Takin’ A Walk Nashville: Wendy Moten on Resilience in the Music Industry and Her Journey with The Time Jumpers

00:00:01
Speaker 1: Taking a Walk Nashville.

00:00:02
Speaker 2: Hi, this is Sarah Harrelson, your host of Taking a Walk Nashville, and tonight we are at the iconic music venue Third in Lindsley, right near downtown Nashville, and I'm you're in the green room today with our guest Wendy Morton. She was on the Women Behind the Lyrics episode with us on Taking a Walk Nashville, and she is about to go on stage with the Time Jumpers here in a bit.

00:00:25
Speaker 3: They perform here at Third and Lindsley.

00:00:28
Speaker 4: Every Monday night in Nashville, and there's just such a stellar lineup of award winning musicians in the Time Jumpers.

00:00:36
Speaker 3: Wendy, thanks for being back on Taking a Walk Nashville. Thank you for inviting me.

00:00:40
Speaker 4: This is exciting, it is How long have you been with the Time Jumpers?

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Speaker 3: I will say this is six years. I've been in math for six years, which is I never thought this could happen. Yeah, that's amazing.

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Speaker 5: And so in that six years, do you perform every Monday night? And do you guys rehearse every week and change up the set list?

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Speaker 3: We don't rehearse, which is really ironic. But when somebody wants to add a new song. They just bring it in, they put it, bring your body a chart, and then we just try to do it that night. Wow, just like tonight, I probably try for a couple of songs that hadn't done before. But these guys they make their living as session musicians, and so there is easy for them just to pick up a heart, read it and play. Yeah. Very fun.

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Speaker 4: And Vin Skill used to be a part of the Time Jumpers and he was the one you introduced you to this group.

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Speaker 3: Correct, Yes, it's because of him that he's turned me onto this path. And I think we've never talked about it, but I think that he probably felt, you know, when he was going to the Eagles, if he didn't want to leave them, you know, not that they needed anybody. They were here before he became a member, and then when he was a member for like thirteen fourteen years, and he just starts saying, you know, when I started touring with him, it was like, come sit in with us. So I'm like, sit in with her, come sit in with the Time Jumpers. And then I love the music, love the musicianship, and love of those guys, so I would just sit in every once in a while, and I thing I know, they were just like, Hey, we're going to add you to our team, even though that's something they didn't have to do, and I'm so glad they did. Yeah.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, I recommend anyone who was visiting Nashville, especially on a Monday, to check out the time Jumpers at Third in Lensley. And I kind of want to circle back to the beginning of your career.

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Speaker 3: So you grew up in Memphis and you always say that you watched Soul Train and he all growing up and we're drawn to all sorts of genres.

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Speaker 4: And then you had to deal with EMI in the nineties releasing Coming Out of the Rain, which was a top five hit on Billboard Adult Contemporary Chart. What was it like to you when you relocated to Nashville thirty years ago and got your first label deal.

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Speaker 3: Well, it happened like I got my record deal first. I was still in Memphis when I got the record deal, and it was during the Whitney Houston era, so it was Whitney Selenium, Mari Carry and I will consider myself number four, but every label was looking for Whitney Houston. So the only way I got to Nashville was because my guy David Santo's Fixed Bared to the Stars, was like, Hey, I'm gonna move to Nashville. I'm like, Memphis. People don't live in Nashville. What are you talking about? So it was not a bad move because I was a recording artist, so it didn't matter where I lived. But we're in the same state, so it wasn't It wasn't too strange to be in Nashville other than I only knew it for country music. But moving here thirty years ago was still a little traumatizing. Yeah, but I moved here for love and we're still here. Yeah, it's two together. There was a lot different in Nashville thirty years ago. Now it's all new and new restaurants, and people are from everywhere and you know, this other place, but there's still a small town element here. Yeah.

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Speaker 4: I'm definitely embracing other genres besides country music now too.

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Speaker 3: Yes, that was not in existence thirty years ago, right. Yeah.

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Speaker 4: And from there in your career, you became one of the most in demand background vocalists. You toured with Julio Iglesias, Martina McBride, and now Vince Gale. Was it kind of a strange transition, going from an artist with a label deal to a background vocalist.

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Speaker 3: No, because I didn't know what I wanted to do. So when those opportunities presented themselves, it gave me a chance to make a living when I was still trying to figure it out, you know, and you're gonna have to work one way or the other. You're gonna either work at a department store or you can sing background for somebody else. So I said, let me just try that. And I used their experience to learn something from these icons. And so that's what it was really about, was every time I said yes, I the goal was to learn something new that could take with me and add to my artsal of things. And you know, it gave me, brought me some time because I didn't know if I wanted to be a solo artist anymore. I didn't know if I wanted I love music enough to stay in it, So those gigs gave me opportunity to stick around till I can figure that out.

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Speaker 4: And I think it's so important that you bring that up because it's not always easy for artists just to get a label deal and go forward from there. A lot of artists and creatives have to do other gigs or side gigs while they're trying to make it as a solo artist.

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Speaker 3: And like you said, it can bring you so much experience. Yes, and that's what it did. And it gave me realistic idea of what I really want out of my journey. You know, I could check some things off. Do I need a three million dollar maintenance G five six every year? Do I need that? No? I don't need my private jet. Okay, good, that's less pressure, you know. So it gave me a chance to check some things off to help me, you know, really figure out where I want to be and what I don't want. Absolutely, yeah. Yeah.

00:06:31
Speaker 4: And Vince Gale, he's been such a huge mentor in your career as well and person in your life. He produced your twenty twenty solo country album I've Got You Covered, and it was this project that gave you the courage to enter the show the voice in your fifties.

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Speaker 3: Correct. Yes, I just don't think that had I not done that record with Vance, because Vice he chose the songs at the end of the session. I mean, I gonna do I know, so that was already story. So he's like, oh, let's do each season, and I'm wondering, like what is each season? Like, I've never heard it before, So Dolly Parton do it? And so he would play the song he had chosen. All the musicians. We did it at his house, and he would choose a song and then they would play it like two times. Somebody would write a chart and then they're ready to cut. Now, I've never been in that kind of situation before, because you know, I'm not used to I'm used to jumping in on live gigs, but on recording sessions you usually have a little bit more planning. And so he called the song and I never heard it before, but I was like, can I make my own? Can I get a lyric sheet and like make my notes? And I told himself that I was not going to be afraid today, like I don't care what happens, I'm going to jump in today. I will not be the weakest link with all these iconic musicians in the realm. So if I don't know going to jump in, and Vin said, because you don't know these songs, you're truly gonna make them your own. That was the psychology behind that, which was brilliant. I wouldn't have been able to come up with that. I was terrified, but I was like, I'm just gonna jump in even if I don't know the melody well enough. I don't know the song at all. And he said, well, that's what the magic is, and then you'll make it your own. That's an interesting perspective, isn't it. And I was like, okay, there was a method to his madness instead of obsessing over it exactly and over analyzing and you know, not even finding yourself in it. So that process really helped me think more like an artist again for the first time, and I decided I would trust my instincts for myself. I do it for all the other people that I work with. That's why they get the call, because they know I can deliver. But as a song little artists, I hadn't had to use that in a while, and so that gave me an opportunity to to say, yes, I'm ready to do that again, A ready to trust my artistry, just trust my instincts. And that was the first step. Trust your voice, trust my voice. Yeah, well, I don't get you know. I always made a living with my voice, so I never worried about that. But as you know, being out front, it takes a whole other mental challenge.

00:09:29
Speaker 4: It's speaking of mental challenges, you know, it's it's hard enough being on live TV with the Voice. And I'm sure a lot of people know the time in the show when you fell on stage and you.

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Speaker 3: Broke your elbow right yeah, yeah.

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Speaker 4: What was it like having to go right on TV right after that after falling on stage? How did you overcome that or how did you deal with that?

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Speaker 3: At least well, going on the Voice after everything that I've done was a big decision. And this was post COVID, so we weren't sure we would ever get a chance to be in a place where you got other people sitting there with our mask on. So I said, when the world opens back up, you know what am I going to do? And so I decided that I needed television? Okay, what can I stomach? Because everything is real? How I need TV? And I'm from the era that you don't talk about yourself at all. If you don't boast, you don't brag. And so I was like, Okay, I need TV. It's obvious because I don't have a team, I don't have a label, agent, management, I don't have a machine, and so I decided I was going to send a video in to the voice. I didn't tell anyone, and I said, if they accept me, then I know that's the path I need to take. If they don't because I got way too much experience, then I will have to find another way to make a living. And sure enough it took a few months. So I didn't even tell David Well, my significant other for third one, Geers. I didn't even tell him that I set the video in because I knew what he was gonna say. He was gonna say, why are you doing that? That can't teach you anything? But I knew I had nothing else nothing, So I sent the video in and I said, I'll just keep it to myself because then if they reject me for whatever reason, too much experience, whatever, then I can live with that. Nobody will be like I thought you were gonna be on the ball, and I was like, I don't want to live with that. So I set that video in I and once they said yes, then I had to figure out my purpose, like what to expect out of this. And I needed to number one, know if I was still competitive, if it still mattered. Number Two, I needed to know if there were people that still liked the type of song I loved singing. And then number three was I had to I wanted to be an advocate for people over fifty to say that we still have dreams and have things that we want to do and say so I needed to get those things answered me on a reasonable doubt because I knew wats the show was over. I'm gonna be on my own again, but I'll have what I need. So when I got on the show, I just left my ego at the house. I said, I'm just gonna pay attention to the challenge of the week, and I should go far, because if I think about all my experience, it's just gonna make everybody miserable, and I'm gonna be miserable too, because like, come here, we're doing it this way and not that way. So I got rid of all of that comes treatum the challenge of the week. So when I did fall, I got this three weeks before the finale. I had just turned fifty seven on the show, So that was November my birthday, twenty second, twenty twenty one. I turned fifty seven on the show. The next day, I fed, oh, why TV five sixty eight million people. So when I fell, there was only two other people on team Blake left because we're three weeks from the Fanala and the Gentleman Paris. He was also on Blake's team, but he had been in the army. And nobody was picking me up off the ground. Oh, none of the crew, nobody. They were all in shock. And then I heard him say, Wendy, I'm going to pick you up because I couldn't get up. They were all waiting on me to get up and I didn't get up. I said okay, So he reached under my arms and then he got me up. But he was the only one. Nobody else touched me. Everybody was like, LetGo we ate the ground and so you got me up, and I was like okay. I looked over and I realized I'm injured, Like, oh my god, that's what a break looks like. Because I've never been injured before. I didn't cry. Got me up. They cut to commercial, took me off to the stage and had me sit down, and still wasn't crying yet or anything. I never cried, and they said can you come back out there? And I knew why because they having a Live TV. I'm sure the network was going crazy. I'm sure the producers of the show were going crazy. They're like what and I'm a true professional. Yeah, they were like even cursing day. It's like everybody was like, are our lives gonna changed before? You know? So I was just like, so I went off to the side. I still hadn't cried, and can you come back on? So I said yes, And mainly because my family, I want people to know that I was injured but not life threatening. Yeah, so I said yeah, and I'm sure to help that work and all that stuff too. And so I ended up going to the hospital and you know, the show was still going on. And then it took me about three hours before I saw a doctor. Me in a room, and I had three phone calls while I was waiting to see a doctor. One was vest Gill. He said, I just saw the fall. Where are you. I said, I'm at the hospital. He was like, okay, well you have to stay on the show. I said, I don't know. I'm broken. I don't know how broken. And he was like, well, he still wasn't registering. Everybody thought because they saw me after the fall, they thought I was okay. He's like, well, you have to stay on the show. I said, okay. The second call was Leslie Fram see him to us the fram She called, I saw the fault. Where are you at the hospital? And she said, you have to stay on the show. So I got two successful people telling me that I have to stay on the show. Dam and I'm like, okay, well if the show lets me stay, because I'm thinking that I'm on my way home, I'm thinking that it's over. And then the third call was a friend, christ Klaus, who used to be the CEO of Northwest Carolinas. So he used the CEO and king too, and he called, you have to stay on the show. Like okay, three successful people say I have just said it's okay. So finally I get to a room and of course they have somebody with me. The voice people have somebody with me. And then I asked the doctors finally like what's wrong? Okay? You got two broken arms? This is completely broken my elbow and this is broken mayfractured and broken pieces in here. So I said, how long do I have before I can't get this repair? And they were like, you got three weeks. So a person I was like, when is the finhale three weeks? I said, okay, I guess I'll stay and then she was like really, and so she was so, let me make some phone calls. They called some people and they were like, hey, she wants you to stay on the show. So we were like, okay, I said, if they'll have me, because I didn't know I was gonna have splints and I would be you know, it's obvious that my arms are like this. I didn't have that idea. I didn't I've never been injured. So that night, by now we're like six o'clock in the morning, around three pm, I checked out of the hotel, went back on the set with you broken arms. And then when I walked on the set, they had Blake on a screen and he was talking to me and he was like, man, break a leg, not your arms, and I'm like, dude, I know, I know. So if I hadn't had those phone calls, I don't think I wouldn't I wouldn't have known them to keep going. I just wouldn't have thought about it. I was I was thinking that, okay, well this is it. And when I said, you know, well, they let me stay on the show, they were like, yeah, you can stand on the show, just don't fall again. And I was like, you gotta worry about that. I'm gonna be taking my time. But it was amazing that fall was for me because it was like if I can do that in front of all millions of people, and it not phased me at all. Like I was still singing, still being active, never complaining, never cried. I still didn't cry. Even Blake talk about it a lot. She don't even talk about it. But I'm like, if I talk about it, you might as well just go home. You know, nobody wants to hear it.

00:18:07
Speaker 4: Yeah, you just want to keep going and focus on your singings.

00:18:11
Speaker 3: Focus on why I'm there. I was too close to the finish line to just stop, and thank goodness, I had those people in my life who said you have to stay on the show, because I thought they would even want me on the show. So when I talked to the producers the next day, and you know, I'm sure they told everybody, you know, don't talk or do you know, do do too much because they don't know I to beget sued or what. And I didn't go down that process. I just didn't feel like going even though my arm is crooked for life in my spirit, It's just it wouldn't have passed. I just felt like it would have been a waste of time. And I don't know if I would have really reaped the benefits that people would us assumed that I would. I just I just didn't see. I saw that being like a short lived type of thing where I lose instead of on all of my life. Yeah.

00:19:01
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think it's great that you embraced it, kept going and you made it to runner up of the season because you stayed on.

00:19:09
Speaker 3: Yes, I loved it. I love the opportunity. And it was for me that whole process of the three things I needed to know to stay on the journey because age is a factor, being a gender as a factor in the music industry. Yeah, it's just this, And I said, I need a way to get rid of all of that noise in order to continue. And that's what happened in the fall was the ice And it was like you like have two broken arms on TV for three weeks. You have everything going against you, but you're still gonna do it that and just not you know, that not being enough to stop anything. M h.

00:19:49
Speaker 4: Yeah, And also, yeah, be persistent. Yes, yeah, yeah, thank you for sharing them. I have a couple of questions left for you, and I just feel fortunate to have gone to know you through the past year through I'm behind the lyrics and performing with you.

00:20:04
Speaker 3: You know, I've gotten just.

00:20:06
Speaker 4: You through so many different events like time Jumpers, Muscle showals at the CMA Theater, Todd Rendering last April.

00:20:15
Speaker 3: That and I know you performed.

00:20:17
Speaker 4: Around the world, and I think I already know the answer to this question, but do you have a favorite moment or a place that you performed at.

00:20:26
Speaker 3: Yes. My number one ultimate performance was in front of the pyramids in Egypt when I was touring with Leioid Glaciers because I was his duet partner. So I'm singing duets with one of the most amazing singers in music history. I am in front of the pyramids. Are right here, This Finx is right here. We're singing love songs and people have a tuxio and stars. It's like the Starry Night. And so after we did our duet and he was like, Darling, are you happy? And I was like, yes, I mean, I'm dear en, I'm thinking about it. He said, yes, and he's like, why are you happy?

00:21:04
Speaker 2: You know?

00:21:05
Speaker 3: All I could do was sparty. People started to clap, but that was so like, I don't know, other worldly. Yeah, yeah, that's amazing.

00:21:13
Speaker 4: I always say you never know where music can take you, and now music's definitely taken you a lot of places.

00:21:18
Speaker 3: Do you have an idea where it's taking you next? No, I just know to stay open and keep working at it and keep believing in myself and me and kind and nice and learning and being and having gratitude.

00:21:32
Speaker 4: Well, last time you're on taking a walk in Nashville, I asked you if you had a favorite place to walk.

00:21:36
Speaker 3: I think you said downtown.

00:21:38
Speaker 5: So this time I'm going to ask you, do you have a favorite place in Nashville, like a favorite restaurant or a place to eat?

00:21:45
Speaker 3: Oh my gosh, yes I do. I love Princess Chicken, the one off of Old Eir Grey Boulevard and Noah's Phil because I love that chicken hot chicken, Medium, and I love mac and cheese and green.

00:21:59
Speaker 4: Okay, yeah, I was going to ask the spice a little again, Medium, but I want the reviews and I want the mac and cheese. Yeah, even medium can be pretty hot there you he can handle it though.

00:22:11
Speaker 3: That job all the way from spring Hill, get it? Wow? Yeah? Nice, that's all you know. It's good.

00:22:16
Speaker 4: Yes, well, Wendy, thank you so much for being on Taking a Walk in Nashville tonight and I hope you have a wonderful time with the time Jumper.

00:22:24
Speaker 3: Thank you, thank you for comedy, thank you for inviting me, and congratulations being on your podcast. Thank you.

00:22:30
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening to Taking a Walk Nashville with singer songwriter Sarah Harrelson, and check out our other podcasts, Music Save Me, Comedy Save Me, and Taking a Walk. Available on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.