Hardy

0:06Pushkin.

0:10Before Hardy was known as the breakout artist who pushed country music into hard rock territory, he was a self-proclaimed redneck from Philadelphia, Mississippi, who studied songwriting at Middle Tennessee State University. Since moving to Nashville in 2013, he's written 16 number ones for artists like Morgan Wallen, Blake Shelton, and Dierks Bentley. In 2018, with the encouragement of producer Joey Moy and his label Big Loud, Hardy started writing songs for himself, and it paid off. He's now a five-time ACM award winner and a two-time CMA award winner, joining the upper echelon of Big Loud artists that Moy has helped build alongside Morgan Wallen and Florida Georgia Line.

0:50On today's episode, Leah Rose talks to Hardy about the craft of writing a song that sticks, including what he's learned from studying artists like Eminem. They also get into how AI is showing up in Nashville writers' rooms and why Hardy thinks bro country isn't going anywhere anytime soon. This is Broken Record. Real musicians, real conversations.

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2:29They know the military community protects our country, takes care of their families, and volunteers in their communities. That's why they've helped the military community for over 90 years. Learn more at NavyFederal.org slash celebrate. And happy Military Appreciation Month. Navy Federal Credit Union. Navy Federal is insured by NCUA. Here's Leah Rose with Hardy. Head over to youtube.com slash brokenrecordpodcast if you want to see the video. Brad Paisley has the, well, I'm going to miss her. You know, the song about, she says, you know, it's like, if you go fishing today, we're over. And then he just says, I'm going to miss her.

3:11I'm like, that's like some shit I would do. You know what I mean? Especially as a teenager. And so I started, that's when I started getting into country was just when it kind of started. The lyrics got a little more clever and it just appealed to people that grew up country. So is the bro country era like that's over? Okay, so I'm glad you asked. I have not commented on this yet.

3:39I know you studied songwriting at school for a period of time, but how do you go from just being a regular high school kid to making the move to Nashville? Like, how do you even know that any of this existed? Well, so my sister moved to Nashville before I did. She's a year and a half older than me. She was two grades above me. She was a singer. She was really talented, still is a really talented singer. And, you know, she moved to town and I was in like junior college and just didn't know what I wanted to do. And at the same time, I had kind of gotten, you know, decent at guitar and had written a couple songs.

4:18I mean, that literally is it. And, and was sending them to her, you know, I was recording them on back then. I don't even know what I recorded it on was before iPhones. And, um, but I sent them to her and she basically hit me up one day. I was just like, Hey, you know, there's a whole industry here, like the songwriting, the publishing industry where you get, people get paid to write songs. And most of the songs you hear on the radio aren't written by that artist, or at least it was written by like some normal guys and girls that just go to the grocery store every day. And, uh, you know, I, I didn't listen to country music growing up.

4:47I grew up in a small town and I grew up hunting and fishing and doing all this stuff, but I, I didn't listen to country music cause it didn't appeal to me at all. There was nothing I got out of it until like Eric Church and some of these guys that started kind of singing about being a good old boy came along. And then I was like, okay, I do this stuff. So I resonate with it. But, um, I, I learned more about songwriting by locking myself in a room for four years and just listening to country music and trying to more or less replicate that in my own way than I did in school. I don't know. I feel like I got very lucky and I just made a snap decision and I just sort of wound up here.

5:21I mean, I worked really hard, you know, once I signed a publishing deal and all that and really never gave up and never thought about giving up and all that good stuff. But I made such a snap decision and it just, which, you know, I just felt like it was just meant to be. I also saw you that used to be really into like new metal like you went through a phase I guess when you were a teenager still in it you're still in it of course I love all that stuff I was so happy for you that you did a song with Fred Durst I was like that must have been so cool it was it was a moment where I mean they're like you know I there's a lot of highs and there's a lot of wow I can't believe I met this person or I wrote a song for this person or what I'm doing a song with this person But man, the Fred one was different.

6:07And I was like in Italy at the time. And at the time, a guy that was working at my label, we had reached out to him, but I had no connection to him other than the guy that was working at my label. He texted me and just said, hey, if you get a phone call today from like whatever number, like answer it. It's going to be Fred Durst. And I was like, what? And so it was like one of the coolest things ever. I mean, it was such a huge Limp Bizkit fan. I still am. I love the stuff they put out to this day. But yeah, all that stuff. I mean, that really, that was, I was, new metal was when I was like age nine to like, you know, 14.

6:39So those are very, very absorbing music years for me. And so I took in a lot of that. It just, it was, man, something about like all that stuff, Linkin Park. I mean, I had, I begged my parents for the Hybrid Theory record when I was like 10 years old and they gave it to me. And, and it just, it changed my life. I mean, I was obsessed with that stuff. I still am. I love it. I love new metal so much. that's so cool i hear very few people like people like to shit on new metal but i love that you're into it i mean you can shit on it all you want but like i i know for a fact that both lincoln park and lint biscuit at separate times were the biggest bands in the world yeah system of a down same thing they're kind they're i guess they're new metal ish they're they're just their own thing They're huge.

7:28But that era of rock and roll, aside from like a little bit after that with like Nickelback and Three Doors Down, that was like the last era of bands that were just absolutely worldwide gigantic. So you can shit on it all you want, but that shit was worldwide and they crushed it. So, you know, a lot more people liked it than didn't. I'll tell you that. What about metal? Like, were you into like Slipknot? were you into like more like harder metal stuff yes I um I love Meshuggah a lot um oh wow I uh I didn't get into Slipknot as much until uh I was older um I know that was kind of happening at the same time but I just I wasn't into Slipknot quite as much but um let's see um high school like a kid made me a burnt cd i i was more like in the post hardcore era um or like you know like people call it death core uh early like a day to remember and like band like august burns red and um i don't know there's so many and i i rode that way for for quite some time and and i still listen to a lot of stuff now i love spirit box i think it's dope um i like falling in reverse i if another one that people like to shit on but i think is like the fresh freshest shit that's been come out in a long time is sleep token um oh i don't know sleep token oh my god you have to listen to sleep they are so sick they're the huge like genre blenders but they're really cool but yeah i love all that stuff if it grooves like i can't listen to i'm not a big like black metal or just nothing that really ever grooves that's why i love macho so much is their riffs were so like clean and and and just groovy.

9:19And I just, I love that. Yeah. Yeah. Were you kind of like an outcast in high school? Like what was your, what were you, and what were you dressing like? Like, did you have like the spiky Lincoln Park, Mike Shinoda hair? No, I was a, I was kind of a regular Southern boy. People in high school liked to tell me that, uh, that I was a little bit different and I was kind of a rocker kid. And I guess maybe I was, but no, I just, music was ironically kind of a big, like it was big in my hometown and like people loved music and all different kinds. And there was a little bit of a scene you know there was a couple scene kids and metal kids that that i went to high school with but they were also like they were cool you know and and uh are just you know they were popular they had friends it was just it was sort of different but um no i was i felt like i belonged just right where i was and had a good i mean i was in i was in like ffa and shit i was i was a a country kid i just uh wait that's farmers future farmers of america was my favorite class in high school.

10:14Oh, nice. Most of my close buddies, though, were like, bro, turn this shit off when I would play stuff like that. But I just, you know, I loved it. I had my metal buddies and I had my hunting buddies and, you know, all that kind of stuff. How old are you when you're allowed to start hunting? Seven, maybe. I have an eight-year-old right now. I'm like, oh, no. I think I think I came up with my first deer when I was seven. Hunting by myself, I think I was like 12. Wow. Obviously, I would go with my dad and we would go separate ways or whatever. But yeah, a really, really young age, it's a big part of my family, the men in my family specifically.

10:58We all still are big deer hunters. Yep. So you talked a little bit about the country that was popular when you were growing up and how you didn't identify with it. I guess, was that, like, what was that era? Like, how would you classify the music? Like, it was 90s, right? Yeah, late 90s, early 2000s. It was a lot of, like, honky-tonk music. I mean, I grew up in a dry county. I didn't drink. I didn't start drinking early. You know what I mean? I started drinking, like, or had my first few beers, I guess you would say, like 18, 19 years old. Like most kids, you know, maybe 20. But you're hunting at seven.

11:35Yeah, I was hunting at seven, but I didn't start drinking until I was, you know, senior in high school. That's crazy. Yeah. It just didn't appeal to me. I'd never been in a bar, you know, and it was either that or it was very, it was like a lot of adult, it appealed more to adults back then, I feel like, the subject matter. And I just, it didn't, it just didn't resonate with me. You know, Brooks and Dunn, who I now go back and I'm like, this music is awesome. But a 16-year-old kid, you know, I don't know anything about Boot Scoot and Boogie. I've never swing danced or whatever that song is about.

12:06I don't know. It just did not appeal to me at all. It was just very adult and not until, like, Brad Paisley has the, well, I'm going to miss her, you know, the song about, she says, you know, it's like if you go fishing today, we're over. And then he just says, I'm going to miss her. I'm like, that's like some shit I would do, you know what I mean? Especially as a teenager. And so that's when I started getting into country was just when it kind of started. The lyrics got a little more clever and it just appealed to people that grew up country. I feel like that was not a thing in the 90s. There wasn't a lot of country boy can survive type stuff in the 90s.

12:46Yeah, that makes sense when you could see yourself in the music. Yeah. I heard you talk about like songwriting now in Nashville has gotten very industrialized. I guess what I meant by that more than anything is it's just you don't nobody sits around and lights candles and says kumbaya and talks about what they've what they've you know what they've been through. I mean that does happen. It's happened to me and it's I've written those kind of songs and they've been recorded and everything. But but you know really it's just you sit down that day and you try to write a hit or just the best song in the room.

13:20And it's just, it's kind of the same thing over and over and over again. And that's, and that's okay. It's just, it's, it's a job. It's literally like any other job where, you know, you kind of just do somewhat of the same thing every day. And, uh, that's all I mean, you know, there's, there's all kinds of cool little magic moments throughout town. And, you know, like, uh, I wrote a song that Cody Johnson recorded called Jesus Loves You, which it's not what you think if you go listen to it, but about a guy that is talking to a guy in jail because the guy in jail broke into this guy's house and stuff like that.

13:51Like a buddy of mine came in with that exact story the next day because somebody had broken into his house. And anyway, so like, you know, stuff like that. Like it does happen, but it's just not as common as just sitting down and just trying to write a good song every day. And that way, I think it's industrialized for sure. Got you, yeah. So are you still enjoying it? Are you still enjoying writing songs? I love it so much. I enjoy it more than any part of my career. I enjoy it all, but I enjoy it more than any part of my career. I mean, that feels like pretty amazing because you've obviously done it for so long.

14:25You're almost like a decade in, right? Professionally, I'm 12 years in. Yeah. Yeah. The fact that you still love it is pretty amazing. I mean, I like to consider myself a decent singer and a pretty good performer. But I think that the reason that I was put on this earth was to write songs. There's just something that happens to me in a songwriting room that like, I can be having the worst day. I could be having like a mental breakdown or anxiety or whatever it is. And the second we get on a song and start digging into a lyric or whatever, I mean, everything in the world just goes away. And that is my zen moment, especially professionally.

15:06It's like the one time that I just sort of feel like I'm just in a different place. And it's just such a cool thing. I love it so much. Have you ever tried to analyze what it is about the process that you love so much? Like, is it like the puzzle part of it? Is it the like clever side of it? I think all of it, I think. Or at least those two things. You kind of nailed it. I mean, it is very much, especially with country, like every line has a place. Like you're not, there's, you know, somewhat of rules. Like you don't really, you're not supposed to contradict yourself. Like don't say anything that you've said before in the song, within the song, you know, there's all these different kind of, uh, caveats or rules or whatever.

15:46And, and, um, I just love, and so that way it's like a puzzle. It's like, well, what do we say in the second verse that we haven't said in the first verse? And like, how does that court sort of change the course, but you get back to the, the course in the same way and all that. The puzzle is like really my favorite part, but, um, lyric more than anything, like a the lyrics more than the melody and the music and all that. That's where I get off. I love that stuff. Is it okay in the room, when you're in the room with people and you're writing, is it okay to use AI? Like, is it okay to like put something in chat GPT and be like, can you like?

16:20I do it all the time with, you get, look, here's the thing. Any Nashville songwriter would be lying if they didn't say that they didn't go to either like rhymezone.com or like a rhyming dictionary website thing. And so if I'm stuck and I'm like, hey, can you give me a line for whatever that that is in the vein of like, you know, being outside in the woods, I'm just looking at my computer back screen, which is like, you know, the woods. And, you know, half the time, like, I would never chat, chat GPT doesn't have a soul. So like, it doesn't it, it would a I would never ask it, but it doesn't get like the the inner soul that produces like the lyric that will make somebody cry if that makes sense yeah that all just comes from being a human but uh but with like rhymes and just sort of stuff really simple stuff I've used it before for sure yeah I feel like it's if anything it's like a good jumping off point sure I mean it's not going anywhere you might as well be a part of it you know so when you locked yourself in the room what did you figure out about country like what was the formula did you crack the formula or did you were Were you trying to figure out themes that resonated with big audiences?

17:32Or were you trying to think more about verse, chorus, bridge, that kind of thing? The mechanics of the song? Yeah, more of the mechanics. I didn't really get into... I still, I swear to this day, not until you're deep in the middle of a song do you think, oh man, okay, this is a hit. What if we do a moment right here where it's like, boom, crowd moment? And, you know, like that's kind of, that comes way later, I feel, in the process. At least for me, it did. So for me, I was just figuring out the structure. And it's just, you know, it's like you either go verse, chorus, verse, chorus, bridge, chorus.

18:08Or you go verse, chorus, verse, chorus, solo, chorus. Or you start with a chorus and then you do a verse and then a chorus and then a solo and then a bridge. You know, there's like four or five different formulas. and I don't know, I just kind of felt like I learned those types of things. And, you know, a big one for me was paying attention. I was a big Eminem fan, still am, but figuring out how to phrase lines, putting emphasis on the right vowels so that there is a, is it assonance? And I think it's assonance is the one that like puts the emphasis on the vowels. And so if, like, I studied that a lot because there's certain ways you can phrase a line.

18:51You can phrase a line two different ways and make them sound. One sounds like a hit and one doesn't sound like a hit. And it's all about where you put the emphasis on certain parts of the word. And I wish that I could just pull one out of my ass and do it right now. Dude, wait. Can you think of one from your own catalog? Or maybe something from Eminem, like an Eminem song where he does that? Okay, let me think really quick. um uh oh my god this is gonna kill me now because i can't do it now um so if you put emphasis on a word in a sentence it'll make it sound more like a hit is that what you're saying yeah like if you if you were gonna say like like think of like a morgan wallens or some like big like okay all All right, so the second verse of More Than My Hometown, I ain't the runaway kind, I can't change that, my heart's stuck in these streets like the train tracks, city sky ain't the same black, ain't that a map dot shame, and to think that chorus, I love you more.

19:56It's just like finding those vowels that sound the same and making sure that you sing them the exact same every single time so that it just sounds like a bar. It sounds like an Eminem song, you know? It sounds very hip-hop-y. Yeah. That's so cool. I studied that. There's a guy, he's still around, and he's written so many hits, but Casey Bethard, I'm not going to call him an old man. I'm going to run into him and be like, boy, you call me an old man? But he, it's like, man, I've always wanted to ask him, like, dude, who did you listen to to develop your internal rhyme scheme? Because he, if you go back, I mean, look at all the songs he's written, but he's just, he had such a cool way of finding those internal rhymes because they're kind of, sometimes they can be hidden in a line, you know, and the right person sings it the right way and you're like, oh, that sounds awesome.

20:40But I really learned from him and Rodney Clausen was another one. There's a second verse or first verse of that. Actually, I don't even know if Rodney wrote this song, but around here at GL, I'm going to pick her up at six. I hope she's going to wear the jeans with the tear that her mama never fixed. I don't know. It's just finding all the little internal rhymes in there. that makes a song better. It always makes a song better. I say all the time, if you, if you, when you're writing a song and it's like a tongue twister, sometimes people are like, ah, that's kind of hard to sing. And I'm like, no, because when you finally spit it out, it's going to sound awesome.

21:17Like it's, you know, when it's hard to say, that means it's, it's, it's a good thing. You just have to learn it, you know? Yeah. I feel like with the song radio song, you're writing about the thing, like you're commenting on things and getting really clever with like the fourth wall kind of yes yeah yes did you start doing that like out of boredom like were you trying to make a statement like how like where did that come from i just always like songs about songs or like they call it meta too you know like it's yes um like uh and for radio songs specifically i just i've there's a few songs uh that have done that in history that i loved and i wanted my own version of that there was a song, you know, a lot of people don't know that Hey Yaa by Outkast is about how people these days don't stay together anymore.

22:05They just get married and then they'll just get divorced. And that song is like, my baby don't mess around because she loves me so. And this I know for sure. Like, thank God for mom and dad for sticking two together because we don't know how. And then in the bridge, he's like, y 'all don't want to hear me. You just want to dance. Hey, yeah. Like this song is, it's like really cool. But the chorus is just like, you know, man, but whatever. Y 'all don't care. Here's a chorus. That's kind of where I just, I wanted to do something like that with, with radio song. And, and by no means was I fed up.

22:33I mean, I wrote that in the peak of my, well, I like to say my first peak in my songwriting career. So like my relationship with radio was great. And I'm like praising God every day for the radio. So, you know, and most of the radio people that I've come in contact with, they love it and they, they, they get the cheekiness of it. And when I play it live, I'll, if the radio people are in the room, I'll give him a wink and kind of make a big smile. Like, I'm never really angry about it. I just, I just wanted to write a song about a song. And it's not the first time I've done it, but I enjoy doing it sometimes.

23:01Yeah, no, that's fun. And it makes sense when, like, knowing that you admire people like Eminem, he commented a lot on the state of, like, the music business and just pop culture in general. Fleetwood Mac kind of did it with rumors, but it was a little bit more cryptic. But, like, Eminem was the first person also to just completely open up his actual life to the world. And so it was like listening to reality music. You know what I mean? Yeah. And I think, you know, I don't ever, I don't have the balls to do that. I don't want to air out, which I don't have a whole lot of laundry, but I don't want to air out my laundry to the world.

23:33But he, you know, I've always admired him for that because that was really brave of him to do that. And it worked. People became invested in like his story, you know, and it just totally worked. And I think that's so cool. Yeah. And then he had like eight mile and then that's even like taking it further. Yeah. And then Bro Country, I want to ask you about that song too. So is the Bro Country era like that's over? Okay, so I'm glad you asked. I have not commented on this yet. Okay. Me and Earn came up with that idea together at a Morgan Wallen show of all things. We were opening for them like three and a half to four years ago.

24:09I feel like that concept completely, like I'm like owning up to this, But I feel like the concept of Bro Country, the song, is kind of out the window. Because I now feel like in the next few years, some of that is going to come back. And I'm just being completely honest. When we wrote it, it was like, man, there's all these new people that are coming in. It was very fresh off of a really potent Bro Country era. but even just four or five and now almost maybe six years later, you know, there's a guy, there's a guy, a kid right now named Cody Loden. He's doing this like, he's got a song called Buckle Up and it's just, it's just earwormy.

24:53Like the debt, the mute, the lyrics aren't super, super deep, but they're so well-written and it's just, it's that thing. It's just like, don't know what we're going to do tonight, but baby buckle up. But it just, it sounds good. I saw a girl, Lauren Watkins, make a video a while back, and she was like, I'm just going to say it. I miss bro country. And she was like, I – she didn't use the word objectified, but she was like, I want to be called hot. I want people to think I look hot with my legs swinging off tailgate. I miss it. Bring it back. And I was like, man, you know, that's right. And I honestly believe that girls that grew up in that era listening to that kind of miss that a little bit.

25:32And Morgan will do it. Like Morgan does it, but he's kind of the only guy that sort of can still get away with it. But all that to be said, I think it's going to come back. In the next 10 years, I think it's going to come back, and I'm here for it. So sorry, Bro Country. Bro Country, it wasn't a bad idea, but I think it was a short-lived thought. We'll be back with more from Hardy after the break.

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