Tag: Willie Nelson

Mixtape: Wyatt McCubbin’s Songs to Fill a Songwriter’s Cup

Posted on by Editor

These are a few of the songs I run to when I need to go back to the well. They inspire me to be more creative, honest and authentic because that’s exactly what they are. These songs also belong to some of the most important songwriters who have ever lived.

“I’m Leavin’ Now” – Johnny Cash & Merle Haggard

This song kicks off with my ol’ pal, Marty Stuart, playin’ the flattop guitar. I love songs that still have energy without needing huge productions. Don’t get no cooler than Cash & The Hag.

“Satellite Radio” – Steve Earle

Steve Earle is such a North Star for me and my music. He has always pushed the envelope and made such creative records throughout his career. This album (Washington Square Serenade) and this song are proof of that.

“Pontiac” – Travis Meadows

Travis Meadows is such a hero of mine. I have turned to his records a lot throughout my career. This song makes me feel 16.

“Best of All Possible Worlds” – Kris Kristofferson

“If booze was just a dime a bottle, boy, you couldn’t even buy the smell.” KRISTOFFERSON. Enough said.

“That’s Life” – Paul Thorn

I’ve heard Paul Thorn say in interviews that this song was inspired by a list of things he heard his mom say. There is so much simple wisdom in this one. Makes me want to call home and just let Mom talk.

“Leaving Souvenirs” – Chris Knight

I found Chris Knight’s music in the darkest time of my life. His albums The Trailer Tapes and Trailer II changed my life and made me want to lean into writing songs about what I was going through. This one is still hard for me to listen to, but I love it so much.

“I Need You” – Tony Lane

You’ve heard this song before, but maybe not this version… This is the incredible Tony Lane. The writer behind so many of country music’s coolest hits. He has been one of my biggest inspirations for years now.

“East Houston Blues” – Rodney Crowell

Rodney Crowell is the king of uptempo grooves in my opinion. “East Houston Blues” is just pure grit and swagger.

“Stuff That Works” – Guy Clark

I heard this song at a bonfire jam when I was 14 years old. I’ve been hooked on Guy Clark ever since. I am a fan of simple songs and this one hits that nail right on the head.

“Who’ll Buy My Memories” – Willie Nelson

It would be impossible for me to build a playlist around songwriters and not include Willie Nelson. This is easily one of my favorites from the Red Headed Stranger.

Photo Credit: Evan Harney

The 15 Best Country Albums of 1976

Posted on by Editor

Country music has a long-standing reputation as being a genre focused primarily on breaking songs at radio and, consequently, one that releases albums routinely dismissed as “hits plus filler.” Conventional wisdom is not entirely wrong on this point, but it is wildly overstated. The truth is that every year is a good year for country albums—and that was once again the case fifty years ago.

I wouldn’t crown 1976 as the greatest country-album year ever—as I once suggested at No Fences Review, that title may belong to 1973—but the U.S. Bicentennial was yet another year filled with fantastic, even essential, country albums. Of course, any Best-Of music list is subjective, but I’d argue the best ones both validate reader experiences (“Oh hell, yes! That’s a great one!”) and challenge their taste (“What the hell?”).

So, listed alphabetically only, and with the understanding that I could have easily doubled the length of the list below, here are my 15 Best Country Albums of 1976.

Jessi Colter – Jessi

Colter will forever be best known for the pissed-off vulnerability of her “I’m Not Lisa,” the quiet crossover hit off I’m Jessi Colter. But Jessi, her follow-up in ’76, is the better album. Colter’s quaver doesn’t always hold, or even hit, the notes she’s after, but somehow that limitation consistently deepens the domestic turmoil she sounds in her songwriting. And the wild, bluesy, and country-rock arrangements on “The Hand that Rocks the Cradle” and on No. 11 hit “It’s Morning (And I Still Love You)” only reinforce Colter’s conflicting emotions. “Without You” opens at a crawl, just voice and piano like it’s going to be the unhappy sequel to “I’m Not Lisa,” then suddenly it’s a party. “Without you I can’t go on,” she keeps insisting, but you can tell she’s already starting to dance.

Stoney Edwards – Blackbird

Stoney Edwards’ final Capitol album included several tracks that, then as now, sound like they should’ve been good-sized hits, but both the sweet country pop of “Love Still Makes the World Go ‘Round” and the prayerful version of Merle Haggard’s “Don’t Give Up on Me” barely charted at all. In the uplifting but controversial social commentary “Blackbird (Hold Your Head Up High),” which just missed the country Top 40, Edwards used the N-word to describe himself and his father—pointedly so, to shine a light on the white world’s bigotry and oh-so shrewdly, as well, to claim country music for his own. The unexpected closer, a crawling six-minute version of Leonard Cohen’s “Bird on a Wire,” is a perfect vehicle for Edwards’ worn-sandpaper baritone: “I have tried in my own way to be free…”

Emmylou Harris – Elite Hotel

Elite Hotel was technically out in 1975, but since it wasn’t released until Dec. 29th, I’m more than pleased to include it among the best of ‘76. On her second album, and as of that April, her first No. 1, Harris dedicated her luminous voice to bridging country scenes new and old. She memorably covered her late friend Gram Parsons twice even as she also scored a pair of chart-toppers with versions of classic hits by Buck Owens and Patsy Cline—and added a No. 2 hit with George Jones deep cut, “One of These Days.” I know the competition has been stiff, but is this Emmylou Harris’ best album?

Waylon Jennings – Waylon Live

Recorded at shows in Dallas and Austin in 1974, Waylon Live is my pick for Greatest Country Live Album Ever. Jennings is at his tender, burly best and Ralph Mooney adds lightning-strike pedal steel throughout, atop the Waylors’ thumping, bumping country rock. From “T for Texas” (“Wanna hear me yodel?”) to “Bob Wills Is Still the King” to “This Time,” this is Outlaw country at its artistic peak. Pro tip: The 11-song original LP was bumped to 20 tracks when reissued on CD in 1999, then expanded to 42 tracks in 2003, and will still leave you wanting more.

Loretta Lynn – When the Tingle Becomes a Chill

Lynn was never much of an album artist but this one goes on her short list. The title track, written by Lola Jean Dillon, is a women’s movement anthem that lays out the cold, hard material conditions of domestic life. You wish Lynn had gender-flipped her cover of the Glen Campbell hit to “Rhinestone Cowgirl” or that her only song credit here, “Red, White and Blue,” didn’t claim Cherokee roots for herself quite so stereotypically. But those are quibbles next to how persuasively she transforms each cut here as a statement of her absolute Loretta-ness.

The Osborne Brothers – Number 1

This Osborne Brothers album included zero No. 1 hits, zero songs that include the phrase “number 1” and, what’s more, was approximately their 18th studio album, not their first, so my guess is that this album was called Number 1 because it was their first for bluegrass label CMH. Regardless, Number 1 pops like only the Osbornes can. It’s filled with Bobby’s great high leads and jaggedy mandolin solos, with Sonny’s ringing banjo and, for even extra pop, David Brakefield on high-lonesome drums. A-Team pianist “Pig” Robbins even drops by on “Memories Never Die” and “Each Season Changes You.” Bluegrasspolitan!

Johnny Paycheck – 11 Months and 29 Days

This album didn’t include any radio hits to speak of, the way earlier Paycheck sessions with producer Billy Sherrill had, and certainly nothing as monumental as the pair’s “Take This and Job and Shove It” would the following year. But would you settle for some of Paycheck’s greatest performances? The title track (a Paycheck/Sherrill co-write) is a rough-and-rowdy, in-the-jailhouse classic, while “The Feminine Touch” is a tragicomic testament to the way every domestic nicety abandoned Johnny when his wife moved out, and “Gone at Last” (a Paul Simon song and duet with soul singer Charnissa) is delivered with fingers-crossed, Pentecostal mania. Best of all is “I’ve Seen Better Days,” a miserable country-soul masterclass that begins with Johnny coming to on the lawn.

Elvis Presley – The Sun Sessions

Either a jolting reminder or thrilling revelation, depending upon when you came in, The Sun Sessions brought together for the first time Presley’s first commercial recordings, the game-changing sides that both challenged and help to expand what people thought of when they thought of country music. It kicks off, of course, with the genre-scrambling debut single “That’s All Right” b/w “Blue Moon of Kentucky,” and gathers as well his game-changing run of initial rockabilly hits—all on country radio, mind you—including his career-first chart-topper: “I Forgot to Remember to Forget.” In June 1976, the reissue of the year peaked at No. 2 on the country album charts.

Charlie Rich – Silver Lining

Country soul singer Charlie Rich teamed here with producer Billy Sherrill for a gospel album that remains too little known. Silver Lining features the dynamic rhythm beds and harmony group arrangements, and the deeply felt and swung vocals, that were already beloved from Rich’s many seventies country hits. Indeed, the versions of “Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child,” “The Milky White Way,” “Down by the Riverside,” “Why Me” and the rest would fit thrillingly on any of Rich’s albums in the decade. I especially appreciate the Silver Fox’s joyous, rousing intervention on the normally staid “Amazing Grace.”

Linda Ronstadt – Hasten Down the Wind

Mention Linda Ronstadt in a county music context and people will jump first to her Trio collaborations with Dolly Parton and Emmylou Harris, then maybe recall her contributions to the country rock scene of the late 1960s and early 1970s. But her most important and lasting contributions to country music were her several big radio hits in the middle of the decade. Hasten Down the Wind further cemented old-time rock and roll sounds as up-to-date country with her version of Buddy Holly’s “That’ll Be the Day” (a No. 27 hit) and reestablished Patsy Cline’s reputation for new country and rock fans with “Crazy” (a No. 6 hit). The album also paved the way for the acceptance of a certain type of arena rock balladry for countless country stars to come—especially with the pedal steel-powered “Try Me Again,” a song Ronstadt co-wrote with Andrew Gold.

The Seldom Scene – The New Seldom Scene Album

This is the Seldom Scene late in its classic lineup’s run (John Duffy, John Starling, Mike Auldridge, Tom Gray, and Ben Eldridge) as they put their newgrass stamp on old gems from the Stanley Brothers and a couple of new ones from Rodney Crowell (including harmony vocals from one Linda Ronstadt on his “California Earthquake”). This album has often been judged as lesser than earlier efforts by the Scene, but I love the way it leans so hard into eclecticism, which is this ensemble’s always-seen calling card. From the album’s opening, rolling-on-home version on Jimmy Buffett catalog cut “Big Rig” to their closing Dobro-and-harmony-forward cover of Hank Williams’ “Pictures from Life’s Other Side,” this set feels like one more tent pole for big-tent bluegrass.

Various Artists – Wanted: The Outlaws

Sitting atop the country album chart for two months early in the year, this compilation served as the national coming out party for a long-simmering scene that remains a genre touchstone to this day. Technically speaking, several of the album’s cuts weren’t Outlaw at all: Waylon Jennings and Jessi Colter’s duet “Suspicious Minds” had been released as a single before Jennings’ famously renegotiated his RCA contract, and two of Willie Nelson’s contributions, “Yesterday’s Wine” and “Me and Paul,” had already been released as a failed two-sided single before Nelson left Nashville for Texas. Time changes everything, though, and when rereleased in 1976, these cuts were understood to crystallize progressive-country sounds and the genre’s newly rebellious attitude. The first country album ever to be certified platinum, Wanted: The Outlaws nudged country music in the direction of becoming more explicitly an album-oriented format, just like rock, even as Outlaw country also became, ironically, country music’s next big pop crossover sound. Don’t sleep on Tompall Glaser’s fantastic version of “T for Texas”!

(Read more about Wanted: The Outlaws.)

Leona Williams – San Quentin’s First Lady

When Merle Haggard played a New Year’s Day show at San Quentin in 1976, his opener was Leona Williams, who was a member of his touring troupe as well as his future wife and songwriting partner. He wrote most of the songs she performed, and his band, the Strangers, backed her up. But make no mistake: This is the Leona Williams Show. She sings the husky hell out of “I Wonder Where I’ll Find You at Tonight,” “San Quentin” and “Workin’ Girl Blues,” and she and guitarist Roy Nichols both like to tear the placed down on “If Anyone Ought to Know.” San Quentin’s First Lady is long out of print, but do yourself a favor and track down it down on YouTube.

Hank Williams Jr. – Hank Williams Jr. and Friends

Hank Williams Jr. and Friends was recorded before the singer nearly died falling off a mountainside in April of 1975. But, like Elite Hotel above, it wasn’t released until December and didn’t chart until ‘76. Timelines aside, this is the album where Hank Jr. finally began to find a rocking, modern sound of his own in the swelling southern rock anthems “Losing You” and “Can’t You See” (by his friend Toy Caldwell of The Marshall Tucker Band) and tender ballads like “On Susan’s Floor” (by Shel Silverstein). But it’s the pair of minor hit singles that close the album, both Williams originals, that steal the show and predict his superstar future. The haunting “Stoned at the Jukebox” is a boozy honky-tonker about the loneliness that closes in after all your rowdy friends head home, while “Living Proof” wrestles with having to live up to family traditions. Among the very best country albums of the entire Outlaw moment.

Bobby Womack – BW Goes C&W

R&B legend Bobby Womack’s country album was summarily panned in its day, but working a bigger-tent understanding from here in the 21st century, it sounds awfully good to me. Womack leans hard into the soul of the already soulful Charlie Rich hit “Behind Closed Doors,” brings a playful modern bounce to the mid-century Eddy Arnold smash “Bouquet of Roses,” and makes over another Rich hit, “I Take It on Home,” into delightfully ragged countrypolitan. Most telling of all, as far as cracking open genre walls goes, is when Womack turns away from the Nashville songbook to underscore the country in his brother Curtis Womack’s “Don’t Make This the Last Dance” and the song Sam Cooke wrote for Womack’s old family group The Valentinos, “I’m Tired of Living in the Country.”

Lead image: Emmylou Harris, Elite Hotel; Waylon Jennings, Waylon Live; Jessi Colter, Jessi.

Lily Meola is Lucky to Be Living This Life

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

For the cover of her new album, Lily Meola wanted to lie across a lily pad, but not just any lily pad. Something like the gigantic Victoria amazonica, which has enough structure beneath it to support the weight of a person. After searching the internet and calling botanical gardens around the world, she happened upon a place in Tennessee that allowed her to achieve her dream.

It’s an apt metaphor for Meola’s debut album, Lucky to Be. The Hawaii native has found support in her adopted hometown of Nashville through the likes of Jamey Johnson, who appears on the new album, and through performances at CMA Music Festival and the Grand Ole Opry. Meola draws from all eras of country music – one of the songs, “Daisies,” is inspired by ERNEST’s “Flower Shop,” while “Tumbleweeds and Chewing Gum” is a duet with Willie Nelson. Lukas Nelson, a longtime family friend, also lends his voice to the charming “Mar Vista.”

Meola earned a national breakthrough on America’s Got Talent in 2022 with her original song, “Daydream,” which was written as a way to show support to her struggling friends as well as to grieve her late mother. While writing the new songs for Lucky to Be, the Maui native learned that you have a one-in-400-trillion chance of being born with your exact genetic makeup.

“That sounds like such a wild statistic, right? You’re like, ‘Where did they come up with that?’ But it really stopped me in my tracks and made me think about life differently, and approach the record so differently,” she says.

BGS caught up with Lily by phone a few days before the release of Lucky to Be.

Let’s start with the song “Lucky to Be.” There’s that opening line, where you’re recalling a moment of seeing the shooting star through an airplane window, which I think was a real-life moment for you. So, what were you thinking about when you wrote that song?

Lily Meola: Honestly, that song has so many different little meanings and moments in it. Yeah, that first line – actually, each line – in the song is a real life-moment. I was actually on my way to Nashville to write. At the time I didn’t live here, but I spent a lot of time here over the last 13 years and it felt like a second home to me. But I had been away for a while and I didn’t have a record out.

I was like, “Okay, am I doing the right thing?” There’s always like a little bit of… I wouldn’t say doubt, but I’m always looking for signs that I’m on the right path. On the flight, I looked out the window. It wasn’t even like I was staring out the window. I just looked for a second, and this shooting star went by. And I knew. I was like, “Okay, this is a good sign. I’m still on the right path.”

That’s got to feel good to know you had a little bit of validation that high up in the air.

Yeah, exactly. I didn’t know if that was even possible. It’s just a wild experience to see it, so that’s the first part of the verse, and the next part of the verse actually ties into the first line as well. I lost my mom in 2020 to cancer and I try to look for the signs and everything to keep communication with her alive, if that makes sense. And so it was like a sign from her. … The next line is [about] this palm tree buried with some of her ashes at a special beach on Maui, and even though she’s gone, how lucky was I to be able to have such an incredible mom for so many years?

The whole song is just kind of looking at the bright side of the wildness of life and the next line is, “how lucky are we to feel chaos and peace and everything in between.” … Whatever it is we’re going through in life, whether it be the good, the bad, the ugly, it’s all just part of this experience and journey of being a human. Regardless of it all, we’re all just lucky to be here in the first place, and I think that we lose sight of that within our everyday hustle and bustle of life. And so it was a good reminder for me. I struggle with depression, and I needed that reminder in that moment, that this is all just a part of the journey.

Where do you get your drive to keep forging ahead? Where does that motivation come from?

That’s a good question. It’s literally just a part of me, I guess. I’ve been playing shows since I was 10 years old and I haven’t really looked back. I just had one foot in front of the other and kept going. I have a lot of things I’m interested in in life, but it’s what feeds my soul, and I’m addicted to it, I guess, in a healthy way! [Laughs] I don’t think I could really do anything else, because of how special it feels, and how natural it feels to me.

What were your gigs like when you were 10 years old?

I got my first gig at 10 and it was before a movie at a film festival. And then I just started getting little gigs here and there. I had a weekly cafe gig in my teens. I had a bar gig on Friday nights. I’m from Maui, which is a small island, and so I just kind of popped around all the different places that you could perform and did little shows. Then I did conventions, like Toyota would come and they’d bring their whole company. Anyway, it just evolved and I just kept doing it. Different events, private events, parties. I’d walk around with my little sound system everywhere. [Laughs]

Not a typical teenage life in Hawaii, playing corporate gigs. That’s a cool story.

Yeah, it is, and I loved every minute of it, and I think that’s what kept me going. I’m truly obsessed with what I do. I love every aspect. I love to write, I love to record. I love to perform. I think maybe the only part I’m not that interested in is the business side. [Laughs] So, you find the right partners for that, but I just love what I do and I can’t imagine a life where I’m not doing it.

How did you connect with Willie Nelson?

It’s a small island, and he lives there, and our families are friends. So they came to my gig, and he sat in and sang “Crazy” with me. After the gig, he handed me a napkin and it had a few songs written on it and he was like, “If you’d like to record any of these, let me know.” I was like, “Oh my gosh, of course.” We ended up recording some stuff, but what we had done that day was corrupted. There was some situation that happened with the sound board that made the files unlistenable and unusable. So we’re not going to be like, “Hey, well, you want to come back and do that again?”

So fast forward a couple years, he was making his duets record, To All the Girls…, and he invited me to come and do a song with him. I flew out to Austin and we recorded “Will You Remember Mine?” It’s a song that he wrote, and one of the songs that was on the napkin, I’m pretty sure. Then he took me out on the road with him to promote that record and it was just incredible. It was the best experience ever, and I’m so grateful to him and his whole family. They’ve all been so lovely to me, and taken me under their wings, and showed me that I could love what I do even more. It’s been a beautiful journey with them. I’m forever grateful.

“Tumbleweeds and Chewing Gum” feels like a really full circle moment on my record, coming back to honoring how grateful I feel for that time. His voice is just so, so sweet on it, and his guitar playing is just one of a kind. And having a perspective on a song like that, from two different people in very different parts of their lives and careers, it makes the song have so much more depth to it, and meaning for me.

He’s the perfect voice for that song, because tumbleweeds and chewing gum are gonna be around forever, and the music of Willie Nelson is gonna be around forever, too.

Yeah, exactly. There’s all these things in life that’ll stick around, but we’re here for just a moment. And we might as well do what we love, because it’s gonna end at one point. The line in it that resonates with me the most is, “You and me will turn to dust and all our shiny things are gonna rust, so love me just because.” It’s so true, and we forget that.

I watched your video for “Never Want This to Change,” and I was thinking, have I ever heard Jamey Johnson sing harmony before? I can’t imagine he does that very much, but he sounded great. What did you like about hearing your voices together?

Oh, Jamey is just… I use this quote for his voice: “It’s as if God has favorites.” There’s something to it where it’s so soulful, but it’s gritty, and also feels like you’re getting a warm hug at the same time. Does that make sense? [Laughs] I love him, and he’s been a friend of mine for many years. I’ve always wanted to do a song with him. We did something years and years ago for a Christmas record he did. This song just felt perfect for his voice, and I’m just so happy that he’s on it.

Some people think you have to suffer for your art. Have you ever bought into that theory, that you have to suffer in order to be a great songwriter?

No, no, I don’t think so, but I do think that without darkness, how can you fully appreciate the light? There’s definitely songwriters out there that haven’t had tragedy, but they’re just poetic and it’s a part of their being. But when I write with someone who shares a similar experience, or has been through something hard in life, the songs are just different. There’s an understanding there, but I will say, when I write with someone who hasn’t, it also brings out a light-hearted side of me, as well.

There’s a line on the album that says, “It’s lucky I’m crazy for you,” and later you’re singing, “you’re lucky enough to find you and I,” and of course the album title is Lucky to Be. So I get the sense that feeling lucky is more than just a line in the song for you, and I wondered what makes you feel so lucky these days.

It’s just an accumulation of everything, all the things I’ve been through. All of those lyrics just naturally ended up in the songs. I just pinch myself daily that I get to live this life and do what I love. Again, that statistic made me really think about life and understand how lucky I really am.

Photo Credit: Jimmy Fisco (lead image); Bailey Roberts (alternate images)

Thomas Csorba is Bringing Tender Country Back

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

Thomas Csorba’s new album, Tender Country, is a tip of the hat to a gentler time in country music, when songs about family life and nostalgia were easier to find on the radio dial.

For this album, his fourth, Csorba (pronounced Chor-ba) drew songwriting inspiration close to home – specifically his wife and two young sons. Raised in Houston, Csorba naturally found an early affinity for Guy Clark, Townes Van Zandt, and Don Williams, all of whom came up in that city’s live music scene. In 2019, Csorba graduated with an English degree from Baylor University in Waco, Texas. It’s no surprise that his literary leanings are evident in his lyrics, while his low-key vocals fit right in with his musical heroes.

“I’m obsessed with Don Williams, and what I love about Don is that it sounds like he’s sitting down on every recording, every vocal delivery,” Csorba says. “The thought and spirit behind this album was like, ‘Let’s make a record like those Don Williams records that I want to listen to when I’m doing laundry.’ I’m not in the business of making ‘exciting music,’ or what the world says is exciting. What’s exciting to me is something disarming and something thoughtful.”

Now based in Dallas, Csorba will hit the road later this summer with fellow Texas artist David Ramirez. In the meantime, calling in from a family vacation in Colorado, Csorba chatted with Good Country about his responsibility to share good music with his kids, the revelation of Tony Rice, and his long-held Grand Ole Opry aspirations.

I like that kind of comfortable, relaxed feeling on this record. What was the vibe in the studio during these sessions?

Thomas Csorba: It’s funny how relaxed and comfortable it was, in contrast with how quickly we worked. Most people would think that when you’re trying to record 10 songs in two days it’d be pretty uptight and stressful, but the goal was really like, “Hey, I got two extra days, let’s go record whatever we can.” Because I felt so comfortable with the guys, because I felt so comfortable in the studio, and because the players are so damn good, I was able to say, “Hey, here’s the next song.” Everybody charts it and I’m like, “All right, you want to try it?” And by the third take, it’s like, “All right, that feels good.”

Obviously, we live in a world of perfect and auto-tune and Melodyne and AI integration into Pro Tools. And, for better, for worse, I can’t understand how and why. I just can’t see myself getting into that. I don’t have the time or energy, so I’d much rather turn and burn with guys in the band, overdub a couple things, and what comes out of it is like, “Oh, this feels nice.”

I was curious about “Homemade Margaritas,” because to me it sounds like the spirit of Guy Clark and “Homegrown Tomatoes.” Was he an influence on you?

Yeah, absolutely. When I was a kid, my mom sang Willie Nelson songs to me. The mother-son dance at my wedding was “Mammas Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys.” She’s a Texas gal and loved Jerry Jeff Walker and Willie and all those guys. She knew about Guy, but my older brother, Will, who’s a phenomenal old-time player, who’s wicked smart and wicked talented – he’s the kind of guy that’s frustrated with me and doesn’t think I’m cool because I have words in my songs. He’s quite the purist, but he was the one who introduced me to Townes Van Zandt’s music when I was 14 or 15 years old. And my parents are rolling their eyes, thinking the older brother’s corrupting Thomas.

I fell in love with Townes and my brother was like, “Great, if you like Townes, you’ve gotta like Guy and Blaze Foley and Rodney Crowell.” Then I went down that deep dive and his response to that, he just kind of walked through with me and said, “If you like all these guys, and if Townes is your favorite and Guy is your favorite, you’ve got to like the people they were obsessed with.” So, Lightnin’ Hopkins and Blind Willie McTell, and this kind of lineage.

I don’t know how relevant this is, but the big through-line there is that everything I love, in some way, comes from the bedrock that is Black American music. Guy certainly embodies that, Townes certainly embodies that. Guy was a big influence, and Texas Cookin’ is one of my favorite records of all time. Especially on “Homemade Margaritas,” I’m like, “Man, let’s do something fun like that.” … Anything I can do as a songwriter to have somebody listen to my record and be like, “Oh, this reminds me of Texas Cookin’,” mission accomplished in my book.

Since Good Country is on the Bluegrass Situation, I do have to ask about “Tony Rice & Beans.”

Hell yeah! I wrote that song with Matt Tedder. He plays guitar for me and he’s a phenomenal thumbpicker. He can play Western swing stuff. He played all over my record, has toured with me, and has been a dear friend for ages now. Matt knows the songbook. If I get booked for a private gig, and I know I’m gonna have to play covers, I bring Matt because he knows every word to every Merle Haggard song, and I can just sit there in a cowboy hat and strum.

He can tell where I am musically and what I want musically and point me in the right direction. All that to say, over the past 10 years, especially, a lot of our heroes from the ‘70s, who made those recordings that I love, have passed away. Jerry Jeff and Merle and obviously Tony Rice. For half of these folks, like in memoriam, it’s like, “I’m going to go listen to Jerry Jeff today,” in honor of Jerry Jeff, and I know exactly what deep cut I want to listen to.

Other people of that era have passed away, and I’ve been like, “Man, I know ‘Church Street Blues,’ but why have I not done the deep dive?” That was Tony Rice for me. When he passed, I did the deep dive, and Matt was there to hold my hand and point me to the right records and tell me what to listen for, because I’m much less musically advanced, as a way to put it. So, he pointed me through those records and I just fell in love. It made me want to start trying to practice guitar again, and get better flat-picking, which I am still a beginner at.

I think it’s because I was so new to the idea of Tony Rice that I was like, “Why is there no song called ‘Tony Rice & Beans’?” So, Matt and I wrote that tune and tried to shoehorn about as many references from the country and American songbook as we could. In Matt’s favorite line, the fact that we fit “The mule and the grasshopper are eating ice cream” from “Stay All Night, Stay a Little Longer,” from Bob Wills and Willie… It’s like, “What the hell does that line mean?” I don’t know, but there it is in my song, too.

Is it fair to say that one of the obligations of fatherhood is introducing your kids to good music?

Oh, totally! Maybe this is hyperbole, but I’ll say it anyway: There’s no better feeling as a father than your kids sitting in the back seat and saying, “Dad, can we listen to ‘Working on a Building’ but the Stanley Brothers’ version?” It’s like, ‘Dude, you’re not even four. Why do I want to cry right now?” Our oldest son turns four in July, and he’s requesting Dolly Parton and Linda Ronstadt and the Trio records, and loves Doc Watson.

Obviously he wants annoying brain rot songs, as well. There’s this song called “Chicken Banana” that he’s obsessed with that’s just terrible. We listen to soundtrack stuff and even in movies, it’s like, “Yeah, let’s watch Robin Hood, and let me tell you about Roger Miller.” It makes it much more enjoyable for me. … I think our kids need to listen to stuff they don’t understand, and I think they need to sit there in adult conversations about music and about art that they may not understand. But they’ll sit there and they’ll absorb it.

I just think my responsibility as a parent is to put the right things in front of them and bring them alongside of where I am creatively, where I am socially, and not draw the line between what Dad listens to and “Dad music,” and what the kids listen to and what “kid music” is. Because it’s unfair to them. It’s unfair to me, too. So, that’s my spiel on kids listening to good music.

I did want to ask about “He Would’ve Loved This.” In country music, there are a lot of songs where Dad is talking about the lessons he’s learned, or saying something with wisdom, but this song has a list of action items that show love. He’s trimming the trees and checking the gravy, and so on. Who were you thinking about when you wrote that song?

I was thinking of my granddad. We called him Papa. He passed away when I was in high school. My oldest son carries his name, which is really sweet. The guy was a chain smoker since he was 12 years old, and worked drywall in Canada after he moved over from Hungary. He’s got this amazing story, and because of his history and his background, his whole spirit was kind of like, “Isn’t this awesome?” Even the little things. And that permeated through all of his life.

You know, he was certainly a crotchety old man at times, but there was a sense of gratitude that was kind of unfathomable, literally. I couldn’t understand it, even if I tried, just because of where he came from. All he wanted was to survive and start a family one day, and there he was watching me grow up and taking me to baseball practice, and trying to correct my attitude on the golf course as a 10-year-old. It’s like, the fact that he was there embodied that gratitude.

So, as my wife and I are watching our boys grow up doing all these menial, seemingly throwaway things, I have to remind myself that if Papa was here, he would be beaming with joy.

You’re not even 30 years old yet, and I know time passes fast, but do you consider yourself to be a nostalgic or sentimental person?

Yeah, I’m a “hoarder lite.” I hang on to things. On this record cycle, I’ll be transparent here, it’s like my big dream – if there’s any record I’ve put out so far, this is the one that would bring me to the Opry. I think it just fits the spirit of the history of the Opry. That’s been a dream for a long time. I’ve wanted to do that, and my manager and I talk about it, literally, every phone call.

The other day, my wife said, “I understand the historical significance, but what’s the deal? Why do you want to do the Opry so bad?” In the same way I talk about these records being handed down to my kids, I was kind of like, “I really want to have done it. I really want my kids to be like, ‘Dad played the Opry!’” Not to look cool, but mostly as a nostalgic thing, to get them to come and stand side stage, whether they understand it or not.

Those moments of nostalgia, in conjunction with the moments of nostalgia around the house, paint a really idealized, probably, but really beautiful picture of what I am up to, what I want to do, and how I want to show my kids I’m going about life.

Photo Credit: Alex Csorba

The Other 22 Hours: Lukas Nelson

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

It is easy to look at a lifetime spent traveling on a tour bus in a famous family and assume someone’s creative path was completely clear. We sit down with GRAMMY-winning singer-songwriter and guitar player Lukas Nelson (A Star Is Born, Promise of the Real, Neil Young) for an incredibly honest conversation about moving past the shadow of his father Willie Nelson’s towering legacy, and detangling his identity from the cliched drug-induced creative culture.

LISTEN: APPLE • SPOTIFY • AMAZON • MP3

On this episode of the Other 22 Hours, we explore the distinct clarity that arrives with sobriety, the physiological realities of keeping your body moving on the road, and how treating musical discipline like Olympic training allowed Lukas to fully claim his own voice. It’s a masterclass in boundary setting, honoring the natural muse, and discovering that a long-term commitment to your health and your relationships is the ultimate engine for creative longevity.

In This Episode:

– Lukas Nelson
– Promise of the Real
– Willie Nelson
– Merle Haggard
– Lady Gaga
– Neil Young
– Paramount Theater
– The Red Clay Strays
– Outlive by Dr. Peter Attia
– Willie’s Remedy
– All Things Must Pass

Go Deeper: 

Watch: View this entire conversation above or on YouTube.
Explore: Find similar conversations in these themed playlists.
Connect: Join the conversation on Instagram.

The Other 22 Hours is hosted by Aaron Shafer-Haiss (producer, mixer, musician) and Michaela Anne (songwriter, artist, creative coach). More about Aaron’s work. More about Michaela Anne’s work.

Produced by Aaron Shafer-Haiss. Original music written, performed and produced by Aaron Shafer-Haiss.

Photo Credit: Matthew Berinato

Ringo Starr and T Bone Burnett in Conversation

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

On a sunny day in late April, I stood outside an ad hoc interview room at the Sunset Marquis in West Hollywood waiting for my turn to speak to Ringo Starr.

Sporadic laughter boomed through the door as the hazy afternoon light danced on the doorknob hanger. Instead of the usual “Do Not Disturb,” this one simply said, “Peace.” The verbiage, apropos for Ringo, served as one part levity and one part beta-blocker as I prepared to speak to a Beatle.

When the door opened, I was surprised and delighted to come face to face with Phil Rosenthal (of Somebody Feed Phil). The unabashed smile on his face foreshadowed the similar joy I would feel taking the same steps through that door just 25 short minutes later.

And yet another revelation unfolded as I walked in the room to find both Mr. Starr and T Bone Burnett, producer of Ringo’s newest album, Long Long Road. The ensuing discussion covered their relationships with genre, synesthesia, and inevitably bobbed and weaved across the rich musical history of these two icons.

Do I get both of you today?

Ringo Starr: Yes!

Excellent!

T Bone Burnett: Only if you want.

RS: Hi. I’m Ringo.

Ha! Yes. The man of the hour. How are you?

RS: Good. Excellent.

Thank you so much for having me.

RS: Oh, it’s our pleasure.

TB: Her dad is a great songwriter, a great guitar player from Muscle Shoals.

RS: We were just talking to someone else about that today.

Really? You were talking about Muscle Shoals today?

RS: Well, we didn’t actually mention it, but we were talking about the music that, for me, started with Johnny Ray and people like that. I was a teenager, and then it went up to country music, and then I got into blues music, and then I got into pop of the day music.

I love country music. And he’s the country boy [as he points to T Bone Burnett].

That’s a fantastic segue to my first question. So as we mentioned, I grew up in Muscle Shoals, and I had this record player that was a little battery-operated blue Volkswagen bus. Do you remember these?

TB: Yeah, I do!

It would ride around the record, and it had a little speaker in it, and I would lay on the ground, and I’d listen to Abbey Road. But it was also around the same time that the video for “Act Naturally,” the duet with Buck Owens, came out. So, for me, you were very genre-fluid from a very early age. I’m curious about a couple of things genre-wise, and T Bone, please jump in on this too.

TB: Okay, I’ll jump in, and I’ll say that the Beatles probably invented what became known as “country rock.” You know, with “I Don’t Want to Spoil the Party.”

RS: And what were the two that were Carl Perkins?

TB: “Honey Don’t” and “Matchbox.”

RS: “Honey Don’t” was the best line I ever heard.

TB: Yeah, it is a killer title.

RS: “Matchbox” was a blues song, really.

TB: Well, “Matchbox” was an old Blind Lemon Jefferson song.

RS: Yes. The interesting thing is I did those in the ’60s, and we just found a Carl Perkins tune that we’d never heard, and we’ve done it on this record. “I Don’t See Me in Your Eyes Anymore.”

I love it.

RS: It is so beautiful and he was just a cool guy. You know, I was a teenager when I first heard him, and it was like, “Oh yeah!”

T Bone: Yeah, he was cool. He, [Carl], had heard “Matchbox” or his dad had heard it by Blind Lemon Jefferson, but they could only remember a few words of it, so he rewrote it as a rockabilly song.

So you knew of country music when you were growing up, you were aware of it.

RS: I did. I was aware of country music. I loved it because it was emotional, and I was a teenager. That’s what we are at that age.

[Ringo singing:] “ Well the wife is dead and I’m leaving home. I got no money for the jukebox.”

Perfect for teenagers.

When I say the words “country music” to you now, what do you think of? Who or what or how do you think of it?

RS: I still think a lot about the people from yesterday, who I came in with. You’ve got to say Willie. I mean, he’s magical and still out there. Thank you, Willie. And who used to open for Willie?

TB: Waylon?

RS: Waylon! He was great. I have to think back.

TB: Well Hank Williams…

RS: Well, no, Hank was where we came in. And Hank Snow. No one mentions him. He was Canadian. Patsy Cline. There’s too many really.

I was talking to someone the other week and they asked, “What is your all-time favorite record?” I couldn’t answer. There is too much that I love. “Who’s your favorite artist?” I start with Ray Charles. And Stevie, and down that line. But I can’t answer it. We were on TV, and I stopped it. I said, “I just can’t answer.” There are too many in my life to say, “That’s the one.”

Plead the 5th.

Do you ever feel constrained by genre? Or inspired by it? What is your relationship with the idea of it?

RS: I’m a pop-rock music drummer. I’ll play whatever you’re gonna give me. If you want it heavy, I’ll hit the cymbals. Heavy metal has some great acts going down. We would jam sometimes and be that.

TB: Oh, well, I mean, the Beatles invented heavy metal, really.

RS: Yeah. It’s just playing the same shit, but heavier.

TB: “Everybody’s Got Something to Hide Except Me and My Monkey” or “Helter Skelter.”

RS: “Helter Skelter” was a jam. We had no song, nothing, we were just jamming, and then Paul came in with, “Hey! Helter Skelter.” Like “Say It’s Your Birthday,” there was someone in the newspaper who we knew, and it was their birthday, and we were jamming. Paul stepped up again, and we got another song. We were like that. You could jump in, any one of us could jump in. I’ve got odd lines we aren’t gonna talk about on certain tracks.

[A publicist chimes in to say:] “T Bone you have five more minutes before you have to leave and then you’ll go and he’ll stay in.”

RS: And then I’ll go and then you’ll stay in. [Laughter]

Well, let’s go back to the Volkswagen.

RS: Let’s get back to it.

Because I have a little bit of synesthesia, I think.

TB: I have that, too.

RS: What have you got?

TB: I see colors when I hear music.

RS: Oh, great!

So, “Octopus’s Garden” was very purple for me. “Act Naturally” is very orangey gold. I’m curious if you’ve ever experienced anything like that. And if it’s not colors, if there are certain textures that you’re looking for in a song, when you’re casting songs for an album? And T Bone, this question’s for you too, since you have it.

RS: T Bone will give me a lot of songs, and I listen to them and I picked my six at the beginning. There were only three I didn’t use. That’s how we started this. In the end, we were talking in my little studio and I said to him, “How many songs have you got?” And he had nine. It gave me the courage to ask him if he would produce the record. All the songs were not on my mind; we were just hanging out like two guys. But it turned into a fellowship.

TB: Well, I can tell you that the Beatles stuff that first came out was very dark blue, all of it. “Don’t Bother Me” especially was the most dark blue of them. It was interesting that the album cover that first came out over here [in the U.S.] was dark blue. So it all sort of coalesced, I think.

That was one of those blessed moments that happen occasionally on earth, you know? Where everybody heard the same thing at the same time.

Absolutely.

RS: I never saw colors. I mean, I did see colors some days… You know what I mean?

[All laugh]

RS: When I listened, it’s how I felt. A sad song, a happy song, a rock song– some of it will move you, and some of it moved me.

TB: Well, I’d better go. But thank you, great to see you again.

Yeah, you too. Nice to see you again.

[As T Bone got up to leave, his wife entered the room and chatter ensued, but he added before walking out the door:]

TB: By the way, “I Want to Hold Your Hand” was very dark blue.

Well, you know, what’s funny is, I had a synesthesia question for Ringo about you, because I didn’t know you were going to be here. But I was going to say that your musical color and texture is exactly like what you are wearing, to me.

TB: Oh, is that right? That’s wild. Thank you! Nice to see you all.

RS: God Bless, peace and love!

Tell me about what it is like for you working in Nashville? Tell me what it feels like working with those players.

RS: I did have experience in the early ’70s when Pete Drake invited me to come, because we were working on a George Harrison record. You know, we keep talking about the steps we take, the moves we make. And I was there with George, and I’m playing for him and he’d called Pete – I didn’t know Pete. Pete had landed at Heathrow, and the car George was sending broke down, so we sent my car. And then he arrived. “Hey, hoss, I see you like country music.”

“Yeah, yeah, I do. How do you know?”

He said, “All those cassettes in your car.”

And then a few days later, he’s saying, “You should come to Nashville.” And I thought, “I’m not going to Nashville. I’m doing stuff here. I don’t have a month or six weeks to go to Nashville.” He said, “A month? Six weeks? Nashville Skyline took two days.” And I said, “I’m coming.” And I went, and we did the same thing.

On the first day, five songs were picked in the morning. Between us, we listened to them all. Five songs were recorded, and five songs were finished. And the next day, we picked five songs. Anyway, it went on the same way, and it was finished. And it took two days, so that was great.

Well, Ringo, you have one of the finest reputations in the music business.

RS: As a drummer or else?

EM: As a drummer, as a human.

RS: Or as a tall person?

The tallest around.

Just for being so kind to people and emanating peace and love, obviously. And you’ve been such a beacon of that for so many decades. Especially in the last couple of weeks I’ve been thinking a lot about that, after finding out that I was going to talk to you. I was curious, I’m sure it’s mostly innate, but do you ever feel like it’s a responsibility – in terms of how you are in the public, in terms of what songs you’re picking? I’m particularly thinking of “Choose Love.”

RS: I just do my best, you know, to pick the songs that give you some movement, and you say, “Oh, I’d like to sing that.” That’s what I’m with these two country songs with T Bone. I mean, I don’t really do it in a political way, that it says this or that. It’s usually peace and love. If I write it, it’s always peace and love – I don’t know what the question was.

Just wondering if it ever feels like a responsibility to you.

RS: You know, I’ve had many a good year, but some years I’ve made really bummer mistakes. It’s like that’s when your brain wins. I mean, even on this record, I’ve got the lines about “let the stuff come in, but let it go.” And I’ve been pretty good at that for a long time. Not that it’s every second of my life. Sometimes it gets in. And it stays in your thoughts. Then you’re in hell. I’m blessed that that doesn’t happen half as much anymore. I can just dump the thought that comes in and deal with whatever it is.

I was going to ask you about that line in particular, because I think it does this beautiful job of talking about a meditative quality of finding peace without being preachy or telling people “how to” and I really love that.

RS: I meditated this morning. I meditate every morning, this time since ‘92. You know, we went to the Maharishi in India with the boys. And I was worried, you know, “Am I doing it properly?” I was talking to him [Maharishi] and he says, “Ringo, even if you fall asleep, you must have been tired.”

And it taught me a great lesson. I was into like, madness and stuff, you know, “It must be this. It must be me. What’s the problem?” And now I get quite calm.

That’s wonderful. Yeah. It comes across on this album. You’re talking about your own experience and that’s–

RS: What else can I talk about? I can’t talk about yours, you know? But thank you.

Tell me about the band that played on this record.

RS: T Bone’s whole band is great. The rest of Nashville is so great. They all came out to help me. To be there. It is in my heart.

Last January, when I was there and back three times. And every time when I’ve played at the Ryman… I’ve been playing there for the last 15 years with the All Stars, but when I go on that stage, I feel all the guys and all the gals who stood on that stage.

And then what happens? The Grand Ole Opry invited me to do three songs. And I go on that stage that has the Ryman circle that the singers stand on. It is magical. For me, coming from England, it was really magical to get on that stage. And the people are great. It is built for music coming out and hitting everybody, because it was a gospel church. I’m still moved. I get on the stage, and I have to go through a minute of, “Wow, wow!”

Photo Credit: Dan Winters

Drayton Farley Asks the Big Questions

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

You’ve got to have some durability to name your album A Heavy Duty Heart. For Drayton Farley, paying a decade’s worth of dues is an important part of the story.

After a slow but steady build of recording albums and relentless touring, Farley picked up four significant synch placements in 2025, with songs “Blue Collar,” “Touch and Go,” and “It’s Called Doubt” heard in the Paramount+ series Landman, and “Turn Around” appearing in the CBS show Sheriff Country. That remarkable achievement seemed like a perfect way to set up A Heavy Duty Heart, which was recorded with his touring band and produced by Sadler Vaden.

“What I found is, usually the biggest enemy is me when it comes to how I’m feeling about how it’s going,” Farley says. “When things like that happen, it pulls you again out of your head and reminds you, ‘No, everything’s going great, actually. You’re doing really well, and you should just keep doing it and get out of your head a little bit.’”

In an interview with Good Country, the Birmingham, Alabama-based singer-songwriter retraces his trajectory to becoming one of roots music’s most promising performers. He explains why he considers Robert Earl Keen a role model and shares the song that still makes his wife cry.

The opening song, “Love We Mean,” captures that moment in a relationship where you have a rare moment to reflect. What was on your mind as that song was taking shape?

Drayton Farley: Yeah, it was pretty much that. I wanted to write a song about that moment where the kids are gone and you’re not on the road and there’s not a lot going on. All of a sudden, you’re both just at the house and there’s nothing to do or worry about. [Laughs] And you’ve both been going a hundred miles an hour, sometimes in the same direction, sometimes in the other direction, but all of a sudden, everything just kind of stops and gets quiet. Then you’re both looking at each other like, “What the hell just happened?” And you start kind of taking stock and checking in.

I sensed a theme throughout this album of assessing where you are in life and asking those big questions. Then I looked you up and saw that you’re just 30 years old. Have you always been the kind of guy who’s willing to look inward and analyze the world around you?

Yeah, I think so. I don’t know why. I think that feels easier to do. I celebrate my 10th wedding anniversary in May. You know, I’m only 30, but I guess I’ve worked enough of the real jobs and been married long enough with two daughters now, these kinds of things feel required to do.

What were the day jobs you had before you could finally dedicate yourself to music?

Out of high school, I spent about three and a half years working on the railroad [as a subcontractor for Norfolk Southern doing derailment cleanups]. I got married while I was working there, then quit that job, and I got a job working for Mercedes-Benz. I worked on the assembly line building cars for the next four years. During that last year is when I started releasing music. I spent the last two years there, kind of gigging after work every day that I could, just trying to build whatever local presence I could and release as much music as I could and build a catalog. And this is just me and a guitar with a few microphones. Just lo-fi. It’s really demo tapes. They’re live recordings really, just in the house.

Then I left that job so that I could gig more. I got a job working for Safelite, doing auto glass for about two months. Then I booked myself opening a few tours and I booked a little headline run for myself. I told my boss, “Man, I gotta do music. I thought I could just open my schedule a little more and that would make me happier. But it’s pretty obvious now that music is what I have to do.” In the next month or two, I met my agent at CAA, met my manager, and hit it off with David Macias at Thirty Tigers. All the dominoes started falling immediately. Within three months of quitting that last job, I was already booked to open two shows for Willie Nelson. So it all happened fast, and it’s like reassurance that I’d made the right choice.

I’m going to quote a lyric back to you, which is “Somewhere deep inside I knew/ And I know you knew it, too/ Couldn’t be more proud to see we saw each other through.” That’s got to be the best feeling to know it actually happened for you. You held onto the dream. How did you stay motivated when things weren’t exactly going fast for you?

I think, especially for those times, the struggle was the motivation. It came pretty naturally. That song specifically, “Dream Come True,” that is mine and my wife’s story. I spent those years working the jobs – and even on the railroad I brought my guitar with me to write songs in the hotel rooms. I played open mics after work. We traveled for work on that job. So, those days, all the way leading up to, I guess around ‘22, that was it.

It was always just like, “How do you even make a career in music?” You know, “I’ve never been to Nashville. I don’t know anybody in Nashville. I really don’t know anyone in the Birmingham music scene. I don’t even know where to start or what to do, other than use social media to try to get my stuff out there.” And then fast forward to Mercedes. I was gigging after work for a few years, like Thursday, Friday, Saturday, as many shows as I can play, and I’m releasing EPs that I’ve self-recorded. The dream was always to do music and just find a way to be able to support us with music, instead of these other jobs that aren’t what I’m supposed to do.

We were trying to have kids and start a family and we ended up losing the first pregnancy. We kept trying after that, we had a second pregnancy, and we lost that one. So there for a while, it just felt like music wasn’t going to happen. How do you get that to kick off? And we’ve lost two pregnancies, so who knows if we can even have kids? That was our shared dream. That is what the whole song is about. We have two daughters now and this is what I do. When my wife hears that song now, she cries.

Being married myself, I appreciate these songs about the depth of that relationship, just leaning on each other and trusting each other.

I just needed something in my catalog that would reflect those parts of my life, because I’ve written so much about other things. Just looking back through all the songs, I was like, I have a severe lack of love songs going on, you know? Why not write an entire album of it?

I also picked up on the Robert Earl Keen reference in “Feel Like Getting High.” What do you enjoy about the music that he’s made over the years?

It spans a lot of different moods and I want to be more that way. So far, a lot of my projects and albums and catalog have had a similar atmosphere around it all. What he’s talking about, and what he sings about and writes about, is a pretty broad spectrum. As a writer, I want to get more in that direction where I’m not gridlocking myself to a certain topic or a certain mood. I would say that’s inspiring from him.

Why did the album title, A Heavy Duty Heart, seem to fit?

That was the hardest part of this whole thing, just naming it. It had me stuck for a while, trying to figure out the name. I don’t know where that came from. It was just a thought and I kind of liked the way it rolled off the tongue. Looking through the songs, almost all of these songs say the word “heart,” and it’s talking about the inward, deeper, zoomed-in struggles and details of my life, being a touring musician and having children and a wife, and our journey to get there. So, it felt like it would take a pretty strong heart and will to keep going through all that and keep your eye on the prize. I thought that title reflected the overall idea of the album.

I really like “Turn Around” right there at the end of the record. What was going on in your life when you were when you wrote that song?

That was a similar thing to what I was talking about earlier, where it was kind of throwing yourself a pity party and losing perspective. “Why is this going on?” “Why are these tickets not selling more?” “Why is this artist doing more than I’m doing? Two years ago, we were at the same place.” It’s just a game of comparison on social media and that can really begin to affect you, just wondering if you’re stalling, or if you’re doing well or not.

But the truth is, that’s just your mind going to those places because you haven’t kept your own perspective on everything. Like, me five years ago wouldn’t believe anything that me right now would have to tell them about all the things I’ve done and accomplished. That’s the real perspective. And when you lose it, you get too far in your head, for no good reason. And then stopping and turning around, kind of taking stock of where you’re at, and what all you have, and measuring yourself again.

Photo Credit: Leah Dockery

12 Fantastic Merle Haggard Covers

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

April 6 would have been Merle Haggard’s 89th birthday – and was also the tenth anniversary of his death. So, before these anniversaries get too far in the rearview mirror, I wanted to take a moment to remember one of country music’s all-time legends – and one of the great singer-songwriters in all American popular music.

One lesson of Haggard’s career is that you best honor your musical heroes, not only by playing their records at home or talking up their influence in interviews, but by continuing to perform their songs – on stage and in the studio. Merle released tribute albums to Jimmie Rodgers, Bob Wills, and Elvis Presley, and across his catalog cut at least an album’s worth of Lefty Frizzell songs.

Since his death, it’s been nice to see how often Merle’s musical contemporaries and descendants have taken Haggard’s model to heart, recording his songs and even releasing entire Merle Haggard tribute albums.

In recognition of his ongoing legacy, I’ve chosen 12 of my favorite cover versions of songs by Merle Haggard. I shared a kind of companion piece to this list last week, at No Fences Review, pulling choices from the 20th century only. Now, for Good Country, I’m focusing my dozen picks on Hag covers from this century.

I could assemble similarly strong lists every week for months without running out of possibilities. But these dozen Hag covers are among the very favorites.

“You Don’t Have Far to Go” – Candi Staton (from His Hands, 2006)

Co-written with trucker-song specialist Red Simpson, “You Don’t Have Very Far to Go” was the earliest of Merle’s songs to have legs. Recorded more than a couple dozen times through the years (including three versions from Hag himself), it’s proven a special favorite of first-name-basis country women. Bonnie and Connie, Rosanne and Lucinda, and others all seem to sing the song directly to some toxic asshole: “If I’m not crying, you’re not satisfied.”

My favorite reading of the song in that way is by Candi Staton. She became renowned for her disco and gospel recordings, but when first establishing herself as an R&B star circa 1970, it was with striking country soul takes on hits by Tammy Wynette and Patsy Cline. Decades later, she deploys Merle’s old song to deliver a master class in soulful, thought-by-thought phrasing. Staton sounds fragile and beaten down yet, by the end, her tone hints she may finally have had enough.

“Hungry Eyes” – Leona Williams (from Leona Williams Sings Merle Haggard, 2008)

Leona Williams may be best known as Haggard’s third wife, but she’s a tremendous artist in her own right, a country music lifer who played bass behind Loretta Lynn in the 1960s, enjoyed a solo career worth tracking down, and wrote or co-wrote chart toppers “You Take Me for Granted” and “Someday When Things Are Good” for Merle in the early ‘80s.

Leona’s version of “Hungry Eyes,” from her superb 2008 Haggard tribute, always stops me in my tracks. In the verses, she sounds haunted by her parents’ long-ago struggles. At each chorus, she gulps and springs to the top of her range, once again meeting her mother’s dissatisfied gaze. “She only wanted things she really needed!”

“The Running Kind” – Marty Stuart & His Fabulous Superlatives (from The Marty Stuart Show, c. 2009 or 2010)

“The Running Kind” is both one of country music’s great declarations of independence and, for Haggard, a great self-own: Merle boasts that he’s always on the run from one thing or the other even though, “I know running’s not the answer” to anything. The sentiment can serve as a kind of thesis statement for the Hag’s own restless life and career, so it’s ironic that my favorite version of the song isn’t Merle’s but this live cut from Marty Stuart. From an episode of the singer’s television series, Stuart and his Superlatives rage noisily and headlong, while staying absolutely controlled, through Merle’s tune. The solos from Kenny Vaughan and Stuart are my idea of Telecaster heaven.

“Ramblin’ Fever” – Tanya Tucker (from My Turn, 2009)

My pick for the best-ever “Ramblin’ Fever” is this version by Tanya Tucker. Riding an outlaw thump spiked by country disco high-hat, Tucker honors a musical hero, a former paramour, and a kindred rambling spirit. To that end, she loves it when some good-lookin’ fella rubs her back, but what really turns her on comes in the a.m. when she can drink a cup of coffee before leaving. The series of guitar solos that play out the final 1:20 here sound like she’s already out the door.

“How Did You Find Me Here?” – k.d. lang (from Sweet Relief III: Pennies from Heaven, 2013)

“How Did You Find Me Here?” was among Merle’s finest new songs of this century. From 2010’s I Am What I Am, Merle sings the number like a grim but grateful gospel ballad – his savior has come for him in his grave. “Thank you, Lord,” he prays at the close.

k.d. lang’s spare, ethereal reading feels less straightforwardly religious but, if anything, more spiritual. She’s desperately alone, at her nadir, but now someone – a lover or friend, her sponsor or her community – has seen her for who she is, taken her in. Lang’s contralto sounds bleary-eyed and dumbfounded, but she gains strength as she goes, ready to move on up.

“I Think I’ll Just Stay Here and Drink” – Suzy Bogguss (from Lucky, 2014)

Back in 1989, one of Suzy Bogguss’ earliest charting singles was a cover of “Somewhere Between,” still my favorite version of that great Haggard ballad. So my expectations were unreasonably high for Lucky, a full-length Merle Haggard tribute that she released in 2014. But the album’s a gem straight through, and I especially recommend her take on “I Think I’ll Just Stay Here and Drink.”

Most versions of Merle’s boozy romantic complaint have been done by rowdy dudes who sound like they’re slamming shots while ordering their fourth pitcher ahead of passing out. Bogguss, by contrast, comes off country-jazz cool, sipping a good bourbon and commiserating with herself in some dark corner. Don’t wait up. She’s going to be here awhile.

“Shelly’s Winter Love” – Lonesome River Band (from Turn on a Dime, 2014)

Merle’s most haunting song is about depression: Shelly’s depression each winter, the narrator’s the rest of the year round when the sunshine’s lured her back to town. This Lonesome River Band rendition from 2014 is the most haunting I know. Brandon Rickman sings beautifully but frighteningly too, and LRB’s pacing, like seasonal affective disorder set to a melody, reflects the long, slow days of a long dark winter. Midway through, Sammy Shelor’s banjo plunks a drip, drip, drip, that quickly gathers to a stream. A thaw’s coming; spring is on the way. It won’t be long now…

“A Working Man Can’t Get Nowhere Today” – Rob Ickes & Trey Hensley (from Before the Sun Goes Down, 2015)

This was a savvy cover choice by Rob Ickes, 15-time winner of the IBMA’s Resophonic Guitar Player of the Year award, and Trey Hensley, the association’s pick for Guitar Player of the Year in 2023. For one thing, the song is an underappreciated gem of the Haggard songbook, recorded maybe not even half a dozen times since Merle had a hit with it in 1977. More importantly, this Hag number lets Ickes and Hensley trade elegantly exhausted solos while tapping into a perpetually frustrating and common condition: Working your ass off every day to to put food on the table yet still coming up short. Hensley moans, “I’ll still be deep in debt the day that I fall dead.”

“Some of Us Fly” – Bonnie “Prince” Billy (from Best Troubador, 2017)

Merle’s “Some of Us Fly” served as the concluding track to his underrated release Chicago Wind, from 2005, and featured a guest vocal from Toby Keith. Because both men had already experienced such heights in their career, the message of each chorus – “Some of us fly but all of us fall” – comes off a little like superstars performing their humility. But where Haggard and Keith share hard-won wisdom, Bonnie “Prince” Billy casts a spell. With his duet partner, Irish singer/flutist Nuala Kennedy, he surrenders to a mystery.

On the remarkable 2017 Haggard tribute album, Best Troubador, Billy (AKA indie songster Will Oldham) and Kennedy whisper their way through Merle’s song in cautious harmony, their hands clutched tightly. The whole performance feels so fragile a strong wind might blow it way.

“Today I Started Loving You Again” – Eli “Paperboy” Reed (from Down Every Road, 2022)

Eli Reed specializes in making over all manner of roots-adjacent material into cool, committed soul music. Down Every Road does that for the Haggard songbook with thrilling results straight through. (A duet between Eli and Sabine McCalla on Merle’s most covered song, “Today I Started Loving You Again,” was inspired by a famous, but officially unreleased, 1969 version by Buck Owens and soul singer Bettye Swann.)

I especially appreciate Reed’s take on Merle’s celebratory kiss-off “I’m Bringing Home Good News,” which he relocates from Merle’s dusty, country-rocking San Joaquin all the way down to Louisiana for some funky Tony Joe White-styled swamp.

“Workin’ Man Blues” – Willie Nelson (from Workin’ Man: Willie Sings Merle, 2025)

One of Hag’s signature hits, “Workin’ Man Blues,” is usually framed as a purely blue-collar anthem, but it’s good to remember he identified the song as a blues. Having to work to survive while hoping your body holds out as long as you’ll need it is something to be cursed more than celebrated.

From last year’s Workin’ Man: Willie Sings Merle, a 92-year-old Nelson delivers his friend’s lines with a bit of a slur, weary and resigned but also grateful still to be working, to be on the road again until he runs out of road. Similarly, Willie’s arrangement sheds Merle’s Elvis-y fanfare for some hard, use-it-or-lose-it swing. “Play it, little sister,” he says, introducing one of the hot-jazziest solos in the career of the late Family band pianist Bobbie Nelson. Willie’s solos up top and midway through, meanwhile, are things of singular beauty, guitar work that sounds like play but refuses to hide the callouses and the miles. “As long as my two hands are fit to use…”

“Daddy Tried” – Jade Jackson (single, 2026)

Merle’s “Mama Tried” has been covered well over 100 times since he wrote it for the Killers Three soundtrack in 1968. But the song’s indelible ascending chorus and its universal theme – Merle sings it as if he’s as proud of defying his mom as he is remorseful for disappointing her – have encouraged people to use the song in all kinds of ways. Country comic Don Bowman parodied it as “Pappa Tried” as early as 1969 and more recently Angeleena Presley was clearly in conversation with Merle’s classic when she released “Mama I Tried” in 2017. As was Keith Urban when he sampled its lick for “Coming Home” in 2023.

Jade Jackson grew up in a small Cali town between Bakersfield and the Pacific, and her updated, gender-flipped take on Merle’s tale sounds just like that: Her voice feels a little dusty and a little sunny. Switching out Merle’s locale from “prison” to “Nashville” is funny because those two aren’t at all alike, but also because maybe they’re a little alike. For sure the ache in her voice reveals her as another singer-songwriter in a long line of kindred spirits to Merle; she’s going to go her own way, no matter her dad’s good advice.

David Cantwell is the author of The Running Kind: Listening to Merle Haggard, the co-author of Heartaches by the Number: Country Music’s 500 Greatest Singles and the co-creator of No Fences Review. His byline has appeared at Rolling Stone Country, The New Yorker, Slate, and No Depression, among other publications.

Photo Credit: Workin’ Man: Willie Sings Merle on Legacy Recordings

Welcome to Meels’ Critter Country

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

There are plenty of country subgenres out there, but quickly rising up-and-comer Meels has carved out a unique new niche. The California-born singer-songwriter calls her sound “critter country,” a fitting term for her playful but grounded brand of country-leaning roots music, which takes cues from folk of the ‘60s and ‘70s, traditional bluegrass, and classic country a la Loretta Lynn or Willie Nelson.

On her recently released new project, Across the Raccoon Strait, Meels takes listeners on a colorful, far-reaching tour of critter country and in the process announces herself as a fresh, genuinely exciting new voice in the broader roots music ecosystem.

Folks are taking notice – Meels is one of the first handful of artists signed to the newly rebirthed Lost Highway Records, with a legacy of artists like Lucinda Williams, Lyle Lovett, and Johnny Cash, as well as another left-of-center singer-songwriter, Kacey Musgraves, who was announced as the first official signee when the label relaunched last year. Meels has shared stages with artists like Molly Tuttle and Old Crow Medicine Show, and will appear with Margo Price, Carter Faith, and Nitty Gritty Dirt Band this spring.

Below, BGS catches up with Meels about songwriting, “critter country” and signing to Lost Highway.

In the lead-up to releasing Across the Raccoon Strait you shared that this batch of music feels truest, holistically, to who you are as an artist. Can you elaborate on that? What do you think enabled you to express yourself so fully?

Meels: As a writer and a producer and a songwriter and a singer, I really trust my gut and just follow the wave. With these songs, it was just me doing that. A few summers ago, before I made the project, I dove deep into the country classics – like Loretta Lynn and Marty Robbins and Dolly Parton. I got super inspired, the floodgates opened, and I just started writing like crazy. I grew up on a lot of ‘60s and ‘70s folk and my uncle is actually a bluegrass musician. He gigged around town where he lives in upstate New York. So I was already introduced to that world, but I took a deep dive and felt really inspired. The project just kind of poured out of me.

Would it be fair to say you found some unexpected connection points or overlap in those genres – the bluegrass and folk you grew up with, then the classic country you dove into?

Oh, totally. I also was trying out my own take on all of these genres and, again, trusting my gut with production and with the songwriting, to find a space within the genres that felt right for me as an artist.

You describe your music as “critter country,” which I just love. And that seems to encompass more than just your sound, as you’ve developed this really strong visual aesthetic in your videos and artwork, too. How did the concept “critter country” first come to you?

That came naturally, too. I grew up surrounded by a ton of critters in the woods in Northern California and found myself using animals as metaphors for my life. I went to NYU for music, and I took a branding class. I remember all of my peers were coming up with all these cool names for their genre. The teacher was like, “Oh, come up with a name specific to your genre and who you are as an artist.” I was still figuring out who I was as an artist in college and when I was looking through my lyrics and finding all of these “critter” similarities, I was like, “You know what? Critter country, that has such a nice ring to it.”

Take me back to the early days of making Across the Raccoon Strait. Was there a moment or idea that kicked off the creative process for you?

I think it was probably “Out West.” That track, in itself, encompasses the whole idea of the EP. I wrote it in New York when I was still living there and I’d just decided that I was moving back to California, back to my roots. I was just so excited about the idea of moving back out to the West Coast that the song came ripping out of me in my New York apartment. So that was a catalyst for me. I wrote most of these songs – that are about California and about home, actually – in New York when I was in a state of longing for home.

Did having that physical distance from your California home, and maybe the benefit of hindsight, help you write those songs?

I think so. My whole life, I have felt the most creative when I’m in California. New York is very overstimulating and there’s a lot going on all the time. I feel like, when I was living there, I was very much just absorbing everything that I could, but I wasn’t really writing so much until I was like, “Yeah, I’m gonna move back.” Then all of the sudden, I just started writing like crazy.

Something that stands out in your songwriting is how freely you use humor in your lyrics. You tackle some tough subjects, but never shy away from playfulness and to me it makes the stories feel more realistic, because in real life our experiences are often mixed bags. Are you consciously trying to inject some lightheartedness into your writing or does it just happen that way for you?

I don’t know. I do find myself making little jokes in my songs all the time. For example, in “The Wizard” I’m writing about a heavier topic: my struggles with OCD for my whole life. But I’m writing about it in a way that I’m not trying to hide anything. I’m just trying to put it in a way that’s maybe a little more digestible, and a little silly and a little funny, to help myself work through it a little more. And maybe to make it more digestible for my audience, too. Maybe I use humor as a way to cope.

“The Wizard” really does nail that balance of sharing something difficult and vulnerable while giving a little wink and nod to the listener.

I love a wink and a nod.

Speaking of that song, when you do get into vulnerable territory in your writing, do you ever feel fear or hesitation? And if you do, how do you engage with those voices?

To be honest, I feel like when I’m songwriting I’m at my most fearless. Since I was young, it’s been my way to put it all out on the table and not be afraid. I think me writing in these little critter metaphors, or using humor – maybe that’s my fear talking, I don’t know – but when I’m writing I just want to lay it all out on the table. It’s my one true release, so I try to do it without fear.

It sounds like you had a fantastic group of collaborators working with you in the studio. What was your time together like?

It was so wonderful. We recorded at a studio in Oakland called Tiny Telephone [owned by John Vanderslice]. They actually had old telephones that worked all over the studio. And they had everything you could want and more to play with and to get creative with. The space itself was incredible. We had an incredible engineer named Danielle, and she was also so important in the creative process, you know, running the vocal through this weird flanger and making moves that were so creative and so unique and so cool.

I also co-produced it with Peter [Groenwald] and Mark [Campbell], who made my first record with me, so that felt really comfortable and really safe. I knew nothing was off the table. I could bring up any idea, no matter how stupid I thought it was, and we would try it. Sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn’t. But we had such a good, natural flow in the studio. I brought a lot of friends, too, to play in the band, which was just really great.

You can hear the looseness and camaraderie in the music, in a way that I’d assume can’t be replicated without having close relationships with the players.

I’d always wanted to track a whole record live to tape. And we did that with Across the Raccoon Strait. We didn’t use any click [tracks]. It was just like, “Let’s get this next one tight, guys, let’s go.” We were all having a lot of fun with it.

When I’m in the studio, making music is such a collaborative thing. Even if it’s my song, every musician that I bring in is going to bring something unique. I really love to let them loose and let them rip. We can pull back where we want, but everybody in there plays an instrumental – no pun intended – role in making the music great.

This is also the first project you’ve done as one of the initial signees to the newly relaunched Lost Highway Records. How did you get hooked up with them and what does it mean to you to work with such an historic and impactful label?

This record has opened a lot of doors for me. I made it a little over a year ago and I was like, “I’m gonna quit my day job.” I was living with my grandma in Pasadena. She’s 86 and she’s so cool. “Marsha June” was actually written about her. So, I was basically like, “I’m just gonna give this thing a go.”

I sent this record around to literally anybody that would listen to it. I would send it to venues, because I’d just moved to LA. I was like, “Hey, I haven’t played a lot of LA gigs. Here’s my new record. You want to book me?” I was just kind of fearless about that, too. Some artists are so precious with the new stuff and don’t want to send it around. But I was sending these songs around before they were even mastered.

Eventually, I started working with a manager, I started working with an agent, and then I got a lawyer and did the whole thing. I talked to a lot of great labels, but when I met with Lost Highway I knew that it was the right direction. I’m so, so happy that I’m working with them. It really does feel like a family. It’s such a close-knit team and everybody really cares. … So many of my favorite artists have put music out through Lost Highway. Its legacy just runs so deep. I’m the hugest Johnny Cash fan in the world – and a Willie Nelson fan, and Lucinda Williams. It’s kind of absurd to me that my name could be looped in with all of those other names.

Photo Credit: Jim Hughes

Stephen Wilson Jr.’s Dreams Have Been Outdreamed

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

Stephen Wilson Jr. knows he doesn’t fit the mold of your typical mainstream country artist. But honestly, who needs that?

A 46-year-old former microbiologist and Golden Gloves boxer, the Southern Indiana native stands out with probing lyrics and an experimental sound to match. Grunge and jazz combine with country inside a drop-tuned gut-string guitar, powering the 2023 album søn of dad to critical acclaim and a slow build of career momentum. But Wilson has now reached exit velocity.

After a viral, six-minute solo performance of Ben E. King’s classic “Stand By Me” at the 59th Annual CMA Awards – so stark and surging it stunned Nashville’s Bridgestone Arena into complete silence – Wilson has followed up with the equally enigmatic single, “Gary.” Like his album debut (which was a tribute to his multi-faceted father), “Gary” takes an almost scientific approach to detailing the mythical class of people who don’t do fancy, but do get things done.

“When life gets very real, like your plumbing or your electricity goes out for two weeks like we experienced [in Nashville’s January ice storm], you need a Gary,” Wilson explains.

“Gary” is now climbing up the country radio charts and it will eventually become part of Wilson’s next album, currently in the works. But we wanted to catch up with him now. Wilson spoke with Good Country about his musical worldview just before the launch of his headlining Gary the Torch Tour, which kicked off March 6 in Columbus, Ohio – and just added dozens of dates through the summer and fall, including appearances in Europe and the United Kingdom.

I was hoping you could tell me a little about how your sound developed. I mean, you play a gut-string acoustic guitar, but not the way Willie Nelson does, right? It’s down-tuned and you have these very hypnotic sections that I really love. Have you always played guitar like that?

Stephen Wilson Jr.: Yes and no. I’ve been a guitar player of all ilks over the years. I’ve been an electric lead guitar player, a jazz nerd in college. And I was an indie rock guitar player for a long time. A lot of soundscaping and stuff like that. And I was super technical for a long time. I still am very much into Apocalyptica and Al Di Meola and the John McLaughlin Trio.

Oh, ok!

I used to go to sleep to the song “Mediterranean Sundance” [by Al Di Meola, Paco de Lucía] all the time. That was the soundtrack to my late teen years. And just because I love that kind of music, there’s a lot of percussiveness in the style that I play. Influencers like Dave Matthews, a lot of acoustic players like that, they kind of treated the guitar like a drum as much as they did a melodic instrument. …

I was also very influenced by the Seattle sound, all the drop tunings. The fundamentals of my guitar playing I kind of learned from the Superunknown record by Soundgarden. I learned it from front to back, and there’s so many different tunings and so many droney riffs that had a huge inspiration on me, too. So it’s really a combination of Seattle and then a bunch of Spanish-style guitar players.

Wow, I had no idea.

Then, I discovered Willie Nelson. I grew up listening to tons of country music, but it was more like George Jones and Johnny Cash and Hank Sr. and a lot of ’90s country. Willie wasn’t a big part of my soundtrack growing up. But I saw him at the Ryman Auditorium the year I moved to [Nashville] and it changed my life. I saw him playing a gut-string through two Baldwin [amps] with a pick and I’ve been pretty much chasing that ever since. I play a gut-string through an amp, too, but not the same way. It’s a lot heavier and a lot grungier. And, obviously, I use these drop tunings, which Willie doesn’t do, which has made for a lot of challenges in the production department. It’s like trying to figure out how to tame that animal, which is honestly kind of the point. I didn’t really want it to be tame. I want it to be wild. I liked that it always has the ability to get away from you.

I think it tells – definitely on stage.

That’s kind of what I learned from Willie when he would solo. He would just fly real close to the sun. He had no problem taking the 18-wheeler right to the edge of the cliff and seeing how far he could take it before it almost goes off the edge. And he’d always somehow pull it back on the track. I really lean into that every night and every song – every time we produce a song, we kind of go in hoping that the wild animal will show up. And it does all the time on stage, there’s a lot of unpredictable things that happen, but we kind of welcome them.

The untamed wildness of it. I would say you can even hear that in your lyrics. Tell me a little bit about “Gary” and why you felt the need to say this. You write about the value of blue-collar folks, how loyal, selfless, and capable they are. But also how they’re not appreciated enough sometimes.

Well, yeah, I grew up in a body shop. I’m a son of a body man.

Really? Me too.

Yeah. Grandson of a body man. All my uncles are auto body repairmen. I grew up in body shops. I grew up in a house that was surrounded by a cornfield, like the movie Signs. And there was farmers all around me. The blue-collar influence was everywhere. I grew up in a John Mellencamp song, literally. I grew up in a town where there was an abundance of these “Garys,” as I call them. I kind of started thinking about Garys as a subspecies of humanity, and I started to observe them in the wild, similarly to how Jane Goodall would observe chimpanzees and other greater apes. That’s kind of the approach with the whole song, but it was all inspired by a tragedy, really.

I was driving down a highway and I saw a memorial billboard sign and it said “in memory of Gary,” and there was a picture of a boy who was probably 16 years old. It was just really heartbreaking. I could feel the sadness and the heartbreak and the family’s plea to keep this boy alive in any way possible. I understand that plea. That’s why I made that album. I mean, søn of dad is a sonic monument to my father. That’s my billboard that I put on the side of the road to keep my dad alive, to keep his memory alive. So I really understood that sentiment behind it, just on the foundational level. And then when I saw it, I couldn’t help but say out loud in the car, “Dang, there ain’t a lot of boys named Gary these days.”

That’s where my brain started subconsciously turning Gary into a subspecies of human. And then honestly, the song just fell out. Because of my upbringing, it wasn’t really written. It was subconscious. I guess my brain just started writing, and that’s how I write pretty much all my songs. Generally, I write them fast and I write all the lyrics first. I wrote the whole chorus in my car right there and I just kept driving around and I kept writing it. Then I put it to music a couple hours later and it was 85 percent done.

It seems like people have really latched onto the “Gary” theme. Those people you can depend on, but they’re not flashy.

There’s a lot of truth to this Gary thing. There’s a lot of people coming up after the show or whatever. I was getting overwhelming evidence to basically prove that this Gary thing was real. … You really couldn’t deny the conclusions that, yeah, I’m not the only person that has seen this Gary theme. Because I had so many people like, “Dude, I know exactly who you’re talking about.” It wasn’t a couple months after we started playing and people were chanting “Gary” in the audience. The song wasn’t even recorded yet, let alone released. … Now it’s being played all over the country. It’s pretty wild.

And the song is sad. I mean, that’s the thing. I’m definitely celebrating a working-class human, but at the same time, it’s a very sad story. I wasn’t trying to make Gary some superhuman. I wanted to try to be real about the situation, because the Garys are endangered. We experienced that when we had this ice storm in Tennessee [in late January 2026]. We had to import Garys from all over the country to get everybody’s power back on. There’s logistical evidence that we just saw recently to prove that, yeah, these Garys? We’re running out of them, and maybe we should pay attention to that because we rely on them to fix things. … Instead of just letting them drive off into the abyss to go save another person’s day, how about we give them a moment and celebrate them?

You’re starting the Gary the Torch Tour in March, and that should help. I was wondering, what’s your favorite setting for listening to music? Do you consider that when you’re putting your tour together?

I guess I prefer vinyl, and I listen a lot in my vehicle as I’m driving. But also, I don’t listen to a lot of music. It probably will shock a lot of people, not that it matters to them, but I wouldn’t say that I just sit around and listen to music all the time. I listen to a lot of silence, and I think it’s really important for musicians to listen to as much silence as they do sound, because that’s where the inspiration for me really comes from – the silence, not the sound.

That’s actually fascinating.

As much as I want to sit around and listen to bops, I got to listen to nothing, too. I’ve never had a song come to my head from listening to another song, ever. It’s always come from silence.

@stephenwilsonjrwent loco tryna open my møuth more for y’all this time. “Cuckoo” live acoustic version out now. love y’all. 🖤🥕🏃🏻‍♂️♬ original sound – Stephen Wilson Jr.

I saw you at the Ryman Auditorium in November and I know those were special shows, but you had a boxing ring on stage there. Where do you go creatively from something like that?

That was very much an ode to my father and getting to that stage was all I ever dreamed of, really since I moved to town. Back to the first part of this conversation, seeing Willie Nelson at the Ryman? I’ve been dreaming about that show since I moved to town.

Typically I tend not to rely on a lot of spectacle for the show. I tend to rely on something divine. … The real light show is what descends into the room during those shows. That’s really what I try to focus on more than laser beams and a bunch of production tactics. I do have a really quirky stage design that I created. I have my own little world up there. And ideally, full-time, there will be a boxing ring on stage. We’re working out the logistics of bringing that around full-time because it’s quite the undertaking.

But I mean, I think it’s all about feeling at home up there. I’m not really supposed to be here in this world. I’m not a natural-born star, as they would call it. My goal is to try to feel comfortable up there, and get people feeling things. That’s what people really remember. I’m in the emotion business, not the music business.

You’ve been working on some new music, right? What do you hope people will take away from that?

Well, I’m working on a whole new record, which is more just the continuation of conversations and observations from where I left off. Because it would’ve been really easy to never make another record again after søn of dad.

Oh yeah?

I never was trying to be an artist in the first place. And there was a big part of me that was … I mean, honestly, when I was making that record that’s what I was thinking, if I’m going to be perfectly honest with you. “I’m going to make this and then I’ll never make another record again,” because why would I? Then the story of søn of dad just was so much a God thing. It was so divinely orchestrated that I just had a hard time thinking, “What would I do from here?” Everything I ever wanted to do was already done.

But that was my own stuff, and I don’t believe God put me in this position for me to do that. It took me some time to figure that out. I’ve got to give “Gary” the credit for that because when “Gary” showed up, that’s when I knew I wasn’t done. If “Gary” hadn’t showed up to show me that, I’m not sure I would’ve ever recorded another song ever again. Like I said, I’m not supposed to be here. None of this was supposed to happen. So for me to have any expectation of what is down the road is pretty comical. My dreams outdreamed me a long time ago. I really just want to focus on being there for people and being where I’m supposed to be.

That’s one thing I learned from being a scientist and doing all these things over the years: There’s where you can be and then there’s where you’re supposed to be. And there’s nothing wrong with being in either place. There’s no guilt to be had in being where you can be because, man, we’re all just trying to survive. But then there’s where you’re supposed to be, and that can be a very difficult place to be. But I’ve chosen to be there and for whatever reason, I intend to stay there until the day I die.

Photo courtesy of Missing Piece.