Ep. 25: Michael Ray on Florida, Hunting Alligators, and Country Music

Published Jun 18, 2024, 9:00 AM

This week Dan and Reid Isbell host hit-making artist Michael Ray out in God’s Country. Ray shares his thoughts on keyboard warriors, how Joe Diffie impacted his life, and how he mentally recharges from life in the spotlight. He shares some crazy alligator-hunting stories from his upbringing in Florida and how music has been a part of his life from the time he was born.

Catch Dan and Reid playing live as The Brothers Hunt @ Chiefs in Nashville on July 19th: Get Tickets

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What's up?

You're up in God's Country With Reed and Dan Is, also known as the Brothers Hunt, we take a weekly drive to the intersection of country and music in the great outdoor. Those things that go together like Granddaddy's acoustic guitar and the Grand old Opper.

Stage Florida and refrigerators on the porch. Brought to you by Meat Eater and iHeart Podcasts.

We're gonna be sitting down with Michael Ray today, Michael Great Beard Ray, Great Teeth Ray, Michael Great Teeth, Rat tattoos Man. We're gonna be talking Florida. We're gonna be talking hunting, We're gonna be talking music when we talking family. A lot of great stories from this cat, good buddy of ours. Really excited to sit down with him in God's Country.

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Where's Home, Like where you be born Eustace in Florida.

So it's like south of Okalla. Dude, Okalla is beautiful.

Yeah that's horse country right, Yeah, dude, it's gorgeous. Now I've been there once.

Yeah, I didn't know that Okala was horse country until like I started figuring out. Someone told me they're like, Okalla, that's where Toby Keith is. He invested in like horses and and all that stuff, and that's where Toby Keith gets his horses. I'm like from Okalla and they're like, yeah, it's horse country, and I'm like, I have lived there my entire life and I had no idea. Of course, I don't ride horses. I don't get out on top of anything with the brain anything.

Good point, what like, what was it like?

Give us a glimpse into because I think, I mean, I'm kind of judging you.

I mean I know you, like we've written songs together.

I know you, but I feel like you're like kind of authentic Florida redneck a little bit. Yeah, like just from where you've give us an insight on like what growing up there was like.

Man, it's you know, the older you get the more you see around you know the world and around the United States, it's just great, hardworking all American people, you know what I mean, like blue collar folks that take care of each other.

Man that look out for each other.

And it's it's just one of those places that now, you know, a lot is changing just because everything's growing, you know, but it still has that And where my dad and everybody lives is the same land that my grandfather had, his dad had, so where we grow up where you know, when I go home, I go to the same place that you know, I learned to ride a bike, shoot a gun, you know, all the stuff my dad did.

Yeah, all that stuff.

So it's cool for me to go back there because a lot hasn't changed as much as much as like infrastructures are changing. And you go back there and yeah, we used to have like a bunch of orange fields out there, and now there's a Publix, and you know, there's different ways popping up, but it still has that This is a core value man's god family country. And and it was a great spot because you were dead center of the state, so you know, you can hunt. We were in the woods, but you're only forty minutes from Orlando, you know, forty five minutes from Daytona, you know if you wanted to go to the beach or whatever.

So kind of had the best of all worlds.

So that's where we went to the beach.

You went to Daytona, Daytona and New Smerna.

Yeah, bro the horse game, which I mean, I don't ride horses or anything like that.

That's one thing I wish I had in my in my like redneck cred card, was that I knew about horses.

Dude, don't. I don't know anything about horses.

I don't am my stepsisters and I have some cousins that like they had horses and you know where like they would go and they do horse shows and stuff like that. And so one of my stepsisters get bucked off, and I was like.

Down that, and that's why that's why I said.

I was like, I just don't get on any animal that has like a brain that could like make and go squirrel and then throw me off the other season.

You know, my wife is from Kentucky and she went to school at Les and like some of those horses they're buying for those races and stuff.

For like millions. Oh yeah, man, I mean like it is some of that money.

You ever gambled on horse racing, I have done that. Yeah, well I have no idea what. We played some show and the guy had there was like I think it was in Kentucky and it was like.

Ducky Downs or whatever is it is.

The Kentucky Downs is like the Owensborough.

The Kentucky Derby, like a round.

Like oh, you're thinking of in Losbull, Well, there's the Oaks.

The day before the derby at Churchhill.

It wasn't that.

It was like I think, I want to say, it was like it might have been like early, way earlier, but this guy brought us there. But you want to get your blood pressure going, yeah, if you put some money on a horse and you know, I just I was like, that's a cool name, you know what I mean.

Bitch comes out the gate in first and it's like, oh buddy.

That I'm like, yeah, double down, lose everything.

It's pretty fun. Man.

Yeah, I've been that evans Evansville, that's whatever is there, but that's where that's where. That's where we went.

But they like when we went, they took us back to like like pre race. They took us back into the stables and like we got to see the horses that were about to run and how they were feeding them and doing like.

They take care of those horses like they are athletes in the Ellis Park. I also didn't realize how small the jockeys are, little little guys.

Yeah, tiny little, tiny little man.

Little man.

Yeah, it's it's pretty incredible. It is. I'm I'm your five eleven blaite guy six foot you know what I mean?

No, And when I walk around there, dude, I was like, this is what Riley Green feels like when he's walking.

I'm sick five Holly Green. Oh, dreamy wrong? He was out with this past year. We had a we had a lot of fun with that guy. Man, he's uhthing else.

Yeah yeah, So what was like your first like it says we've got it, like your stat sheet right here?

Yeah, you got a statue? Check that out.

Alligators? Yeah, come on, what's the best alligator story you got?

Well?

Uh, last season, so you got to get tags, right, My cousin Lee got tags and I took off three days and you know, hunter the night and.

So long how long is the season?

Sorry? Shoot, I don't I don't really know what it is.

I think it's short.

It's short, yeah, I think it's like three weeks, three weeks, I want to say, three weeks or a month. It's not very long. You want to get so many tags, you know. And then of course there's like the lakes where like at night you could walk across on Gator's back. Can't go to those, you know, So I'm like, we just go to Lake George.

We yeah, tag out in an hour, you know.

And I think they do, like they a lot tags for residents, like if you like on land or if you they basically give you tags, right you sell them.

Or I think, so, yeah, that's a person never got tags. I've always like my cousins always got them or some always had them. But this last season, normally like you get like a ten foot you know, like one, you know, you get.

Some big ones.

You know.

Lost of six is for us.

We got completely skunked last season, right three nights, and so we're in this in this canal, in this canal.

How does the process work? Do you real them in? Do you shoot them?

Like?

How is it?

We had a so we had a like a big treble hook there.

In the middle of the water and throws across them.

Yeah, and the only alligator experience or like this is the show like the swamp people.

Yeah, yeah, and they're hanging like what like chicken, like full chicken.

Yeah off, So you're snagging them.

Yeah, we're snagging them.

And then get them to the boat shooting and shooting.

And so we were and then a second night, me and my cousin are having a great time.

It's so much fun, dude, Like it's one of That and duck hunting are two of my favorites, just because you can talk and bullshit, you know. And anyway, we're in this canal and we're shining, you know, looking for for eyes and stuff. And like I said, normally, man, every season you're you're tagging out right. Everybody we knew was not. We couldn't get a gater close, right, And at one point in time they were like literally baby gaters around our boat. We're like, mama's here, have no clue where you can't find her nothing, right, So we're shining. We're in this canal and there's houses around it. This lady comes out, She's like, you're shining in my house and my cousin's like, no, we're not. We're shining on the water, you know. And she's like yelling at my cousin. So I'm like letting him kind of handle it, you know. And I'm getting stuff and my back's turned and our buddy JJ's on the back part of the boat, and I'm like, Lee, he's got this. He's a smooth talker, you know. And uh, he's like He's like. She's like, we aren't supposed to be out here, and he's like, man, we have tags.

This is a lake. Yeah, completely legal.

Well, she goes back in her house, comes back out. Keep in mind my back's turned to her right. She's yelling at at my cousin Lee again, and he's like just backing the boat out, you know. And now there's it's gotten a little heated more, right, YEA. All of a sudden, I hear no way, the lady had a gun on her and shoots right. And my cousin, my cousin this at night, bro, and my backs turned right. In my mind, I'm like they they say that when your body is in shock, you don't feel it.

So I'm like.

I'm looking at my check, I'm checking the whole time, and then we end up back and we back out, you know, and and then of course, you know, all the all the anger sets in, so you know, we're calling our buddies, you know, our buddies as this lady just walked out and shot it. It was only a gun we fired for three days. It was the only gun that was one damn gator.

Dude, that's kind of terrifying.

Yeah, it's Florida, baby.

That is Florida. That was the Florida story.

Yeah, that's exactly what random Ga popcast alligator is.

If you never had alligator people listening, it's actually really good.

It's really good, and it's like one of the highest proteins really gator tail. Yeah, this guy, I think like you got like a ten foot gator. His tails was pushing them through the water and it's just solid.

Oh yes, you know. Yeah, it makes it no fac to go to.

My dad would preach like revivals down in southern Mississippi, and we went over to Basket Goula.

It was that was that what it was? What song is that in that squirrel and herself that they didn't past?

Do you know what song?

Yeah? Ray Stevens the Mississippi Squirrel Revival, Like you're like Jamie Joe Rogan is, Yeah.

It just kind of became that over time because we were like, get so much stuff wrong, like the Atlantic. Yeah, so she's kind of cleans it up, but he's like actually.

At the end, it's like.

But that.

We like went through a drive through like you would go through KFC, and we would order. I remember Dad ordering just like these styrophoam plates of Gator and jalapeno fat and stuff, and it was all crumpled up. And I was like five, I was probably older. I literally brown bag, yes, like brown bag styrophone. They give you napkins and this thing of Gator tail and uh dude, I remember grabbing a piece thinking it was Gator and it was about ten jilapenos Friday together.

It was awful. I put him in it up so it lit me up.

But I just remember every time he went down there, I was so excited because I was gonna get to eat gator.

Do you remember, like the punch of that story is yeah, that the way dad tells it. You know my dad, our dad's a preachers, very animated storyteller, and he'll say, yeah, Rady he come up and finally got it a drink dr pepper whatever my dad had which was probably really unhealthy, and and uh he said, yeah, raak him up. I had a drink at Dodtor pepper and he said, what Alligator's good? But uh, but man, I don't like him.

Pallahennahippers.

I just remember like doing like this, and I just feeling.

You try because your dad, you don't want to say anything dying gator.

You could be crying, like, why's it getting so emotion I love him?

Plahna heippers.

So when did you fall in love with duck hunting? I mean, can you duck hunting?

Florida?

So, my my buddy Tim Montana's who got me got me hooked on it. I went, we go every year. It's probably about six years ago was my first time going.

That's the second time my buddy Tim Montana has been mentioned on this podcast. Kobe said the same. I guess she's friends with Yeah.

Yeah, he's been one of my one of my best friends man for for years. And uh he goes every year to Stuttgarden, friends of ours that have a camp out there.

Capital of the World.

And let me just keep in.

Mind we all probably grew up the same where like before hunting season, you have to go bomb the trailer, get the snakes on, all the all the bugs.

So that's what I'm used to at the time, right, And He's like, we're going duck hunting and I'm like, I've never been. He's like, you gotta go.

And he goes every year at the beginning of January for his birthday for like four or five days. And and Tim is the one degree away from everybody.

A dude knows literally everybody.

We've heard that too, Yeah.

Well everybody we talked to, like in hunting camps or whatever. His name feels like it always gets brong.

He knows every And what's great.

One of the one of the many things I love about him is he's like if he has a connection with something and you're a friend.

With his, he's connecting.

You're plug you know, you're plugged, insuged And.

Literally knows everybody.

I mean, like and and I got plenty of Tim stories just like this only happens to you, you know what I mean, Like the dude's playing a trade. He would tell me for years how him and Dave Grohl are going to be buddies right, are going away listen to this. I might be messing this up a little bit, but he was playing a trigger event, right and he's I'm pretty sure just him acoustic on like a probably a goose.

Tim Tanne, for views don't know, is an artist in his own right.

Yeah. Yeah, he's got a big rock song right now called Devil. You know. That's that's crushing it. But he, uh so.

This guy he's playing, this guy comes up with a hat on watching him, gets up on the.

Ca hoone what starts playing the home guy.

It's Dave Girl, No way, Dave and him hit it off. Tim gets Tim, Tim, Tim get a little wild, you know yeah, And so they get a little whild that night and Dave girls like you're one of the last real rock starry man, you know.

Weeks later, Tim's flying.

Dave is asking Tim and Danielle his wife, dude, you gotta come. We're doing two nights of Madison Square Garden. It's my birthday, you gotta come. And this ship only happens to Tim, you know what I mean. I'm like, he sees this stuff and I swear it happens, you know. But so he he had a good has this you know, just knows everybody. And he does his duck hunt every year for his birthday. And so I went the first year. And this is way nicer hunting than I've ever done in my life. Right, Like he's like, he's like, they have a lodge, and I'm like, okay, and I'm thinking what I grew up on? No, everybody has their own bedroom. There's a fully stock bar, there's a commercial sized kitchen. Easy hunt and yeah, I mean it's and then you go out there and you can, you know, drink where, you know, talk, have fun, you know, if you want to shoot, if you want to not shoot, if you don't want to, you know, you got a guy watching and calling the birds for you.

And I'm like this is my Yeah, this is this is And I've gone every year.

I love it, man, And a lot of it is just last year we went and we were in Montana and actually Tim and Billy Gibbons zz Top bought a bar called the Wise River Club and Wise River, Montana because Tim's from Butte, Montana, which is like thirty minutes from there.

Yeah, and so Wise River.

Is just this awesome town dude that like you feel like you step back in time, right, it's they still, It's very Montana. I'm the wise river. You step out there, dude, it looks like a photo, you know what I mean, Like a Thomas Kincaid picture.

You know what I mean. You got like a log cabin. The lights are on. You know, everything's beautiful out there.

Bro.

We were riding around at like six in the morning in a Polarius. I'm shooting aurs. I'm like, this is freedom. I had to readjust the society when I got back. But we had a flights out there, and I convinced the guys. I was like, let's take a boys trip. So we took Tim Sprinter because we thought it was a good idea.

Yeah.

Uh, from Montana to Stuckguard, Arkansas. Get in at three thirty, put camo on and go right to the.

Yeah. But we had a good time.

But but one of my favorite memories, man, and what I love about it is the hunting's fun. But we you sider it. There's always a table you know that everybody gets together at. And you know there's some of the old men out there that I've been hunting that land.

For for years and they just all telling stories.

Dude, and I'm like, you know, you're staying up way too late, sleeping an hour and then going and grabbing your gun.

That's part of her camps.

It's my favorite, man.

It's like it's like, you know, once I've hit kind of once you shot a bunch of ducks and geese. I'm like, dude, I just want to go chill with some of these old timers and hear some funny stories in the back when nobody had social media.

Day I'll never forget. We were at at our deer camp in West ce. We went to get sandwiches one day and there's an old man saying there and.

Our deer camp, same thing.

Dude.

It's like double wide or like til be built a two by.

Four, you know I was used to.

Yeah, And so.

We sleep on a table that we fold back.

We see this guy.

He's like, yeah, he's like, y'all killing the deer over there, and we're like, man, you know, we take a good one. He was like maybe every couple of years or something. And he said yeah, he said, uh, hunt was better back before you youngins filmed everything, except he said he didn't say youngs. And he's right, man, you know, it's like, I mean, those guys are fun to talk to just because they have a completely different view of the ground that you're on. Like I would venture to say that those men around the table that lodge probably wasn't or it might have been there, but it wasn't as grandiose as it is, right, Yeah, you know.

And they know it was back before you could look up on your phone how to get to a planet. Those guys know the land like the back of their hand. Yeah, yeah, I mean had dark in the dark, you know. And those also are the guys that are sitting in a tree stand from morning till yeah night.

Yeah, and you know, dark Woods has never really intimidated me. Well, I mean besides, when I was like eight and my dad would leave me out there for fourteen hours by myself.

Can I talk about Nope?

But since but dark water, like you think about it, man, Back in the day, those casts were going out there in places where no cell phones.

Oh no, literally dark putting waiters on and putting.

Waiters on, and walking or boating and then eventually stepping out into like dark water. It's not that I'm I'm not scared of it. I just, dude, that's a that's the like a mind thing of mine, like filling up and like not being able to get back in the boat, or maybe there's not a boat and then you got to go and you trip and you're soaked and you're in the midd I mean that it's pretty safe now, but man, to be able to go after ducks back then, you had to really really love it.

Oh you had to.

Yeah, you know, it probably wasn't anybody on a griddle cooking your breakfast, which is polarious, but hell you God knew when to put us in to the world.

Bos they're gonna dive, they put them in. Put them in where they're cooking breakfast in a commercial.

Kid cargoes, or you can drive out to the.

Step right there.

Yeah, it's something.

Maybe it's because I have mega short legs and I'm like, man, that freaking I'm just built the saint.

You know what I mean?

Who introduced you to hunt?

Was it?

Granddad?

Who was it?

My family grew up hunting, and I remember, like my great grandmother's house is I mean probably the size of this room and a half right little block yellow house still there, and that's where everybody would get together, you know, the smallest house possible. But everybody my great grandmother growing up, you know, it was you know, their generation.

My great grandpa worked.

She got up, they breakfast as soon as I was done, she was preparing lunch because everything was from scratch, you know, And so all of my family, all the our bus stop was her house. And so all the guys that were working, yeah, they were all telephoned, like telephone men a lot. We're getting off for My family's either veterans, first responders or cable splicers, right, like, that's what That's what everybody in my family, all the guys did. And so everybody meet up my great grandma's house would be all of us cousins and stuff, and she would cook, dude, like for everybody, homemade biscuits, grits, eggs, baked, I mean, the whole deal, you know, and so everybody, oh, dude, she she's passed away a few years ago, but she man, that's we all talk about it.

We're like, and I don't think she really.

I think she left out a couple of things in the recipes just so we would miss her, you know, because like no one can make Grandma's fried chicken the way she did you know. I think people have tried, and a lot had tempted, but they've fallen short. You know what we're like, I think she left something out. She's looking down on heaven going you'll never understand. That's it's a pinch of salt, you know, got you? But uh, But then like when my uncle Earl would come down from uh, North Florida, and they would ever they would get together. My grandfather is one of six seven boys, I think, and then they had and one one have one sister, aunt Debbie, So everybody would always get together in the mornings and then every holiday we would all end up at my Greatrandma's house. But then during deer season and Florida, like I still this day have not killed like.

A huge deer. You know, deers aren't they're like great dames with horns.

I haven't seen many.

Yeah, you might get lucky.

I think my cousin Donnie got a pretty decent sized ten point.

And that's like Uncle Earl.

I got a great story about when we filmed the Holy Water video. I'll tell you all that about Donnie and Spidey. You know Spidey the videographer photographer. He's like huge and all the eminem stuff he did, I mean everybody stuff.

But I got a funny story about Donnie and yeah, pin that.

So anyway, I just remember when they would come down, my cousin Buyern, everybody would they'd go, you know, deer hunting, and they'd all come back.

And I remember just being a kid. They teach us how to skin it, you know, and all that stuff and so and then it was just like always around.

It was something I look forward to, you know, as a kid, you know, and then as I got older, you know, I would hunt here and there. And then in high school I became buddies with you know, other buddies of mine that hunted and their dad's you know, had some land and you know, hunting camps and stuff, and so there was a little bit of family, little bit of friends I grew up with, and so a little mixture of both, I think. But to me and I think more and more the busier you get and the more especially with all of our lifestyles and where it's ninety miles an hour all the time, it sending the Woodsman, there's just nothing.

There's just nothing better, you know, it's just peaceful.

It takes on a different like uh, I mean, just like a different spot in your life as opposed to when you're young and don't have anything to do. Absolutely like it just it becomes almost therapeutic.

But it also almost like meets you where you are though too, Like even when you're little, there's a there's an excitement and there's something there's something about that you know, and then like in high school it's a little bit different. But now sitting in the woods is completely different than any of that. I could go a whole season and just sit out there and never shoot anything, just to be out there.

Yeah, I agree, man, There's just nothing like seeing the world wake up, you know, the birds are you know, like turkeys are coming down. It's just something special.

Yeah, I just I need it more now.

Yeah, you know, and like Reid said, it doesn't have to necessarily be action or whatever. But dude, I mean, our lives are crazy. I can't imagine how jammed yours is. I mean from touring and all that. I mean, I say this, I feel like every podcast, but I went out with Loot last year and I recognize now, like that's the first time I've ever seen like actual professional touring schedule and so I know there were years of your life where you were probably playing well over one hundred days of year. I mean, he's not even doing that. He's doing you know, forty or whatever I did thirty or forty with him whatever. But like, I can't imagine in those years of when you're just show after show, trying to write songs, trying to be a good friend, trying to be a good son, trying to you know, it's like we always talk about energy and how much energy you have to give to these certain things, and there's probably not much time for you to just chill and kind of take instead of give, give gift all the time.

Yeah, I think that's why I love the being in the woods so much now. You know, it's just that time to kind of reflect and because you're right, man, and a lot of this stuff, you know, it's there's not a there's not a book a handbook of how to handle it, you know, and everybody's different, and so there's this you know, you're like, oh my, and then and then when it happens, you get it, you get to hit everything changes all of a sudden, you know, and you're like, oh, now you're everything you've wanted and dreamt for is here. But then there's all this other stuff that comes with it that you're like, I thought I was just going to be playing shows, you know, and there's all this other stuff. And like you said, you you go through the years of dropping the ball and other things so you figure out your you know what putting you out. I was just saying this to a new artist not long ago. I was saying, I was like, man, have grace for yourself, you know, like, because you have no you don't know what's coming right, and hopefully it's everything and more, you know what I mean, Then your butt off for and and I and I hope that for you, but just understand that, man, there's gonna be times where you know, maybe you aren't showing up like you should, you know, and I've done that, you know, and and and you wear yourself out.

I go. If you don't take care of this, then everything else is gonna fall.

You're crazy, man.

Like I mean, I even I still think of you as like a new artist because I feel like when I got here, Look, we kind of came up at the same time as far as like songwriters and being in town. And I'm like, dude, we're not We're not like the new guys anymore.

Dude.

No, you know what reminds you that is when you meet somebody that's twenty five.

Now.

Man, I saw you when I was fifteen, and I'm like at kicking Chicken when I was playing in high school, They're like, no.

Dog like you were my favorite artists when I was growing up.

I was growing up. I'm like, oh, I'm here. It happened so fast.

But to your point, man, like that, and and I hope everybody, everybody should have something to be that release and that that outlet for him. But but that's what that's what the outdoors in the woods and and something unt and fish and just like that's what that is for us. And dude, that is invaluable.

It is, man, That's why. That's what I was telling telling them.

I was like, you know, find that one thing that is yours, right and no matter what I mean, unless you get a big pet, but no matter what, that doesn't change, you know. And and some little things that I look back on, go, man, I wish I would have handled that different. You know, like my great grandmother who were talking about she passed away and I was on the road for a funeral. I went to a funeral in my bedroom of the bus via FaceTime with my sister, you know what I mean. And like little things like that, that that that you miss and I'm like, oh, man, I could have you know what I mean.

I wish now looking back.

That I but you know, but when she passed, it was she was ninety eight, so like we kind of knew it was coming.

And and uh also, man, like the job in the dedication to it kind of puts you in a place where sometimes like you can't make that stuff.

You can't and that it was one of those situations, you know where and thank god, man, thank god I got a family that is so supportive. And and you know, my great grandmother anytime I was on Good Morning America or any TV show you know, she was watching and she was she always told me that she was writing a book about about my life.

And I'm like, well, leave a couple of things. How much.

I appreciate that.

Yeah, we read that one time.

She get we're at We're at Christmas and my uncle Kenny said, and they all live. Like what do when I tell you they all live? And it's like you go down this road. Ranch road was uh dirt and now it's uh what ever the next level between dirt and shaved it? And uh, Well, you go down there, and I always joke, I'm like, when you drive down and you think there's no way anybody lives past year, you take a left right, you go down about a hundred yards and you take a right and you're going past my cousin Teresa's trailer. I ain't Kim's trailer, my uncle Kenny trailer, my cousin Mason's house. My dad's house is in the back, and we're we put a gate up, buddy, helicopters on.

Yeah, that was where.

You were from.

I don't know if you had told me that or maybe i'd seen that about it, but I was like, man, I think he's yeah, Man, I think he's from it.

Oh yeah.

You shoot turkeys from the front porch if you want, but you don't season. But you don't season and season, you don't call calls came along.

The refrigerator, you don't. We do not on the porch. Yeah, we have.

With all the signs of you know, if you shoot once, if I'm issue to get my dad on the front.

Porch yeah, what is the uh this uh?

Oh shoot, it's like our place is protected by like the gun, you know what I mean.

It'll be like the.

Good Lord and the Gun.

That is song.

Yeah, it is, oh shoot the songwriter's coming out of you to day man.

Yeah, of course.

Josh got that one.

Yeah.

Haven't you had enough? When is it?

So?

Turkey season opens pretty soon, like, and it's the first one in Florida, right, it's already open.

Yeah, I think it's already opened down there. Man.

Yeah, they start like March fifteenth.

It's all where are we doing?

We gotta go?

Yeah, come on down to Florida.

Boy, is that you got Olla's then?

I've never killed one?

Yeah, it's a uh And dude was crazy about so, Like I said, I mean, we're generations on that same land, right.

And so my.

Grandfather, my grandpa, when he was alive, he would go out there in the morning and when he got off work pretty much around the same time, and throw a corn out right, these wild turkeys. All of a sudden, my grandfather looked like the pigeon Lady in New York, right, and they know the time, you know, And he's like, y'all can hunt anything.

Out here.

Don't you touch these turkeys. So now we got turkeys out there, bro that the beard is like dragging the ground.

We have to kill this. He's like, shoot me, please try to get this gobbling.

Yeah, he's twitching a little bit, you know, his head down. It was the wildest same when my grandpa go out there, put a bunch of corn in a bucket and go out there and just feed the turkeys and then out of nowhere do They'd be twenty of them coming out and he'd just be right there in the middle of them, and they knew him, but none of us could even get close.

Man, we got palm trees or like what's.

Yeah, like thick, thick woods. It's like really, oh, it's like heaven for ticks. Really a lot of tics, a lot of ticks. Yeah, especially down there because it's we're it's I don't know if you consider it swamp but kind of you know, back in there, but it's it's like the thick moss and charm a.

Lot of rock mountain spider feet at them.

Bringing up I just did a writer's retreat and Josh Phillips was.

Awesome.

We were just talking about like how no matter where he's from North Carolina, gone from Central Florida. It's the same, you know what I mean, Like when you grew up like we did. It doesn't matter if you're in Kentucky, Florida. It's upstate New York. And like all of us grew up with the same type of guy, same mama's same.

Oh yeah.

Josh will tell some stories and I'm like, we grew up together exactly what my dad.

There is the foundational red neck neet red neckness. I guess when we make that word up that that yeah, man, you just know, like you just know what you cut from the same floth man.

Yeah. Absolutely.

I went hunt with Josh one time, and I'm not much of a duck hunter. I mean, I guess we've hunted a little bit now, but five years ago we had not been basically, and uh, He's like, man, you got waiters.

I was like, no, dude.

He's like, dude, let I got something. I let you bar you know. I was like, okay, cool. So we got this place, we're duck hunting, and the next day we have to wear the waiters. Well, first off, I didn't know he had like a size eighteen foot dude.

If you see.

I mean that dude's feet.

Are like he's a big boy. Yeah, dude. He texted me this when we were right and he's like, he's like, this song's a hit. I put up.

I threw up three fifteen. I'm like, I threw up at three fifteen, thrown up fifteen on a bar.

So he he gives me these waiters and we get into this water and I'm telling you, we were literally having to break the ice to get in the water. And man, We've been standing there about an hour, and my toes and my shoes like went like this, and when they did, they came down in water.

So I was like, oh no, these waiters. I was like, Josh, did you know these waiters leak? He was like, yeah, bo, I don't think you'd be deep enough in that water. That's my bad. Are you serious? And I I'm telling you, I didn't want to go out, bitch. Dudes.

I stood there for like three hours and man, I have my feet have never hurt. They were hurting, Yeah, to the point to where when I got back to the uh little house lodge they were staying in, I turned the space heater on and put my feet by the heater.

That was sleep for two hours, woke up and they were still cold. Dude.

Yeah, nothing, nothing's worse than that. That that same similar we weren't in the we weren't in the water though, we were in a blind and that that morning hunt was pretty warm, right, And so we had gotten there, Like I said, we decided to drive the sprinter from Montana to Stuffguard, Arkansas because it was we were drinking a lot of adult.

Water sure.

And and and so I was like, all right, yeah, I'll go, I'll do an afternoon hunt.

And they're like and that morning, dude, we like limited out and geese and like it was fast. So I'm like, we're not going to be out there long. So me and my buddy Chad, mindez, you have Steve Fighter now baar nocle Fighter. And I think we just put on like a hoodie, you know, and went out there. Dude, I'm just holding the gun.

I'm like, yeah, this is not safe for me to fire because I don't know what I'm not hitting a.

Duck and there's nowhere to go, man, Like, you just have to freeze it out until either sun goes down or you limit out. I mean, there have been plenty of times where I'm like, maybe I should go I should go ahead and shoot at four points so I can get on that.

Of here I'm freezing. It starts when it starts influencing your uh.

Your judgment on you, and you're like, all right, sorry, buddy, yeah right, it's me or you.

All right, we probably need a music, don't we. We're only fifty.

I'm reading this and I love this.

Man.

It says your grandfather used to do a Sunday morning gospel show on the radio with your second grade teacher.

Yeah, yeah, missus hype.

Yeah, so miss Height would when I she was my second grade teacher, and she would always she'd bring her guitar and like teach us two class two class, and she would play and she would like sing songs for us. We should we learned songs, and then we would learn, you know. She would put like things we need to learn in a song. You know, you memorize it better, you know, and so and so we you know, I had seen her in a long time. Once in a while you'd run into her, you know, a small town and and uh, my grandfather was doing this Sunday morning gospel.

Show on an AM station.

With him and you know, his friends that he jammed with and stuff, and they would just play old gospel songs and and my Grandpa's on all the time and he's like, hey, I'm this height you know you remember miss Heightning. I'm like, yeah, she was my second grade teacher. He's like, yeah, she's in our band, in our in our Sunday Morning and gospel.

And I'm like what.

So I was like I got to see her and so, uh we it kind of like got me back in touch with with Miss Heighten and yeah, she was awesome.

Yeah is that where is that kind of where your your love of music started happening?

Uh? Church?

And yeah, well it was kind of So my grandfather got out of the army and like I said, he's one of my six or seven and my grandmother was one of eight girls, all girls. Right, So my my grandpa and all his brothers lived in the ones you know, from that area, and then my grandmother and all her sisters their family moved like right up the hill, right, So you got eight girls who just moved in with six dudes, you know you're gonna meet and so so he meets my grandmother and all of them. You know started, you know, having kids. You know, they all met their wives and stuff. They all had a bunch of kids. So I got slew with cousins. You know that that uh that we're all around the same age, my dad's generation. So my grandfather, dude, I still to this day, I don't think I've met anybody that had more passion for music than him. And he played lead guitar, had an old Gibson three thirty five.

I got now and and it's it's incredible, man, Yeah, I mean the he he played lead. So the finish has worn off. The bagame. The case is exactly the.

Only thing I've changed on it is the strings because I played it my first song on on the op on my opera dat. So the only thing I've the only thing I've changed on it is the strings. Everything else is the case is exactly the same. Everything, everything's the same. And so but he would, I mean, dude, he would play four nights a week. He'd get off work, My grandma would have everything ready, he'd get home, change his shirt, comb his hair.

They'd go and he played for four hours for free, right like wherever.

This didn't matter, Oh dude, they would My Grandpa would play till the sun comes up right, and he would always be and whenever I moved, he'd be like, man, you gotta come down here.

He plays.

He'd played like assists of living homes and then he'd be like, he'd be like, men he got, come on down here, man, you got you crushed them. He's like, he's like, dude, they're gonna love you. And uh and and I don't pay anything, but they feed you. And I'm like, that's it's bland food first off, like it's mel on wheels.

Grandpa, He's like, come on, can't can't get no better.

You ain't getting white bread any better than you play.

You just play a couple of songs. They got you and so so but free sandwich is all you can eat. Blow but you've never had frozen ham.

Like and so. But when he got out of the army, all the you know, they all had kids.

And so my grandfather just loved music and so he was just putting. I mean even to this day, I mean there's guitars in my family's house.

Is that some don't play. It's just he was the guy right just giving him out.

Oh, he just wanted he wanted you know, he just wanted to play music, and and so he had my dad and my uncle Terry and his you know, my cousin Jeff and Greg and Matt and all them. They would they were on the same age, and so they all grew up more like brothers than cousins, you know, And so they learned you know, harmony at like you know, young age, and my Grandpa's teaching them all this stuff, and so that would end up becoming my family's band. So my grandfather played lead, my dad sang lead, played rhythm, my uncle played bass, sang harmony. My two cousins, Greg, Jeff and Eric sang harmony. And then my cousin Matt played drums.

He played in this band.

He was just chucking oysters. I think my uncle Kenny was managing and running down.

It was a family affair. It was like a redneck partridge. Yeah.

Their van that they traveled and is still at my dad's house. Really, yeah, my grandpa had My grandpa would have all these old trucks out there, wouldn't sell any of them, would just crank them once a week to make sure they're still cr They would never move the great But then when I came along. We always joke I have two older sisters, and I think my Grandpa's just process of elimination. Once a grandkids started, He's like, guitar, all right, they're not picking it up. Next wee come guitar. And I, at the time was the first grand I'm the first grandson. I was the only one at the time. And so you know, when you got that bond with your grandfather, you know, there's nothing like I mean, there's a bond with a dad, and then there's a bond with a grandfather, you know, and it's very different. And I didn't realize how fortunate I was until later on in life. You meet people that didn't ever meet their grandparents or whatever. And so when I was always they'd have me on stage. Man, when I was a kid, I was this little Kermit the Frog guitar, you know, years old, and they would just put me on stage all the time. And then my parents got divorced when I was eight and I and we were headed up to my uncle Kenny's property in North Carolina, and I remember going, man, I want to learn guitar. Everybody in our family plays. You don't want to learn And now looking back, I think it was like one of those moments of like we put let's let's see if he picks this up and doesn't go another route, know when when your kid and your family's splitting up, and you know, you don't know what's going on, and so I just hooked onto it. And then it was like I started learning. It came pretty easy to me, you know, and and most things didn't and so and so this came easy to me. And then I started learning songs with him, you know, And so that's kind of what got me falling in love with what would now be I guess traditional country music.

You know, do you remember one of your earlier songs that you learned, like with your granddad?

Yeah, I started loving you again right before that was second to Boil Them Cabbage Down? Have you remember that old bluegress on Boil them Cabbage down down, made them whole cakes around?

Yeah, because it's G, C and D. And my Grandpa's like, just learned this progression and then just make it faster.

Playing faster as fast as you possibly can.

Uh.

But uh, but that and I think like impressing him, you know what I mean, became the thing. And then my dad was my dad was a play guitar, so I was playing guitar with him. We had the house and and and then my grandma I would go and we had every second and for Saturday was a gem at this community center in Kashia, which is a little town right outside of where where we're from. And they would do two every second and four Saturday was like everybody would bring, you know, their castle rolls and all their stuff and they would just be bands, bluegrass bands, country bands, just jams, you know.

So I grew up playing that.

And then I'd played this sis the living Holes in my grandpa and you know, the moose Lodge or whatever, and I was the twelve year old kid, you know, doing it. And then finally I was like I remember the first time I sang in front of like my middle.

School here of fine, scared of death.

And because like your grand I'm like, oh, I've played for is older people like they're not going to tell the twelve year.

Old kid he sucks, you know, speed it up. Yeah, there Drew Parker and me in the front.

Here just double double yeah, and so throwing a white bread at me, so I get them cut his throat. Yeah, get this kid out of here. So I might dawned on me when they asked me because my mom was like, Michael was singing. I'm like, oh my god, I really don't know if I'm good, you know, playing all these damns with my grandpa where there's like fifteen flat tops, you know, no microphone, you know, you're singing over this. I'm like, man, I don't know if I'm screaming, don't know what's going on. And I remember singing and I got stand innovation and all my buddies and you know how all buddies are, Oh yeah, they're the first ones to give you ship. Yeah, you know, so they all come up and I might here it comes and they're like, actually pretty good man, Like we were going to get your ship. But you know, that was the first time where I was like, oh, maybe I can do this. Maybe I can do this, you know. And I think because it was such a passion to my grandfather's and my families and just growing up in a small town and you know, where it's you graduate, marry the girl, have a kid, get the job, you know, and uh that timing just didn't work for them and they had kids, young and jobs and very hard to move to Nashville, and obviously it was no social media, so you're not posting on from your house, you know. And uh so I think that night singing for my middle school and then just having a family that was like, bro go, really worst case scenario what you moved back, Like worst case it doesn't work, was going to give you ship for trying, you know, And so they just always pushed me, man, and it was like, you know, you know how this is, man, The highs are high even at this level. You know, you have you're on fire side. That Jason Alden song is so true. It's like one year, you know, they repossessed your truck. Next year you got a million bucks. It's like it's it's like this man and it and it doesn't you know.

It's always like that.

And so those those lows, man, I was so grateful now looking back and being able to call a family when I was like trew that I was living in a two bedroom, two bath with five guys in Nashville, sleeping on the floor, driving my tour van around for a car because we couldn't afford a vehicle, you know, and just playing anywhere. And there was those days where I'm like, dude, I don't have enough money to get to the show that's only paying us two hundred and fifty dollars.

I'm literally, yeah, I'm breaking.

I'm sleeping on a couch. My friends think I made it because I'm recording in Nashville. Absolutely like we should come visit you.

I might give me five years, a ten year town, right, yeah, eleven, give me eleven years. But you know, so those moments I looking it was like I had them so uh So it was a combination of of definitely church, growing up in the Southern Baptist Church, and then my grandfather just having this mad passion for country music.

Crazy man, what a great story, dude, And you're so right having that having that, I think about it too.

On the way home.

I always either I'll read or I'll call my one of my sisters. I'll holler at my dad because he don't care, right, like yeah, I mean he'll even go, who's you right with it today? And I'm like, oh, you know somebody he doesn't know, right, He's like, oh, okay.

Well fish riting.

Yeah.

Immediately it's like he dangles it out there in order to be like I kind of care about what you're doing. But also I bought a brand new I brought a weed eater on Facebook marketplace for seventy eight bucks.

You need one, you know what you're writing with Luke Combs, I guess, but listen, I saw get down Turkey's Gobic leave the songs up there, And it's so.

Great to have that, you know, to bound to fall back, you know a lot. And you're right.

As you get older, you start recognizing not everybody has that, dude.

I didn't realize that until I moved here and started meeting, you know, artists that were coming around the same time I was, you know, that not everybody had that support system.

You know.

I met some artists that their families were like, you move, we ain't cut you off, yeah, you know, and yeah that's look if you're not, yeah, best luck.

You ain't taken over the family. You know, at least get a college degree, at least get this, you know.

And they went this route, and I'm like, all in my family, like, hey, appreciate you, you know what I meant.

And my family they and they and the and that.

You know, they were all middle class, hard working people. So when they had the money to give, but the support was there, and that's sometimes that's more than the money. That's worth more than the money, you know, when you're down. Each so you're down and you got to do I remember one time, man, we we had the van, had a drive to I think Cookville or somewhere in the middle of nowhere to get my cousin's trailer to haul all this stuff. So we drive our cars there. I drive the van to of my buddies had cars and two of my band members did.

I have the van. So we drive down there. We get there.

This van is damn there bigger or the trailers them there bigger than the van. Right, so we're pulling this thing.

We finally get it all set up and uh, I take off. We get right down the road.

This is one of those where I had like one hundred and fifty dollars to my name and we're playing this place in Gainesville. That their form of advertising, not that anybody probably would have showed up anyway, but like.

Their form of advertising was, well, we put the flyer outside you know what I mean, what more you want? And oh yeah, there was ten people, including the five that I brought in the band.

And then when nobody's showing up. They put pressure on you. Well, I hope you bring them out to that.

Yeah, and so and so we get through, and we finally get through, and I swear to you, dude, I it looked like a Ninja star that I ran over.

Right.

This tire doesn't just bust, it explodes. Right, We're in the middle of nowhere. I have no money, I got nothing, and of course, you know, we find this small town tire shop. The dude hooks us up with a tire for like seventy five bucks, right, so I barely got enough gat We changed in the in the Sitco gas station before the show because we were hauling asked to get there, you know.

And uh.

And I remember sitting when the tires blown my one of my band members took it to go to the tire shop, and some of us stayed with the van, and I'm just like, damn near in tears, dude. You know, I'm like, I don't know what to do. Man, I really don't know how to connect Eustas, Florida to a record deal in Nashville. And I didn't really understand like the Nashville networking thing at the time because I was playing bars and I'd go down to Florida. Thank god, it was working down there, and we were selling tickets. I'd sell out House of Blues and all these places. But then you go to Mississippi and they be twelve people, you know. So I'd go to Florida, play down there's play some bars for a couple of weeks and make some cash and that would fun. Yeah, the rest of the other shows, you're just playing to make fans. And so we were just road dogs, dude. Like, So like when I got I remember I got a record here, They're like, if you just moved to town. I'm like, oh, man, I've been here for eight years. They're like what, And I'm like, yeah, I didn't do that part, right, I'm been down here, dog. Yeah, yeah, I just didn't know.

You know, I had no idea.

But you also have to do what pays the bills, you know what I mean. I mean, you gotta We would do the same thing basically, except we would we would go make our money in Mississippi and then play to twelve in Florida, you.

Know what I mean. So it was the same. It was the same thing, man.

But you talk about, uh, just having to make it work. I mean especially with the prices. I mean, now, I don't know how anybody does.

It now, bro, It's it's so hard, and I would Me and Josh were talking about that was like the problem is the guarantees aren't going up, but everything is else is going up. Yeah, you cost to living, cost of living's going up, man. I mean you look at you know, filling a bus up was five six hundred bucks. Now it's fifteen hundred and seventeen hundred dollars. So when you look at a tour of like Luke's size or Morgan size or any of these big tours, you know, my brain, I'm like, they're spending hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Just to get to the show, you know what I mean.

Just to get there, and six seven buses, ten twelve trucks.

Yeah, yeah, man, I mean all the crew that goes in it, you know what I mean, there's a lot, man. I remember figuring out once up there was this little place called the ust to Sunshine Opry, right, and they would during the winter times they would bring some of the older guys in, like you know, I open for Porter Wagner down there, Ray Brice, Bobby Bear, Uh, Tommy Cash, Johnny Cash's brother, would always come down once a year and then during the summertimes they would do like open mics with the band on Fridays and then they'd give like random people, like a show, you know. And I remember, uh, the old Miss June, the older lady was she was. I was like, they kind of like took me in.

I was a young kid. I was. I was a kid sixteen.

Instead of going to parties, I was playing the Sunshine Opery Fridays. Yeah, and uh and so Miss June was like, I go, how much how much these guys? You know, Porter Wagoner? Porter came with Bobby Bear. They were fishing and he brought Porter with him and uh so she showed me how much you paid?

And I was like, holy cow, how much was it? One night?

I think it was like think for that little thing. I think it was like ten ten grand, you know what I mean? I think so yeah, I think it was about then.

I was.

I was in high schoolmember going like I'm calling Kicking Chicken right now, They're playing me one hundred and fifty for four hours. I'm getting rapped, oh Uday Kick and Chicken. We played Shay's bar and grill dude on Thursday nights. Man, I played every every bar in my hometown. But I remember seeing that and then she broke.

It down for me. She's like, no, no, no, there's a booking that gets this. There's a manager gets this. He's paying for this.

So at the end of it, he's walking away with whatever, you know. And that's and then now you know, now getting you know, having a bus and crew and band and everything. I'm like, man, it's a lot, dude. It's like you said, I don't know how some of these new artists are are able to do it, man, And I see them, you know, just now with social media, you gotta be on social media twenty four hours. They you gotta do this, have your numbers. And then you also got a tour and you gotta write the songs. You gotta be the face, and you gotta do this, and you got to be the leader of your business and your team. I'm like, you know, these kids are twenty years old, dude, and I'm like, I'm in my thirties and I'm just now kind of getting it, you know. And the other just like and that's why I was telling that artist. I was like, man, just find that thing. Keeps something for you, keep something for yourself, dude, because if not, they'll take it, you know, and and commercialize and before you know it, you haven't done.

That with your buddies in five years.

Man, very very good point.

But yeah, it's getting it's expensive out there, man.

And not only like is it expensive, but like like you're talking about struggles when you move here and like early struggles with money and all that kind of stuff and trying to get your break and find break through the wall, climb the wall. But there's also like there's struggles when you make it. Oh yeah, like there's like and that's yeah, what what's making it? Yeah, I mean, but like there's struggles in success.

That's just like there's struggle. There's not struggles. There's struggles in not success.

That's why I tell everybody, man, it's like no matter what level you're at, whether you're brand new, where you're you know, where Luke is at. Yeah, every step, every tier comes with something, you know.

Like my preacher says, new levels, new devils, dude, and and he was, I told you we had our breakfast earlier this week. And I told him, I said, man, I zone out on a lot of agent just because I'm my dad's preacher, and I get real tired of it.

I said, but new levels, new Devil's got, that's gonna And it's very true.

It's like as you progress, like you were saying, it's like struggles early, but there's also struggles with staying right and and and there's that constant you probably have this.

I don't know, we I do.

We deal with it all the time, like the constant full of like growing up in a small town, like I kind of want, you know, my family, my kids to have that that kind of effect.

You know, I think too, there's a feel a fear of when's it gonna end? You know what I mean? That oh my god, is this the last?

Yeah, you're always just like ah, And it's that constant that's what keeps you going. But it's also what keeps you crazy to you know what I mean. You're like you're like, oh my god, is this it?

You know?

And and and it's so easy to let those moments that you need to soak in, you know, like you get a number one song, bro, you were It's it's like, statistically, you have more chances of throwing a pitch as a professional baseball player. Then you do get the number one song. You know, it's like getting struck by lightning. Now if you get that two times out there, you know what I mean, think about if you think about, like how many people are on the radio. There's a lot of people making music and where you know, everything saturated. We're getting hit in the face constantly with social media and you know, streaming. There's a bunch of music out there. There's only like so many slots on radio, you know, And so for you to get on there and then get a top forty thirty, twenty ten, then to get a number one, dude, you know what I mean, it's like so when that happens, you're just like, oh my god, it's happening. You want to take in that moment, but then that little bit of fear of well, I don't want this to be if this is my last, so I got to get on the next one. Next thing, you know, you look back, you're like, man, I didn't even take in that. Yeah, I didn't even take that in.

You know. I was just like, what what's you know?

You gotta have another one?

Yeah, I gotta have another one. Okay, I got that one. I don't you know, I want to get to you know you quit ten years later?

Well you got what we got Spirits, demon spirits and demons, right, yeah, yeah, yeah with the Megan Pasture.

Yeah, I love that.

Y'all had her on here. She's she's she's awesome.

We've been hunting kid with her a bunch and she literally has the first the big deer she's ever killed.

With the latitude and longitude of it.

Yeah, really where it had the topography of.

Yeah, the topography geometry where I'm a mathematician guy. I don't know if y'all know I make numbers disappear.

We had been friends, you know, like and I hung out with her and Mitchell and everybody kind of get off the bus, come back on Sunday. There we meet a doghouse or tin roof or whatever, and and so we were always you know, friends, and but never saying again. We never even done like a writer's round together. But uh, we recorded Spirits of Deamons, right, who we're gonna get? And I knew we wanted to keep it in the country music family, and you know, have a female country artist on there. And so they brought a Meg and I was like, oh, yeah, that'd be awesome. So we sent to her and and uh, she jumped on it, man, and just took it to another level. She's a real deal man, you talk, great singer and somebody she works hard, works her ass off, dude, and wants it. Handles her business great. Like I Like, she's done some shows with us, and like she says some things and I'm like, what are you doing?

I need I need to do that.

Yeah, I need to do that better, you know.

Yeah, and uh, and so she just mad. She you know, she has all the.

Old road dog stories too, man, you know, being in Canada and this girl was driving from Canada to Nashville and going back up and playing shows and come, I'm just putting the time in.

Yeah. So excited to see things popping off.

Yeah too, I love that song.

Man. What's uh, what's next? What's coming?

Man? We're we're cut.

So we just released a song called nothing Else, and then we got another song coming out here in a couple of weeks, and then another song after that.

We're about to jump in the studio soon and and cut more and just.

Just continue getting us keeping music out there and and really just seeing what the fans gravitate to to see what we.

Go to radio with. And I think, now that's that's how it is now. You know, there's no albums anymore.

That seems like the program.

Yeah, so it just just put songs out, which is which took me a minute to us because I was still part of the generation of you had your radio song and if you put anything else out then everbody's gonna get confused.

Are you saying, bro, we're not in the pops anymore?

No, No, we're not the old boys yet.

We're not old boys.

We ain't on the porch. We're in the yard yard. We ain't we ain't mindlessly running around yet.

You know, but it's coming.

We're muming, not playing ball.

Yeah, people still want to pet us. We ain't there yet, but uh but yeah, so now it just took me a minute to wrap my head around. And then uh so we've just been releasing music man, and I've been working with Michael Knox and and uh, he's always kind of been in my corner since I came to town, since before I moved to town. And and I really think that everything happens in God's time and right time, and when it's supposed to. And you know, I've been able to work with, you know, Scott Hendricks and Ross Kaufreman a great taught me how to you know, singing live and singing in a studio or two very different things, you know. So Scott Hendricks taught me how to sing in.

A studio, you know what I mean.

And and he's so precise on on vocals and for a guy that doesn't sing, he's got the perfect pitch in his ear. Yeah and uh, and I remember he'd make you sing. He's like I believed it, but the word was was a little flat. And I'm like, we can't tune that, you know, singing. But he was doing that because you're gonna get that live feeling. Guess what you are also going to learn how to do it singing, you know, singing in a microphone. So I went through I always called those those are like my college years of cutting records, you know. And him and Ross taught me a lot and and then it got me ready to work with Michael and and I say that in a way because I just I always felt I always knew we wanted to work together, you know, I just didn't feel like I was.

Confident in who I was and what I bring to the table with him yet and.

So I learned a lot from those guys, had hits with them. And and and Knox and I were just talking and I'm like, man, let's do it. Now's the time, you know, and uh and so we just man, have just been writing.

You know.

I always listen outside songs and and and cut outside songs as well, but just releasing music as much as we can, man, once every four weeks, six weeks, and just keep it going.

Yeah, awesome, that's awesome.

I'm sure I was important, but it's the time.

That got.

But I mean, I feel like I should tip you. Just leave it there, Just leave to leave my one debit card.

We'll cut it half.

Go lightly. It'll get you Mercedes. But it's gonna be a ninety one.

One that got away. Man, it could be fish dear whatever, Hamburger.

Oh.

So there was a there was a time, you know, talking about like the old men that knew the woods and knew you know, back and Florida. It's like these guys knew the lakes like the back of the hand, you know. So me and my buddy John would go we were like I was like, man, I want to I want to learn a lake. He's a little bit older than me, and his father in law owns the car dealership down in our hometown Bank anyway. And so we would go to this lake every day for this summer, right, and it's a lake that all these houses have been there for years. Nobody really fishes it, right, you got to kind of know somebody to fish. So there's fish, you know, easy bass fishing, you know, you just go out there all day and so oh man, it's so much fun. And and and I remember getting this. I was real this it would been the biggest bass I ever caught in my life.

I pull it right up to the boat. This bastard kicks his tail. I mean he's right there sunset and.

Eric Church CD is playing because we put the CD and speakers in his boat and didn't realize when we put the steering wheel.

On the CD hit the hut.

We listened to Airic Church record for every day for three months, the one with uh uh, the uh.

Yeah with a Haggard song on it, dude, yeah, boots, all of them. Yeah. So I was the biggest Eric.

Church fan because knew to back your hand because we put the steering wheel on into the CD.

Was the one that we're still in there. It's probably still there.

Someone has that boat where I can't get this Air Church CD. These guys love Eric Church again. Yeah, I tell you what, man, you really get to talk to your buddy. After about three months of listening to the same record over and over, I remember that bask getting in and it was like it would have been one of the biggest ones ever caught. And right there, dude kicked and just watched.

What do you think, I mean, what's it gonna go nine to ten?

It probably been. It probably been ten, my buddy. So so Chip Van's son, my buddies, my buddies on son in law. He came out with us one day and I was on the I was on the battle of the boat. John was in the middle. Chip was on the back of the boat. And we finally talked Chip into coming out with us, right, and he comes out. I catch at eight pound, right, which is a big bass, a huge, huge bass. As I'm reeling it in, Chip goes I got one on too, right. So John's like, damn it, He's realness to go to get the net, right. I pulled mine up.

I see Chips the fish he caught it. It looks like a whale, right, Like, this is the biggest bass I've ever seen in my life. Dude. Wow, he pulls it in. Fourteen pounds. Fourteen pounds and.

Chip soft belly too, by the way, right, so no, no, no eggs, no nothing right, And Chip's just the sweetheart of a dute. He's like, man, we should just measure it, throw it back. I'm like, I'm gonna let you know right now, if you throw this back, I'm gonna jump in. I'm gonna catch this thing, and I'm gonna lie to everybody.

Take a long picture.

Yeah yeah.

And so dude, you could fit both your fists in this fish's mouth and I'm holding my what looks like a dinky bas Yeah. People think this is good if it wasn't for this guy, you know. And uh so it's still mounted in his office at in Vanka anyway.

But I'll never forget that. Man. I was like, this is but it was that lake. Man, no one ever fished it.

So they had those big bass in Florida.

I've never steal.

And all that stuff down there. It's just a it's a mecca for for bastards.

You were hearing like the fiberglass and his rod popping.

That's what everybody like. When people are stocking ponds up here and lakes up here. They're buying f one strings from Florida and putting them up here and put them in the ponds.

That they're crazy.

You're doing, yeah, but keep posting them ten pounds.

We love to see, all right, favorite song, greatest slash, favorite country song that that uh, you know.

I like to throw this into.

It can be just kind of like your chorustone song, you know, like the thing that inspired you or maybe man I love this, or you know, you have a moment where they or whatever the whatever the hell it is we're doing.

We're doing a playlist God's country playlist that weak and nobody said the same one so far.

I doubt anybody said this one.

Joe Diffy became like a mentor to me, right and somebody that we like good friends, and I got some funny stories with me and him, dude, just obviously growing up in the nineties, you know, Joe Diffy, and then to become good buddies with him and his family, and and he was just one of the best dude. And I remember being with him in places and fans coming up and and he just didn't take the picture.

Dude. He I mean, he sat and talked. He taught to fans so much that they're like, maybe.

We gotta go to we gotta go to watch He was just he just the friends are coming up like, yeah, we gotta go, you know what I mean. And he was just he just made it was like and I remember watching them as a young artist, going Okay, that's how you treat fans, you know what I mean. But he would tell them stories and and and and just the sweart of a dude personal to him. And and I got to sing this with him one time because I told him the story. I was like, bro, ships that don't come in his hands down one of my favorite country songs of all time. God made life a gamble. We're still in the game's favorite lines of all time. And it's something that I still think of, you know, because life gets busy and you know, stressful and whatever. Everybody has their own their own stuff, and it's like, man, you know what, We're still in it, you know what I mean. We still wake up and get a shot at it. So it's a good thing. So mine's going to be ships that don't come in.

Awesome, that's great, said that.

I'm surprised he said that's yeah. Man.

He was the best dude. He was way forever. And I'm like, oh my gosh.

That was the best part when they started those festivals, when they started putting like more than nineties artists on it too, i was like moving my meet and greets around. I'm like, dude, I'm not missing little text that's I got a free backstage pass to Joe Diffy, you know, Tracy Lawrence.

I'm like, I'm not missing this. I got to see.

Haggard one time. No way, we're playing this festival, dude, and we're pulling through and it's big beer. I don't know if the festival is still going on or not, but anyway, they had like a side stage where they had a bunch of you know, those artists from you know, nine eighties, ninety seventies and colling up and I'm like, is Haggard playing tonight And they're like yeah, And I'm like, get off the bush.

Oh.

I told him. I was like, dude, y'all know, if it's during my time I'm not playing. Yeah, I'm gonna tell everybody, listen, go to the show.

Don't worry about me. I'll be there. Yeah and uh and luckily he was playing before.

I'd gone on on that stage, man. And it was one of the last, you know, a few shows that he did. Man.

I remember, I think Jake Owen was was standing next to me, and the Oakreage boys were sitting in front of me, and Jake were like, this is nuts, dude, Like it was just really cool.

Man.

But when they started putting all those guys on it, I was like, I love festivals. I feel like the biggest fan that that happens after do forty five minutes worse.

That's awesome, dude.

I killed to see the hag Oh man, it saw diffy down here when he did the the whiskey jam thing.

Yeah yeah, and man, that was that was fun.

Yet it was that was like one of the last shows.

Yeah yeah, dude, Haggard.

I remember them walking them on stage, right and like helping him walk on stage. I put a guitar in his hand and he.

Goes up.

Like it was really man, talk about like down just like the record still just I mean talk about guys that.

Had to do it.

I mean he dude, he could have stayed at home and never touched the guitar again, but like he had to play music, yeah, and had to sing those songs.

When you get to that age of life and it's like, dude, you were there will never be another Merle Haggard.

There will never be another Haggard. And so when you get to that.

Level, I remember kind of thinking that too, going here, this is a passion this guy has, you know what I mean.

It's Mount Rushmore country.

Will he's doing it right now.

Will he's still do yeah so much.

Eighty five years old.

Hen got a tour no more, no sir, but he is now, but he's got a tour. It was what keeps those guys alive. Man.

You know, It's like it's like when you you know, if you're if you're you know, grandfather worked a blue collar job his whole life and then all of a sudden he retires.

If he just stops, he stays at home.

He stays at home. Dude, he's dead in five years.

Man. You know, well, dude, I hope.

You just for the note.

Willie Nelson is ninety years old and he's putting the next record. It's an R.

You got a valid email?

Yeah, check on.

Well, I hope you're making music when you're eighty five or yeah, me too. And you've been a staple in this town. People love you and we appreciate you coming on hanging out.

Dude, I've been wanting to do this. I've been watching y'all's podcast on here. I like, I like watching it. Like the kid that was like, please invite me to I wanted to do it. I'm like, man, I'm proud of you guys.

This first time we ember like really hung out. Uh man, cool ship. I appreciate it, appreciate it. Thanks on hanging out. Thanks for coming on, Michae away everybody. I hope you'll enjoy us. Thanks for hanging out in God's Country with us.

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God's Country

“God’s Country” with brothers Dan and Reid Isbell is a rollicking weekly podcast that sits at the in 
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