#393 - Alana Springsteen on How Taylor Swift Inspired Her to be a Songwriter + Why She Believes in Signs + Having 'Bad Taste' In Guys + Having to Explain She's Not Related to Bruce Springsteen

00:00:01
Speaker 1: The first thing that came to mind is just be patient and be present. And present has been a big word for me like this year, because I'm starting to realize what it's like to have a whole week and look back and be like, I have no idea what just happened, and what's the point of that?

00:00:18
Speaker 2: Episode three ninety three, Alana Springsteen a couple things in this interview. You'll hear me try to figure out a town near Virginia Beach, Virginia, which is where she's from. I was thinking of Chesapeake chessa peak yea, yeah what they call and they say chessa freak. Yeah, So I'll get to that, and I can't remember what it is, but that's what it is. Later on, you know, she picked up a guitar about seven years old, started writing by like nine, and I can believe that it's like some of those kids on Idol and they were like, I knew at one year old, I wanted to write song.

00:00:46
Speaker 3: And I wrote my first one at a year and a half with the Rubber Band. And remember you didn't wrote it in the womb. Yeah you're pooping.

00:00:52
Speaker 2: So anyway, I really enjoyed this talk with Alana and my favorite thing too, is the fact that I'm talking about how people mispronounce her name. They do mine all the time, and then at the end I still mispronounce her name right into her face. And I think a part of that was because I just kept saying all the ways of was mispronounced or I'm just an idiot, one of the two.

00:01:07
Speaker 3: But oh no, she was super nice.

00:01:10
Speaker 2: You know, I never know what to expect with new artists, especially if they haven't done, you know, an hour long sit down, really nowhere to go type interview.

00:01:20
Speaker 3: But I thought she was great. You know, she has a.

00:01:22
Speaker 2: Three part album and her first installment, twenty something Messing It Up. It came out last month, right about a month ago.

00:01:29
Speaker 4: Yep.

00:01:30
Speaker 2: Here is the first song released and track one on the album called you Don't Deserve a country song.

00:01:35
Speaker 5: I bets you that I'd sing.

00:01:41
Speaker 2: The second song released and the last song on that album is called Shoulder to Cry, on which we featured a bunch of times on the Women of iHeart Country. I thought what was interesting, the most interesting about this is the fact that she got a publishing deal so young, and she's moved to town.

00:01:58
Speaker 3: Yeah, it made me feel bad about myself as a kid.

00:02:01
Speaker 2: I was like a young teen It's crazy. She tells the story and she just moved here when she was a young teenager. But she got a publishing deal, so here we go. She's on tour with Luke Bryan's Country on Tour. That's the name of Luke's tour, Country on Tour. Well, you just hit it right on the nose, high Country on country. Oh, it's country on Tour like a song. I thought I was like just country on tour.

00:02:23
Speaker 3: This country going on tour.

00:02:24
Speaker 2: It's like a dude on a tour. Yeah, a country on tour that starts in June. She's gonna be a big star. Follow her at Lana Springsteen on Instagram and let's do it here she is episode three ninety three.

00:02:35
Speaker 3: Alana Springsteen.

00:02:36
Speaker 5: Do you drink coffee?

00:02:38
Speaker 3: You know a little bit?

00:02:39
Speaker 2: Now I don't really like it, Okay, you can roll on this discussion. You know, I never even tasted coffee until like five years ago. Really yeah, I just I just smells bad.

00:02:52
Speaker 3: So I never really got into it.

00:02:54
Speaker 2: And I was doing Dancing with the Stars and I was struggling because I was working the radio. Showed training for that show and touring and I was just dead, so I drank coffee and I hated it out of necessity.

00:03:06
Speaker 3: Yeah, it really did. Caffeine doesn't really affect me that much, you it.

00:03:09
Speaker 1: Actually, it's hard to tell because I definitely have like three cups a day, like I'm a headache. I will absolutely And it's funny. I was sick recently, like I guess, like last month. I got this like throat congestion, like it just it was that time of year, and when I'm sick, it's like the only time I'm like, Okay, I should not have this caffeine.

00:03:29
Speaker 5: My body does not need this right now.

00:03:31
Speaker 2: I had some weird deal we'll compare illnesses where I had a call for like six weeks. I went out to California and I was doing a deal and I got sick and have a doctor that now can prescribe medicine anwhere it's pretty cool.

00:03:44
Speaker 3: It's concierge doctor.

00:03:45
Speaker 2: Yeah, I got it because I would just be on the road so often and I would go to minute clinics if I got sick, and they'd hit me with a steroid shot or they would just be like you're not from here, wow, so we can't really do much. So I got a concierge doctor, which like changed it so I can be anywhere be like I need crack.

00:04:01
Speaker 5: That's a game changer, not crack though only sometimes.

00:04:04
Speaker 3: Yeah, Oh, it's good to me. I don't think we've met.

00:04:07
Speaker 5: We have not.

00:04:07
Speaker 3: I don't think we've met. Yeah, So, but congratulations on everything.

00:04:10
Speaker 2: I mean, I see all over the place and it's really cool to kind of watch because it only happens a couple times a year where you kind of see an artist like definitely get crazy traction before the big pop even happens.

00:04:22
Speaker 1: Wow.

00:04:22
Speaker 3: And that's how I would if someone was asking me to.

00:04:24
Speaker 2: Describe you, That's what I would say, is that, man, I see her everywhere. She got crazy traction and it didn't even hit yet. Man, So that's a And I don't want you to take it and hit yet as a bad thing. I think it's a great thing because you're already like killing it and the early potential isn't even there yet. Do you feel in the last year or so, do you feel like you've kind of made some ground here or is you just running so hard it all feels the same, man.

00:04:49
Speaker 5: Thank you for saying that. The past two years have been.

00:04:52
Speaker 1: The absolute craziest time in my life.

00:04:55
Speaker 5: And it's been like my early twenties too.

00:04:57
Speaker 1: I'm just twenty two, so I'm going through all this changed, like kind of getting to.

00:05:01
Speaker 5: Know myself, figuring life out and just how to be an adult and all of that.

00:05:05
Speaker 1: Meanwhile, yeah, it really has felt like a whirlwind. From the music side, I mean, this year, I'm getting to release my debut album. I released a couple of projects History of Breaking Up, which was kind of the catalyst for finding this fan base in this community that related to what I was saying. Apparently I'm not the only one that has terrible tastes in men, but.

00:05:27
Speaker 3: You're supposed to. When you're twenty two, you're just.

00:05:29
Speaker 5: Figuring things out, you know, making mistakes to.

00:05:31
Speaker 3: Light coffee and like bad dudes. That's it.

00:05:34
Speaker 1: I can't believe you just loved coffee. Same thing, Yeah, the same thing. But it really has been a whirlwind. I mean, I moved to town when I was fourteen. Yeah, from where I'm from, Virginia Beach originally.

00:05:48
Speaker 3: So I've been to Virginia Beach a bunch.

00:05:50
Speaker 2: I've been to Virginia Beach in all of that area that played the festival in the beach.

00:05:54
Speaker 3: You know.

00:05:54
Speaker 2: So I've spent a lot of time and there's a lot of military that we work with over there.

00:05:57
Speaker 1: Yeah.

00:05:57
Speaker 2: And so did you grow up like a military area ish?

00:06:02
Speaker 5: I mean there's so much. Yeah, you got like the Navy, the Air Force.

00:06:06
Speaker 1: I mean, being from Virginia Beach, it's like you just talk about the jets flying, yeah, like jet noids all daily.

00:06:12
Speaker 3: Virginia Beach is just you know, all of the USA.

00:06:15
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a real thing. And then people would come visit and be like what was that? Because they fly so low and you just.

00:06:20
Speaker 5: Get used to it. Yeah. But the town I grew up in is called Pungo, so it.

00:06:25
Speaker 2: Was like, you guys don't call me that often. So how many people in Pungo?

00:06:31
Speaker 1: You know, I don't know the exact population, but I'm paying a picture for you. I grew up like five minutes from the beach. It's like a straight shot road that kind of winds. It's called Sandbridge Road, and it's like a local beach. The beach is called Sandbridge, so it's not like as touristy.

00:06:46
Speaker 5: It's a lot more quiet.

00:06:49
Speaker 1: But I also grew up like right next to Cornfield's strawberry farms, like farmers that have been there for generations, where everybody kind of knows each other. My grandparents knew these people, like, so it was this really cool cross section of what felt like country meets coastal.

00:07:07
Speaker 3: And for a while, do you guys do that?

00:07:08
Speaker 2: A lot of the ocean stuff there big time. Really it's always cold, the water always cold, though it's.

00:07:14
Speaker 1: Not I mean in the summer it warms up pretty fast. There's massive surfing competitions. Really, and I still regret to this day that I never learned like I will one day.

00:07:22
Speaker 5: I think surfers are so cool.

00:07:24
Speaker 3: You never learned to surf, never learn at the beach?

00:07:26
Speaker 5: Isn't that crazy?

00:07:27
Speaker 3: What did you do at the beach?

00:07:28
Speaker 2: Then?

00:07:29
Speaker 1: I mean, layout you go on the water body surfing. But I'm just self, admittedly not the most athletic person.

00:07:37
Speaker 5: My coordination is not. It's not I'm calling myself out here.

00:07:41
Speaker 4: I'm not.

00:07:41
Speaker 3: You know, I didn't grow up around a beach.

00:07:42
Speaker 2: I grew up in Arkansas, so we didn't have any sort of beach and never went on vacations or anything until I got older. But I'm not a beach guy because I was never around it. And all my friends want to go to the beach, like it's vacation. Even my wife, let's go to the beach.

00:07:55
Speaker 3: What do you do at the beach? Don't I don't. I get there and I'm like, now what, like what what do you?

00:08:01
Speaker 5: You just lay out and you soak up the sun and you smell the ocean.

00:08:04
Speaker 3: Yeah, like all those three things don't interest me at all. Soaking up anything. I'm good. But so you grew up at the beach. Were you a musical kid at twelve?

00:08:14
Speaker 1: I mean music, I feel like was just in me from when I was born.

00:08:18
Speaker 3: Play your first instrument.

00:08:19
Speaker 1: I started playing guitar at seven, and I will never forget the day that I picked it up. My granddad and who doesn't play, had this orange classical guitar sitting in the garage and he was like cleaning it out and brought it inside and I was seven, and I just remember him opening it up and seeing it for the first time, and I was like just so drawn to it, mesmerized, and I was like, can I have it? Can I have it? And he made me promise to learn to play it, and he gave it to me, and so The only person my family that played was my uncle. I would beg him to come over on weekends and teach me chords. But I just had this love of it. That's all I wanted to do.

00:08:57
Speaker 3: When could you play five chords? What age?

00:09:00
Speaker 6: Oh?

00:09:00
Speaker 5: I was definitely seven?

00:09:01
Speaker 3: Really?

00:09:01
Speaker 1: Yeah, dude, NonStop? Like I practice all the time. I just loved it.

00:09:05
Speaker 2: So were you practicing thinking when you grow up? Because it's seven, who knows what you want to be when you grow up?

00:09:10
Speaker 3: But I did.

00:09:11
Speaker 2: But were you like I want to be a singer I want to be or were you just like, this is a fancy looking guitar.

00:09:16
Speaker 3: I'm seven and I'm gonna play. Tell I poop. I don't know what seven year old right?

00:09:22
Speaker 1: I just I don't know if I knew at seven that I wanted to be an artist yet. I think that wasn't really unlocked for me until I started writing songs.

00:09:30
Speaker 5: That changed it for me.

00:09:32
Speaker 1: But I definitely loved music, Like I grew up in a musical house. Nobody is in the industry, but my dad was always playing something from Michael Jackson to John Mayer, Ace of bass, like eighties music, like just a wide variety of things. So I grew up with that, and both my granddads are pastors, and I grew up singing.

00:09:50
Speaker 5: In church a lot too.

00:09:52
Speaker 3: Yeah, that would be a big influence then massive. Yeah.

00:09:55
Speaker 2: Yeah, a lot of people, especially country music, grew up in church and they go, yeah, I sing in church. But if both of them are pastors, did they ever have a rivalry.

00:10:04
Speaker 1: You know what's funny is they actually get along like so well and they agree on almost everything. So when we have family gets together as like my grandparents will just be sitting there talking about the Bible.

00:10:16
Speaker 2: Who gets to say the blessing? Oh that's what you call it, the battle of the blessing the blessings? So do they have other churches close to each other?

00:10:26
Speaker 1: Actually, my dad's my dad's family's all in Illinois.

00:10:30
Speaker 3: Okay, so not even close. Not battling for the collection plate.

00:10:33
Speaker 5: At least there's that O.

00:10:34
Speaker 3: Great, Yeah, that's good. That's safe.

00:10:35
Speaker 1: Then, just you gotta worry about Thanksgiving and Christmas, like who's saying those blessings?

00:10:39
Speaker 2: So you're singing a little bit in church, when did you know that you could actually not be a good singer but actually stay on key and sing kind of like the radio or kind of like you know, naps or whatever you're doing.

00:10:52
Speaker 5: I have vivid memories of like, because what I listened to.

00:10:56
Speaker 1: I loved vocalists like Carrie Underwood or Mariah carry Whitney, Houston, Shania Twain, like I just loved big voices. And so I have vivid memories of me with my little iPod shuffle, like on the floor of my room with headphones and trying to mimic these runs and just sing like I was in love with singing. So I feel like I just had this obsession with being a great singer really young.

00:11:23
Speaker 3: Did you ever want to be anything else?

00:11:24
Speaker 2: Like when you look back at ninth, tenth, eleventh grade, even here, because obviously when you're in Nashville, musics everywhere, But did you ever think not that I don't want to sing, but maybe I want to be a veterinarian.

00:11:33
Speaker 3: Or maybe I want to be a don't know, astronaut or once you got to that age, you're like you just knew.

00:11:38
Speaker 5: Man.

00:11:39
Speaker 1: I feel like I knew so young. I knew so young, and I had other things I loved, Like I rode horses for a while. That was one of my first loves here. That was actually in Virginia, okay. And I did that for a couple of years and then music just took over. Like once I found songwriting, it was this this whole world that.

00:12:01
Speaker 5: Opened up for me.

00:12:01
Speaker 1: And I feel like I understood myself better, Like there was things that I could say in these songs and get out through music that I couldn't any other way.

00:12:09
Speaker 2: My therapy listening to music. Who was the first songwriter that you heard it can be an artist? Mine was an artist who was the first songwriter you heard that actually sang what you were feeling?

00:12:22
Speaker 5: Maybe an obvious answer, but Taylor.

00:12:23
Speaker 3: Swift, Yeah, obvious, probably because it's true for a lot of people, right.

00:12:27
Speaker 2: I mean John Mayer was that for me. He would sing things and I'd be like, oh yeah, I felt that. Wow, no one's ever said that, But you felt that through Taylor.

00:12:33
Speaker 1: I felt that through Taylor. And she was doing it so young too. I think I had that to look up to. I could look at her and be like, she's fourteen, fifteen, sixteen writing her own music, like, there's no reason I.

00:12:44
Speaker 5: Can't do this too.

00:12:46
Speaker 2: When when you moved here at fourteen, I think he said fourteen it was fourteen, did you move here because of music? Yeah, so who moved here with you?

00:12:53
Speaker 3: Everybody?

00:12:54
Speaker 1: My whole family moved with me. But I first came to Nashville for the first time.

00:12:58
Speaker 5: I was ten years old.

00:12:59
Speaker 1: Believe it or not, and I knew enough to know that country music was here, like there were songwriters here. We didn't know anything about the industry, but I knew Nashville was the spot to like, pursue this and get discovered and air quotes, right, get discovered.

00:13:15
Speaker 2: Only in like a week two you'll show up a week later you'll be famous and rich, big star.

00:13:21
Speaker 1: So we came here when I was ten and I had my first co writing sessions, which was unreal. There's nothing like that. I just love the process of getting in a room. You never know what's going to come out.

00:13:31
Speaker 3: How old were you?

00:13:32
Speaker 1: There's ten?

00:13:33
Speaker 2: How did you even get in a room with who? And who was it was other like kids, Bob Rights the Country or.

00:13:37
Speaker 1: It was actually Sharie Austin and Will Rambo, who are incredible songwriters.

00:13:42
Speaker 3: How did you end up in a room with them? Who set that up?

00:13:45
Speaker 5: It's wild? It's such a god thing.

00:13:47
Speaker 1: Man, Like I we had we knew somebody who worked in the industry here that had, like saw me sing the national anthem at Wrigley Field.

00:13:54
Speaker 5: I did a bunch of anthems when I was young. It's trying to get in front of people.

00:13:57
Speaker 3: No, there was your first big one, right, that's right.

00:13:59
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm a huge gu So yeah, when I saw that note, I was like, oh, that's pretty cool. Get to set a huge Cubs fan again. But you sang that at nine or so? Were you were you a good anthem singer or were you pretty good? But since you were a kid, like a cute kid, you got to go everywhere and do it.

00:14:13
Speaker 5: I don't know how to answer that. I feel like I was good.

00:14:16
Speaker 3: Yeah, but okay at nine.

00:14:18
Speaker 2: Or if you saw you right now at nine or ten, a version of you another kid and they sang like you saying there, would you be like that kid's got a lot of potential or that's a freaking really good kid.

00:14:27
Speaker 1: I'm the second because at that age you're just like all cute.

00:14:30
Speaker 5: Like you don't take a ten year old nine year old very serious?

00:14:32
Speaker 3: Okay, so the first then you say that, Wait, my I forgot what older I said it? I think the first one?

00:14:36
Speaker 2: Yeah, okay, so you would say, that's a kid that's pretty good, and if they keep working, they can be great.

00:14:41
Speaker 3: If you saw you then maybe because like America's got talent.

00:14:44
Speaker 2: Sometimes those kids come out and they're like ten, they're opera singers, and you're like, that's freaking crazy, right, Like that's like obscene how good they are? Were you that good at nine or ten? You can say, yes, we have all ego and the ego at the same time.

00:14:55
Speaker 5: Here, oh egoing No. I like that. That's my new motto. I think I was good enough I could carry a tune. And I remember the.

00:15:04
Speaker 2: Reactions, Yeah, that's what I'm gonna say, where they're like, holy crap, you're only nine, you can do.

00:15:08
Speaker 5: That, man, I was gonna like.

00:15:09
Speaker 1: I remember walking off the field, which that was just such an especial experience too. I remember before just being so like I was nervous, but I was so zoned in, like I couldn't be distracted with anything. And one of my like signs in life, I don't know if you have these things.

00:15:25
Speaker 5: I'm curious.

00:15:25
Speaker 3: I don't, but like, go ahead, you'll get me on a ramp.

00:15:29
Speaker 5: Okay, let's get started, let's go into it.

00:15:32
Speaker 1: I like, have these things in my life that just pop up that are like signs I'm on the right path. I guess you could call it. Maybe you're looking for things or whatever.

00:15:41
Speaker 3: I'm not saying anything. I like your story. Don't cater to me with this, don't be making excuses.

00:15:46
Speaker 5: I'm a big believer in it.

00:15:47
Speaker 3: I love it. I love it.

00:15:48
Speaker 1: But dragonflies have always been that for me. I will see them at the most random times. And there were hundreds on the field that day.

00:15:55
Speaker 5: It was crazy.

00:15:56
Speaker 1: Another one of those things is the number eighteen for me. I've seen it twice day already. It's the craziest thing.

00:16:01
Speaker 3: Where have you seen it? Today?

00:16:02
Speaker 1: We were sitting getting these coffees and the girl cross from me had just an eighteen on her pants.

00:16:08
Speaker 5: We rolled in here. It was exactly one eighteen eighteen.

00:16:11
Speaker 3: What's special about that number? I couldn't tell you, but I see it times that have been important.

00:16:15
Speaker 1: Yes, dude, all the time. It's crazy. I can't explain it.

00:16:18
Speaker 2: So you had dragonflies and number eighteen. There was there an eighteen at the ball game.

00:16:23
Speaker 1: It was no eighteen at the ball game, not that I remember. Maybe I was sitting in ceed eighteen or something. Weird but I remember walking off the field and the lady that was standing there, She's like, I've seen hundreds and hundreds of these games and anthems, and I've never seen a crowd react like that. And I'll never forget her saying that that's awesome. It was like nine year old me just like freaking out.

00:16:44
Speaker 3: That's good. I liked that you're also confident in the kid you.

00:16:48
Speaker 5: I just wish I could go back and give her a hug.

00:16:50
Speaker 3: Well, we'll get to that too.

00:16:52
Speaker 2: I want to say what I was going to say about I wish that I could believe in signs. And I wasn't like going, oh, I don't believe. Well, I mean I wish I could. I just had this conversation with Amy on my show, and although she has some ridiculous ones, she was walking near a tennis court in a tennis ball hit her leg and she was like, it's a sign from God that I should play tennis. I'm like, no, you're walking next to a tennis court. There's a ball that there's five hundred. So but I told her, I wish that I could be open enough to believe in that. So I I think it's really cool that you can, yeah, because it's only bringing positivity your life.

00:17:24
Speaker 3: There's no reason for you not to.

00:17:25
Speaker 5: Big time.

00:17:26
Speaker 2: So you see these dragonflies? Have they ever popped up in your life? At other times?

00:17:30
Speaker 3: I mean, like why why is the dragonfly so important?

00:17:35
Speaker 1: It's usually times that I'm like have like kind of like questions, uneasy feelings about things like maybe I'm just having a shitty.

00:17:44
Speaker 5: Day or whatever.

00:17:45
Speaker 3: Do you have any dragonfly tattoos on you?

00:17:47
Speaker 5: I don't. That's what I want to get. I have some.

00:17:49
Speaker 1: I don't have an eighteen yet, but I have my hometown area code.

00:17:52
Speaker 3: That's cool.

00:17:52
Speaker 5: Got a moon back here because.

00:17:53
Speaker 1: Like, one of the first songs I sang with my grandparents was moon River. And then I've got this little like inside joke between me and my man moon River.

00:18:00
Speaker 3: That's quote Willie, what's that? What? Moon River? Which version of it?

00:18:04
Speaker 5: Oh? The Breakfast at Tiffany's version?

00:18:06
Speaker 3: Okay, so different, Audrey? Oh even old, yeah, so even even older.

00:18:10
Speaker 2: That song's been done by so many people, so many wonderful ways.

00:18:13
Speaker 3: That song. Probably you have really great memories attached to right if you sing it with your grandparents?

00:18:17
Speaker 1: Oh my god, big time. Yeah, that's why I got this is it just it reminds me of them. I'm super close to my family.

00:18:23
Speaker 3: Are your grandparents still alive?

00:18:24
Speaker 5: They are on both sides.

00:18:26
Speaker 1: I'm so lucky and I always I talk about my nana a lot because I look up to her so much. I grew up super close to my mom's parents and practically like raised me in a lot of ways too, Like I felt like I had another set of parents growing up. But my nana just has this appreciation for little things, has a piece about her have. I grew up in a very loud, like chaotic everybody has strong opinions, just say what you're feeling, blunt, that kind of vibe, and that's not my comfort zone. Like I'm a much more quiet kind of an introvert sometimes. And me and her just kind of had that bond, Like I see a lot of myself and her, and I looked up to her so much growing up.

00:19:04
Speaker 3: That's cool my grandma, when I have heard, she adopted me for a long time. So that's her. That's my mom all the way. For those that can only hear, which is most of you, I'm showing her my tattoos right now, and so but I have the state of Arkansas. You know, you have your little.

00:19:16
Speaker 2: Uh oh yeahs, like where you're from. Yeah, So okay, so you're nine, you do the game, you're ten, you're here riding. Are you going back and forth before you move here at all? Or did you just come at ten and say I'm out.

00:19:28
Speaker 5: We did quarterly trips. Wow. And when I say we, it was mostly me and my parents would come out.

00:19:34
Speaker 3: He had some crazy support.

00:19:36
Speaker 1: Crazy and I at the time like, I think I probably took a lot of it for granted, because you're ten years.

00:19:41
Speaker 3: Old posed to you're ten or eleven. Yeah, of course, twelve or thirteen.

00:19:43
Speaker 5: You're like, this is life, this is my life, this is how it is.

00:19:46
Speaker 1: But looking back, like you know, amongst my friends, like hearing their stories of how they got to town, and so many people are coming here on their own, like straight out of college, know nothing about it, but just have this blind passion. And I have so much respect, like the respect in the world for pursuing it that way, because I never knew what it was like to have parents or family that didn't wholeheartedly like believe and support and just feed those passions. They they are, yeah, and they live here now, so they would take these quarterly trips with me.

00:20:18
Speaker 5: Sometimes we drive, which is twelve hours.

00:20:21
Speaker 3: I've done it before.

00:20:22
Speaker 5: You have, Man, it's a lot.

00:20:25
Speaker 3: There's not a lot. There's a it's a pretty not interesting drive.

00:20:28
Speaker 1: There's a Chick fil A in Lynchburg. We'd pass and stop it. But uh yeah, they sacrificed so much, seriously, and from those trips just back and forth, I learned so much about the industry and like got to know the community, found some early champions that got me started. I mean like b and I, Leslie Fram I just sorry, Leslie Roberts. It's too many incredible Leslies in this town. But Leslie Roberts at BMI, I met super young, and she.

00:20:56
Speaker 5: Was one of those people.

00:20:57
Speaker 1: I just saw her yesterday and we were talking about just how far everything's come, and she's gotten to see me grow up in.

00:21:02
Speaker 5: So many ways.

00:21:03
Speaker 1: There's a lot of people I can point to you like that, but just found those early champions that were willing to help me and get me connected.

00:21:11
Speaker 5: And that's the special thing I think about Nashville.

00:21:13
Speaker 1: I don't know if it's like that in La or these other music cities, but it feels like people genuinely just want to help you end up where you're supposed to be and help you along that path.

00:21:23
Speaker 5: Do you find that.

00:21:25
Speaker 2: I've been a troublemaker a lot, so mostly I was fighting people the first few years I was here once come on mostly so yes, I've seen that now and then I think now I have some rely great relationships. But I came into this town like a bull in the china shop. It was just like I was different. So I just took everybody on, even people I didn't need to take on, Like there was I look back at when I moved here ten years ago and I go, dang, I wish I wuldn't been so aggressive.

00:21:50
Speaker 3: Wow, But I learned.

00:21:52
Speaker 2: You know, I messed up a lot, got find a million bucks here. You know a lot of things happened. But I think you're onto something. I think country music there's more of an investment from the consumer, the listener to the artist, from the artist to the label. And it's still a business, and it's always going to be a business. But you're right, this is much more of a town of long term investment because the people that are here are mostly going to stay here, even if they're not at the same label or same publishing company, and so yeah, I think I do see that now where a lot of people do that. And when you're here with your family and at you're fourteen fifteen, they just moved.

00:22:29
Speaker 3: Who all moved?

00:22:30
Speaker 2: And what was that conversation like? Because again, that's awesome that they were that supportive.

00:22:34
Speaker 5: Crazy.

00:22:36
Speaker 1: The catalyst really for the move so young was I got an offer for a publishing deal. I've been meeting with publishers and got my first offer.

00:22:46
Speaker 3: At how old it was?

00:22:47
Speaker 5: Fourteen?

00:22:49
Speaker 3: They offered you money like a publishing deal, like a salary at fourteen years old. That is wild.

00:22:57
Speaker 1: And when I couldn't even drive myself to rights that that is what old crazy?

00:23:03
Speaker 3: So who do they offer it to your parents? They have to offer to your parents.

00:23:06
Speaker 1: My parents had to sign, I think, yeah, but they offered it to me technically.

00:23:11
Speaker 3: But could they?

00:23:12
Speaker 2: But fourteen I couldn't work in Arkansas. We had to be sixteen to actually have a real job.

00:23:16
Speaker 1: You know what's funny. I think we had to set up like a separate account to put the money into that I couldn't touch until I was like a certain age. There was like all these laws and stuff that went into it because I was so young. I think actually Taylor was fourteen when she signed too. There's a couple other people that were that young. But I got that first offer, and at that point we had taken so many trips and my parents just kind of saw what was happening here and that I.

00:23:42
Speaker 5: Was just where I was meant to be.

00:23:43
Speaker 3: Did they like it here?

00:23:44
Speaker 5: They loved it. How can you not have Nashville special?

00:23:47
Speaker 3: Do you have brothers and sisters?

00:23:48
Speaker 1: I have three younger brothers, so they all picked up the entire family and we moved February of twenty fifteen. I think it was literally like on my dad's birthday or the day after something.

00:24:02
Speaker 5: We were driving up and we had.

00:24:04
Speaker 1: This massive U haul and the day before we left, it dumped snow like it was a freaking ice storm.

00:24:10
Speaker 5: I don't know if you remember this as like seven eight years ago, but it was a crazy ice storm here.

00:24:14
Speaker 3: It was eighteen inches. Yes, I'm just kidding, eighteen I just want to.

00:24:18
Speaker 5: It was absolutely eighteen inches.

00:24:22
Speaker 1: Well dud, but yeah, we moved here in the middle of all that insanity and just started writing like full time, you know.

00:24:30
Speaker 2: Took the publishing deal I did. How many years was that deal for man.

00:24:33
Speaker 5: That was I think I was there three or four.

00:24:36
Speaker 3: H three or four years. You write anything good?

00:24:38
Speaker 5: I wrote a lot of great stuff. I learned a lot. I wrote a lot of bad stuff too. Yes, you have to get to the good stuff.

00:24:45
Speaker 1: But I've those years were just learning, Like I got to write with so many incredible writers. Tommy Lee James was at the company and kind of took me under his waging a little bit and was an early mentor of mine and John Randall. Like I had a lot of people like that surrounding me that I just learned so much from just being in the room watching how they craft these songs.

00:25:04
Speaker 3: Were you singing it all?

00:25:06
Speaker 1: Like?

00:25:06
Speaker 5: Were you playing like shows things like that?

00:25:08
Speaker 2: Yeah, like songwriter nights or shows or like mini showcases even if nobody came.

00:25:13
Speaker 1: Not showcases so much, but I did a lot of rounds. I played the Bluebird several times, which is so special.

00:25:22
Speaker 5: Timpan South a few times.

00:25:23
Speaker 3: How'd you feel about performing as a kid here?

00:25:26
Speaker 5: Loved it? Okay, I loved every second it.

00:25:28
Speaker 2: Did you like performing more than writing? We're using writing to get to the performance part or did you think you may just be a songwriter? Like what was the goal at I mean, you moved here, so now you have to have goals. So now you're yeah, you're still a kid, but you just made a career decision at fourteen, so you have to have goals.

00:25:43
Speaker 3: What was your goal at fourteen or fifteen?

00:25:45
Speaker 1: I knew, I knew I wanted to be an artist, like even from that age, like I saw myself selling out arenas stadiums. I had big vision, like I just wanted to get my music out every everywhere.

00:26:00
Speaker 5: But I knew it had to start with music.

00:26:01
Speaker 1: Like songwriting and being an artist always went hand in hand for me. I think writing songs is what made me want to be an artist. I don't think I had those dreams until I had something to say.

00:26:11
Speaker 6: Hang ty, the Bobby Cast will be right back. Wow, and we're back on the Bobby Cast.

00:26:20
Speaker 3: Were you an impatient kid?

00:26:21
Speaker 5: Though?

00:26:21
Speaker 2: When you got here you're fifteen, You're like, yo, you should put me on a huge stage. I need to be playing arenas right now.

00:26:27
Speaker 5: Oh man.

00:26:28
Speaker 1: I feel like I'm always at war with that because I it's part of being young too. I think you're just like it's like I want to go, like you just want to run, but this it feels like this business is very much like a hurry.

00:26:42
Speaker 5: Up and wait kind of thing, so I'm always at war.

00:26:44
Speaker 1: It's like part of me wants to get to that next level, so bad get to that next thing. You're always looking ahead at what can I do, how can I get there?

00:26:53
Speaker 3: But at the same time, I'll never stop with you, never it doesn't stop with me.

00:26:56
Speaker 5: I feel like we're very similar to that.

00:26:58
Speaker 2: Way, just like and I'm constantly and don't don't feel any fault for being like confident and proud, especially with me, because like I've always thought I'm gonna be the biggest thing ever and if I did, nobody else would. So I have no problem and no shame on saying that, because if I don't again, nobody else will. And I definitely feel the confidence in you, but not in a way of like arrogance.

00:27:21
Speaker 3: Again, you have to believe I appreciate that.

00:27:23
Speaker 1: It's like I was just talking to somebody about this yesterday, another artist's it's almost like you have to have this balance of being overconfident to the point where you have the audacity to put yourself out there to be like, I have something to say and people need to hear it and think you're good enough to do it. But at the same time in insecurity, absolutely that makes you want to be better.

00:27:45
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm wild and secure. I'm super confident, wildly ansecure.

00:27:48
Speaker 5: It feels like, yeah, it's right.

00:27:50
Speaker 1: It's this perfect like balance and that's maybe why we're so crazy as artists and doing what we do.

00:27:56
Speaker 2: But I mean, think about the fact that we think people should pay money to come watch us do what we create in our brain. I mean, you gotta be pretty whatever word you want to use, confident, arrogant, cocky, it doesn't matter. But crazy is the word that I go back to because for me to go, all right, I'm gonna go to theater and I'm gonna there's gonna be fifteen hundred seats. I'm gonna tall jokes, and I think people need to pay sixty seventy dollars a ticket?

00:28:18
Speaker 5: Right?

00:28:19
Speaker 3: Who thinks that? You're like what kind of weirdo?

00:28:22
Speaker 5: Make me?

00:28:22
Speaker 2: And then yes, And then it turns into the exact opposite where I'm like, oh my god, they probably want to leave.

00:28:28
Speaker 3: Oh they're not having a good time? So am I even that? Funny? I have what are they imposter syndrome?

00:28:35
Speaker 5: Like so big time.

00:28:36
Speaker 2: I battle that angel and that devil of you suck and everybody knows you suck and you're faking it versus No.

00:28:43
Speaker 3: You're kind of You're the best. You should have huge things happening to you.

00:28:46
Speaker 5: It's the weirdest thing.

00:28:48
Speaker 3: But you almost have to have that to be this crazy, to do this you do and you're crazy, young.

00:28:53
Speaker 5: Young, I've always been crazy.

00:28:54
Speaker 3: You got paid at fourteen to write songs?

00:28:57
Speaker 5: Yeah.

00:28:57
Speaker 1: I in some ways it's weird because I feel like I've always lived in this like fantasy world in a way, like I just I had those dreams as a kid and a lot of I feel like a lot of times you have these crazy visions when you're a kid and you're like, one day, I'm gonna be an astronaut, I'm gonna be whatever it is. But my like I was crazy enough to actually do it and still now be doing it. So I think in a way, it's like I've always lived in this world that I've just kind of made up in my mind, and now it's a reality and it's kind of crazy.

00:29:30
Speaker 2: I always thought it was weird that people didn't know what they wanted to do, because when I was five or six. My grandmother kept it and it was like, what do you want to be when you grow up? And I was like, this is easy.

00:29:38
Speaker 3: I want to be a comedian. I want to be on the radio, want to be on TV. I knew from kindergarten. Wow, And I thought all my friends were crazy. I was like, you guys don't know what you how do you not know? And I knew from you know, five? And I feel like you knew from seven, eight nine, you know from that age, which as I get older, I realize is not common.

00:29:57
Speaker 1: I'm going to ask you what you ask me, Is there anything that you thought about doing other than those things?

00:30:02
Speaker 5: Never?

00:30:03
Speaker 2: I've done other things other than those three things, like I write books or I'll but no, it's I never even had a plan B because I didn't want to give myself an option to quit plan A.

00:30:14
Speaker 1: Wow.

00:30:14
Speaker 2: And there were I mean, and I was poor broke forever, not just broke, but like poor broke. When ear broke mean you don't have anybody you can ask for money? Like poor broke is that you got nothing. They ain't got anything. Yeah, nobody even to ask if you do have I was poor broke forever and so but I was never But it's easy to keep going if you're not used to having anything ever anyway, And so I never was, like there was never a Plan B for me.

00:30:38
Speaker 1: I feel like plan b's are just the enemy of Plan A, like they're gonna sabotage.

00:30:41
Speaker 2: The two enemies that I found in One I try to avoid now is now that I have success on a big level is I don't want to get comfortable. And it's easy to get comfortable when you start to make a lot of money and you start to travel nice and you start to have all these things you can do in your free and you're gonna come to this too, to a point where you're like, oh man.

00:31:00
Speaker 3: I can just do this.

00:31:01
Speaker 2: I got a little money, now, I could just But comfort is the also the enemy of it.

00:31:07
Speaker 5: And complacent.

00:31:08
Speaker 3: I guess I will never.

00:31:10
Speaker 2: Get complacent because I always think I'm getting screwed over by somebody unfairly or by something.

00:31:15
Speaker 3: You need to unpack that, oh I do. I'm in therapy all the time. I love it.

00:31:19
Speaker 5: It's shocking.

00:31:20
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm in therapy.

00:31:20
Speaker 5: I feel like this combo got so deep and I'm here.

00:31:23
Speaker 3: For I live in therapy. So and what you're gonna see too.

00:31:26
Speaker 2: What's really cool about watching kind of your Spaceship shoot up is that, you know, you talk about the last couple of years are not crazy, it's been Once you start to have even more success, which you're gonna have, you are gonna be even more tired, and you're gonna work so hard, and you're gonna be so lucky to be so exhausted, and you can have to check in with yourself sometimes and be thankful that you're that exhausted, because most of the time you're just gonna be tired and pissed. You're like, I've been flying, my throat's sore, I'm never home, and that's okay to feel that way. But every once in a while you got to go, oh, this is what I wanted, Like, I'm so lucky to be this tired.

00:32:01
Speaker 1: That's a great way to look at it. It's like, you work hard, so you can work harder.

00:32:04
Speaker 3: That's it.

00:32:05
Speaker 2: And you'll reach depths of being tired you've never been and it's okay, and you can get upset. You just try not to be upset at people and try to remember every once in a while that you're so lucky to be this tired, and it is a weird mindset to have, man, because all you want to do is be angry at everything.

00:32:20
Speaker 3: You're just tired and hungry.

00:32:22
Speaker 2: And but you're already on that track, and so it's about to happen for you where you're just gonna be so exhausted. You're like, I gotta go do a stupid morning show. I got to go now and do this interview over here, and in between, you're like, I'm so lucky to be this tired. That's all I wanted to do since God Danks, I was like seven years old.

00:32:40
Speaker 5: Yeah, that's so true.

00:32:41
Speaker 1: I people come up to me sometimes and they're like, how are you, Like are you doing okay? You've been going crazy, Like you've got to be exhausted, And.

00:32:52
Speaker 5: I hope I always keep this perspective I have now.

00:32:54
Speaker 1: It's like I feel like I very much am just in that grateful place where I'm like, so many people work exactly as hard as I am, are as exactly as tired as I am right now, and still never get this opportunity, never get to be in this position where I am right now, and I would never I would never take that for granted. Like the only thing I want to do is work harder. And it's like, you know, talking again about that younger me, like nine, ten years old. I think about her and how badly she wanted all of this and just had these dreams that never never knew they were gonna actually happen, or that she would get this opportunity, and I feel like I'm just doing it for her.

00:33:35
Speaker 2: Well, what would you tell nine year old you just walking off the field, a wrigular field, you just crush the anthem. Everybody's like, ah, so you're kind of on a high at nine though, but you're like, I'm nine, what's going to happen?

00:33:47
Speaker 3: You get five minutes? What do you tell yourself? But no psych no stuff like invest in apple. You can't do that. So it's no like Genie, of course.

00:33:54
Speaker 5: That's where your head goes.

00:33:55
Speaker 1: I was going for the sappie like meaningful stuffs.

00:33:58
Speaker 3: I would cheat and be like here's who wins the super Bowl?

00:34:01
Speaker 5: Nothing like that, like fulling back to the future.

00:34:03
Speaker 3: Yes I would.

00:34:05
Speaker 5: I think I would. That's a deep question.

00:34:07
Speaker 1: But the first thing that came to mind is just be patient and be present. And present has been a big word for me, Like this year, specifically because I.

00:34:19
Speaker 5: Starting to realize what it's like to.

00:34:23
Speaker 1: Like have a whole week and look back and be like, I have no idea what just happened, Like I really can't remember. I can't remember how we got to the airport this morning. I can't remember what happened after the show last night. Like you just have these I don't know if you feel this, because you're just going crazy too, but it's almost like these holes in your memory where you're just on autopilot, going, going, going, and you forget to take in these moments and actually be in it.

00:34:47
Speaker 5: And what's the point of that?

00:34:49
Speaker 3: I hear you. I know you're way advanced at twenty two than I was at twenty two because I was not smart enough even though that was a concept to be present.

00:34:58
Speaker 2: It was just run. And now I look back and I'm like, I don't even remember that, right, don't. So yeah, I didn't until like three or four years ago. I didn't start practicing being present, and I'm still not great with it.

00:35:10
Speaker 3: I love my phone too. I cannot have enough phone.

00:35:13
Speaker 5: I'm with you there, I mean, I just.

00:35:15
Speaker 2: It's my I can have friends on the phone, I can be entertained I can watch TV, so sometimes even the phone gets in my way of being present at Tames. So yes, doing forty things at once, but being on my phone, it's very difficult. But I now, like you're saying, like, okay, if you don't, if you're not present for this stuff, why it wasn't important, Like you're acting like it's a huge deal and now you're here, yet you're still not even that present. You're worried about something else, or you're focused on you know a lot of things that aren't a priority.

00:35:44
Speaker 3: So good for you. And you can't be present all.

00:35:45
Speaker 5: The time, you can't always.

00:35:47
Speaker 2: But you can prioritize what you want to actually like keep dear to you and be present during those.

00:35:53
Speaker 1: You gotta try, And that would be my worst, Like I would regret it so much if I got years down the road looking back and I just never really soaked up these moments because I also have so many people like just giving me advice, being like you're gonna miss these times, Like I know you're tired.

00:36:10
Speaker 5: I know it's a grind, Like we're right now, we.

00:36:12
Speaker 1: Run on the bus, we're in rental cars and planes and it's it's hard.

00:36:16
Speaker 5: Yeah, but people are like.

00:36:18
Speaker 1: This passion, this fire, this like intensity that you have right now. It's it's never gonna be like this again, so like soak it up.

00:36:25
Speaker 5: And so I don't want to forget any of this.

00:36:27
Speaker 1: There's so many cool moments happening, I feel like every single day.

00:36:30
Speaker 5: So yeah, just being present.

00:36:33
Speaker 6: The Bobby Cast will be right back. Welcome back to the Bobby Cast.

00:36:40
Speaker 3: How are you keeping notes for songs? Let's say you're it's a Wednesday, and you're stopping to get some coffee and some tea.

00:36:45
Speaker 5: Is it any Wednesday Thursdays?

00:36:47
Speaker 3: Oh my god, we're all up. Check.

00:36:50
Speaker 2: So let's say I'll have a great idea for a song. It's called coffee and tea.

00:36:55
Speaker 3: What do you do? Immediately?

00:36:57
Speaker 5: I get on my phone.

00:36:59
Speaker 1: I either if it's a melody, which a lot of times it is for me. First, I'm a very melodic writer. I'll pop in my voice notes and like make a voice memo.

00:37:09
Speaker 5: And sometimes I listen back the next day and I'm like, what the heck were you thinking? Like this is a mess.

00:37:16
Speaker 1: I can hear more of like the background noise or if I'm driving, whatever's going on, I'm like, this is terrible I'm never gonna use.

00:37:21
Speaker 3: This, but yeah, sing a gibberish melody. Let's say you go, but is it copy of teabat taboo boo? Is that what you're leaving in there all the time?

00:37:31
Speaker 1: So no, no, no, no, whatever. It is like absolute gibberish. And a lot of times that's how I'll like when I sit down at the piano, when I get in rooms with other people, I do the exact same thing, And a lot.

00:37:42
Speaker 5: Of ways that's my process.

00:37:43
Speaker 1: Because I end up finding vowel sounds I like, or a title will freaking fall out or words, and I'll be like, that's it, Like we need to write around that. There's been so many songs that have started that way.

00:37:55
Speaker 5: I mean twenty something, for example, which is the.

00:37:58
Speaker 1: Title track of my album, was that, Like I was just at the piano one morning, had this like melody line in my head, sat down and just ended up singing twenty.

00:38:07
Speaker 5: Something in the midst of my mumbles.

00:38:09
Speaker 1: So I definitely do sing gibberish melodies all the time. And I really do need to get better about titling my voice memos though.

00:38:17
Speaker 5: Because if you look through it, it's literally like.

00:38:19
Speaker 1: New recording fifteen thousand, forty five, New recording fifteen thouty six, And I'm like, what, I have no idea, It's an undertaking, like I have anxiety about going through my voice memo.

00:38:30
Speaker 2: That's funny that it's just all randomly when you get a melody, man, but maybe it is random if you get a melody, though, and let's say, yet, d da da da da da?

00:38:41
Speaker 3: Are you like, Okay, this one sounds, but how do you title that? I guess this is my question too, because you don't know vibe atmosphere would described.

00:38:50
Speaker 1: I try to describe it or like epic stadium ballad, like whatever, whatever, whatever comes to mind.

00:38:59
Speaker 3: I don't know you should I will you be somewhere quiet and you do it quiet, or we leave and do it.

00:39:06
Speaker 1: If you have one, you just die quiet sometimes quiet. Sometimes you can't leave.

00:39:10
Speaker 5: Do you ever do that? Do you get melodies at random times?

00:39:12
Speaker 3: I get funny ideas?

00:39:14
Speaker 2: Yeah, because you know, if I'm writing jokes, I will just take a concept.

00:39:21
Speaker 3: I just pull some up.

00:39:22
Speaker 2: I think I have some here, and you're far more advanced than I am in that by far. But like I have things that it's called song ideas, and I just write down. Yeah, I need to fix one. One funny song that I wrote for stage and it says fix. The song called in Laws.

00:39:37
Speaker 3: I have a idea about a dude who did drives a huge truck, and it's like, is he haven't been live crisis or does you just hate the environment?

00:39:44
Speaker 5: Right?

00:39:44
Speaker 2: So it's like so, and they're not fully formed jokes, and some of them aren't even that funny. And then a song that I wanted to write called plural rural Murals and it's really hard to say, but and then you can.

00:39:53
Speaker 5: I don't even know what you just said, plural rural murals, plural rural.

00:39:57
Speaker 2: So it's multiple countryside paintings, right, that potential and you get the whole crowd to sing plural rural murals, but they can't eat.

00:40:04
Speaker 3: I can barely say it, so they can't even say it right, it's so. And then I have.

00:40:11
Speaker 2: I have a really dumb one that I'll never write about a guy who meets a girl sounds like a traditional lesson and they kind of fall in love until you find something out about her and she's she's never been potty trained, even as a kid, so she still has no idea how.

00:40:24
Speaker 5: To does she wear diapers.

00:40:25
Speaker 2: Well, that's part of the story I just have she's never been poty trained, written in my phone.

00:40:28
Speaker 5: I've got adult diapers.

00:40:30
Speaker 2: I haven't even thought about that since I wrote that line. But you're right, some of it you look at and it's and yours are obviously melodies, mind are ridiculous.

00:40:39
Speaker 5: A lot of it's ridiculous.

00:40:40
Speaker 2: Yes, eighty percent of the stuff I write I never can get back into. But I need it for that twenty that I do find that I can really start to ding ding ding on.

00:40:48
Speaker 5: It's so true.

00:40:49
Speaker 1: If we want people to think we're any decent at all, we should never show these people.

00:40:54
Speaker 5: So anyone these if.

00:40:55
Speaker 2: Anyone heard the potty train story, they may you know, I share that with you being vulnerable right here, Mike, I have ever shared the potty train.

00:41:01
Speaker 3: No, I'd buy that movie rights for the Girl the Love Story. Yeah, that's a great potty train.

00:41:06
Speaker 1: You know what's funny is you might actually find some people out there that relate.

00:41:10
Speaker 5: They're like, oh my god, that happened to me. That would be ridicul You might find the one do.

00:41:20
Speaker 3: You ever find a melody that you did a long time ago?

00:41:23
Speaker 2: And you're like, oh yeah, and then you are like, I'm reinspired by this that I did, and now let me.

00:41:28
Speaker 3: Write this song, dude.

00:41:29
Speaker 1: Actually sometimes which is surprising, because I'm literally getting like five melodies a day, Like it's so much. That's why, that's why I have anxiety about my voice, mammas, because I'm.

00:41:40
Speaker 5: Like, there's just so much to go through.

00:41:42
Speaker 3: You have everybody else go through them? Or again?

00:41:44
Speaker 5: Are you absolutely not? I wouldn't put anyone else.

00:41:46
Speaker 3: Through that, I agree, not yours, my.

00:41:49
Speaker 5: No, mine too.

00:41:50
Speaker 1: But I every once in a while, I'll usually wake up sometimes I'll wake up with these melodies in my head and I'm like, what is that? And I'll realize it's from years ago, something that I started still just.

00:42:00
Speaker 5: Kind of hanging around.

00:42:01
Speaker 1: And I think that's a special sign when you haven't forgotten it after that long, right, So I don't know, maybe they'll turn.

00:42:07
Speaker 5: Into something one day.

00:42:08
Speaker 2: What about an old song that you wrote a long time ago that kind of comes back and you're.

00:42:12
Speaker 3: Like, oh, yeah, that was good. It's not there, but let me work on it again. Has it ever happened.

00:42:18
Speaker 5: That hasn't happened specifically?

00:42:20
Speaker 1: And maybe it's because right now I'm so inspired by just writing in the moment and kind of taking my fans along with me on this journey. You know, my album being titled twenty something, it's very much like this is life right now, and so I feel a responsibility to write about what I'm going through in real time.

00:42:42
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's hard to take a page from five years ago and put in a.

00:42:44
Speaker 5: Current diary right five years ago.

00:42:46
Speaker 2: For me, for like seventeen right, I was reading, well, you talk about your album. I just want to read you the first line of what whomever sent over the album's about choosing to embrace that uncertainty and the inevitable volatility, volatility of her twenties. Now, you say that you've met a lot of or you dated a bunch.

00:43:06
Speaker 3: Of unquality guys. Is that what you said at the beginning of this something?

00:43:09
Speaker 5: Very nice way to put it.

00:43:10
Speaker 2: Okay, But if I read this headline here embracing the uncertainty and the inevitable of volatility, that also sounds like you may be no walk in the park man.

00:43:26
Speaker 3: Volatility.

00:43:27
Speaker 5: Volatility, Yeah, that's a word.

00:43:29
Speaker 3: It is a big one. Yeah, And if that's if I'm a guy and I'm like, hey, let me see, oh oh, she says she's balatile.

00:43:34
Speaker 5: I feel kind of called out.

00:43:35
Speaker 3: You said it, not me. That's why I wanted to bring that up.

00:43:38
Speaker 5: You're right.

00:43:39
Speaker 1: And the funny thing is, I think, specifically this first part that just came out, the first six songs on this album are about messing it up. It's about the messy parts of being in your twenties.

00:43:52
Speaker 3: So you do acknowledge that you're in your twenties, and you also screw.

00:43:54
Speaker 5: Up big time, got it that whole first time.

00:43:57
Speaker 1: I feel like there's an uncomfortable I have about releasing these these songs, and that's honestly the way I want it. Like I think if I was doing if talking about your twenties is an undertaking right because it's so like nuanced.

00:44:12
Speaker 3: Certainly in your twenties.

00:44:13
Speaker 2: I think that's pretty It's so new advanced for you to be able to do that now in it and say this is what I mean thirties. I can talk about my twenties all the time, but you're doing it now.

00:44:22
Speaker 5: And maybe I'll have a different perspective on it then.

00:44:24
Speaker 1: But I also think there's something special about being in it and talking about as you go. I mean, I just write about my life. I write about my No, but a lot of these songs are me taking ownership and being like having some distance from those relationships, kind of looking at areas that I screwed up to And it takes two a lot of times. So I think I'm trying to be mature and like own up a little bit.

00:44:46
Speaker 3: Do you think you have bad tasting guys?

00:44:48
Speaker 5: I think everyone knows I have bad tasting guys, including me.

00:44:51
Speaker 3: I don't know that I have.

00:44:52
Speaker 5: Bad tasting guys. Yeah, the track record shows.

00:44:55
Speaker 3: Do you have a type?

00:44:59
Speaker 1: I have a type, but not as much like physical. More it's more of a vibe like emotional. I guess I'm very much an emotional connection.

00:45:09
Speaker 3: Do you need an emo, dude?

00:45:12
Speaker 5: I need a deep person.

00:45:13
Speaker 3: Okay, that's fair.

00:45:14
Speaker 5: I don't know if we'd call that emo. Is that the same thing?

00:45:16
Speaker 3: No, not always.

00:45:17
Speaker 1: I need somebody who is pretty in touch with their like emotional side for sure. Like if we can't get to that depth, then I don't I'm not in it.

00:45:27
Speaker 2: Which is hard for a lot of dudes because they haven't been taught or allowed culturally to go to those places inside. You know, they may have masculine influences that are like, we don't get sad, we don't cry, we don't feel, and so not all dudes can do that.

00:45:42
Speaker 5: Yeah, there's probably a lot of truth.

00:45:43
Speaker 1: To that, but that connection, that connection, that's why it's probably so rare for me, Bobby, Like, I don't connect with a lot of people on a deep level.

00:45:53
Speaker 5: It's a pretty rare thing for me.

00:45:55
Speaker 1: So I think part of my problem is when I do find someone that I'm like, ooh, I feel something like interesting, I connect with you, I'm intrigued, I go kind of all in. I tend to get wrapped up in it. And I'm a very much all or nothing person, which I.

00:46:08
Speaker 5: Think I'm trying to.

00:46:09
Speaker 1: I don't know if it's a bad thing or if I just haven't found the right thing to be all in on, but I think that's part of it, is I full send and then really quickly kind of.

00:46:19
Speaker 5: Start to realize this is not good.

00:46:21
Speaker 2: Like I why do three parts the album?

00:46:27
Speaker 1: It made sense to me because I kind of processed writing these songs in my twenties.

00:46:33
Speaker 5: So far in these three separate phases.

00:46:36
Speaker 1: You know, there's a lot of times when you feel like you're messing it up and you're missing reflax and you're getting things wrong and you're not trusting your gut, and you have the.

00:46:42
Speaker 5: Messy side of it.

00:46:44
Speaker 1: And then there's been moments where I'm kind of just stumbling my way through and feeling like I'm kind of understanding things better. And then I've also had moments where I'm on top of the world, living my best life, feeling like I got everything together, which is usually not the case, but it feels like it in the moment, And there's all these different sides of it. So I thought it'd be cool to take fans along that journey with me. And it's also a way to give the songs a chance to really be heard and digested. Because I'm a new artist and dropping like eighteen songs.

00:47:19
Speaker 3: It was a lot. I agree completely.

00:47:21
Speaker 1: You know, it's it's a lot to ask of people to be like, Okay, boom.

00:47:26
Speaker 5: Here's eighteen songs, now, go listen.

00:47:28
Speaker 1: So this way I can do six at a time and give the music a chance to be heard.

00:47:33
Speaker 6: Let's take a quick pause for a message from our sponsor. This is the Bobby Cast.

00:47:41
Speaker 3: What do you think right now? You're good at ooh, that's a general question.

00:47:45
Speaker 2: Take music out of it, though it is on purpose because to see kind of where you go, because you did say you're very all in and sometimes it's not right and you're kind of doubting or at least not having full confidence in that area. But let's take music out of it. What are you have full confidence in you for right now? It's supposed to be hard and you're not hurd I'll sit here, sit here and have a drinking to you while you think about it.

00:48:09
Speaker 5: You know, it's funny.

00:48:10
Speaker 1: I'm like realizing how rarely I ask myself that, and that's not good either. Like I tend to the kind of person that focuses on how to be better and like things that I'm doing wrong, and I kind of focus on that because it makes me better and it gets me where I want to go.

00:48:25
Speaker 5: But it's it's so important to kind of look at what you're doing right too, Yeah, what are you doing right?

00:48:33
Speaker 1: I'm really proud of where I'm at in a creative standpoint, like as a writer, as a creative like in the music when I'm co writing. I'm also a co producer on a lot of this album, and I'm proud of that. Like I think the past two years, me and my team, like, it's been really important to dive into the creative community in Nashville and put the music first.

00:48:58
Speaker 3: I'm gonna challenge a little Bitcause'm gonna take a career out of this again.

00:49:01
Speaker 5: Oh sorry, you.

00:49:01
Speaker 3: Know it's okay. I do it all the time.

00:49:03
Speaker 2: No career, no career. Like, are you a good driver? It doesn't count. I'm gonna give you examples here.

00:49:08
Speaker 3: You're not a good driver. I just saw somebody to shake their head.

00:49:10
Speaker 1: No, oh I have, I have. I'm a terrible driver. Okay, yeah that my manager was back there calling me out.

00:49:16
Speaker 3: She didn't call you out. It just happened to see a slight terrible driver. But what are you as a person? What do you Why do people like you?

00:49:25
Speaker 5: I'm a really good cook.

00:49:27
Speaker 3: Okay, I'm I'm listening. Go ahead something.

00:49:30
Speaker 5: This is why people hang out with me, because the.

00:49:33
Speaker 3: Reason they like to be around. Everybody has things that they contribute. You're a good cook.

00:49:37
Speaker 5: I'm actually proud of this too.

00:49:39
Speaker 1: I'm kind of self taught, Like I grew up in a house where I'll be like Southern and Virginia is, I guess, kind of a weird cross section it's not northern, it's not southern, like it always felt like is in between. But my family, like my grandparents are from North Carolina kind of so very southern. It was like, you know, gravy and mashed but potatoes and chicken and dumplings and like all of the delicious like biscuits and just southern good cooking. But I kind of try to be healthy. Like over the past few years, I've realized that I feel better when I eat cleaner. So I think that just made me. I was like, I gotta do it myself, Like my mom's not going to cook for me. I gotta kind of figure out how to do this. So I got obsessed with what's making really good salads, making really good healthy food that makes me feel great. So I love I love a good salad. I've actually been told by a lot of people.

00:50:32
Speaker 5: I make the best salad.

00:50:34
Speaker 1: And people forget to season salads, people forget to like put thought into it.

00:50:39
Speaker 3: I don't know that I've ever had a best salad.

00:50:42
Speaker 5: Thing like you just you think it's like throwing lettuce in a bowl.

00:50:44
Speaker 3: What I do.

00:50:46
Speaker 1: You gotta like love it, you gotta like take time with it, you gotta season it really well. You gotta put in like a lot of time into the dressing flavors.

00:50:55
Speaker 5: Like storm by it I make.

00:51:00
Speaker 1: I get like a blender, and you do like you do a bunch of different herbs, olive oil, tahini, avocados.

00:51:11
Speaker 3: I'll be proud of this too. Make a salad, you know, a big salad guy.

00:51:16
Speaker 5: Maybe I'll convert you lettuce.

00:51:18
Speaker 3: What's the use? Lettuce is a waste? What kale taste bad? I go through the whole list of why come like big dark, leafy greens. I don't like them, so I drink them.

00:51:34
Speaker 5: You do smoothies.

00:51:35
Speaker 3: I do juices. Wow. And I don't even like vegetables and juice because I don't feel like that's a juice. That's more like an evil syrup or something. But I'll do it with my wife.

00:51:46
Speaker 2: Will have the green juice and put lemon and orange in it, and it'll just I need something sugary. I'm still nine myself. Big leafy greens not really my thing. Fair enough, cupcake guy.

00:51:59
Speaker 5: I totally understand.

00:52:03
Speaker 1: I will say though, I see the leafy greens as like a vehicle.

00:52:06
Speaker 5: For the rest of it, It's like it's like the chip It's like.

00:52:09
Speaker 3: Which reminds me, say, vehicle, did your dad tell me the story?

00:52:12
Speaker 1: Not?

00:52:12
Speaker 2: Your dad drove it uber and would play people's music while in the car.

00:52:17
Speaker 5: How do you know this story that's absolutely accurate?

00:52:20
Speaker 3: That's what. Yeah. When you said vehicle, I was like, oh yeah, I'm a dad's true.

00:52:23
Speaker 1: So my dad is the actual best, Like my parents are pretty much my.

00:52:26
Speaker 5: Number one fans.

00:52:27
Speaker 3: What town was he doing this here? Nashville, Okay?

00:52:30
Speaker 1: Which is the funny thing because he would end up with people in the car that like, like are in the industry and will come up to me now and be like, oh my god, your dad one time, like years ago, played me your songs before.

00:52:42
Speaker 5: They were werever out.

00:52:43
Speaker 3: How would you do it?

00:52:45
Speaker 5: I you know, I don't know for sure. This is what he told me.

00:52:51
Speaker 1: He was like he would get in the car and just kind of have it playing in the background. And this was before history breaking up projects, before I released anything, so it was demos that he just would put on a playlist and like have it.

00:53:01
Speaker 5: Playing in the car.

00:53:03
Speaker 1: And he was always like I would never say anything like I don't bring it up. I just kind of wait, and if somebody asked a question, about the music or a lot of people would try to share his zam it and they'd be like I can't find it, like who is it? And then he would like just tell him the story. And my dad's a talker, like he loves people. He's just that person and people love my dad. He's just kind of life of the party, center of attention person, and so he would tell him the story and they'd be like, oh my god, we're gonna be on the lookout. And there's actually been crowd of a lot of really cool things that come from that, believe it or not. Like Fillmore was in the car one time and we ended up like writing from that and getting connected and putting out a song.

00:53:43
Speaker 3: Together because he was in my dad's super like crazy.

00:53:50
Speaker 5: I mean, I'm his little girl. I'm his only girl, his first kid. Like we're so close.

00:53:55
Speaker 3: Does Nashville Is that home to you? Guys? At home home? Because it's home just a question, but it's not home home or is it home to you?

00:54:03
Speaker 2: It's home, but it's like I still go by home Darkansas and sometimes I'm like the.

00:54:08
Speaker 5: What you just did?

00:54:09
Speaker 1: That's how I feel about Virginia Beach and I describe as to people all the time.

00:54:13
Speaker 5: I'm like, it feels like I'm taking a deep.

00:54:14
Speaker 1: Breath, like it when the plan lanes plant what did I say, plan lanes.

00:54:19
Speaker 5: Put in the plane lands in the lane, in the lane.

00:54:24
Speaker 1: It feels like I'm taking a deep breath that I can finally like this weight off my shoulders. And I wonder if that's not because, like Nashville, I moved here to do music. Like in a lot of ways, it was work. Like being in Nashville means working. It means NonStop, go go go. There's always somewhere to be, there's always people to hang out with. But when I go back to Virginia, yeah, it does feel like a deep breath the ocean, like I'm the water being by the water. And you talked about this like you're not from the ocean, so you're like, I don't get it, But me, I didn't know what it was like to not have it five minutes down the road.

00:54:58
Speaker 2: It's like with two cousins that are married, I feel perfect around them from Arkansas, you know, that's what we do. So when I'm around all my cousins that are married to each other, I'm like, oh, are you taking the fact you even had to ask. That is also plenty of I have no cousins that are married, but I do relate, and I think that's what it is for me too. I go home and it's like I don't have anything that I have to do here, meaning I don't have any of the pressures that are awesome pressures by the way that I've created myself here, but there, I just don't have that.

00:55:28
Speaker 3: And it's the same. I get there and I'm just like somebody pulled a twenty pounds backpack off of me.

00:55:32
Speaker 5: Oh yeah, it's a good feeling. Do you have family there still?

00:55:36
Speaker 3: Just a sister? Yeah, and she's there. But we go back.

00:55:39
Speaker 2: I almost ran for governor of Arkansas last year, and so we have a place out there that we don't really go to a whole lot, but I had to have al stair case. I ran, so yes, and she's from Oklahoma. So my wife and I we make we call the hill Billy Trail. We go to Arkansas then Oklahoma. I called the hill Billy Trail. She hates that name, so when I say we, I say it, then she says to calling it that. But we make that trail to Arkansas. My town her town, Oklahoma, then all the way back.

00:56:04
Speaker 5: I think it's awesome.

00:56:04
Speaker 3: What part of Oklahoma from near Tulsa.

00:56:07
Speaker 5: That's so cool?

00:56:08
Speaker 1: You know, Tulsa is the place I've played my first arena, Boka Center with who Laney as not Laney Wilson. Everybody always thinks it's Laney Wilson, who's actually also incredible. I love her, but it was the pop indie band Laney. And that was my first real tour ever, right out of COVID, because.

00:56:26
Speaker 3: I really, how did you get that to your first tour ever? How did you get that?

00:56:28
Speaker 5: Crazy?

00:56:30
Speaker 1: So I released a lot of music during COVID when you couldn't tour obviously, And one of the first things, like me and my manager met about two years ago and we kind of just started building this team. And one of the first things we did was meet with talent agents and we met my agent, Jeffrey Hassen with Uta really early on.

00:56:49
Speaker 3: Are your Uta really so my? Are you? Yeah?

00:56:52
Speaker 2: I didn't know usually because you know, when I was at TA and I moved to Uta, and usually you're like, oh, it's my Uta part.

00:56:58
Speaker 3: I didn't know you're a Uta Uta school. Let's go.

00:57:01
Speaker 5: We didn't even know, but Jeffrey's the actual best and we met. It was a tail end of COVID. I'll never forget it.

00:57:05
Speaker 1: We sat outside Pinewood Social and he was like double masked up because he was like, I'm not supposed to be meeting with people, but I want to.

00:57:12
Speaker 5: I want to hang out.

00:57:13
Speaker 1: And one of the first things we talked about was just influences. Who I loved, who I was listening to, Like Goals, and that was one of the bands that I mentioned because I've loved them since their first EP.

00:57:23
Speaker 5: I was such a fan.

00:57:24
Speaker 1: And they're actually really connected in Nashville too, like they lived here when to Belmont. A lot of writers are on their records with them from Nashville.

00:57:33
Speaker 3: And yeah, yeah, yeah, Sasha Sloan.

00:57:36
Speaker 5: Who's here now.

00:57:39
Speaker 1: But that tour was an absolute dream and it really was just an organic thing. Like I had covered a bunch of their songs, Paul had seen it reposted, like was a fan of the music, and it just made a lot of sense.

00:57:48
Speaker 5: And that tour was fun and it.

00:57:49
Speaker 3: Also so they just said, hey, yeah, come on come out with us.

00:57:52
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, it was a team effort. It was from all sides. Jeffrey and Uta like.

00:57:58
Speaker 2: But you also really enjoyed their music and that's.

00:58:01
Speaker 1: Just organic, which I'm lucky enough that all of my all the tours I've been a part of, have really been that way.

00:58:07
Speaker 5: I mean, Mitchell was the same way.

00:58:08
Speaker 3: Like I was gonna ask about how did that collaboration come together?

00:58:11
Speaker 1: So we met writing you Don't Deserve a country song. That was the first song we wrote together, and I again like love his music, such a fan of what he does. He's such an he just so authentic, always himself, and that's I think what his fans love about him too. And we met writing that song and instantly connected. Just from a creative standpoint. We're very much both like kind of emo kids. We laugh about it because we just love that rock emo vibe. I play in this open tuning, and I think once I started playing.

00:58:38
Speaker 5: He was like, oh my god, this is sick. This is gonna be great.

00:58:40
Speaker 3: You play an open tuning. I do open d Yeah, why why it's funny.

00:58:44
Speaker 1: It's a writer showed me this tuning years and years and years ago, and I just never went back, like I fell in love with the way it played with my melodies.

00:58:53
Speaker 2: Do you feel that you have to manipulate chords or when someone's like, okay, played, well, play a se chord, but it's not the same to you because your tuning is a bit different, right, So it is.

00:59:07
Speaker 5: A little bit of like mental math.

00:59:09
Speaker 1: And there's some keys like that I can't play in because of the tuning.

00:59:14
Speaker 5: There's like one or two that I can't get to.

00:59:15
Speaker 1: But for the most part, my way around. Yeah, and it's kind of become like my signature thing, Like I play on pretty much all my songs and it kind of just is this through line.

00:59:26
Speaker 5: But I love it.

00:59:27
Speaker 3: Mitchell, we're writing that song and then you what. Then He's like, let's sing together.

00:59:33
Speaker 1: Yeah, Well the cloud came later. We started just writing a bunch together.

00:59:36
Speaker 5: Like we've written.

00:59:37
Speaker 1: I think we've only written four times, believe it in that four or five times, And every single song we've written has ended up on this album, which is special. Like I'm sure you know this as a writer, like you write with people in book.

00:59:47
Speaker 3: You don't can say I'm a dumb writer. Come on, so but you get it, Okay, there's people that you love.

00:59:53
Speaker 2: Fair I get it, but I'm not like you and that I'm not talented. But anyway, go ahead, I'm gonna fight. I'm gonna fight, go ahead.

01:00:01
Speaker 1: We just bonded, like the fact that we only wrote that many songs and every single one was something that I loved, Like that doesn't happen a lot. So we had that, and then we went on tour together, which was so much fun, and that was.

01:00:15
Speaker 5: Top of last year.

01:00:17
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I was solo acoustic on that tour, like forty minutes that I learned so much out there in these crazy bars.

01:00:23
Speaker 3: Forty minutes solo acoustics.

01:00:24
Speaker 5: Forty minutes solo acoustics.

01:00:26
Speaker 3: Tough.

01:00:27
Speaker 5: I had to work for it.

01:00:28
Speaker 1: I had to work for it, and it taught me so much about just performing, Like it wasn't about how good I sounded. It wasn't about the songs really, because a lot of people go in and don't know who I am. They don't care. They just want to have a good time. They want to connect with me as a person. And so I learned to just be in the moment on stage and make moments happen and just connect with the crowd and like have to reel people in just with my voice and my guitar.

01:00:51
Speaker 5: So now when I play full band it's like cakewalk. It's like this is easy.

01:00:54
Speaker 3: Yeah.

01:00:56
Speaker 2: Four final questions. Speaking of collapse, I think are you and Breeland and Brilin too. I just was flipping through and Marcus, who I love, who is a writer?

01:01:04
Speaker 3: I think it's a picture of you.

01:01:05
Speaker 2: Guys likes on homie, Yeah, cameras on the ground or something right.

01:01:09
Speaker 1: My manager actually took that literally two days ago outside the Rhymemen and we always take these like from the ground up, and it's just like become our thing. Because I'm a big sneaker head too, so a lot of times it's like show off the Jordans.

01:01:19
Speaker 5: But Marcus is awesome.

01:01:20
Speaker 1: And he's written like a bunch of stuff for me and been a fan and he always has the best fits.

01:01:26
Speaker 5: You see his outfit.

01:01:28
Speaker 2: I've seen a lot of them and they're all just so good. I can't remember all the yes, but he's always dressed like perfectly. But I saw him and then the Britlant thing near each other on an Instagram feed. So what you guys are together like doing a song?

01:01:40
Speaker 3: Yeah?

01:01:40
Speaker 5: Song or song?

01:01:42
Speaker 1: His song, his song for what It's Worth, which I loved that song, and he reached out a few months ago and he's awesome.

01:01:49
Speaker 5: He's so good.

01:01:52
Speaker 1: I saw him for the first time live at Whiskey Jam and this was like I remember because it was his toll team was like, this is the first show he's ever played because some to me, like in COVID released a lot of music, had that one go crazy, and I was like, you would never know, like just watching him, he's such an entertainer. That was a fun night because it was a whole squad, so many talented people. But he called about gosh three four months ago now maybe longer, I don't know what time is, but he wanted to feature on this song, and he's like, you know, you're my first choice.

01:02:23
Speaker 5: Obviously had written a lot.

01:02:24
Speaker 1: Of breakup songs, like my first two projects were all break up. So he's like, I feel like you would have a perspective on this, and listening to that song, I'm like, how many times have I wished an X would say something like this to me? And I felt that way in a lot of ways too. It's like like we were talking about earlier, you own up to mistakes and you kind of look back and you're like, man, I kind of screwed that up. So I immediately like saw myself in it, got in with Liz Rose wrote that singer verse, and it just turned out to be a perfect lab And it's been so cool to see people react to it in a different way.

01:02:57
Speaker 5: And I feel like that perspective it it to me.

01:02:59
Speaker 1: It felt like that song always wanted to be a collab. Like having both sides of it, I think is really cool.

01:03:04
Speaker 3: Right, three questions left. I want to go to your name.

01:03:08
Speaker 2: You have to tell people you're not related to Bruce Springsteen all the time.

01:03:10
Speaker 1: Man, all the time, Like I and I get it, Like there's not a ton of Springsteen's It's coming.

01:03:19
Speaker 3: Just too justice, literally the only two I know.

01:03:21
Speaker 1: It's but we're not related. Like there's no there's no to spell the same. It's spelled the exact same. Yeah, it's tough, so like I've dealt with it my dad. It's funny like growing up, people would call their house and be like is Bruce there? And you'd be like always in the shower, Like give me a minute, and just like mess around with people.

01:03:39
Speaker 3: Have you done the family tree thing? You know you're not related.

01:03:42
Speaker 5: We haven't yet, we haven't done ancestry.

01:03:44
Speaker 2: So sixth cousin, you almost don't want him to be though, because you don't have to tell that story exactly. Eventually people get and I wasn't evenna ask you about it, but I was like, I bet I want to ask you about getting asked about it.

01:03:55
Speaker 5: Yeah, appreciate is that the.

01:03:57
Speaker 3: First question that a lot of people go, So are.

01:03:59
Speaker 5: You starting to change a little bit? Which is good? But yeah, people always ask like I'm used to it at this point.

01:04:05
Speaker 3: Okay. The other thing is two questions left. Your first name not what how most people would say it Elena? Yes? Do? They often say it wrong?

01:04:15
Speaker 5: Always? Well? Often is the right word.

01:04:19
Speaker 1: I get a Lena, I get a Lana, I get a lot of and two ends. Sometimes it's it's kind of funny, like Starbucks is a nightmare. So I've just started telling you my name is Sam because it's an absolute nightmare.

01:04:31
Speaker 2: Do you have your people make sure because here's the I say this is from an empathetic perspective. When I was inducted into the Radio Hall of Fame, Big night for me is the youngest person ever inducted.

01:04:44
Speaker 3: Huge a wow.

01:04:45
Speaker 1: Wow.

01:04:45
Speaker 2: People are flying in to Chicago the big ceremony, and they say, and Bobby Jones are you kidding?

01:04:50
Speaker 3: No, I'm not kidding. Oh my god. And so it's it often happens.

01:04:57
Speaker 1: Was that like a mental thing for you? Like hearing that, do you go, Oh my god?

01:05:02
Speaker 3: It happens to set you back.

01:05:03
Speaker 2: It happens enough to where I don't get upset at it. I get a little annoyed, But it's happening less and less because because right same with you, like all this crap here that's kind of annoying. You're gonna have different reasons to be annoyed later. But the Bobby Jones thing, at pretty big parts of my career, they'd be like, and Bobby Jones and sometimes I'm live on television.

01:05:26
Speaker 4: You just go and I just like, don't react, just keep going right right right.

01:05:30
Speaker 5: And you have such a cool name that shocks me.

01:05:32
Speaker 3: Then well it's fake name and it's not like a pirate but whatever, it's not a fake Is it a fake name? Yeah, my real name is Bobby Estell.

01:05:39
Speaker 5: I did not know that.

01:05:40
Speaker 3: So, and my wife uses my real name because she's like, I'm not going by Caitlyn Bones. Wow. She's like, that's the dumbest thing you ever heard.

01:05:47
Speaker 2: And I'm like, cool, cool, and so she's you know, she goes by Caitlyn Estell.

01:05:52
Speaker 5: Yeah, so but you get it, you get it.

01:05:55
Speaker 3: Yeah, I just people by Bobby Jones.

01:05:56
Speaker 2: I'm just like, oh so if they get they're like, here's a Lena Springsteen.

01:06:00
Speaker 1: I internal eye roll, But the show goes on and it's fine. Like I really don't get as annoyed as some of my people on my team do, so it's fine. But I've actually kind of started just having fun with it.

01:06:14
Speaker 5: Like there's been a couple of times.

01:06:16
Speaker 1: Where they've gone both wrong and it's like Elena Springfield.

01:06:19
Speaker 4: So now.

01:06:21
Speaker 5: I have this alter ego. She's a Lena Springfield. She's real country like this, and so sometimes Elena Springfield come out and that's the fun.

01:06:29
Speaker 2: That's funny. All right, final two questions. When you leave here today, what we do.

01:06:34
Speaker 5: I'm actually going to the studio today.

01:06:36
Speaker 1: I'm getting together my producer Will Weatherley and we're working on this song for the album. It's just a kind of I'm simultaneously doing everything at once, like I'm touring while I'm writing, while i'm producing, and that's just the nature of I feel like the way the industry is now, like maybe at some point it'll be more like you write the record, you produce the record, and you tour the record.

01:06:57
Speaker 5: Than it continues.

01:06:58
Speaker 1: But right now it's kind of everything at once, which is has its challenges, but it also, I think is creating a really unique album because I'm just in the thick of it while I'm creating.

01:07:09
Speaker 5: It's fun.

01:07:10
Speaker 3: I'm sure you get the Taylor parallels all the time. But even when you said you write with Lizzro, you know Liz. I love Liz. She's just the best, actual best.

01:07:18
Speaker 2: And you know, Liz wrote a whole bunch of stuff with Taylor early on full albums, Like she's a big part of the reason that Taylor was able to come so hard and so quick here in Nashville. And so when you're write with Liz or you ever, like, man, this is super cool.

01:07:31
Speaker 1: Oh it's it's weird and I have to like stop and think about it, and it's pretty surreal. I mean, yeah, those songs that she wrote with Taylor and even live in a little big town like these other artists.

01:07:43
Speaker 3: All the love junkie stuff is it's just all of it.

01:07:45
Speaker 5: I just had my first love junkies day.

01:07:48
Speaker 3: You did, yeah with all three?

01:07:50
Speaker 1: All three of them, and it was a pinch me moment. I mean, just you're in the presence of greatness.

01:07:55
Speaker 2: In that room, and you're in the presence of greatness that also wants to write you because they can write with anybody else.

01:07:59
Speaker 3: Like that's the cool thing. Yeah, that's the cool thing.

01:08:02
Speaker 5: And it blows my mind, Like I'm lucky enough.

01:08:04
Speaker 1: Like I've been on a couple of retreats with Liz two and we go to her beach house and actually shoulder to Cry on twenty something both came out of that retreat, which are ending up on the record, and it was probably some of the most special four days of my life.

01:08:18
Speaker 5: I don't know what it was. It was just really magical.

01:08:20
Speaker 1: We were for the first time, I was writing on the water, so I think that was part of it. I just felt so at peace, so at ease. But she's just one of those writers like you get in the room and you're like, I see why you're Liz Rose. She has this way of just making you feel so safe and like able to just talk about anything. You know, Yeah, and which is crazy because she's a legend and a lot of ways you're like nervous, You're like, oh, my god, this is Liz Rose. But she's so good at just finding what the song is. Like I'll sit there and we'll talk for an hour and she'll be like, how about this. You said this like thirty minutes ago, and I feel like this, we really need to say this, And it ends up being the most vulnerable thing I've ever written.

01:09:03
Speaker 5: And it's just beautiful how she can do that. I look up to it so much.

01:09:08
Speaker 2: Some of the songs and we're gonna rap here but that I've put on our national countdown. It's our women to buy our country show that I would listen to and be like, man, that's so good.

01:09:17
Speaker 3: I have them all listed here.

01:09:18
Speaker 2: Shoulder to cry on while you're at it, Trust issues, me myself, and why zero Trucks?

01:09:23
Speaker 4: It's funny that yeah, so of those songs, I'm want to give you those five options because over the last two years, year and a half or so, when listening to those for one reason or other, been like, oh, let's put this on the national playlist.

01:09:40
Speaker 2: Which of those songs do you look at and go still love it so much? It still represents either who I am or who I was.

01:09:53
Speaker 1: Shoulder to cry on and I don't know if still applies as much to it because I just released it really recently, so it's very like it feels like me right now. But I think that's one that years from now I'll look back and be so proud of because just the song, I feel like the song from a songwriting perspective, that's one of my favorites I've ever written. I love a good hook where it just kind of it's a turn on a phrase that you didn't expect, and.

01:10:16
Speaker 5: I've just admired that about country.

01:10:18
Speaker 1: Music and been like, I want to write like that, And I feel like this song is special to me because of that, and it's also a vulnerable one for me. I just it kind of speaks to the fact that I'm not really good at being vulnerable in front of people.

01:10:31
Speaker 3: It's vulnerable to say that you're not good at being vulnerable, though, did you know that You're right?

01:10:35
Speaker 5: That's kind of trippy. It's like a mental game.

01:10:37
Speaker 3: But likely it's like uh inception.

01:10:40
Speaker 1: But yeah, I admittedly like, I'm I hate crying in front of people, like I when I.

01:10:45
Speaker 3: Process and thinking about how you hate crying in front.

01:10:48
Speaker 5: Of people, that would also the same thing.

01:10:49
Speaker 3: Similar.

01:10:50
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, first song released and the track one on the album You Don't Deserve a country song, which you wrote with Mitchell, Jeff Warburton, Will Weatherley, Michael Whitworth.

01:11:00
Speaker 3: So that's that's there. That's it's the number one streaming song you have right now. I was like all this.

01:11:05
Speaker 5: Time, I didn't know that.

01:11:06
Speaker 2: Actually the second song and it's the last song on the album, which is Shoulder to Cry on what you just talked about, right, and then you have four other ones coming from this specific project, right you said six?

01:11:17
Speaker 3: Right?

01:11:17
Speaker 5: Goodbye?

01:11:18
Speaker 1: Looks good on you all caught up to me, Uh, if you love me now?

01:11:23
Speaker 5: And Tennessee is Mine.

01:11:25
Speaker 3: Mike played me just a little bit of Tennessee is Mine. And then we're gonna wrap it up here and the.

01:11:30
Speaker 1: Welcome side Tannessee is Mine.

01:11:36
Speaker 2: We've got a podcast, Jael if we play more than that. Okay, this has been a delightful conversation.

01:11:41
Speaker 5: Thank you.

01:11:42
Speaker 3: You You're fun to talk to you. I mean back at you.

01:11:46
Speaker 1: It's just like, yeah, I knew it was gonna be fun, but I feel like we got we got really deep. We talked, We talked about so much. I feel like this was a little mini therapy session.

01:11:54
Speaker 3: We did Mike, how long we go here? An hour? Ten? It's good. Yeah, I'm gonna, you.

01:11:59
Speaker 1: Know what, I'm gonna spend more time thinking about things that I'm doing well and good at. That's what I don't spend too much, but just a little bit, just enough.

01:12:05
Speaker 2: That's what I've learned in therapy that I need to acknowledge things i'm good at. So when I beat myself up, which I constantly do for things I'm not as good at as I hoped try to be, I can somewhat reach into the good bucket, so I don't go crazy as I'm always always in the bad bucket. So you owe me like twenty bucks of that sessions. That's just a little slipp of what I paid it.

01:12:26
Speaker 5: He covers half that.

01:12:27
Speaker 3: That's all right, you guys.

01:12:28
Speaker 2: Follow Lance Springsteen on Instagram, on TikTok, same thing, same name.

01:12:36
Speaker 3: It's all there. Good for you for having your own name. I said you did I say?

01:12:40
Speaker 5: Did you say it's Alana?

01:12:43
Speaker 2: Oh my god, Now I've trip myself talking about how your name gets messed up. All right, So Bobby Jones here, We're gonna see you guys next time.

01:12:50
Speaker 3: All right, we're doing good to see.

01:12:52
Speaker 5: You see thank you so much, see you later.

01:12:54
Speaker 6: I love this episode of the Bobby Cast. Subscribe on iHeartRadio, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.