Alabama-based singer, songwriter, guitar player who just released a new single earlier this month, already his fourth new song of 2023. As a songwriter, he has had songs recorded by the likes of Miranda Lambert, Little Big Town, Kid Rock, Travis Tritt, Lee Ann Womack, and more. He has his own record label and last September released an album that hit number 10 on the Americana chart, plus he’ll be releasing another album this coming September. Last October he made his Grand Ole Opry debut and then made a return appearance four months ago. Between this recording and early November he will perform in Georgia, Texas, Colorado, South Carolina, Idaho, and at the 3rd Lake Martin Songwriters Festival in Alabama. His top five songs on Spotify have a combined 5.3 million streams and his official YouTube channel has a combined total of over 1.1 million video views.
“It’s funny how some things, in spite of your best laid plans, will force you to do things differently.”
“There's a part of me that feels guilty for the years that I let people pay the money that they paid to walk in and watch me behave the way I did on stage.”
“In 2005 I went to Los Angeles and made a record with a guy named Pete Anderson. It was the first full-length record I ever made. Pete was the guy that produced all Dwight Yoakam's records. The guy had GRAMMYs. It was my first opportunity co-writing.”
“In as much as you can put yourself and your heart and your feelings in a song, it is equally as important to be able to remove yourself from that song and say, ‘Alright what do I like about this tune, and what do I not like about this tune’?”
“This record was recorded in Capricorn Studios in Macon, Georgia. Capricorn Studios is where The Allman Brothers recorded, Lynyrd Skynyrd did some work there, Wet Willie recorded records there. I mean, Macon, Georgia, is kind of, Little Richard is from Macon, Georgia, Otis Redding is from Macon, Georgia.”
“I can’t think of a single solitary moment that everything changed. I mean, I'd say probably Miranda (Lambert) is probably the reason why I got a job in Nashville, which started everything. So that was a pretty crucial moment. But then the Opry is, it was just one of those things to where we went and played it and then just the phone calls were different.”
“I started playing guitar before I started singing, and so I really enjoy plugging my Tele in and turning it up and just being Delbert McClinton for a little while.”
“Songwriting is probably – dare I say this – it’s probably the more brutal aspect of it, to be honest with you. The songs are the first place you're going to hear No.”
“Travis Tritt got me to Bob Seger that got me to Van Morrison, and Travis Tritt got me to Steve Earle that got me to Townes Van Zandt that got me to Delbert McClinton, that kinda opened the doors to Texas and so when Texas opened its doors to me, I was very well knowledgeable in the music that kinda came out of Texas.”
“I feel like I found a depth of music that takes some people a long time to find really early in my life and it set my trajectory, so that's kind of what we decided, I want to give that to people.”
“From 2007 to, like, 2009 I toured with a guy named Leon Russell… and Leon was, well he was the keyboard player in the concert for Bangladesh and wrote A Song For You that Ray Charles and everybody from Ray Charles to Christina Aguilera has recorded. Leon Russell's career is very much worth a Google. And so, I spent three years on the road with him.”
“Harder Stuff”
“Cars, Trucks, and Me”