Episode 12
Brad Paisley on Fish, Phish, and the Origins of the "Lost" Paisley Guitar
Welcome back for a special season finale of Wong Notes!
We’ve saved one of the best for last: Brad Paisley.The celebrated shredder and seasoned fisherman joins host Cory Wong for one of this season’s most interesting episodes. Paisley talks his earliest guitar-playing influences, which came from his grandfather’s love of country music, and his first days in Nashville—as a student at Belmont University, studying the music industry.
The behind-the-curtain knowledge he picked up at Belmont made him a good match for industry suits trying to force bad contracts on him.
Wong and Paisley swap notes on fishing and a mutual love of Phish—Paisley envies the jam-band scene, which he thinks has more leeway in live contexts than country. And with a new signature Fender Telecaster hitting the market in a rare blue paisley finish, Paisley discusses his iconic namesake pattern—which some might describe as “hippie puke”—and its surprising origin with Elvis’ guitarist James Burton.
Plus, hear how Paisley assembled his rig over the years, the state of shredding on mainstream radio, when it might be good to hallucinogenic drugs in a set, and the only negative thing about country-music audiences.
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Visit Brad Paisley: https://www.bradpaisley.com/
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Produced by Jason Shadrick and Cory Wong
Additional Editing by Shawn Persinger
Presented by DistroKid
Transcript
What's happening?
Speaker A:Welcome to Wong Notes podcast.
Speaker A:I'm your host, Cory Wong.
Speaker A:Today's the season finale and we have one of my favorite guitar players on the planet, Brad Paisley.
Speaker A:I've been trying to get Paisley since season one.
Speaker A:No joke.
Speaker A:And finally we got to hang, jam a little bit at the Fender showroom in Nashville.
Speaker A:Got to know each other, had a great time, good hang, talked Steely Dan, talked guitars, we jammed, we didn't even go to the five chord and we just looked at one of my, I won't name him.
Speaker A:One of my friends was playing bass and he just like wouldn't change chords.
Speaker A:And Brad and I were kind of looking at each other the whole time like, yo, we gonna resolve, we gonna go somewhere.
Speaker A:And we ended up laughing and it was a good time.
Speaker A:And then we went into some other jams and blah blah, blah.
Speaker A:It was, man, it was fun.
Speaker A:Brad is an incredible guitar player.
Speaker A:I'm so excited about the conversation that we had.
Speaker A:It was a good one.
Speaker A:And you know what, I'm also excited because I got a couple other fun things going on.
Speaker A:Fearless Flyers new album comes out.
Speaker A:We got a little vinyl pre order going.
Speaker A:Go check it out.
Speaker A:If you're not familiar, it is a four piece ensemble with myself on guitar, Mark Leteri on baritone guitar, Joe Dart on bass and the incredible Nate Smith on drums.
Speaker A:Fearless Flyers 5 coming at ya.
Speaker A:Also, I just announced 12 intimate shows at the Blue Note New York.
Speaker A:I am doing some shows with my rhythm section.
Speaker A:Plus I've got special guests with Joshua Redman, Mark Lettieri, Taylor Eichstie.
Speaker A:It's gonna be insane.
Speaker A:Go check it out.
Speaker A:It's gonna be fun.
Speaker A:We're doing these in beginning of November, I think like the 4th through the 9th, six nights, two shows per night.
Speaker A:It's gonna be insane.
Speaker A:It's gonna be so much fun.
Speaker A:I am just, honestly, I've been a Redmond fan for years and I haven't been able.
Speaker A:We've actually never played together, so this will be our first time hanging and playing.
Speaker A:Looking forward to it.
Speaker A:And anyways, that's enough about what I got going on.
Speaker A:Let's podcast.
Speaker A:Without further ado, the season finale, Brad Paisley.
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Speaker A:All right, let's hit this episod.
Speaker A:What's happening, bro?
Speaker A:How you doing, man?
Speaker B:I'm good.
Speaker B:How about you?
Speaker A:I'm doing good.
Speaker A:Good to see you again.
Speaker B:Where yet?
Speaker A:I'm in Minneapolis right now.
Speaker B:Is that where you live?
Speaker A:Yeah, most of the time.
Speaker A:I got a little spot in Nashville too, in Madison, but I'm mostly here.
Speaker B:Well, that's great.
Speaker B:Good for you.
Speaker A:I gotta come down to your spot to that little fishing hole you've been talking about.
Speaker B:You really do?
Speaker B:If you like to do that.
Speaker A:Absolutely.
Speaker B:Come on out.
Speaker A:I'm a lake guy.
Speaker A:I'm a lakes guy here in Minneapolis, you know.
Speaker B:Well, we.
Speaker B:We don't have the lakes you do, but we have.
Speaker B:But I got bigger fish.
Speaker A:I bet you do.
Speaker B:We got a.
Speaker B:It's three acres.
Speaker B:I wonder if I can find a photo I can show you right now.
Speaker B:Check this out.
Speaker A:Yeah, that's bigger than what I got here on my lake.
Speaker B:Yeah, it's like, look at that.
Speaker B:That is a largemouth bass from my pond.
Speaker A:It's like a 24 pound largemouth.
Speaker B:12.
Speaker B:But still.
Speaker B:We were in the.
Speaker B:We were in the basement working on guitars here at this house.
Speaker B:And he was fishing.
Speaker B:It was just getting dark.
Speaker B:And he's.
Speaker B:He called screaming.
Speaker B:We thought he'd hurt himself.
Speaker B:And so I ran up there, I said, keep it in the water.
Speaker B:Put your thumb on his mouth.
Speaker B:Keep it in the water.
Speaker B:And ran up there.
Speaker B:With a scale from the basement and set it on the scale and it was 12 exact.
Speaker B:And then we flew.
Speaker A:Wow.
Speaker B:That's the biggest I've ever weighed out of there.
Speaker A:That's amazing.
Speaker B:They're not all that big.
Speaker B:It's not like we catch it.
Speaker B:But he's caught.
Speaker B:He's spoiled by it.
Speaker B:He's caught a 9, a 10, a 12, and he's 15 years old.
Speaker A:So that's pretty dope.
Speaker B:I don't think I've ever.
Speaker B:My biggest fish is 10.
Speaker B:I don't like.
Speaker B:It's pretty nuts.
Speaker A:You able to get your kids into music too?
Speaker A:Or they just like.
Speaker B:They like.
Speaker B:They like music, but they don't like mine.
Speaker B:But they, they do.
Speaker B:They're way into it.
Speaker B:Like, no interest whatsoever in my stuff.
Speaker B:Like, they, they.
Speaker B:They respect it, I think.
Speaker B:I think.
Speaker B:But they really are more like they.
Speaker B:They have found their own thing and, and they like.
Speaker B:They like a lot of like they're both.
Speaker B:Well, my oldest especially is a piano player.
Speaker B:That's what he learned.
Speaker A:Oh, that's cool.
Speaker B:He likes that.
Speaker B:I don't know the first thing about it.
Speaker B:I really have tried before to work that out a little.
Speaker B:And it's so another language to me.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:How about you?
Speaker B:Can you play the piano?
Speaker A:I mean, I can.
Speaker A:I got my M Audio 49 key that I can tinkle around on.
Speaker A:I mean, I have a piano up in the living room that I can, you know, I can dink around on and I can get away with things, But I'm not a piano player.
Speaker A:Not at all.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:I mean, I can't even.
Speaker B:I can figure out like a couple of chords when I need to, but that's it.
Speaker B:Like, that's it.
Speaker B:That's really it.
Speaker B:Like, it just feels so weird to not be able to bend the note.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:You know.
Speaker A:Did you start playing guitar by accompanying yourself or did you start by like being a guitar slinger?
Speaker B:So I started at 8 because my grandpa loved country guitar.
Speaker B:He loved, like, it was a really good influence.
Speaker B:It was like Les Paul, Chet Atkins, Roy Clark, anything guitar based.
Speaker B:Yeah, love.
Speaker B:So it was like Buck Owens, like all that stuff that really had great playing on it.
Speaker B:He was, he was just this fan of.
Speaker B:Just really big fan of that.
Speaker B:Like a virtuoso or a fiery guitar player.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:And so I learned that stuff as soon as I could.
Speaker B:You know, you don't learn that first.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:But like, you know, it was the Mel Bay book for a minute.
Speaker B:And then once I got to where I could do the fingerstyle and play like you know, Freight Train and Wendy and Warm and these Chet instrumentals.
Speaker B:He was, he was pretty happy that his kid had learned that because he, he never did like he could play, he could play flat pick a little bit and, and play like Wildwood Flower and songs like that.
Speaker B:But he couldn't, he couldn't do anything complicated.
Speaker B:He.
Speaker B:He picked it up later in life and just loved it.
Speaker B:And so I, I was first a guitar player and then it wasn't until I really started like they needed somebody to sing in the church service on a Sunday.
Speaker B:And so the next thing you know, it's like, well, he plays and you know, I sort of was like, oh, I'll do it.
Speaker B:So next thing you know, I'm singing in special music on, you know, doing Glenn Campbell.
Speaker B:Try a little kindness.
Speaker B:Yeah, someday.
Speaker B:And, and as soon as you do that, like in a small town, you're booked solid.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:Like the Lions Club lunch and was like, can you do a couple songs first we'll pay you.
Speaker B:And when they will give you like 50 bucks at 10 years old, you're like, yeah, sure.
Speaker B:And you get out of school.
Speaker A:You know, I find that interesting because you know, you're, you're playing professional as a kid and then you know, you go to a couple different colleges.
Speaker A:You go to Belmont for music business.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:That like you moved, you moved to Nashville.
Speaker A:As somebody who wants to get in the music business, but like you're already working gigging as a musician too.
Speaker A:Tell me a little bit about what was happening there.
Speaker B:That was really about.
Speaker B:I just knew that there's no guitar degree going to help.
Speaker B:And I felt like I needed like with what I wanted to do which was, you know, play, sing, write, whatever.
Speaker B:They'd let me in Nashville.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:That I needed to be, you know, savvy on the one thing I didn't know anything about.
Speaker B:And you know, and in retrospect that was a really good plan.
Speaker B:Just the idea that, you know, it's like guitar wise in country music and whatever you're, it's up to your own devices.
Speaker B:There's no teacher going to make you into the of successful guitarist.
Speaker A:Sure.
Speaker B:Like it's really as you know, it's up to us.
Speaker B:Like we have.
Speaker B:You gotta practice and figure out what you are and find your sound and find out how.
Speaker B:What other people want out of you.
Speaker B:So for me it was like I was able to just really focus on like, like this.
Speaker B:The classes you took were like copyright Law and Publishing 101 and Music Business fundamentals and just stuff that Was like, I, you know, when I got my first record deal, they asked me questions like.
Speaker B:Or they didn't even ask me questions.
Speaker B:I asked them questions like, they were like, we, you know, we're gonna do a us, whatever it is, a six album deal or whatever album deal.
Speaker B:And I'm like, yeah, but what about controlled comp?
Speaker B:And they're like, how do you even know what that is?
Speaker B:And I said, well.
Speaker B:Which is essentially for anybody watching that, doesn't they like to.
Speaker B:Labels do some pretty unfair things.
Speaker B:And one of them is in Nashville.
Speaker B:I don't know if it's this way in L.
Speaker B:A or not, but here it's very common that they don't want to pay full royalties to any songwriter that writes with the artist.
Speaker B:That makes no sense.
Speaker B:That's just unfair.
Speaker B:But it's been this way a long time where they will.
Speaker B:So they're like, well, you wrote it with the artist, so we don't feel like we should have to pay them 100%.
Speaker B:And they.
Speaker B:So when you write with an artist in Nashville, if they have controlled composition, which is what this is, then that means that this is something they're going to pay you 75% royalty on.
Speaker B:And I told them, I said, this is ridiculous.
Speaker B:I'm not doing it.
Speaker B:And they're like, okay.
Speaker B:And most artists just sign their contract and their lawyer says, oh, this is the way it is.
Speaker B:But I was able to get that out of there.
Speaker B:So anybody that co wrote with me on any of my albums got 100% of their royalty.
Speaker B:I had to pay the 75.
Speaker B:What's funny is when I would co write with somebody, I got paid 75% royalty because they refused to sort of not do that to me.
Speaker B:But I said, you got to take that away from my writers.
Speaker B:Yeah, so.
Speaker B:And so I, you know, I was able to at least know things like that and that that allowed me to be able to like, go in there from a position of strength that most new guys just don't.
Speaker B:They don't know.
Speaker B:And it's.
Speaker B:And they take advantage of you.
Speaker A:This is so modern music business era of you.
Speaker A:This is.
Speaker A:I'm just stoked that you did like, that's.
Speaker A:It feels like that some of that kind of stuff is more common now.
Speaker A:But I feel like a lot of people don't realize how rare that must have been because nowadays, you know, a lot of us, we, you know, I'm still independent, but we grow up indie and then, you know, you have to go through so many roles as a modern musician and artist now.
Speaker A:So when it does come time, you know, if you've had a little bit of career, when it comes time to talk to labels, you know, they.
Speaker A:They know that you have a little bit of knowledge in this.
Speaker A:But I bet you were one of the very few who came in and they're like, they're probably.
Speaker A:They probably had some.
Speaker A:Several sidebar meetings, like, what are we going to do with this Praisley guy, man?
Speaker A:He knows too much.
Speaker B:Yeah, it was kind of like that in that, you know, also by going to Belmont and.
Speaker B:And learning so much about how they operate.
Speaker B:And I was able to intern.
Speaker B:I interned at Atlantic Records, I interned at ascap, I interned at Fitzgerald Hartley, which later became my management company.
Speaker B:You're.
Speaker B:You're a.
Speaker B:A peon at that point, but you're.
Speaker B:You're getting coffee for people that you will eventually get to know and.
Speaker B:And it.
Speaker B:And you learn how the workplace works in our town, at least how it did, I don't know that's like that at all now.
Speaker B:I'd probably be so lost.
Speaker B:But.
Speaker B:But essentially, you know, it was like I learned.
Speaker B:One of the things I learned was, oh, I really need to be.
Speaker B:If I do get a record deal, I need to be ready now for, like, year two.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:So I had, like, a lot of my second album.
Speaker B:The reason the first album was called who Needs Pictures?
Speaker B:The second album was called Part two.
Speaker B:The reason it was called Part two was there was a song in there called Part Two.
Speaker B:But at the same time, most of that record was written, like, before I had a record deal.
Speaker B:So I sort of decided what was on album one and album two.
Speaker B:Like, for instance, I'm Going to Miss her, which became one of my biggest hits.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:This fishing song was literally written for the Belmont Songwriters Showcase because I needed something that didn't.
Speaker B:That wasn't a sad ballad and.
Speaker B:And wrote that and brought the house down with it and knew that was a hit and kept it off the first album because I just felt like it's the kind of fun, novelty, ish thing that could be a classic, but released first, that's all you are.
Speaker B:I knew that it was like another dimension to me that I was going to be able to present in my second record.
Speaker B:And you could think that way then because it was way less about one song at a time like it is now.
Speaker B:I mean, now it's literally like what is streaming and which ones are lighting it up.
Speaker B:And I haven't even done an album in a while, so I want to.
Speaker B:But it's like but albums almost feel now like more of like you're doing it for yourself.
Speaker B:You're not doing it for other people.
Speaker A:Sure.
Speaker B:Ever listen all the way through or buy it or whatever, you know?
Speaker A:Well, it's interesting because this gives me a little more insight into your brain.
Speaker A:Like, you are a long term.
Speaker A:You're a.
Speaker A:You're a strategic thinker.
Speaker A:Like, it seems to me like you knew early.
Speaker A:Like, I'm going to make this thing happen and I'm going to get in the business.
Speaker A:And meanwhile, you're also this killing guitar player, which is its own thing, but then a songwriter and singer as well, this triple threat.
Speaker A:And even just thinking strategically about your albums, it almost feels to me like you're.
Speaker A:You're one of those few cats where it's like, yeah, it was.
Speaker A:It was gonna happen no matter what.
Speaker A:I mean, obviously, because of your hard work and work ethic.
Speaker B:Yeah, that's, you know, we'll never know.
Speaker B:But it's like, thankfully, right?
Speaker B:Yeah, we'll never know.
Speaker B:If I'd gone the other, like, down the wrong path, what that would look like.
Speaker B:But I, look, I moved to Nashville.
Speaker B:Just my first love is guitar playing.
Speaker B:My sound man accuses me of singing to get to the solo.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:On a nightly basis.
Speaker B:And as you know, when you tour and do, you know, same songs every night throughout a tour, you get a little tired of the regimented thing.
Speaker B:And I always live like.
Speaker B:One of the things that keeps me going is the fact that there are portions of the show that are meant to be.
Speaker B:In many ways, my band and I are a lot more like a jam band than a country standard thing.
Speaker B:We have instrumentals that we do.
Speaker B:We have areas of the show where I don't know who's gonna play what and we take it, you know, and even though there's video and there's set list and some things that are set in stone that, you know, we're starting with this.
Speaker B:You know, we're doing this in the middle and this is happening at the end in the middle of all that there.
Speaker B:I always leave room for that because I.
Speaker B:My first love is that.
Speaker B:And I would have been.
Speaker B:I used to say I'll.
Speaker B:I'll take whatever I can fit into in Nashville.
Speaker B:If they'll.
Speaker B:If they'll let me be an artist, great.
Speaker B:If they will.
Speaker B:But if it's.
Speaker B:If it's not an artist, then I have these other skill sets and I'll write songs for other people.
Speaker B:I'll play guitar for whoever wants it, maybe in the studio or on the Road, worst case scenario, you know, you're just kind of like an ancillary, working for other people thing.
Speaker B:But the main goal was, you know, a tour bus and a.
Speaker B:And a band.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:And some songs that people knew.
Speaker A:It's funny you say the jam band thing, because I, I bought a Honda, an old Honda CR V.
Speaker A:And it has a CD player.
Speaker A:Can't hook up Bluetooth to it.
Speaker A:So I just went to Cheapo Records down the road and I just bought.
Speaker A:I was like, I'm going to buy like 12 CDs, put them in the car.
Speaker A:Just.
Speaker A:I'm going to buy all random stuff.
Speaker A:And I was there with my daughter, and she was like, oh, who's this guy?
Speaker A:I was like, oh, that dude Rips on guitar.
Speaker A:And it was your live album.
Speaker A:I was like, yeah.
Speaker A:Oh, really?
Speaker A:Get that one.
Speaker A:And she, she just listened to your song Celebrity over and over in the car every time we got in the car.
Speaker A:And then, you know, I, I got to listening to the.
Speaker A:You know, I've listened to through that whole album.
Speaker A:You know, it's been in my car for 10 years.
Speaker A:But I've always thought listening to that record, I'm like, you know what?
Speaker A:I would love to just, like, see you play at some jam band festival where you just kind of like, yeah, I'm playing some songs.
Speaker A:Like, I'll, I'll do some songs, but then I'm gonna stretch this thing out, like, each one for like, 10, 15 minutes.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:Or.
Speaker A:Or even just like, do a special set where you play instrumental tunes and just see you how you would explore that side of your artistry.
Speaker A:Because when I listened to your live record, it really showed a certain amount of depth that was like, oh, my gosh, I knew this cat could play.
Speaker A:But like, the, the, the live interplay that you have with your band is so great, too.
Speaker B:Well, we've been together.
Speaker B: ew guy in the band, joined in: Speaker B:He's still getting haze.
Speaker B:We've tried to add new guys since, and so far it hasn't worked out.
Speaker B:It's the same exact guys.
Speaker B:Some of them have rheumatoid arthritis now.
Speaker B:A couple of them, most of them are on there.
Speaker B:One guy's on his fourth wife.
Speaker B:You know, it's.
Speaker B:We've been through a lot, and.
Speaker B:But we know each other's thoughts.
Speaker B:You know how that is.
Speaker B:And, And I would love to do what you're talking about, because I feel like it would have to be.
Speaker B:I get Away with murder a little bit.
Speaker B:In my shows where I've learned how to, like.
Speaker B:Like, for an instrumental, we will produce a.
Speaker B:Like, a cartoon thing.
Speaker B:Over the years, like, I would do a cartoon, and we would play something like Nervous Breakdown or a song called Time Warp off of the live stuff or off my albums.
Speaker B:I used to always have an instrumental on there, and we'll play one of those, and we would do, like, animation on the screen so that the audience.
Speaker B:Because my audience, it's sort of like you have to fake them out and make them not realize you're just kind of up there doing this for you and not them.
Speaker B:Because that's.
Speaker B:And that's one of the biggest.
Speaker B:That's the only negative about a country audience to me, is they do expect certain things out of you that the Jam band audience is a lot more forgiving.
Speaker B:Like, you know, it is.
Speaker B:Like, I've.
Speaker B:I've heard about a Fish concert this moment.
Speaker B:I forget what they call it.
Speaker B:Where there's a.
Speaker B:There's a moment where they really find this, and it's what Fish fans live for.
Speaker B:You know, they go, and they want this for this point where Trey and the guys are in.
Speaker B:They're like, in this meditative state, and they are all acting as one, and they.
Speaker B:They achieve that almost nightly.
Speaker B:And it's like, we would love to be able to do that.
Speaker B:They would leave, though.
Speaker B:My crowd would leave.
Speaker B:They would literally be like, well, to hell with this.
Speaker B:I don't know what's wrong with him tonight, but he.
Speaker B:You know, and I feel like if we played one of those festivals, that is a spot where it would be really fun to be like.
Speaker B:It'd be really fun to play a gig where it's like, you can turn your back to the audience.
Speaker B:They don't give a shit.
Speaker B:They're facing the wrong way, too.
Speaker A:Okay, this outlet is available to you.
Speaker A:Okay, think about this.
Speaker A:John Mayer is playing with Grateful Dead, Dead and Co.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:You think the average.
Speaker A:Like, the person who listens to Mayer's first couple albums.
Speaker A:Yeah, like, he's got a.
Speaker A:He's got an expectation to live up to John Mayer shows, but now he can on the Dead Co shows.
Speaker A:We just need to find you a band where you can go jam, do whatever you want to do it.
Speaker B:I'm in, man.
Speaker B:That would be fun.
Speaker B:And I definitely think that, you know, there's a.
Speaker B:There's an aspect of that that I have toyed with that, like, how do I do something?
Speaker B:And it's almost like what you say, like.
Speaker B:Like, you One of my best friends and a band that I actually have a song out with right now is Dawes and they straddle that line.
Speaker B:Really?
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:Like Taylor and those guys will do 8, 10 minute versions of certain songs and they've got a few songs that do the, you know, that.
Speaker B:That have like the first, like.
Speaker B:Like an A section and then the whole B section like Layla, where it's like they have the.
Speaker B:Yeah, that.
Speaker B:That thing where the first song's this and then it's a waltz and then, you know, for like an extended out.
Speaker B:And they've done some shows with me too.
Speaker B:And it's like I wonder what the world is where I cut a record that sort of announces.
Speaker B:When you see this, it's.
Speaker B:There's going to be moments where it'd be best if you had hallucinogenic drugs because it's not for everybody.
Speaker B:That'd be fun.
Speaker A:Well, I'll tell you what, you know, you say you get away with murder.
Speaker A:Sometimes I think you're one of the last cats who is just like straight up shredding on mainstream radio.
Speaker A:Like, I'm serious.
Speaker A:I was thinking about this.
Speaker A:I was like, what are the last.
Speaker A:The last tunes that ended up on mainstream radio where there is just straight up ripping guitar solos and it's, you know, it's just ripping guitar.
Speaker A:And you're one of the last people who's had that and continues to.
Speaker A:Where I'm like, you got to give it up.
Speaker A:I would say that is another thing where, you know, the state of guitar in popular music.
Speaker A:And I am curious to just get your thoughts on the state of guitar in the general zeitgeist, but also the state of country music and kind of the evolution of some of the scene that you've been involved in.
Speaker A:But starting with guitar, you know, it's like the.
Speaker A:You're one of the cats who's really helped keep the guitar in the mainstream.
Speaker B:That's nice to say.
Speaker B:There's some new guys in our format that play the fire out of it that it's.
Speaker B:It's pretty neat to see them.
Speaker B:Oh yeah.
Speaker B:I don't know if I don't know if I was any influence or not, but it seems a little bit like it and that's great to me.
Speaker B:It's like I always felt like my favorite records.
Speaker B:What goes back to what we were saying about my grandpa, my favorite records were those ones that literally you.
Speaker B:There was something about the guitar on it that was, you know, I just vital.
Speaker B:Like if you think about Tiger by the Tail And Buck Owens and you think about.
Speaker B:And it's hell in the 80s and when I was growing up, the.
Speaker B:The Vince Gill, Steve Warner, Ricky Skaggs era.
Speaker B:Those three.
Speaker B:Give me a break.
Speaker B:It's like best guitarists of all time, some of them.
Speaker B:And they were all on the radio at the same time.
Speaker B:And.
Speaker B:And then after that, you had Brent Mason playing all these records, like Alan Jackson and things that had crazy picking and you had.
Speaker B:You know, so for me, I was just.
Speaker B:When I came up, by the time I was coming around, there wasn't as much of it and there's less now.
Speaker B:And.
Speaker B:And we did have that era where grunge kind of made it not cool to have a solo.
Speaker B:Like, they never had solos in grunge records, it seemed.
Speaker B:Yeah, they sounded great.
Speaker B:They were cool songs.
Speaker B:You so easily could have thrown a massive Van Halen solo in the middle of.
Speaker B:Of, you know, Smells Like Teen Spirit if you wanted, but it would have felt weird.
Speaker B:But I still want to hear that.
Speaker B:Like, I would, you know, and.
Speaker B:But it also got to the point where in modern music now, even, like, let's talk about John Mayer, like, who's one of my favorite people and players and artists and been great to me.
Speaker B:And I love his records for the tasteful nature of how he places his guitar parts.
Speaker B:But I.
Speaker B:And I think this is a.
Speaker B:Maybe on purpose, but it's like I'm left wanting more.
Speaker B:And that's where the Dead and Company thing is.
Speaker B:Like, you go to that and I'm sure you get all of that you wanted to hear.
Speaker B:And then when you see him live, you see any of the YouTube videos and everything, and the way he shreds and what he does, it's like, it's all there.
Speaker B:And he is so tasteful with his.
Speaker B:His records.
Speaker B:For me, I never.
Speaker B:I never had the tasteful thing down at all.
Speaker B:I literally like, needed reined in so much.
Speaker B:My producers over the years have always been like, well, that's really cool.
Speaker B:And no one's ever going to want to hear that again outside of a.
Speaker B:Outside of a guitar lesson booth in a music store.
Speaker B:And so I would always try, you know, tasteful was not at all what I was looking for.
Speaker B:I was a.
Speaker B:I was bad that way.
Speaker B:Like, and.
Speaker B:And I.
Speaker B:But I unapologetically love that about country guitar.
Speaker B:Like, sometimes, like when you.
Speaker B:You talk about something like one of my songs, like you were talking about Celebrity, like, I.
Speaker B:The solos that we.
Speaker B:That my producer had to throw out, that.
Speaker B:I mean, I'm just going crazy.
Speaker B:But some of what Ended up in that song, which is very much a standard country composition in terms of, like, melodically and whatever.
Speaker B:But I did these.
Speaker B:These bent chords up to this.
Speaker B:You know, it's key of C and I'm.
Speaker B:And then there's these major seven, like, things that sound like a whammy bar, but it's not.
Speaker B:It's literally bending the entire chord up.
Speaker B:And.
Speaker B:And when we did that, the whole studio cracked up, you know, and we knew that was the solo.
Speaker B:Was it tasteful?
Speaker B:No, it's very distracting.
Speaker B:But to some degree, when you think lyrically about the song, it should be.
Speaker B:It should be crazy.
Speaker A:No, it fits the character of the song.
Speaker B:You're losing your mind.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:Literally.
Speaker B:You know, and.
Speaker B:And so I think that, you know, it's.
Speaker B:It's.
Speaker B:For me, it's always been this dance that way.
Speaker B:And I.
Speaker B:I do.
Speaker B:I do love that about country guitar, that there's more there than people realize.
Speaker B:I've said it's a couple of different things.
Speaker B:It's like.
Speaker B:I've always said it's jazz on the back pickup.
Speaker B:It's literally like, ah.
Speaker B:It's.
Speaker B:You know what I'm saying?
Speaker B:Like.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:As opposed to, like that neck pickup thump.
Speaker B:You do that with.
Speaker B:It's the same notes, but, yeah, all of a sudden you're inbred.
Speaker B:It goes from cosmopolitan, you know, city.
Speaker A:Folk to Central park west to West Virginia.
Speaker B:Mm.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker A:Well, I mean, your guitar playing is.
Speaker A:Has influenced so many.
Speaker A:I mean, I.
Speaker A:I don't play in that format, but, I mean, I've listened to your playing and been inspired because you play.
Speaker A:So your.
Speaker A:Your articulation is one of the things that I feel like sets you apart in your lines, you know, like, the way that you pick the articulation and the clarity between all the notes.
Speaker A:When you were starting playing these tunes, were you doing it, like, as a kid?
Speaker A:Were you on acoustic?
Speaker A:Were you on electric?
Speaker A:Where did you kiss?
Speaker B:Well, acoustic, sort of.
Speaker B:Well, I don't know.
Speaker B:My first guitar.
Speaker B:It's the coolest first guitar you could ever have in many ways also the worst in terms of playability.
Speaker B:But I was one of the Sears Silvertone amp in the case, had the tube amp.
Speaker B:Oh, really?
Speaker B:My grandpa gave it to me.
Speaker B:It was his.
Speaker B:He gifted it to me for Christmas at 8 years old.
Speaker B:And.
Speaker B:And, you know, I still have that.
Speaker B:It's.
Speaker B:It's ridiculous.
Speaker B:It's.
Speaker B:It's literally set up for slide without meaning to be.
Speaker B:It's so the action, like, I.
Speaker B:I think back to, like, if I played it now, I'd be like, there's no way I can play this.
Speaker B:And I was eight.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:And.
Speaker B:But quickly after that, I got a.
Speaker B:An acoustic and then started the process of getting better and better guitars.
Speaker B:That's the thing.
Speaker B:That's always my best advice.
Speaker B:And you probably give the same advice.
Speaker B:It's like, when you buy a really cheap guitar for a kid, you're dooming them to hate it.
Speaker B:Like, if it's.
Speaker B:If it doesn't play well, like, Fender at least makes things.
Speaker B:Now that you can.
Speaker B:You can go get a $400 guitar.
Speaker B:That's in many ways everything you need.
Speaker B:Absolutely.
Speaker B:But when you and I were first starting, that wasn't really the case.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:Like, they had, like, beginner stuff was worse.
Speaker B:Harder to play.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:I mean, that's the tough thing is, you know, you don't know, should I spend the money on this kid's instrument?
Speaker A:Because are they going to like it or not?
Speaker A:But if.
Speaker A:If I buy a crappy instrument, then it's going to be hard and they're not going to love it, you know, so that's a tough thing.
Speaker B:But that, you know, in that sense, like, I don't know.
Speaker B:I think that the articulation comes from the people I was influenced by.
Speaker B:You think about Albert Lee and James Burton and.
Speaker B:Wow.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:I mean, and same with John Jorgensen.
Speaker B:And these guys were virtuosos on the instrument.
Speaker B:Still are.
Speaker B:And able to just attack and, you know, and, and, and even those they influenced, like Skaggs, Vince Gill, Steve Warner, Jimmy Olander from Diamond Rio.
Speaker B:I mean, these guys, like, they would take a telly or in Steve's case, really a Strat, and they would just, like.
Speaker B:It would just be like they would milk things out of it a lot of the time.
Speaker B:Clean.
Speaker B:And so when you learn to play that way, like, for me, there's an art to milking tone out of an amplifier.
Speaker B:Clean.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:You know, like, and.
Speaker B:And that is about the.
Speaker B:Your hands.
Speaker B:That is about going like this.
Speaker B:This pluck.
Speaker B:Or if I'm playing a flat pick on an acoustic, I mean, I play hard.
Speaker B:Like, it is literally with my right hand.
Speaker B:With my left hand.
Speaker B:I've had to teach myself to be a lot more sort of delicate with my left hand and really aggressive with the right hand.
Speaker B:Like, you don't have to press harder, but, like, if I'm going to, like, the way I dig in and play, like, I want to hear that amp, spit it out.
Speaker B:Like.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:And.
Speaker B:And even at high speed.
Speaker B:So that got to where.
Speaker B:I mean, I do think A lot of the sound of a player is in the hands and I try to get, you know, an articulation and I also use like, I use class A British style amps.
Speaker B:So it's like, that's something I want, like, I want it right at the edge of where it.
Speaker B:Where you would consider it dirty.
Speaker B:Yeah, you know, right at the edge.
Speaker B:And if it were down, you know, there's that spot in like a Vox where it's like here is too clean, here is like distorted or here, you know.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:And right in there is where I am, where if I hit it really hard, there's a little grit.
Speaker B:If I don't, it's very clean.
Speaker B:And.
Speaker B:And I like that about like tone that way and that's that sweet spot that I look for.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:When I still.
Speaker A:I got a Paisley drive that I bought in like, I don't know, I was in college.
Speaker A:I bought the Paisley drive because I, I liked where your, where your settings were at for your drive.
Speaker A:I mean, I'm always such a clean amp guy.
Speaker A:So I was trying to find that because, you know, most of the gigs that I was doing it would be way too inappropriate to get my amps to the volume level that you're talking about.
Speaker A:You know, sometimes like, yeah, I want to be at that edge, but it's going to be freaking loud.
Speaker A:And the amps that I had at the time, it was just like it's going to be too loud.
Speaker A:But I used that drive and I accomplished that pretty great.
Speaker A:That's good.
Speaker B:That's good to hear.
Speaker B:You know, that thing's versatile.
Speaker B:The little switches and the, it's essentially got, you know, when you set it all flat and everything, it's, it's, it's in that tube Screamer world.
Speaker B:But then you do the scoop or you do the mid boost or you do the, the little drive switch and all those.
Speaker B:And it's like a lot of different pedals in one.
Speaker B:And you can find that, that sort of lower volume breakup with it.
Speaker B:And you know, and I've.
Speaker B:I'm somebody that I've been spoiled by the fact that they're my shows as opposed to playing guitar for somebody else.
Speaker B:Because all of my guitar playing friends that are playing in a band where other people have a say, sure.
Speaker B:They get, you know, heck, some of them, most of them are playing through digital gear and have no stage noise.
Speaker B:And I'm like.
Speaker B:And they're like.
Speaker B:And then they'll come to one of our shows and they walk out there And I have two, you know, Dr.
Speaker B:Z, essentially.
Speaker B:What are 30 watt AC, 30s at.
Speaker B:Breakup level.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:And they're like, holy crap, how do you get away with this?
Speaker B:And it's like, see that sound man out there?
Speaker B:I pay him, you know, and he knows.
Speaker B:It's like.
Speaker B:And we've had fights.
Speaker B:He's been with me a long time.
Speaker B:I'm like, you know, he's like an old Alabama sound guy who's been around forever, and.
Speaker B:And.
Speaker B:And he's like, oh, man, I'm bleeding in your mic.
Speaker B:I'm like, well, you know, ride it then.
Speaker A:Figure it out.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:Yep.
Speaker A:Well, I want to ask you a little bit about this new guitar of yours, this new one you got with with Fender, this lost paisley.
Speaker A:Because actually, at that last Fender hang where we were hanging, you were talking about how hard you dig in just a minute ago.
Speaker A:I was like, yeah, I know.
Speaker A:I watched you do it from, like, a foot away.
Speaker A:When we were hanging and jamming in a really.
Speaker B:That was a really fun, impromptu jam session, wasn't it?
Speaker A:It was really cool.
Speaker B:Of course, we never changed chords on that one song.
Speaker B:I was dying for a four chord.
Speaker B:And then we just stayed on, like, the one and that one.
Speaker B:Something, right?
Speaker B:Never.
Speaker A:Yeah, we were all looking over at the bass player.
Speaker A:We were.
Speaker A:I won't call him out right now.
Speaker A:He's a friend of mine.
Speaker A:But I was looking and I was like, yo, you get a move, dude.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:Like, we're all.
Speaker B:We're all hanging on a leg, you know, it's like a seventh chord going.
Speaker B:Come on.
Speaker B:It's begging for.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:See?
Speaker B:But.
Speaker B:Yeah, it's right there.
Speaker B:It is.
Speaker B:I got it right back there.
Speaker B:So the.
Speaker B:This here.
Speaker A:Yeah, this thing is dope.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:So that's it.
Speaker B:So it.
Speaker B:This is a 67 telly.
Speaker B:And the story.
Speaker B:We're telling the story at Fender here.
Speaker B:But, yeah, like, how this came to be is.
Speaker B:Get the paper on the back of that.
Speaker B:Like, how it came to be is really fascinating.
Speaker B:And you can see right there, that's.
Speaker B:That's an original pink paisley there.
Speaker B:There's a blue flower right there.
Speaker B:So when they made these, those were.
Speaker B:Those were the two they decided.
Speaker B:And they.
Speaker B:They really thought this would be a great idea at the time.
Speaker B:They were like, this will sell like hotcakes to all the hippies.
Speaker B:Like, they were literally like, it's hippie puke paper stuff called cling foil made by Borden.
Speaker B:And they're like, we'll.
Speaker B:We'll charge a premium for these.
Speaker B:And they basically stuck aluminum foil with adhesive with this, this great looking pattern on it, on these bodies and then covered them in poly and then.
Speaker B:And then did a nitro coat to do the bursting, you know.
Speaker B: y didn't realize was this was: Speaker A:Sure.
Speaker B:68'S when they were released and the hippies had no money.
Speaker B:Like, you know what I mean?
Speaker B:Like we're making a premium product for an entire generation of like, you know, Berkeley college kids that did not have an extra whatever they cost.
Speaker B:And, and so they, and not only that, but they, they looked so absolutely radical.
Speaker B:You can imagine.
Speaker B:Like they were like the, the main thing was like every now and then a custom color was red.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:And.
Speaker B:And most of the time they were blonde or black.
Speaker B:And then there's that, that just people thought they were the ugliest thing they'd ever seen.
Speaker B:And they didn't sell.
Speaker B:Like most of them got destroyed and people would buy them.
Speaker B:John Jorgensen talks about going in to a music store somewhere.
Speaker B:I forget where he said it was.
Speaker B:There were five or six paisley tellies hanging on the wall and they were giving them away.
Speaker B:They were, they had marked them down.
Speaker B: This was like: Speaker B:And.
Speaker B:And they would go.
Speaker B:And so they just hung there.
Speaker B:And what's really neat is the story of like why they became cool to me is all about James Burton.
Speaker B:And they were desperate for anybody to play these and no one really was outside of like every now and then some guitarist at a festival.
Speaker B:But they sent one to James Burton.
Speaker B:He got it.
Speaker B:He remembers, he's told the story.
Speaker B:He got it in his dressing room, the pink paisley.
Speaker B:And he got it in his dressing room in the Las Vegas Hilton.
Speaker B:He's playing for Elvis.
Speaker B:And he looked at it for a couple of days in the case and it's just this shimmering paisley, crazy looking, unbelievable anomaly.
Speaker B:And then he decided one night to sort of like prank Elvis and play it.
Speaker B:And there they are in all of their.
Speaker B:The whole band is in white jumpsuits and Elvis is in his specialized white jumpsuit and probably by then Girdle.
Speaker B:And James is like, he's got this guitar on, right?
Speaker B:And they start the show, he's playing and Elvis comes out and he said Elvis just was like looking at him like, what is that?
Speaker B:The whole show he just kept looking at him.
Speaker B:And James is going, oh man, I'm dead.
Speaker B:He is going to fire me for stealing the show with this monstrosity.
Speaker B:And he walks backstage and he says, boss I'm sorry, I had to do it.
Speaker B:They sent it to me, you know, I'll never play it again.
Speaker B:And he said, oh, no, no, you'll never play anything else again.
Speaker B:That's cool as can be.
Speaker B:And so Elvis is.
Speaker B:Who blessed these.
Speaker A:Interesting.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:And then James never played anything else.
Speaker B:Like, he retired his other guitars and he was known until he came out with a Sig model later, but he was known for that throughout that era.
Speaker B:And.
Speaker B:And had he not done that, I mean, I don't know if I can play them because honestly, they were that crazy.
Speaker B:They were sort of.
Speaker B:Although a lot of the old stuff, that was an insane idea we now look at and go, I got to have one those.
Speaker A:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker B:But who knows?
Speaker B:And I mean, in the end, like, when I came, I'm, you know, I was born with this name and I got a record deal or in 95.
Speaker B:I bought that one, that.
Speaker B:That pink one right there.
Speaker B: I bought that in: Speaker B:And because I.
Speaker B:I'd gotten.
Speaker B:I.
Speaker B:I hadn't got a record deal yet at that point, but I was about to, I think, and.
Speaker B:And I took what little songwriting royalty money I had and got that for, I think I paid two, $3,000, which seemed like a lot.
Speaker B:And.
Speaker B:Yeah, and they were already collectible, but they weren't what they are now.
Speaker B:Like, now they're getting kind of ridiculous.
Speaker A:But, yeah, those things are sick.
Speaker A:Well, and yours is.
Speaker A:Your new one.
Speaker A:Your new one has a B.
Speaker A:Bender on it.
Speaker B:G.
Speaker B:Yeah, I put those.
Speaker B:It's a glacier.
Speaker B:You can see it right there.
Speaker B:I put those on things that are.
Speaker B:That I use live.
Speaker B:That's kind of my.
Speaker B:I.
Speaker B:I chose that.
Speaker B:It's kind of my go to signature thing that I can.
Speaker B:I.
Speaker B:I always heard, you know, B Bender is one thing.
Speaker B:It's a whole different sound, though, that.
Speaker B:This thing.
Speaker B:The.
Speaker B:That's your B, you know, but if it's a G, it's more of the.
Speaker B:It's that lower.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:And that's got a.
Speaker B:It's throatier and it sounds more.
Speaker B:Well, I just thought, you know what?
Speaker B:Nobody does this.
Speaker B:I'll do this.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:I mean, I'm curious because I've seen, you know, I've looked at him and people are like, oh, yeah, you can sound like a pedal steel.
Speaker A:You can do this and that.
Speaker A:And I'm just curious, can you tell me what, like, what's your main.
Speaker A:Like.
Speaker A:Oh, yeah.
Speaker A:Here's the stereotypical ways that I would use this.
Speaker A:Like, what's the main two ways that you like to Use the G bender.
Speaker B:I like to use it to do something you can't do with your hands.
Speaker B:Like if you played like, I don't have a strap hooked up, but if you played a.
Speaker B:Like this right here.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:You can.
Speaker B:You can bend this while it's a chord.
Speaker A:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker B:So it's like.
Speaker B:So imagine this right here.
Speaker B:But it goes.
Speaker B:It's immediately country.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:When you can.
Speaker B:And that's the thing that sounds pedal steelish is when you take chords and you're bending notes in the middle of them.
Speaker A:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker B:And.
Speaker B:And sometimes it's about the sound.
Speaker B:There's a.
Speaker B:There's a mechanical nature to what a steel guitar does, which is.
Speaker B:A steel guitar usually has like eight of these on the strings and they.
Speaker B:And again, that's an instrument that's an insane thing to really master.
Speaker A:Oh, yeah.
Speaker B:And you know, your.
Speaker B:Your knees are doing this and your feet are doing this, and you're literally like.
Speaker B:It reminds you of one of these organists that's playing the bass part, you know.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:With their feet and.
Speaker B:And so.
Speaker B:But the mechanical thing is a different sound.
Speaker B:Like you.
Speaker B:Like when even the most.
Speaker B:I try to go, that still sounds to me like hands doing it and.
Speaker B:But when I do it with the.
Speaker B:The bender, it's literally gonna go, you know, I mean, in a way that.
Speaker B:That feels like a steel guitar.
Speaker B:And it's about the sound.
Speaker B:It's not that I can do much with it that I can't do without it.
Speaker B:It's about a signature thing.
Speaker B:And when you couple like, what is my sound?
Speaker B:I wanted to create something where, you know, it's me before.
Speaker B:Before you hear me sing.
Speaker B:Like, that's the.
Speaker B:The goal for me was that I was signature enough in sound that it was unique.
Speaker B:And it's.
Speaker B:When you couple a guitar like this with.
Speaker B:With tele pickups that I like through a little slap back through a.
Speaker B:Either a doctor's ear, a Vox, or a train wreck or whatever it is I'm playing through.
Speaker B:That's kind of that British thing through, you know, with a little bender lick.
Speaker B:I.
Speaker B:I mean, it's.
Speaker A:It's me, but I could plug into all that gear and not sound like you.
Speaker A:When did.
Speaker B:You might sound a lot better.
Speaker B:You might sound better than me.
Speaker A:I doubt it.
Speaker A:When did you.
Speaker A:When did you feel like you accomplished that where.
Speaker A:Where you had a signature sound before you started singing?
Speaker A:The second you start playing guitar, it's like, oh, that's the thing.
Speaker A:And.
Speaker A:And what.
Speaker A:What do you think were the key moments to get you There if you.
Speaker B:Well, influences like I was emulating sonically, I've always wanted to be John Jorgensen, who in the eight in the late 80s, early 90s, he was in the Desert Rose Band and they came through Wheeling, West Virginia and I opened for them.
Speaker B:And he had two AC 30s, both of them custom colored.
Speaker B:He had a teal one and a red one sitting on the stage that he had recovered.
Speaker B:So here's two AC 30s and he's playing.
Speaker B:He was playing a GNL a set, but it's essentially a telly.
Speaker B:And he's plugged into these two with a little delay pedal.
Speaker B:He also uses some great vibrato effects and he'll do chorus and he'll do.
Speaker B: an imagine at that time, it's: Speaker B:And here comes a guy playing Vox AC 30s.
Speaker B:Nobody was doing that since the Beatles.
Speaker B:Like he had found two old JMI AC 30s refurbed them got him running his fun fact, his amp tech at the time was Mark Sampson, who went on to make Matchless.
Speaker B:Yeah, and so he knew how to make these sound good.
Speaker B:And I was like, what is that?
Speaker B:Like, here's a guy, he's cranked, he's playing these on stage, he's doing crazy instrumental stuff.
Speaker B:And I wanted to be him.
Speaker B:Like I've always said he's my broken arm, like pinch hitter.
Speaker B:You know, if I had a skiing accident, I'd be like, john, I'm gonna pay you to play my solos for the next six weeks on these gigs.
Speaker B:And I'm just gonna stand there and watch what you do, you know what I mean?
Speaker B:I'd be like, you gotta play through my rig, which is essentially his rig.
Speaker B:And I'm just going to let you take it and do what you think I should have done on these songs.
Speaker B:That would have been the dream, you know.
Speaker B:But he's who I always wanted to sound like.
Speaker B:And there are a lot of similarities.
Speaker B:And I've told him before how much I owe him that way.
Speaker B:But then there's also some, some things that I, that I learned from other people.
Speaker B:Like watching Vince Gill and watching Steve Warner and, you know, and then getting into like what makes an amp sound good and what sounds good to me.
Speaker B:But when we started Cutting the first album, to answer your question on, like, when did I find it?
Speaker B:So I.
Speaker B:So I had a.
Speaker B:I had an old 63 AC 30, and I had this pedal at the time that was obscure, just I had bought and I thought it sounded great.
Speaker B:A way huge Aquapus delay.
Speaker B:So on my first album, I had that.
Speaker B:That pink telly right there.
Speaker B:I was just getting started overdubbing the very first song when the pickup, the original 68 pickup blew.
Speaker B:It just came on.
Speaker B:It just flew apart.
Speaker B:Like, they do that because they kind of made them pretty bad in the late 60s.
Speaker B:So I had to go buy a pickup for.
Speaker B:And I bought a Lindy Fran.
Speaker B:I went through a bunch of pickups, tested them out, and bought a Lindy Fran that really mimicked a late 60s pickup.
Speaker B:Put that in that guitar, went through that delay pedal into that AC30, really worked on micing it, and played track one, album one, which is a song called Long Sermon.
Speaker B:And it's.
Speaker B:And it starts with guitar and it's an entire, like, thing.
Speaker B:And that was my sound immediately and still is.
Speaker B:And it's so fascinating.
Speaker B:Even when I've used other amps and other versions of this, it still comes back to.
Speaker B:I sound like that.
Speaker B:I already had the G bender.
Speaker B:I played all those licks with it.
Speaker B:And it's still.
Speaker B:It still to me holds up like.
Speaker B:It's like, oh, yeah, that I got it right the first try.
Speaker B:And since then, I've kind of lost my way now and then.
Speaker B:But I think that really was.
Speaker B:Yeah, it really was.
Speaker B:Like.
Speaker B:And what's funny is the first year I'm out there promoting the album, had my first single out, and I played Town hall in New York and I opened for Loretta Lynn.
Speaker B:And at that gig, I set up my pedal board and my delay pedal died, which was this Aquapus.
Speaker B:And I went.
Speaker B:I went down to one of the music stores down on.
Speaker B:What's the street where they're all at?
Speaker B:Yeah, you know where.
Speaker B:And I.
Speaker B:And I walked into, like, it was Sam Ash or one of those.
Speaker B:And I'm like, hey, can I.
Speaker B:Does anybody on this street sell way huge effects?
Speaker B:And they're like, oh, no.
Speaker B:You know what?
Speaker B:They just went out of business.
Speaker B:That thing's going to be worth some money.
Speaker B:And I had to take.
Speaker B:I had to go buy, like, another delay pedal, use that for the gig.
Speaker B:And then I got back to Nashville and bought a couple more Aqua Pusses.
Speaker B:Yeah, they now go for.
Speaker B:I've seen them online for, like $8,000.
Speaker A:Really.
Speaker B:And this is what sucks when you read the thing.
Speaker B:It literally says, john Mayer and Brad Paisley use these.
Speaker B:And they aren't made.
Speaker B:They now make new versions of them, which sound great, but, like, they're like the originals, which have some identifying things, thanks to us.
Speaker B:Unaffordable for me.
Speaker A:You are the reason why your reverb cart is so expensive.
Speaker B:Oh, it's like you read.
Speaker B:I read things like that all the time.
Speaker B:I'm looking at it going, I need to quit telling people I'm buying this.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:That's funny.
Speaker A:Okay.
Speaker A:I was thinking about our 1.
Speaker A:The last time I hung with you before we said goodbye, we got in this exciting conversation.
Speaker A:And you'll know which one I'm talking about after.
Speaker A:Okay.
Speaker A:This is your whole rig, right?
Speaker A:You got your sound, you got your thing.
Speaker A:You got your AC 30s, you got your delay.
Speaker A:You got your guitars.
Speaker A:Donald Fagan calls you tomorrow and asks you to play with Steely Dan for one tour.
Speaker A:Are you still bringing the same rig?
Speaker A:Are you switching it up?
Speaker B:Steely Dan?
Speaker B:I'd have.
Speaker B:I think I'd have to switch that up, probably.
Speaker B:I mean, I guess that's a 335.
Speaker A:I mean, John Harrington normally plays, I think, like a 3:30 or something.
Speaker A:But I also.
Speaker B:I have.
Speaker B:Now, that's my fa.
Speaker B:I got a 3:30 right over here.
Speaker B:It's my.
Speaker B:That's my favorite Gibson ever made, that.
Speaker B:The 330 with P90 is unbelievable.
Speaker B:I don't know.
Speaker B:I mean, I guess, first of all, they will.
Speaker B:I'll get fired from that gig quick.
Speaker B:They're going to be like, this is the wrong idea.
Speaker B:What?
Speaker A:Reason?
Speaker B:First it's like, you know those later attempts with Van Halen to find a lead singer.
Speaker B:It'd be that.
Speaker B:Be like, you know what?
Speaker B:You're cool, but you're not this band.
Speaker A:Sure.
Speaker B:No, I think.
Speaker B:I think it'd be that.
Speaker B:It'd be like, I don't know.
Speaker B:You're probably.
Speaker B:Yeah, I could learn all that.
Speaker B:I.
Speaker B:And it'd be a lot of fun.
Speaker B:Maybe I'm too set in my ways to, like, take a gig where I gotta sound like somebody else.
Speaker B:And now if they're wanting, like, if.
Speaker B:Like, that would be fun to be like, oh, we'd love to hear what you do with this.
Speaker B:Okay.
Speaker B:Careful what you wish for here.
Speaker B:What about you?
Speaker B:Would you.
Speaker B:Would you, like.
Speaker B:Could you do it?
Speaker B:Could you fit right in and play through the.
Speaker A:I mean.
Speaker A:Yeah, I'd still play my Strat.
Speaker A:I'd still.
Speaker A:I'd take a little more of, like, the.
Speaker A:You know, here's Later.
Speaker B:Later, Carlton.
Speaker A:Later, Carlton.
Speaker A:Or even, you know, when Walter Becker was taking some solos and some of that Strat zone.
Speaker A:I'm.
Speaker A:I'm going to lean into the Strat and just be like, I'll.
Speaker A:I'll do.
Speaker A:I'm going to play to the gig, but I'm also going to.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:You know, I'll play the signature parts of the solos, but I'm also going to kind of take my own.
Speaker A:I'm going to do my own take on it, you know?
Speaker B:Yeah, that makes a lot of sense.
Speaker B:I've always thought of it like this.
Speaker B:And this is kind of a rule I have for when we work a song up that we've recorded.
Speaker B:It's.
Speaker B:You have to stick to the ones that you remember in your mind.
Speaker B:Like the Sig Things that you remember.
Speaker B:Like, there are.
Speaker B:You know, like, there's a lot of that song that.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:If I were to listen to it right now, I'd be like, well, I didn't realize that's going on at the same time.
Speaker B:But what I remember, you're gonna need to hear.
Speaker B:And it's sort of like the.
Speaker B:It's sort of like Sweet Caroline, right?
Speaker A:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker B:Like, you think of that, and I guess that happens.
Speaker B:But it's so much more now, thanks to Boston and.
Speaker B:And every bar when they win or whatever.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:That it's literally.
Speaker B:And it's same with, you know.
Speaker B:So Good.
Speaker B:So good.
Speaker B:That's not on the record.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:You're not playing some blues lick in between.
Speaker B:No, you gotta play songs that.
Speaker B:I think of that I think we have constructed.
Speaker B:Like, I.
Speaker B:What was the song I listened to the other day, and I was that way where it was like it was somebody else's.
Speaker B:And I was going.
Speaker B:I don't think that even really happens.
Speaker B:The thing we think of as this signature progression, it's kind of there, but not really.
Speaker B:And in my mind, it's mixed louder than anything in the song.
Speaker B:And so when you.
Speaker B:When you play something like a Steely Dan record or anything like that, I think you got to hit the ones that in your mind are there.
Speaker B:And then don't worry about the nerd that's in the front row going.
Speaker A:Whether it's a musical Mandela effect or.
Speaker B:Not, it's exactly that, isn't it?
Speaker B:It's literally that a thousand percent.
Speaker A:Yeah, I have that with certain songs.
Speaker A:I actually was just in an argument with my daughter about the song Landslide.
Speaker A:I was like, the landslide pull you down down like they say, down, down again like, there's no version I'm like, maybe it's the Smashing Pumpkins version.
Speaker A:Maybe it's the Chicks version.
Speaker A:Maybe it's.
Speaker A:And then we listen all.
Speaker A:None of them do it.
Speaker A:And I'm like, well, I don't know why I thought it did it, but.
Speaker B:Well, hey, we were just talking about that.
Speaker B:Are you Black Mirror fan?
Speaker A:Oh, yeah.
Speaker B:So the new season, I love everything about it.
Speaker B:Some of them are too dark for me, but I hang in there and watch it most of the time.
Speaker B:I love it.
Speaker B:Did you see the Mandela Effect episode this year?
Speaker A:I didn't.
Speaker B:I think it's episode two.
Speaker B:It really is about that.
Speaker B:It's about.
Speaker B:But it explains, like, why this is happening to this person.
Speaker B:Like, they'll say, you know, I put that there, and it's not there.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:You know what I mean?
Speaker B:Like, I said it there.
Speaker B:And they're like.
Speaker B:And then they review the video.
Speaker B:It's.
Speaker B:She never did.
Speaker B:And then you find out why.
Speaker B:But, like.
Speaker B:But we were.
Speaker B:I was just having this discussion with a brain surgeon friend of mine.
Speaker B:I was like, have you heard of the Mandela Effect?
Speaker B:He's like, no.
Speaker B:I said, what?
Speaker B:You're a brain surgeon?
Speaker B:And we got into these things, like, did Curious George have a tail?
Speaker B:And this one.
Speaker B:See if you were.
Speaker B:You with me on this.
Speaker B:The Raisin Bran son.
Speaker A:The Raisin Bran son.
Speaker A:Okay.
Speaker A:I'm thinking about the guy.
Speaker A:I'm thinking about the jazz ensemble.
Speaker A:Okay.
Speaker A:No, they had the sun.
Speaker B:The sun on the.
Speaker B:The sun on the box of Raisin Bran.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:I'm trying to picture it in my head.
Speaker A:Go ahead.
Speaker B:The sun and black sunglasses.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:You know, he never had sunglasses.
Speaker A:I do picture him with sunglasses.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Now that you mention it.
Speaker B:Absolutely.
Speaker B:No question about it.
Speaker B:There is no version they've ever sold where the sun is wearing sunglasses and everybody remembers the sunglasses.
Speaker B:Something's up.
Speaker B:They're messing with us.
Speaker B:No, but it's like.
Speaker B:It's like that musically.
Speaker B:I definitely think they're trying to think of the song that was.
Speaker B:That was like.
Speaker B:Literally, I was like, that doesn't.
Speaker B:They don't even say that in the song.
Speaker B:And you're right about.
Speaker B:Same thing with Landslide.
Speaker B:And so when you play for somebody, that's the trick for me, too, is like, we talk about tasteful.
Speaker B:When I'm playing something on a record, I really want something that you want to hear over and over again.
Speaker B:And then I want something later in the song that you don't want to hear over and over again.
Speaker B:But you're going to have to, because it's that Intricate.
Speaker B:I want the.
Speaker B:I want the lick in any song I can cut.
Speaker B:I always kind of want one lick that a guitar teacher is going to get mad at me about.
Speaker B:When a kid comes in and wants.
Speaker A:To learn it, I like that.
Speaker B:And I had that experience once which was the best I was.
Speaker B:It was at a music store in Santa Barbara.
Speaker B:I walked in there to buy a couple of things and there's a little kid standing with his dad and he yanks on his dad's sleeve.
Speaker B:When he sees me and I see him do it from across the room, he's like, new points.
Speaker B:And his dad comes over to me and says, you're his favorite.
Speaker B:And he's taking a guitar lesson today and he's learning Mud on the tires.
Speaker B:And I said, oh, really?
Speaker B:He's like, yeah.
Speaker B:And he said, which is.
Speaker B:Which is a great example of one where it's like, you know, it's like, you know, things like that going on in that solo that.
Speaker B:I mean that's.
Speaker B:That'd be hard if you're eight.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:That stuff.
Speaker B:And.
Speaker B:And he said, any advice?
Speaker B:And I said, no, tell me what I'm doing wrong because I'm pretty sure I have some bad habits live now.
Speaker B:I don't play like the record.
Speaker B:The guitar teacher walks out from the lesson booth, comes out and goes, all right, Tommy.
Speaker B:And sees me standing there and he is.
Speaker B:And he's like, oh my God, I had to learn this.
Speaker B:And he's like, you're.
Speaker B:Show me.
Speaker B:I'm like, no, you're on your own, dude.
Speaker B:It was so ironic.
Speaker B:We took a bunch of photos.
Speaker B:But that idea, like seeing the guitar teacher who's just had to sit down because the kid wants to learn this and learn it himself.
Speaker B:And then I'm standing there.
Speaker B:It was so much fun.
Speaker A:That's great.
Speaker A:I love that.
Speaker B:And what is a typically simple song.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:But you got these one time events in there that.
Speaker A:That make you think.
Speaker B:I really like that about it.
Speaker B:Like the idea that you can do something in this, you know, because that's a.
Speaker B:I've got some big news.
Speaker B:The bank finally came through.
Speaker B:You know, and.
Speaker B:But in the middle of that, there's things that even I don't play right now.
Speaker A:Well, yeah, even harmonically.
Speaker A:How you got.
Speaker A:And got those minor 11 chords, those voicings where it's like.
Speaker A:You wouldn't normally think to put those kind of voicings in that kind of song.
Speaker A:But it's like, oh, that's really what makes.
Speaker A:It's kind of an X factor in some of that.
Speaker B:And I steal that from.
Speaker B:From Red Volkart.
Speaker B:Like, I.
Speaker B:Right around the time I did that Mud on the Tires album.
Speaker B:And he's on there.
Speaker B:He's on the instrumental.
Speaker B:Red is this monster who.
Speaker B:You know, he's a monster.
Speaker B:He played a big.
Speaker B:I think he played a Don Kelly memorial type event.
Speaker B:And they had everybody there.
Speaker B:I wasn't at this, but I heard about it.
Speaker B:They had everybody, though.
Speaker B:And still he ate them for lunch.
Speaker B:Doesn't set out to do that, but he is like.
Speaker B:It's like he.
Speaker B:Around that album, I realized.
Speaker B:I'm like, you can do these jazz chords in a country thing like.
Speaker B:Like.
Speaker B:Like celebrities on that record.
Speaker B:So it's like that.
Speaker B:So you have that.
Speaker B:That second.
Speaker B:The first solo.
Speaker B:And Celebrity is.
Speaker B:But that's.
Speaker B:That's kind of some jazzy licks.
Speaker B:But that's not the crazy one.
Speaker B:It's the second one, you know.
Speaker B:But the more they run my name down, the more my price goes up.
Speaker B:When you're celebrity.
Speaker B:Right?
Speaker B:So at the end of Being a celebrity.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:You know what I mean?
Speaker A:That's Steely Dan sounded stuff, too.
Speaker A:It's like the J grade, right.
Speaker B:So that I.
Speaker B:Yeah, that part, I'd be all right.
Speaker B:But, like, the tonally, I don't know.
Speaker B:But in the end, it's.
Speaker B:It's always fun to be like, what can I do with this?
Speaker B:That doesn't feel like I've phoned it in.
Speaker B:I never want to.
Speaker B:I always want to think it's creative.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:On a record, guitar wise and state of music right now, I think there's a little less of that, but there's some coming back for sure.
Speaker B:I've heard some lately that's like, oh, that's a cool guitar part.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:My friend Chris, Young, country artist, sent me a song the other day that he's cut and had all this telly stuff on it.
Speaker B:And he's like, dude, I need you to listen to this.
Speaker B:And I listen to it.
Speaker B:I'm like, it's great.
Speaker B:I'm pissed, though.
Speaker B:Why.
Speaker B:Why am I not doing that?
Speaker B:And he's like, will you do it?
Speaker B:I said, sure.
Speaker B:I mean, I'll do it.
Speaker B:He's like, you play the like.
Speaker B:Like, put your guitar on it.
Speaker B:I'm like, all right.
Speaker B:That always makes me happy when somebody's, like, not just ripping me off, they're letting me play on it.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Well, what do you look for?
Speaker A:I mean, you probably get so many people who say they want to work with you as a producer or as a writer, you know.
Speaker B:I definitely don't get that they've people the words out.
Speaker B:You don't want me as a producer.
Speaker B:I don't even produce my own stuff really well.
Speaker A:What do you.
Speaker A:What do you look for in a producer?
Speaker A:What do you look for in the people that you work with?
Speaker B:I think patience, for sure.
Speaker B:When it comes to, like, these things, they aren't quick.
Speaker B:Sometimes.
Speaker B:Like when I think about the Mud on the Tires record or even like you say, like my.
Speaker B:My instrumental, largely instrumental album called Play, that's.
Speaker B:That's a.
Speaker B:That was discovery.
Speaker B:That was a lot of hours, a lot of late nights and.
Speaker B:And I think that's as big a factor as anything.
Speaker B:Of course, somebody's going to be creative if they're a record producer, but the ability to sort of, like, it's archeology.
Speaker B:You're digging for these bones of something.
Speaker B:And I look for that somebody who's passionate and excited to find something new.
Speaker B:And that's always really.
Speaker B:It's really refreshing energy in the studio, you know, like, if you're in the studio, when I cut by myself, that's a.
Speaker B:It's.
Speaker B:I can do it.
Speaker B:And I do do that a lot.
Speaker B:I sit right here and do that.
Speaker B:But, like, there's nothing more fun than when I.
Speaker B:When it's time to play guitar solos on a record and I have.
Speaker B:I'll call a co writer on the song or somebody and say, hey, come in.
Speaker B:I'm going to cut solos today.
Speaker B:And if they're sitting in the corner, I'm telling you, I play better.
Speaker B:Yeah, you know.
Speaker A:Yeah, I absolutely know.
Speaker B:You know, because you can imagine, like on the celebrity solo, it's like, like, it's like, so we're doing this, you know, and it's like.
Speaker B:And the easy solo would have been something like that, right?
Speaker B:Yeah, but it was like, no, I've been listening to Red.
Speaker B:He throws in, Red will go.
Speaker B:You know, he'll do Django stuff in the middle of a.
Speaker B:Yeah, typical song.
Speaker B:And it's like.
Speaker B:But I'm like, all right, what about.
Speaker B:You know what I mean?
Speaker A:That.
Speaker B:Yeah, as soon as we did that, the studio had.
Speaker B:I think I had two engineers and a.
Speaker B:My producer and.
Speaker B:And a friend sitting there and they.
Speaker B:They all stood up and, like, cackled.
Speaker A:Because it was like.
Speaker B:And I'm like, play that back.
Speaker B:Let me hear if that's ridiculous.
Speaker B:And you hear it back.
Speaker B:And I'm like, I gotta do that.
Speaker B:I want to do that every night.
Speaker A:Yeah, well.
Speaker A:And I mean, just that biofeedback.
Speaker A:I mean, I Know what it's like where you're sitting here by yourself and.
Speaker A:Or, you know, I'll sit here by myself and play something.
Speaker A:Like, I don't know.
Speaker A:Am I even on the right track?
Speaker A:I'm not getting any energy.
Speaker A:Like it maybe is great.
Speaker A:But I have nobody else maybe in my own head too much.
Speaker A:Nobody's telling me.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker A:That thing.
Speaker A:Or like, oh, no, switch direct.
Speaker A:Sometimes just having somebody in the room, if you do something.
Speaker A:Oh, this is getting a response.
Speaker A:Oh, okay.
Speaker A:Yeah, I guess this is great.
Speaker B:Exactly.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:And I think that's the reason I co Write a lot.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:It does.
Speaker B:It does affect how you write.
Speaker B:When you co write.
Speaker B:Like, it's a different painting, you know?
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:That was the thing about.
Speaker B:That's what Roger Miller used to say.
Speaker B:It's like, Roger, why don't you co write more?
Speaker B:He's like, because Picasso didn't co paint.
Speaker B:But it's like.
Speaker B:But I feel like co writing.
Speaker B:It does.
Speaker B:It does lead to.
Speaker B:It's the closest thing to trying it out for an audience.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:Before you ever do.
Speaker A:Sure.
Speaker B:And I have a couple of guys that I've written with since I was in college and they.
Speaker B:They're an extension.
Speaker B:We are absolutely synchronized when we write, you know, and new people.
Speaker B:It's a different experience.
Speaker B:But like a couple of these old friends.
Speaker B:It's a.
Speaker B:You know.
Speaker B:But that's.
Speaker B:That's the thing.
Speaker B:It's that feedback and I think music.
Speaker B:We're living in a world now where it's so weird to think about the fact that whatever you do can immediately be available.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:And immediately value evaluated and immediately shit on in a major way.
Speaker B:Like.
Speaker B:You know what I'm saying?
Speaker A:It's pretty crazy.
Speaker B:Yeah, it's crazy.
Speaker A:Oh yeah.
Speaker B:You think about.
Speaker B:I remember the first time, like my first album was so like the Internet was kind of new and it was like.
Speaker B:I remember seeing like the message board would spring up or they would put one out, you know, and it's.
Speaker B:Everybody's finally able to.
Speaker B:It's that the dawn of.
Speaker B:Here's my opinion.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:You don't know who I am, but here's my opinion.
Speaker B:And it went from like kind of in there discussing in a really healthy way, music and whatever to you're ugly and me going, am I?
Speaker B:They were right.
Speaker A:No, no.
Speaker B:But you know what I mean?
Speaker B:It's like anything they.
Speaker B:You started to.
Speaker B:It took a minute to go.
Speaker B:I don't really care now what they say.
Speaker B:I have to make it for me.
Speaker B:Although I do Think there's a.
Speaker B:Any artist that says, oh, I don't really care.
Speaker B:There's an element where you do.
Speaker B:There's things you do care about.
Speaker B:Like, I do want someone to like it, but everybody doesn't have to.
Speaker A:I mean, the tough part about that is now it's even kids that aren't putting themselves out there with an album are just out there on the.
Speaker A:All the platforms and, you know, having to figure out how to deal with that before they even have a chance to develop their brain.
Speaker B:And, yeah, I was even.
Speaker B:I don't know how you are with years, but it's like, I.
Speaker A:We.
Speaker B:We were really careful with our kids, like, that.
Speaker B:They weren't on it.
Speaker B:I mean, heck, they didn't get their first phone till they were 13 or 14 years old.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:You know, they had.
Speaker B:They were the last in their classes to get their own phone.
Speaker B:And even when they did, it was.
Speaker B:There's.
Speaker B:They weren't on social media.
Speaker B:And I just tried to preserve some of that.
Speaker B:That thing that we grew up with more.
Speaker B:That was a little less of a obsession with it.
Speaker B:And it's.
Speaker B:I don't know what it does to creativity now.
Speaker B:Like, there is the effect of, like, we're all wondering what it does to music by the fact that, you know, everybody's got a platform and everything's kind of free for the most part.
Speaker B:Like, you can find a way to listen to music free.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:If you want.
Speaker B:But, like, it's not.
Speaker B:I don't love that.
Speaker B:But it is what it is.
Speaker B:And.
Speaker B:And in.
Speaker B:In the sense of, like.
Speaker B:But that's one side of the coin that we're all focused on.
Speaker B:The other side of the coin is, are people as creative or are they just addicted to something and not, you know, they're not sitting in a log cabin reading a book by candlelight anymore?
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:I mean, it's such an interesting conversation because there's so many sides.
Speaker A:But, like, as a consumer, Spotify is the greatest.
Speaker A:It's like, oh, my gosh, I can listen to the entirety of recorded music at any moment.
Speaker A:You know, like, yeah, I could pull up Stevie Wonder's entire catalog and listen to it if I wanted to.
Speaker A:But also.
Speaker A:And, but so as a consumer, it's great.
Speaker A:I think as a budding artist, you know, the barrier to entry is lower than ever, and there's such a fast way to be able to be heard.
Speaker A:But then that's the exact thing that its greatest strength is also its greatest weakness in so many.
Speaker A:I mean, not even on the side of Opinions where it's like, yeah, anybody's opinion can be heard across the world.
Speaker A:It's like, eh, maybe you're not an expert in this thing and you know what you're saying is not true.
Speaker A:Or it could be like, oh yeah, it's kind of, you know, there's a lot of noise to have to sift through.
Speaker B:The noise is the thing.
Speaker B:And that's the thing too.
Speaker B:Like, my kids now are a great influence musically on me because they find the things they like.
Speaker B:They are not necessarily things I would discover.
Speaker B:The other day Bonaver did a new album that was.
Speaker B:That just came out.
Speaker B:That's really cool.
Speaker B:I think he's a brilliant guy anyway.
Speaker B:Oh yeah.
Speaker B:And so my oldest and I, I was like, let's go.
Speaker B:We went at.
Speaker B:At 11 o' clock, which is midnight east coast in Nashville and drove and listened to the whole thing beginning to end.
Speaker B:Which has been a while since I did that when an album was released.
Speaker B:And yeah, I mean I used to do that.
Speaker B:You know, the new Alan Jackson record or the new Eric Clapton record or something would come out and I would.
Speaker B:That was be like what I would do and just drive until I'd heard the whole thing and then I, you know, and that was a really neat experience.
Speaker B:But it, you know, at the time when I would do it as a kid at his age, it was one of three or four CDs released that week.
Speaker B:You know what I mean?
Speaker B:The one that I would drive and listen to.
Speaker B:And this was, you know, we're choosing to listen to an entire album when I.
Speaker B:I don't even know what the number is.
Speaker B:I've heard it before, but it's of daily released songs.
Speaker B:Like it's got to be.
Speaker B:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker B:It's insane.
Speaker B:Like it's more in one day than used to come out in a year.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:And.
Speaker B:And how do you get someone with a new record to do that?
Speaker B:What I did for Bon Iver, you know what I mean?
Speaker B:Like, I want to hear.
Speaker B:I want, I want somebody next album to do that.
Speaker A:Yeah, I know.
Speaker A:Again, it's like it's great that people have the output let.
Speaker A:But there's part of it that gets taken advantage of.
Speaker A:It's like, oh yeah, I work for this company and really we're just like putting out music to make money because like we think that it'll.
Speaker A:It.
Speaker A:We've done the research and found that, you know, if we get on one study playlist that will make X amount of money.
Speaker A:So we're just putting out a hundred songs that Sound like things that are on this other study playlist.
Speaker A:And if we land on this study playlist, we'll have, you know, a few grand a month of revenue, and then we'll aim for this other playlist and this other wine bar playlist.
Speaker A:It's like, are we.
Speaker A:This is all just for commerce.
Speaker A:We're not making art here.
Speaker A:We're not trying to move the, you know, move the art form forward.
Speaker A:It's.
Speaker A:It's really.
Speaker B:Does anything make you sadder than those discussions?
Speaker B:Like, for me, those discussions with the label make me sad.
Speaker B:Like, I'm like, guys, can you talk about this without me?
Speaker B:Like, find it.
Speaker B:Find the playlist I need to be on and tell me what interviews to do, because I don't want to think about it.
Speaker B:I don't want to worry about it.
Speaker B:I want to make music.
Speaker B:And that.
Speaker B:Because that is where, like, the.
Speaker B:The joy of this is when we play.
Speaker B:The joy of this is when people love it or hear it or when you create and you're proud of it.
Speaker B:The marketing of it.
Speaker B:Like, I went to school for that, and I knew how to do it at the time.
Speaker B:It's changed a lot.
Speaker B:But, you know, it's hard to market yourself and not lose it.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:You know, and there's definitely a way to do it with integrity, and there's a way to put out your album and market it with.
Speaker A:Without compromising any of your artistry.
Speaker A:It's just the stuff that frustrates me is when the thing is just being made for the sake of whatever, you know, it's like, I think we're losing the plot.
Speaker A:I think we're losing the plot.
Speaker A:You know, like, I don't know.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:You want to.
Speaker B:You want to make music that you would have made anyway.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:I'm never as.
Speaker B:You know, we're all guilty of it, like, doing what we're told now and then or some, you know, when it doesn't feel great.
Speaker B:But it's like, you know, I'm definitely happiest, like, when I'm excited about what I'm coming up with on my own.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:You know, and.
Speaker B:And getting a good guitar sound and getting a.
Speaker B:Like, that's.
Speaker B:That's when it's like the chase.
Speaker B:It's where we are the dog that never catches the car on that.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:And it's not about catching the car, like, tone or even perfect notes and choices.
Speaker B:It's like, I still.
Speaker B:There's nothing I look at and go, wouldn't change anything.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:Ever.
Speaker B:Even.
Speaker B:You know, I can think of moments in my career, like, I.
Speaker B:I listened to something like Whiskey Lullaby, like, which to me is, you know, it's.
Speaker B:It's a very important moment where me and Alison Krause do this song that becomes song of the Year.
Speaker B:And it becomes in every way, you know, more important than either of us ever dreamed.
Speaker B:But I still look at that and go, oh, I would re.
Speaker B:Sing that part.
Speaker B:No one else would feel that way.
Speaker A:Sure.
Speaker A:I mean, I got that on every record that I've done.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:Pretty well.
Speaker A:Pretty much everything I'm like, I could have done.
Speaker A:Oh, maybe I should have.
Speaker A:Maybe I should have put the reverb at 6% instead of 12, you know?
Speaker B:Yeah, well, I think about it.
Speaker B:Yeah, exactly.
Speaker B:It's like, you know, we all know so much more now, and we look back and go, what was I doing?
Speaker B:Or you did some ridiculous new trends on a song that felt like it was the future and it was not.
Speaker B:You know, like, I'm like, nobody's doing that now.
Speaker B:Why'd I do that?
Speaker A:Yeah, well, I mean, you know what the joy of this conversation in general is that I've gotten to know a little more about how serious you are about your craft and how much think about it, you know.
Speaker B:Well, likewise.
Speaker B:And I think that, you know, it's.
Speaker B:It's always the fun part as a guitarist is that we are in a little.
Speaker B:We're in a little club that does exist outside of the typical music business.
Speaker B:Like.
Speaker B:Like, I.
Speaker B:You know, guys like us just like the Fender event where we got to jam.
Speaker B:It's like.
Speaker B:Like my wife says, it's like, you.
Speaker B:She's like, you know, a language I don't, you know, and she.
Speaker B:Because I can walk in a place, and if there's a guitarist and they know who I am, we have a common ground, despite genre, despite region of the world we live in.
Speaker B:And.
Speaker B:Yeah, it's one of the reasons I love playing in Europe and do so well over there is that they, you know, it's a great example of, like, there's these guys in Sweden that they can play my stuff better than I can play it.
Speaker B:They've learned it, you know?
Speaker B:You know what I mean?
Speaker B:And they.
Speaker B:They've opened for me a few times, and I'm looking at them going, wow, how in the hell did I have anything to do with how they spend their time?
Speaker B:Yeah, halfway crap around the world.
Speaker B:And so it's the great equalizer.
Speaker B:The guitar is like.
Speaker B:For me, I think it's just this.
Speaker B:It's the.
Speaker B:It's magic.
Speaker B:It's.
Speaker B:It is.
Speaker B:It's a strange former tree, you know, that makes noise.
Speaker B:That is a whole reason you have everything you have.
Speaker B:And likewise for me.
Speaker A:It's insane.
Speaker A:It's really fun.
Speaker B:You think about the lucky trees behind you, too.
Speaker B:As I look at you on your right, my left, those trees became that.
Speaker B:But some of them weren't as lucky.
Speaker B:And they're that door.
Speaker A:I like that.
Speaker A:Have you written that song yet?
Speaker B:No.
Speaker B:That's.
Speaker B:That's a good one, isn't it?
Speaker A:I like that one.
Speaker A:There you go.
Speaker B:Do that.
Speaker A:Wow.
Speaker A:I never thought of it like that.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:These are the lucky trees.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:You know, it's like.
Speaker B:It's like, if you're lucky, you're maple or spruce.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:But.
Speaker B:Or ash alder.
Speaker B:If you're.
Speaker B:If you're, you know, oak, you're probably not going to get to be a guitar.
Speaker B:You might be a really cool bureau.
Speaker B:That.
Speaker B:That was the thing.
Speaker B:Marsh, they took that.
Speaker B:You know the pews in the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville, the old church pews?
Speaker B:They sold a few off because they didn't have room for all the.
Speaker B:All of the old ones.
Speaker B:And I think.
Speaker B:What are they?
Speaker B:They're probably like hickory.
Speaker B:They're like really.
Speaker B:They're.
Speaker B:They're really heavy wood.
Speaker B:And.
Speaker B:And they.
Speaker B:Washburn made some acoustics, acoustic electric guitars out of the old Ryman church pews.
Speaker B:They basically carved them into kind of like that solid body, Chet Atkins, Gibson look, you know, steel string, solid body acoustic with a paizo.
Speaker A:Yep.
Speaker A:And they gave Matthew special.
Speaker B:Yes.
Speaker B:Well, they gave one of these guitars made out of the Ryman church pews to Marty Stewart.
Speaker B:Said, what do you think?
Speaker B:He said, I think you ruined a good pew.
Speaker B:It wasn't meant to be a guitar.
Speaker A:You weren't meant to be a piano player.
Speaker B:I was not.
Speaker B:That's for sure.
Speaker B:I didn't miss that calling.
Speaker B:I could have been other things, maybe, but not that.
Speaker A:Well, I'm glad to see you're at least living out your fishing dreams.
Speaker B:Yeah, well, you got to come join me next time you're here.
Speaker A:All right, I'm gonna be there.
Speaker A:I'm gonna be there in three weeks.
Speaker B:Come hang.
Speaker B:I'd love to have you.
Speaker B:Yeah, come hang out and we'll.
Speaker A:I'll bring the hula poppers.
Speaker B:Yeah, you can.
Speaker B:That's actually kind of what he caught that 12 on.
Speaker B:Really top water at the end of the day, huh?
Speaker A:That's my favorite.
Speaker A:I mean, that's exciting.
Speaker B:I think, like last year at this time.
Speaker B:Let me look at when that was so you.
Speaker B:This might be the time to like.
Speaker B:It was.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B: March of: Speaker A:All right, I'm coming over in a few weeks.
Speaker B:There you go.
Speaker A:I'll bring my rig.
Speaker B:I'd love to have you.
Speaker B:Yeah, bring a.
Speaker B:Bring a Strat and a poll.
Speaker A:All right.
Speaker A:I'm down.
Speaker A:Deal.
Speaker B:I would love that.
Speaker A:Sounds good.
Speaker A:Well, I'll see you then.
Speaker B:All right.
Speaker A:All right.
Speaker A:Thanks, man.
Speaker B:It's been a blast, man.
Speaker B:Thanks for talking to me.
Speaker A:Yeah, thanks for.
Speaker A:Thanks for being here.
Speaker B:Jason.
Speaker B:Producer.
Speaker B:Nice job.
Speaker A:You did a wonderful job just sitting, hanging out.
Speaker A:There you have it.
Speaker A:That's it.
Speaker A:Paisley.
Speaker A:What a great dude, man.
Speaker A:I gotta go fishing with that cat.
Speaker A:You know, I'm.
Speaker A:I'm Minnesota.
Speaker A:We're lakes people.
Speaker A:We like to get out on the lake.
Speaker A:I like to fish.
Speaker A:I grew up doing it.
Speaker A:I'm not a pro or anything, but he's got this dope fishing hole in the backyard.
Speaker A:I gotta go see what's going on there.
Speaker A:Anyways, thank you so much for hanging out.
Speaker A:I really appreciate you listening.
Speaker A:If you made it this far, that means you've listened to a lot of me yapping and talking to other people.
Speaker A:So thank you.
Speaker A:Thank you so much for your support for hanging out, listening to what we do.
Speaker A:I'm super passionate about this.
Speaker A:I mean, honestly, this podcast is so fulfilling for me because a lot of pretty much everybody I'm interviewing, it's just people that I want to talk to and pick their brain.
Speaker A:You know, nobody's like, oh, you should talk to this.
Speaker A:I'm like, okay, yeah, there's plenty of people I should talk to, but.
Speaker A:Or, like, you know, well, so.
Speaker A:So whatever.
Speaker A:The people that I interview are people that I'm genuinely interested in and want to learn from and want to get to know about their artistry.
Speaker A:So thank you for joining us on this whole thing.
Speaker A:Season finale right now.
Speaker A:And you know what?
Speaker A:We're talking about what we're going to do for next season.
Speaker A:If you got people you want me or to interview or think would be interesting for me to have a conversation with, please let me know.
Speaker A:All right, hit us up.
Speaker A:Wong Nodes, pod on all the socials and whatnot.
Speaker A:Hit me up on all those.
Speaker A:Anyways, I'm going on too long.
Speaker A:We'll see you next time.
Speaker A:Peace.
