#62 - Carly Pearce - The story behind her song "Every Little Thing"

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Speaker 1: I welcome to episode sixty two of the Bobby Cast. Our sponsors are Ah, Yes, Sleep Number and YEP and Blue Apron. Sometimes I like to lay in my Sleep Number and eat my Blue Apron and me up. If only we get Netflix is a sponsor, Mike d I could have all three at once, Sleep Number and Blue Apron and watch my Netflix. Carli Pierce is here. Carl good to see you, man. Let's see. So the last time we saw each other was you came to my stand up comedy show on Nashville and then you got up and played. And then I think the guitar we gave you was broken or something. I just couldn't figure out if it was in standard tuning or not. Well, it was all my fault too, And I was like, I'm like, all right, come up, you know, come to the show because you're coming out on the road. I was like, just you can see what it is the theater show. And I was like, carl I Pierce, come up and sing a song and you get up to play, and I gave you Eddie's guitar and I didn't tell you anything about it. It's so I felt so bad. But the good news is he still killed it, and everybody walked away like Dann, that girl's good. After the second in time, after I had to, you know, like no, start, you're following me like I have, I get talked like yeah, nothing, w You're actually good. So I'm glad you hear. There are a few things I want to talk to you about. The First of all, we're gonna come back around to the song at the end, But Carly has a song right now. Depending on when you hear this, you may hear this in a year and she may be on her third number one single by the time this song right here. We're gonna get to But what we do on this podcast, it's different than our radio interview because we have time to talk and sometimes like talk about some of the stuff that maybe you wouldn't talk about in a radio interview because people that listen to this. I bring a lot of songwriters on and they don't really get talking on the radio that much. But I want to hear the stories about things that really maybe people don't think of that interesting, which I find fascinating. So first, I want to talk about your move to Nashville, because people a lot of people listen to this go hand like to move to Nashville. You know what do people actually do in the move to Nashville. They literally pack up their car and get an apartment. And then, so I want to talk about your move to Nashville. So start me. How old were you? Well? I I quit high school. Just to take it a little bit back, I I quit high school at sixteen because I saw an audition for Dollywood and asked my dad and convinced him to let me quit high school and start homeschooling so that I could take a job working in the country show. Okay, hold on a minute before we go any further that, man, I got a lot of questions from that. So were you performing at home? I grew up singing and always knew that I wanted to do that, and they knew you wanted to do that. They did my whole life. What kind of student were you? I was a really good student and I loved school. But that helps you quit though, And and I I want you to listen to me, because usually it's my friends that every wood school they weren't good students, and they their parents like, you can't quit because you have to get your But if you're a really good student, and you're really smart, like m well, she's really smart, so she must be wanting to quit for a reason. Is their truth to that with your parents? And they think she wouldn't quit unless she really knew what she wanted to do totally. I was the student that never missed any homework and I was always there on time. Didn't want to me. I loved school, and so they knew it wasn't me trying to find some kind of like outlet just to quit. And my dad was crazy enough to let me take this summer going into my sophomore year to find a homeschooling program. And I quit that conversation. I looked at him and I said, Dad, I think I want to quit high school because I saw an audition for Dollywood, like not even kidding you, straight out of Kentucky, like that is a Kentucky story. And my dad looked at me and was like no, And I said, just give me the summer to find a homeschooling program that will get me into college and it's reputable and you won't have to do anything, you won't have to teach me, and just let's leave it at that. And so he's like okay, but I don't think he really thought I was going to do it. And a couple of weeks later, I found this online schooling that was just like a college, and I showed it to him and he was like, all right, all right. So I went an auditioned and got the job and moved to a pigeon forge. So when you're fifteen years old, are you kind of the big deal around the small town because you were really good for your small town? Of course, you know, it's like the stereotypical big fish in a small pond. So I was the only one that sang, and everybody knew me as the singer. So I was feeling like, I'm gonna go to Dollywood. I'm gonna work for a year, and then I'm gonna move to Nashville and be a star. Were you Carly Pierson? That your name? I was, So my last name is actually Slusser, and I my grandparents are really close to me, and I wanted to pay tribute to them because Slusser does not sound very good, and h I took my grandfather's name Pierce, so I didn't know that. So my list is not bone with My line was est and it didn't sound good, Like, Hey, uh so Pierce isn't in your name at all? No, it's my grand's name. That's cool, my mom's maiden name. Is your grandfather alive? What he's not? But he is if you follow my story at all. I have red feather tattooed on my on my arm just for him. He was probably the closest person to me and died of cancer, but always knew I wanted to do this music thing and always believed in me and didn't get to see it, but I know that he sees it. How old were you when he died? Okay, so he he got to see you move away and actually pursue a dream. Then he did. He he actually he had a lot of health problems, but he made it to Pigeon Forge to see me, saying right before, right before he died, like two months before. How special is that memory? Amazing? Yeah? And he always knew I was going to go to Nashville. He was like, I I have no fear that you're gonna that You're gonna go there and it's gonna be fine. Where in Kentucky did you grow up. It's called Taylor Mill. It's right outside of Cincinnati. Actually, but it's a super small town. There were eighty people in my graduating high school class there in Arkansas. I would have said they were very, very similar. So when you went to town, where would you go? Um? Skyline Chili? Have you ever had it? No? We had one stop flight and like one super small shopping center and Skyline Chili is really big in Cincinnati area. And so after football games we would go either to the Skyline or the subway, or we had an oriental walk, which was like a big deal. That was fancy. Was that in Ccinnati though? That was in Kentucky. That was in Taylor Mill, Okay. So if you had to but did you have a Walmart? You can add a Walmart? Right, so if you had to go to walmarte grocery rub as you go. We had a grocery store. But if we want to do to the Walmart, we had to go to Covington, which was the nearest like a suburb of Cincinnati. So you grow up in Kentucky, you're a teenage kid, you're singing, where you doing all the school stuff? If it was a thing at school where you one of those kids, Yeah, I mean, and that's the thing I really had a lot of friends in school. I was a cheerleader, but I always would pick music over everything, and so my friends I would drag them. I sang bluegrass a lot growing up too, and so I would drag them to all these different festivals and things that I was singing at. Uh. So I was juggling both at the same time. But everybody knew that I wanted to do music. So you go to your dad and you say, hey, I want I don't know the story of your parents. Um, where is your mom? Is she alive? Oh? Yeah, she's there too. She's looking at me like I'm an idiot too at that time. But I mean they really they always were like the perfect I always say that my parents were. I'm very close to both of them, and they were the perfect balance of being supportive, uh and always giving me an opportunity to do music, but also we're not ever going to push me to do it. They wanted me to figure that out on my own. Were they musical. They can sing, but they would never tell you that when they sing in charge or sing around the town. So you would see them sing. Though they loved music. I more they sang growing up, But my grandparents sang and they played banjo and yeah, so they loved music. But I come from a family of all music lovers. So music was like a big part of our family. Okay, So and you say I want to quit school? Did you practice your speech? Because just think of me like a prom asking a girl. I've been like, I had this whole planned thing and I knew and it just didn't go near as I had planned. So did you have a play? Did you write down your speech as you plant it on your head? I just went to him and kind of gave him the if if any of the girls out there they know, being the only daughter and I'm the only child, just kind of looked at him. It was like, Dad, you know, this is what I've always wanted. And he did. He just knew. I think he knew that conversation was going to happen at some point. Um, I don't think that. He probably thought it was going to happen at fifteen, but that's when it happened. So, Dollywood, where did you see the ad on the newspaper, the Cincinnati newspaper and the acid what looking for Dollywood entertainers? And I left a Dolly parton growing up and so I'm like, I want to do that, and so I looked on the website and it was they had different shows and it was similar to a King's Island in Cincinnati, which is like a theme park, but this was all country show. Had you been in Dolly whatever, yes, as a kid. So I I looked and saw when the audition was and took my guitar and went and sang a couple of songs and did a little dance number because obviously, I mean, it's theater at the end of the they are looking for entertainers Mickey Mouse Club, and I auditioned and moved as soon as I got my license. My mom actually moved with me for the first year that I was there because I was I couldn't get Yeah, I'm sixteen, I I know she was crazy. And now I think about it, you know, looking back, and I'm like, I can't believe that they did that because my parents are still married, um, and my Grandpaul was sick at the time, and my dad just started taking care of him so that my mom could take me. And my mom and I moved into a one bedroom, one bathroom, Grizzly Bear decorated condo with a jaccuzzi tub in the bedroom. He isn't ready to rock. Huh. Really, you're at a party. It sounds like you move to I don't know about this audition. What do you do? You're sixteen? You go and I'm sure there are other kids everywhere. Yeah, And i mean I when I got the job, I was the youngest by at least five years, So I mean it was pretty much adults that were there. Uh. But they put you in a room and you have to learn a dance number, and then you sing a couple of songs that they had picked off of a list. And I brought a guitar just to be like, hey, I can hold a guitar and play. Did they let you play? Yeah? I'm just picturing American idol, And there's like some British country guy, and there's Paul Abduel country and there's Randy, Like, who's judging you? The guy that was in charge of the entertainment, So just one guy, just one guy in his assistant. So you go up on what do you sing? I sang Emily Lou Harris song called Wayfer and Stranger, and then I sang a Dolly song sing Joline does everybody sing a Dolly song probably, I mean, yeah, exactly. I heard a lot of people sing a Dolly. But what's funny is when I worked at Dollywood, I didn't sing any Dolly. Really. Yeah, that's kind of weird. It was we So you go, you're sixteen, you get the job? Did they how long until you finished performing to they call and say you got the job? Because that that is going to tell you a few move and quit school or not, right, I know, And I was like, I gotta know soon. I think it was like maybe two weeks and I got it. Yeah, I had to wait that long, and so I'm like freaking out. I don't know, you know. It was the summer. Uh, And they called me and they told me that I got the job, and so we're scrambling to figure out, you know, where we're gonna live and all that stuff. And really, as soon as I got my license, I started rehearsals and just walked in and was kind of like, hey, and everybody now tells me that was in my cast. They were like, yeah, we were really upset that we were getting a sixteen year old because they were all older than me. But we ended up just being like a little family. So you were the new kid? Were you the only new class kid that came into that cast? Everybody was new, uh? Put together? A couple of people have been there before, just working in different shows. But I was the baby baby of the of the group and kind of was intimidated because I was used to being around high school kids and these were all college or above. Was that a bad influence for You're looking back like you have a bunch of you know, they're drinking. Yeah, Like that's probably not the best environment for a sixteen year old, is it? Probably not? But I feel like I really did get around a lot of people who were like big brothers and big sisters to me. They knew I was super young, and I didn't hang out a lot with them outside of work because I feel like they knew that I was really young and they didn't want to do that. So were they all aspiring musicians too? Like everybody? That's kind of a step you know of because it's like in our world, first of all, the steps are like this. For some artists, the most common steps are you put your music on Spotify, iTunes, wherever you just put it. Then you try to get out satellite then you try to get on the radio. That's kind of the jumps. Friends come and I have other friends with Dollywood, and you know, they moved, they did Dollywood, then they came to town and they were a songwriter and they tried to make as an artist, and they tried the other steps where all the other people that were there doing the same trying the same path you were. That's what's crazy. And I always tell people, I so I was in Pigeon Ford for two years, and it for me would have been very convenient for me to just stay there. Um to answer your question, yes, a lot of everybody goes there thinking of it as a stepping stone, but never leave because it's you're singing every day. You kind of have like a little weird community of of fans that recognize you and you're kind of yeah, you're kind of like Pigeon Oh my god. So many yeah, so many Dollywood and Pigeon Ford just groupie love. You know, you're on billboards and I thought that was so cool on billboards. I still think that's billboards are cool. So yeah, I mean a lot of people moved there wanting to eventually go to Nashville, but very few have gone so interested in this cult. It's weird because in a good in a good kind of way, but you do become it's in your own environment. It's just like the Nashville community or Bubble everybody hung out that was in all the different shows that were in Pigeon Forage, and um, you knew that. I mean I knew so many people that were like, oh, yeah, we're eventually going to move and they're still at Dollywood, which is awesome and great, but um, I knew after being there for two years that I was kind of just going to coast and never grow. You have a challenge at all, Yeah, I I I had done pretty much everything that I could do over there, because really a thing of the day, you're an impersonator. You just are. You're not you as an artist, were the best. Don't look away and smile like it's okay to say, like did you feel Because I feel like I'm the best at what I do. I feel like I am the best, and I have to feel that way, and I have to have an ego to do the job that I do, because if I didn't, I was like, I'm third best. I'm never off. People listen to me I'm like, there, you have to feel like you're the best. So you felt like you were the best there at Dollywood, right, I'm sure that I did. Yes, I'm sure that there was a part of me to answer that I knew I was good enough to go to Nashville. I knew that I wasn't supposed to the best. You broke eye contacts. It's okay, I'll get the truth out of you. So you're there, and you went at eighteen or so, you decided to go to Nashville because you were an adult then and you actually could do adult things exactly. So in January of two thousand nine, I moved and made the jump. So he moved to Nashville. And again, that's what the whole first part of this is about, is about people listening, like, how do people actually moved to Nashville. Your story goes through Dollywood, So you moved to Nashville. Does your mom go back to Kentucky. My parents decided to split time because I didn't really know very many people in Nashville, and I was scared, and I'm an only child, and so they kind of split time with me and wanted me to be able to focus on music. So they moved and my dad's company is actually in Nashville. They moved here. They did, so you went from having one of them, you got both of them. I got both of them. But my dad traveled so much that it still felt like it was one. Uh. So they were there with me for the majority of the first couple of years that I was there, just trying to make the transition, and I was I did. Yeah, they put your bills and stuff. They did, Michael. We didn't get this leg. We had to go out, Wow sleep your parents. But it gets pretty my story. You'll see it catches some sadness. You gotta get me something. Well, so I moved. Hold before you do that, let me talk about before we get sad, I get to sponsors thing here. Let me talk about sleep number for a second. So we do this show from my house. You probably talk about my sleep number bed and where we're located in my house is actually one door away, so probably twenty ft from my sleep number bed. I do love the bed as sleep I used score have a sleep number setting. It's two things that that's why the bed is so awesome, because it is a bed for you, and maybe you consider a sleep number bed. But you wonder if you could afford one? Right now? The best time to go in right now. There's semi annuals sell where Queen c two mattresses six. Let me talk about the sleep number. I went into the store, I laid on the bed. I said, I'm looking for a new bed. I said, how about this one? I said, cool? Find the one that I liked. I laid on it. That a computer screen that showed me my back and my neck on my leg, and it shows you your body and how it and they they give you the number that's right for you. My sleep number setting is thirty. My sleep I Q score last night it was ninety four. I slept so good. You'll find any of the sleep number beds at five fifty sleep number stores nationwide. Find the nearest one. If you wanna call eight hundred next bed you can, and be sure to tell them you heard it here on the Bobby Cast. I love my sleep number bed. Okay, So okay, I'm just kidding by this sat and the stuff. I don't feel like you have to make something up. I won't make anything out of it. So you moved to Nashville. What kind of apartment you guys get our house. What'd you move to? We got a house in almost white House, so almost into Kentucky. It was very far away. That is far like past um Goodletsville, past Hendersonville. So what do you do when you move to Nashville. You just start finding light minded people and go and do you want to write a song? I would there. There was a an Italian restaurant in Hendersonville that had an open mic night, and so I would play their own Mondays. Everybody does. And then I figured out I met a few songwriters in town and really was lucky to get plugged in pretty fast. Um Pat higged in at Universal. He was at Universal at the time running It, took an interest in me and wanted to start working with me. So I kind of got um put into the Nashville community pretty fast within the first year. So I thought in my head, ah, this is gonna be fun. I'm gonna be famous in a year. And had a lot of label showcases. Premature surely, um, meaning you weren't ready. When you say pretty much, what defined that? I thought I was ready at nineteen. And of course, of course you think you're ready. You always are going to think you're ready. But now looking back at it, I think that what has been my struggle. I've been here eight years before anything really took off for me like it has in the last six months. Um. But I think people got a first time. You only get your first impression once. And I think if I would have taken maybe a couple of years to develop that, I would have had a better shot. It wouldn't have taken maybe eight years for people's opinions to maybe turn around of what they thought I was. They just they they never could get that nineteen year old girl out of their head, if that makes sense. So you're nineteen, you're playing in front of you're trying to get a labled. Do you're gonna get a recording deal now immediately? While you're writing songs? What would you tell an eighteen or nineteen year old now doing the same thing. I think, don't rush the process. That's so easy to say, But you're right. I mean I'm the same way as you. Yeah, I was seventeen, eighteen years old, like I know it all here, let me go, and yeah, exactly, And I don't think and I feel so motherly when I say that, but it it really is take your time and develop as a human being. I mean nineteen two that that's such a young age. And sometimes it works out for people, and obviously we have people in our format that started super young and our superstars, um, but I think personally for me, and if I was going to tell like a student Belmont, I would just be like, take the time and don't think that you don't have time because you really not saying that your opinions can't be the opinions of people in town can't be changed. But it's just gonna be a lot harder for you, I think internally if you put that kind of pressure of like I have to get it now. No, no, no, now in the first year that I moved here, instead of being like, what do I want to say? Who am I as a person? What is my lane? You know, it's gonna be crazy in ten years when you go, I do really know what I was doing ten years ago. So it's a cycle ten years having like as big as idiot ten years ago, I know what I was doing. Now I do, and then after that I'd be like, man, I don't know what I was doing ten years ago. So how many times because this is fascinated to me being here, said, I see people get to be the shiny toy sometimes two and three times, like they'll get their shiny to my moment, and then it goes away and they didn't quite flourish the way they had hoped. But time and uh learning and more different shift in managements all around. How many times were you the shiny toy? Do you felt like like like boom eighteen nineteen? Did you have another spot in the middle between the last year and a half and the eighteen nine year old. Yeah, I I had a developmental record Dean Sony in when I was twenty two, and I think, you know, you immediately get put into uh song plugger meetings where all the people or pitching you great songs, and you see your name on a pitch sheet, which for people that don't know what that is, it's you know, you see your name next to Kenny Chesney or something looking for songs for your album, and and people answer your emails and come to your shows and think you're awesome. But then you know, my person at the label got let go, and the minute that that happened, the whole town turned. And so you were part of that person so when they were let go are you Wow? So you went through two shiny toy phases. So you're in town, let's go back to being nineteen or so. You're writing a bunch of songs, You're trying to do your Are you working other jobs? I I worked a couple of retail jobs at the Upper Mills mall. Yeah you want a lot of my other friends? Really? Yeah? Yeah? I worked at the Loft and I worked at Banana Republic. What do you do? You worked? Sure, that's funny. Worked in the dressing room at both places, super glamorous. Every time I go by, I'm like, oh my god, I always wonder do you think the whole time you're doing it, You're like, Man, I know, I'm gonna make it like I'm just doing this right now, and that's just getting part of my story. Yeah, yeah, for sure, that was always the intention. I think who was in your class of people that kind of came to talent because and everybody goes and succeeds at different levels and years, and but who when you moved to town? Who are the other people that I moved town around the same time. I had a group of friends. We played a lot pretty much every weekend at a place that's no longer They're called Hotel Indigo. Uh. We played writers Rounds and it was me and Casey Musgraves and John and t j Osborne and Lucy Sylvius gree Harrison. That was kind of the group that I came up with that I played with all the time. And now, you know, it's like you said, people go faster, and you see your friends go up, and I've had other friends I've watched them go up and come down and you just never know what's going to happen. You know. Natalie him be in the same chair. We were talking about that and she was like, you know, I've seen friends go all the way up and then come all the way back down to even below where they were when we met. And she was like, it's really giving me a respect of that. You go when you're meant to go, and if you go later, that's okay because some of the you know, she wanted to be a recording artist and she moved to l A and then she you know, found her spot where she and by the way, she put on my favorite people like she's awesome and if you listen to that, she should listen to not you, you too, but I'm going you should go listen to it too, because it's fantastic. But she talks about that too, like, you can't look at other people going up and go, oh my goodness, I'm not as good as them, because they could be way back down when you finally get your shot, for sure. And I was frustrating to you to see them go up. Oh yeah, I mean, and it was difficult because they were my friends and obviously I thought they were all amazing, but yeah, you start to completely compare yourself and wonder why it wasn't you, and and you get in your head and social media doesn't help, and and you you have to kind of step out of that and understand that everybody, everybody's plan is different and you can't constantly but this town is so small and we're all friends, and we're all trying to kind of get those certain spots that a label has, and um, there's only so okay, what do you do? You know your twenty like, what do you do? How do you keep yourself saying? Well, after I after I lost my developmental deal, I obviously thought about moving home. Plenty of people in the industry very and I've been very h just open about the fact that I was told to move home. I was told I was old news. I would uh leave meetings and keep face just long enough to get in my car and just ball or make it home and start crying and wonder. I look at apartments in Kentucky hometown, and my best friend from home she cried and she was like, you can't. I will not let you move home. And I'm like, I think I have to be done. And I had to take a job cleaning airbnbs and I nannied, and that was kind of what I juggled for a year and a half. And I was depressed and I just didn't know what I was gonna do. Uh, And randomly got called to be a backup singer in Lucy Hale's music video Pretty Little Liars Girl. Yeah, and so I go. And my dream was always to sing at the Grand Ole Opry, and her music video was being shot at the Opery and I remember being like, Wow, this definitely isn't how I thought I was going to stand on the opera stage for the first time. So I'm standing off to the side and I'm like, what is happening, Like is this what you're what is this and just being the kind of I don't know, fearless girl that I was, I walked straight to a tour manager and I said, you know, I'm still taking meetings and nobody's calling me back, and I'm still writing songs, but just really lost. And I just said, hey, if you ever need a backup singer for real, let me know. Why would they need a backup singer. Nobody has female backup singers just because anymore, you know, budgets don't really call for those anymore. And two weeks later, I'll never forget it. I was nanny and her tour manager called me and he said, hey, can you fly out to l A for a couple of months and do some shows with US and TV. And I was like, yes, quit my nanny job that day and just was like maybe right there, no, I mean I did quit. I was like, there's a kid that just left behind. I left her, so you quit your nanny job. So I was I'll never forget being on an airplane going to l A and thinking maybe this is what I'm supposed to do. And again so many people in the town were like, you are going to have the kiss of death of your career as a solo artist because you're going to go be a backup singer. And I was just like, you know what I want to I want to feel music again. And I really do think that that experience helped me to fall back in love with music. I was part of something that felt like a family and I felt like I was respected and she I made it a point to not tell her I was an artist, and she YouTube me and she came to me during rehearsals and she was like, why are you singing it back up for me? I looked at your videos online and so I told her my story and you know the power of social media and the power of somebody like that just starting to She really was so kind and wanted to make her fans aware of me as an artist. What a great move to not tell her you're an artist, though, because I'm gonna tell you as soon as someone comes up to me and I do on the same thing, and it's a great thing to have to deal with. But it's like, hey, I am an artist. From my boom guard to go up immediately like yeah, why are you using me? Why are you talking to me? Probably wouldn't talk to me. She has to feel that way. All artists have to feel that way. And I just decided. I was like, I'm here for her and I want her to feel like I am, and I was. I felt so rejuvenate, and I've told her many times we're really good friends, and I've been like, you really did help me fall back in love with music. It was totally not. Uh, there's a there's a guitar player in town that's a really good friend and we've played together for a long time and he's the guitar player on everything that that is out right now pretty much. He's a session guys nams Derek Walls. I'm sure you know him, and I remember crying to him one day because he's like a big brother, and he was like, the moment that you decide to let your mind switch and understand that you're going to get from A to B, but it might not be the straight line that you want, and it may twist and turn and go up and down, but you're gonna you're gonna still get there. And I'll never forget him telling me that. And that was why I took the job with Lucy, because I was like, it keeps me in music, and it keeps me out of Nanny, and it keeps me out of Airbnb's Hey Go Home. Because one of the I like, heard a lot of biographies of people that dinner my profession, that do comedy, and some of they write comedy, they performed stand up comedy. They and I remember him saying, you know, they told me I wasn't funny, I wasn't good enough, really famous comedian, and he was like, I took that in my badge of honor because everybody that's ever been really good has been told you're not good enough. He said, anybody he had ever talked to, from the biggest stand up comedians, the biggest TV hosts, the biggest ever had been told you are not good enough. And when he finally got his and meant there was something so different about what he was doing that he was like, Okay, I got my badge. Now now it's time for me to go out, and now I'm one of the rest I've been told. Then there's also I read Amy Schumer's book I'd like to read and she was like, you know, because she tried forever, couldn't make it, couldna make it. Amy Schumer is you know huge, hilarious, and she was like, you know what, when I finally stopped caring that I cared is when it started happening. When I stopped carrying up being so strategic about every single little thing, or she said every little thing. Yeah, actually I wasn't doing that. But and those two things stick with me a lot. I I can really identify with that because you know, something I've learned is Nashville goes in cycles. And when I moved here, you were almost penalized for being a female as soon as she walked in the day. And when you are again, here we are again. Although it is getting better, it's better than it was a year ago, and in a year to be better than it was this year. Right back when I moved here, it was no no, no females. And what I do is definitely a little bit of a throwback to the late nineties and early two thousands women. I really want to step into that, just being the female that you think of when you think of country music. I just that's who I want to be in For so long people told me you're kind of you kind of Mr Mark you you you sound too old, You're that that era has already passed, and so even I tried to start chasing what was on the radio. And I can hear it in my songwriting, and I can hear it just as things have evolved when I went back and just did what I do. You know it. You can't fake authenticity. How did you eat for so long when when you were just doing music? Yeah? So you you work in a Banana Republic, you're singing back up? I mean, was it just odd jobs as you continue to try to find your spot as being you? Really? Yes? And I feel like each time, you know, I would I would sing different gigs. I would do listening room rounds, and they pay you for those, they give you tips, or you can sell burnt CDs. So I would just sell these cheap CDs that I burnt myself at home. That honestly would sometimes I'd make enough money to be like, oh wow, okay, this is good between this and and you know, Airbnb or Nanny and I'll be okay. And I feel like for some reason, I did corporate events and those would help. And I just did so many different autumn things and was really, uh, I didn't have any pride at all, and it was like I just said yes to everything, because at the end of the day, it was a paycheck and you gotta eat. Yeah, and you gotta eat in a place where you can make music, or you move back. What if you were back home? You have done you think? I don't know. I mean I didn't. I didn't go to college at all, and so that scared me. Did you end up getting a high school equivalency? I did? Yeah, I got a diploma in the mail from Phoenix High School from it's called Keystone National High School. I have a lot of friends of graduated from Keiston. Let me talk about Blue Apron for one second, because I do the show from my house. Like we talked about earlier, things like Blue Apron, who was an awesome sponsor of the show, are literally in the under the same roof Blue Apron dot Com slash Bobby Cast. Check out this week's menu. You get your first three meals for free with free shipping Blue Apron dot Com slash Bobbycast. The box comes to your door. It's pretty portion ingredients, fresh, high quality ingredients, affordable two for less than ten dollars per person per mill. Blue Apron deliver seasonal recipes along with preportion ingredients to make delicious home cooked meals, a lot of variety, choose. There's a lot of recipes every week or let Blue Aprons Culinary Team surprise you. Recipes are not repeated. You're gonna love it. You're gonna love it because it's like we when you have tonight, we do only cook and you have all these options guarantee the freshness. Blue Apron dot Com slash Bobby Cast. You love how get a feel so I get a tastes again, the ingredients, they're not all equal fresh It's what Blue Apron is all about. Blue Apron dot Com slash Bobby Cast, Blue Apron a better way to cook. Okay, so we're gonna take a huge leap because I wanted to talk about the struggle first, and that's part one. Part two, I want to talk about something called radio tour. So again something that people that listen to the radio or follow really on social media really don't know it because it's not something that's talked about, not that anybody hides it. It's just kind of boring. So let's talk about radio Torre. Were jumping way ahead from the struggle to the success of the song too. You get signed a big machine to Okay, now what and so they say, Okay, we're gonna start this radio tour. How did they describe a radio tour to you? How did they do to you? I just that I was going to go and meet a lot of radio people and kind of introduce myself. It's pretty much how it was explained to me. Now I knew what a radio tour was because right, and I'll never forget I had a few I'm close to a couple of girls, female artists, and they were like, we promise you after radio tour. Nothing is as grueling as that, and I remember thinking I'm pretty competitive, and so I thought I'll be fine, Like, it's not I can do that. You know, I've worked so long. I can handle that. And it is so many people think, oh, your song just magically appears on the radio and it's awesome, But they don't see those uh you know three am lobby calls that you have to be as a female dressed and ready to go and have a full day and be on and it is unfair your female. Oh it's hard. We can jeans, not shave and hat and still look like an artist. It's I know, it's really unfair. It's hard, and you're a new artist totally. It's not like you're coming to a radio station one that you already have one or two hits and it's like, hey, oh look, you know, Susie's back in a cab. Look at us. He's one of the girls. You really can't be that unless that's your thing. If that's your thing, right, but it is. It's I've I've described it now as you're kind of campaigning yourself. So you have to be your best version of you for that twenty minutes that you get. It's a first date. It's like a first day every single time you walk into a radio station. So do you remember the first day and you went to on your radio tour? I do. Actually, we started in Kentucky home first. I had great experiences my first week. I was like, this is gonna be awesome. Everybody was super excited. I love him, Yeah, he's as my dude. So you started Kentucky. That feels good because it's comfortable and girl like away before my ad date and I'm like, oh my god, this is awesome. Then we start the different you know, because you go to a different territory and you have a different regions of the country, and I was out. I remember, you know, each week I was home maybe at most twenty four hours to do laundry, and you may a couple of days I flew into a city, would drive. I didn't realize how much I was going to be in a van. I mean, you know, you average in a van four to seven hours a day, and then you know three to four stations in there, and you have to do a lunch with the radio people and a dinner with the radio people. So let's walk through a day then. So let's say I'm gonna put you in a place so you don't actually talk about it. Pacifically, you fly to California. Okay, they don't know who you are really. So you fly to California and it's a Sunday night and you started on You're starting on Monday. So you probably get to the morning show of some local station. So you're in the lobby, like you said, at three four in the morning of the hotel to get to the radio station. What do you do? So if I'm already there, we may get to the first station, you know, for the morning show. At seven you're hosting or co hosting for an hour with the radio people that still sometimes live on air on my show. They got two or three hits hanging out with the with the p D and the m D and play a couple of songs live and do a little interview and take pictures and they're fast usually unless you're doing something like that, but you know you're in and out, and uh, you may have I've had a couple of stations where I played for one person. Uh. Some you play for the staff and totally I've had people heat their lunch while I'm singing my ballad uh in the room that I'm in and the timer goes off and they chew in front of me. And so you do that, and then you may get in the car and drive two hours and then you do it again. And then you may at lunch at lunch and you may have right then you may have listeners at your lunch and like a um, a little bit of a show and have a little meat and greet and then lunch with the p D and the m D of that station. And then you may get in the car and do liners from your phone where you're saying, hey, this is Carly Pearce and you're listening to blah. Then you get to another station and it's in the afternoon, and then usually I would have an evening station. Uh, and then go to a dinner that could last, you know, until midnight. How are you eating all this food? Don't stand thin. That's why I don't do work dinners. It's so hard. I'm just like, you can't have to eat my right food or I don't stay. Then we'll see. And that's I have my right food too. I'm super healthy and so that that in itself, just the adjusting to I don't have time to work out every day. I don't get to eat. I like to cook, and I like to go to the grocery store and I like to eat certain things. And that goes out the window. You have dry blue apron, Oh you should. They're in a great sponsor and the ingradients, right, Mike, did you put on the fresh and fifteen? No? I just wouldn't let myself. I would bring like bars, and you know, I tried to be as as conscious as I could, just because that makes me feel good. And I felt like I was going to go insane if I didn't um. But that was hard for me. So you would do maybe sometimes three apparances a day, three stations you do, his parents drive a few hours, parents a few hours, and you're singing in all these and your drumaliness going up and down because you've gotta be on and then be off, and then be on because people will ask me why it's so tired when you're off the show, because not listen my step dad work of the mill. My like, I see, I've seen real work, and the people should know when we talk about grilling, what we do is not groeling like people do real work. It's growing, but in our own little creative like adrenaline. I'm on the air at five o'clock and it's like this for five hours, I'm likely and when nit's off, your whole body is liked. It just shuts down. People like, why are you tired? You didn't do anything, You didn't run a marathon. Yeah, my adrenaline was up because having an entertain you're bought for the last five hours. You don't have to say like that. I can because I like that, but people. So then I come home recharged for a second, and I got like eight other jobs and like writing comedy or might a book or whatever. Then I go back to bed again. But it is a thing. It is a performance thing where you do get up high and you do crash. It's like a five hour energy It's like sugar totally get sugar rushed and you crash. Even my band, I watched the two players that were out with me. I watched them go from being so excited, awesome and like yay, but neither one of them had never done a radio tour to like probably the fourth week. I mean, they were like zombies because they just had no breath. They just would look at me and be like, I don't know how you're doing what you're doing. If this is all we're doing nowhere like this, Well, you have a golden light under the tunnel of years works like a big light. So you go, how long does radio tour last for you? How many weeks? I did? I think eleven? Wow, it was. Do you have any idea how many radio stessations you went to? You know what? My drummer kept a spreadsheet and the last I heard we and this was maybe at week nine, we had visited ninety three. That's crazy. We averaged like I had a lot of problems even you know, I had never flown like that, so my ears for three weeks, I was trying to figure out why I felt like I was under water and I couldn't get well, and that was super frustrating. But we were averaging, you know, twelve days in a row in an airplane. I've never experienced that before. You don't even think about what travel does to your body. And then singing without a microphone, a lot of times you're singing over players and your voice gets raspy, and it was interesting stations, Huh, that's a good radio store. They didn't joke, and that means the label also paid the money for you to move around, because that doesn't happen a lot either. Were where that's also a blessing that your label paid money because that costs now listen, you gotta pay it back sort of, you don't have to pay it back, but if you make that money, it goes back to that pot right there. But they're paying for it up front and you can take players out. Like that's actually a really cool thing. And that's that's been my other thing, And not to be cheesy, but it's like it's the best kind of exhaustion I've ever had in my life. Like this is all I've ever wanted to do. I'm super grateful to be doing it, but it was it was hard. That was that was boot camp training for the Country Music Olympics. How many of the program directors were white and over forty percentage wise? Man? Seven? Yeah, probably more than that eight and a half percent. Oh man, So okay, you do you're down with the radio tornell as it right now? When did you finish? I finished? I mean really, I have one more visit this week. Even so, I've finished probably two weeks ago, but I still am doing like a couple did you guys do that? Hey, you were done? Did your bandgo the whole time with you? They did many and then when we started it was going to be I think six or seven weeks, and then we ended up. You know, they add more and I'm I'm like, let's go, let's go, let's go. And I just wanted to do it so that I could have the best chance of meeting as many people, because it is so much. They want to meet you, and they want to have that penalize you if you don't meet them, and like, you don't have to say by this it's a dirty political thing. This is the whole world of music and just entertainment. It's not music, it's not even just radio. It's just entertainment. It's a very political. If you don't show me that you like me, then I don't like you. It's second grade, like I will you go with me? And if you say no, I don't want to go with you anyway, totally, and again, being a female will just make it that much harder because you have to go in and light up the room. Yeah, you have to. You have to have the presence. I gotta get me mysterious. He can going to be mysterious and quiet plays music. If you did that, they'd be like, what a bee? I think? So? Yeah, no, no, I think so. I know. So I'm sure it's an unfair environment completely. Ah. So eleven, congratulations that you get a high one on eleven weeks, because that's a that's a grind. So you go and you finished your radio tour, So now like, what do you do now? Right now I'm transitioning that I've been joking that it's just radio tour part two, but it's doing radio shows which are fun. That's a good thing to bring up because that's something too. Yeah, it's like you go back. It's kind of like you go and you say hi, and then you come back and you do shows, and you may you know, you gotta go for free and placed and every artist has to do it. And and I'm not this is not a youth thing or any artists or any radio station or company. Listen out with the biggest company in the whole world. So we do it too. Radio shows are like, hey, we'd love you to come and play our radio shows. Show'd be cool if you did, and if you do, we might like you a little more like that a radio that's so annoying. So you have to go play for free. That's a thing. So now you're playing radio shows. So now I'm doing that, Yes, but I will say it's so much better for my brain to be able to know that when I fly into this town, that's the only town and the only radio station that I'm going to see for the whole day. It's a promotion, for sure. Radio toward a radio show is a promotion. Oh, I'm I'm happy going to the airport smiling. Now forget about radio show. That's such a good thing. And people listen to this. So if your radio stations having a show and there's like six artists, four artists. They just don't pay them an artists. I mean, the artists go in and it costs money for you to do it. Don't pay you. But again, this is not complaining. We don't We wouldn't complain in the real world. We only get to complain in our bubble of people listen to this are in the bubble for sure. So you're going you're doing radio shows now, oh boy. So but here's the thing too, You're the only one that doesn't get paid. Everyone in your man gets paid like they get all. They all get paid. My touring intitigue, you don't get crap. But again, you're the one with you're doing the investing and you're you're looking for the big investment. In the end, you're looking for the you know, to start getting paid big money to do shows. Man, how about that radio show? Many radio shows do you have? You know? Oh gosh, I don't know. I just I try to look at it week by week so that it doesn't overwhelm me. But quite a few. How about that? I think about radio show that's funny things suck man saying they suck And sometimes I mean we have them here. The good thing. Well, sometimes I'll go to radio my state shows if I'm on the road every weekend. Though like for me, it's really tough because I'm on the road every weekend to it stand up or sometimes playing with the band, stupid band. But if I have a weekend off, like I'll go to w m z Q or DC my d C station, and I'm gonna go up for that because that's a huge radio show. It's Lady Ain't Kelsey, who I'm close to, so that obviously influences it a bit. But here's the thing that's the big stations canna do they can attach their name to a show like Lady and Kelsey and Brett are all getting paid because that's a tour that goes through like they're getting paid. Yeah, you're not getting paid. That sucks, all right, I get off that. But just to be fair, when you're coming out with me, you're getting paid. I am, hey, And that's gonna be so fun. And that's, you know, the things that I get to look forward to, and life is easy on the road with me. You get your own dressing rooms in theaters and air conditions, and it's the people are awesome. I'm excited. So okay, man radio tour, radio shows. But then it's you know, you talk about Brett and Kelsey and Lady they all had to do it too, so you look at it and it's like it's just part of the sit. Kelsey's radio tour though, she was lucky because she went with us and she just opened for the Raging Idiots and got to go meet PDS. When she was in front of us, you're almost like, although we're just a few years difference in age, you're almost like a grandkid because Kelsey was like my kid, and you opened for Kelsey for a while because of the you're my kid. That's weird to say, but she was our opener, like our our baby act for a while. That's and then you went on there with Kelsey. Oh I love Kelsey. Yeah, that's funny. I like it. I don't like the grandkid thinks you're older than Kelsey too. They just it's told Arkansas, Kentucky thing for all the relatives of different ages, as they should be. So okay, So now we're gonna go to the um. The question you're gonnaet asked all the time, but I think it's good you can talk about it long form a little bit, because I also don't know the answer to it. So this song here, what is it really about? Like, what's that story behind this song? I've heard your stuff on the radio, like on the verge. You know this song is about somebody. It sucks here it is, So I'm like, I've heard those things, but like, like I want to know, like what made you write it? Like what was the tipping point in your life? I'm like, Oh, I write a song, and what's it about? It? Give me the whole thing? Okay, Um, it is about a guy broke my heart really good? How long ago? That's what's funny, Probably four or five years ago. He's married, has a family weird for his wife, huh. I don't know. I don't know if she's ever heard it. I don't know if he's heard it. We know we have never spoke, even like install come to see if you put up a post like I got a song about me on the radio. I mean, I think I'm a female, so obviously Insta stocked, But no, he has never posted. I think he's happy. I'm happy, and I gotta like you there, what was he was together? You don't say, I'm not even gonna put you that words. Don't worry, but he was, yes, like you should send out like a carry your pigeon somehow, third person to go, here's a song about you on the radio, like a little bit you want him to know, right, just a little like selfishly. I mean, of course, yes, we're all humans. We can act like we do. We're all human beings. Yeah, I think he probably does. He listens to country music. He's not dumb. Okay. So also now that you're like, because you're gonna have a hit song, but now like what he missed, Like I love that too. It's like and I mean, let's take it a step further. Kind of the reason that we we didn't see eye eye was because he didn't think I was going to make it in country. So I'm like, thank you for this song. Okay, that guy, I was totally in love with him, and when he broke up with me, it really was like earth shattering and there were nights that I really didn't think I was going to be able to take another breath. I mean it was that kind of pain that I have never experienced. And this song, even from a melodic stampoin I remember very rarely does this happen. But my producer, Musby Uh, we had been talking about how I really needed a haunting ballad, and so we went into this right with one of my dear friends that I've been writing with since I moved to town, Emily Shackleton, and we knew that she would get it, and it fell out in forty five minutes because it was so real during the song after Yeah, yeah, I did. It's common for emotional songs to have that almost I guess went through that experience again. Yeah, and it was almost like final. I don't know. Once it was in a song, it was kind of like, okay, that was that's me closing the chapter on that person, even though yeah, unexpected to I bet. Yeah, it was a weird feeling. I remember hearing it back and kind of being like, wow, if I ever thought for a second that it wasn't done, it's done. Okay. We're talking about the song, though, like I want to know, like like what, like what's it about? Like I've heard of their band, but normal people, like I try to say as normal person as possible. I don't listen to music before it comes out, try not to get too deep in the lyrics a lot of times, because I know normal people are just listening and singing along. You don't really listen to the lyrics that much, which kind of a little bit so like, what are you saying in this song? There aren't a lot of a lot of lyrics in this song. It kind of repeats itself a lot because I feel like you, I wrote it from this place that I was going through of kind of being trapped in this person's memory and being like I cannot forget every part of you in my life, and you know, laying in bed at night and seeing these images burned in my brain that we're haunting me, and I didn't know if I was ever going to forget it. But then it's like this roller coaster of I wanted to forget him, but then I didn't want to forget him, because then that made it completely done. And I didn't hate this person when we broke up, so there was there was a lot of good that was in that relationship. So it was me dealing with the fact that he was gone, but also dealing with I had a lot of fond memories of him too. Oh okay, I know this part, So I have a drink water that you left on the pillow sand sand. I'm like what you got from the beach. As humans, we don't google lyrics. We just I'm I was always like the sand. I was like, that's really about what the lyric was. I'll bannesced with you, okay, But so you're this is cool because this is like I'm not a normal person. That's close as you can be to it. The sound of the bee with money your like a window but used to kiss one. It's like such a positive like go away song. Yeah, I wanted it to be. It's a positive heartbreak like all the great things like that. Until you said that you didn't. Because I've been listening to song again, feel different about it. Well. I feel like, especially female artists get pegged as just man bashing heartbreak writing songs. And this is a song about somebody that I loved, and if you it's me tracing back all these positive things about this person and the memories. And I really sonically think Buzzby nailed it because we wanted it to have this uncomfortable space in between each lyric, in between each memory, I guess because those are the moments that are uncomfortable and you're dealing with them, and they they really do burn in your brain. This guy, let's just call him HERM for like, I just wonder what it would be like to be herm because here he is living his life, breaks up, he gets split up. Whatever you up with him? Up? Okay, could make a song even better, more pain. So, heybody's up. You marries the other girl? Because you're never gonna make it. You're never gonna make it, Karli, never gonna make it. Now he's living his life. Here's a song about him that's kind of positive. He's like, man, now, I wonder what does his wife do for a living? Do you know, like what kind of job she kind of has? Actually don't know. Are you prettier than her? She's pretty? Would you? Would you say she's prettier than you? I would say she's a very very pretty girl and that. But it was it was I was like, yeah, I mean, he didn't leave me for her, but the next one he was, she's the next one. Are you sure? But leave with her? Though? Are you sure? I'm sure? I'm sure? Alright, alright, I got lots of questions now and then if I'm her, I'm like talking you don't know. I'm like, is she trying to get him back by putting this song out? Like? Is he gonna start feeling in our kids? Are these kids really ares that? I try to think everything. Oh my goodness, listen to this. That's like a Jerry Jerry all from this song. So okay, all right, all right, how about this though, Now on the other end of it, you're not married, you have a boyfriend at the current time. Okay, let's just say I don't know if you do. You know, you say you do, but I don't put you a weird one. Let's just say you have a boyfriend. Okay, hypothetically you didn't Frankie Frankie, what about Frankie having a day? You what? You got a song about another dude? That's gotta be weird, definitely weird, crazy, because anytime you're doing anything, you're talking about it. Of course, I mean, you know, it's an awkward thing to have a song that obviously was Are you real I can identify with it? It was a real thing as a dude. I'm just going crazy right now. If if it was another I was in a girl she was like, I got a song about another dude, and she's talking about all the time. Frankie, I know it's hard, it's a weird, it's a weird thing. But I think this is this is the most personal and I guess just vulnerable song that I've ever released, and hearing people's stories and just makes me understand everybody goes through heartbreak and and I feel like a vessel of just really bleeding out my heart to people. And you know, it's definitely uncomfortable for me sometimes because it's so real. Look at you, herm, Frankie, you got everybody, it's like all of them just one big happy wow. I was um listening ear later to some of your bluegrass stuff. Oh no, no, what were you? Yeah, yeah, yeah, I was because I was up, and I was like, because we know each other, we kind of know. I remember the first time I saw you. I was the listening room. You're playing. Phil Barton is a friend of mine, already kids on together. I can't even sing and I sing in a band, and it's like when I grow up. It makes me like emotional. I don't know why. It's just really sweet. I really love that song. I appreciate that you're my biggest fan, I think, but that that's really nice of you. No one's ever said that, But no one adult has ever said that. It just takes me to a place I've told Phil about before. Thank you very much. So the first time I ever saw you was at the listening room and I'm sending you back to like, hey, you're really good, Like, holy crap, that was really good. And then next thing, you know, power she is Carly Pierce singing about I'm gonna blue rass. You realize, I'm no, I did not know. I just feel like that needs to be so it's even better. Wow, it's my little Christmas nightmare. This is called old timer and from Carly Pierce fifteen years old. You watch some time, give me that that old you know what? Not that bad. I'm gonna tell you. You can tell you're trying to sound First of all, it's not bad at all for a fifteen year old. You can tell you're trying to sound a little older. But you had a pretty deep voice even as a kid. Yeah. I listen to that and I'm like, mom, how did you think? Nah, you could sing? Let me see. Let me say, let's say, how about dare you do? You know? Here's the thing about you, that people say all the time because a lot of friends here. Now I have a lot of friends, I know a lot of people here. I stay hidden most of the time. They have a few people I like a lot, and everybody's like, you know what, we really are rooting for her because she's been she's been grinding for a long time. Like that's generally and just being honest. What always says like we we really want them great to happen to her because she's just been grinding forever, and that's the best reputation you can have. It's I really do feel like the town has wanted to see me find my way and acknowledge that this isn't you know, a lot of people I just are hearing me for the first time, so they think, oh, I just moved here in boof poof like success. Yeah, but it's it's you know, I always looked up to Chris Jansen's story. I remember just listening to him and when Buy Me a Boat came out and I remember you playing it and just being like, wow, okay, I'm not you know that took him a really long time. Yeah, And it's just cool to have people come up to me and just acknowledge that I've been here for a really long time. You know, when you're telling your story about Lucy, reminds me of Craig Campbell, who's a friend of mine and who's come out and played with the idiots, and I just I just like that guy a lot. But he see really good. He's so he's so good, he's so good. It was a similar story of you with Lucy. He was playing keys for Luke and yeah, he should listen to podycasts really good. This is the whole series of shows we do. It's like, if you haven't listen all sixty, you're a failure. But he tells a story. Luke was like, dude, you too good. Wha. Yeah, He's like, go go you have to be an artist. He's like, Luke fired him because he was. He knew he wasn't he wanted to be an artist, and he didn't tell him, but he was like, you have to go run along, go spread your wings to be an artist. But the Jansen stories, uh, just the Craig Campbell story. I mean, man, there's there's a different than The similarities are that you're a grinder and I'm on grinder. Perfect. I figured that um, this has been really cool. I thought I didn't think we would go hour, and you made you made an hour. I can talk a lot. I don't think if you can talk about you have you have a story. It's just cool. Yeah, you have a like a like a You're gonna make it, you know. I hope so. And I hope that when people just hear my music and hear my story and come and see me live, that they see that this is really all I've ever wanted, but that I've worked really hard for it. And but I can also show you, and not to be cheesy again, but you can do anything you really can't if you really I'm a perfect example of that. I mean, it's just I'm the least talented guy. It's just about work. You just gotta stay in the game. Jesse Alexander is a songwriter in town. She's written you know her, She's written a million songs. And I was crying in an Ascap girls group where I met Kelsey when we were babies, and she looked at me and she said, if you hang in this town long enough, it'll give you something back. And I never forgot that either. Yeah, she's cool. I talked to her. I talked like two days ago we should get her in here. I just saw her. We were on a board, were on one of these fancy pants boards together, and I'm not on any boards. I've always stayed away from any sort of board because I don't want to be in the machine. But I'm on one. I like it because it's the charitable part, the sound of it. So I was like, you know what, I think I can help in that, and her and I have that's kind of where we bonded. She's awesome, she's great, She's so good, and she was right. I mean, I the lucy thing. And then I had a song with Josh Abbott and then it was like, you know what, your name is still written on my board because I never I don't ever want my board off, Like literally, your name is still written and I think about it in green marker. Why did you know that? In my office? We walked in there and wrote on your board. I wasn't I was on the road. What else I was on the road. And and I know Josh because Josh used to come into my studio in Austin, and so he would come play my show because I was like thirty po stations, but I bring country artists and all the time. That's then it ended up being what got me here because they're like, well I feel like country so much, why don't you go to do it? So Josh would come and play my show and so yeah, and then you said I forgot you sing on that song with them too. Just I went from the backup singer to the duet partner to Okay, let me hear this is not running over. Might give me like five minutes. Okay, we're talking honestly here because I have friends who have been in duets that have been successful, and I'm like, dear God, get me out of this because it's like it's a great and I'm happy for it. But I got like to do my own vain, I think because I was so searching for opportunities to get my name out there, and he really in his band so much made that song about trying to get my name out there. I feel like he really it was a great douet partner, a great experience. We got to do so many things that I never thought I was going to get to do, and he really there was He was so selfless about it of being like you need to go listen to this girl. She's gonna have her time. Da da da da. It was great. That's really cool. Yeah, he I will always be grateful. I wonder if this song would have been if it would have been like a hit, if you'd hated it. I don't know that would have been miserable if I would. Because we we met after together. How did you guys together? By the way, I'll tell you the really fast story. Singing at Whiskey Jam four years ago. He was there. I knew nothing about Texas country except through Casey, and he messaged me on Twitter three years later, sent me this song and was like, hey, I think you're the right voice for this next thing. I know he needed it. In like three days, I go sing my part, send it to him. And the first time that we met, sang the song and I jumped on their bus. Was all. I went to the Houston UH Stampede and met him, sang it and jumped on the bus for two weeks. Wow. Yeah, but it ended up being great. But that's how that happened, just singing and Whiskey jammy herban and you got to meet radio people with him. Yes, that was a yeah. Again, these experiences where I'm in the room but it's not me that's front and center, because that's how I remember you. It's the only way. Honestly. I was like, Carli Pierce, I know her from her name on board, which was with Josh when you did the song with Josh. So yeah, yeah, funny how things work out, huh, never know? Okay, well, good luck with life. Thank you. Um, you know, these things live for ever, so it's kind of hard to talk about anything in real time. But if you do hear this in the next couple of months, we put it up like come out to a show because carl will be playing. She's the featured musical performer of the show. Yeah. Um yeah, that's good. It's fun. I'm glad. It was a whole thing. It was like they were like, who do you because we have we have Walker. I'm such a big Walker fans. He's so good for like, you know, but before it was cool via Walker fan. I was a Walker fan, right, And I don't know if it's cool not to be a Walker fan, just I'm a Walker fan. And so I was like, hey, like six months before this stand up tour, was like, hey, dude, come on tour and do every day with me. We'll do twenty maybe daights and he was like yeah. Well then in that time, people started like whoa this first of Walker can write his brains out, like it's such a great too many words sometimes for making I'm like, dude, I mean, where'd you come putting this line here? Because I've we've written walking over together, but h Walker has to go. Now Walker is going to go and do a real tour with t Rette. And so they're like, oh, who do you want? I was like, you know what, I think I want Carlyle's And so we went from my I remember text you be like hey, do you know anything? And You're like no, do you know anything? We're like no, not the one of us know anything. Maybe if we're gonna And so I'm glad it was too. I'm really excited. It's gonna be fun. You will have fun. There'll be a point we're like, man, I wish I was getting paid more, but no, Now you will be always honest with me. But um, it'll be the best environments. Because I'm excited Walker left. He was like, dude, this is the gradios ever played because the people that come out are just awesome. Um from now until I don't know whenever we stopped this thing, um, but Carly will be doing shows for the next couple of months after in in between doing radio shows. It's really good to have you up and good luck and thank you. I'll see you and people will see we'll see each other on and I don't know. It's weird because at least Walker was here, like we're already on the road together, right yeah, yeah, Okay, good luck. Thank Next time you come in, you have to have like three to get a second time, you gotta have like three hits in the middle. So after the third time that you've had to listen to every Bobby cast because we will quiz you, I'll go back. I'm gonna do my homework between that. Definitely don't do that, all right, We're gonna go, um, Carli Pierce and download every little thing. I mean, you can stream it if you want. I'd really download it because at least, yeah, her do you live at least in the south? Is live in the South? Hear it? But poor Frankie man, Poor Frankie. I've been on the I've been on both sides of this. I've been on this side of dating a girl that written a song written song aboutnother guy, and then same girl and then her dating another dude with a song about me, And which side is more fun? No, no, don't care. I'll tell you which is more fun. I'm just just spit. I'm laing. That's hard. The second was way more fun because you're like, that was a night I've already set through that once. Oh man, yeah you always yeah, whatever, Alright, we're gonna go, Um, Carla Pierce. What episodes is? Mike? Alright? Sixty two at at Carli Pierce c A R L Y p E A r C Mike d stro at m I K E D E E s t r oh. And again thanks to our sponsors. And you know, we're getting millions of downloads now because you guys downloaded and you tell people about it, and it's crazy that a podcast about songwriting and stories from behind the scenes is getting so much traction. So we appreciate you listening. That's it sixty two and we'll see you next time here in Around the Boby guest by re