Ross Cooper

Full episode transcript, auto-generated from the audio and lightly formatted (verbatim, not edited).

Purple [Music] in the canyon. That's where I need. Yeah, boy. 247 gable.

I just got to I put on a couple of lbs. So, I just got to make sure I'm long and lean, you know? I see that little tummy trumpet. Do you dude?

What's a bad What's a tummy trumpet? It's when you got the farts, I think. No, hold on. We need to dissect this.

Is there a lighter anywhere? You want to throw one at me? You going to dissect it or smoke it? Dude, I'm about to smoke this little tummy.

Oh, dude. I thought he threw it. I thought he threw it. Oh, just boink me right on camera.

Okay. Okay. That was an unfortunate word to use. What kind of shoes are those, dude?

These are my I got some new little Vans. Yeah. Ow. Some new Vans.

Are those the ones that like are basically, you know, like what a love sack is, right? One of those like kind of mattress things. Why does everything starting to sound okay? Yes, I know.

It's like those are those like the skater shoes when we were in junior high where it's they look like they're always loose, but you're just putting your foot into a pillow. You know what I'm talking about. I know. You know exactly.

It's like they always look like they're going to slip off, but you look down and it's just it's like 4 inches of tempropedic foam in those shoes. It's like Etnney's, you know? Yeah. It's just skate shoes that you didn't [expletive] skate you lived at.

Like there's goat heads everywhere. You didn't even have concrete. Yeah, they're just skate shoes. But I agree.

They're like Are those that they're like wearing a boat? Yeah. Yeah. These have the padding and everything.

You can tell from the inside, dude. That's what they're good to shoe in. Oh, you know. Oh, really?

Skate shoes. Hell yeah. I uh you know you got a good horseshoe if you wears skate shoes. I shoot in uh those like twisted X like walabes.

You know what I mean? You know those walabes? Yeah. They're like they're like uh a walabe.

Oh, you know they're like [expletive] driving shoes. You know you can get from here to Melbourne down to New South Wales and I don't know maybe like a [expletive] minute or two. Oh no, Ross. Yeah, that is wild.

Yeah. Yeah. I'm a little road rash brain though. I'm going to try to kind of calm it down.

Can you do the whole Can you do the whole pod with that accent, dude? I don't even know if there was little like words in between that you just absolutely nailed. It wasn't even the big words, you know? But like I would be I would be trying to get to daminium or like but like all the words leading up would just not be.

So I always had the Australian but I never had the u the British and I was driving for like six hours one time and like kind of figured out how to jailbreak the British accent. So, uh, you start with like a, um, you start with like the, oh, puppet, you know, like you do that whole thing where it's like a Hold on. What's like the real like cochney accent? What's like a Oh, yeah.

Oh, he's right in the [expletive] alley. You know, and do that whole thing, but then you just smooth it out and push it to like the front of your mouth and keep it a little bouncy. We're talking about an accent, right? An accent.

Yeah. It's because it's all like it's just all m you know muscle and feel and whatever. I was trying to think of my like process of like the like what I was saying to get to get there though and I can't remember because now I'm just going defaulting back to Are impressive? I think they're so impressive.

I think so. I wanted to I don't Some people act like it's not that big of a deal. I find them I think it's a I think it's a huge deal. Not a huge deal to be but I think it's um to be able to do them is insane to me at that level.

Dude, your Aussie one just dumbfounded me. I need a uh I need to get back into my British one, though. I need like a sentence, you know, that's like a real like kind of cochnney sounding sentence. This word, huh?

This word cochney. Yeah, it's a style. It's like a trash person style of speaking in England. In England.

Yeah. It'd be kind of like their version of a redneck accent. Really? Yeah.

But it's uh Hold on. Let me let me figure out a good like I need I need to hear you got a good British accent. No. [expletive] Uh I the only thing I can ever go is like the Tom Hardy thing.

Oh, okay. So I kind of I remembered how to do it. So it's like there's like a Oh, it's down on the bridge I was. And so you kind of do that thing, but then you lighten it up and keep it bouncy.

So you go down from the bridge I was and then it softens up a little bit and bounces on the tip of your tongue and all of a sudden you studied at Oxford and you have many leatherbound books dude go back to the other one and then you go back to the docks and I work for you governor. It's like that dude the idea but where are you originally from? You are from Leick like around Lik. Yeah I mean from Yeah, you're from Leick.

Well south of town. Is that technically west Texas? Yeah. Okay.

I think everything west of Abalene is West Texas. Are we Are we going? Yeah, but not where are we start? Has this started?

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Oh, [expletive] Really? Yeah. Oh [expletive] I thought we were going to get like a go. No, dude.

We just We just roll. I know. It's the best part of the whole thing. Yeah.

I don't Come on. Look at him clam up now. Yeah. Please no.

Please know that I can make it. I'd be so embarrassed. Why? No.

I was going to say I think it's so funny that you're you're doing that accent like all these accents in such a wild character and then you're in like you're like legit cowboy West Texas cowboy wearing that hat doing that whole thing is like the funniest thing ever. Yeah. All right. Can we officially so I know I can be I can turn it on and turn it off.

Oh gosh. Yeah. That's not how I roll. Okay.

You're either on or I don't want to talk to you. I do. It's like either the real person or not. Well, I am that.

Um, but I am also a person I've got uh six hours of sleep in the last 48 hours and just drove for 12 straight. So, really I should pro you know what I mean? I need to lock it up. I need to kind of like reel a little bit in.

Okay. Yeah. I don't think I think you should I think you should reel it out. I think you should let the slack out and just turn her loose.

Tell Telly Tan in whatever crazy accent you want. you say, "Hey, go for it." When we do, why have you only had six hours of sleep? Um, the night before last, I was like thinking about everything I needed to get done and so I was stressing about it and then I just had I slept for like two hours and I had stress dreams for two hours.

And then last night, um, I had dreams that I was having to weld a bunch of stuff. I don't weld like at all. Don't like I never have been a good welder. And I had a dream.

Four hours last night of nothing but welding dreams. Interesting. I'm glad you're having dreams. Very stressful dreams.

I don't really have dreams. How do you not have dreams sometimes? But they're only like really early morning. Well, how would I even say that?

I guess it's not that early. Late morning. Well, kind of. Then that's when you're in your rim cycle.

That's when you're like in your heaviest sleep. I know. It drives me nuts. But they're like those 5 6 a.

m. Probably 6 a. m. I finally get to like have a dream.

Yeah. I dream basically all night. That's crazy. Vivid dreams.

Do you get to remember them? Hey, Booger. Yeah, I remember them. Yeah, most like 75% of them I remember for sure.

Forever. Like you don't you don't forget them at all. Well, I mean, yeah, eventually I do. I think you have like you have That was a dumb question.

You have like a subconscious kind of like decide for like you have to something has to decide what you allow in and out of the filing cabinet, you know. Sure. Probably I'm probably not going to store the welding dream up there if I can help it. Sure.

No, I appreciate you not pounding me into salt for asking a stupid question. No, I don't think it's a stupid I think that's a good question, but uh No. Well, I have to I have to really make it a point to remember them like and 20 minutes after I wake up. Do you write them down?

Well, that's what I've I've at times I've kind of done that. Do you have a dream journal and hold on you have a dream journal of your dreams and then another dream journal of your aspirations? Yeah. Well, yeah, it starts to get confusing.

Yeah. Like you're like, "Oh, I want to do this. This is a dream, but this is what I dreamed of." Yeah.

Well, the really scary thing is uh my wife read both of them at one point and she didn't she and I made her guess which one was which and she didn't know like you want to be you want to you want to be a lizard man. It's your dream journal. This is your dream. Oh, that's the that's the one that's a five-year plan situation.

Yeah. She didn't know. Oddly enough, I didn't know either. I couldn't tell her which one was the difference.

I only wrote down one. This is one that I had a long time ago that uh it was terrifying because it felt so real. And I wrote it down because it was so uh it was so crazy. I dreamed that I was in the forest and there was a um I made friends with these deer.

They could talk. All of them. I'm not lying to you right now. Like you had No, it's a dream.

Like I don't No, it didn't hap. I mean, right. It's not something It didn't happen, but that would be something else. Yeah.

Have you guys met Ross Cooper? He like he's super cool, but he thinks he could talk to deer. No, but he lied about his dream. I mean, he made up a story that he dreamed.

So, so in this dream, this dream there's like a herd of deer and they could all talk English, which um is a little surprising, but we had we were like in the brush at the edge of this forest and they're like telling me to be quiet and so we're like kind of um I don't know I was crouched down crawling and I don't I don't think I've never seen a deer crouch and crawl so I doubt they were doing that. But then we come up to the top of this hill and I look down and it's just like hundreds of crows. And these crows are like I guess a murder of crows. These crows are like villains.

And it's so obvious that they're villains. And the only thing I know in this dream at this point is that they're uh plotting on they're like plotting. They're trying to catch me and they don't know where I am and I just know that they can't catch me. Interesting.

Yeah. I wrote that one. I w I woke up in the middle of the night and I was like a cold sweat and was like, I need to write this down. Do you do the waking up writing a song thing?

Melodies. You ever done that? I Well, so I dream songs a bunch, but um I always will wake up and be like, I need to write that down. And I'm so tired in the moment.

I'm like, there's no way I'm going to forget that. And then I wake up like in the morning. I'm like, I don't I forgot that. So you don't you won't write them down or anything?

I don't write them down. I do a little voice recorder. I should and I've dreamed songs for years. For years I've dreamed I've like I'll dream like a melody or dreamed that like um at least have a little bit of lucidity in the dream of being like, "Oh, this is a I'm dreaming this is a song.

This is really cool. I'm going to remember this." And I wake up and I'm like, "Holy [expletive] that was really cool. I need to write this down.

I don't write it down." Dude, what I was going to tell you off camera, but I wanted to wait till on camera. Are we really started right now? Yeah, man.

Are we really started? Yeah, I have to keep cutting that out now every time you ask. Well, I don't you know, have you have you never I guess I Yeah, just don't make me look like an idiot. I guess I get I didn't really uh I mean, I didn't really give you much uh in I didn't know how you started though.

Yeah, but like I was going to read off your biography right in front of you. In the eyes. Yeah, he should put out his fourth album. You should you should have plugged it into chat GPT just to see what it would say.

I'm terrified. Yeah, I deleted it. I'm terrified. Well, it's ruining the human experience.

Isn't uh I mean, you could make the case that your experience with it is part of the human experience. Okay, that's pretty that's pretty meta. Yeah, but then that part of the part of our human experience is uh wondering if AI is going to I don't know and like jump into your toaster and become sentient, you know? Yeah.

But we're like a pro. We're like it's like a mirror of us. Yeah. Black mirror, man.

It's It terrifies me. Yeah, the whole idea everything like the human experience especially art is self-expression and the actual value of it is the work you put in to make it happen. Yeah. And then to just like now I'm getting demos from people that are AI now.

Yeah. See that's stupid. What is the point of writing a song if you didn't write it? It's you didn't write it.

What is the point of it even if it sounds good? I feel like thisird it's come up a lot here lately. And um yeah, I mean it's either you're on one side of the fence or the other. I'm on the other side of the fence.

I don't I don't want to for that type of stuff. Like I use it in place of like Google, you know? Um but I'll never like put it into like an app and say or put a song into an app and say build me a demo using these. It's a bizarre thing to do.

It's a bizarre thing. What is the point of doing the art form at all if it's not for just doing it? I guess like probably the argument for it um maybe on the publishing side is if you and I write a song and um we think it's really good and then we need to do a demo of it and we can just plug it into an app instead of like actually going that's assuming that you have the melody done and everything. Yeah, I think I don't know how those work.

I think that you can like I don't know. I don't know how it works. I have no idea because I'm getting demos from people that I don't think they're writing the melody either. Probably not.

They're just what? That's not songwriting. I don't I just It's so bizarre. I agree.

Um it's a So then at that point, it's only for attention, right? I don't know. cuz there's no like being a painter. Part of the being a painter is actually doing the painting, not just showing it.

I know it seems like I'm advocating for it, which is the absolute opposite. I don't I don't think it's I think we need to get away from it. I think the thing that makes art and music special is the subjectivity, you know, like of um you are creating a you know, you're creating something that came from your human experience, right? So, um, on the I think in maybe songwriting publishing world, um, I know that there's people that will build demos with it.

Um, use an app and I don't know if you can like send a voice memo into it to where it picks up the melody. I don't know how that works. I think you can. Okay.

So may So I know that people use it to build demos and the only um the only thing I the only reason I could see it being like a trying to like figure out how to word it so it doesn't seem like I'm saying yeah use it because I don't think you should but um people are already using yeah you're not and you know they're using it to write lyrics too which is way shittier you know but um I think probably the only advantage that I could see and I'm not going to do it but um of somebody using it in songwriting or publishing is if you have a pub deal and uh you have a really good song, you have a voice memo, plug it in there, get a full demo of it, and then you're not having to spend the time or money creating a demo. But it's wild to think that some studio musicians, some of the best musicians in the world are just going to copy that demo. Yeah. Yeah.

I mean, well, and that's the that's already I think the whole demo thing, songwriters demoing, and then you take that demo into the studio and you get some of the best musicians in the world that then just copy the demo that a bunch of songwriters made. Yeah. Like even if they played those parts and stuff, it's still a weird process in my opinion. Yeah.

Yeah, I agree. I mean, um I just fundamentally disagree with that process, much less using AI for it. Yeah. Well, and they're kind of lie as part of the argument, too.

Or not the argument, but part of the point of if you already fundamental fundamentally disagree with the process, then you're not going to be all of a sudden convinced with something that is like so inhuman. You know what I mean? It's like you're already like, I don't really like this part of it. And then now all of a sudden, a computer's going to do it.

Um, but yeah, I mean, you know, if you're a uh a staff writer and you have to write this however many songs, whatever, and they expect this many demos, like um like I guess I get it, but I'm not I mean, I don't agree with it. I don't think, you know, I understand it. I can understand it. I understand.

That's why it scares me is because it makes so much sense for somebody that isn't actually in it for the process. Right. Right. And the in the world of like kind of that demo land too, it's like, you know, most of the time on it feels like to make a good pitch, it's u you have to kind of spell it out, you know, for the for the plugers, pitchers, etc.

I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. Yeah, it really scares me.

I'm on the train of like we need to find some program that can identify if people used AI in the making of some sort of I'm sure I'm sure that there's something like we need organic certified pesticidefree music you know there needs to be labeling nonGMO music you know that should be your next like merch line yeah well I have a little nutrition fact shirt that I'm doing because of where it's just like no autotune that whole thing Like I think it's the only way to separate yourself now more now more than ever is like the human experience is imperfection. If you I even hate using the word imperfection. Yeah. The human experience is the flubs are human.

The only reason a compliment feels good is because there's an option that somebody could insult you. God. Yeah. I mean you're right.

If you had no choice to be mean, being nice wouldn't be that meaningful. If you let that creep in and fester, that becomes such a uh like a ego death. You know, anytime you get a compliment, you're like, "Thank you for not saying the insult that you could have said." Well, yeah, sure.

Well, the point is just the ying and the yang. It's like you can't have good without evil kind of thing, right? So, the imperfections like that's the human experience. Do you feel like the perfect note?

Like what's the perfect like what do you mean like the perfect pitch? Like not to mention when you're like recording instruments in an acoustic environment, there's little tuning things. There's little rubs happening in the real world. The dissonance I think kind of uh can inspire the motion just as much as the right note.

Definitely, you know, it's humans doing it. There's also there's that fine line, too. And I'm so guilty of it. Um like when I'm in the studio, if I know that I can sing something and hit it and I don't it's not like I'm like, you know, riff a paloo over here.

Yeah. Uh, but if there's a run or something that I that I know that sounds good, that I know that I can sing, whatever, whatever. If I'm having a hard time getting it, and I know I can get it, I'm gonna keep going, keep going, keep going until I get it. But if we're talking about a word or something or a phrase sounding just a little kind of like, huh, like interesting.

Yeah. Where it's like technically it could be a little bit more quote unquote perfect. Yeah. Um, I'm trying to get to a spot where more times than not I want to leave it because I do think that it's the only way to separate you from from the machine.

Yeah. And like this uh this live record is the scariest thing I've ever done. Yeah. It's so scary cuz I do anything that's acoustic I do at the house and I'll build demos and like I have the control over that.

I'm just enough type A to like not release 75% of the stuff that I record. You know what I mean? Because it's like it has to hit some standard that only I've like put into place. It's so stupid that nobody harsh.

Nobody would care. Yeah. So are you. Yeah.

Oh yeah. Yeah. And uh so uh which Sorry that So are you. But uh I'm not.

Yeah. No, no, you are. But uh the live record was it was like we didn't do it over two days. We did it over one night and we only recut two songs at the end of the whole thing because it was like this just let the night kind of be the night.

And um it was uh yeah, it was it's I mean it's still there's days where first of all any artist that says they don't listen to their own like album after they get it back is so full of [expletive] That's they get it back. Yeah, it's um or doesn't listen to it. Yeah. I'm not like jamming it down the road, but like I'll because it's uh I guess when this comes out it'll be the album will be out, you know?

But so before the album has come out. Yeah. Like you do that thing where you're like we go back and listen to it and you're like am I am I right on this? Is this good?

I don't know. It's not for you to decide. Oh, the second guessing is crazy. The and it's uh that's just kind of part of the job of like you don't get to decide whether or not people like it.

The only thing you could decide is what songs you want to put on it. Yeah. if you liked it in the moment and how much energy that you can put in. I do think you can you can come back to it um often before you release it like during the mixing process um and you can get a lot of first listens with just like a clean pallet.

Mhm. Um that's been really important for me. But that's a time thing too. Like early on my first two records I didn't have the time or the budget to be able to sit with it Yeah.

for long enough. Yeah. But in the last couple years, I've had more time to sit with stuff so I can come back and just be like, "Oh, okay. Well, let's change this."

Yeah. Um, which has been helpful. Yeah. But they're not like insane changes.

They're just That's the biggest thing like they're not like scrap it. Let's freaking I think that comes with age, too. It'll just sometimes be like, "Oh, what were we why do we have the vocals sitting right there? Yeah.

Why don't we make them a little roomier?" Right. And then sometimes it's just like the clear choice. Even though when you just last time you sat down to mix it, you spent four hours, you just couldn't figure it out.

Yeah. And then you come back and in five minutes you're like, "Oh, I have four compressors on this vocal. Sounds like it's in a can. I wonder why."

I'm in the same boat with like trying to pull myself like off Let the Rains Go a little bit with some of the because I like things to be perfect. And then I grew up in a time too that a lot of the music we hadn't heard perfect music before. Yeah. Um and then I grew up at a time that similar to you that music became perfect for the first time.

What would be a good example do you think? Like synthetic hyperprocessed. Yeah. Like rock music, pop music, everything because of the best of the best the introduction of like computers basically.

Yeah. And then music could become perfect. Okay. I think that's fair.

So we heard a lot of perfect music, perfectly tuned. I think that's Yeah. Like and to a certain degree some of our ears I think got used to that in a way and then like it's like stepping back and being like there is kind of that like sonic pallet you know that to me what you're talking about is kind of those junior high MTV days of when pop punk was such a thing. It was like you know you're it's and I never got super huge into it but that was what was so big.

Yeah. But make no mistake, even like the stuff in country music, George Straight and all that stuff in the 2000s, like with modern recording, all of that stuff was pretty heavily tuned and there was some slick processing that went on. There's kind of that's I know what you're It's kind of all a sound and that, you know what I mean? Like you can kind of hear that stuff.

To me, that's early mid 2000s. Yeah. Where it's just really slick. Um, and then you had a band like so after 2010 you had you know Mumford and Sons and Lumers and stuff Bonav that f that like did this roomy like whole like super raw thing and everybody went whoa.

So I think that's just how far the pendulum swings you know. So when you have something that's super um slick sounding whatever then the pendulum has to swing hard the other way. So you have this Rootsy, Stringy, Mumford, AIT Brothers, Lumers, etc. And then I don't know what was big after that, but I would be willing to bet anything that the pendulum swung back hard the other way and it was probably going to be it was it was fuzzy.

It was fuzzy guitars and you know like when like the fuzzed out guitar thing was um Black Keezy black everything came after Black Keys like there was a handful of those bands and it just swings back and forth and back and forth and I feel like well then it got pretty processed and went into the 80s thing if we're talking pop music. Oh totally. Yeah. Pop.

Also I have a theory too. Go ahead with what you're about to say. So now like we're in, you know, country music feels, I guess, neotraditionalist is probably the best way that you could put it now, you know, where it's uh it's definitely more traditional than it has been in years past where I'm wondering how far the pendulum is going to swing back the other way when uh when people get tired of the cowboy thing. You know what I mean?

Like what's next in country? What is it going to be here to stay? Like obviously some of that stuff is always going to be cool, but as far as big music, is there going to be I mean I don't know. It's hard to say that a guy with a an acoustic guitar is going to continue to sell out stadiums.

Is that going to happen or is country going to move into this world where it's going to be a guy with a computer? I don't know. I mean, I'm just I'm trying to just who you can't I don't know. I don't know what I'm talking about.

Well, my theory on the AI thing is I think it's going to get so advanced that look, if any if any if any person can just plug in a random thought into an AI program, it's going to spit out a fully written song, melody, arrangement, full recording. Yeah. In like five minutes. Um, if anybody's going to be able to do that, I think people are going to start walking around with the soundtracks of their own making.

So there's going to always be a segment of people that I think want to interact with like real music from real with that. I think that there's especially, you know, I think it is uh part of the job for us to just always kind of like talk [expletive] on the generation that's younger than us. But I think one thing that they've got right is uh they really do kind of attach and you know they root they fan they fan out hard for you know these different artists and whatnot and I think that they kind can kind of smell BS from a mile away. So I think so too.

Like I think right now I don't disagree that um I think there will be a time where it's going to be like you know a 14-year-old version of Jared comes home and had a bad day and it's like you just go boop and it makes a song for you based on what you put like you know what I mean? I think I saw a Tesla I think it was a Tesla um that has a program that will create the music. It's all like EDM type dance club music because that's what you need to do. But it'll make it in real time and it'll change depending on how you're driving.

So tempos and it'll do drops and like when you take off the drop will happen and then the beat kicks in and you can like specify what style you want it to do. That's so lame. Yeah, it that's so lame. Well, yeah.

The whole point of all of it is it's kind of lame. It depends on what it's used for, but the idea of passing off music as like artistry and like somebody like art is self-expression. That's the point of it. Like this thing is not expressing itself.

So like people consuming it in that way is really bizarre to me. But the time will tell if people are able to consume it. But the problem is if they're not going to be able to tell the difference. Well, right.

That's what's just depressing more than anything. I can't I'm not even like mad about it because if it's probably going to get to a point that it's good enough and you won't be able to tell the difference. And I'm pretty positive there's already songwriters that are really big that are using AI to generate lyrics and you're probably right. I don't know.

Um and to be clear, it's not a uh it's not such a uh attack on EDM if a Tesla was writing country songs like that or folk songs. In fact, that's stupid. Well, right now you can tell the difference. You can 100%.

Lyrically though, that's where it starts to get a little dicey. Yeah. Yeah. But there's definitely lyrics that I that those programs are just not there's very niche like specific detailoriented songwriting that it can't do yet, right?

Um and that is the stuff that I'm gravitating towards. And that's why like I like people that are doing that type of stuff. You know, this like generic they can be for everybody. It's like, well, yeah.

I mean, it just sounds like this. It sounds generic. So, like I Yeah. I mean, I guess what happens when you tell it to read On the Road by Carowak, you know, and it's like, write me, you know, a 60s folk inspired record.

Yeah. In the style of in the style of and inspired by it's terrifying by Carowak and Alen Ginsburg and like then it's then you pick a I don't know. I don't know. Um, it's a bummer.

It is. It's a bummer, but I don't think it's I think I don't know until it's live. Live performance. That's where live performance comes in.

See, I don't I think that's where it'll fall flat. And that's what I was saying earlier about like the youths of America now that um I just don't I don't see them rooting for something that's not real like that. And how does that work, too? So, it's like, let's say that you build this um this AI hologram and you 10,000 people are going to show up to see a AI hologram.

They're all listening to this AI holograms hit on spot like, you know, I think it's going to I think if that's the world that we get into that um the stronger argument that it's going to be more narrowly tailored for each listener. So, at the time it was cool cuz it hadn't been done before. Are you about to talk about gorillas? 100%.

Yeah, but there was people behind it and they used it as a mask and the gorillas are awesome and it's but it wasn't it wasn't made by computer. It wasn't made by computer. They made those avatars theirelves but it was Yeah, it was like animated type stuff. I agree that it was but the idea of it not being ne we knew it was a real person behind it.

Yeah. But I guess that's the only difference is like Well, because there's somebody behind it. I'm sorry I'm I interrupted. No, go for it, dude.

Uh I think because there's somebody behind it that um adds to the mystique of it, you know, like why care if why care if not agreed. But what about But clearly we don't have to see a real person doing it. I think part of the mystique of or a big part of the popularity popular popularity for gorillas was there was a mystique because there's somebody behind it and it's like who's this person and are we ever going to see this person? But now where the line gets blurred where it's like we clearly don't have to see a person doing it or performing it.

Yeah. But there's nobody but then if we don't know there's nobody to root for though, you know. No, I know. That's where it starts to get so confusing for everybody.

We don't know who we can. We don't know who's real and who's not. I'll tell you, I think it's as easy as this. Like, if your best buddy If your best buddy's favorite band is some new fake AI band, just don't hang out with that dude anymore.

Yeah. I don't know. I don't know. I just It ain't for me.

And um I like the stuff that's human and dirty and bad than good. You know what I mean? I like all parts of it. I think that's the only way that you're going to the people can end up separating themselves from it.

Yeah. It's like you got How many times have you talked about AI on this podcast? Not much at all. Oh, really?

I don't think so. Yeah. I feel like maybe a little bit. Maybe in the last few episodes we've talked about maybe a little bit more, but not I feel like it's come the conversation's come up a lot in the last in the last like month or two.

Yeah. That I've just kind of seen. Yeah. It's kind of starting to come to a fever pitch.

Yeah. In my opinion. Yeah. Uh but there's been a lot of big podcasts too that have uh started to talk about it more.

Yeah. I think some people are starting to get a little bit more worried. Even the people that have developed it are likely what's the kill switch on it? A wall outlet.

Just unplug Isn't it ironic though that some of the stuff that was considered maybe like or so like stuff like manual labor things that traditionally maybe didn't make the most money are some of the things that will be taken over last by robots and computers. I mean it's things that are most Yeah, for sure. Isn't that wild? Yeah.

It's like the most It's the most human stuff that I mean it's like kind of the most archaic stuff is the stuff that goes last. Yet that was the stuff that was replaced first. Yeah. I mean in ways.

So like uh or like the people that made the most money traditionally or at least in the American experience like the white collar jobs and stuff, those are the first ones that are going to go away. But yet the welder or the horseshoeer or the horse trainer or like those people like that's a long ways off for a robot doing that. There's kind of a dark cynical joke built into that. You know, the world needs ditch diggers and even the robots are like, "We're not doing that.

The world needs horseshoe." Yeah, we're not doing that. That looks like it's when they can start to feel they're like, "No, this is horrible." But hold on, bro.

Accounting that's pretty bad. Yeah. Be an accountant. Yeah.

Forget that. Yeah. Once they get Do your taxes this year. Excuse me.

[Laughter] How much did you make uh net of expenses? How much did you make last year? How did you bring that? Dude, that is so funny.

How much money did you make before taxes? Go. Dude, I'll tell you what. I will I will absolutely not talk about taxes at all on a podcast.

You talk Dude, the only thing that scares me more than AI is the IRS. Yeah, both acronyms, not acronyms, but abbreviations. I felt the hammer coming in your eyes right there when I said acronym. I was like, he's about to bury me.

I had to You just were not ready for that question. Maybe for the sake of your popularity and growth, we don't we don't talk about doing taxes because that's what people, you know, that's really what that's why they come here. That's why they come here. Exactly.

Talk about taxes. Yeah. Uh no, it's mainly so the IRS can't be like, "Wait, you did what?" Here, huh?

This what? Yeah. I'm not talking about any tax secrets. Hey, so what I was gonna originally say was um Lightning Heart.

Yeah, that record. I just listened to it on the drive. Uh I hadn't I had heard a couple songs off of it, but I hadn't like actually listened to the whole record, like from front to back. Um and it's unbelievable.

And the light the first song, Lightning Heart. Yeah. um the lyrics where you're like the you're living you're dying. All the um all this living can feel like dying when your heart's fighting a lightning heart.

So I have a Yeah. But hold even the way you say it like all this living can feel like dying when you're fighting this lightning heart. You know what I mean? Like but the cadence of it.

Thank you. I don't know. Um I love that. I like you love every record you put out.

Otherwise you wouldn't put it out. Um, but I love that record and nothing happened with it and I Yeah, that was shocking listening through it and it had a bunch of different sounds, too. No, but it didn't It sounded cohesive, too, though. I tried really hard because I've kind of I feel like there's been times where I have like not thrown I've never been a throw spaghetti at the wall.

I just like you, we've talked about this a lot. I like different things and I want a I want a record to reflect where I am then. be, you know, a record of where I am and uh with that sometimes it can be I'm pretty scatterrained obviously, but I've had records that sound really scatterrained and I think that's great. I love listening to records like that.

Like truly, I love those records. Um but I wanted to try to at least not stifle it, but at least just kind of have something to shoot at. You know what I mean? Yeah.

Like I don't know. It's like shooting with a rifle or shooting with a shotgun, you know? You can still hit a target with both. You just might be a little bit more scattered with one, you know?

Yeah. I It had a really unique sound to it. And you can't really put your finger exactly on it. Everything always does have a pretty southwestern thing with you, which I can really appreciate.

I don't think that stuff gets out there quite enough. I would be curious about um if you if you are you do you like Chris Isaac? I love Chris Isaac. Okay.

The Baja Sessions record is one of my favorite records of all time. Yeah. Yeah. We could definitely I want to make that record.

So yeah, I was curious and like that. Yeah. Listening through a lot of your stuff over the years, I'm like I think we have a ton of similar influences and it What about T-Bone Bernett, the producer? Um, I like I like the I like his produced stuff a little bit more than I like his artist stuff.

Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Totally.

Yeah. Just the stuff he produces. Yeah, definitely. For sure.

Yeah. I can't remember which song there was, but um of yours, but there was a drum there was a drum thing that I was like, "Oh, that's very t-bone and brunette." Maybe Blue Stem maybe. It's kind of a broken beat.

Yeah. Where it felt like you expected a train beat. Yeah. You're one of the rare songwriter types that is heavily in tune with production and the actual cutting of a record and how that's put together and the arrangement chord progressions there.

There Yeah, there was Man, I just really like that record. Thank you. There's multiple ones. I know.

I'm kind of clamming up. I don't My wife says I need to learn how to take a compliment, so I'll just say thank you instead of like, well, well, you should have listened to song five. It wasn't very good. But I got a text.

You can downplay too like your ability like for chord progressions and that type of thing. I just I like they're fresh. They're definitely fresh. I remember the first time Thank you.

I mean um weird though. Very weird. I got a text message today and I'll tell you uh I'll tell you later who from, but I got a text message today. No kidding.

that um it was a screenshot of a song off that record and said, "Dude, this is the first time I've really listened to this record all the way through and it's awesome." Oh, wow. That's weird. And it was today.

That's weird. I just listened to the whole thing. Yeah. And it wasn't from you.

How odd. It's very odd. But uh thank you. I told him to text.

I was like, "Hey, man. Go." I was like, "Go text him. He really needs a boost."

He's about to do the podcast today. Boost his ego. I mean, you know, um, thank you. And with the progressions, I remember the first time I heard, um, it was the Satellite Rides record from old 97s and I was like, "Holy shit."

Because there's a lot where it's like if you listen to this same type same type of thing, whatever. If you get if you're listening to the same stuff you always listen to and then all of a sudden, you know, you hear this stuff that's kind of country ccentric and but it's not really and it's kind of rock and roll and it's kind of punk and whatever and then all of a sudden you think like you think you know where the song's going. It's like whoa, they went to the I don't know three major instead of like six minor and you're like what it not that's like a huge thing but it is kind of and I ended up just loving old 97s. Um because a lot of those types of songs of how just kind of their treatment on country songs, you know, I think they're still a country band.

You know, I they can put out like the coolest rock and roll songs that exist, period, bar none. Like go listen to the song Victoria if you don't believe me. But they're such a great band that can kind of do it all. But I never ever get bored with their songs.

And I think early on I was like, "Okay, what are they doing? How can like what do I like can I do that? Like what would you know?" You start off with three chords and crappy songs, you know, or at least I did.

You know, you start off 12 years old, 13 years old, however old with you learn GC and D and you put your crappy songs to it and you hope that they get better. And some of the best songs that have ever been written are three chord songs. But um anyway, I guess all that to say is um I really like listening to that type of stuff. And part of it um I want to make stuff that I really like that I'm really proud of because there's been times where probably when I was younger I put out stuff where I was like I probably if I was being honest with myself I didn't love it.

I just thought I didn't you know I didn't know. And now I think that's kind of the sacrifice sometimes of like just being a thousand% yourself and being uniquely you also means knowing that maybe nobody cares. Maybe nobody cares. But that's not for you to decide.

You know, I think either way, if you put out whatever's honest and unique to yourself, if nothing happens, you can still sleep at night. And I'm overthinking it, too. I promise you, there's some guys, some friends of ours that have like huge kick-ass buses and great living. And um they're not thinking about it.

Think about any of it. Yeah. And I'm just like, you know, poking around in my poking around in my 15, 20 year old truck and I'm like, you know what? I am proud of this [expletive] I know there is a simplicity.

Um there the overthinking it. I don't think it's overthinking. I think the thinking too much about it can get in the way of timing. Yeah.

Yeah. And so I think some guys that really take a super simple approach to a lot of it um and they and they don't really think much about any of it, their timing is typically really great because I've noticed they tend to emulate some sounds, some popular sounds of what's happening like right in that moment. Oh, hey, that's working. Let's do that.

Um and they don't really think much about it. And yeah, that works cuz it's popular right now. Those sounds are popular and so they tend to like go with some trends because they don't have this overarching like um it's almost like they don't have this uh dark cloud of like, well, you got to do something different. You got to do something authentic.

You got to do something fresh. Some people I've been around don't have that. And they're like, well, I don't know. That seems to work.

Let's do that. Yeah. Yeah. And then they might have success in the way of popularity and stuff.

Um but in terms of longevity or maybe at some point even fulfillment, I see that they tend to lack both of those at times. Well, sometimes. And some guys some guys are able to like have great timing and maybe even follow trends, but do it in a super unique authentic way. Sure.

Well, and then I think at some level too, um, depending on how big the following is, it's kind of one of those things. Is it, uh, you know, art informing the culture, culture informing the art, you know? Um, also, we're kind of in this era where everything's a little bit more bespoke and kind of ready to go. Like, usually by the time, and I agree with your point.

Um, first of all, what does bespoke mean? Um, custom made, ready to order, like c not ready to order, custom made, customtailored for that. So, like, um, if I hear a Zack Bryan song, a huge song, whatever the, you know, whatever the song is, and I'm like, just for an analogy, uh, and I'm like, man, I'm going to go write something that sounds like that. Used to by the time it came out, you're already too late.

But now because the ease of releasing music, you can do it. You could do it. You could do it. And I think that's probably, and I hope not to go down this rabbit hole because it is one that um that I'd love to stay away from, but I think that's why Tik Tok is such a thing because, you know, want you want to talk about bespoke and things being tailored, go look at your feed or Yeah.

trends. Yeah. But it's also our feed is going to look probably pretty different, you know, depending because your algorithm is going to give you exactly what it knows that you've been liking for the last however many. I don't I think there's a there's a segment of people that really are trying to search for some stuff that is fresh sounding.

Yeah. And um they're struggling to do it. I struggle to find new stuff that I really love. Like even on Spotify and in their what they present to me, it's a lot of stuff that I've just already heard before or Yeah.

Well, so what 30,000 songs get released every day and then 100,000 songs released on Fridays. I think that I think that was the number the last time that I heard those numbers. Um, somebody fact check me. I'm sure I'm talking out of my ass, but it's it was a lot of people a lot of people releasing music.

So, how do you find it? You know, like I found this song the other day on the release radar. This is where it like got it right on Spotify. I was like, "Holy crap."

Like, "This song is awesome." Um, never heard it before, never heard the artist before. They have like a thousand monthly listeners. I was like, "This is great."

It was when it that's when it works where it's like, "This is this is cool. This is I would have never heard about this person had it not been for this release radar playlist." That's when it works. But um the big playlists, I say this a little uh um ad admittedly a little jaded because I don't get on those huge playlists, but some of them can kind of be an echo chamber a little bit.

You know, it's like of it's going to have all the especially in our kind of line of work, the country Americana folk alternative side. It's going to be kind of a lot of the same names because you almost can't afford to have them to not have them on there, you know, and you only have if you're a playlist curator, you only have so much room on that on that sucker, you know? Yeah. fascinating to hear some of the kind of self-appointed like trends setter type music critic people because that started to pop up more on social media.

Not opposed to it. Anybody's a critic really. Yeah. Um it's funny to see a lot of them act like their music opinions and their musical taste is so eclectic and just so fine-tuned and all they're saying is like, "Man, Turnpike's underrated."

And I'm like underrated. They're like the biggest band. They're huge. What are you talking about?

Or like just pick them. And I love Turnpike. Yeah. It's just funny.

Like I could probably say that to those guys and they'd be like, I know. Isn't that kind of goofy? What? What?

Uh, but there's just massive bands that like it's an echo chamber thing because part of getting attention for your what you're if you're like a music reviewer type person, part of getting attention is using popular bands. Mhm. Yeah. Right.

That's going to get Yeah. You have to you have to draw. It's kind of built baked into the cake. Like you're not going to Yeah.

But which f What uh what would you say is like the uh And that's not even I'm not even coming from a bitter standpoint because I've been on No, I've been on the positive end of that too. Yeah. At times. Yeah.

So it's not like a bitter thing. I dude, we I accidentally I accidentally on the Lightning Heart record like landed a one of those huge pop ones and I think somebody just fouled up and because it was only on there for like two days, but it just like funny like two days. Yeah. I mean, it didn't go crazy, but it went like whoa.

Hey, what's going on here? What do you think's like um in your mind the most kind of off-the-wall thing that you're either listening to now or kind of an old standard? You know what I mean? like as it could be a what's something that's off the wall that I'm listening to now or you know because I find myself listening to the um kind of the same stuff a lot or I'll listen to my friends, you know, like but I have these guys named Dope Melon or Dope Lemon.

Dope Lemon. Yeah. Well, I mean, but it's kind of like instrumental quasi instrumental. Yeah.

I just get so much into production and stuff that like a lot of stuff I start listening to is instrumental stuff. Yeah. Um, but yeah. Yeah, that's cool stuff.

Yeah, that's really good. And also, Black um, who's the lead singer for the Black Keys? What's his name? Not Patrick Carney.

Dan Hourback. I think he produced all their stuff. Oh, I think he's sign I think they're signed to his label, actually. Gotcha.

He was one of the first people I saw when I moved to Nashville. But I would say the old stuff that I've gotten into more. What did you just say? He's the first guy that you He was He was one of the first people I saw when I uh moved to Nashville.

My uh sweet mother took me to Nashville right after college to see I was going to move somewhere, you know, and um I'd been making trips to Austin a lot. My brother lived there at the time and I didn't know what I was going to do. Um so took a trip to Nashville. We didn't know anybody.

Like I didn't know anybody. And so like my mom took me down Broadway cuz we thought that's like what you did. And it was horrible. Hated it.

Hated it. I like 13 years ago I still live there. I can't believe I ever moved there because of that how you know my mom was like doing this the sweet mom thing like trying to make this trip awesome and I'm just kind like yeah I don't know if I'm going to move here. Anyway, but we ended up in Roberts on Broadway which is still one of my favorite bars of all time.

And it was uh early in the week, probably a Tuesday night, and um I don't know, I don't remember who was playing, but Roberts is always just awesome. It's always slamming. And then I saw Dan Arbach at the at the bar and I was like, "Hey, man. Are you Dan?"

He's like, "Yeah, man." It's like, "Hey, I'm a big fan. Keep doing what you're doing." Or whatever, you know?

And then I was like, "Oh." And that at that point like the Black Keys were huge, huge. And this dude's just drinking a, you know, drinking a beer at the bar at Roberts. And I'm like, "Okay, I'm missing something.

I'm not seeing something." Then you walked up to him and you were like, "Hello, [Music] please cut that." See, now we can't cut that out because if we cut it out, there will be no context for it. No.

Can't see what I did there. That's all. That's all. And we roped you into it.

I hate it. Please don't. I for continuity has to be in there. I can exp I'll just explain it.

I'll explain how good my accents are, but please don't. That would be a good and how to do them. How to do them. That could be a better thing.

A howto instead of just me coming in tonight. I just feel like I was hoodwinkedked. I think that's very bespoke of you. Oh my god.

I still don't know what it means. Could we get a Google on that just to make sure I'm not full of [expletive] Chat. Hey, chat. GBT.

That already deleted it. AI. It already deleted it. Let's write a song with We're not doing that.

Um, so anyways, you met Dan Hourback. Yeah. But I so at the end of that I was just kind of like if it's if this guy who I think is one of the coolest guys on the planet is living in this town and hanging out at this bar like I'm not seeing something that's going on here. And at the time um like these Andrew Combmes records were big and Robert Ellis and all this stuff that was getting recorded there and I just couldn't see it because I didn't know I didn't know any better, you And then I remember we went to Third and Lindsley and the Tom Jumpers had their residency.

I was like, you're seeing Paul Franklin and Vince Gil play together, play swing music. It's like, okay, there's something cool going on here. So anyway, whatever, whatever. Um, but my one of my go-to records, I need to send it to you for like my off the uh not off, it's not off the wall, but every song I still think is so interesting.

The production I think you would love. I'll send it to you here in a little bit, but it's Da Vincra Banhart and the record is Smokeoky Rolls Down Thunder Canyon. Um, so you know who Deendra Banhard is. He was kind of like the indie folk guy, you know, of like the like mid 2000s, early mid 2000s, like super hip folky that record.

There's some songs in Portuguese and some songs in Spanish and some songs in English and um but really cool, really interesting and that's one of those records I can still just put on and just let it roll and uh there's not really a skip on it for me and it doesn't it's like one of those albums where you're like, man, I want to make a record like this knowing that you never would. It's like how do you make you know what I mean? It's just it's so uh it's a kind of a bizarre album. I do you get super hyperfocused on certain styles of music if that's the style that you're maybe going for?

No, I get hyper fixated. Um uh I don't like that we're in like the um the self diagnosis culture, you know. So, I don't I want to be really uh I want to be really careful and not saying how like, you know, OCD I am about this or that. Um, I don't think that I'm OCD.

I think that I probably have compulsions for sure, but I get really obsessive over uh Oh, well maybe. What? Okay, like obsessive. No, you needed this preface.

I wasn't saying that. You like No, no, no, no. Not over um not over genre. I get I get Yeah, I get um I get You have a problem, Ross.

I get very obsessed over um individual songs, you know, like you'll listen But do they always have something to do with the sounds that you're going for? No, but they might inspire something that I that like I'm like it's trying to capture whatever that mood is. It's like is it because they're singing a melody over this like key chain? Like what this chord progression like what is the thing?

Like it's like trying to capture figure out that magic, you know, like why a song. Everybody has that song or has those songs. And I'm so thankful when you hear them because it feels like because there's so much music, the new ones don't do that so much for you anymore because it's like we're in just kind of skip world. You know, if it doesn't do something to you in 20 seconds, skip.

But, you know, you got those songs where you listen to them and then if you're riding by yourself, you automatically restart it. Then you restart it again. Then you restart it again. And then all of a sudden it's like you've driven somewhere.

You've driven back to your house and you've listened to the same song five times because you want to get captured up in that moment of how it make that song makes you feel. And that to me is like that's when a song is perfect. It's doing exactly what it's meant to do and it's eliciting this emotional response to it. That's like the goal.

A thousand% that's the goal. How do you think you keep like a fresh sound on chord progressions? [expletive] Fo, I don't I don't because I can tell though like through all of your music that you've put out, there's been like I can almost see certain styles and certain approaches that you use on maybe a record and then corresponding to that some songs that you write with or for other people kind of coincide with that timeline if that makes sense. Yeah.

like where I'm like, "Oh, that's interesting." He was like in a world at that point of like this sort of vibe. I'm specifically thinking about Cowboys and Indians. And then I think about um gez, how do I freaking forget that?

The Will the Will Green song. Ringling Road. Ringling Road. So where there's but and at that time when those came out like what a fresh like little progression thing had the spookiness and like so you want to talk about obsessive I'd uh you can't find these albums anymore.

Well, you can you can find a couple of them, but there's a couple of albums where there's songs where I was you could tell that I was in deep on those minor chord swingy kind of spooky gothy country things. I was like chasing that for so long. Um, I did it. I have a like three or four songs on a record called um, uh, Give It Time that still exists.

And uh before that I had a song on a EP that kind of was try like it was trying to chase that chase the dragon or whatever that I was so obsessed with like that minor chord swingy thing that I felt like it's like I was I was I couldn't like get it right or something. You know what I mean? It's like I just I was a I loved the way those songs sounded and then I feel like it kind of got to a point to where um on that same record with Cowboys and Indians, I Wrote the Wild Horses kind of does a similar thing. It's a minor chord kind of alternate uh baseline thing.

And then um uh there's a song on that record called Heart Attacks that is a kind of a similar thing. Um, and then I just kind of like it, it's almost like it ran its course. It was at its peak when we uh wrote Cowboys and Indians and Ringling Road like um and then I don't know if I've written another one like that since. Yeah.

So, you do. It's like you go in these little phases over them. Yeah. Yeah.

Wait, but you're not obsessive. I'm not obsessive. Not obsessive. I swear I'm No, I swirl.

Let me Let me spend five hours obsessing. you become obsessed about not being obsessed with it. Yeah. Um yeah, it's I don't know why I don't know why.

I just I love and I still do. Um there's really not you get you get tired of playing some of your old songs. Like see I don't either. And I think it's because um I don't know, it might just be getting older and having kind of like the perspective of how lucky I still am that I get to write songs that I have that good or bad I have the ability to do it.

Um but even though I don't write those types of like songs anymore, um I don't get tired of playing them, you know? Like I think I'm actually so unimpressed with my ability. It feels like every time I play it, I just kind of discover like a new way of doing it in ways. Yeah.

It's every time I perform one of my songs, I'm like I just I'm kind of unimpressed with how I do it. So I'm just like gosh, I just don't even feel like I've still ever nailed one of them. I know that feeling. But that's the So it's like every time I play it, I'm just like let's see let's see what we got today, you know?

So it's like almost fresh every time I do it. I just don't There's maybe been like a few times that like I'll just get done with playing or something and just be like, "Yep." Yeah. Right.

Yes. Yeah. That it that Yeah. I know that feeling.

That to me is kind of um I have that same feeling with gigs. I can count on one hand the amount of times where I was one hand over a decade of like I crushed that. I could not maybe I could have sounded better, but I know that I personally couldn't have done any better than what I did on that a handful of times over a decade. Usually the first thing in my head is you did that, you know, like smile and wave and then when I get kind of by myself, it's like automatically kind of just going through the notes of like, okay, tomorrow do this better because you did that.

Like I'm having fun. I'm having fun, too. I am too. But sometimes I'll listen back maybe to like a like a tape of the show or something.

There's been times I listen back and I'm like, "Oh my gosh." I'm like, "You're kind of crushing right now." Yeah. I'm like, "Hell yeah, dude."

Like, "That sounded great." You know, not great, but I It sounds far better than I like in the moment in my head. I s Well, give you're allowed to give yourself a compliment. It does sound great.

Um, it does sound great. And if you think it sounds great, we I'm speaking to myself right now, too. No matter what you're doing, it doesn't have to be music. Like, it's okay to be proud of your of what you do, you know?

It's okay to be proud of yourself. Well, I'm proud of like I'm proud of myself cuz I give my best effort always. Like I'm just I'm addicted to effort. Just give 100% effort.

Yeah. So, I'm always like proud of my effort. Yeah. Uh the like actually what how well I do something.

Sometimes I'm disappointed, but I can always like hang my hat on the idea that I just you gave it everything. Yeah. Yeah, I agree with that. Um Yeah, I feel the same way.

Um there's times, so I've had this conversation with my wife, you know, um you there's always the conversation in this industry of like, you know, comparison is the thief of joy and you know, it shouldn't be there shouldn't be a metric of success. there's not one, you know, general kind of metric of success or um, you know, the stay in your lane thing or yada. Um, I've found myself being really guilty of not being so like, you know, comparative or um of and never like jealous of somebody's success or um but it's I always thought the conversation was interesting where it's like hey like stay in your lane you know like what they're doing doesn't really affect you but now everything is on this metric of numbers right so it's like yeah but it kind of does like the metric does matter otherwise it wouldn't show how many monthly listeners anybody has on Spotify, you know what I mean? But there's always that's what makes our industry unique.

It's like um so I'm putting a bow on this. This is going somewhere. I promise you. But I think it's easy when it's been really easy for me of if I feel like I've given my best effort on a song or if I write or if I sing a song that I'm really proud of um and I know I'm proud of the song and I know that I've did the best I could writing and performing the song and if it lands flat in front of a crowd or something, it is human to be like, "Oh, maybe that song sucks.

Maybe I'll," you know, like that like letting that negativity creep in. So I've I think I've been spending my 30s trying to kind of like not make peace but understand the difference. Understand that's like going back to our conversation from earlier knowing that you are satisfied with the work that you're putting forth and you have no control over the perception of it. you know, because a different a different me, my 20s or whatever, um has defin definitely been more bothered by like I'm so proud of this song.

Nobody gives a [expletive] The song sucks. I suck or whatever. You know what I mean? Um and uh you know, stay in your lane.

There's no metric. It's like, yeah, but you didn't get this gig and somebody else didn't. They have more month of you know what I mean? It's like you go down that rabbit hole and it's not fair to do I think as a songwriter, you know, probably not.

There's a there's a healthy amount of it, but yeah, it can start to become debilitating. A thousand%. Yeah. And yeah, I guess so.

Uh we were talking earlier before you got here. Um there's like this really good interview with Ethan Hawk where um I forget who it's with. I'm sure it's a quick Google. Um, but he's talking about getting into acting and the um he's essentially saying that if you get into it for the right reasons that you have to make peace with the prospect of potentially being the 60-year-old woman who teaches theater at the local community college that if you get into it, you have to know that the rest is up to the world and what they do with what you chose.

You know, like you can't really control that. Yeah. Be a lifer. Yeah.

I just don't jive that well with people that are just in it for attention. Yeah. Just attention. Clearly this guy.

Yeah. No doubt. You do you do all the right things. That's how uh that's how come why I got so much Tik Tok followers.

I don't know what uh you're really good at Tik Tok. You have a you just figure Yeah, I think your yours are great. And uh not to go down this rabbit hole. said I wouldn't.

It sounds like you want to. Every now and then I'm like me and uh me and my wife O'Neal will be like kind of BSing back and forth. I'm like, "Ah, we should have videotape that. That'd be funny."

And then you go to like maybe recreate it and it's like, "That's stupid. Let's go make a sandwich." Yeah. You know what I mean?

You can't recreate that magic on some of the thing. Yeah. Some of it just needs to be organic. I got I think I got shadowbanned on TikTok.

We're pretty sure we did, right? Yeah. We got I got shadow Well, it's shadowbanned. I mean, I got I got like stried for like multiple things.

How But how do you know? I was doing a lot. Well, they send you a message, too. Well, the shadow banning, they don't send you a message, but you can so clearly see like when you're getting a certain amount of reach and then just like all of a sudden it's like, yeah, you go from getting a like a lot of reach to just like nothing.

Uh and then my account got like hit for like a few things or like I was driving while I was doing a TikTok live one time. Oh, they shut it down. That was the first one, I think. And then second one was I was on a uh another live and then I said gay, but I asked like I was like, "Well, that might be gay."

I'm like, "Is that gay?" And uh and then it shut it down like immediately. Really? Bam.

And then like they sent a message and like said, "You got banned or something like that." Uh or like they put it on hold, right, for like 30 days. I couldn't lock in. Um, and then there was another one.

I was shoeing horses. God, you're a problem. At one of I guess you're a reckless. Yeah.

A real freaking a real troublemaker on Tik Tok. An outlaw. Yeah, that's the new age outlaw is just saying the I wasn't even I wasn't even saying gay in like a man. You see that?

That's Jared Morris. He's been banned on Tik Tok. I didn't even say it in like a negative way at all. It wasn't a slur or anything.

It was just the word. You're right. And to get banned for 30 days. Um, and then the next one was, uh, I was at one of my I was shoeing and then my customer has a daughter that's like I think she's like she's eight or nine or something, but I was shooting her horses.

She's a little barrel racer and um she was like she was like, "Oh, hey, it'd be really fun to like do a TikTok live while you shoe and then I can read out the comments to you and then you can like say stuff." But she's like in front of the phone screen and I'm back there shoeing. Right. That was her idea.

Yeah. Yeah. It's a good idea. And so Yeah.

And it was fun. Like and I was just shoeing and she was like so and so is saying this, you know, and so I was just like saying it back. They shut it down and then and then they strike my account because I had a minor on there and I was like whoa whoa. Yeah.

I was like, "Oh my." Because that's an age restriction. If you're under 18, right? Isn't it?

If you're under 18, you can't be on TikTok Live, which I didn't know that. Yeah. I took a video of my baby throwing up. It's on my Watch out, dude.

They're going to freaking strike you for something worse than you could ever imagine. It's insane, dude. So, that was one of them. Um, what was the other one?

I think there was one for smoking, too. Uh, well, actually, so I was like, listen, Tik Tok, so I called him on the phone. You said, "Hey, is this tick or talk? I got some over here in Winston Salem right now."

Is that where they're based at? No, I that's where the cigarette company is. Oh. So anyways, uh so like yeah, after that like our reach just like disappeared for a while and then now it's like well sort of you can tell it like it's weird but it all es and flows but even I just don't get I just don't get super wrapped up in it.

It's like just do the work. I even had to find the joy and like I like the idea of even uh you know doing videos and connecting and I just don't post something if I don't like it and I think it's stupid. Yeah. Then I'm not going to do it just for the sake of doing it.

And uh and it all es and flows. The amount of people that have had these like blow up moments that everybody starts talking about and then like nobody talks about them anymore is hilarious cuz you get texts from people that are like, "Hey man, so and so is really blowing up." And I'll be like, "Yeah, that's awesome. That's great."

And they're like, "Man, you should do, you know, then because I know the next thing is going to be you should do Yeah. Right. Like whatever they're doing." And I'm like, "Yeah, I mean, but yeah, maybe.

Yeah, okay. Whatever." The problem is you're only ever going to get the text, hey, so and so is blowing up. That same person never texts you back like a year later, two years later, and says, "Hey, remember when I told you so and so was really having a moment and blowing up?"

Um, they don't have anything going on now. They like kind of went backwards. They never do like a follow-up text about that person. So if you're if you're too obsessed with what everybody else is doing, you'll just get inundated with like there's always going to be people that are thought about trying this.

Yeah. There's always going to be people that are more successful than you in that moment, right? But you're comparing yourself to like this endless the entire world. That's where it gets the world just replaces itself.

Sure. You're just you. Have you um Well, until the robots replace you. That's right, man.

That's right. Um, have you had anybody at a show come up to you because they know you from TikTok? Yeah. Like not because they knew you before?

Uh, yeah. And I mean, I've had a couple people now that are like, I don't even know you did music. I just listen to your podcast. Huh.

That's pretty cool. Maybe. I mean, I think so. Possibly.

I don't know. Yeah. I don't know. I've just always tried to keep stuff like I just want to do stuff that I like I like to do with people that I think are like genuine and sincere and authentic and then if I just keep on that road who canceled today that I got Yeah.

I was actually going to uh talk with Booger here. I love Booger. Boogie Woogie. Yeah.

How old's Boo here? Well, so uh you've also we co-wrote a couple songs on my new record. We wrote Well, funny thing. So, do you know this story?

Probably not. I don't think so. It's quite embarrassing. It's actually really funny.

So, our writing style is through text message. Yeah. About 90% of it is through text message, which is great. And then phone.

Well, we've gotten together in person before. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

That's right. Um but a lot of it is like just driving and phone calls and whatever. And uh you know it works that works great. Like it works great.

So you were in Nashville what like two weeks ago and uh you were introducing the kick rocks cowboy song and I was like I'm pretty sure we wrote this guy. No I don't think we did. And he played I'm like yeah we did. Did I like show you?

You're like, "Oh my god." But you'd replaced so much of it. It like No, we didn't write that song. Yeah, we did.

No. Yeah. Well, we texted back and forth. We had the note section for it.

That's Well, yeah. I just blanked on it. I just kept writing it cuz I will like with in that type of setting too, like I'm like bringing you some songs that are like somewhat fleshed out and I'm like, "Okay, I need like a line like it's pretty weird." It's like I need a line here.

Give me like what's like what's like 10 things that like you think could like work right here. And then you rattle off a bunch of like cool [expletive] and then and then it's like Yeah. Then just like get back in the meat grinder, you know? It's kind of a weird way of like writing a song.

That's not always how like a co-write normally goes. No, it's there's been some uh early on that you sent me that I was like you already wrote the song. Like you know what I mean? Yeah.

I'm not going to at all give you that one. That one was really funny though. That was really funny. Well, cuz this the next one I was going to play was uh one that we wrote together and I was like And then you just went into Kick Rocks Cowboy instead.

Yeah. Yeah. And then you were like, "Wait, which one?" And I was like, "Well, we wrote that other one."

And you were like, "Well, we wrote that one, too." And I was like, "Yeah." Um, so I wrote a song today on the drive up here. We were going through Paris.

There's a billboard when you get into town. It's like it's a billboard and it's in red duct tape and it says, "Leah, I'm sorry. I love you." Which is great.

And uh so I like wrote I wrote it into a poem and I think I'm just going to do it as like I just recite it as a poem, you know, like it shows with Oh, yeah. Maybe with no music behind it. Just no guitar. Just waterboard your audience with a poem.

I might do it this weekend, but uh I just was like imagining so I Googled to see what the average cost for a billboard was in Paris, Texas. Um so the whole thing is like he prom, you know, he promised her Paris, they ended up in Paris, Texas, and the whole thing, you know, and uh and then he like looks up to like he screws up. I don't want to, you know, give too much away because you'll see tomorrow when we're playing in Turkey. Uh but uh where it's like he's going to go take out an ad on a billboard profess his love and you know declare how sorry he is but it's $673 and so he just finds a roll of red duct tape and stuff.

It's like a way cheaper fix. Like it was so I don't know. We left. I don't Poor guy.

There's I mean poor guy. I don't know. Poor gal. I don't know.

Yeah. Right. Yeah. But uh I wrote it and then I recited it to my to my wife and she started laughing.

I was like, I don't think this is a song. I think this is something that I just you just recite as a poem. Well, I'm a freaking massive fan, dude. uh as a person uh as a person.

No, not really. But yeah, as a writer and stuff. Yeah, you do have a way of putting some really unique stuff together. Well, thank you.

And you got such a cool presence too with like cultivating like making people feel comfortable to like be themselves and be creative and stuff, which is rare as well. I don't like I don't like these compliments. Yeah, those West Texas boys don't. Well, and likewise.

Likewise. No, you don't have to do No, I'm not I'm not Yeah, I know. Um that's not what I No, it's not. I know it's not.

Um but also for years it was like, you know what, every one of our like mutual friends, every person for years, have y'all have y'all hung out together yet? Yeah. They're like every Yeah. Every person like, "Man, I really think you and Ross Cooper."

So now I'm waiting to show you these songs, too. We're like almost done mixing. Yeah. Yeah.

Don't show them to me until Yeah. They're uh Yeah, they're rocking, dude. Awesome. Awesome.

When's that going to come out? Just in the summer. Yeah. Yeah.

Is it already summer? Well, yeah. I like to keep it open-ended. Yeah.

You know, a summer. It could be. It's going to happen in a year in my life. 2000.

Yeah. 20. Well, so when people hear this, your record will be out. Yeah.

Yeah. That's exciting. Yeah. Yeah.

Gosh, that was beautiful. That was really beautiful. Um, it is. It's It is way exciting.

Um, there's those like live records, you know, like Live from the Old Quarter and um the uh like the Adam Carroll live records, Todd Snyder live records. Like I love all those records and they just s you're just listening to a guy sing songs on a with a guitar, you know, and I love like love being in the studio and making produ production decisions and this is like the first time in my life that I've taken that all away from myself and I think it's a good thing right now. Hell yeah. Um, and it is really scary and I'm fully kind of prepared for uh people to either like not get it or not like it.

But that I also know that's a negative like I should be that's a negative outlook, you know, I should be like, well, I'm really prepared for people to really love it. It be their thing, you know. But um I think I'm saying that to say that it was uh I'm really proud of it and for way different reasons. way to like it is a thousand percent different record than Lightning Heart or um Chasing No, anything that I've done.

It's not It's not It's got some of those songs, but this is like there's some moments where I'm like, "Whoa, there that's a human that's a human moment right there, you know." And uh I debated so Charlie Stout um did some uh some engineering on it for me and there was one song in particular where I was like man I could fix I could fix this vocal or whatever at my house and make it pretty seamless. And uh thank God Charlie talked me out of it. He was like that's not what this record is.

What a G. And um he's like, "If that's what you want to do, yeah, we'll do it, but I'm going to make the case that you shouldn't do it." What a G. And um so we didn't.

And just it's there. Well, y'all, Ross has been a part of a lot of songs that you guys jam and are some of your favorite songs, and I don't think he's gotten the credit that he's due. And I'm hoping that yeah, people will go listen to this stuff and listen to him. He's just a freaking lyric wizard and he writes unbelievable melodies and really dope chord progressions and he's a great producer and a great songwriter and he's a really cool dude.

He's the same off the court as he is on the court and I'm glad you're my friend. Likewise, buddy. Thank you. Thanks for having me.

Yeah. Thank you all for listening. Addios, do your Aussie sign off. I'll only do it if you promise to take it out of the very beginning.

I can't. Well, I think where there's a But this is the way my bank account set up. I can't do it. You go for it.

Well, yeah. I guess we'll see you next time, eh? [Music] [Music]