Universal Universal Music Group Nashville Pressroom

AJ (working people songs) OC: … appreciate that. :28
“I’ve always written songs and recorded songs, other people’s songs, about workin’ people, and workin’, the workin’ life ’cause I mean, that’s where I’m from. I mean, I worked…I’d already had jobs and worked as a grown person before I ever even thought about bein’ in the music business, so I come from that background, and…although I hadn’t had a job in a long time (laughs), I still remember a lot about it, you know, and I remember what the lifestyle is, and I still appreciate that.”

Billy Currington (jobs Labor Day) OC: …record deal. :40
“I started working like at [age] 12, landscaping. This was summer, every summers, and roofing. I started when I was about 16 roofing houses, and that was probably one of my toughest jobs because down there in South Georgia, it gets hot, so doing that every day all summer long. The pawn shop when I moved to Nashville was one of my favorites, even though it was one of my least favorites. The concrete job was my least favorite of all – six years of that, and I couldn’t take it no more. After that job, that was my turning point. Either I’m going to do something else for a living [laughs] or quit and try to really focus on music and get this record deal.”

Carrie Underwood (Labor Day) OC: …born to do. :59
“I don’t think I’ve ever had a bad job. I’ve had hard jobs. I’ve had jobs that worked random hours. My first job was at a gas station, and that was a lot of fun actually. While I was working at the gas station, I took another job at a hotel down the street. There was nobody else working there. I had one day of training and then the next day I came in, and the lady that had worked there the longest and was training me just didn’t show. So, the second day at work I was now in charge ‘cause I was now the senior member that was working at the hotel. So, I feel like that one was really challenging to figure my way through it, but I did. My best job is definitely what I do now. I really like being on stage. I really like performing for people and just having fun and singing, because that’s what I feel like I was born to do.”

Caylee Hammack (Labor Day-worst job) OC: …worst job. (laughs) :38
“My worst job was working in a nursery, actually. I love kids so I thought I’d be really good at it, but wen you’re the new person coming in, you have to change all the diapers first. So, I was changing 45 diapers a day and it got to the point where everything smelled like baby poop. It literally drove me crazy. I would walk my dog and I would have to go to pick up her poop, and it would smell like baby poop, and I just couldn’t handle it, honestly. The smell of poop warded me away. The children were lovely, but the smell of poop lingered, and I couldn’t handle that job. That was my worst job.” (laughs)

Dalton Dover (Labor Day) OC: …never go back. :18
“Man, the worst job that I think I’ve ever worked is a place called Tip Top Poultry in Rockmont, Georgia. When I worked at the poultry plant, we didn’t kill chickens there or anything, but it was more or less raw chicken than cooked chicken and you had to like send it down the line so it could get de-boned. It was just a headache, you know? I would never go back.”

Darius Rucker (Labor Day) OC: …pizza. :15
“I was fifteen, and I worked at a pizza place, and the guy decided that at fifteen, that I could not only clean the floors and wash the dishes, but I also had to make pizza. So, for two months, he taught me how to make pizza.”

Dierks Bentley (Labor Day) OC: …generosity. :26
“Personally, the fans give me amazement. That’s the only word to really sum it up. I look out in the crowd, you know, usually see a lot of faces and fans are cheering. I know each one of these like from the road-the signs are from California…Michelle and Kayla live up in the Ohio area. They’re all, I just see them, and I’m like, ‘Wow!,’ they’re all from different regions. You know when you’re in a different region of the country and you just see certain fans. These people are way more hard core than I am, and I’m just amazed by their generosity.”

Eric Church (Labor Day-odd jobs) OC: …bought at 2am. 1:27
“I had an awful job. I’ve had a lot of awful jobs…my worst one was when I first came to Nashville. I got a job at the Shop at Home Network. I worked midnight, graveyard, midnight to eight. That was bad enough but then I would work all night, go home, shower and then I had writing appointments all day because I was trying to get a career started. I’d go write songs and get meetings just trying to get signed. And end up getting done at 3 of 4 with all of that, I’d go home, take a shower or sleep for a little bit and then I had to be at work again at midnight. So the schedule was bad enough, however, what I had to do at the job…I sold knives from midnight to 7 or 8am. And, anytime somebody calls you at 3 or 4am and needs 200 knives for $19.95, it’s automatically an alarming situation. And I just, I was young and I’d been in a lot of these people’s shoes, I had done this…I knew they were drunk. I knew what they had done. They’d just come home from the bar, flipped on Shop at Home and said, ‘You know what? I need that.’ So the reason the job didn’t last long for me is that I was maybe the worst salesmen in history because I ended up talking a lot of these people out of it, I’d say, ‘I’ll tell you what man, go to bed, call me, I’ll be here in the morning. If you get up in the morning and want these knives you call me back.’ Because I knew what was going to happen, you know. They bought 200 knives for $19.95…first of all some of these people you didn’t know whether you should call the cops. What do you need 200 knives for? Even though I’m selling them…what do you need them for? So, it was awful doing that job. And then they got rid of me because, they were like, ‘You’re the worst. I can’t believe you’re talking people out of it.’ I was like, ‘Man I know…I’ve been there.’ [laughs] I’d want some to talk me out of buying some of the stuff I’ve bought at 2am.”

Jon Langston (Labor Day) OC: …is the bomb. :45
“The worst job – it wasn’t bad – I could just say growing up and stuff and in high school, I was working for my dad. It was a great job, working at the shop. One day I got tired of working for my dad. I thought it’d be smart to go work for somebody else and so I went to work at Chik-fil-a for a family friend, and I’m just not made for cooking chicken. But, I told my dad, ‘Hey, can I come back to work?’ (laughs) So, yeah, I mean, Chik-fil-a a great place to work if you’re into that kind of thing, but not me. But Chik-fil-a is m favorite fast food restaurant of all time. I mean, I will go to war for Chik-fil-a. I eat there probably three or four times a week. Chik-fil-a is the bomb.”

Jon Pardi (Labor Day) OC: …so bored! :17
“The worst job I ever had was at Hometown Grocery Store. I didn’t want to work, I was 15, and I did not want to work at the grocery store. Bagging was fun, but they sent me down the aisles to pull up cans and turn ‘em around and face ‘em, and I would just get so bored!”

Jordan Davis (Labor Day) OC: …worst job. :41
“[My] worst job was probably whenever I got out of school I started working for an environmental group in Baton Rouge, and I was doing actual environmental work at first. I went to my boss probably about four months in and told him that I was going to move to Nashville and write songs. Luckily enough, he let me stay on, but I became the weedeater guy for the landscaping side of the business. I seriously weedeated eight hours a day. The only break I would get would be in-between yard to yard. So, like we would be in the car and I would try to doze off for like 10 minutes. I was covered in grass in the middle of the summer in Baton Rouge. It was awful. That was definitely the worst job.”

Keith Urban (Labor Day-job) OC: …to sell things. 1:56
“I’ve had a lot of crappy jobs. Wow! I don’t know about the worst job, oh, telemarketing. (laughs) I hated it! By all accounts, I was actually pretty good at it, and my boss was really upset that I wanted to quit, ‘cause he said you’d actually be pretty good at it, other than I was just too brutally honest. I was working for a company that at the time sold Franking Machines, which was a thing where – back then – you would put postal impressions on an envelope and send them out, instead of buying a whole stack of stamps. So, you had this thing called a Franking Machine and you’d pre-load it with a whole bunch of pre-paid for stamps. And you just put the envelope(s) in and (sound efx). So, if you’re putting out a whole bunch of mail from a business, it’s much better to get a Franking Machine, then have someone go to the post office all the time. I would have this whole long pitch about, ‘Hi, I’m Keith, blah, blah, blah, what volume of mail would you say you do every week?’ I was talking to this lady from a florist, and she was so sweet, and she goes, ‘Oh, I’d say I send out about three letters a week, love.’ And then I’m supposed to say, ‘Well, then you need a Franking Machine…’ (laughs) ‘cause it’s on the script, you know? I’m going, ‘I’m so sorry, you don’t need what we’re selling. I’m sorry to bother you.’ And she goes, ‘No, no, tell me about this. What are you selling?’ She was the perfect customer, and I went, ‘I promise you. You don’t need this thing. It costs a fortune. You don’t need it. You don’t need it.’ She goes, ‘No, but tell me about it.’ I said, ‘Honestly, I’m not even going to waste your time. You’re so lovely, but thank you so much. Have a great day,’ and I hung up. My boss was standing behind me (laughs), and he goes, ‘They all need Franking Machines. They all need…’ I was like, ‘She didn’t. I hate this job. I quit.’ And that was it. I wasn’t cut out to sell things.”

Kylie Morgan (the road is her happy place) OC: …that’s me. :48
“The road is truly my happy place. I love going to sleep and not knowing where I’m going to be the next day. I love hotel beds. I literally just eat and breathe the road. It is truly an adventure all the time, and I knew even when I was little that I had to do something where I traveled because I love the feeling of it. I love experiencing new things, and the fact that I truly feel like what I do is not a job. And the fact that I get to see the world, meet so many amazing people, have a one-on-one connection through my music, I never have to work a day in my life because I would do this for free. It is one of the most liberating feelings to finish a song and see someone turn to someone and go, ‘Omigod, that’s me.’”

Luke Bryan (Labor Day-jobs) OC: …Nashville… 1:07
“At age 12 thru 13, I worked at Rubos IGA Supermarket in Leesburg, GA. I worked during the summers on Monday and Tuesday. I stocked and cleaned up the produce.  They paid me under the table…I peeled off all of the brown lettuce. Let’s see, when I was 15, I was a cashier at K-Mart for two months. I worked at K-Mart for two months, and then I reverted back to Rubos because it didn’t really make sense for me to drive all the way into Albany and work for K-Mart. The benefits were great though-you’d get an hour-long on the blue light special. So I started back at Rubos, and then I quit Rubos and worked for my Dad-just awful just driving tractors through cotton all day, and spraying pesticides that eventually would turn your hair green. And then at some point, I started playing guitar. And well, after college I went back and worked for my dad and continued to spray and haul fertilizer around. And then I moved to Nashville…”

Priscilla Block (Labor Day) OC: …didn’t care. :34
“Cleaning Airbnbs, and that was really interesting ‘cause you’d find some crazy things in those Airbnbs. Those bachelorette parties, all I’m saying is I want to be invited next time. I was kind of sad that I had to be the house cleaner and I wasn’t at the bachelorette party. It was great! You’d go in and sometimes there’d be extra food, alcohol. When I walked in and I would see White Claws in the fridge, I’m, ‘Bingo, baby! Let’s go!’ I don’t know if I was supposed to be taking the alcohol, but I didn’t care.”

Travis Denning (Labor Day) OC: …right for it. :13
“I’ve always played music. I mean, my first gig was when I was 16-years-old. That was what I did. And as soon as I found out I could make money doing it, I thought I’d much rather make money doing this than anything else, so I went right for it.”

Tyler Hubbard (Labor Day) OC: …where I’m at. :43
“One of the worst jobs – I don’t know if it was the worst job, definitely the most physical, was probably pouring concrete. I did that for a year with a friend that had a concrete business, and we poured a lot of concrete that year, and I just remember really early mornings and really late nights. It was, if the sun was up, we were working, and that was pretty influential in creating the work ethic that I have. It was either that or my dad had a tree service that I grew up working with him doing that, as well, which was again, very manual labor, very long days and taught me a lot about working hard. And so, those were special times and as hard as it was, I’m thankful for those years. I love working hard, and I’m grateful for the struggle that got me where I’m at.”

Krystal Keith – Toby Keith American Icon (AUDIO): “I think to us, I don’t want it to sound pompous, but it’s fitting. I think he would have rejected it a little bit. He always did reject it. In fact, the BMI icon award that he received, they talked to him about giving him that for several years before he actually received it. And he kept turning, he kept telling our manager, I’m not ready for that yet. I feel like those types of awards are given to people that are at the end of their career that are already retiring, that have kind of stopped touring. And he was like, I’m still selling out arenas. I’m still putting music out. Like I am, I’m still climbing and haven’t, you know, I haven’t started a decline yet. And I think he just wasn’t willing to say, okay, this is the level of what my iconic status will be because I’m still going. I still have room. For us, especially now that he’s gone, you know, I mean, he, very few artists attain the statistics of success that he attained. I mean, he is a Hall of Fame songwriter, all genre and country. He’s now being inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame. He’s, you know, he just, those aren’t given to people. The New York Songwriter Hall of Fame is one of the greatest honors any songwriter can get all genre across the world and he’s in that and it’s a very select group of people and there’s a reason for that. He was an incredibly prolific songwriter. He sold so many albums, so many spins. His tours were record sales. I mean he sold out tours constantly. He never really had to shift his model because his tours always sold out. So, you know, I think icon is a great word. It’s incredibly fitting. And I think it’s more than deserved for him. He definitely deserved it.”

Krystal Keith – Eric Church on Toby Keith Special (AUDIO): “Eric was someone that… He mentioned that early on, no one was taking a chance on him. No one was asking him to come on tour. And he was just trying to get his career off the ground. And my dad was willing to give him a shot and brought him out. My dad really was somebody that if he liked someone’s style, or he felt like they had something special, he would bring them out on tour and give them a shot. Especially when no one else did. He kind of always looked at himself as an outsider, doing things outside of what the norm of the industry was. So if everybody’s looking for the average, you know, pop country pretty boy, my dad’s going to go with the guy that’s, you know, got sunglasses on and a little bit more edgy and a little bit more old school country. So if you look back at the history of who my dad had on his shows, and where the trajectory of their career went after that. I’m not saying… It’s due to a lot of hard work and a lot of factors, but he took chances on artists long before they were really given a shot in the industry from Miranda to Blake and Thomas Rhett and literally everybody, Rascal Flatts. I think Eric was really, it was really sweet to hear how humbled he was by my dad at that point and that my dad would give him that shot and that he’s giving-  I think he said something like, if it wasn’t for Toby Keith, there wouldn’t be an Eric Church. And I think it’s so sweet for him to give that kind of respect to my dad. He doesn’t have to. He could say, I mean, that was a leg up, but I did all this work and there’s an Eric Church because I’m Eric Church. But the fact that he is crediting my dad with that level of respect is pretty astronomical for me.”

Krystal Keith – The Show Must Go On (AUDIO): “I think I knew that in order to honor him, I had to get through it without crying and stopping. I didn’t want to mess up lyrics. I really wanted to put the performance out with a clear beginning, middle, and end, and not have to choke up. I just had to get in the head space that I was doing it for him. He would make fun of me if I didn’t do it right. So I wore his cowboy hat so that I had a little piece of him with me. And I think it was hard to get through, but it was something that he taught us how to, especially me being the artist of the family, he just taught me how to power through hard moments and just the show must go on.”

Krystal Keith – Singing Special Toby Keith Lyrics (AUDIO): “So one of the things about this special is, watching people do his songs is, they’re singing the correct lyrics and we’re not used to that as his children. So my sister and I were sitting there. My brother was kind of tending to my mom because she was on the other side of him. And so he really spent the whole show just checking in with her and making sure she was okay. And my sister and I, I feel like got to relax a little bit more and just kind of enjoy it as a celebration. And one of the things that we laugh about is that every time a lyric would come up, like if you’ve been to a Toby Keith show, you know that he swaps out lyrics a lot. So you’ll be singing along and then he’ll say something like funny and it’s a dirty joke or whatever it is, it’ll be a witty, funny take on the song. And so we were constantly singing the lyrics that he would sing live and he sang those lyrics live so long that that to us is the correct lyric. And so when they would, the artists that were singing the song would sing what is actually the correct lyric, we would catch ourselves singing his incorrect lyrics as if it was the right one. And we just kept laughing because that was just so part of him. And people in the audience or friends that came from Oklahoma. After the show said, oh my gosh, how many times did you sing your dad’s stage lyrics versus what’s on his albums? And we were like every single one. So they were all our friends were doing the exact same thing.”

Krystal Keith – Toby the Songwriter (AUDIO): “He’s an incredible writer. He’s written, you know, if you look at his discography, he wrote 98% of the songs he put out, he wrote or co-wrote and a lot of them he wrote by himself. He just had a way of putting, he had a song that he had in his pocket for probably 12 years that he sang to me when I was a teenager that he ended up putting out, I think when I was in my twenties and it had a line that said, “I know she hung the moon cause I’m the one that held the ladder.” And I was just always just like, yeah, I wish I could, I wish I could write like that. I mean, I’m a songwriter, but just growing up watching him create these incredible songs and storytelling through lyrics like that. I mean, there’s a reason he’s in the Hall of Fame. There’s a reason.”

Krystal Keith – OK Kids Corral (AUDIO):“When NBC approached us, we wanted to make sure that we weren’t just doing a special for the sake of doing a special. My dad would not have been into a frivolous party in his honor. That would have been something he would have shied away from. He didn’t love going to award shows and being just on display. And that’s something that our family shares. We don’t love that, but it is part of the job sometimes. And we felt like if we were going to do this, my dad would only want to do it if it benefited something he cared about, whether it was the troops or in this case, it’s the corral. So we started the Toby Keith Foundation a little over 20 years ago. And it took us 10 years to raise the funds, but we opened the OK KIDS Corral. And it was inspired by like the Ronald McDonald House at St. Jude. We had a friend that had gone through a journey with their child that she ended up losing her battle a little bit shy of her third birthday. And one of the things that was the most helpful to their family while they were at St. Jude was having cost free housing, having food and toiletries and clothing, anything that they needed provided for them at no cost where they didn’t have to go shopping, it was just there. So that they could put all of their energy and focus into their child. A lot of these parents that have sick children have to quit their job, and then they have to move, they get an apartment or a hotel near the hospital while their child’s being treated, and that family is divided. Their income is cut in half, but their expense is double. Because now they have a second home they have to maintain or an apartment that takes the money of basically a second mortgage. And then on top of that, they have medical bills that they now have to pay. So it just drains families and it destroys families a lot of times. So my dad decided he wanted that in our backyard. He wanted Oklahoma to have that. And I think initially it was, we want that for Oklahoma kids. But what it’s become is, oh, you children’s hospitals right across the street. And those are the children that are referred to us. But kids come from all over the nation to be treated there. So those children all over the nation are benefiting from our kids. Corral. It’s a no cost housing facility. My dad always said it’s like Ritz Carlton meets Disney World. So it’s like really, really nice hotel and apartment type accommodations. We have volunteers make them dinner in our state of the art kitchen every night. We have a movie theater. We have a play room for the kids. We have playgrounds. We have reflection rooms, a gym, a teen lounge. Um, every, we have day rooms that are really cool for kids that live a couple hours away and they’re only coming in for the day, but they can relax between treatments and kind of hang out. Um, and then we have rooms that are up to three bedrooms for grandparents and so the whole entire family can come stay and be together. So the other children can come and be a part of this journey. And they’re in this community with kids that are also going through what they’re going through. So they have a support system. And you know, that it’s, it’s the thing that my dad was the most concerned about when he was diagnosed with cancer is who’s going to carry the torch, who’s going to take care of those babies is what he kept saying. And you know, that’s become our job is, you know, our role. Me and my siblings came together and said, okay, this is on us. It’s our job to continue this. And we did a really good job. I think this year we had record-breaking fundraising at our event this year. It was the first time of us hosting it without him. So I think his supporters, our family, our community here, stepped up with us and said, we’re here for you. We’re gonna stick with you through this. But it costs a lot of money to run that. And so we just, you know, we’re gonna just reach out in every avenue that we can to make sure that his legacy with us is carried forward.”

JD-Picking “I Ain’t Sayin'” (AUDIO): “I’ve never been in a situation where I’ve had to go write an album now looking at a show, like looking at a tour. And you know, I love the moments in the show where we get to break down Dirt and Next Thing and talk about those songs. But I did, I was missing those Singles and the Take It From Me. And I wanted to get back to that. And to be honest with you, I think one of my favorite, I try not to look at too many comments on socials…But one of the first comments after we released I Ain’t Sayin’ was somebody had said, I was missing this. And truthfully, I was missing it too. So it feels good to kind of be back in that vibe and the style of music that me and Paul [DiGiovanni] started making in his spare bedroom, you know, seven years ago. So that was kind of the reasoning behind going with I Ain’t Sayin’.”

Josh Turner – Down In Georgia (AUDIO) – “

TURNER: So ‘Down in Georgia’ was one of the first songs that I had pitched to me for this record. And it was actually surprisingly, pitched to me by my brother. My brother’s in the publishing industry there in Nashville. And he’s pitched me a lot of songs over the years, but you know, I’ve never cut any of them until now. So that’s an interesting connection. And I think it’s kind of cool that that’s actually you know, leading the record off. And not only that, I think the writers of this song, who I’m not familiar with, Tyler Booth, Anthony Olympia and Brent Rupert, I think they’ve been reading my mail because I married a girl from Georgia and we actually moved to Georgia last- last year. So it’s kind of a special song in that aspect.  

INTERVIEWER:  That is cool. And I think it’s a great one to start off because you get that real low bass note.It comes in real early, right? Was that part of the idea there? 

TURNER: Yeah, and you know, and that was kind of the way the song was written, but obviously, my voice is lower than the guy who sang it on the demo. And I feel like my version of it on this record has a lot more texture than the demo had. And that was one thing that I was a little concerned about. I felt like the song was really thin when I first heard it, but I like I said, I never know how a song is really going to turn out when you go in and make a record on it. When I first heard ‘Your Man’, I didn’t know if it was going to be right for me, but it’s been one of the, if not the biggest hit of my career.”

Josh Turner – If You Ain’t With Me (AUDIO) –

TURNER: So, ‘If You Ain’t With Me’ was, it just was kind of a straightforward country song that, that I liked. I love the simplicity of it. And, you know, like I was saying earlier, a lot of these songs on this record were pretty challenging vocally. And this one kind of allowed me to kind of sit back and have a little bit of fun and not have to worry about killing myself. So, you know, this was one of those songs that was written by Marv Green and Jimmy Urie and Lance Miller and it, you know, like I say, just a straightforward country song that I had a lot of fun with. 

Josh Turner – I Just Wanna Kiss You (AUDIO) –

TURNER: So Jeff Hyde and I have become really good friends over the years and I’ve actually written with John Knight too. John and I actually went to Belmont together and Jeff, I’d been begging for songs from Jeff and we’ve had a lot of his songs on hold for this record making process. And this was the one that kind of surprised us. This was literally pitched to me the night before the first tracking session. So it was like the last song that, that we heard that ended up on this record. And so it just had that, it had a laid back kind of feel and it told a story, but melodically and musically, once you thought it was going one place, it went another. And I think that was the most intriguing and interesting part of this song was that it wasn’t predictable. 

And so it was a really fun song. And like I said, it was super laid back and kind of mellow. But then Gordon gets to playin’ on that little, that organ part in the solo, and it just kind of took it to a whole new level. It’s like, you know, you’re already visualizing what’s going on in the song, but when he did that, it was like you were there, you know? And it was, you were at the fair with that young couple. It was pretty cool.” 

Josh Turner – Heatin’ Things Up (AUDIO) – 

TURNER: “So, ‘Heatin’ Things Up’ was one of the first songs that we cut, and that was the one that we were most excited about early on because I think from what I’ve heard, Marv said that they actually sat down to try to write a song for me. And I don’t hear that very often, but I was flattered by that. That’s not why I cut it, but they did a great job with this melodically, and it was, it was, kind of in the same vein as ‘Your Man’.” 

“Um, but, uh, musically it’s like I say, it’s just very interesting. It’s got a very unique chord progression. And when I went into to track this, I’m, I’m standing in the big room there at the castle and so it’s like, you know, me and Glenn Wharf and, uh, you know, Kenny and a couple of other guys and we do that first pass and when it’s over, Glenn says, my God, he was like, that first note, you know, it felt like you just had a load of gravel dumped on you- in a good way. He was talking about that first low note in the song and he was just like floored by that. But so that’s always fun. I can’t wait to see, you know, how fans react to that live.” 

INTERVIEWER: “I’ve never heard that one before. (inaudible) That one’s got a bit of swagger too, which is nice and fits in well here.” 

TURNER: “And that’s one, this is one of the songs too, you know, that is not easy to sing. You know, I won’t be singing this one, right as I get out of bed every morning. This is gonna be one that I’m gonna have to warm up good for.”

Josh Turner – This Country Music Thing (AUDIO)

TURNER: “Yeah, This Country Music Thing, I think it’s an appropriate title for the record. It’s uh, it kind of, you know, encapsulates my story in a nutshell where I grew up, you know, dreaming about singing for a living and ended up moving to Nashville, leaving everything that I knew and loved for a dream that wasn’t guaranteed to me. And it worked out,  and I’ve had success doing this as, as a career. And so I’ve had a lot of fun doing it. So it’s not only that, I’ve been able to become friends with, you know, a lot of my heroes. And so that’s been a dream come true too. So it’s a, you know, small snapshot of my musical life.” 

Josh Turner – My Side (AUDIO)

TURNER: “Yeah, you know, this song kind of stands alone on this record because it, it’s kind of got that bluegrassy thing. It’s got that folk thing. It’s, it’s kind of, it kind of harkens back to like the band and you know, the, you know, Bob Dylan and, and just that kind of era. And it, it just, it’s a cool love song that I felt like was, was written in a way that I’ve never really heard a song written before. And, and there’s these little interludes musically that happen at the end of the verses that, you know, kind of catch you by surprise. You know, we were talking about the unpredictability and it definitely, this song definitely has that element to it. And so having Brian Sutton play in the banjo on this and, and just that whole thing with him and Joe Spivey on the fiddle, it’s just, it just adds for a cool moment on the record, um, because there’s not a lot of songs, you know, no other songs on this record like that.” 

Josh Turner – Two Steppin’ On The Moon (AUDIO)

TURNER: “So this song was very similar to a lot of songs that we heard in preparation for this record. There’s a lot of that kind of just hip hop-y, dance-y kind of thing that gets pitched to you nowadays. And a lot of them just fell flat. But this one just had a different kind of vibe to it. It felt like it had potential. It felt like it had some depth.It was fun to sing. We just kind of had to get it out of that more dance club kind of feel and get to where it was like you were– you were in that honky tonk and you were in a country kind of setting. And so it was fun to sing. You know, the band played great on it. I think Matt Dragstrom, actually, I think Kenny got him to kind of help us do a little bit of the tracks on this. But uh yeah, it kind of provides a little, you know, newness and freshness, you know, compared to some of the more traditional songs on the record.“

Josh Turner – Somewhere With Her (AUDIO)

TURNER: “Rhett Akins and I are really good friends and we’ve written together a lot, but we’ve never, you know, had a cut together, but I’ve always been interested in what he’s doing and what he’s writing. And so, he pitched me a ton of songs as we were making this record. And this was the one that really just kind of stuck with us. It just kept coming back over and over again every time we- Kenny and I would talk about our list of favorites and it kind of talks about how, you know, this guy is in this conversation with another guy, but his mind keeps drifting off to being with her and whether it’s in California or Alabama or Tennessee or Mississippi or, or wherever it doesn’t really matter as long as he’s with her. And so it’s like, he’s, he’s there supposedly having this conversation with this other guy, but he’s really somewhere else. Um, and so it was a fun song to sing. It’s kind of got that more, it’s honestly kind of more of like a 90s country kind of feel to it as far as the way it was written and all that. But like I say, Rhett and I, we’re like, I always tell people that we’re brothers that were separated at birth because we’re so much alike and we have so many common interests that, I always want to hear you know what he’s writing, just to make sure that I’m not missing anything.”

Josh Turner- Whirlwind (AUDIO)

INTERVIEWER: “It’s got that barn burner feel and I love the production on it, but where, where did that come from when you guys wrote that?” 

TURNER: “So for me, anytime I write a song, um, especially by myself, but even a lot of times when I’ve, when I’m co-writing with somebody, you know, it always comes from a title. The title always comes first with me, uh, predominantly anyway. Uh, and so Whirlwind was a title that I had written down and I knew kind of what I wanted to write, but then when I sat down with Mark, it’s so funny, you know, we were talking about the evolution of this record and how it starts out one way and ends up another. 

“I wrote this song, I don’t even know, it was like 2015, something like that. I mean it’s an older song and I had wanted to cut this, I don’t even know, like probably, you know, seven years ago, something like that, but it just never happened. But the first time that I had played it for Kenny, he had kind of come up with a different chord progression on one or two of the lines in the chorus, which kind of gave it a little bit of a lift. And at the end of every verse and chorus, I would always kind of go down, but he wanted me to go up. And so it was just kind of messing with my head and then it just kind of got swept under the rug for a lot of years as I was making a lot of passion projects and everything. And so this record comes along and I bring it back up and we really felt like it kind of had that potential of like, if you remember the fiddle intro on Kenny Chesney, ‘She Thinks My Tractor’s Sexy.” 

“We were trying to find like that signature musical lick that you know, that could really make this song kind of come to life. And so we had Stuart Duncan come in and just play around with it on the fiddle. And he, I think he did a great job, but as far as writing this song, Mark Normore and I have written more songs than I can count. And this was one of those songs that is classic Josh Turner and Mark Normore cleverness. There’s a lot of funny lines in this song. It even starts off with one where it says, “I was out standing in my field”. And then in the chorus, it’s like, I remember Kenny’s first reaction to it. He was like, oh my gosh, he’s like, this rhyme’s been here forever and you’re the first one to discover it. Where it’s like, you know, it’s like “I’m in a whirlwind, she’s a mighty strong girlfriend”. And so it just, it goes from there and it’s just, it uses all these metaphors of like, you know, a tornado just kind of ripping through a, a neighborhood or whatever and just leaving a path of destruction. But it just kind of talks about how strong this girl’s love is.” 

Interviewer: “Yeah, it’s a fun one. And you mentioned earlier, I mean, do you think part of the reason that it came back around right now is just because of the whirlwind that your life has been the last couple of years?”  

Turner: “Well, that and, you know, I’ve always believed in this song. You know, there’s a lot of songs that, you know, I’ve believed in over the years that didn’t make it on a record, but that doesn’t, you know, keep me from believing in those songs. There’s still probably a lot of songs that I’ve written in years past that will probably end up on a future record. I don’t know. Just kind of depends on what kind of vibe the record is, you know, becoming. And so, but yeah, I think it, you know, as far as my life and everything, it’s definitely been a whirlwind, but I’m still here to… It’s like George Jones, I live to tell it all.” 

Josh Turner – Pretty Please (AUDIO)

TURNER: “Yeah, so I was excited to get this song pitched to me because Wyatt’s actually opened for me on the road several times and he’s obviously pretty talented. And you know, Gordy and John, you know they’re seasoned writers. And so it was obviously a great song. It was a very interesting ballad. You don’t hear ballads like this very often. It’s just kind of, it’s got a really cool feel to it, kind of got that slow dancing kind of thing about it. And production wise, it turned out great. And my wife, Jennifer, actually sang one of the harmony vocals on this song, and so, you know, that makes it even more meaningful and personal to me. So yeah, I was excited about cutting this song. And this is one of those songs, it’s like, it’s more laid back and more of a ballad, but it was still fairly challenging to sing, because you have to be in that kind of sweet spot for this song.”  

INTERVIEWER: “Absolutely, for sure. Has she ever done that before? I mean, what was that conversation like asking her to jump in?”

TURNER: “Well, I actually wasn’t the one that asked her. Kenny was the one that wanted her on this song. But, and she’s been on my records before, but not in this capacity where it was just her doing a strict background vocal part. And so she was super excited about that. And I think she was more excited about the fact that it wasn’t me that asked her.”

Josh Turner – Unsung Hero (AUDIO)

TURNER: “So this song I had written years ago about my granddaddy and I had actually, I guess it was about a year or two ago, I had actually sung this song during three shows around July 4th weekend when I was out on the road. But the original way that I wrote it, it didn’t have any minor chords in it. It was pretty straight up kind of a marching military kind of feel. But Kenny and I started playing around with it. And we even brought in Brian Sutton at the tracking session to really try to figure out, you know, how this song was supposed to feel. And, you know, we were just, we literally had to, the three of us had to kind of gather up into a corner room and kind of map it out to where we knew that we were gonna be doing it right. And so we kind of turned it into this more mysterious kind of thing, because I was describing my granddaddy to Kenny one day. And he said that my description just wasn’t really fitting with the musical feel of the original way that I wrote it because he was saying, you know, this was a guy that was a man of few words. You didn’t really know a lot about him. He just, his actions spoke more than his words did. And he was kind of a badass and a hero and American hero and just…never really craved any adulation or praise. And so he said, you know, this song musically has to have some weight and some viability. And so we kind of did all of that. I love what Fred Elterham did on the drums, especially at the end when he brought out the mallets and it just kind of takes you to another place. And there’s only two songs in my career that I’ve ever shed a tear over in the studio. One was a song on my Haywire record called I’ll Be There. It’s about, you know, I didn’t write it, but it was singing it about my boys. And then this one, I literally went in, sang one pass of it, and everybody was in agreement. They were like, we got this track. So I went back into the control room while the guys were taking other passes and doing overdubs and stuff. And I… just sitting there listening to it. I’m looking out the window in the control room. I just, all I could think about was my granddaddy. It was like, man, like we just recorded this song about somebody who didn’t ask for attention, but he’s getting attention. And now, you know, hundreds, if not millions of people are gonna hear this and they’re gonna be able to relate to their granddaddy or grandmother, father or whoever it is, you know, that, uh, that served this country honorably and, um, and made sacrifices that they didn’t have to, but they did it, uh, because they love this country and they love their family and, and they love their freedom. So it’s, uh, it’s it’s something that I feel like a lot of people are going to be able to relate to and I hope they do.”  

INTERVIEWER: “Absolutely, man. Thank you for that. Yeah. It’s got some gravity for sure. And I guess in some ways it’s sort of also a good reminder that like that sacrifice is what allows people like you and me to get to do this thing, this country music thing, right?”  

TURNER: “Absolutely. And that’s once again, that’s something that I don’t take for granted. And you know, every chance that I get, I try to thank our men and women in uniform, you know, for doing that very thing, past and present. Because, you know, when people like you and I start taking for granted what we’re doing, and forgetting the sacrifice that people like that have made, we’ll be in a pretty bad place.”

Tucker Wetmore – Musical Inspirations and Upbringing (AUDIO) – “I was inspired by a lot of different artists and genres. I grew up kind of a mutt when it came to music. When it came to reggae, rock, pop, hip hop, country. I kinda just listened to it all. Anyone from people like Jay Bug, Otis Redding, or Chris Stapleton.”

Jordan Davis – Behind The Writing of “I Ain’t Sayin'” (AUDIO) – :46 – “This song was written on a writer’s retreat in Montana. That was this year, earlier this year. And it was cool because I was able to kind of talk to everybody and let them know like, hey guys, Next Thing You Know is great, Buy Dirt was great, the family stuff was great, but I think that I was missing it. I wanted to go back with something up tempo. So we kind of wrote that whole week, looking for a song like this. I was probably about 50 yards away from where this song was written. This is the first song I’ve ever put out as a single that I’m not a writer on. So, you know, Travis, Emily, Mark, and Steve, they had this and Travis had told me, man, I’ve got something started. I think it’s really cool. And they finished it and sent it over. And I was like, man, this song is done. Like I can’t add anything to it. There’s nothing I want to change.”

Josh Turner – New Production Perspective (AUDIO) – “One of the most exciting things about the last several records that I’ve done is the new production perspective that we have. And we’re continuing to try to just take these songs to a new current place without sacrificing integrity. And Kenny(Greenberg), so far, has been a master at that. He comes up with things that I think are super cool, but they stay in the vein of what the song is about. And so, like I say, you know, there’s times where I’ll throw out an idea and he’s like, oh man, why didn’t I think of that? And then he’ll come back with something or play a solo. And I’m like, oh yeah, that’s it right there. You know, just keep doing that. And, and, and so it was just, you know, he and I have just worked really well together and, and, you know, we kind of come from different places, but at the same time, you know, we’re on the same page and we’re working together towards a common goal. So it, I think the production kind of makes some of these more traditional songs kind of sound, you know, more current and fresh and new and intriguing.”

Luke Bryan – “Closing Time In California” (INTRO AUDIO) – “Hey y’all it’s Luke Bryan. Here’s my new song Closing Time In California.”

Luke Bryan – “Closing Time In California” (STORY AUDIO) – “Hey everybody, my new song is called Closing Time in California, and it’s about small town guy whose girl moves out west and kind of the time differences of them trying to keep their relationship together. And I do a little bit different singing in this thing. I’ve never really done a lot of falsetto, and I do it on this song, and I think the fans will love to hear the change.“

Jordan Davis – “I Ain’t Sayin'” (AUDIO INTRO): “Hey it’s Jordan Davis. Here’s my new song “I Ain’t Sayin’.”

Jordan Davis – “I Ain’t Sayin'” (AUDIO STORY): “I Ain’t Sayin’ is a song about a relationship that you see happening. I feel like I’ve kind of noticed this here in the past couple of years in some people that I’m close with. They’re in a relationship that maybe they’re in it, just to be in it. You know that who they’re with is not the right one. You don’t have a better option for them. You’re kind of just saying it’s not that guy.”

Tyler Hubbard (Park) OC: …about it. (laughs) 1:23
“I literally didn’t think of it until about halfway through the song, and I had a flashback to being 15 and riding around, and my girlfriend was 16. She had a Toyota Camry, and I remember us riding around and we had a little tradition where we would find a parking lot and stop on the way, usually on the way home from church we would stop somewhere and kill a little time in the parking lot, if you will. And so, yeah, we were coming home and we pulled off into this, actually another church parking lot, a lot of churches in small town Georgia, apparently. But, anyways, we pulled off into the parking lot and we were sitting there making out and next thing you know, there’s blue lights behind me. Man, I was kind of nervous and the cop comes up and he kind of makes a bigger deal than it should’ve been. I was only about a mile from my house, so he ended up escorting us home, walking me to the door, making a scene about it with my dad and saying you know, ‘Caught these two down here in this parking lot.’ So, my dad had to make a scene about it too, so he grounded me for about a month. At 15 years old, when you’re grounded for a month, especially from your girlfriend, I was like, ‘Wait, I can’t…’ She was my ride at that point. So, yeah, I was out of commission and lesson learned. I should’ve just went home and sat in the driveway and made out. But, so yeah, I had a nostalgic memory attached to this song. Every time I sing this song, I think about it.” (laughs)