're doing your best, that you know
• 40:52
  there's always going to be someone that's better than you.
• 40:54
  But how do you, how do you overcome that mentality to be OK
• 40:59
  in your own skin to just say, you know what, this is who I am.
• 41:02
  I'm going to just show up today and God's going to meet where,
• 41:04
  meet me where I'm at AT and things are going to go well in
• 41:08
  the way that they're supposed to go.
• 41:09
  How do you get to that kind of place?
• 41:12
  Yeah, the couple different angles there.
• 41:15
  One is confidence that if I do everything in my power, if I if
• 41:23
  I am a good steward of what I have, if I'm listening to God
• 41:27
  and I'm moving forward, wherever he wants me to be, I'm going to
• 41:31
  be there. And there's a pastor, he's a
• 41:36
  friend of mine. And he actually told me this
• 41:38
  like a couple days ago. I was in his house and Scott
• 41:40
  Wilson is his name. He said you cannot be anything
• 41:44
  you want to be, but you can be everything that he wants you to
• 41:47
  be. And so there's a confidence of
• 41:50
  that, of whatever he wants me to do, he will put me in the
• 41:55
  position to do it. I believe that that is a very
• 42:02
  fruitful and successful culture shifting level of a music
• 42:08
  career. I believe that if I'm wrong,
• 42:12
  that's fine. But I do believe that that's
• 42:15
  where God wants me. So when someone says no, my
• 42:20
  mentality is OK, I guess you're just not in the picture.
• 42:27
  I guess you're not the way I get there.
• 42:30
  That's fine. And I tell people, when you go
• 42:32
  on American Idol especially, you have to have that mentality of
• 42:37
  I'm going to make it with or without the show, the show and
• 42:42
  my success on the show or my success with this manager.
• 42:45
  When I'm going to this meeting or whatever it is, the result of
• 42:49
  this meeting, the results of the show is not indicative of my
• 42:55
  career success. It's just indicative on if I
• 42:58
  take this path or if it's going to happen another way.
• 43:01
  So that's one you got to have that.
• 43:04
  But there's also I depends on, you know, when you ask me, I
• 43:10
  will say different answer, but I'm always going back and forth
• 43:14
  and and wondering for me personally, what's more
• 43:18
  motivating belief from outsiders or doubt from outsiders?
• 43:24
  And I don't know the answer to that because one of the most
• 43:27
  motivating things in the world is when someone says it not just
• 43:34
  says that I can't, but I can see in the depths of their soul that
• 43:38
  they believe with everything they have that I can't.
• 43:42
  That lights an explosive that ignites a bomb, a fiery furnace
• 43:54
  in me. I remember I was running a a
• 43:59
  ultra marathon. This one was 50 miles and I was
• 44:04
  looking at the time and I did the math wrong and I was doing
• 44:08
  the miles and what I'd done already.
• 44:10
  And then I'd looked at the cut off time and I was thinking, Oh
• 44:12
  no, I might not make it like I might not finish.
• 44:17
  And I got so scared and I was sending voice messages to my
• 44:20
  wife throughout the race. We were dating or engaged at the
• 44:25
  time. We weren't married yet.
• 44:27
  And I was just talking to her and, and I told her that I was
• 44:30
  like, I got to pick it up and I got to sustain it.
• 44:33
  I, I, this is going to be really, this is going to be
• 44:36
  tough. I think I've taken too much time
• 44:38
  and I don't know where the time went.
• 44:39
  And, and her voice message back was very sweet and very
• 44:44
  thoughtful and shoot, but it was consoling and it was, well,
• 44:49
  babe, like there's no shame in not finishing.
• 44:52
  It's OK. Like, you've worked so hard and
• 44:56
  you know, you don't have to and it's so it's OK if you don't
• 44:59
  make it. And dude, there it was like
• 45:01
  someone injected me with 10 times the healthy amount of
• 45:09
  adrenaline and like steroids. I was like, oh, heck no, I am, I
• 45:18
  am going to finish this thing. And I, and turns out I did the
• 45:21
  math wrong. I had way more time than I
• 45:23
  thought and I was totally fine. But I mean, I just felt that
• 45:27
  ignition any time and and you know, I don't think a lot of
• 45:34
  people know this story, but one example of rejection that led to
• 45:39
  incredible motivation was how I left Quincy Jones productions.
• 45:46
  So my day-to-day manager, Janice Wang, someone who brought me in
• 45:55
  to Quincy Jones Productions, she's the one who went to bat
• 45:59
  for me and said, hey, this Guy Clark, he's some special.
• 46:03
  I think Quincy would love him and brought me into the fold.
• 46:07
  If it wasn't for her, would have never met Quincy, would have
• 46:09
  never been connected to them. Most likely.
• 46:12
  She two years, 2 1/2 years in to my term with with them.
• 46:20
  She got a great job offer somewhere else and and she took
• 46:24
  it and she called me and said, hey, this is going to be a hard
• 46:27
  conversation. And I was like, oh boy.
• 46:30
  I was like, OK, what's up? And she said I got a job offer
• 46:36
  to do this thing and I'm taking it.
• 46:40
  And that means I'm not going to be at Quincy Jones Productions.
• 46:44
  And I can honestly say I was really excited for her.
• 46:47
  I was like, wow, this job has to, I mean, I'm sure this job is
• 46:51
  awesome. Like this is a very hard
• 46:53
  decision for you to make and you're making it and you're such
• 46:58
  a hard worker and you're so brilliant and obviously someone
• 47:00
  else sees that and they want you and they're offering you
• 47:04
  something that you can't say no to.
• 47:05
  Like, awesome, going to miss you.
• 47:10
  I knew that there were other managers like I just get passed
• 47:15
  on to someone else to manage me and Zeke.
• 47:19
  Almost like a release point for a brief moment of like, oh, OK,
• 47:23
  we're we're not talking about that.
• 47:25
  Oh, just it. Oh, great.
• 47:26
  And then you put your hands down for just a moment for the
• 47:30
  haymaker. Yeah, yeah, And here comes the
• 47:32
  haymaker. She's like, well, listen, So
• 47:37
  because she managed Dirty Loops. Jonah Nelson, lead singer of
• 47:45
  Dirty Loops and Dirty Loops themselves, that band, this
• 47:49
  incredible songwriter named Eli Teplin and myself, those were
• 47:54
  her people that she managed. And so she's like, so they had a
• 48:00
  meeting to pass ever, you know, to pass on my artist to other
• 48:04
  managers. And Dirty Loops is going to be
• 48:08
  managed by so and so. Eli's going to be managed by so
• 48:12
  and so. But unfortunately, when your
• 48:15
  name was brought up, nobody wanted you.
• 48:25
  I was like, oh, she's like, yeah, so they're going to,
• 48:36
  they're going to drop you. I was like, oh, this was a
• 48:44
  unique rejection because these people knew me well, knew my
• 48:50
  career well, knew my numbers and nobody wanted to work with me.
• 49:03
  And I got along with everyone. And I've never had an issue with
• 49:08
  like personality clashes. So I I knew that it wasn't like
• 49:12
  they didn't want to work with me because they don't like me as a
• 49:14
  person. They didn't want to work with me
• 49:16
  because they didn't believe in me as an artist in my career.
• 49:20
  That was why. And I just imagined them all
• 49:25
  being at the table that I've sat at all, huddled around and got
• 49:29
  All right, Who wants Eli? You OK?
• 49:33
  OK. So you got OK.
• 49:34
  You got Eli. Great.
• 49:35
  What about Jonah? Who was Jonah?
• 49:37
  Dirty leaves. OK, OK, not OK.
• 49:39
  You know who's who's. I'm sure everybody wanted them.
• 49:42
  OK, This person. OK, great.
• 49:43
  How about Clark? Anybody.
• 49:51
  Clark. Nobody.
• 49:54
  Just. I don't know if this happened,
• 49:57
  but I'm just my imagination and probably something similar like
• 50:00
  that happened. And it's just that nobody, all
• 50:03
  those people that I knew and and loved and still love and care
• 50:05
  about, but at the time, just like none of them spoke up for
• 50:09
  me. And I was, I've been working on
• 50:15
  an album for a while, and I just kind of found myself into a
• 50:22
  place of just apathy and laziness.
• 50:28
  And like, yeah, it'll come out like when it comes out.
• 50:30
  And yeah, I'm working on it. And just this thing instead of
• 50:33
  actually getting it done, I'm signed by Quincy Jones.
• 50:36
  I'm hot stuff. And at that point, the reality,
• 50:43
  the inarguable reality that these professional managers,
• 50:50
  professional music industry people who knew my career
• 50:57
  intimately, did not believe that I was worth the investment to
• 51:04
  continue on with. They believe in their heart of
• 51:07
  hearts that I was not going to make it or be successful.
• 51:11
  I wrote a song the next day. I had a writing session with
• 51:15
  these two brilliant writers. And I wrote a song that says, I
• 51:21
  guess it's just, you know, back to the way that it's always
• 51:23
  been. It's just me who believes in me.
• 51:27
  And I wrote the song about that entire experience and man, I got
• 51:31
  that album done so fast. I got it to mix.
• 51:34
  I got it to master. All of a sudden I was I was able
• 51:37
  to raise the money I needed to get it mixed and mastered well.
• 51:41
  I was writing the rest of the songs, I was finishing them, I
• 51:45
  was working on and all of a sudden it's like I had all this
• 51:48
  motivation to be a workhorse and release the album and then go on
• 51:52
  a tour where I'm driving myself. I'm going to venues that will
• 51:57
  have 300 people one night and seven the next and not
• 52:01
  understanding or not, but just like going for it, you know,
• 52:04
  making awesome money at 1 venue. And then the other venue I go to
• 52:08
  the guy, I'm like, hey, we're going to settle up And he goes,
• 52:11
  sorry, you didn't make any money.
• 52:13
  You know, there's nothing for you.
• 52:15
  Or here's $7.00 for the night, you know, which happens, which
• 52:22
  has happened, but I didn't care. I just had this resolve and this
• 52:26
  fiery like I'm going to show them.
• 52:29
  And I the jury's out on if that's healthy or not, but boy,
• 52:34
  is it effective. Yeah, it's funny because as you
• 52:40
  were, as you're talking about them sitting around the table,
• 52:42
  all, all I can see in my head is, you know, that it's that
• 52:45
  classic picture of the the kid that's getting picked last on
• 52:49
  the sports team. And everyone's like, wow, I
• 52:51
  don't yeah, I don't really want them or, you know, coming back
• 52:54
  from football, you know, or coming back to football and
• 52:58
  then, you know, racing against everyone else to get to the ball
• 53:01
  1st and everyone. Why are you, you're slower than
• 53:05
  Clark now. What happened to you?
• 53:07
  And it's almost, if you look at that and you, you hear the way
• 53:10
  that you're talking about that It was, it was, it wasn't that
• 53:13
  they were dogging on the on you necessarily.
• 53:17
  Well, they, they are, I don't know.
• 53:19
  It's, it's this weird. It's, it's how it was said like
• 53:23
  going back to that football experience of everyone talking
• 53:29
  poorly about the other person because they weren't better than
• 53:31
  you. And there's this like cyclical
• 53:34
  thing almost throughout life of like, man, you, you couldn't do
• 53:38
  it. Like you're not, you're not good
• 53:39
  enough to make it at this level. And I think I feel like a, a lot
• 53:43
  of us experienced that in life where we get to a place in our
• 53:46
  career, we get to our place in our family ago.
• 53:49
  Man, is this, is this all that we can do is like, I feel like
• 53:52
  there's more like I, I should, I should be in a different place.
• 53:57
  And I think sometimes God just says, I have you where you're at
• 53:59
  right now for a reason. And doors will open up when he
• 54:04
  decides those doors are going to open up.
• 54:07
  I'm curious in in that experience, when you were
• 54:11
  dropped from Quincy Jones, what was the door that opened for you
• 54:17
  that that door needed to be closed in order for you to move
• 54:20
  forward in your career? Yeah, it ended up ending
• 54:24
  incredibly well. Like fairy tale like is
• 54:28
  relationally with them just in a lot of like legalities and
• 54:37
  logistics that and relational things that, you know, we don't
• 54:41
  have time to get into. But it ended incredibly well
• 54:43
  with them and I have great relationship with all of them.
• 54:47
  An infinite amount of gratitude for what they've done for me.
• 54:53
  But when I, when I, when I left Quincy Jones Productions, I
• 54:59
  found this other manager that had been with me for a long time
• 55:06
  named Mike Kraske. And right when I got out of
• 55:09
  American Idol, I didn't know what to do, which is a common
• 55:14
  thing for Idol contestants. When they're done and they don't
• 55:17
  get signed like immediately, they, they're just back to their
• 55:21
  apartment or their home or their mom's house, like wherever they
• 55:23
  live. And they're like, oh, well, what
• 55:25
  do I do now? Mike, who has a ton of
• 55:29
  experience in the music industry, lifetime of
• 55:32
  experience, he sat down with me and was like, all right, what
• 55:37
  are your numbers? What do you want to do?
• 55:40
  Who's some artist that you want to be like, OK, this is what you
• 55:45
  need and I'm going to take you to every meeting you need with
• 55:50
  every person that you would need.
• 55:51
  So he took me to like the vice president of like the biggest
• 55:57
  agency in Nashville. He took me to a business
• 56:00
  management firm that handles all my taxes for artists and I'm
• 56:06
  still with today. He took me to other management
• 56:10
  companies. He goes, I'm not your manager.
• 56:12
  He's like, I'm not looking to, to manage anyone right now, but
• 56:16
  I will help you. And he put in so much time and
• 56:19
  effort and he had such a reputation where he could get
• 56:23
  into any room because everyone loved him and he could get to
• 56:27
  the bottom of anything. And he did it all for free and
• 56:31
  didn't ask for any money, didn't ask for Commission, didn't ask
• 56:34
  for literally all. He said.
• 56:36
  He's like, the only thing I want is I want tickets.
• 56:41
  When you're doing a big giant show in Nashville, he's like,
• 56:44
  that's it. And which is kind of like, it's
• 56:48
  really just a big old compliment you know, of just like you're
• 56:51
  going to be a big star. And when you do a big sold out
• 56:54
  show, I just want to be there, you know?
• 56:57
  And off I went. Independent artist, set it up.
• 57:01
  Quincy Jones. 5-6 years later I go, hey, Mike, are you
• 57:08
  interested in management? And he's like, I would love to
• 57:13
  manage you. And so after all that time, I
• 57:17
  got back with Mike. He's my manager now and he's
• 57:21
  been invaluable. And what's great about Mike is
• 57:25
  he's in Nashville. He knows everyone and everyone
• 57:29
  loves him. And he's a very hard worker.
• 57:32
  He's done every job in the industry.
• 57:34
  So he knows when someone who's working for me is doing a good
• 57:36
  job and when they're not. And he knows the language and
• 57:39
  knows how to talk to them. And I would have never gotten to
• 57:46
  that place with Mike, you know, if I was still signed with with
• 57:51
  Quincy. And, and I think there are a lot
• 57:54
  of doors that open that that I don't even quantify, I don't
• 57:59
  even necessarily know to point to, but surely doors have opened
• 58:04
  that have led to success since then.
• 58:06
  And and because of that door closing, many others have
• 58:10
  opened. I love it.
• 58:13
  It's so, it's so interesting to me.
• 58:15
  There's so many different facets of your life, you know, from
• 58:19
  from music to sports to, you know, even even preaching some
• 58:23
  sermons, which is which has been kind of cool to see.
• 58:27
  And I know that that's something that you've also wanted to ramp
• 58:29
  up. There's a lot of areas I think
• 58:30
  that that there's great opportunity.
• 58:34
  I, I do want to ask you a question focused around your
• 58:39
  relationship with your wife, 'cause you know, starting,
• 58:43
  starting all the way from Champy's Fried Chicken in
• 58:46
  Chattanooga, TN all the way to now five years.
• 58:50
  Actually, it's 10 years, 10 years now since you guys were
• 58:54
  mad. I'm curious, what what has your
• 58:58
  relationship with your wife? What has that shown you about
• 59:02
  who you are as a person? How?
• 59:04
  How has that changed the way that you view yourself and how
• 59:08
  you show up today? This one could get emotional for
• 59:13
  sure, which I'm I have no reservations about.
• 59:19
  I think with my, with my wife, really the, the thing that I've
• 59:28
  learned about myself was my, my parents split up when I was 18
• 59:35
  and, and I remember when that happened, I was just thinking, I
• 59:40
  got to do whatever I got to do to make sure that hasn't
• 59:42
  happened to me. You know, divorce.
• 59:45
  It's just so awful. And my and my parents were the
• 59:49
  best case scenario. Like they were very respectful
• 59:52
  of each other. Neither of them have ever talked
• 59:54
  negative about the other. They're cordial.
• 59:57
  They ask like when I'm with my dad, he's like, how's your mom's
• 1:00:00
  everything good, great. I'm so glad vice versa with my
• 1:00:03
  mom about I mean, so I, I, you couldn't have had a better, you
• 1:00:09
  know, situation there if divorce was the thing that happened.
• 1:00:14
  But even still, I was so scared. That that it wasn't going to
• 1:00:19
  work out. And I was so scared that I
• 1:00:21
  wasn't going to be a good husband and that I was going to
• 1:00:26
  really try and I was going to fail.
• 1:00:28
  And there's going to be strife. And, you know, the next step
• 1:00:31
  with strife, if there's a lot of it is divorce.
• 1:00:33
  And and I had such pressure on myself.
• 1:00:37
  And I think the thing I've learned about myself is if you
• 1:00:39
  really want to be good at something, which we've talked
• 1:00:44
  about sports, talked about 40 yard dash times, we've talked
• 1:00:49
  about music, we've talked about cool tour concepts, we've talked
• 1:00:53
  about making an album. But even with relationships, if
• 1:01:00
  you really want to be good, it is totally in your control.
• 1:01:04
  And if I want to be a good husband.
• 1:01:06
  And luckily I've had such a great model in my dad, but even
• 1:01:11
  more than my dad in in the Bible, like how the Bible
• 1:01:15
  explains marriage and what the husband should be like and what
• 1:01:21
  God and what Christ is like. To me that that's the model that
• 1:01:25
  I should also be like. If I want to be good at that,
• 1:01:29
  it's, it's totally in my control and it's a decision that I make
• 1:01:32
  every day. And then when I'm when I mess up
• 1:01:35
  and I'm not that to sincerely, authentically apologize and try
• 1:01:42
  and and get better. And in through five years of
• 1:01:47
  marriage, that has been our story.
• 1:01:50
  And with that has come the most joyous, fulfilling experience
• 1:01:56
  and time season in my entire life.
• 1:02:01
  And people say your wedding day is the best day of your life.
• 1:02:05
  Not even close, not even close. Every single day after that has
• 1:02:11
  been better. I would take any day I've had in
• 1:02:14
  the past five years being married over the day of the of
• 1:02:18
  the wedding. Not even close.
• 1:02:21
  And I remember we were told, like you're told for some reason
• 1:02:25
  when you're getting close to the wedding, when you're engaged,
• 1:02:28
  you you're told how hard marriage is going to be.
• 1:02:31
  And yeah, it's it's hard also to run 90 yards for a touchdown.
• 1:02:36
  But does anybody go to like Jonathan Taylor, who just ran
• 1:02:42
  like an 80 yard touchdown against the Titans?
• 1:02:45
  I'm OK. But anyway, like, did anyone go
• 1:02:48
  to him? Did anyone go to him after that
• 1:02:51
  run and be like, oh man, that looked really hard.
• 1:02:54
  How was it? And he's like, it's really hard.
• 1:02:58
  I had to run really hard. And those guys were really
• 1:03:02
  trying to get me and I had to run around them and I trained so
• 1:03:06
  hard. It's, I mean, it's worth it.
• 1:03:08
  Like the touchdown's worth it, but gosh, it's hard.
• 1:03:12
  Like, no, obviously it's going to be hard.
• 1:03:16
  But that is not the emphasis on marriage.
• 1:03:19
  The emphasis on marriage is the touchdown.
• 1:03:21
  It's, it's the success, It's, it's the joy and it's the
• 1:03:24
  fulfilment that comes from being with someone that is locked in
• 1:03:29
  with you forever, no matter what, someone that is your best
• 1:03:34
  friend, as corny as that sounds. And I always rolled my eyes at
• 1:03:36
  that before I was married and people would say that, but it's
• 1:03:38
  the truth. When we got married, everyone
• 1:03:42
  told us like, get ready, it's all, it's all butterflies right
• 1:03:45
  now, but just wait, you know, so encouraging, so encouraging,
• 1:03:51
  right? And that was the like, that was
• 1:03:54
  the predominant narrative. And then we moved in together
• 1:03:59
  and I was like, this is pretty great.
• 1:04:03
  Things are pretty good, but it's only the first month, you know,
• 1:04:06
  it's only first month. Yeah, I'm sure it's going to get
• 1:04:08
  terrible soon. Yeah, that's what everybody says
• 1:04:10
  anyway. It's going to get really hard.
• 1:04:13
  Six months in and we're like, hmm, this is pretty great.
• 1:04:19
  One year in, first year anniversary, we're like, this
• 1:04:25
  was awesome. I loved all of this.
• 1:04:29
  And what people were saying was like, oh, you like it now, but
• 1:04:33
  wait till Bah, Bah, Bah. And we finished the first year.
• 1:04:37
  We're like, this was amazing. I thought the first year was
• 1:04:41
  supposed to be the hardest year. And five years later, when I
• 1:04:46
  look back, yeah, I guess first year was the worst year because
• 1:04:49
  every year as good as the first year was, every year after that
• 1:04:52
  has somehow gotten even better. And when I hear from people who
• 1:04:59
  I love and respect and have a a strong relationship with God and
• 1:05:03
  love and our love their spouse and our selfless with them, they
• 1:05:10
  say it doesn't it? It keeps getting better every
• 1:05:12
  single year keeps getting better.
• 1:05:15
  And that's exactly what I've experienced.
• 1:05:18
  I love that it's so good and it's so good to hear because I
• 1:05:20
  think you're right, a lot of people do focus on the negatives
• 1:05:24
  of marriage and there's so many wonderful benefits to marriage.
• 1:05:27
  There's the, you know, there's something about being able to
• 1:05:30
  wake up next to an amazing person who hopefully he's the
• 1:05:36
  best in you and encourages you on your lowest days and vice
• 1:05:40
  versa. And, and on top of that, like
• 1:05:43
  there is just something about knowing that there is someone in
• 1:05:46
  your corner that's there that has been with you for a long
• 1:05:50
  time to see the UPS and the downs and, and to encourage you.
• 1:05:54
  You know, I've, I've really enjoyed our conversation.
• 1:05:58
  There's so much wisdom behind everything that you've said.
• 1:06:02
  I do have one more question for you.
• 1:06:03
  But before I ask it for all of you guys listening, take a
• 1:06:06
  moment, go follow Clark's Instagram.
• 1:06:08
  He has some incredible covers and runs that will blow your
• 1:06:12
  mind. I, I still listen to some of
• 1:06:15
  them on repeat. I'm just like how like I said
• 1:06:18
  earlier, just just literally just like makes me shake my head
• 1:06:21
  of like this guy's, this guy's too good.
• 1:06:26
  But he he also has some incredible stuff that's coming
• 1:06:30
  down the pipeline. He's got a new single that's
• 1:06:32
  going to be coming out very shortly.
• 1:06:34
  In fact, I think what when this episode airs, it'll actually
• 1:06:37
  probably be out. So keep your eyes open for that
• 1:06:40
  because it's going to be fantastic.
• 1:06:41
  Clark, when you look back on your life, you've had some
• 1:06:46
  incredible success, some incredible significance
• 1:06:49
  throughout your life. I know that a lot of people that
• 1:06:51
  listen to the show, they're, they're trying to figure out
• 1:06:55
  identity of who they are. And they're trying to figure
• 1:06:58
  out, you know, what do I do when I feel lost, when I don't feel
• 1:07:02
  like things are quite working out the way that I feel like
• 1:07:04
  they should, like I should be further along than I am.
• 1:07:08
  Or, you know, fill in the blank of whatever that limiting
• 1:07:11
  thought is that comes up. What would you say to someone
• 1:07:15
  who's wrestling with that to encourage them to really just
• 1:07:19
  lean into their true identity? What would you say to them?
• 1:07:23
  I'd say you got to have two things in line 1.
• 1:07:27
  You got to make sure that your goal is God's goal, and we
• 1:07:31
  always have to be open to being wrong on that.
• 1:07:35
  Like I said earlier, I believe with all my heart that God's
• 1:07:39
  purpose for me is to have a very impactful, fruitful culture
• 1:07:44
  shifting music career. I I believe that with all my
• 1:07:48
  heart, but I have to be open to the possibility that I'm way
• 1:07:53
  wrong about that. It's not what he has for me at
• 1:07:55
  all. So first, being open every time
• 1:08:00
  that I'm every time that I'm at church and I'm leading worship,
• 1:08:04
  I've got a mic in my hand anytime that I feel led to kneel
• 1:08:08
  and to bow like get on my knees. I make a habit of if it's
• 1:08:13
  appropriate in the song to turn off my mic and set it out in
• 1:08:19
  front of me, like I'm laying that on the altar too, and to
• 1:08:23
  always make sure that I'm able to lay that down and say God, if
• 1:08:28
  you want to take this, you can take it and to mean it.
• 1:08:32
  So that's first. If we have this goal that we're
• 1:08:36
  like God, why am I not there? I want to be there.
• 1:08:38
  I want to do more. You have to be OK with not
• 1:08:42
  reaching that at all. If that's God's plan for you
• 1:08:46
  because we have to believe him, not just believe in him, but
• 1:08:49
  believe him when he says that he has life, that the easy
• 1:08:54
  translation says that is that is full and good.
• 1:08:59
  That is what he has for us life to the fullest.
• 1:09:01
  That's what he has. And if we believe him, we
• 1:09:03
  believe that that's true, then we have the freedom to just dive
• 1:09:08
  into whatever He has for us and to be totally comfortable with
• 1:09:12
  that and totally confident. That's the best thing for us.
• 1:09:14
  Second, we have to believe that whatever that goal looks like,
• 1:09:19
  whether that's huge commercial success or fill in the blank
• 1:09:27
  that he orders the steps of a righteous man or woman.
• 1:09:34
  And it's all comes down to making sure your goal is God's
• 1:09:38
  goal, being open to the fact that maybe your goal is not
• 1:09:42
  God's goal, and then being patient and knowing that he is
• 1:09:48
  your provider, not your your employer is not your provider.
• 1:09:54
  A talent buyer is not your provider.
• 1:09:56
  Spotify is for sure not your provider.
• 1:09:59
  It's like no one's provider. And just be patient and be open
• 1:10:07
  to see what God is trying to teach you right now because it's
• 1:10:10
  real corny to say, but it's absolutely the truth that God is
• 1:10:15
  trying to teach you something in every season, even when it feels
• 1:10:19
  like there's no fruit. Don't miss out on the fruit that
• 1:10:22
  he's trying to get you to receive in the hard times as
• 1:10:27
  well as the big times. Because Paul says they'll say
• 1:10:30
  this, I'll be done. We all like to quote the
• 1:10:32
  scripture that says Philippians 413.
• 1:10:36
  I'm able to do all I can do all things through Christ who
• 1:10:38
  strengthens me. The context there is he's
• 1:10:40
  talking about I know I can be I've been rich and I've been
• 1:10:47
  really poor and I've been content and both of those things
• 1:10:49
  because I can do all things through Christ who strengthens
• 1:10:51
  me. But for some reason we always
• 1:10:54
  talk about the poor. I can be content and and when
• 1:10:58
  I'm poor or when things are down, when things are not going
• 1:11:01
  well. And that is absolutely true and
• 1:11:03
  that's part of it. But also don't take your hands
• 1:11:07
  off the wheel when things get great.
• 1:11:10
  Because he also said, I also know how to be content with
• 1:11:15
  wealth. I also know how to be rich.
• 1:11:19
  I know how to be content and fulfilled when things are going
• 1:11:23
  great. So whether things are going
• 1:11:25
  great, whether things are going really bad, you have to stay
• 1:11:31
  focused and thank God. What do you want from me right
• 1:11:35
  now, and what are you teaching me right now?
• 1:11:40
  I love it. It's so good and there's so many
• 1:11:43
  pieces of wisdom that you just shared and I want to encourage
• 1:11:48
  all of you guys go back and listen to it again and again and
• 1:11:51
  again. You know, the fruit of your life
• 1:11:55
  that really does determine your day-to-day actions that you do.
• 1:11:59
  Are you are you trying to live out, you know, a righteous life,
• 1:12:02
  which you know, we're not we're not talking about perfection
• 1:12:05
  here. We're we're talking about
• 1:12:07
  purpose of just truly waking up and doing the best that you can
• 1:12:11
  with what God has given you, whether that's little or whether
• 1:12:14
  that's a lot. Clark, thank you so much for
• 1:12:16
  coming on and sharing your story.
• 1:12:18
  You truly are such a great guy with a humble heart to serve
• 1:12:21
  others. Lift.
• 1:12:22
  Other people up. For all of you guys listening,
• 1:12:25
  make sure you share this story of Clark because I know that
• 1:12:29
  there's someone out there that just really needs to hear what
• 1:12:31
  he said. And I know it's going to inspire
• 1:12:33
  them to continue to lean into God's purpose for their life.
• 1:12:36
  So until next time, remember to be more, see more, and
• 1:12:39
  experience more than before.