#1987 - Jelly Roll

32:26And I just kind of want to write this kind of journey and just kind of aid as he, it write a real project. And Zach was like, I'm in. He's like, well, why don't you just call it Witzett Chapel? So that's how we ended up doing Witzett Chapel. So when Neeta Favour came into the fold, I was like, what's worship music for Center Sound like? Like, what is a motherfucker like me? You know, because when you're a church, it's holy, holy. You were great. I was like, I don't necessarily feel that way. So how do I feel? You know what I mean? And then it was like, oh, it took the guy when I need a favor. You know what I was like?

32:54We got to build it with a choir and big production. I want that old, uh, style clap. You know that old church feel. And I want to bring like that vibe of that church, you know, into the, into the, and the whole thing is the whole album is built on that vibe of like, there's fire and brimstone, there's everything you go through in a Sunday's morning worship service. If you ever been to a Sunday in the South of worship service, they're going to, you're going to convince you you're a horrible human at some point. You're going to hell. And then at the end, they'll hit a major key instead of a minor one finally and go, but there's hope.

33:23You know what I'm saying? So I was like, how do I write that? You know? Man, well, I've always been a fan of those preachers. I'd love the way they, they captivated audience. And even if they're crazy, even if they're talking nonsense, there's just something exciting about watching some dude preach the word and just yell it out and then fire. Oh, fire. So I got a, I got, I'm going to send you a link to the album, but I got a preacher throughout the whole album doing that, Joe. Ooh. The tie the record together. Oh, wow. So you read like the album starts with this dude like, in by the grace of God, we were saved and it just drops the first song.

34:03Oh, it's cool, man. That's amazing. I got nerdy, dude. I went like old school dude. I went like back to the 90s. Joe, I was in the studio like, we were just getting high and coming up with shit. Beautiful. Yeah, it was so much fun. It's probably the most fun I've ever had writing an album because it's the first time I've sat down a long time and wrote an album. Instead of just writing a bunch of songs and then picking an album. You know what I mean? I was like, now I'm writing, like we're going to sit down and write an album. So did that just came out of the blue inspirationally? Yeah, it just, I just wasn't just felt like something to do.

34:30Man, I'm going to get like all the way real. So I didn't understand what was, I had commercial success for the first time in my life. And I didn't know how to deal with that. So you do what everybody does in that moment. I'm sure you may or may not have been there in your career early where you like you chase it then. You're like, oh my god, hold on, I can be. Yeah. And I realized that the song's what in sound like jelly roll no more. You know, and I was like, no, I'm doing the thing that people do where they fuck their career up. I was like, I'm not doing that, man. So you think that that's just a normal trap that happens to everybody that gets success.

35:01And they don't want to fuck up that success. So they try to make a formula for what they think the people liked about their early shit. Yes, yes, 100%. Or they chase whatever the poppy record was or whatever the record that did the most. So it's like, how do I write another song like that? So I was coming off of a hit that I, when I gave you the plaque for Son of a Center was my first radio hit, like hit hit. And I was like, I didn't know how to come out of it because I didn't write the song for radio. I wrote the song like I wrote every other song. But then you start thinking, oh, I can write songs for radio.

35:35And I had fucking 70 radio songs like fuck, I'm not it. You know, it's like, no, man, I just need to do what got me to radio. I need to do what jelly roll does. And I was like, I know what it is. I'm gonna get back in my fox home and write me a fucking album, dude. You know what I'm saying? That's beautiful. I took it off music row. We went back to some of the low backass studio in the back woods. And we wrote it kind of like, you know, like we wrote all my early shit. I feel like it's like every level of success that you get you're presented with a unique problem that you haven't seen before.

36:01And you it's up to you to just figure it out. Just figure out what what are you doing this for? And I think that applies to everything. I know it applies to comedy. It definitely seems to apply to music. I think it probably applies to everything. Figure out what you're doing it for. Like, what why do you like to do? I know you have to make a living. But once all that's taken care of, like, what are you doing it for? You should be doing it for the love of this thing. Whatever this thing is that you do, you're a love spreading machine as a human being. Whether it's your love of carpentry, whether it's your love of electronics, what is it?

36:34What's your thing, man? Everybody's got a thing. But not everybody finds their fucking thing. That's the problem with this world. So people get trapped in something that's not their thing. And that's what they are now. And they don't ever get to express themselves in a way that would make them feel good. Well, for me, I always call it the why. And it's like what you said, even with the music. And that's what happened with those 70 songs. When the why comes down to, oh, this is catchy, or this is a good song, I'm past the point of like, if this, I want to help people, Joe. Like, my music has always been therapeutic.

37:07My music has always been for people. What got me into music was my mother. So my mother was a woman who struggled with extreme mental health issues and drug addiction. And she would never come out of her room, Joe.

37:29And she would come downstairs. And she'd throw a record on. And she'd light a cigarette at the table. And do it out and watch the house change. Like, brothers, sisters, cousins coming from across the street. Going in a little tight neighborhood. And she would go to the airport people, you know, neighbors coming over. Her friends start flooding the house. And she held court. Joe, I would watch our kitchen turn into a nightclub. And she'd start telling stories. And listen, we didn't have Google. We had to believe the bitch back there. Right? Joe was saying like, you know what I'm saying? So she would be like, James Taylor wrote this about his drug addicted mother.

38:14You know what I'm saying is something to play fire and rain. Or it seemed to be like, bet Miller wrote the rose about. And we're just like all captivated. And then she played the rose and we're all crying in the kitchen together. And it's like, and I didn't understand because I'm a kid, right? But something changed in her when the record went on is how I looked at it. I didn't know anything about drug addiction. Anything about schizophrenia, bipolar, any of this stuff she was dealing with her manic depression back then. What they called, I didn't know any of this. I just knew that this lady never fucking leaves that room.

38:45And when she does, it seems like the music does it. So I spent my whole life writing songs for her. Right? I was like, I kind of indirectly was like writing these songs for the addicted and the broken. You know what I mean? Because that's what I was seeing. So it's like, I found purpose in the music. And like I tell people, if I was going to do it for money, like any sane fucking comedian or musician out of quit 10 years ago, because fuck, I wouldn't, I didn't make any for 15 years. You know, if I was doing it for money, how to quit forever going, wouldn't got a job. I just knew that it was always helping people.

39:18You know what I mean? It's like the music was all because I've seen how it helped my mother. And I knew the power of music. And to this day, like when you first bring up music, I'm like, I'm a mood guy. It's like, you know, you know how I feel about what I got to go listen to. Yeah. To this day, if I'm going through something in life, I'll grab a joint, go hop in the pickup truck and tell my wife, I'll be back. And she knows what I'm doing. I'm just going to go listen to music for an hour and smoke a joint. I'm going to come back and sort through this shit. But it was something about that that made me want to write songs for purpose.

39:46You know what I mean? It's like real music to just try to get, I understood the power of it. You know, funerals, like how many, I probably lost my first friend when I was like 11. I remember every song they played at the funeral that day. You know, does that make sense? Like these are the moments in my life that stuck out to me. It was like the impact of music. And then I went on to write, save me, which I've been told by multiple funeral homes, it's their most requested song of the last decade. You know what I mean? Which is really sad. It hurts me. But it makes me feel so good that that's there to help somebody in that moment.

40:24Yeah. So for me, if I'm listening to a record, Joe, back to your why. That's how it started, right? It's like if I'm listening to a song or I wrote a song and the why is like, it's just cool. Fuck that song, man. Like, who is this exists for? You know what I mean? Like, what am I doing? Now sometimes the answer is just as simple as like, yo, we just need a party record. That's cool too. But just make sure you have a why. And if the why is money, you got the wrong why. And this song will never fucking work anyways. You know what I mean? And that's how it's always worked for me. Which is like, I was telling you out there, I wanted to tell you the story about how my music changed.

40:54I was doing DMT. We were up in Iowa. And I had done, you know, we were in Nebraska. We were at a KOA truck stop. I'm in a camper. We're driving one of the big campers, right? We just toured with ICP. I've been on like, oh boy. Dude, I did three tours with ICP there. Oh, fuck it. Awesome. It was the what dude? Listen, I played at the Gavin and the Juggalos one time, though. Listen, and from stage, I seen a girl getting her back blown out on a fence. Getting fucked. I'm in the middle of a set. They're people to this day. I'm on Good Morning America. And they're like, what's the wildest talking to the people from Good Morning America on the funer?

41:27Like, what's the wildest thing you've ever seen in the show? I was like, I girl getting fucked. The Gavin and the Juggalos. I was on stage. You see, it was just getting their brains beat out. They were foe their filming and whooping and cheering it on to the music. It was fucking incredible. So I'm doing DMT up in fucking this camper. And I start tripping mushrooms. And I'm coming out of my DMT thing. And I'm in that afterglow state. And in that moment, I went. The music's being packaged wrong. It was this weird moment where I was like, I'm writing these super dark songs. But then I'm putting a cartoon picture of myself on the cover.

42:03And I'm shooting, you know what I mean? Like, it just hit me. I was like, I'm writing the right songs. I'm just writing them over the wrong chord progressions. And I'm dressing it up the wrong way. Changed my whole life, Joe. Wow. So what was it about the trip that made that apparent to you? I wish I'd, dude, I don't know what it was. We wasn't even listening to music. I was just sitting at that KOA staring up at the stars. You know, I'm getting 60 bucks a night or something. Or 100 bucks a night. I mean, I'm playing, you know what I do? It's 10 of us. I mean, it's, you know, the story. We've all been there.

42:39So we were like struggle buzzing. And I was just having one of them vulnerable moments in life. I was like, am I fucking doing the right thing here? Like, am I tripping? How much longer am I going to try to push this square through this circle? You know? And I looked up and I was like, God, what am I doing wrong? I know my heart's right. I know that my only other choice in life is criminal. That's all I've ever done. Joe was music and crime. That's the only two things I've ever known. You know? So I'm like, I don't have any qualifications to do anything. You know, I was like, what am I doing wrong here?

43:08I know the music's right. And it was almost like it was that easy. From years of trying to figure it out, it was like, you're just writing over the wrong chord progressions. You're writing the song, you're writing the right songs. You're just writing them wrong. Wow. What do you think that is? What is happening? I wish I did. I was hoping you were going to give me the answers. I've been wanting to talk about this. I think if I had the answer, you should walk out and never trust me again. Yeah. Well, because I learned about DMT on this show. Whoops. Right. Well, it's like, change my fucking life.

43:40But they're doing legitimate studies now in the UK, where they're doing a drip. So they're doing an IV drip with a long release of DMT. So it stays in your bloodstream for hours. And these people are having these experiences that are repeatable. They're going to similar places. They're going to the same place. They're reporting these contacts with entities. They're reporting these experiences that are, it's odd. It's very odd. Because no one does it in long doses. You do it in this 10 to 15 minute dose. And it's so overwhelming that the moment you get a chance to, it's so hard to relax in the middle of all of it and just accept it and just be empty and let them show you things.

44:25It's so hard that you, a lot of people wind up with this like tense conflict where you're in conflict with the overwhelming nature of the experience. So you're trying to control it in some sort of way, or you're trying to deal with it. And you just got to be able to, you just got to be able to do that. And if you can't do that, it's going to be a fucked up ride. Yeah. But these people are going through all that and then they're getting to, and they're staying there for hours and hours. What is that? I mean, I don't know if that's a hallucination. And that's the simplistic reductionist view. If I was a person who was a cynical, academic, who's never fucked around with drugs, I would look at that and then go, the world is really simple.

45:15It's interacting with your visual cortex. It's some sort of hallucination. Your imagination is producing these results. But man, it doesn't feel like that. And I really wish people would have more of an open mind about what this is. Because I have a feeling it's the root of humanity. I have a feeling it's the root of all religious experiences. I have a feeling that it's the root of compassion and love. And I think it separates us from the more primal aspects of our beings. And it does it in a very tangible way. And it did it with me, and I'm sure it did it with you. And it does it with a lot of people that go and have either a ayahuasca experiences or a DMT experiences.

45:53These things that you should probably call ceremonies, even though it sounds like ceremonies are ridiculous work. But it is kind of like you're in a religious experience. And that might be what God is. That experience, when you, there might be layers and layers to that, until you eventually get to God. And I don't know what these people are doing. They're doing this long term IV drip thing. But I mean, you literally might be opening up some sort of a wormhole to heaven as bonkers as that sounds. I know you're going to be one of the first people that will figure it out. And when you do, please let me take a long one.

46:24I will not figure it out, but I will talk to whoever figures it out. That's what I'll do. Yeah. But was you finding the drifts? Let me know. Call it save me a seat for the hundred percent, bro. We're going to travel together. Yeah, we did it. We did a bunch of that on that tour. And to this day, if I'm really dealing with something I can't figure out my own, I'll take some shrooms and go to the lake. Like to this day, I just kind of count on that stuff to kind of recalibrate me and set me, set me, set me back, especially artistically sometimes, or when life's getting overwhelming. There's such a humility and humbling that comes with that.

46:59You just realize how much you don't fucking matter. And how much you, there's not even that you realize shit don't matter. You realize you don't matter. It's also when you ego gets squashed. You realize your ego is the source of almost all the fear and anxiety, almost all of it. Once your ego gets squashed, which is what the trip does initially, especially. It's like you don't even exist anymore. You're just like, oh, and then you can see things. What they really are. Like, oh my god, we're a part of this insane soup of molecules that literally goes on forever. And no one understands it. No one understands that even the parameters of it, it's all guesswork.

47:34It's all these legal pads where these psycho smart dudes are writing down computations and they're looking at these images that are billions of light years away. I mean, it's all even what are limited ability to observe the known universe. But there's the capacity of knowledge that had to be moved all together in synchronicity to create these fucking telescopes. All the citizens in that is just scratching the surface. Oh, yeah. There's so much out there. I've went through so many of those wormholes recently. I finally got to watch the On the Bus the other night that Graham Hancock. Oh, yeah. The Netflix doc.

48:17Oh, it's amazing. It was insane. I never really scratched it. And I just knew his name. I'd seen clips. And I was like, fuck it. We're sitting on a bus. That's the coolest thing about the bus. We'll sit there and catch up on all that shit. Graham Hancock is the man. He was one of the first real guests I ever had on the podcast. Yeah, he flew in. We ate pizza. And then we did a podcast. Yeah, he had just flown. He came right to my house from... This one I used to do in my house. And I had it in one of my spare bedrooms. It was me and Duncan and Graham Hancock. Because I've read his first book, Fingerprints of the Gods in like the 90s sometimes.

48:49And everybody was like, that's nonsense. You're into that pseudo history shit. And I was like, this guy's got like really good points. I think he might be honest something. And his whole like journey from being this guy who is maligned to being a guy who has a Netflix series. And all these archaeologists are complaining. But hey, look what he's doing. He's showing you archaeological evidence. You psychos. Like there's something to this. Whenever he sings, he comes in and crushes it and looks. And because he crushes it so much, you realize how much other people wouldn't do in their job? Yeah. Like when you hire a new tourtecher or something, he comes in and kills you.

49:24Like, damn, that other dude sucks. I didn't know that he was saying that. That's why they're mad at him. They're like, oh fuck, we've been blowing it. Exactly. Exactly. Yeah, they're all kind of humiliated by this guy who's not an archaeologist who's discovered this very clear and distinct pattern. And this pattern seems to indicate that civilization is far older than we think it is. And there's likely been some interruptions. We were knocked into the Stone Age. And then when he got together with Randall Carlson and all of the archaeological evidence lines up. With all the evidence of the impacts.

49:58Randall the old. It was with him that has the beard. Yeah. Always has the left top. He's the best. He's the best. I met that dude in Georgia. I was in Atlanta and I was doing, was the funny bone or the punch line, the punch line Atlanta, right? Yeah. It was a punch line. So I was doing the punch line and after the show, this dude came up to me and was talking to me about asteroid impacts and sacred geometry. I'm like, what the fuck do you do? Me and him at this conversation and he started talking to me about asteroid impacts. And he was telling me that he thinks that that's what reset civilization.

50:30I was like, how long was this? Long time ago. This is a long time ago. Of the idea of being at the bar after a show and a guy's just running around. I think this is like an asteroid. 2005 or some shit. Yeah, it was a long -ass time ago. I think I'm pretty sure it was pre -podcast when I first met him. That's me and him. What is that? Oh, that's like 2007 then. It says 9. It says 9? 2009, yeah. Is that the first time I met him? I don't. Got him off by that many years. Well, you also, you know how this shit works though. They might have uploaded this. No, I think that's correct though. It looks right because of my beard because I grew up beard when Evan Tanner died.

51:082008. 2008. That's right. Okay. Yeah, there's a dude named Evan Tanner. He was a UFC champion and he was a very interesting guy. Very interesting guy and he would do these things that he would go on a walk about. You know, to try to find himself. Just to just go alone in the woods and he did one in Death Valley and he, he, he, he, he, Heatstroke apparently affects your ability to literally you can't think straight. So he couldn't figure out where the water was. He just couldn't figure out where it was because like I don't know. I've never had a heat stroke but with the way it's described. It's like it doesn't matter how tough you are.

51:44Like your brain doesn't work right. Right. Like your memories aren't good. You can't walk right. Like you're about to die. Yeah. And then he died. And Death Valley is, I think it's the hottest spot on earth, right? Yeah. What does it get to? That's right outside of Vegas, right? Yeah, the hottest recorded I think we hit was like 130 some. Yeah. So Evan, you know, so just a very interesting guy, very, very tough guy, two and a great fighter. And we all loved him.

52:16So that was like right around that time. That's how you remember it from the beer. Yeah, man. It was an interesting dude. When an interesting dude winds up dying in a way that's unfortunate and preventable like that. It's like, fuck man. He would have been cool to have around, you know. He had like a very different take on why he was a fighter. Like he was like trying to find himself through this. You know, there's certain guys. It's like there's an authenticity that comes through a music. And it fucking comes through and everything man. It comes through in fighting too. It comes through the certain humans that are just so authentic that when they're out there, you just want the best for them.

52:52You want to see them fight. You know, when you see people like that in life, that's the one of the beautiful things about today. Is that you get exposed to so many more inspirational and fast -ending people to be a young person right now and to have all these different stories. You got your culture walls out there. You got you. You got Zach Bryan. You got all these different human beings. You got all this music from the 60s and the 70s and the 80s. And there's so much to influence you. And it's at the tap of a... It's in our hand. Any time you want. Yeah. Why go to sleep, your parents are paying attention.

53:30Stay on YouTube. You'll be on YouTube to four o 'clock in the morning. You got to get up at six. Yeah. These kids don't give a fuck. They don't give a fuck at all. And the thing about it is it changed our business on its head, like on our head. And everybody was so against it at first. That's true. Yeah, they were so... But they were so like... I never forget having a conversation with a distributor that said... Well, let me say this first. Well, I would like to say though, I don't want to breeze over. I'd like to take a moment because I know it means a lot to his family. I'm sure to say rest in peace to Evan Tanner.

54:02I'm sure you bring that up. It means so much to that family alone. And that's awesome. And that alone his story will live forever. Because of this. And that's also what's cool about the era we're in. Right? You know what I mean is that forever will have that clip of Joe Rogan getting emotional talking about his friend Evan Tanner because you've seen a picture of you with a beard. So that makes me want to cry with you Joe because that's that fucking awesome. I don't want to... I don't want to breeze past that because that's cool as fuck. There's something about like commentating on fighters where you have this crazy connection with them where you want them to do good in life.

54:44You want them to... You've seen their soul. When you see two dudes going to war inside the octagon, they're exposing every fiber of their being. Especially if it's a tough fight. All the quitting you shows up, all the excuses show up, all everything shows up. The will, the courage, everything, whoever you are, it shows up. And you get to know these people. And you get to know them as a fan too. And I think it's one of the things that people love about fighters. So you get to see... You see the actual whole human being. There's no place to hide. Yeah. I think we relate to things... We connect with things that we either relate to or things that are so like a roundus that we could never understand it.

55:28So for me for a fighter, it's like I respect the fact that I could never imagine getting down into a diaper, getting into a ring with a pair of oven mitts. A pair of oven mitts, Joe, and fucking trying to kill another man from north of 15 minutes at times. You know, that just turned it for me as fucking insane. You know what I mean? It's like... Well, it isn't insane. I just could never wrap my head around that. I was talking to Tony last night about... I felt about a comedian's. Like, me and the musicians were in the green room shooting the shit with Tony. And I was like, we got something you don't, Tony.

56:00We can bail each other out. Or we're gonna bomb together. I bomb before and look back at the band and just smile like that. Well, we're bombing the tap and then saying, fucking sucks. You know what I mean? It's like... But when y 'all bomb, you could hear a fucking mosquito fart. I could have heard a mouse piss on cotton last night a couple times after a dude just threw up an egg. Well, those are hard sets. Those kill Tony sets because those guys are going up. They have one minute and you got one minute and you didn't even know you were about to go up until like 10 seconds ago. They pull your name out of that.

56:31Like Mike Wilson. Oh shit. That's me. Oh my god. And then you're up there and you're like, you're talking too fast. Your heart's beating too quick. You thought it was 60 seconds, but it was 20. Yeah. And then your joke, you forget one of the punchlines. Like fuck. Yeah. Yeah, it was fucking awesome though. But Tony's so good at like making fun of those moments. No, he's just seeing people bomb and then come back and do well. I have to see that. I have to see that. I've seen a guy last night. I'm sure Tony said I could talk about it. I've seen a guy last night. Bomb and then Tony punched his shit up in real time.

57:04And it was the funniest thing I've ever seen in human. I guess myself, look, I think of myself. I was sitting there. I was the obnoxious dude on the balcony laughing so hard that the balcony kept laughing because I was still laughing. Everybody had moved on in the club, but me. And I just couldn't get over fucking him going up and just being like, listen, and he would tap on the, I don't want to blow his whole shit. I'll watch him out on the watch. That's good watch. But this one's worth watching. It's fucking great. I'll watch him. That's the best show. We watch him on the bus. Pretty religious.

57:32I come in on Monday nights when I'm free. I come in and check it out and watch. It's just to sit down and watch. It's so fun. No dude, it's a hang. It's such a weirdo extravaganza too. The weird energy from all those open micers on the stage. They had a kid with Down syndrome get up last night, Joe, and kill. And then the guy that came behind him did not. And it was the funniest thing I've ever seen. It was a Jared Cleaver. I don't remember his name. Jared Nathan, rather. Yeah. Who's Jared Cleaver? Jared Nathan. Yeah, but he was. Yeah, but he was. And Jared Nathan is the guy that's always on a song thing.

58:04Him and his son always do those Instagram clips together. Yeah. Yeah, we're here. Jared Nathan is hilarious. Yeah. We're huge comedy people on the bus, man. We watch all the specials, all the pods. Like, well, because I don't listen to music. When I'm in album cycle mode, Joe, it less it's like 70s music, because I'm already drawing so much from that shit anyways. You know what I mean? And my style. Do you have a playlist that you listen to before you perform? Do you ever listen to it? Like, I got that from Cat Williams. He said that once he was doing this interview. He said, uh, I have a playlist of music that I listen to before I go on stage.

58:37I was like, ooh, that's a good idea. Anthony Smith told me he's got one for his pre -fight too. He's got the same playlist. He said he puts his headphones on as the same playlist. Because I had a song in it. That was the correlation, how we met. Oh, that's cool. Which was super cool. And he explained, he's like, yeah, listen to the same playlist for the last four or five fights. I create new playlist every time. You know, whenever there's a new energy shift and it's what I listen to. I listen to a full playlist and that's crazy. Well, listen to like, Outlaw Country music. I learned out. You know, I was a kid.

59:07My mama played this for me. And this is when I knew I didn't up doing country music. The first time I heard it, looking for trouble and I found a son. Right down the barrel, leveled it all, man's gone. And I was like, this is a fucking country song. Yeah. I was like, they ain't living long like this. Ain't living long like this. And I was like, holy shit, this is gangster. Outlaw Country was the original gangster rap. Oh, for sure. For sure. 100%. Well, listen, hot take, subterranean blues by Bob Dylan was the first rap song ever. You ready for that? I'm ready for that. Listen to this. What's subterranean blues?

59:44Which one is that? You pull it up right quick. I'm in a basement mixing up the better man. I'm on a pavement thinking about the government. Oh, yeah. Tell me to say rap. Oh, that's the one with the science. Yeah. I'm in a basement mixing up the better man. I'm on a pavement thinking about the government. I'm in a trench coat, patch out, laid off. Says he's gone back for a horse, get a paid off. I got a kid, just like me did. Got no win, but you doing it again. You made it tough down the highway. Lipping for a new friend. I'm in a pinch, get a camp and a pig pen on. $11 bills. See you on the goddamn.

1:00:27Yeah. Now I'm sure there's something that dates back before this. That can be as a tip to hip hop. But to me it was one of the first songs I heard that I was like, yo, this is, this was like early rap. Like, it was early rap. Did you ever see, there's, what is the oldest rap music? We played that on the podcast before. It's these dudes from like, is it the 50s? 40s. The Jubeliers. Jubeliers. Jubeliers. Jubeliers. Yes, these guys. If you ever seen this, look at these dudes.

1:01:26Oh, I know. I got to go to the right of the way. I don't know where. Why does the coast get right away? Said he would ride on a wind and toss. Hey, you can stop still and listen to me. I got walk down to the bandit seat. Oh, shit. You know the sentiment that has been hit. Decide to just throw the land that he spoke to. No, stop. He said, no, I would be to build me an ox. I won't do the billetry too bit longer. I won't do the billet big and strong. I want it back to high. 50 wide. So it will stand the wind and tide it. Come on, man. God, dude. 1940, what? Crazy. What year was this, Jamie? I don't know this specific.

1:02:10Says, active in the 40s and the 50s. Wow. Yeah, never knew. I knew, like I said, I knew it came from, you know. This is incredible. Yeah. Because a lot of the melodies and stuff in music came from this era. Oh, it really came out. A lot of the melodies still to this day. And the real soulful melodies came from the slave spiritual songs. What is the other one they put it through a color filter? Yeah, they just colorize the filter. How dare they do that? And out of the beat. Oh, oh, that's an 808 though. Oh, hey. That's a basic on. Oh, this is good. Really? So keep it going.

1:03:02Keep it going.

1:03:14I like it. B -A -S -S -S -I -C. Basic on YouTube. Fuck yeah. I like that. So that must be the earliest wrap. Yeah, that was that. Oh, yeah. Who's scoring big in the NBA this season? You are playing daily fantasy adraft kings. An official partner of the NBA. Playing daily fantasy is easy. Draft a lineup, stay under the salary cap, and watch your team rack up the points for baskets, rebounds, assists, and more. Take it to the rack with Draft King Sportsbook. New customers, download the Draft King's app, and use code Rogan for a free shot at a share of millions and prizes with your first $5 deposit.

1:03:51That's code Rogan. Only on Draft Kings. The crown is yours. Gambling problem called 1 -800 -Gamberler. In New York called 877 -8 hope -in -why, or text hope -in -why at 467 -369. In Connecticut, help is available for problem gambling called 888 -789 -7777, or visit ccpg .org. 18 and over in most eligible states, but age varies by jurisdiction. Eligibility restrictions apply. New customers only. Minimum $5 deposit required. One single use $3 ticket rewarded that expires in 14 days and is February 28th. See terms at DraftKings .com slash promotions. This episode is brought to you by Visible. Is your wireless full of stuff you didn't sign up for?

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1:05:15That's Visible's best plan with premium data for $15 off each month for 25 months. Get Visible's fastest network now with even more savings. Switch at Visible .com slash Rogan with the promo code Rogan for this offer from Visible. Didn't think wireless could be so transparent, so visible? Well, now you know, switch today at Visible .com slash Rogan. Terms apply, see Visible .com for network management details. Sure, let's come straight out of it. I bet they probably had some stuff that felt real rampage back in the old churches too, man. When the preachers would get to go and over the music, you know, or over the organ, I bet a lot of that stuff was just the start of the early rhythm of that shit, right?

1:06:02For sure. Yeah, a lot of people's introduction to music. I'm sure it was in church. Sure. You know, when you go back to old music, there's similarities like an old music, old literature, old comedy, old movies. You're in a time machine. It's hard to put yourself in that time to appreciate what it was like, but like Robert Johnson. Like if you can listen to some Robert Johnson, like what year we talking with the Robert Johnson recordings? Because I think there's only a few. But this motherfucker was so good at the time that the rumor was that he sold his soul to the devil. That was the one they did the Netflix doc on there, right?

1:06:47Robert Johnson, dude, yeah. When there was, was that not the one that the devil or something? I don't know if they did. I'll check, but there was a knock about it. That was always like, that was how people talked about it. Yeah, because if he's the one I remember, the story was he disappeared for like a year. They said and came back like the best guitar player ever. Right? Wow. I swear there was this story of this guy that was like he disappeared. And that's when they said he met the devil and made a deal. Three days over 19, 1936. He recorded 29 songs. Wow. God, dude. That was like 1936 of working.

1:07:22Jesus Christ. Back when I was singing the Cato. Oh, shit. He didn't say that Antonio. Um, he did a little bit in 31 also, but the main thing that everybody knows I believe is the salvage the complete recording. Yeah. Dude, play some of that for me. Give me some of that. So the thing about listening to this dude is you got to kind of put yourself in 1936. You know, even the idea of an electric guitar, all these things are alien. Amplifiers are alien. These are all new things. What are these things? And you got this dude that everybody's like, how? Like, what do you? And it is these people that come out of these situations and emerge and everybody sort of like learns from them.

1:08:09And now these kids of today, they get you, they get him, they get Johnny Cash, they get Funkin Casey in the Sunshine Band, they get a soup of influences. This guy. What did he have? He had to figure it out. Yeah, listen to some of this. So that you got to know influences other than other musicians.

1:08:36He's singing about me in the dumb. I went to the crossroad. He leaned into the room and it was neat. It's double down.

1:08:53He had to lie above my missing arm. You know what you can hear distinctly? It's the pain of that arrow. Yeah. You know, you say you put yourself in that arrow? Not much of a historian, but I can hear the pain. Yeah. And that text, that soul. So this is the 1930s, so this is post depression. And this is also the south. And it's not even a hundred years since slavery was abolished. So you're dealing with Jim Crow and the stains of hundreds of years of oppression. Just in the culture and everything. I'm just hearing so clear. That's the horrible thing about horrible things. Is it dark going to get me here?

1:09:47Hmm. Dark going to catch me here? Oh, this is awesome. I'll be listening to this for the rest of the month now. See, this is the shit I want to be inspired by working on the album. Oh boy, dark going to get me here.

1:10:09Damn. God, dude. Yeah, we're so fortunate that we have the access to all these different things, like instantly. And you get to think about it. Like, I don't even think we could imagine living at that time. If you took a person from 2023 and you put him in that time, just it would feel like torture. You'd be like, what is this? You guys don't even have any medicine. Yeah, you look the fuck is going on. You don't know what's going on. You have no internet. You're about to go into World War II. You don't even know. Even getting records when they stopped selling CDs, you know. I was just how long I've been doing this.

1:10:51So, a buddy of mine calls me and goes, we had an distributor. We used out of Memphis called Selector, hits about a Phillips family, and put out records for 50, 60, 70 years. He said, you need to hurry up and get you a trade card at Best Buy because they're fixing to disappear. And I'll never forget this phone call, Joe. I said, hell, it sounds to me like we need to be figuring out what's next if we're fitting the fucking disappear. It don't sound like I need to be rushing to get on a shelf that's fixing to go. Right. And I felt like the guy screaming the sky was falling. Right? I was like, I'm telling you all.

1:11:30Like, as soon as they called me with Spotify and everybody was like early, early. iTunes was cool because you still got the same dollar per download you would for a CD sell in the store. But when Spotify and I'm coming, remember how many people held out initially. All these major artists held out like, we're not letting Spotify play it. And I just had a feeling that once this thing converted to here, and you could listen to music anywhere, because when I was growing up, it was even worse when you were growing up. Probably, but when I was growing up, you had two choices of listening to music. In the car or in the house, or you could bring a boom box outside, but wherever you took music, you had to carry a physical thing to play it.

1:12:09You know what I mean? It was like a chore. You'd even had to buy two CDs or for one for the house. You know, or you'd scratch the shit out of them. We'd have the cases going down the road. And that's the only time we could consume music. Dude, my daughter listens to music all day. That's all I hear. She cleans her room. I hear music. She's downstairs, scramble eggs. I got a 15 year old. She's downstairs, cooking scrambled eggs, Joe. She's fucking got her little cell phone sitting right there playing. And it's so cool to listen to it go from Ariana Grande to Co -Wetzel. You know what I mean? And then I watch it go from Co -Wetzel to Cardi B.

1:12:45And then it swings into like a print song. You know what I mean? I'm just like, fuck yeah. What are you talking about? Because when I was in Canada, if you showed up to school in a Metallica shirt, you better not show up in the Eminem shirt Friday, my fucker. You know how that was? You were tribal by music. You know what I mean? It's like, no, you were, you, you, you, music identified you. Her, your generation, she, she's got Ariana Grande shirts, Taylor Swift shirts, fucking Cody Johnson shirts. Beautiful. Yeah, she's all over the place. Well, it's like, you'd be stupid to deny there's all sorts of cool shit out there.

1:13:17I've only been a Metallica fan and get the fuck out of there. I've only been a heavy metal fan. And that's how it was. Oh, no, you're a metal guy. You can't, you know. Oh, for sure. Like when I first started listening to the country, a lot of my friends were like, what are you listening to? Why are you listening to that? Like, what are you talking about? This is great music. It sounds great. I enjoy it. I'm not going to pretend I don't enjoy something. So I fit into a tribe. That's just seems so stupid. And you're missing half of what life is all about. God, dude. It's, I appreciate all music.

1:13:47That's kind of where I lined up in the music world anyways. I was the youngest of four, right? So by default, I never controlled the fucking radio. I never one time in my childhood got to determine what was getting played in any room of the house. So I just learned to deal with whatever I was listening to, you know. And because of, you know, how brothers and sisters are, none of them wanted to be alike. So I had a sister that listened to rock music. I had a brother that listened to nothing but rap music. Another brother that listened to like singer, songwriter, shit like our father. You know what I mean?

1:14:17Like we had all these different, my mother listened to this kind of music. Daddy listened to this kind of music. So every car I'm baby Jason, I'm just sitting in the backseat, you know, pimping and whatever we're pimping to, you know. And that's, I think why my music ended up going from hip hop in the rock. And then I've had a hit, I've had a billboard chart on all three genres, right? Because I was so influenced by this shit for so long anyways. Like I just fucking love the concept of music. I love the idea of, I went to a lot of Paloos in 97 at Starwood Amput Theater. Mmm. Joe. Dude, listen.

1:14:51Wow. Let me remind you, it was Snoop Dogg, Prodigy, Tool, Corn, right? And I'll never forget watching Snoop Dogg go on and then Prodigy and then Corn. And I remember thinking, this is the coolest shit I've ever seen. And this is 1997. So keep in mind Snoop Dogg is Snoopin. This is like prime time Snoop Dogg, right? Oh yeah, not what's fucking insane, dude. I remember watching Julian and Damien Marley on the second stage, right? And us sliding down the hill in the rain. And I just remember going, man, if you can go from Snoop Dogg to Tool, you know what I mean? And to Corn? And all these fans were the same people.

1:15:36The same people that were acting all tribal at school were all here singing everywhere to Snoop Dogg and everywhere to Corn. And right then I knew those lines were just going to get more blurry. And then the phones came out. You know what I mean? It's not weird now. Like, I love the genre influences. I love hearing an 808 in a Morgan Waller song. You know what I mean? Like it's just a moment I just fucking love that had it. I love that tip when Zach Crowell first started producing the old Sam Hunt records. And the first time I heard break up in a small town and she would get down and you just hear that fucking pounding 808.

1:16:08And you're like, this is not country music. This is awesome. They have officially brought hip hop into country music. You know what I mean? Yeah. I just think I love anytime people can tastefully bring shit together. I mean that was one of the cool things about early hip hop too, it's samples. You know it's it fucked them up when it came to licensing and a lot of people had to pay a lot of money because of that because they had hits that sampled. Other people's music, vanilla ice, the famous thing. I mean that was under pressure. And then he tried to dispute it. Which was the craziest shit I've ever seen from my wife.

1:16:42I'm listening to the same thing. We all heard it. There's no way if my mom could figure it out, you're fucked. You know what I'm saying? If my mom was like, that sounds like the same song. You're not winning it. But there was some great uses of sampling. There's like songs and rhythms and different beats. It was really interesting. It was an interesting thing that happened that sort of emerged from the hip hop world of combining music to make a totally unique product that's arguably as good if not better. It was more like a better than the original. Yeah. They made some amazing songs with sampling that the sampling made the song better.

1:17:19Oh 100%. Yeah it was fun. Yeah. It was fun too. And it was also an homage to all these other things they were sampling. Yeah. I mean how many movies did they sound? How many times did people use say hello to my little friend and a hip hop song? You know I was telling Stan Hope. I tell my sampling for about three years I opened my show to a Stan Hope bit. So the stage would go completely black and you would hear his bit about. Yeah a lot of people here tonight are counting on me for a good time. That's why I drink booze. I don't count on you for a good time. I'm going to have fun no matter what.

1:17:53What if I get up here and I'm too drunk and I fucking blow it. And I don't tell one funny fucking joke and everybody hates me. What in my fault you should have drank, Coxucker, whatever that bit was. Yeah. I'm butchering it but it was the bit. And we literally played that every night. I got a Joey. I don't want to spoil it. I don't know. But yeah I love it. Imagine it goes stacking. You hear fucking Stan hoping the best part is Stan Hope was like I fucking why didn't I know this. And I was like I think that's what makes it so cool. I fucking did it for years. I wanted to reach out but as I prayed you'd want money or something.

1:18:24I have to pay whoever fucking had because it was one of the old albums you know. That's hilarious. Yeah maybe some of the else owns it right. Yeah that's always. It might be one of those things. Yeah that's always the sketchy part. I'm going to have to find out about the JVS. I'm going to put it on the next record anyway. I'll pass. Yeah well you know Joe. Yeah I'll hit him. I'm going to send it to him and be like yeah I want to I want to I'll tell you which one off camera because I want to still be a surprise at the show. Okay. So but it's cool. It's a good idea. Yeah. It's the whole way of you're doing it of just doing what you want to do.

1:18:56It didn't and it's having a good time. It's comes through in your music man. Your expression. It comes through. It's awesome. Thank you man. You know Josh Adam Myers right. Sure. I got to tell you my Josh Adam Myers story. I went I played Fremont Street the day of the weekend of Skankfest last year. So Skankfest is on just coincidentally coincidentally. Oh boy. Skankfest is on this part of Fremont and I'm on the middle of Fremont doing the stage right. And we have literally and I'm proud of this by the way. We have the biggest crowd they've ever had at a Fremont Rocks ever. Like literally the mayor comes and meets us.

1:19:38Now keep in mind. Now keep in mind that my wife Joe and I don't know what you know about her but I want to tell you a piece of her story too. My wife grew up in Las Vegas Nevada. My wife was a high end escort her whole life. That's what she did when I met her. I was broke. I was living in a 1996 van literally didn't have a house. And this woman has like two condos and a few sports cars. Right. She's like fucking bawling. It's so funny now the internet when I won these awards are like this bitch is a gold digger. I was like I was the gold digger. You know what I'm saying? Like this woman had so much money.

1:20:13So the irony that we're sitting here meeting the mayor on Fremont Street and she's like holy shit. We fucking did it because she's got a podcast and a huge Patreon and she's just crushing on her own regard. Love you mama bear shout out to the dumb blonde podcast. But thank you for firing up that cocoa one more time. That laughing gas. But I'm leaving and I know skank fest is there so I'm ready to go. I'm like we're going to skank fest. I'm fucking almost black out drunk Joe. I may or may not have been fucking with my nose. I mean I'm having a Las Vegas night. Right. And I haven't done this in a long time.

1:20:50I'm like off my shit. And they're doing the goddamn comedy jam. It's skank fest. So it's where Josh Adamire does this music medley of funny like and he's Shane Gillis is up singing like mega death. Yeah, comedian sings. Bro and I'm crying though. It's so fucking funny. Sam Tripoli brought me up and fucking I didn't know the song we were singing. I'm just fucking drunk drunk. And when Josh Adamire gets off stage I look at him. Joe and I go. I want you to open up my tour next year. I'm doing my first full arena amphitheater tour and I want you to be my opening act. And I offered him money right then on the spot.

1:21:26I made the deal right there drunk Joe. Wow. I didn't talk to this guy for 10 months. I'm sitting in CAA's office right. And they're like, hey did you look over the list of the one of threes. You know it's the first you know how it works. So it's like did you look over your list of one of threes. I said now I've already got that figured out I'm taking this comedian that does music. And they were like what? I was like, yeah. Yeah, I'm taking this comedian that does music. I called column Joe. Right. I called him. Ten months later. You know, you know, you're sitting in CAA. You're not remembering that.

1:21:55Sitting in CAA and I'm like, hey, Josh is jelly roll. He's like, what's up, Bubba? I was like, did you block that month two months off? I told you to block off. He said, I did and everybody thinks I'm crazy. I said, you're not mother fucker. You're coming. He was like, you're shitting me. So right now Josh Adam Myers is going to open up the empty. He's actually hosting it. So between each act he'll come out and do 10 minutes of like comedy music shit with the band. And it's fucking, that's my favorite story to tell. Because Josh said he called Steve Byrne because he's a buddy of mine. And Byrne said, listen man, I don't care how drunk jelly was.

1:22:28If jelly looked you in the eye and told you you're doing it, leave those two months open. Yeah, Josh was like, everybody thought I was a fucking nut bag. I've been turning down shows. Wow. And I gave him what I offered him that night. I can't believe you can remember it. No, I remember the number vividly because when live nation told me what they give him, I was like, I was just going to cost me some money. Fuck. And I was a man of my word though. I was like, yeah, I'm going to eat it. Let's do it. Beautiful. Yeah. It's one of them old school deals where the contract says something, but what we worked out is different.

1:22:56But that's my guy, man. I told him I was going to do it. And that's my fucking, and we're still going to do skank festers. Yeah, we're going to fly on that last Sunday and do it together. Because at night I got drunk and told Jay I'll place skank fest for free whenever. You know what I said? I hit Jay this year. I was like, yo, I didn't forget. I'm coming motherfucker. Skank fest is a wild experience. It's the gathering of the juggalos for comedians. It is. It is fucking awesome. It seems so insane. That's it. That's it. That's it. That's it. That's it right there. That's it. My favorite thing was fads all day called our group, Gilly Roll.

1:23:30Gilly Roll. Yeah. Best night, dude. That's awesome. It was so, it was, it was, it was really cool. And I'm excited to have Josh out too, man. I think it'll bring a whole different element to the tour because we're taking a Ashtamic Brides doing six or seven dates to the Grammy award winning. Chase Rice. When I come to Texas, we're here. Do you remember the date? I'm not told you. September 21st, I'll be here. I've yarned town. I'd love for y 'all to come out and I got three six mafia doing all the Texas dates, the original group, DJ Paul and Juicy J from the legendary rap group. So this is big.

1:24:00They were one of the first people to give me my chance. What an interesting combination. You know, that's, that's such a fun thing. Like you were saying about kids today and about, you know, your taste and everybody says they're like, you can mix up shit together and it works. Just somehow another works. It's fun. Josh. My best friend, Struggle Jennings, will be doing the whole tour. So me, him, Josh Adam Myers, it's going to be fun. It's going to be, it's going to be really big. And I thought it was a cool way. Me and him, we're talking about it's a cool way to bring comedy while keeping a music crowd entertained.

1:24:31Yeah, it's, it's funny that musicians like to listen to comedy and comedians like to listen to music because we all fucking think we're funny. Yeah. You know what I mean? It's, I have a metta musician to do it and at least have a couple of minutes of jokes that we can say on stage if we get in a cramp. Yeah. You know what I mean? Like we got a couple of go to get a quick cheap laugh, cheap claps. Yeah. You know what I mean? But just enough over that we all think we're fucking hilarious. You both everybody could do comedy. It's just, you know, if you could talk to people like you talk to me right now, you could do comedy.

1:25:02You just have to figure it out. Right. But it's the figuring in our part. It's, it's weirder than it looks. It's like it's very easy to judge too because you're on the outside and you could talk too. The idea that you work your stuff out in front of people is crazy to me. That's what I admire the most from comedians is like as musicians we got a little cheat code. We get to go sit in a room and get really weird and like fuck up a thousand times before and nobody will ever know it because by the time we put the song out, you know what I mean? Yeah. We've wrote 70 songs and picked seven and reproduced them 10 times and it's like where y 'all motherfuckers are like.

1:25:38You're just up there like, yeah. I thought this was funny in the car on the way here. Let's see how it works in front of 500 strangers. There and at me. I think it's like everything. You get accustomed to stuff. Like you know, the problem with like going back to 1936 is that we're accustomed to 2023. If you lived in 1936, you'd be fine with it. If you were a fighter, you'd be fine with being a fighter. It would be a normal thing for you. You've been always been doing martial arts. Well, it used to be an impain. You used to get punched and kicked and strangled. You'd do it. Like just like if I had a, if I was a musician, I would do music.

1:26:12You would, you would figure out you'd be a chess player. You would be a fucking whatever it is, man. There's like things that people do where they figure something out and then they become that thing, whether it's a soldier or a fighter. And there definitely are people whose personalities are more aligned to certain types of occupations. But like how much of that is chance? How much of that is your personality sort of evolved along with your obsession with whatever it is, whether it's music or comedy or martial arts or sports. People become like a sort of a conglomeration of all the other people that are around them, too.

1:26:46There's a lot of that. So there's like this giant influence from all over the place. Well, like I tell, with my music, because it's changed over the years, the man changed. I just drugged the music along, right? Like as my heart and my spirit changed and my views about life and people and my spirit changed. So the music changed. You know what I mean? Yeah. So you know Joe, I don't know if you know this, but I spent most of my, from 14 to 25 in jail. Yeah, I do know that. I spent like a ton of time at 16. I was charged as an adult for a charge. And what did you do? It was the first time I've ever actually talked about the charge.

1:27:28I just say it was a heinous crime. Admittedly, it was horrible. We robbed a couple of guys for some weed, but they called the police because we took some money and some stuff. And it was, it was an armed robbery. I mean, we went in there with a gun. I regret it every day of my life, Joe. You know, I mean, I was a kid. Now I'm not making an excuse, but I would like to paint the picture that I literally did not have pubic hairs. I'm a 15 year old kid when it happens, you know? And I still feel horrible about it. But because the state of Tennessee has a zero forgiveness policy for violent offenders, I've carried that unexplungable felony for 20 something years.

1:28:05It prohibits me from getting houses. It's prohibited. It's put me in, I mean, life insurance, homeowner insurance is higher. If I can get it at all, I can't get life insurance at all just because they just, they have a, most of them won't give you a decent policy as a felon. I can't volunteer at the YMCA. The young man's a Christian academy won't let me, you know, just me and my wife just got turned down for her house. I'm in a place in life where I go to buy my dream home, guard gated community golf course. Man, I'm crying, Joe. They accept my offer. Everything's going crazy. It's going to be real.

1:28:38They turn me around saying, oh, the golf course won't let a felon be a part of the community. You know, and I'm a fucking, dude, I'm a 15, 16 year dude. The idea that there's just one definition, this one solid, yes or no, this is a thing. You have the mark on you. Right. And it's not an individual with individual circumstances. That's so ridiculous. And that's not what a human being is supposed to be about. We're not supposed to be about that. We're supposed to be about understanding situations. Right. And when there's a child that does something really fucking stupid and knows it forever, you don't think you could have done that.

1:29:15This is what I would tell to people. If you were in that same community, you were with those same influences. This is the reality that you were born into. You don't think you could have gone with those other kids that were going to rob someone with a gun. You could have. Don't lie to yourself. You could have. They're not unsavable human beings. Right. And then that's why I focus all of my philanthropic efforts with the juvenile at home. You know, we suck a quarter million dollars into there from my last hometown show. I sold out my arena. Big crazy night ever. You know, fucking hometown arena.

1:29:47How big is she? You know, hometown it just hits different. Yeah. You know what I'm saying when you're like, oh, no, this is home. You know what I'm saying? Like, oh, they like me at home. Yeah, for me, it's Boston. Yeah, when you play the garden, right? Yeah. Crazy, dude. I just couldn't imagine the emotions of just like, dude, I fucking ate shit at this comedy club here. I fucking, fucking, fucking kickboxing and shit out here for fucking 20 bucks a session. And here I am standing in the fucking garden. I said, dude, I was like, I was sitting two blocks away from the juvenile. I was in George.

1:30:19I mean, Joe, and I'm sitting there, Joe. And I went and talked to the kids before. I went and met them all, spent things, giving with them before the show, fed them, and sat down with them and said, look, y 'all, I know a couple of y 'all been here for a year or two, just like I was. I built in a studio in here, and I'm building trade programs, and I got y 'all's back. Man, we helped out with a lot of lawyers. We put it, we worked with the state. Now they're building a new juvenile that we're going to sink millions of dollars into and have an aftercare program. I'm going to do so much for at -risk youth and Nashville because my whole life changed in that.

1:30:51It was the most, I look back at it, and I talk about it so much that sometimes I desensitize myself for how traumatic it really was. I spent my 15th, 16th, 17th, 18th, 19th, and 20th birthday incarcerated. Straight. Like, most kids are like, my daughter will inevitably, by the grace of God, get a car on her 16th birthday. Like the dream shit, you know what the ribbons should. It's going to be a big moment. You know, it's going to be fucking crazy. But I got, you know, they didn't even give me an extra piece of cake for dinner. You know what I mean? I didn't have a guard tell me happy 15th or 16th birthday.

1:31:32You know what I mean? You don't get a family visit. I missed high school completely. I have, I think I was in high school for like, I think we actually pulled the records like six weeks. You know what I mean? And then the only thing that turned that shit around for me was Bayley. I was in the revolving door of the judicial system, in and out. I knew I got a woman pregnant. I'm back in jail. She's pregnant. She hates me. We're not talking. I'm a bad human. She's right. I was a horrible human. And I was sitting in there and that guard knocks on my door and made 22nd, 2008 job. D Ford, it's count time.

1:32:09I say, what's up? He goes, you had a kid today. And he walked away. Dude, it just, I still get emotional. It was like, I don't know what kind of, it was like a Damascus road experience in the Bible. Like I immediately, Joe, was like, I've got to do something to say, I've got to quit this shit. Like, I got to figure it out. Now, I'm in the violent offender gang unit of this jail. There's a sign on the door that you can sign up for an education unit, right? But nobody ever signed up for it because it's like checking in. You know what I mean? Like, in jail, it would be like, your boy told the jail stories that was in here with Bobby.

1:32:46So you understand the lingo is like, they put you on the door. You sign up for the sheet of paper so they get you out of the unit. Or if you were scared, you would sign up to get out of the unit. I've been in there for fucking a year. I mean, a fucking, a seven, eight months, six months, seven months playing poker every day, chilling. And immediately, Joe went and signed up for that education unit and got my GD. I didn't know what I was going to do, but I knew that I was, I was dead set on not selling drugs ever again. Because once I caught that adult felon, he went back home, I'm a felon. I couldn't get no decent job.

1:33:16I just went straight back to the streets. I knew better than the rob people then. I didn't see no integrity in that. And at the time, I was foolish enough to think that drug dealing was a victimless crime, right? So I was like, oh, fuck, I'll sell dope. And I got caught on a crack cocaine case. So when Bailey's born, I'm in there for a crack case. And I now see the victim sign of that because fast forward Bailey's mother ended up with a heroin addiction. And me and my wife ended up getting full custody of Bailey seven years ago, right? So now I see the victims of these crimes now because it's my daughter.

1:33:46You know, I thought it was an equal exchange of goods. You give me money for a drug. I give you a drug. All that started changing in my mind right then. Went straight, got the GD, came home, started selling mixed tapes out of the trunk, Joe. Wow. I'm selling tea. I started a YouTube channel, my homeboy, Chaddy Bobby Chaddons. I love you forever. Started me a Facebook and a YouTube channel while I was in jail. Because I call him from the education unit now like, look, we got to figure it out. I got a kid. I was like, because I had a really good dad. He was a hustler. My father was a great man, but he, he booked bets.

1:34:16You know what I'm saying? He was kind of an old school gangster, you know? Old Marine, he ran his family's meat business that he took over from his father, booked bets on the side. I just kind of got, you know, I was just, that's just where I'm from. It's just what it is. So I was like, I want to be a good father, you know? And to this day of everything I'm proud of, every achievement, every accomplishment, I am the most proud of her. This kid kicks fucking ass, Joe. That's all. She's fucking, she watches a comedy nerd. She is a fucking, she watches the most, she's like, she's into like dark, dark comedy too.

1:34:49Like she is just a little funny motherfucker, dude. You know what I mean? Like she's just, she's been my best friend. He and my wife had custody ever seven years. Her mother sobered up. I fucking kept selling these mixed tapes out of the trunk. You know what I'm saying? I'm fucking, I'm hustling. I'm building the YouTube channel. I put up a thing called a 10 minute freestyle. I guess taking down because I called my PO out. What a wild journey, you better know that. Jesus Christ. Like what a fucking movie. You know, it's like the opposite of the Elvis movie.

1:35:19I'm gonna get chaggy PT. I'm gonna get skinny later in my career. And then she can't fat later in that. That's hilarious. It's like you went from the worst situation possible, other than being in jail for life, to being selling out in arenas. It's wild. It's unreal, Joe. I don't want to say like it overwhelming where you just can't believe it's real. All the time. They're doing a, I got a deal with it. Man. So I'm learning now to deal with like, I'm learning to deal with, I finally got an, I've really taken therapy serious. And it's kind of helped me with my weight. I've been losing weight recently.

1:36:02I've been taking my health more serious because I've always had a mental thing like this just blockage of like, just this overwhelmingness cloud of sadness. You know, but I find purpose in this. So it's like, as this starts to work and as me and my daughters were like, I always felt like I wasn't gonna be a good father, you know. Now that you've become a good father, you're like, man, I'm actually figuring this out. All of a sudden, dude, I told my wife recently, I don't think I, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, really wanted to live until the last probably 20 months. You know, as my life came together as me and my wife have just become my best fucking friend, dude.

1:36:36You know, you talking about a story, dude, we're talking about a crack deal in a prostitute dog. He was saying it fucking figured it out, Joe. You know what I'm saying? And it's like me and her joke the night I won those awards at the CMT, I grabbed her and I whisper in her ear. I said, bitch, this is the greatest trick I've ever pulled. Like, like, this is crazy. Like, I can't believe I'm afraid I'm gonna get arrested walking up there. Like, that's how I was thinking. You know what I mean? Because I was like, there's no way that this happens to people like us. When I won the third award that night, you see the camera.

1:37:05I mean, her talking, I'm like, I'm definitely not winning this award. There's no way I'm winning because it was a big, big one, you know? And when I won it, I just ball -crown of course, but it's just to come from where we came from, Doc, to sit here with you. I love you, man. I know we just met, but I fucking love you, dude. You've helped me so much. You know what I'm saying? Like, we laugh at you unfucking controllably, Doc. You and all your homies. I have so many friends that have become friends of mine that are just because I was fans and they were great that I met through this circuit of people.

1:37:35It's sharp as the homie forever. You know what I'm saying? Like, I'll always love shops. Shorts. Me and Shorts found each other because of my, you know, we did the song in the middle of the pandemic and I had a public. Am I, I got fired my first publicist, Joe? And they fired me because I did a song with Andrew Shorts. I had, I had a publicist for 17 seconds one time. I came and fucking hung out with Saul some did a song get dry. What was the song? It was called Opener Up.

1:38:05Now this is the middle of the pandemic, Joe.

1:38:25Opener Up. Like a can of beans. Opener Up. Oh, okay. So you had it. This was perceived as being anti -COVID lockdown. I guess. Yes. It's funny. I said, I hope grandma Maxine gets her vaccine. I can grab two band blondes and tag team.

1:38:48It's hilarious. Did they drop you for that? They dropped me, dude. Luckily, I got one now that fucking let's me. Maybe me. Good. They don't get it. They don't get it. Yeah. Yeah. We've all laughed about that. In the moment though, in that COVID fucking fever that everybody was in, the fever, mental fever, over. Like anything like that, where you couldn't even joke around about it. Like you can't even joke around about something like that. No, it's funny. It was hilarious. Oh, dude, my first set. I hope grandma Maxine gets her vaccine. So I can back to bad blondes and tag team. I run fast as an athlete at a track meet.

1:39:25Yeah, shit was so good. No, we just had so much fun, dude. And I got dropped. I called souls and said, I just want you to know. I was my first publicist ever, too, Joe. I didn't get another one until I got the one I got now. I was scared of them. I was like, yeah, I'll leave you. That's hilarious. And I did it with a comedian. That was the best part. It's like, it's not like me and fucking Ernest are harder or more than walling cut the song together. There was like me and I wrote a song with a comedian. That was a comedic song. I don't know. I'm just fucking whatever. But yeah, me and souls always laugh about this shit.

1:39:58That's funny. It's a funny song. It's just, that was a weird time. It just happened. And it's almost like everybody wants to forget. It's like, we were at that crazy. I mean, we all understood the sign. You guys just got a magic trick pulled on you. It's sad, man. My niece got COVID. I found out this morning. She with my wife. My wife said, okay, let's get COVID. I said, shit, I don't know. It was still here. You know what I mean? Like it just seemed like it just kind of disappeared off my feet at least. Well, it's very mild for a lot of people that already have the antibodies. I didn't have a problem with it.

1:40:34Joe and listen, I was COVID's dream. If you could write down a dream scenario for COVID, a fucking active drinker, obese, everything that comes with how I look is there. You know what I was saying? It's like, only thing I wasn't was old. And man, my wife got dog sick. She works out three times a day. My kid got dog sick. My niece got dog sick. And I was walking around the house like, hello, everybody. I was running and dropping off soup. I was fucking kidding. So what do you do? Three times. Everybody in the house, can you normally get sick? I get some sinus shit every now and then. Well, you got to think if you're going to get a real stimulation of your immune system, I would imagine jail is a very good way to do that.

1:41:16Oh yeah. Because you're around. The tour bus is the same thing. It's a submarion. Tour bus. Same thing. Like we don't have a bus. Same thing. Oh yeah, for sure. Or I'll hang around with so many people in such close proximity so often that your immune system gets tested all the time. Like you're always, these like colds go around. And like when comedians get the flu, they use the same microphone and they give it to other people. It happens all the time. Yeah, we were laughing about that last night too though. The Jail show up just by yourself. You just trust the sound man at the venue and everything.

1:41:48Yeah. Me and Tony were talking about some shows and I got offered my biggest guarantee ever just yesterday and I was like no fucking way. And Tony was like, I was like the difference is you'll fly and go pick up that money completely by yourself. And I'm going to take seven buses, ten trucks, three managers, two fucking booking agents. You know what I mean? Like it's going to fucking, you know, because when you, when we got to put on an arena show, I love the way y 'all did the arenas with Dave though. I thought it was a really cool way to put on a show but keep the production minimal but just making a party.

1:42:20Yeah, those were very fun. Those were always fun. Yeah. That shit was dope. But the DJ to me was like, that's the move. You know what I mean? Yeah, for Dave loves that. He just loves, so you're gonna bring the DJ too. It's dope. It's a party. Yeah. Yeah, it's like that's kind of back to why I brought bringing Josh on tour. I was like, how do we bring that, because I thought about Lollipaloo's again, right? I'm like, what are we, what how can we, like let's bring the circus to town, dude. Like I'm a fucking, I'm a sad clown. You know what I'm saying? Like that's what I have to do. I think sad clown songs.

1:42:50Let's bring a fucking circus to town. Like what's the, let's bring three six mafia. Let's bring a fucking comedian. Let's bring Wail and Jen and grandson. You know what I'm saying? Let's do that fucking shit. Yeah. You know, let's figure it out that way. Yeah. Let's go out here and have a fucking party every night, you know? Yeah. I love it. Yeah, that's kind of the fucking, the, the dream. You talking about dealing with the pressure too, and about this story being crazy, ABC News followed me from my Red Rock show last June to my bridge stone sell out in Nashville in December. Thousands of hours of footage, raw, full length documentary coming out next week on Lollipop.

1:43:29Ninety five minute film. I haven't seen a piece of it. I've seen the two minute trailer and I cried like a baby. But you talk about in the middle of this all happening like when we first, because dude, we came the 22, my first show of the year was a makeup show from 21, late 21. But it was in March of 22 and it was at a thousand clap, thousand capacity club in Buffalo. And by the end of the year, we had sold out Red Rocks, the bridge stone arena, every, every hockey arena in the South. You know what I mean? And Hulu caught all this, should you? Wow. It's, and I'm nervous because it's a, it's a ABC News thing, so I don't get to like make a note.

1:44:10You know what I'm saying? They're not going to send it to me and go, what do you think? You know what I mean? Like I'm going to be watching it with everybody fucking May 30th, but I'm excited to see they were there for those moments that were just like the first time at Red Rocks. You know what I mean? Like the fucking, the bridge stone, the juvenile, the kids, like this whole culmination of this shit kind of going the way it went, man. It's, the last seven months have been the wildest I could have ever imagined. How could you even imagine it, right? It's past what I dreamed of, Joe. It's past what I dreamed of, man.

1:44:43I'm having to make new dreams. You know what I'm saying? Is that making sense? My dreams were so small. When I saw it with, so I kept it independent. And I still am proud of this that I own 100 % of my masters. That's awesome. Right. I have complete creative control in my deal. We're, you know, we got, I got the best deal in Nashville history to this point. But because I built, I had a billion views on YouTube before I signed the deal. You know what I mean? So I'm coming with an already built business. You know what I mean? Right. And I come into this deal. And that wild. It's crazy. It is. It's back to the internet.

1:45:21It changed our lives, dude. It changed everything. And it's fucking guys like me and you could just do what we love and hit upload and fucking it worked out. You know what I mean? It's like I'm dropping June 2nd. We're calling it my debut country album. I dropped 39 projects and I'm dropping a debut album. That's how this game works. You know what I mean? But I'm the way the deal structured out. And the way I come to them and I'm like, yo, just, just let me, and like it's different than every other artist in town. I just give them a record and go, this is the record. You know, like we're not, I'm not playing no games.

1:45:53You know what I mean? Like, and it's the best thing. And these people have changed my fucking life. They found me a publicist that was not afraid of me fucking talking about doing DMT with Joe Roken. You know what I'm saying? Like, country radio gave me my first hit. You know what I mean? My first actual big hit with Son of a Center. And this all happened when I dropped Save Me. Did you ever get to hear Save Me? Yeah. Can I do it? Jamie pulled that up moment? Yeah. Just because this song is like the first 12 seconds was like when I found my voice. This is how I got the shine down to her. Brent Smith called me from Shine Down.

1:46:28And he said, I was, I'm still a nervous singer. And he was like, it's one of the best vocal performances I've ever heard. And he's fucking, you know, Brent Smith to me is like top six front men in Rock and Roll period.

1:46:42I just remix this to Eleni Wilson. So the album version will have fully produced. This is a coup stick and I have Laney Wilson on it. This is June 2020, Joe. Somebody saved me. Me for myself. I've been so long.

1:47:13That's all you got to do, Jamie. But that's the one that did it. Every label on Earth called me. And none of them knew what none of them understood what I wanted to do except for broken bow records and BMG. Wow. Yep. John Loba got it. He didn't hesitate. We do. I wrote this. Shot that. Recording it and uploading it that day. I'm smoking his hopeless but feel like it's all that I need. Something inside of me is broken. I hold on to anything that sets me free. I'm a lost cause. Baby, don't waste your time on me. I'm so damaged beyond repair. Life is shattered. My hopes and my dreams. I'm a lost cause.

1:48:12Baby, don't waste your time on me. I'm so damaged beyond repair. Life is shattered. My hopes and my dreams. So at this time, Joe, all these labels are calling me from LA and they're trying to pitch me like as a pop artist. And I'm like, yo, I want to play the grand old opera. You know what I mean? We got a different thing going on here. I'm not who y 'all think I am. You know what I'm saying? And like, I want to play the grand old opera. But what is pop is short for popular. The thing is authentic is pop. It's popular. People love it. They love it. They just don't get enough of it because they were kind of spoon fed nonsense for so long.

1:48:56And it's, you know, machine created boy bands. There was just like so much nonsense that was going on. Nashville did it too. I called it the Nashville Builder Bears. And it's like, in these record labels would find the guy. Didn't even care if he could sing. They'd be like, he looks the part. They'd get him somebody that would dress him up. Somebody would write him a hit song. They'd put the bear on the hat. They'd give the bear the bear guitar. They'd put the bear in front of a big country star. And you know, then the bear sings. It's kind of amazing. And then somebody had figured out how to do that with comedians.

1:49:26Just find some needy actor and teach you how to do stand up and write all the jokes for him and take half the money. No, because it's like, there's a thing where we got to connect to you personally from there. We got to feel like you believe what you're telling us. Yeah. Right? And I think we're going back to that in music. Because listen, let's talk about the 70s of me and you love so much. They wasn't the greatest singers. No. Like hot take, but they sung from the sense. Oh man. And you felt like it was their story. Yeah. You know, so it's like, then we went through an era where you just like the song always matters more than anything.

1:49:59It's got to be a good song. Yeah. But we went through an era where you just kind of, it was just a song. You didn't really, there wasn't artists. That's once again, why I think Zach Bryan, Hardy, Morgan Wall and these guys in the country space that are really connecting big. You know what I mean is because these dudes are writing their own songs and seeing their own pain and their own struggle and like, you connect to the artist and their emotion. Like dude, if I meet James, when I meet James Taylor, I'm a cry, like a like uncontrollably sob like a baby because his music is done so much for me.

1:50:33And it's like, you know what I mean? Like, because I connect these songs to him in such a way and they've meant so much to me and they've done like fire and rain has pulled me out of the darkest moments of my life. When I watched my father die, our favorite songs, Fire and Rain. I watched him pass away a CLL. I'm in the room with him the last 90 days of his life, the greatest experience ever to sit down with him every day. When he's knowing he's dying, I'm knowing he's dying and we're just sitting there fucking having cocktails and talking at the hospital 90 days. And Fire and Rain just was like, it helped me as recently as then.

1:51:09I can tell you times it helped me when I was 16 times it helped me in jail when I was 22. You know what I mean? Like this song somehow always finds me when I really need it. Like I can go to it like a, you know, like an old neighbor that gives you some good wisdom. You go knock on the door, they'll tell you something. Like I can get along with James Taylor and have that moment. I connect with him so personally in that way. And I think we went through an era where the artist and the music didn't connect like that. And now we're kind of sliding back into that era. You know what I mean? Like, it's just something about when Zach goes, um, uh, until you're just a man, huh?

1:51:46You know, it's like just something you just look at him and go, I fucking believe you, man. Yeah, I believe him. You know, it's like when you hear me belt out, save me. You just immediately go, I don't know this guy, but fuck, I believe him. Yeah, you know what I mean? No, you're authentic. It's fuck and so Zach and it's a, it's a great time for that. People, that is a mainstream thing now. It's not just some like weird nitchy thing that gets second looks at after the popular stuff. It's the most popular stuff for a lot of people. And for me, it's just more nourishing. Oh, the streams are showing it now too though.

1:52:22The streams are like, we're seeing it have like Zach Bryan was top two biggest country artists on earth last year, streaming wise. You know, it's like, in the radio, the single didn't go to radio until after. You know what I mean? It was just so Morgan's, what Morgan's doing is just unheard of. I mean, he's the King of Country radio right now. The King of Country music period. I mean, that kid is just on fire fire. And I don't know when this comes out, but I know you're listening. Morgan and I hope your voice is feeling better and I love you. Yeah, he had to get some operation. I think they're just putting them on a real vocal rest before they try to cut.

1:52:55Oh, that's right. They'll try to cut on you. They were worried that, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, they'll cut on you dead last. That's the singer's rule is don't let them cut on you. Unless you just have no other choice because that's so risky. How many people have ever had their operation? I think Jacoby, my boy from Popper Roach, did. I need to talk to him about it. He had one and, man, that dude, he's a screamer. You remember Popper Roach? I mean, he really goes for it. And I think since he, whatever he went through with his voice, he got through it. Brother was a surgery or not. He's on the other side of it and sounds incredible.

1:53:28Every night and still can do five shows in a row and belt. That's great. That would be the scariest thing you've ever seen. I was telling you for the pod started that of all the unhealthy habits I have, I take the voice about as serious as I can. You know what I mean? Like, I hydrate the shit out of it. I get IVs every week. I do everything. I, my green room's really relaxed. You'll see it's a party. I believe the green room's a party. You know what I mean? And it should be, and I don't leave the green room or get weird before shows except for 12 minutes before I go on stage. I'll sneak to a corner and run a scale.

1:54:01But just little things. You know what I mean? Yeah. But Morton's also just, you know, he's working really hard, man. Doing four or five shows a week. He's the biggest artist on earth. I couldn't, I know what my schedule's like right now. And I'm fucking like a nat on a bull's ass compared to where Morton's at in his career. For a guy like that, it's kind of a bouncing act, I guess. It's like you want to make hay while the sun's shining. Yeah. But also, you know, maybe, maybe it's just too many shows. Yeah. Maybe just, maybe you just have to say four health sake. You can only do X amount of shows.

1:54:30And he might be figuring that out now. He might have just finally pushed his limit and been like, oh man, I hate that the internet wasn't gentle with him. Like, what happened with Miley Cyrus? Didn't she, she had a serious voice issue as well, right? Just looking at, she had vocal surgery in 2019. Such a tonsilitis. Wow. Oh, she still had her tonsil. Also had something with that. But yeah, there's like a list of people that have had vocal surgery and like a deli had it. Yeah. Now, you know what? I remember the Adele story because she debuted back at the Grammys. She sung at the Grammys that time and everybody stood up and cried because there was a moment where like the world was worried that Adele wasn't going to be able to sing again.

1:55:07Right. It's a scary thing, man. My heart is with Morgan, not just because we're homies, but because, dude, if I wake up in the morning, Joe and my voice just sounds something off, I panic a little bit. Like, I have a small anxiety attack. Even if it's just because I haven't drank enough water, cleared the cobwebs or fucking end up at the mother's ship with Tony Henscliff and got black out drunk. Whatever. I do what I'm saying. Yeah. You know, it's like, I still have a moment where I'm like, hello, hello. You know, I just know I don't sound right. So I can only imagine, man, that dude's probably petrified right now.

1:55:39Yeah. I can only imagine. You guys have a very specific instrument. Yeah. You know, it's part of your body. It's kind of crazy. It's fucking wonderful though. And it's tiny. Yeah. It's fucking, I mean, it's small. You know what I'm saying? When I see it on video, because I go get scoped every three months, I go get scoped every three months. Have you seen that it's interesting? It's just going to say it's just so interesting. The different kind of sounds that people are capable of making with their mouth and their body and the way the variation. And there's some young boy who sang at this frequency that's like this insane frequency that's very difficult to reach.

1:56:20This young boy has this insane voice. He was on one of those talent shows.

1:56:29Can you show us the video? They're watching the young boy. I mean, how old do you think he is? God, he's got to be eight. 13. Wow.

1:56:48Yes. We like that.

1:56:53Ooh!

1:56:57Ooh!

1:57:04God! He's singing. It makes me so happy.

1:57:18This guy's crying. This guy's crying. Oh.

1:57:27And his eyes. So young. So young, but just so good. You see it. That's incredible, right? Oh, dude. I get to, um... What show is that on? Do you know, Jamie? I think that's America's Got Talent, right? Yeah. I'm doing the season finale of American Idol this Sunday. I'm getting to sing on it, me and Laney Wilson. And there's a kid this year on American Idol. Joe, his name is EMTUNGY, T -O -N -G -I. He did this James Blunt cover. I lost my father and he lost his recently. His father gave him a guitar and said, just whatever you do, it's just like one of those stories. You know, 18 -year -old kid.

1:58:04But he looks like the most Hawaiian kid ever. He's like the most gentle face, big dude, Hawaiian shirt, flip -flops, little... And he's playing a parlor guitar. So it's not a ukulele, but it's not a big guitar. It's a parlor guitar. And he's my size. You know what I'm saying? And I'm watching and I'm hearing his story. And he's got like the deep Hawaiian voice, too. He's like, oh, thank you. You know, like I have a Simone Security Guard named Maui, that talks like that. He's like, oh, thank you. And then he starts singing. And it's Angelic. You got it by James, Jamie? Yeah, I definitely remember it.

1:58:37The very first one he did or the one he just did. Yeah, because the very first one he did was called. I think it was James Blunt. And he did the... Yeah, and what was he named? Yeah, but I just want you to see this first thing. This has been so crafty. I feel like we're just hanging out and showing each other. We as a queen of life. Yeah, it's just chilling. I knew this was going to be cool. This is fun part about doing podcasts with people like you. You just hang out. Yeah, just chill. Just fucking hanging, fucking chit chat and so well. Yeah. Yeah, let me show you this other kid. I'll show you.

1:59:01Let's start off with crying.

1:59:06Yeah, so he was just crying. Watch. Oh, they turned off all the lights. I won't read you your arms or your arms. Time is gone. Oh, I'll tell you good night, close the door. You're the chill boss, chill. Oh, I'll tell you I love you once more. Time is gone.

1:59:39I'm not just sun. You're not my father. Where is it to grow and sing goodbye? No need to forget. No need to forget. I know your mistakes and you know my. Wow.

2:00:07Oh, yeah. Crazy, right? Oh.

2:00:24I tear up every time though. I'm going to watch it once. Oh, my god.

2:00:52Oh, my god. Oh, my god.

2:01:03Oh, my god. It's my time to chase the monster. Mm. Choked up the whole time. Oh, shit. I'm crazy, that jolly shit. Oh, I'm sorry. I did that to a man. Oh, please. Oh, it's just far good, man. That's so good. I'm like 18. He's 18. I'm fitting to meet this kid this weekend and I'm literally to the moon about it. Holy shit is he good. That's crazy. I've already publicly put the word out to whoever has the contraction rights to him. I want to end. It's what we were talking about, man. That's authentic. You know, that is, you just can't fake that. There's no fake in that. No, just real, man. Just raw.

2:01:47Don't feel every piece of it. It takes you to a place. Oh, my god. It tells a story. It takes you to a place. Yeah. No, man. The power, too, like the, oh, my god. And you know, it's coming from heaven. Oh, yeah. And you could hear the little times where you could hear the tears and his throat, like that distinct sound of fucking them tears and that thread. Dude, losing my father was probably the hardest thing I ever went through as an adult. So we're hearing this. Man. Musical meet you where you are, man. Yeah. Musical meet you where you are, dude. That also shows you another person in a way that's like, how are you going to see that guy in three minutes like you see him and that's all?

2:02:31Yeah, ever. You know, it's like you see a person with a beautiful voice and a beauty. Like, I don't care how crazy they are. They're capable of that. We know there's some, there's some good in you. There's like, whatever you are, and like, if you can make a song that makes everyone happy, they will look past so much. They'll look past so much. They'll look past so much. They'll think about all the people still listening to Michael Jackson. I still listen to R Kelly. They still listen to R Kelly. And you know what I told somebody one day I argue with him, I said, listen, man. And I might recut, I wish.

2:03:10I'm thinking about doing it the other way. Just because I'm not going to quit listening to the song if it doesn't exist. Like, that song did so much for me. Like, I know he's a horrible human. I watched all, I got all in R Kelly T. I watched every documentary twice. I couldn't quit watching it. But I just, that song, I just, I remember pulling out a few narrals of friends who overdosed and died or were shot and killed. Chisel, one of my best friends died in 2020 right at the beginning of the pandemic who shot and killed. And I remember leaving that funeral, listen to I wish. You know, in just like that moment, I remember that car ride forever.

2:03:44You know what I mean? Like the rest of my life, I remember that car ride and what that song did for me and that car ride? So it's like, I don't give a fuck, I'm pissed on a girl or not. You know what I'm saying? Like, I'm listening to the song. I'm telling somebody, I'm gonna cut it. And fuck it. Maybe I'll just work on it. What it was supposed to do though is that there's a, there's a, like, there's a lot of people, like the Cosby Show. Try finding that. Yeah. You can't even find it anymore. Which is crazy for all the other people that were on the Cosby Show. But also crazy for us. Because I think you kind of maybe should be able to see that stuff.

2:04:15Yeah. I think kind of like just removing it because you know the head guy is a crazy rapist. Yeah. It's like, I mean, should we? I mean, I, I get, I get the idea behind it, but it is real and it is history. Like, OJ Simpson. He's like, what about those football games? We supposed to ignore those? Yeah. Like, can you watch those tapes? So you allow to watch the tapes? The guy who probably maybe fucking shan't hang up. Yeah. He did go ahead. He watches Twitter. He's like, I don't know. I do it. I, I, our Kelly is the one I struggle with the most because of that one song. Yeah. And it's like, I'm just like, look, y 'all, you just don't know how much the song is done for me personally.

2:05:00When you're a, you know, a 16 year old kid carrying a casket of a friend that got shot and killed. And this song hits you in that moment of your life. You just look at it different. You know what I mean? You're just like, yo, this song is done insane. And there's many awful things that he's obviously done. Or does that negate the great things that he's done? That's the question. Like, you allowed to listen to the great songs. Right. Or you, or, or we just boycotting it because it came from that. I get it. I get both sides. Yeah, I do too. But that one song, man, I'm hanging out too. I'm talking to me.

2:05:33It's real talk. Yeah. Real talks. That's the song that real talk. You know, that's like, oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. You tell my Michael. Don't you think I got enough bullshit on my mind? Real talk. That's like for me with Michael Jackson, it's human nature. I'm gonna listen to human nature forever. You know what I mean? Like, I just, I just can't. God, it's just. God, that's a beautiful song. But maybe we'll get here to think about Michael Jackson here. That boy that you saw that was saying, it's insane voice, that very young boy, that is going to change. Right. That instrument's going to change. And the sound's going to be different.

2:06:08Right. Now, what Michael Jackson's doctor said was they had chemically castrated him. And they kept him like a castrado. They kept him with that voice. I don't know if that's true. But that's what is the guy who killed him. The guy who went to jail for like, anesthetizing him every night. Jesus, man. I mean, he wasn't even sleeping. He was just getting sedated. It's the nuttiest thing of all time. Yeah. I think he was gone. I say that was singers all the time too though. We had a, my daughter writes songs and her best friends and I was press. This girl's just turned 16 and can sing. It's unbelievable.

2:06:47I mean, it's like one of those just natural. I don't have the natural thing. I had to work really hard to learn how to sing. She's just like naturally got it. And when I was talking to her dad, I said if she was a 15 year old boy, I'd be worried because his nuts hadn't dropped yet. So anything you're hearing from him, I don't know how that's really going to translate when he really goes through a testosterone -style puberty. You know what I mean? That voice is changing for sure where she's going to be pretty. You're getting a tone from her now that'll be very close to her real tone. We're like that first kid we seen at 13.

2:07:18Now he's been trained his voice to always be able to sing like that. Oh really? I would think that there's a muscle there he can work. He should be able to work up. I'm learning about it though. I never took a singing lesson until probably two months ago. Right before I sang on TV. At the CMTs I went and met with a guy who took two lessons because I was just nervous. I never, you know, the CMTs was like my night. It's the night I met you, the night that I came up to the club. Yeah. You didn't see it right away. Yeah, I came to see you. Coddy, Kale, Brian Simpson. And Kale, by the way. But Brian Simpson, that one of the jokes he told that night I still think is one of the best bits I've heard in a long time.

2:07:56Brian Simpson's an unstoppable force right now. Oh dude. He's very funny. No, no. The Wap bit. Yeah. Yeah. It's one of my favorite all -time bits. Don't mess it up. Yeah, we can't. But you know what I'm talking about. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, but it's shit. I do it. I cried. Yeah. We talked about it. You know how you talk about stuff when you lead a comedy club? Like that's all we talked about. But I go to the CMTs that Sunday night. Big time singing on, you know, CBS, performance. I'm up for three awards. I think I have a chance at one. I don't think the other two are possible. But we're just fucking, we're still just, we're still in the place of like, you remember the wrong way.

2:08:32So let's get, we're not supposed to be here. That's like our whole thing in life right now. Like everywhere we go. It's like how the fuck did we end up here? Yeah. You know, last night I was not even enough to think I was going to go to the comedy club and just leave. And nobody would know me or want to hang out. You know what I'm saying? It's like fucking, you know, and I'm looking to kill Tommy like I fucking hate you at 145 in the fucking morning. Well, people were happy that you came in when Ron was here too. Yeah. No, they were. Yeah. They were out. We bought every mother ship lighter you had.

2:08:59I did, dude. I did. We bought like 100 of them. We just been passing them out. My bus is full of sports and mother ship lighters. That's hilarious. But I took a vocal lesson before that performance because I wanted to make sure I was one. I took two right before I took. How do you, wow, so, but he was teaching me about the scale and working up and getting my range and stuff. You think you're going to continue to do that? Yeah. Yeah, for sure. I've been playing a little guitar. I've always played a little guitar and I'm playing a little piano. I just want to get better. I love this stuff, Joe. You got to tell.

2:09:29I love it, Dave. It comes out, man. You know, that's what we've been talking about. Authenticity is very, it's what we want. We all want it. I don't know if I'll put songs out for the rest of my life, but I can promise you I'll write them until I die. You know what I mean? Does that make sense? There will come a moment where I feel like maybe my time to sing them is over, but I'll never quit writing songs. Like I will write songs fucking as long as my mind. You know, old people play Tick -Tack, toe to keep their mind sharp. Yeah. I'll just be strumming a G, just fucking writing a melody. You know what I mean?

2:10:01Like that's just, I don't know, man. It tickles me. I know what it can do for people. Dude, I've watched me and you sit here and laugh at the fucking roller derby queen and Rosie and then cry to Em Tonguey together in the same fucking couple hours. You know what I mean? Like that's what's so cool about fucking music, you know? That is what's so fucking cool about music. I have a spot playlist that I... Yeah, do you have a pre -show playlist? Yeah, I gotta put it out on Spotify. I haven't released it yet. Yeah, let me sneak in, but it starts out with, I'm your bogey man. Is this other half of joint, the laughing gas, too?

2:10:39This is how... When we get into the green room? Yeah, baby. As soon as we get in the green room. It's like, it's time to go. That's it, baby. Who's got the light on? Ice cubes. Showtime. 30 minutes. That's what I need. Woo! That's what I need. Huh. This is how we started off. Yeah, I'm in my own. It's just... It's just... It's time to party. Yeah. It's time to party. I like to listen to... Lately, I've been listening to Zach Bryant of... Which one was it? Open the gates. Open the gate, the one on the bull rider? Yeah. Dude. Oh, yeah. I like to listen to that one right before I go up. Ooh, dude.

2:11:30Ooh. This one's... This isn't... All of his shit is authentic, but this one is like... It's... It's deeply... ingrained in the rodeo riders, fucking widows. Oh, it's just... You ever listen to Cody Johnson? No. Cody Johnson is a cowboy cowboy. He rode bulls. Um, keep it going. Yeah, play that pimp and pimp and pimp. I want to hear this. It's turning down to your top.

2:12:04Mmm.

2:12:38Mmm. Mmm.

2:12:53Mmm.

2:12:58He's riding the bull that killed his father. Ugh. Dude. Jesus Christ. It's like that Jim Coachie shit like who's right in that song besides Zach Bryant. Jesus Christ. He's riding a bull named to Hell I Go. Oh. He's riding a bull that killed his dad. Fuck. Oh, my God. I love them old fucking rodeo records, man. Zach and Cody Johnson are the two that I think have done it. I got to get into Cody Johnson. You got two, man. He's a Texas guy too. I'm gonna write this on my phone right now. He's one of the sweetest humans on Earth, man. Give me some Cody Johnson. He's got a song called Dear rodeo. Is this Dear rodeo?

2:13:36I know it's T .E. Cano's his big smash. We played Dear rodeo right quick, because I think Joe, because this will touch Joe. So let me just give you a little backstory, because I love stories with songs. Cody Johnson has a documentary on Amazon Prime that is about his, he tried to go be a professional bull rider and he fell short, right? And he wrote this song as a grieving to the rodeo. What's the name of this song? Dear rodeo. Dear rodeo. I'd be lining for a track until we ride on. I don't think about you. After all the miles in the wild nights that we've been through. Lord knows we had a few.

2:14:26Dear rodeo. I'd like to say that I took the reins all the way. Fucking heart breaking. Wow. No regrets, no lift, don't say it. Just turn the page. All that you know better, babe. Twin' all those tatums and broken bones. The dream of a buckle I'll never put on. I'm traded. What I hate is. But somehow the highs outweigh the roads. And I do it all again. Even though we both know. I do have to let you go. So dear rodeo. Wow. It has got this crazy buildup. He did a remix with Reba Mack and Tyrell. That's a royal culture, man. Whenever we were in Vegas, there was like a bunch of UFC's and other things that I didn't Vegas with the rodeos in town.

2:15:26And you see these bull riding motherfuckers. You got a different kind of swag. Different kind of swag. They got that fire swag. You know what I mean? That kind of just like one person. Who the fuckin' wants it? You just see it in their eyes. They're riding bulls. That's not a regular person. They're riding giant 2 ,000 pound angry animals with huge dicks and big balls that don't want you riding. No, sure. Don't want you out with the fucker you doing. You're on the bar. You're fucking with me. You can't believe a human would stand in front of you. You're a 2 ,000 pound wrecking machine. And this dumb motherfucker wants to ride your back.

2:16:03Yeah. Yeah. And the best part is when you fall off and try to hit him, there's another dumb motherfucker in clown paint. Just imagine how stressedrazy humans are. Before I light my weed, I will admit publicly that your weed was better. Do you?

2:16:20I wish I had a piece. I wish you had, you got some more of that. Because I didn't get to bring the actual, I'm doing a cannabis company in Michigan right now called Bad Apple. But I couldn't figure out a way to get it. Because the bus was already here from Dallas. Because who's in Dallas today? He seems to be here two days ago. When you're traveling that much, the bus has to be like comfortable right? You have to like make your own. You guys gotta like it all set up for like satellite and all that shit. I can't wait for you to come hang out on it. Oh, you guys are fucked. I got that Elon Musk satellite.

2:16:49Oh, whatever that Elon Musk shit is, I hooked it up straight to the back of that bitch. So you can get internet. Oh, yes. High speed. I play video games on there. Yes. And we park out. I got the triple pop out so it gets fucking living room size in there. I live on that. I spend you play video games. Yes, dude. I spend a hundred and probably 50 days a year on that bus. This is the least shows I will have ever done because I'm playing the biggest venues I've ever played. You know what I mean? But it's like, I'm normally like a road warrior. And even then, I'm just never at home. We're just always something.

2:17:22I think I'm gonna sleep in my bed three nights in the month of May. Mmm. The two of them were just two nights ago. Yeah. But that wild ride that you're on, like you could stay on it as long as you want and do it as crazy as you want, right? Right. Yeah. And with you owning all your masters and being... You're in a great position now. No, dude. It's so exciting. Yeah. I can't wait to know you're out about the business of it off camera. It's been great. Yeah. It's not sure. It's just been... Like I said, my dreams were too small. When I met with that record label, Joe, they said, what do you want?

2:17:57I said, well, I'd like to be written about in my hometown newspaper. It's just like my request. I got a billion YouTube views. And I'm like... And I was like, and I'd like to play the Grand Ole Opry. And the reason I signed with that label is because it's the first label I met with when I said the Grand Ole Opry, they didn't laugh at me. Like the people in LA was like, but we could get you a... You know, I won't say the artist name. We could get you this artist feature instead. I was like, I want to play the Grand Ole Opry, man. You all think... Because they kept thinking I wanted money. I had a fucking billion YouTube views, Joe.

2:18:28I didn't need money. I was fucking... We were okay. You know what? The white podcast was bubbling. Like, we were cool, though. I didn't want your money. Can you get me to the Grand Ole Opry? And can you get my local paper to write about me? Because I'm trying to do some things in the community here. But I'm fighting a lot of struggles, you know? And they were like, no problem. The debut of the Grand Ole Opry that year. Six months after I signed the deal, I still on that Opry stage, Boy Cry. You know, you got all the mug shots out here? Yeah. I wore... Like, I'm an Opry debut, I wore a denim. The music city outlaw on it.

2:18:59And on the back was Jerry Garcy as mug shot. When he caught golf, that hair went down in New Orleans. And he just all Jerry Garcy it out, just smiling, just fucking... You know, just Jerry in out, you know? And I put that mug shot on the back from my Grand Ole Opry debut, dude. That was a fucking... I'm bringing fucking... I'm bringing it with me. You know what I'm saying? I'm bringing the dead, baby. Do you think that, like, I think now, people like a redemption story now more than ever? Yeah. I think people more aware of all the factors that lead to someone getting incarcerated now than ever.

2:19:34Right. And I think they're more understanding of the hopelessness of the system now than ever. So when a guy like you breaks through and becomes a giant star after this crazy past, like, that... I mean, that opens up the door for a lot of people. Yeah. It opens up the door for a lot of people to realize, like, it's not a death sentence. Like, you can get your life together. And even though at this stage of your career is crazy, as it sounds, you're still getting turned down for living in the community. Yeah. No, I'm still... I got to meetin' with our governor, coming up shortly. Yep, that's it.

2:20:06I wish it would show the back of it. But, look at me, I asked me up there just, boy, I mean, that's the Holy Grounds, Joe. I'm standing in the circle of the Granolopry right there, man. First time ever. A rapper from Annie Yock. Due to the story I said that night was... I grew up 15 minutes away from there, but it took me 37 years to get there. You know what I'm saying? You know what I mean? That's funny. Yeah. Wow. Just, just, and that right there and that, ever since then I told my label, Jonathan Loba, Joe Jamie, Adrian Michaels at the label. I'll never, I'll never leave y 'all, man. I'm with y 'all forever.

2:20:40You were man, you're worried to me. You know what I mean? And the deal's already fucking incredible. The deal can't get no better. You know what I'm saying? I squeezed the book around that quarter, it's over. You know what I'm saying? I got all they're gonna give. You know, so it's like, I don't know, man. I think the redemption too is just people, like, the relatability, like drugs are different. We now know how pain pills have led to heroin addictions. Right? And that 11 people in hour overdosing die in the United States of America, Joe. They think that number will be closer to 14 or 15 by the end of this year.

2:21:16An hour overdosing die. I'm not trying to stand on no high horse here or start a war, but I promise you, if 11 chipmunks an hour were dying in Wisconsin, it would only last a few days before people were out there pick it in a protest and then trying to figure out how to keep the chipmunks alive. For sure. You know? But we look at drug addiction or used to as a personal problem. I'll just quit doing them. Right. You know? And we just were so, we didn't have no compassion for, you know, and now we're starting to see that when I write these songs about drug addiction and the pain and suffering, it's a real thing now.

2:21:50Now people are like, yo, I feel that. Like I feel that. I relate to that. Like I know how to song on my new album is called She and as she was the life of the party. Because see the sun rising in her eyes before the cold November rain. And if you only knew her smile, you never know the season pain. And it's about a woman trying to, my thing is everybody knows a she. Everybody knows a he now. When you hear that song, you're like, oh, no, I actually know her. You like relate to it in that way. And it used to not be that way. So I think that's another thing that redemption's coming around is that it's gotten so out of hand.

2:22:23That plus fuck who didn't want to see a guy win every now and then. Gee, this is a loser winning dog. Like I'm a loser fucking winning. You know what I'm saying? Like they let a fucking loser win. Like that's fucking awesome. You know what I'm saying? Fuck it smoking weed on the general road and show hungover. It's an American success story. Yeah. Yeah, this is American as fuck. Yeah, that's American as fuck. That's what America is supposed to be about. For everybody. For everybody. But it's like, that's the real problem. Right. How do we make it way fairer? Right. I hope that I meet with the governor and I can figure out my felonies.

2:22:57And hopefully I get a pardon from him. Well, that would be beautiful. But more important than the pardon to me is I want to try to see a policy change in Tennessee about Juvenile. That's my big goal. Is that I think that as a juvenile offender, you should, the felonies should only stick with you the length of the sentence. So like even if you, if you committed a murder, which is a heinous crime and you get 30 years and you go do your 30 years in prison because at 15 you can still come home at 42. You know what I mean? The kid should be able to have a path to figuring that out when he gets home.

2:23:30You know what I mean besides just being stuck with this felony forever. Yeah. Like you said, this can't be an end all be all this has to be a case by case basis 100%. You know what I mean? Like, and I just want to do like selfishly. Yeah, I want to get my felonies expunge because I hate that I can only go po hunting. You know what I'm saying? You know, I hate little things that are just like fuck that sucks that I can't do thousands of things. But more important than me ever. I had a felony for so long, whatever. But can we do something to help these future kids man where they don't have to go through this?

2:23:58Like can we start making some decisions now? Can we start institute and rehabilitation instead of disciplining the juvenile system? Yeah. Like that's what the conversations I really want to have. You know, that's the shit I really want to talk about because when I was in there we didn't have a mentor. Nobody cool like me ever showed up and gave us nothing. You know what I mean? Like it was discipline. It was like jail. I'm a 15 year old kid getting treated like a real prisoner and I know what I did was wrong. I mean I was 15. John needed a hug. I didn't need to sell. I needed somebody to love me.

2:24:26I needed somebody to explain to me what a fucking pill addiction was. I needed somebody to, you know what I mean? This is what I needed. You know what I mean? I didn't need that other shit. Sorry to go back on that fucking rant. But there's nothing to think about that. That's important because you're the only person that can tell that story. Right. Yeah, that's your story and it's an important story. That it's also a story where you realize like as you see yourself now as a successful artist like you were always this person. You could always achieve this thing that you've achieved. Why do you have to go through hell?

2:24:56Like what causes people to have to go through hell to before we all realize like how many people are going through hell? Why don't we figure out a way to manage this better? Why don't we figure out a way to help the people that are disenfranchised in a real way? Not just like figure it out. Like there's got to be someone. If you had a budget. Oh, like billions of dollars. If you had nothing that came out, that seemed like a fake joint. I think I'm out of tight and up up top. Goddamn. Looks like I ain't ripping. There was a ripping though. I wish they could taste this fucking pot. I know. It's ridiculous.

2:25:41What were we just talking about? A budget. Oh. I don't remember my point at all. If I had a budget to go to the juvenile kids, I'd focus it all on trades. I think my idea was if you had a budget, an enormous amount of money that would go to a company that could figure out how to take all of the community. That have traditionally been very poor in crime -ridden and fixed that. And you would get an enormous sum of money. Like billions and billions of dollars would be rewarded to someone who could engineer like an ethical philanthropic venture to rejuvenate all of the fucked up areas in this country.

2:26:30You know how much crime you would prevent? You know how much you could change the world. You could change the world? You could change the world. Yeah, for sure. If someone figured out how to do that and engineered that, you could try it in one city, trying to Detroit. Just moving in Detroit. For sure. Revitalized Detroit in some insane way. Right. Watch it boom. Detroit used to be one of the richest countries in the country. Yes. Oh, it used to thrive. During the big times, it still might top four places to play in America, by the way. The fun people. Oh, the Mishiganders in general. In the weed up there's fire.

2:27:05That's why we did our cannabis company up there first. Yeah. I wanted to go somewhere where you had the greenhouse. You know what I mean? Yeah. You try to break the ground that way, because you know, just shouldn't come off the side of a mountain anywhere left of Colorado most of the time. The thing about Detroit as a city that's really wild is you get to drive around and see these buildings that don't have no windows. Just shells of buildings that used to be filled with people working. Yeah. And you're like, well, it's just like some madmack shit. Like it's very unusual in that respect. Like there's so many buildings that are like that.

2:27:35Yeah. No, it's a place warped in time. Do they clean any of that up? Did they? Yeah. I think they had a guy that, whoever, I don't think they should. Yeah, who is that guy? The guy who quick and loans. Yeah, quick and loans. Yeah. A couple other companies that moved in there like StockX is that big issue company. They were like, they were like, they were like, they were like, they were like, they were... Yeah, they're bringing, they're bringing downtown Detroit back. Is that the story that's happening, James? I mean, so yeah, like they, I've seen a few tours of there where they're showing their plans for things.

2:28:02He's definitely not the only person in Niohmo put it that way, but he's one of the bigger ones. That's a few other people who have never done the town to make an development. I don't know. I haven't been there at all. I kind of wish they would leave the fucked up buildings though. Yeah. Oh, yeah. There's something about them. There's character to them, but it's also like this is this weird piece of history that I think destroying it. I mean, it's just, it's not like the pyramids don't get me wrong, but there's something historic about the remnants of the boom and then the bust. Right. There's something about this, this shell of a building.

2:28:34Yeah. That's like, man. Yeah. I never thought of it that way, that it shows that, because that was the boom boom too. Yeah. Right. It's weird. Those buildings were weird. And I was driving around and looking at them. Is that what they used to look like? Or an after, yeah. And what they turned into? A real factory into like, oh. They turned it into a fucking. This is a rendering of what this place looks like. This is an article that says what will Detroit look like in 2033? It'll look like a Chipotle. Why? That's the thing that looks like Chipotle. Oh. There's something about like, didn't the top gear guys?

2:29:13They went to Detroit and I think they bought a house for like $5 ,000 or something crazy. Oh, yeah. It might have been less than that. There was definitely a time period you could buy one for a couple hundred dollars. See if we could talk to your, the top gear guys actually did it. Oh, I guess. Yeah. They like bought a house for like $5 ,200. $2 ,200 bucks. It says, did they really, let me see if they really, oh, is it like, did snopes fact check them? It says it's snopes, but it's like a Detroit blog ask. Oh. Is it a lie? Not quite 2018, but in 2009, Buzzfeed reported about a house in Motown at the live county auction for just $500.

2:29:52That was the auction house. Wow. That happens everywhere. It's still fucking insane. $500 bucks. It's a $500 bucks. Yeah. Really? For a house. You get a good old bag of laughing gas for that. I mean, how bad is everybody want to get out of that neighborhood? I mean, how bad does someone want to get out of the neighborhood? Well, the best part is the positive one on top gear, which that's solid house. Yeah, not a bad house. How much was that house? That says $2 ,200 bucks. $2 ,200 dollars. That is insane. So let's see the pictures instead of they claimed. Look at the house. Oh, that's probably what there's some holes in it.

2:30:29Whatever, whatever, prepper rats. Kind of a hole. Yeah. Oh, yeah, that's a lot. But still, $500 bucks. Yeah, you can see. Like if you were a young single guy, you could sort that house out. Yeah, you could figure that out. Yeah, 100%. 100%. That's an old ass house, too. You see the way they have the pre -wallboard. It has those slats. You know, that shit in between the slats. Yeah. See that? That's an old ass house. So what's that area then? The 20s problem? Yeah, that is. Maybe that's not. I had a building we used on Music Row for years. It was like a 1922 building or something. And it was just big and just fucking concrete.

2:31:09That's just solid fucking concrete dog. And all the rooms were kind of tiny and low ceilings. But it was right on Music Row, Historic Music Row. And it was right behind the bar of losers, which is where all the songwriters in town go to drink and red door. So I was like, it's perfect. It's a prime time real estate, really. I was just like, I'm turning this into multiple studio rooms. And we go to the bar and get drunk and just like, chorale writers. You know, like, everyone, let's all go back down the alley to the spot. That's the cool part. You ever been down Music Row in Nashville? No, really.

2:31:38So it's like a little circle and every label's there, every publisher's there. It's like, you know, whatever. And there's like a little strip of bars off side of it that we all fuck up. And you just, these dudes in town, these songwriters, I admire them so much. I'm jealous at times. All day long, it's like just like fucking orgies of writing songs. They're just fucking each other. They're just going room to room. They'll do two hours in this room, then go down the street and do another one. And they're just fucking playing musical chairs and just writing songs all fucking day long. Wow. And then they go out when they write their last one, like, five to the bar, and then they just talk about writing songs until they get drunk enough to go write another one at midnight.

2:32:15You know what I'm saying? It's fucking crazy. Wow. And these dudes are coming to town, like, sleeping in their car to figure it out. So it's like, how long has that been around for? I don't know when it actually started, to be honest. Now, I know that, I guess, as long as music's been happening in Nashville, you know, that time telling you, being an artist in the town and writing your own songs is still rare. Like, it's still not a lot of artists that come out of Nashville, Tennessee, that are actually in the room writing their songs. So much more of that happens. That's why I call it the build -a -bear.

2:32:50So much more of that happens than you know. You know, in these songwriters, dude, now I'm just like a fan of the grind, so I love writing with them. You know what I'm saying? Because I just think it's fucking sick that they just, these dudes eat, breathe, slip, shit, fucking songwriting. That's it. You know what I'm saying? Wow. I mean, like last night, like, I watch dudes do comedy and then talk about comedy. These dudes write songs all day to go to the bar and talk about the songs they wrote and play on for each other. How many of them are there? I'd say hundreds that actually have a publishing deal that are getting a draw every month and getting put in rooms.

2:33:25And I'd say thousands that are just in town trying to figure it out. Tens of thousands, even maybe. Wow. But there's hundreds who are actively somehow. Because it's like any other thing, you'll come in as a young artist and you've never wrote a song, right? Or you can write a song, you go to a publishing company and go, hey, look, this is my wrote. And they go, okay, we'll give you $23 ,000 by $24 ,000 a year. We'll give you $2 ,000 a month as a draw, recoupable, and then we'll put you in writer's rooms for a 50 -50 split of your publishing. It's a horrible deal, by the way. The music business was meant to make everybody money but the artist.

2:34:00It's fucking wild. But when you're fucking 20 -year -old kids chasing your dream, it's an incredible deal. It's fucking the chance, you know? So you go write out your first deal for two years and take it on the channel, write some hits, hopefully, and get in the right rooms. And then you can kind of negotiate the terms going into term two. You know what I mean? But these kids are just coming in like, you getting picked, my dude, Zach Crowell, huge comedy fan, he's here with me now. He produced my album. Zach Crowell got his first publishing deal and drew, I think, $24 ,000 a year. And like, at that time in his life, he needed it.

2:34:40Like, he was counting on it. Like, I remember a time where he was going to re -up his deal and he was nervous. He was like, yo, jelly, I don't know. You know, it's 15 years ago, 12 years ago. He's like, I don't know if they're going to let me come back. I haven't produced nothing. They gave him one more year and he produced Sam Hunt's first album. In any way, he's going on to have 30 number ones in Country Radio or something crazy. Fucking unbelievable guy. But, you know, he was in a place where he doesn't look back at it bitter about the deal. But he's still, you know, because he's like, man, I needed that.

2:35:10But he's still as like, you know, like every other artist. Once you get out of it, you're like, damn, this system is fucked up. You know, the record labels are even more fucked up. You know how that works, right? They take, let's say, that's why I don't take money from labels. Let's say we have a 50 -50 deal, Joe. And I give you a million bucks. And then I say, all right, coat. Now, every dollar that comes in, I'm going to take 50 cents of it as a record label because that's my 50 cents. And then I'm going to put your 50 cents against a million dollars that you owe back. Now, I didn't go to school or nothing, Joe, as you know, from my story.

2:35:43But I don't sell like a good deal, man. I don't know a lot about interest rates, but that sounds like a fucking 50 % interest rate on money. You know what I mean? It's like, and that's why I stayed independent. I knew nothing, Joe. I was uneducated. Is that a real deal? Listen, how about that's a good one? Really? It's fucked up, Joe. There are dudes in my town that are in 90 -10s with the label getting 90 and them getting 10. Right now. Right now. Millions of dollars in debt to the label and giving them 30 % of their show money as well. Right now, I had multiple number ones at radio.

2:36:18Holy shit. The business is wild, man. That's crazy. But there's also guys, you know, but the amount of times that that's changed somebody's life, it's such a weird game to play. Because from the label perspective, now you look like how many times have they dumped money into an artist that didn't do anything that they just lost and tried? You know what I mean? The labels already down. And then this other guy, how many, you know, there's a lot of these guys needed it. That's why my deal worked out so great, because I didn't really need the deal. You know what I mean? It was like this thing, like I want to do, you know what?

2:36:49It's very nostalgic of you and Spotify. You didn't need the deal. But y 'all, if we're flirting around, then it made sense. You know what I'm saying? It's like, I didn't need the deal. You know what I mean? And it's like, but we flirted around and met with everybody and I met a company that it really made sense with and it changed my fucking life. Country radio changed my life. 100 % the internet started, like, brought attention to it and then country radio just sent it into the cast, you know, just somewhere totally different. Is country radio the last real influential radio? I would say so, because it's like, where's rock radios?

2:37:29I've had a hit on rock radio too. It still moves the needle. But does that popular? Like how many people are listening to like FM? 100 % market dependent, I believe there's probably a few markets. You probably definitely know this, but there's a few markets where rock radio does well. Yeah, but a lot of people are using Spotify or Apple music. You have to get some of the same. Playlist, that's a whole different room. Well, playlist things the new radio and my deal, Spotify, every streaming platform has been good to me, especially when I got with BMG because they have good relationships. So once I started getting country radio and I started getting like, playlist thing because here's another thing.

2:38:07Not everybody understands, wants to take the time to curate their music. They want to find good music, but they don't have time to go find it or curate it. And playlisting is a way around that, just like radio was. That's how you found music. Now TikTok is a place where people find music. And first of all, we're in the golden era of all this shit, Joe, because you can find good shit everywhere. It's everywhere. Everything I touch on my phone just feeds me shit. You know what I mean? At a rapid pace. So that changed everything. But once I started getting real playlisting and real radio love and starting like when CMT, I swept that night.

2:38:42Fucking the fucking load the loser one son. I won the big one. I'm like, I started drinking before the last award, Joe. I was sitting there with my wife the first two went by and I was like, yo, I have no chance of winning this one. So I'm not drinking. I'm like, I'm drinking like this what I tell people. I've never been on TV before. I was gonna act like it. You know what I'm saying? It's like, I'm not too proud for to come in here walk around with Jamie for 30 minutes going holy fucking shit. You know what I'm saying? It's like I'm fucking, I'm enjoying the fuck out of this. You know? It's beautiful.

2:39:15It's like I look forward to coming back next time just as a homie. But the first time I'm walking here like this my fucking dude. This is crazy I'm sitting in here, you know? But I'm in there fucking the night. Everything just starts changing dog and then we're fucking rolling baby. And now we're doing American Idol for in the drop of Hulu documentary. And now it's fucking weird. Whew. This is all in the next like 30 days. As long as you just enjoy the ride man. I'm having a ball. That's beautiful. Fuck your club will tell you that escort me out in a nice way. In a very friendly, which way do you don't know where you are kind of way into the breakfast?

2:39:48Yeah well no. They said, the petonian number's still there when I left. The funny part was, the best part was they escort me out in a way that they could just tell I was lost. I love your club. It's a maze. It's a maze. I know you get it. But I'm still second time there. Tonight I hope I'll get the full just of it. But when I popped in the green room last night when David Lucas took me there and I seen where it was, I was like, hidden in plain sight. It was insane. You know what I mean? Everything about us just fucking the thought of that whole place is. I mean, that crowd left in our first conversation was we're opening the music mothership and NAS for one day.

2:40:24Oh, that would be beautiful. Just a place where like dudes could like singer songwriters can come and just do their songs and kind of work crowds and fucking. Yeah, that's right. Because it's so comic friendly. Like all of the singer songwriters spot to NAS for their legendary, but because they're old school and legendary, they're not like comfortable. You know what I'm saying? Like when you play the legendary Blue Bird, you got to hope that the hair salon next door will let you use it for a green room. If not, Blue Bird don't have one. At all. You know what I'm saying? It's great, but it's like the most legendary songwriter spot in NAS for you.

2:40:55But it's been that since the fucking 40s or whatever. So that's like the small clubs that like comics rely on those two. Yeah. Who rely on places that are like a 200 seat club. Yeah, we do exactly. So we do a lot of singer songwriter nights in town where these dudes that write all these hits will go play them for the town kind of. You know what I mean? And it's like, you know, it's like this really cool thing that happens in Nashville. We still do like writers rounds where four dudes will set us still up on a stage. You know what I'm saying? There we go. Writers rounds. Yeah. And you'll just sit around and like that intimate of a setting, you know.

2:41:33And there might be one artist in there, but every one of those dudes have wrote multiple number ones. Wow. You know, it's so cool to see, man, because you'll just have a dude that doesn't look the part. And he'll be like, hey, I wrote this song and, you know, and then he'll play live like you're dying for Tim McGraw and you're like, holy fuck. Oh, wow. You know what I mean? Yeah, it's cool. It's really cool. When you come to town, we got to do it. I got to go show you the fucking. I would love to. We'll go to our writers round. They're fucking chill. They're cool. That's bad ass. Yeah. Beautiful.

2:42:01And they're just all jamming. It's just a bunch of dudes in every guitar. And they're singing each other's shit. We got this thing we do tonight called bottom of the barrel with that Brian Simpson hosts. And there's a little, the audience is right like a topic. A little piece of paper. And then we put it in a whiskey barrel. And you reach in and just grab a subject and just start riffing. Oh, shit. So everybody, it's all off the box. Is that what they're doing in the, what are they talking about? They're doing that little boy tonight. And you're in the fat man. Yeah. I'll be in that one too. I'm going to do the other one too.

2:42:30Because that, that's one of my favorite shows. Stupid, stupid question. But he gets so silly. Yeah. It's just so silly. It's some of the, it's just very fun. Oh, yeah. Because the cool thing about comedian fans is they're there for the humor. So they're trying to be witty too. So they're writing topics trying to stretch while that bit. There is, but then there's some good ideas. Some of them are just like good subjects. Yeah. It's fun. They're, they're, they're now people know what it is too. So they're comedy fans that show up and they're, they're interested in coming up with a funny suggestion to put in there.

2:42:59I, I hate to be the guy that always pair, the short tates when I do it, but always compare entertainment to comedy. Because I see so many, I see, so I see more resemblances and comedy than I do any other area. Like I've done a little acting and I don't really see that. I see the art, I respect all art, but like the connect, like even down to like the culture that comedians create. Like musicians, real good musicians create culture before they create songs. You know what I mean? Because good songs come out of good culture. Like I bet good jokes come out of good culture. You know what I mean? So it's like we have a, just that one of the coolest things I'll think about forever now is me getting to show you what a writer's round was.

2:43:40You know what I'm saying? Because that's our culture. Like for me, it's like, I can like for you. It's like what I got to see last night at the club was the wildest shit I've ever seen except for a Josh Walshaw. You know what I mean? Backstage, it's like that's how, but it's what y 'all do every night at Josh's culture. Like we just sit around and listen to songs, you know? That's a, that shows the kiltonies that giant part of that culture. Because it's such a rare opportunity for people to get on stage. Some of them, the first time they've ever been on stage and they're on stage at kiltony. They just have this wild idea that they can do it.

2:44:08They put their name in a hat. Yeah. The next thing you know, they're on stage telling jokes that they were like telling themselves in front of their mirror a couple of nights. Yeah. In front of fucking 300, 400 people are following that. And then hundreds of thousands of people down there. Oh yeah, literally. And watch it on YouTube. So it's like, what a crazy spot to be in. And then you're getting roasted and David Lucas is roasted in Tony and. Holy shit. It's a circus man. And William Montgomery. He's so funny. That dude is so fucking funny. I've seen that night at Ron White joint. And like I instantly got him.

2:44:43Because he's so he's so spazzy at first. You have to catch it. But I instantly like, oh, I get it. This guy's fucking great. Yeah, I don't want to say it's joke, but he has one of my absolute favorite jokes. I'll tell you later. I'll remind myself. But yeah, it's, we're, we got a nice thing going on. It's fun. It's fun and everybody seems to be getting better. If it's really people are enjoying it. Yeah, man. Aaron Sharpen's iron. You want to be a good dancer, dance a lot. I think that's true. I think there's no other way. I mean, you need to do other stuff too. You need to write. You need to think.

2:45:15And you need to listen. You need to watch things and read things. And think about stuff a lot. But you got to get up there all the time. Like, there's no if -hands or buts about it. It's no other way to do it. And it's the only way as a comic you ever come up with new shit. Oh, yeah. Same thing in songwriting. Willa, if I take some time off writing songs like between an album cycle. I'll go back and get what the writers for a couple of weeks for I even start writing songs that I'm going to consider. Just because for the fact that I had wrote one in just 12 weeks sometimes. I just know I'll go in the room stale.

2:45:47But like Chris Stapleton said on your pod. As a songwriter, I'm always writing songs though. I put three titles on my phone a day. It's my rule. Bare man on it. Sometimes more. But even it's just like a quick song title. You know, me and Jayne were talking about it. Sometimes I write a song from top to bottom. Me and Ashley McBrigh got to write on my album. She's incredible. And she writes from top to bottom sometimes, which I think is gangster. When you just pick up a guitar and go where are we going? Hey, who's here? You know what I'm saying? How about this? You know, it's just like, like you're just fucking letting it land where it lands.

2:46:17You know? That's fun. But more often than not, I've write from the perspective of like, yo, I got a concept. Here's my idea. So I'm always putting on my phone. But I'm still dull when I get in the room if I hadn't done it in a while. You know what I mean? If I had wrote in six, seven weeks dude, I'll feel it the first time I try to go write a song. Because one of my artists homeless people, hey man, come help on the album. Because we do that. You know, we'll try to show up for each other. And I'll show up and just put on a play and egg the first couple days. You know what I mean? I'll just be in there getting stoned, wasting time.

2:46:43You know, another third day. I'll be like, okay, I got my time and back. We'll figure it out. So is it like a frequency you have to latch on to? Yeah, it's just, there's like, my dude calls it the egg on the spoon. So put the egg on the spoon. Right. And then I'm like, I got a great idea. Yeah, me, you and Jamie are the three writers in the room. Right. We all agree it's a great idea. All right, cool. The egg's still on the spoon now. Now we got to put a melody to it or start with a couple of chords. Well, we know there's only, you know, 12 notes in music. Find the chords is easy. That's why Ed Sharon just won that lawsuit.

2:47:17You know what I mean? You just pick, start fucking with the chords. Okay, that chord progression is cool. Egg's still on the spoon. Now we got to come up with a melody. Now we got to come up with the eye. How do we get the melody to this? Pre -chorus, first verse, intro, outro. Keeping the egg on the spoon. And then the scary part is, even if we do our job in this room, we write a fucking banger, Joe. We got to hand the egg in the spoon to the producer. You know, and now he's got to go in there. And sometimes he'll drop the egg, you know, or sometimes the egg gets dropped somewhere early, you know.

2:47:47And then after that, it goes into how you're going to market it and put it out and stand out at a time where, you know, 50 ,000 songs a week are getting uploaded or something crazy. You know what I mean? Egg's still on the spoon. It's like, it's fucking wow. We call it the egg on the spoon. And there's two different types of people doing it. There's guys like you who write their own stuff. And then there's other guys that are writing stuff for other people. And then other people are just performing only stuff that people have written for them. It's a different thing. It's a wild thing. It's a different thing, right?

2:48:19It's like, they're both great. Some great songs come from the other way. Right. The great, like all -time classics. But I like it when I know the person singing it wrote it. I like it. Yeah. That's what I like. Especially when it feels personal. Yeah. You know what I mean? It's like, I love that, um, yeah, I just love that anytime there's that. But I'm cool either. I used to say this word before was a hot word. I identify as a songwriter above everything. You know what I mean? Like always. Like when you, if I'm at a grocery store in some sweet old woman goes, you know what do you do? I'm a medium.

2:48:56No hesitation. I'm a songwriter. That's what I think I'm the best at. You know what I mean? Right. That's what I think, like I think we strip you down to your core. You're a comedian. Yeah. Right? The fact that all this other stuff works and you're great at it is cool. But like a core, I think Joe Rogan is a comedian. Like I look at Jelly Roll as a songwriter. So I love what these dudes are doing in town. It's just not for me to not sing a song. I didn't write on. I have no point in bringing in another writer. Yeah. It's like I liked the fact that all kinds of different artistic people exist and the idea of just a little like little hit squad people.

2:49:29For sure. I think it's kind of bad. It's bad -astic. It must be fun. Yeah. It's fun. The only thing is that sometimes it gets puppy millish. So they're like so writing for a certain thing that I have to be the guy in the room. It's like, hey man, y 'all know that we can like every song, we've told somebody said I wasn't country music. Which didn't bother me because they said that about wailing. They said this about everybody who was ever big in the country. Of course, there's certain people that are going to say that. Yeah, right. But I'm looking and I'm like, you know, not one deer with skinned or shot or killed or fish was caught in any moral haggard song ever.

2:50:06Like so if you're a barometer of country as I'm not talking about fishing, I'm going fishing with David Lucas tomorrow. You know what I'm saying? I'm not a kid. But it's like, you know, I'm more admired the side of country that was that outlaw shit. Like when you play that Zach Bryan song and I play that Cody Johnson song, like I like a song that nobody else can sing. Let me just put it that way. No, I don't, I would love to sing that Zach Bryan song, but I could never pull it off. He can only, I love that I don't think anybody could have pulled off son of a center. I don't think any artist in Nashville could have took son of a center to country radio and said this will work.

2:50:43I think only jelly roll could have took son of a center. Only jelly roll could take need of favor. You know what I'm saying? Like who else in Nashville of all my friends could cut need of favor and it would impact the way it impact knowing who you are. Exactly. Yeah, knowing it comes from you too. It's just a different thing. That's the connectivity with Bert Kreischer. Right? Is that you become so entranced with Bert and his family and you get sucked into this little Bert hole. Right? So it's like a fucking I love Bert. That's my dude and you get sucked into this Bert hole and then his jokes are triple funny because he's telling you a story of a character that you feel involved with over these specials.

2:51:22Right. You know what I'm saying? Like I feel like I've watched his two daughters grow up. You know what I'm saying with these wild specials. Like when I'm watching Razzle Dazzle I'm like, oh, he's shit. That's the same daughter that six years ago was here in her life. You know what I mean? Like that's just cool. You know what I mean? It's like this follow along that kind of happens. And that's that connectivity of shit that's like, you know what I mean? Yeah. But I love it when an artist does this how much I love art Joe. I love when an artist does the opposite. The weekend is one of my favorite artists of this generation.

2:51:49Man that dude's probably done three interviews his whole career. Didn't he just change his name back to like his actual name? Yeah, I think he said he said he said that he said that he's wrote all he can write as the weekend. So I don't know if he comes back as able. That dude did some acid. Dude listen. He had a jelly roll to his tea moment. He came out and was like, I'm fucking able. He probably had his John Lennon moment. Yeah. It said the weekend starts using his birth name. I don't want to fuck this up. Yeah. How do you say that? I think it's test -fay, but I'm not sure. Test -fay? Yeah. Abled test -fay.

2:52:23This is something I have to do. Yeah, I followed him from the beginning. I'm just a fan of his, but he's the polar opposite of like nobody ever knows anything about him ever. He said that he wanted to kill the weekend. Yeah. Okay. Well, we're talking about it, so he wins. Yeah, for sure. That's it for D 'Alesson. And I love him so much as an artist. I'm anxious to see what happens next. It's like when Prince turned himself into a symbol. Yeah. You know what I mean? It's like I want him to come out of here now. You know what I'm saying? Yeah, like it could be cool. Bro, I remember Prince, one of the first songs that I ever heard from Prince was Head, which is the craziest song.

2:53:00I couldn't believe somebody wrote a song like this. I know I had heard one other song, but Head was the first one where I was like, what is going on with this dude? Remember that song? Dude, fine head. This is what? 80s. Five, six? Who year was this?

2:53:261980? 1980. God, it's so funky though. God, damn it. I remember when we had attention spans and we would let the intro just fucking fill a vibe before the song started. Yeah.

2:54:05Hmm. Hmm. Woohoo! Oh, talk to me.

2:54:22Oh my god. Head. I forgot about this. Head. To your lover's rep. Head. Love you to your dick. And on the album coverage words, Mandex. I mean, he's in high -mont. He's in high -mont. Beato's, you're such a hunk, so full of spunk, I'll give you a head. Dude. I mean, as the kids say, bars. Bar's. Bar's. Bar's. You're such a hunk, so full of spunk, I'll give you a head. My favorite thing was he did that, he did the interview with the, I don't know, Diane. He was a fan of somebody and they said, Jesus Christ. It's crazy, right? And they asked him, they said, why do you wear heels to make you taller?

2:55:09And he said, I wear heels because women like heels. I was like, what? Just fucking pamph. But he came straight off the Vegas strip. He was special. No, man, he was. Yeah, I got what's special. Yeah. He was a very, very, very, like, disassociated from everything too. As far as like, yo, he like lived in his bubble made his music and was like, I love when people do that space, he should do. I think one of the love was the first song I ever heard from him. I think man, I was Raspberry Barat. Oh, that was good. That was later on. Yeah. But I'm older than you. Yeah. When I was a kid, I would listen to Prince by delivering newspapers.

2:55:48Did you ever get into Skinner? Oh, fuck it. Oh, dude. Dude, the, the, the, the, this, the guitar solo, I maintained to this day. The guitar solo in Free Bird at the end. Yes. It might be the greatest guitar solo in the history of all music. It's so choreographed. And it's like, it was a different kind of a solo, man. It was just that motherfucker was so good. He just made a sound. Oh, my God.

2:56:22If you're driving around at a 1969 Camaro, and this is playing, oh.

2:56:31And you back then, you had to hear it on the radio. Oh, yeah. Look at that.

2:56:43Here it is. Oh. I can't tell you.

2:56:53Look how happy those people are. They're losing their shit. Look how happy they are.

2:57:04Look, sunburners, fuck. Middle of the day. Middle of the day. Happy these people are. Look at them jump around with their arms in there. The whole crowd. Oh, yeah.

2:57:21Okay, it's a full. Holy shit. This solo is just fantastic. And this is live.

2:57:38And there's going to do it for the next four minutes. It's going to hurt. I swear. They were just cheering. What the fuck is going on?

2:57:54In conspicuous, in front of his leg. Yeah, yeah, very low -key. Jesus Christ. God. Just think about how much the world has changed since then. Oh, yeah. In that way. You could never do that. Uh -huh.

2:58:38Look at the sunburn. Yeah. Yeah, that girl is going to have cancer when she's older. She's out of fire.

2:58:54Look at this motherfucker. Oh. And people are still just flipping their shit.

2:59:12Just lost in the rock and roll, man.

2:59:19From Florida, fellas. Yeah, Jackson, Bill, dude. Whoa. So I got a Skinner story. I'm sure I hope I'm allowed to talk about it. I'm sure Ross won, man. They have filmed, they were filming a special for Skinner last year, uh, late last year. And they called, and I got to invite to sing Tuesdays Gone with them for this special. And I, we had heard a new from publications that Gary Rosington was getting, dealing with some heart stuff, you know? So there was this kind of quietly unsaid, like, this might be one of his last specials. You know, he's the last standing member, right? And I go to do rehearsal with him.

3:00:04And of course, Johnny's there. Johnny Van Sant great guy. He's been singing with him, you know, 30 years, you know? However long, that's 30 years forever. Peter Kees is on the keys. I know a couple of guys, and I go meet Gary. And he is the sweetest, kindest man Joe. And he just keeps thanking me for coming to do this. I'm doing a fucking Skinner thing. A trip, I grew up in a South Joe. This is insane for me. You know what I'm saying? This is like where I'm from? Jesus Skinner. You know what I'm saying? In football somewhere, you know, they were fought for Primetime television right? And I'm going to leave from rehearsal that day.

3:00:41And I look behind me because I heard some, some feet shuffling and Gary was chasing me, Joe. To the door. To turn around and go, Matt, I just can't thank you enough for doing this. Man, this is so awesome that you took the time out of it. It's just like, what? Fucking legend. And I talked to his manager and his manager and said, is there anything you can do for us? And I was like, I kind of frankly, I don't ever ask, but I kind of want autograph. You know what I'm saying? I was like, but he said not, I don't worry, he's already got something planned for you all. So when I get to the green room the night of this tape was special taping.

3:01:12There's a guitar in the green room signed by the band and Gary. And a poster signed by Gary from my mother. Wow. Yep. This is it. You are fucking wild, Jamie. Jamie's the most. It's scary, to be honest. This is the footage from it. And I think, and I'm not 100 % sure, but I think it went on to be his last performance. Wow. And the story gets even wilder. They, I don't know what I'm allowed to say this part. They say, can you come and touch up, like just come, they want you to listen and see if you need to touch up a vocal. Right. They just give you an option. They just, they just, you know what I mean?

3:01:54And I was like, all right, cool, because they were going to put it out. And I just had to go approving. They want you to approve it in person. And if you need to sing, they'll allow you to sing sometimes. Some specials won't. This may be two inside sausage. But I was going the day that Gary was going to finish putting the licks on their new record or some new music they were working on. That's the day he died. I woke up that morning to the news of Gary rossing to the dead. And I was fixing a scene at the studio in six, three hours. And his team hit me and said, we know just with Gary spirit and energy that what he want for you to do today, go down there if you have time.

3:02:31And I still went and I proved the vocal. And it had to make no changes or touch ups. He just want to make sure I was cool with some stuff and approved, you know, just approval shit just respectful. And it was crazy, man, because his Gary rousing to his guitar tech walks in Joe. And he looks over at the engineer, the producer has been working with Gary for 30 years or whatever 40 years. Have a long been doing it. These guys tight crew guitar tech looks and goes. I was tuning. I was stringing his guitar when I got the call. For today's session. I was like, look, it might be a bad time to say this, but how poetic.

3:03:07Could you imagine being that dude, tell me the greatest guitar solos ever written guitar tech. And you find out he passed away while you're holding his baby. You know what I'm saying? You know, just unreal. Like what a way to go. You know what I mean? Like synchronous. Yeah, I mean, he survived playing crashes. You know what I'm saying? They went through some shit dude. Shitter with some shit dude. Yeah, they were fucking, you know, it's wild, man. So that's dope. And I hope that that special comes out this year because that was just a night I'll never forget. And it just, he was so sweet. And there, I hope that shows this on stage.

3:03:43I walked over to him at the end of Tuesdays, gone Joe and he's doing his solo. And as soon as he finishes, I just grab him by his shoulders and I kiss him on a forehead and I just hug him. And I just whisper, man, you have impacted me in such a way. You will never know how much you've changed how I feel about music, you know. And I know that in my spirit that the last time I sang Gary Rosington, I gave that man his fucking flowers. You know what I'm saying? I get teary out again dude, just talking about it. Just that I just, because I felt like I felt it. You know what I mean? I got to show with Willie Nelson at the end of this month.

3:04:12Wow. Crazy, right? I'm doing a show with Willie Nelson. Yeah. And we're launching our weed brand the same day. Oh my god, that's hilarious. It's Michigan. Bro, you're doing a show with Willie. Yeah. I think he's only doing like 25 this year or something. He almost had to win the lottery to get one. What do you do? What's going to be? The soaring eagle in Michigan. What's in the more than Michigan? It's a casino outside gig right here at the NMA. Wow. Yeah, you got to see Willie before he goes, folks. Yeah, you got to go see Willie, man. Yeah, I just want to see Trigger as much as I want to see Willie.

3:04:46That's what he calls his guitar, his trigger. Oh. He has the same guitar all these years. Really? Yeah, and it's got a pull up trigger if you don't mind. Jim, you got to see this show. You'll love this shit. It's wildest shit. It's where he how he picks. It's got an indent where his fingers go inside the wood. And when they fix it, they fix it around it. Right there is where he sets his hand. What? Yep.

3:05:11Wow. Yep, it's called Trigger. The joke he's made is so quick to earn when they can't fix Trigger. Wow. Look at that. It's worn into his hand. Yeah, worn into his hand right there. Because I thought it wouldn't have picked that way. It's crazy, man. Wow. Yeah. I was excited to see the guitars. I don't have them. I got to see them once. I haven't met them though. So this will be big. It's us. My buddy Ernest. Yep. Tell my Ernest Ernest on that list is a Nashville boy. He was a good friend of mine. He wrote some of his center with me. And Ernest's had, I think, eight or nine number ones. He's wrote for other people.

3:05:52Just big hit songwriter, Nashville boy. Imagine yourself at that low moment when they tell you just how the kid imagined now. He's on stage with Willie Nelson. Like, what a crazy dream. What a crazy simulation you're in. It's a simulation's real. Brother. Yeah, and I defied all, like, you'll see it in the doc, but it's like, you know, I had everything not going for me, even in the music side of things. I had to learn how to sing. I wasn't like, I don't come from a family. And the only songwriter of my family, right? Does that make sense? Yes. There's no historic music. My mother just loved music.

3:06:35Right. You know, it's like, we didn't come. So I had to learn all this. You know, I had a, because nobody would sign me at first. I had to learn the business. You know, how much I had to never, I got my GD when I was 24. You know what I'm saying? Like, I didn't never, before I got my GD, if you asked what my last grade completed was, I would have had to technically write down a, you know what I'm saying? I think it's the last one I passed. And you just, I just had to figure all this. You know, my daddy almost quit one time, Joe. My daddy looked me down and he said, why would you quit, son? He said, if you worked this hard to be a doctor, you'd be going to get your doctorate degree right now.

3:07:06You're two years away from being a fucking brain surgeon. He was like, you just had to go to a different college. And man, that stuck all over me, Joe. Of all the advice and one lineers, my dad was like, one of them old gangsters had just had them quick one lineers, you know? And of all the stuff that he, that, that just stuck with me because it was like, you can't run the time. The fact that I didn't find success till I was 38 is just like, you know, it just is what it is. You know what I'm saying? It's like, you know, yeah, but it's, this is what always begs the question. I would not want you to go through any of the things you went through.

3:07:42But because of the things you went through, this is what we get. Right. It's an amazing thing. Yeah. It's amazing when out of some horrible chaotic situation, something beautiful emerges. And I don't know why we need that. Like, what is it about people? But what do we need to fuck people up so they make amazing art? Is that a little suffer? Is that, I mean, is there other ways can you do it through sports? Is there holding your breath? Is there some other fucking way other than torturing your kids childhood to turn them into something talented? Because I don't know if it is, man, all of my friends that I love the most had the most fucked up childhood.

3:08:27You know, they're the most fun to be around the most silly, you know, and the most appreciative. And you know, it's like the world, there's a sense of community amongst people that grew up and fucked up sort of environments. But I don't want anybody to ever grow up like that. I want people to grow up loved and challenged by things. I want things to be interesting to you. I want you to go after them, not because you're desperate, but because you're fascinated. I don't think it's the mutually exclusive. I don't think you have to be fucked up to be graded something. I just think oftentimes that's the case.

3:09:01And so I think one of the things like that young man, what was his name that's saying that song on American Idol? Oh, EMTongue. Damn. Damn. Whatever that dude went through. Yeah, he lost his father. Oh my god. He tells the story right before he sings the song. But it's just so, man. I know, right? Just everything about it. That song is so good, right? It's so good because that guy went through that shit to make that thing that we all can watch. Yeah. No, and just sings it just in the most painful. And it's just like I told you, like nothing about... I think he had the jelly roll factor of nothing about how he looked made me think he was going to sound like that.

3:09:41Right. You know, no idea what was coming. No, and then you just hear it. And then you start listening to the lyrics and you're like, oh no, I'm off. Oh my god. Yeah. It's so good. You know, I'm telling you, man, I'm telling you, I'm going to see him this weekend, dude. I'm like... I've already said a message a couple times. I'm on Instagram because I'm a nerd. But I'm like, dude, I'm a fan. Like I'm coming to hug you. That's beautiful. Like me and you are the fan, too. I want to talk to you. Listen, brother, this has been a fun, fucking enjoyable, interesting time. And I appreciate you very much, man.

3:10:10No, dude, I'm a brother. You have a great story. You just given me the platform to share it. You have a great story. There is great, man. It's fucking such a good story. It's so important. It really is American as fuck. What you're doing right now is American as fuck. Thank you, brother. You can figure it out. I didn't like this. Well, two things. You don't mind, Joe. Just give me some house cleaning for what we go. Just, I'd be remiss. Because, God, you know how big this is for me. JellicRoll615 .com. I am going on my first arena amphitheater. Tor later this year. There are still tickets available in social markets.

3:10:40I feel like the comedian out into the podcast. We're even going to be at next week. You know? Please. Please, JellicRoll615 .com. You can find me on socials. I'm pretty easy to get to there. And I will say this, that music finds a way. And I thank God that music found its way to you. And I found my way to this room to have this platform with your people, brother. Thank you, brother. And thank you for this. And I look forward to hanging with you tonight. Fuck yeah. I'm coming, Papa. Fuck yeah. All right, brother. Thank you, Johnny. Thank you, brother. Thank you, Johnny. Baby, fucking Joe, I love you.