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We want out. We want out. We want out. We want out. We want out. You guys have absolutely exploded onto the scene. In the industry, we use a term called lightning in a bottle when you have magic, and Happy Dad is definitely lightning in the bottle.

It's magic.

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I believe in that brand. They're doing great things.

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You sitting up here looking at me listening to him.

Go get your order on, man. It's live.

I hate this part.

That's the worst part, right? It's only in there for a second, though. It's already done. And that fast, it's over.

How many times do you get IVs in a month?

If I'm on tour? Yeah, on tour. I could say probably 9:00, 9:00 to 12:00. Really?

Yeah. 8:00 to 12:00. You can't have more than three in the week.

I'll do like two or three a week on tour because I'll do five or six shows a week. I'm like old-school rock and roll. So I'll take Monday and Wednesday off. I'll play Tuesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday. So I'm a big dude, drink a lot, run myself on the ground. So I'm always big on this.

My bad, I'm just getting fucking destroyed here.

No, you're plugged. Oh, you missed or you I think it was my fault, though.

I think I moved.

It sucks when you have to give it another try.

It's like, shit. The third poke is the one for me, though. Because I'm like a three strikes, you're out guy.

I got pussy veins, I think, a little bit sometimes.

You probably I get them a lot, though, right? How much you get IV?

It depends. Same shit. If I'm traveling around a lot, I'll try to get them as much as I can. But I don't know. I'd say maybe once every two weeks.

They make a huge difference in my life, man.It's a bigIt's a cheat code. It's a cheat code, man.

When did you start getting into Like the health shit?

Well, I'm just now really getting into the health shit. But I got into the IV shit because of my drinking years ago. Yeah, I got into the IV shit, and then I realized the healthy benefits of it, that you could do it not just... I thought it was just a hangover cure. I had no clue that it was like jet lag or just little shit like flying them planes of dehydrates. You fly twice in a day, man. I don't care how much water you drink. It'll fuck your shit up. You know what I mean?

So you were getting them as a hangover cure.

Yeah, for sure, because I was just tying one on too much. Dude, I'm one of them dudes that when I puke, the neighbors know. You know what I'm talking about? I'm one of those guys. I'm a violent puker.

What about when you're puking on the lawn and shit?

Close. Sometimes. It depends on what I am.

It's like when you shit, they know, too.

I shit about like you would think a fat person shit. You know how you look at fat people and assume they shit different? It's true. You know that's the truth. Are you going to look me in my eyes and leave and tell me you never looked at a fat person and thought, I bet that's a nasty shit. Never. It is. It's a nasty shit.

That's 100% confirmed.

Yeah, it's 100%. 100%. It's all the way in.

Gabe, yeah, that's a nasty one, too.

What age did you start drinking at?

Fuck, dude. Probably. That's why I wanted to do this podcast. Nobody's ever asked me that. I think probably 13 or 14. My father was a big drinker, so I just thought my daddy would pour vodka in his coffee thermos at five in the morning. I just thought that was like... I thought it was a sweetener when I was probably 10. You know what I'm saying? It's like, I might have drank sooner thinking it was sweet and low. That's awesome. Vodka in the thermos. Yeah. You remember them? They're famous again. I was joking my daughter about. They got a 15-year-old daughter, so it's like I'm watching life coming full circle. The trend at her school this year was them big thermos, the Stanley mugs.

Yeah, those are fucking huge right now.

Well, dude, that was a big thing when I was in the late '80s, early '90s. Yeah, Chicks love those. Yeah, it's crazy. They're a thing, right?

Why are they so hot right now?

I don't know how they... Dude, it all comes back, man. It's crazy. You know what I mean? Let me tell that last night. Yeah, it comes back. But I realized back when I was a kid, my father would pour vodka in his coffee right then and there.

You know what I mean? How different's your daughter's childhood from yours?

Dude, dramatic. Man, it's really cool. I think that's all we really want. None of you all are fathers, if I remember right? If I remember right. No. The coolest thing about a kid is, one, watching her find her own identity and everything was like... But knowing I'm truly breaking generational curses. Genuinenly, I'm going to break curses that have been in my family since three, four generations ago, hundreds of years, almost, of living a certain way and us being able to break that cycle. Yeah.

So obviously, your childhood was pretty... From what I've seen, obviously, we watch interviews and you talk about how you got incarcerated at 15, 16.

Yes, sir.

So what do you learn from that? And why do you think you were in that situation to even have to do the things you did?

I'm not sure that I really had to do it when you look back, but when you're 15, it's do or die, right? As an almost 40-year-old man, I can tell you the shit that you think matters don't really matter. The shit that you think is going to be seven chapters in your book won't even make it. But at 15, you don't realize that. So everything is the complete end of the world. And that's why I'm such a big advocate about giving back to youth and talking to at-risk youth and talking to these kids, because I remember how big life was at 15. You know what I'm saying? You know what I mean? It's like now, at almost 40, I can tell you that we are tiny and life is quick. You know what I mean? But at 15, everything was a different thing. But to answer your question, we were middle, lower-class people, man. I thought about this the other day, and I want to hear you all's story because it could be the same or different, but I didn't grow up next to anybody with a career. There wasn't a nurse on my street.

There wasn't a male Old Man on my street. There wasn't even a hard-working construction. We had maybe one construction worker dude. You know what I mean? Everybody else was just barely scraping by. You know what I mean?

What jobsWhat are they doing?

If anything, they might work in a taco bell. You know what I mean? Like at best, fast food. I knew somebody, a mother with a fast food job.Not a firm job.For sure. A lot of government assistance stuff. A lot of just come and Whatever job they had, you just were waiting for the next one. Nobody had a career career. Nobody came in with an actual skill set. We didn't have a barber. You know what I mean? My only examples of people that were successful were the guys that were selling drugs. That don't make it right, but that is just a pain of perspective. Once again, back when you're 12 and you haven't met, I don't know if any of you all grew up next to a nurse, but I don't know how different that would be, even just for my daughter to think she grows up next to people that work and have had a job or have went to college. You know what I mean? We didn't know nobody went to college.

I mean, yeah. If all the people that are successful around you, you're going to look to them and, Yo, this is what I need to do to be successful, right? You're just a product of your own environment, right?

Yeah. It's like, how many brothers and sisters you got?

I got one sister younger.

Did she graduate?

Yes.

Did you graduate high school as well?

Yeah, high school.

Did you graduate high school, Stani? Yeah. What about you? You graduated high school? It wasn't even a thing in our house. If you did or didn't, it didn't really matter. It was never like... Even something that small when you think about just Cultural differences of learning is that nobody in the house is like, You have put an emphasis on you got to get your diploma. I didn't even know nobody in the neighborhood who graduated. I just assumed everybody went and got their GED when they were 15 or 16 or 17 or whatever the state law was. The idea of walking and getting a hat and throwing it in the air was not even a thought in my mind. You know what I mean? Like, watching my daughter go to high school, Kyle, has been the coolest experience of my whole life.

Yeah, just because you I really saw that.

I'm seeing them like they had the state Championship football game the other day, Bava. That's huge in the south. I don't know what you all know about Southern.

No, I'm from Canada. When I come here now and see how crazy football is, even high school, college.

It's a big deal. State Championship is like a big deal. It's in this little town called Chattanooga. That's just the coolest town on Earth. You all should go to Chattanooga. Happy Dad would be a big hit there. I'm sure it is. But we went out there with her, and it was like watching her go to her high school. She goes to this country-ass back road high school. They have a bring a tractor to work day. She's a part of the farm union thing at school or whatever the farm club is. You know what I mean? Future Farmers of America shit. It's like old-school country stuff. And going and watching that was like, Man, this is every memory I wish I had.

That's cool that you get to live that out now through her.

It's really cool, man. And it's really cool to see her doing the right thing and just watching her become a young woman, her making her own decisions, her own life. It's just really cool, man. I got a seven-year-old, too, a little boy, so I split the difference. But my 15-year-old, my wife and I have had custody of her for eight years. That's awesome.

The first time you went to jail, was that '16, you said?

Really, probably '13. Thirteen? I think I went for a shoplifting case or something. Then I caught a weed charge and a couple of assault cases at school. I was just a troubled kid. Talking about it now is so different because you look back with real perspective and work and you're like, Man, I was just not even misunderstood. I painfully insecure and felt painfully rejected. I carried a chip on my shoulder and a sense of entitlement in life that I didn't have a reason to have, really. But that's the truth. I was just a young, angry kid. You know what I mean? Yeah. You can start me anytime, but you know me, I'll talk and let you poke. Oh, man.

Can you talk about that first significant charge you got, the armed robbery?

Yeah, man. The armed robbery case, the one that really got me was... We were going I don't know if I've ever really talked about this, and I've tried not to, but fuck, I will. We were going to do a drug deal, not a big one, but some weed. I don't know, dude. I was 15 or something. It was like 60.

You guys were just selling weed?

We were going to buy. Somebody said they had some weed. No, somebody said they had some money, and we acted like we had the weed. So we were going to do that. That was where we were. You know what I mean? And we went in with bad intentions. That's the truth. And I don't run from that in my story because I think it's really important to own it. I've made peace with it with myself. You know what I'm saying? But still, it doesn't make it any right. It was a very heinous action. It was a very bad way to live. The thought process going in there was inexcusable by any merit. But that's the truth of the story. We were kids, and they charged me as an adult for that one. That was the one I got charged as an adult for.

And how much time did you do?

Dude, at that time, a few years, I guess. So I've been in and out of the system since I was 13 or 14. From 14 to 24, 25 for me is a little blurry because you were just always in or out of jail and way more time in than out. So I look at it like I might have did eight and a half of that decade, eight years of that decade in I swear it's probably the easiest way to look at it.

How fucked were the jails when you went there?

Oh, dude, jail sucks, dude.

I've only been for fucking 12 hours or 24 hours twice, and that was enough for me to be like, bro.

No, dude, jail is awful.

It is my biggest fear, going to jail, bro.

I used to joke with people all the time. Dudes in prison will be like, I just left this camp. They call it camp, or I just left here, and they'd be like, It was all right. The food was good. We were talking about malls. I was like, We're not talking about fucking malls here, dude. I don't care if they give me a filet in one spot. It's fucking my freedom missing. You know what I mean? The way I describe it is my absolute best day. The best day I ever had in jail was my birthday one year. I'll never forget it. It was just an awesome day for a jail. Was better than my worst day I've ever had out here. The single worst day of my life I've had homeless, thinking I wasn't going to figure it out in life, thinking suicidal thoughts out here were never worse. We're never worse than my best day in jail.

Yeah, jail.

Fuck, bro. At that point, when you're in and out, music wasn't a part of your life?

Music was, but just from the therapeutic side of writing it. I've always wrote songs. Music was a really big thing in my household. You know what I mean? What was you all's relationship with music growing up?

Dude, my Rolling Stones, my whole life. Rolling Stones on Zeppelin, classic rock.

But your parents played music for you? Yeah, they played that.

My dad played '70s. My mom played '80s. Dope.

What about you?

My dad's a big classic rock guy.

Dope. So he made it a point to introduce you to music? Yeah, for sure. What about you?

My son's old, R&B. James Brown is big.

It's old music. Who do you remember introducing you to music the most?

Probably my dad.

Yeah, me too.

That's awesome. I'd say the radio, man.

Really? Honestly. That's cool.

The radio was on, and I didn't know how to change it. So we just kept playing. And then there were some good songs throughout the day, but I didn't know how to change it.

Yeah, that's awesome. So I grew up similar to you all, too. We had a real bang music household. We would all gather around the speakers more than we would the TV. We would come down and listen to records. My mama would play records. It was a way she dealt with her addiction to mental health stuff. I would just come down because we didn't see her out of that room much. When she'd come out and play records, we'd all gather around the table and listen to whatever she was playing or whatever she had to say. You know what I mean? Music was always a thing. When I realized early that my mother loved music, then I immediately was like, Oh, this is... I go, What? I had a little poem wrote or something. Here's a little song as early as I can remember. Music's always been I wrote so many raps and so many songs in jail.

Yeah. Also, if it's a time where you're dealing with a shit of your childhood and you notice that music's bringing your family together, you're going to fucking love that.

Man, it was definitely a part of our therapy. You know what I mean? Especially to see what it did to a woman that I didn't see happy a lot. I didn't see my mother very... She was very, very tortured soul. She's a different woman now. She's actually really cool. Went gambling with her recently. Cool as shit. Like, yeah, yeah, dude. What do you guys play? We went to play Black Jack one night after a Willie Nelson show. Me and Willie Nelson did a show together, and she called me, and she came to the Willie Nelson show. We went and gambled afterwards.

How did you guys do?

Oh, dude, one like 50 bands. It was crazy. What's a huge win. I gave my I got her a chip, and she thought it was like a $100 chip, and it was 10 grand. So when her security, the security guy took her there, she was like, what? She thought he'd stolen something. She called me like, Jason, I think they gave me too much money. I was like, no, that's what we want.

So you play pretty big action when you gamble.

I'll play with you all if you all ever want to go.

Yeah, we should gamble in Vegas.

Yeah, I'd love to. It'll be a dream of mine. I'll have a little fun.

You started on YouTube, right?

Yes, sir. Youtube, man. That's why it's so cool to be here with you all because I'm like a YouTube kid.

You know what I mean? How was it like for you starting during YouTube era back then?

Dude, I started during www. Youtube. Com. I'll show you my age. You couldn't do it on your phone at all. You had to do it from a hard laptop.

I had When you uploaded your first video?

Yeah. Oh, man, I'd say 20... Not even 20, 2007? I'm going to say 2007, 2000. No, it was probably '08 or '09. The 10 Minute Freestyle, I think, went up for the first time when I first got out in 2000, early '09. And I can tell you this, it's called the 10 Minute Freestyle. It's like me, we all should watch it one day. If you got 10 minutes, the blood's funny. But I just got out of jail and I was rapping. And the reason it was 10 minutes was because YouTube would only allow you to upload a 10 minute video. And they gave you a 30 second buffer or something. So I think it was technically 10 minutes and 20 seconds, whatever the maximum amount of the video they cut off was.

That's a long fucking time to first help.

Yeah. What's crazy was we rapped for an hour, and they just chopped it up. I just got out of jail, though. I had so many ideas, and I had so many... I was so hungry. I'm wearing this goofy ass polo, collared shirt because I just I went to see my PO. I'd been out of jail for 40 hours. Wow.

What clicked in your brain where you were like, Okay, let's actually record this, and let's put this on the Internet?

I just was always a dreamer. I just always believed that music was my only real choice, my only true chance I had to make it in life was going to be through music. I put all my cards on that. I was always early to stuff. I had a conversation with a friend of mine, it's a musician, and he was talking about when Best Buy was closing its doors, because I was in the CD era, too. He said, You need to hurry up and get you a tray card at Best Buy before you can't get them no more. I thank God for this spirit, because right then I thought to myself, I said, and I told him this, I said, Man, I'll be honest, I think we should be more focused on trying to get ahead of iTunes than trying to keep our CDs in stores.

Something just hit you.

Something just hit me. I just knew the future. Not that I knew the future, but I was smart enough to see it. For an Listen, you all, I'm an uneducated man. So for me to see that even back then was like, nobody was seeing it around me. None of the indies in Nashville were seeing it the way I was. I was like, I'm telling you, dude, my space is the future. You put your songs on my space. That's how people are going to hear your music now. You're burning this for no reason. The whole world's on my space. I started feeling like that early.

You said the best day was the birthday in jail. What was a bad day?

Oh, dude, the hole.

I love fucking jails.

Yeah, they're the worst, man. I hate teller. It gives me so much anxiety. The worst is when you're in the shoe, when you're in the hole. Anytime you got to do 23 and one, that's the worst. When you're in a cell by your sofa 23 hours a day, and they give you one hour to shower, make one phone call, and stand out in a gated sun. 23 hours? Yeah. It's called 23 and one. It's maximum security. Some places, they'll keep you 24 hours. But in Tennessee, they have to let you out.

How long are you in that type of punishment?

I think I did six months in one was the longest I did. But I know dudes that live that way. That's maximum security prison is the same way. Any time you go to a real maximum security prison.

There's no outside, nothing?

It depends on state and federal rules. There's always some a guideline. In Tennessee, they have to give you one hour out of your cell a day, and three days of those weeks. This is how it used to be. Keep in mind, I hadn't been in trouble in forever. You had three days, they had to offer you the choice to go outside. Okay. Does that make sense? But it was literally like a cage outside. If I put a cage adjacent to this building, just a little cage, like six by eight feet. But it was just outside of a building. Then you just go stand in your little cage outside the building. And those are the worst days. I don't care. Anything else? Those are the days where you really think about life. I read a bunch. When you're in the hole, you're allowed to have religious material. So I got a Bible and I got a Quran, and I just read. You read a lot of the Bible? I'm completely self-educated. I never finished eighth grade.

Did you read a lot of the Bible?

I read the whole Bible, cover to cover.

Wow.

Did you have any other books?

Dude, I've done a thousand podcasts, and nobody's ever asked me the shit you all are asking me about. I know you all are good, but just for what it's worth. I mean, I do this.

What did you get out of every religion and Did you stick with one religion?

Yeah, I'm a believer for sure. I'm a Christian. I had a whole thing go viral, so I won't get back in trouble with it. But look it up. I did with Schultz, where I talked about how I feel about the church now. Got me in a little trouble. But I still believe in God. I still have a real anchored faith. I believe the church's approach is a little off today as far as they're not portraying Jesus the way I know him to be historically. How so? I just think Jesus was a little more gangster.

I mean, he got his wine and shit.

You know that was his first miracle in the Bible, right? What?

Turning water into wine?

That was the first. It's little things like that that I get an argument with theologist about.

Wait, that was his first miracle.

That was the first miracle documented in the Bible. I'm sure it wasn't his first miracle.

I'm going to impress everyone. I'm going to fucking turn water into fucking water.

Which is actually even cooler. His mother came to him and asked him for the favor. To some degree, there's argument about the scripture, but it was a wedding reception is the way I interpreted it. This is where every pastor on earth takes this clip and dissects every word I say. I'm just sitting here fucking high talking about God. From my reading and understanding of the theology is that it was a wedding reception. His mother comes to him and goes, I need a favor. Can you turn this water into wine? And he goes, Woman, it's not my time. I think that was the exact quote in one of the scriptures. Woman, it's not my time. And to some degree, my adlib is, she was like, please. And he was like, okay. You know what I'm saying? There's layers to this story, right? Let's peel it apart. This shows you how cool Jesus is on the front end. One, he'd been doing cool shit, and nobody knew it, because why would she come randomly ask him to turn water into wine? She doesn't see him revive a squirrel. Something's happened. She's seen him do some dope shit.

There's something there that she knows there's something different with this dude. She knows this. Mary is aware of this enough to come to him, which is very telling. And then she goes, Hey, hook me up, and then he immediately is stern with her like, no. I'm not flexing right now. You're tripping. It's not time for that right now. Then the human side of Jesus comes out because it's his mother. Come on, man. It's like mama leaning on you a little bit. Come on, boy. All right. You know what I mean? To me, that was the first miracle. I think it was in... I'm pretty sure it's in Mark. I hadn't read the Bible in a long time, to be honest.

When you break it down like that, you look at it completely different.

When I break it down like that and people understand it. Then some fucking mega church pastor will crucify me on TikTok next week about... My whole argument is like, Yo, I'm telling a story that these dudes didn't even really know, but knew. I'm giving people that otherwise have never thought of that story a different perspective of it. I thought the church would be super proud of what I'm doing. Yeah, shame me. Like, Oh, you're cussing in the middle of it. Your words mean nothing with your curses. I was like, God, we use the most unlikely messenger.

I didn't realize how much of a beauty move that was. The wedding must have just been completely dry, out of wine.

The party was flopping. Let's have fun with this for a minute. Do you know how down the party's got to be? The wedding shit. For the mother to come to you and be like, look. I mean, if you run an alcohol at a wedding, that's a fucking serious problem. I know you told me not to tell nobody, but you got this thing's going south. They're finna argue. I'm watching the grooming wife finna argue. This is our last chance. You know what I'm saying? That's how I perceive it when I'm reading it. To save the party, right? Yeah. It's like, You saved the party, dude. It's like, I was the first thing he ever did. So you just can't convince me that... Dude, he flipped over tables and temples and told them, quit making a merchant of my father's house. Jesus did a lot of gangster stuff. That's all I say.

Church is like, I had to go to church. My mom made me go when I was younger every single Sunday. I used to hate it because it was just It was so boring. You know what I mean? But I still believe in God. But I think you're right. The church and just the way you have to worship God and the way they tell you to worship God is just like, it feels outdated.

I'm too much of a free thinker, especially in this era, for us to think there's only one way to do it.

That's what I was going to say. You know what I mean?

That's my thing.

You could talk to God at any time.

At any time. Even though they use too many cuss words, I was like, We don't even know what cuss words were back then.

Right. But you did it different because you have your own interpretation because you're not going to church. You just have the Bible and you're in jail in a cell, so you're making your own version.

Yeah, that's real. I was just reading the word. I was like, Oh, this is a cool story. There's a lot of crazy stories in the Bible, man. I learned a lot from the Bible.

What's another cool one? Because I didn't fucking know that. And I took religion till grade 12.

Yeah. No, dude. That was, dude. What we talked about, I always talk about when Jesus was protecting the town whore, and he was doodling in the sand, and all the pharisees came to him and said, You got to do something to this woman. And that's when the famous phrase, Remove the log from your own eye before you worry about the speck in mind came from. You ever heard that? So there's a famous phrase in the Bible that says, remove the log. There's so many interpretations in the Bible, obviously. It says, remove the log from your eye before you worry about the speck in mind. Okay. So it's saying, you're over here worried about what's happening with me, and you got a lot of stuff going on with you. But when they came to him about the town hoor, he's doodling in the sand. And that's what the scripture pretty much says. He was just drawing, just like if you stick fucking off in the sand. And these pharises are standing over him like, What are you going to do about this woman? And he was like, You're telling me none of you all never sand?

And they were like, Well, that's different. He's like, ain't nothing different.

Why was it Jesus's job to do something about the town horror?

Well, they were coming to him about trying to find the flaws in his scripture and his philosophy. Keep in mind, he's running around telling everybody, I'm the son of man. I'm here to change the world. You know what I mean? I am here. I'm God in flesh form. It was a wild concept. Just that whole era. If you think about the insanity of this guy coming around and being like, I'm telling you I'm the son of God. My mother was a virgin. She never slept with my father. If that's your story, you're anchoring it around and you're testing all these principles. So all these guys who knew all the scriptures would try to come to them and go, What about this? What about this? What would you do in this situation? They were just leaning on them. It's It's a really cool- It's an interesting thing, man. It's a really cool- Did you have any other things that fascinated you or you read while you were in there? Yeah, dude, I learned a lot from studying a little bit of Buddhism. I read the Quran. Totally get it. I understand those principles. I respect Muslims so much.

How did you like the Quran? I loved it. Reading it.

Yeah, I loved it. It's actually more of a fluid read than the Bible, as far as being able to read the Bible. So all over the place, just so the Quran really sticks to a storyline nine all the way through where the Bible runs all off everything. But I knew a lot of Muslim dudes in jail, so I understood the concept of their religion, and I just loved it. By and large, and this is why I do talk about God openly, I believe I've learned more from Especially in jail, if there was some a religious factor or a gang factor, weirdly enough, you could always... There was more peace in the unit. You know what I mean? Muslims move, especially in prison, very together. You You know what I mean? They don't take... They're no nonsense, but they're very respectful. And their religion is not hateful at all. We got a completely disoriented view of... It's like we do Christianity, where the weird mega church pastor that talks down on me is the guy that we judge as the basic Christian, where I think most Christians are more like me anyways. Same thing with Muslims.

Every Muslim I ever met was awesome. Never felt threatened by one.

I have a question. Did you ever get messed with in jail? I know there's probably a lot of guys in there.

Man, I'm fat. I I've been getting messed with my whole life, Salim. Every corner, every crevice, man, I had to fight every week.

Dude, I feel like you could get along with any crew, though.

Yeah, for sure. But also, it's jail. You're going to fight. That's just a big part of it. Dude, I boxed when I was in the juvenile justice system. They had a boxing coach in there. We fought, fought, fought. We fought our whole lives. I just quit fighting as I've gotten older. When I first met my wife, I was still would get in a bar fight all the time. It took years to conquer that anger. I was an angry little insecure, and then I was overweight, so it just made it even easier for people to fuck with me. So it just made me more aggressive. The work I'm the most proud of on myself and my life change is probably my ability to be unbothered now. You know what I mean? You'd have to spit on my kid or something for me to want to get physical with you. At this point, Brantley Gilbert is a good friend of mine. He's a country music artist, and he says it best. He said, At this point, if you get me mad enough to fight you, I just assume, shoot you. You get me that fucking mad? You know what I'm saying?

If I'm mad enough to get physical, you probably did something make me mad enough to shoot you.

So what? You had a big bar fight career, too?

Well, we were just young and on tour, so we would I don't know. It's like we were playing all those bar shows. I used to do 200 shows a year, like a rock and roll band. We'd open up for everybody. So you get bar fights every tour, at least.

100%. Where'd the most bar fights go down? Like Nashville?

No, No, no, no, no. I mean, we'd fight at home, but not much. You don't shit where you sleep. But there's always random when you're just out of town, it's just you know how that shit is, especially when you're touring. Just like seven or eight of us living in a... I mean, six of us living in a '95 conversion van. You know what I mean? We're doing $50 shows, and some guy in Wyoming doesn't pay you. So you try to steal his TV off the wall of his 200-person bar. His boys pull up and you all got to tuzzle. You know what I'm saying? Just that old tour. Pore, just trying to figure it out, sleeping in the van shit.

What do you think was your favorite? What was the best about those days? Because when you're doing those $50 shows.

Oh, dude, the freedom. Yeah. Yeah, because you all know this, because you all seen it, too, is that we're blessed that I never wanted money. I just wanted freedom. And then you get to a point where you become so successful, you actually give up a little bit of your freedom in exchange for your success because your schedule is... You're now a slave to your calendar. But back then, it was true freedom.

You didn't say chase the cool and not the money, right? I've seen a quote that you said. When did you start saying that quote?

Oh, dude, Chase the cool, not the money. Always. Man, I've always believed that you just look for... Even back then, we were just looking for the coolest tour. It didn't matter if it was 300 people. It's like, Dude, you got a chance to go out with the insane clown posse. You're twisted. I'm like, We're in. You just love it more, right? Yeah, you're like, I'm in. That sounds cool. You know what I mean? Like, dude, example, Kyle texted me. I don't want to date this podcast. So I'm going to say two days ago, a day ago, 20 something hours ago and said, Hey, I'm in Miami from now until these dates and this date. Or he said, These are the dates I'm here. Just come whenever. Forty-something hours later, I'm sitting here talking to you all. You know what I mean? Because you know what? This is fucking cool. You know what I mean? This isn't about no money. It cost me money to come down here, right? But it's like, I wasn't even going to wait for you all to come to me. I was like, No, I'm going to catch Kyle while he wants to talk to me.

You know what I'm saying? I think this podcast is cool as fuck. I've watched, I'd say, 80% of you all's episodes. You know what I mean? For real, I actually watch the pod. I'm like, I always chasing the cool, not the money, because I've learned that money will follow whatever the cool thing is that's happening. You know what I mean? And money also is like, it's easy to say when you got it, but I would have done this shit for free. I proved that because I've got 15 years that I did it for free. It's not like I'm saying something like, It's easy to say now that you got money. It's like, What are you talking about? I could show you the 15 years where I did it for free. You're completely free. It's like those $50 shows we were breaking, even though I didn't even have a house at home. When I go back to Nassau, I still slept in the van.

When you're in those smaller moments, too, I know I could relate, too. It's like you look back and you didn't even really know what you were on at the time, too. It's just such a blur. For sure. But I think that's one thing People are always trying to get to where they're at, and they're not enjoying that grind, that struggle to get there.

You always got to enjoy it.

Even now, we probably have bigger goals that we want to achieve, but we're not appreciating where we are right now, too.

I took a practice going into '23 that I'm going to carry through '24's presence because I found myself having these mega moments and not in them because I was thinking about the next mega moment or my phone, and I was like, I'm detached. When I walk into stuff now, I'm there. Whatever I'm doing, that's all that matters. I'm 100% in that particular moment.

I'm not thinking like, next, next, next.

Yeah, it's like, I don't even like. All that matters in life to me right now is that I'm fucking sitting here with Nelk on the fucking Full Sin podcast talking to you all. That's all that matters.

You're always going to have bigger and bigger goals, too. You look back at old times, you're like, That was so awesome. That was so awesome. But you got to appreciate. That's what I'm trying to do a lot more, too, is appreciate the moment.

Especially the first, because I was just sitting here thinking, just from us talking and me willing this into my world. I think we're all going to be friends forever now. 100 %. I think we'll be boys forever. I think I'll come back and do this podcast again in 10 months with my album drops or whatever. Whenever I call you all for a favor and go, Yo, the album's coming out. They'll tell me a bone. But we'll never do it the first time again. No. This is it. You know what I mean? I'm conscious of that. That's why I'm so gitty about being here. I'm not afraid to embrace that excitement. I did a New Year's Eve, Dick Clark. That's epic. I've been watching the ball drop my whole life. So I go and I got this thing I do when I'm overly excited, where I hug people too hard or I pick them up. I don't mean to. It's just I'm like a big yogi bear. You know what I'm saying? I'm just a big touchy guy anyways. I picked up Ryan Seacrest. I'll show you the video. I pick up Ryan Seacrest, and I'm shaking him around because I'm just so excited.

My wife was like, You did that thing. I was like, No, I didn't. She was like, You picked up Ryan Seacrest. I was like, Oh. Because sometimes I'll get so excited. I'll be like, loud, like the CMA speech. That's me when I'm excited. You know what I mean? I'm like that in our living room. My wife is like, Yeah, you were just doing what you do at the kitchen table when you start really getting somebody starts fucking with your gas and you up. Because I'm excited. I don't think I'm too cool to be excited.

People can feel your authenticity, right? You can just tell you're an authentic guy. You are who you are. That's why people love you, right? Yeah, for sure. I feel like you could get away. That makes you be able to get away with shit, too. You know what I mean? It's like, Yo, we can get mad at Dr. Jelly.

Yeah, right. I love this Dr. Jelly thing, by the way.

He's definitely a doctor.

Who would you say was your biggest inspirations growing up from music and stuff?

Dude, this will be fun to talk about. So 3 6 Mafia is on the short list. You know what I mean? I had them on tour this year, which was insane. But a lot of local rap, too. Quanticash, Hey Dek, Pistol, Top Dollar, a lot of local stuff. But UGK, 8 Ball, and MJG on the hip hop side. Anything Gato Boys, that whole era. I don't know if you all were familiar. Am I speaking Greek? Have you all ever listened to Southern rap? This is fun.

Wait, no, bro, real quick. My mind playing Trix on Me is one of the best songs of all time.

Yes, let's fucking go. Yes, dope. Are you familiar with any of these Southern rappers? No. So are you all familiar with-I think I've heard that.

I know Gato Boys, UGK, fucking obviously three 6 Mafia. I know you did Hard Out Here for a pimp, which is gangster.

I did that at Bonerou. It was really cool, man. I grew up on super Southern rap, and of course, 70s music, Jim Crocey, James Taylor. My sister introduced me to Nervana, Pearl Jam, the whole '90s grunge era. She brought me up into that. My brother turned me on all the hip hop. My mother listened to country. Real outlaw country, though, like Wayland & Willy. You know what I mean? Like Wayland & Jennings, Willy Nelson, Merrill Hager. '90s music, you said? Yeah, '90s, too. A lot of country. A lot of '90s, for sure. Tupac.

How important is it to be like... Because I see all the time people like, Yo, that's not...

90s country, too. It's my fault. Just like Tracy Lawrence, George Strait, Garth Brooks. My mother... Man, Garth Brooks, dude. I'd probably sing more Garth Brooks songs than Garth Brooks, okay?

He's performing in Vegas.

Yeah, I went to see a show. In Vegas? Yeah, I'm that big. I'm up telling you, dude, I'm not too cool to be a fan, dude. I'll pop up to a show now. I'm telling you.

No, I was going to say, how important is it to be... People always compare like, Yo, that's not real country. This is real country. Who defines what's real and what's not?

Man, I don't know. I got in trouble recently because I had a quote where I was jokingly said, How much more country could I be? Should I fuck a goat? And it's like, I got in so much trouble. I'm going to double down on this podcast about it. But it's like, I think that country... There's two different things. One, there's being country and being country music. Because even country music, as far as time has been, wasn't always just super country rednecks. You know what I mean? It's like country music has always had a wide stroke. Like, Wayland Jennings and Willie Nelson wasn't singing about fishing or hunting. You know what I mean? And they were as authentically country as you could be. To me, country music is three cords in the truth. And I know in my soul that what I do is write three cords in the truth. I know if I don't write nothing else, I write the truth. You know what I mean? And I know I'm from Nashville, and I know that you all don't know me from the Man on the Moon, but I'm sure just based on my dialect alone, you probably think you would assume country.

So it's like I tell people country is relative. You know what I mean? If you grew up in Southern Alabama, and I grew up in the metropolis of Nashville, Tennessee, and you grew up outside of Montgomery, you might look at me as city country. You know what I mean? But meanwhile, if I go to New York City like I just did, I was like a hillbilly compared to every other artist on Dick Clark's show. You know what I mean? I was clearly country music. I was so country that I got lit up on Twitter for the first time. A whole new audience found me. I was like, Who the fuck is this red neck rapping at fucking New Year's Eve? I trended for five minutes. It was so bad. But it's like, that's how somebody sitting at their house in New Jersey felt, right? Or wherever, whatever metropolis they were coming from. Or even somebody from the outskirts of town just like, Yo, who is this Hillbilly rapping on Dick Clark's New Year's Eve? Because I'm up there with Sabrina Carpenter and fucking T-Pane or something. You know what I mean? But to me, being country-It's funny to picture you walking down the street in New York City a little bit.

Yeah, right? Yeah. You'll see how country I am in that setting. I did the Jingle Balls this year. It's me, One Republic, Sabrina Carpenter, Olivia Rodrigo. It's one of those shows. Everybody does 20 Minutes. It's like, I'm out there singing rap covers, but it sounds like Billy Ray Cyrus is singing them to some of those kids. All I've seen was tweets like, I hate country music, but I love Jolly Roll. I was like, But you'd never know that... So the country thing is, long answer, bubba, because I've been wanting to talk about this, is to me, it's just what my spirit is country music. The fact that I had a big song on pop radio and some rock radio hits is cool, but my spirit, my heart is you come to Nashville, I told Kyle, We'll do country shit. We'll definitely dick off.

What about fishing for catfish? That's pretty country, right?

Yeah, for sure. Noodling or hillbilly handfishing.

What's that?

So There's a woman, you should look her up.

Are you into that stuff? She'll come out there for an elk video and just fuck her on real country shit.

We'll take you to Hannah Baron then. Hannah Baron is like, she's famous on Instagram. Check her out. She noodles. That's what she does on season. You're talking about that? She's crazy, man. She'll get big. Where you put your arm down in the hole, right? And it's where the catfish are, and the catfish will bite your arm. Because they're big. They're 50, 60 pounds. They're huge. And you'll grab it and bring it. They're 100 pounds. They're huge, huge. You'll bring out the whole catfish on your arm. But your arm is the hook. Your arm is the bait.

Does it hurt when they bite you?

Yeah, you feel it for sure. It's a fucking very aggressive, very heavy fucking fish biting. You feel it, but it's not bad, bad.

You can't lose your arm.

No, you're not going to lose your arm. No, for sure. Hannah'll show us out there, dude. She's the most famous one on Earth.

Maybe we can start with some fishing rods, though, before we get in.

Yeah, we can go fishing. We could just come to Tennessee. We'll go ride four-wheelers and fish. That's whatever.

Yeah, that's more our speed.

Yeah, my uncle's had a farm since I was a kid. It's where I shot my first gun. We'll just go out there and dick off. Yeah, for sure. That was my sales pitch to Cal initially.

Yeah, he said, Come out to Tennessee.

I was like, Yo. I was like, We'll do some shit, dog. I was on the farm that day. I walk on the farm every day. It's part of my Gary Brecker plan. I'm on my health shit right now. And every day I walk the farm. That's when I hit him because that's when I do my thinking. You know what I mean? He hit me in that moment. I was like, I'm out here now, dog. I was like, We'll catch some shit on fire.

Let's do that for a Nelk video. We'll come out and we'll film it for the Nelk channel.

It'll be a fucking ball. We'll go crazy. For the Nelk channel, we'll do it double down. We'll go real stupid. It'll be dope.

When did you decide to get on the health shit? Did we talk about that? No.

We talked about it. We were going to talk about it off camera. I was like, We should talk about this on. I messaged Gary shortly after my CMA speech went viral, and I just cold hit him, just like I did you. Like I said, I'm a fan. I hit him. I was like, Yo, look. I was joking, but I was real. I was like, Do you all work with fat people, I hadn't seen nobody lose real weight. He was like, Dude, whatever. We're huge fan. Him and his wife, Sage. Sage hit me up first and was like, Yo, hit me. Let's do it. He just instantly was in. How God works is like, they were like, Well, we need to get blood. I was like, I don't know when I'll be in Miami next. Then I looked at my calendar. I was like, You won't believe this. I'll be in Fort Lauderdale Sunday. I was headlining Riptide Fest, and they were like, Oh, we'll come up there and do your blood. She came up, they did my blood that day. I met with Gary. I was going to come to the UFC Me, and I was going to meet you all there, too, but I didn't get to make it.

The Covington fight.Oh.

Shit.it was in Miami, right?

No, it was in Vegas. It was in Vegas. It was just the last one a month ago. I was coming from LA, and Gary flew with me from LA to Vegas because I was doing NFR with Laney Wilson that weekend in Vegas, because the NFR was the same weekend as the Kobe Covington thing, the rodeo. Me and Laney Wilson were going to link up, and I was sick, and I felt like it was COVID. So I just went home, and it was. I ended up getting real sick. But right then, Gary went over my labs, and I woke up the next day and cut sugar, cut processed food completely out of my life, been supplementing, been on my Gary breakfast shit, doc. What about exercise? Working, walking every day. That's all I'm doing right now is walking. That's all I have time to do, but it's my anchor. I wake up in the morning Seven days a week, and I go walk.

What's been the hardest thing for you or the biggest change?

Food. I've had a horrible relationship with food my whole life. It's the one drug I've never got rid of. It's the one addiction that still really haunts me deeply. It's hard, bro. It's rooted I had to get ready to do this with Gary, too. One, mentally, but two, I had to do a lot of work last year in therapy to really figure out what I was hungry for. You know what I mean? What I was looking for and dealing with my life and being very open to going back into that and figuring out the trauma that did it to get me prepared. But the sugar craving and the idea of... I'm sure you notice you all travel a ton, too. I'm still traveling 300 days a year.

It's hard when you travel, too.

Yeah, it's hard. I'm eating nothing but plants and proteins, as Gary suggests. It's like, man, that's hard to find, believe it or not.

Did you cut greens?

Yeah, I cut all that shit.

No rice, no bread?

No, I'll do rice if it's organic, but no bread at all. For sure, no bread, nothing processed, no tortillas, no wraps.

Did you say a good hot sauce, bro.

You put that in some chicken. No, the food's not bothering, but the accessibility of plants and proteins, believe it or not, that are not wedged between bread, that are not stuck between a wrap or a fucking quesadilla. You know what I'm saying? It's different, dude.

That's the biggest struggle because I cut grains for a bit for 60 days, too. And yeah, when you're in the airport or if you're hungry, there's nothing to really eat. You know what I mean?

Temptations everywhere. I just got to plan super ahead. So I just actually know where I'm going. I had food waiting at the studio for me before I came here. I got food waiting in the car on the way to the air. I'm just very diligent about it now. I'm taking it serious, but a lot of it, too. It's been a lot of supplement. My hormones were dissolved. You know what I mean? You know what Gary does? He gets there. He gets in there and gets on his biologist shit. So he really made me understand. I feel good. I feel better than I've ever felt. I'm like three, four weeks in and no sugar, and I feel incredible.

What's your goal with it? Is it to lose a certain amount of weight or just feel better?

I'm losing weight, but it's just feeling better, man. I just want to feel normal. I had a realization this year, Kyle, that I have somehow been blessed to be in this position to help people and change my life and my family's life. And I have done it in spite of carrying multiple humans on my shoulders. You know what I mean? I'm just tired of being tired. It has nothing to do with vanity. It has nothing to do with how I look. It has nothing to do with... It just really is genuinely like, I just want to feel good. You don't have energy. Yeah, I'm listening to the Gary Breca stuff, and I listen to you all's part since you all been on your shit. You know what I mean? And I'm hearing Cal talk about how different he feels, and I'm hearing people talk about feeling good. And I'm like, Fuck, I've never felt good. You know what I'm saying? You know what I mean? I couldn't even imagine. Gary looked at my blood work and was like, Dog, I can't imagine what you're going to be like when you can actually think. He's like, Because your bloodwork tells me you can't think.

It tells me that you are in a fog. You know what I mean? He's like, Man, you're going to be a different dude in 12 weeks. I'm four or five weeks in and I already feel fucking crazy.

Are you getting a cold tub or the sauna or anything like that?

I've been doing cold showers. I'm getting a cold tub, but I've been doing a cold shower. I got to ease myself in, man. Those things are brutal, dude. Yeah, they are. It seems easy. I'm just going to sit in cold water for three minutes. You're like, Fuck. You feel like you can't breathe. Am I the only one that thinks I'm dying?

For me, it feels like I can't breathe. It's hard after a fucking night of drinking. It's ten times harder, but it's such a good hangover cure.

Does it really help with the hangover?

If you do cold tub, hot tub, cold tub, hot tub, cold tub, it's the best thing you could do for a hangover. That's what I need after a hangover now because I can't deal with the hangover the way I used to when I was 21 or something. I'm 29 now. So now it's like, bro, one night of fucking big send is like...

I was watching the Gronk pod, and he was talking about that. When he was saying it, I was like, Man, dude, I mean, I've always got violent hangovers, but now they're like two-dayers. It's fucked.

I just can't do it anymore.

I can drink once every two weeks now, almost. And I got to make sure the next day is wide open. I got an idea ready.Not doing shit.I got to prepare my hangovers now. You know what I mean? Where I used to love just my favorite drugs for the random ones. I don't get those as much no more. You know what I mean? That's still my favorite mushroom trip or acid trip.Is what?The random one. When just the home, like how Salim didn't plan on fucking getting super high before the pod. Then I show up with a rig and he's like, Fuck it, we're getting high. Those are the best highs. That's the best mushroom trip. When you're sitting with a home and he's like, What are you doing today? You're like, Man, I ain't doing nothing today. But I'm finally off. He's like, We should take mushrooms. I have some. You're I mean, that's awesome. That's the best mushroom tree.

What era did you go through a super party phase? Like a what ages?

Man, 24 until a year ago. From 13 to 38. Just slowed down last year. I got off cocaine is what changed it for me. I realized that I love drinking, but I love doing cocaine more than drinking, and I would drink just to do cocaine.

There's times when it's peanut butter and jelly, right? For sure. But sometimes No two drugs go together better. Sometimes you just got to have a peanut butter sandwich. You don't need the jelly.

Yeah, but no two drugs go together better. You know what I'm saying? What really got me was, I guess, honestly, the fentanyl epidemic.

Did you have a moment where you're like, I got to stop? Or was it just like-I had came off of codeine and pills, and that was hard.

When I first got with my wife, I was really, really strung out. When I sobered, really got that and dealt with it and got into the program and really started understanding sobriety, I started getting back into alcohol and then eventually cocaine, as it always leads. Then I got off coke and I'll still have a drink. I manage it better today than I've ever managed it. But I do so much for sober living and for the sobriety and for the recovery community that there's a misconception that I am sober, and I'm not. But I am totally anti-drugs. In this era of my life, I'm against all drugs, except for I don't consider mushroom a drug.

What if you don't mind me asking, what was your day like when you were doing all those types of drugs? Would you wake up and just do a pill right in the morning?

I'd wake up and take a pain pill or something like that, a Percaset or something, and I'd hide behind. I have a hangover, so it'd be a reason to take a Percaset. And by two or three that afternoon, but whatever time, within the next two hours, I'd be sipping serve. I'd be for sure pouring codeine in a Sprite, 100% of the time. And then later that day, my heart beats so slow that I do some coke, something to try to balance. I was just constantly trying to balance the equation. I was living in a constant state. And by the end of the night, you're taking a Xanax because you can't come down because you've done too much blow now. You know what I mean? It's like, Oh, my heart's going too fast now and I can't drink codeine. When I look back at the drugs I were doing together, they were supposed to interact in a way that it should have killed me forever ago. My wife parted. She did blow and drank heavy. But we first got together, and she was like, you got to get to fuck off that cocaine.

Especially now, too. I don't know if it's just because we're older, but drugs are just fucking everywhere, bro. It's fucking everywhere. You got to really have self control, and you got I don't know what you want when you go out now. No, for sure. There's not a time I don't go out that I don't see fucking cocaine now. It's fucking everywhere.

At the time, it's the most dangerous, but I think it's because we're older, too. But I was always the guy with it. I was the guy that blocked off bathrooms. You know what I mean? We just took over bathrooms and establishment, fucking a bunch of...

You know what I mean? The urinal is wide open and you're just waiting for the handicaps.

Yeah, literally. People are just like, Fuck, here goes these guys. We just come in and rail out bathrooms.

Did you get caught a lot doing blow?

Yeah, we did it publicly. I always believe that cocaine was for the lip. Yes, whenever, wherever. People wouldn't care. You've been around me enough now to see my personality. Imagine this personality on cocaine.

I can agree with that. You know what I'm saying?

I can agree with that. Just imagine me on a fifth of Crown Royal and an eight ball.

You know what I'm saying? What do you look like at that point? Because you don't seem like an aggressive dude anymore.

Even then, I'm still to this day. I know you all drink with everybody. My word is, we will make a memory. I promise you, I go dark. It is my shit. And I'm happy. I'm a big, happy, lovable drunk. It just intensifies who I am. Back then, I wasn't a good... Man, thank you for this, actually. I've changed who I am as a human. I always believe that... Two things I believe, money doesn't create character, it reveals it. Same thing I believe about alcohol. Alcohol doesn't create character, it reveals character. You know what I mean? When I was a bad human, I drank a lot and became a worse human. You know what I mean? As my heart softened up, when I drink now, I just want to love people. I just want to hug on you and ask you how you're doing. I become a big brother. You know what I'm saying? You've been drinking water. You know what I'm saying? I turned into that You eat vegetables I'm that guy. I'm that guy.

Add us on Nelk Boys because we are posting on Snapchat every single day all the crazy shit that's happening. We're posting it in real-time. It's literally like a daily vlog. We have over 2 million followers on there. It's getting over a million views a day. It's crazy. Search up Nelk Boys, add us because if you guys want to see all the crazy shit that's happening in the fucking Nelk world in real-time, Snapchat is the best way to do it. Just want to tell you guys that quick. Let's get back into the podcast.

You talked about the money. What did change for you, though? Because you talk about it reveals your character. Do you ever feel like at one point you were becoming something you didn't want to be? Because it took you, like you said, you grinded for 15 years.

Yeah, but lucky for me, none of it before success. I tell people, I don't think God blessed me a day before he knew I was ready for it. I think that if he had gave me this money when I was... That's why I'm proud of watching you all grow. If he had gave me you all's money at you all's age, I'd have died. I'd have got myself killed. If somebody would have shot me or I'd have overdosed. I just I had no perimeter. I had no understanding of... I had no moral compass. You know what I mean? I had no vision. I think a lot of this was God just letting me tinker around and figure out. I think that's why my philanthropy is so big, too, is that I just took all that money and burned it and spent it on fucking cocaine and strippers. You know what I mean? Now, it's like, I just take all this money and give it away as much as I can. You know what I mean? It's just different.

Well, dude, when you're doing it for so long, and you're happy doing it without the money. Then it finally comes. It's just like icing on the cake, right?

Brother, I was getting 50 bucks or $500 or now 500 grand or whatever for a show. It was just the idea that when I was there, It was 100% chance I wasn't going to jail for selling drugs. It was 100% chance I wasn't going to get killed. It was 100% chance that I wasn't going to get arrested or brought up on a federal charge. You know what I mean? That's what this dream always signified to me. It was never really about the money. It was just about the fact that I'm here, I'm connecting with people, I'm serving a purpose, I'm helping people, and I'm not risking my freedom today.

How does it hit you when you walk out to a stadium with fucking 25, 30,000 people now?

I cry every night on stage, every night. I cry all the time. I mean, I cry like a bitch, a lot. But I try to explain it to people where I'm from. When you really actually come from that far down and fight those addictions in life and carry this fucking weight on me and you carry, you go through all that stuff and in and out of jail and nobody... Listen, if there was a... What do they call them things? Least likely or Most likely in school? What do they call them? They haven't worked for it.Yeah.

Most likely, too.

Most likely to run for President.

Yeah, but I would have least likely to succeed by every merit of everybody who ever knew me, ever.

Probably by yourself at that point, right?

Yeah, you know what I mean? So When you do that and you go on to do this, and then the music I make is helping people, Kyle. It's helping people. It's touching people, Stani. It's not just something they're banging on the way to the club. This is introspective. They're playing me at funerals. They're playing me in recovery houses across America. I'm helping people through this music, and I'm getting insane amounts of money for something I would do for free. You know what I mean?

It's like-It seems like a blessing from God, bro.

Yeah, it's a God That's the dog. I get emotional. I cry. You walk out and look at 15,000 people, and you're like, Dude, there was a time I couldn't get a visitor. And 15,000 people bought a ticket to see me in Wyoming. You know what I'm saying? It's like, that's my thought process. You know what I'm saying? I sold 30,000 tickets in Washington. At one show, and you're looking like, dude, I couldn't. There was a time in my life where I meant so little, and I was such a bad human that I could not even I get nobody to visit me. My dad would come see me once a month. You know what I mean? I didn't have a friend that would come see me. I didn't have a family member. You know what I mean? I was that bad of a human. You know what I'm saying? Outside of my family, like cousins and stuff.

All those emotions like that, that's what comes out when you see 30,000 people, all those memories and stuff.

Yeah, well, them too. Because there's some lady in the front row that's holding a sign that goes, Man, your music changed my life. And she's crying just because I walked out on stage. There's signs everywhere, like a wrestling, like a WWE, but there are the signs that say stuff like, We played Son of a Sinner at my son's funeral with a picture of her son on this big poster, and I see it in Section 201. You know what I mean? Like, Between that and where I came from, dude, the fact that we did this, I teared up over here telling you all about tearing up. You know what I'm saying? It's just even sitting here with you all, dog, I don't know how I ended up on you all's radar. Love to hear that, by the way. But it's like, I would have just... Even when you all started this pod a couple of years ago, it's been a couple of years now, right?

Yeah, it's been like two years and a bit. Yeah.

So it's like, even when you all started this pod, it's like, I wouldn't have thought. Even then, the concept that I would get invited on the pod was absurd in my mind, as a guy watching, I'm like, That's a pop culture podcast. No way I do something to make it over there. You know what I mean? It's like you just keep having these landmark moments that are like, Man, this is just fucking all unreal to me.

Did you have anybody? I mean, you talk about no one would visit you while you're locked up, not even your family, right? Did anybody actually believe in you the entire process?

Me and my father and my mother. My father really did, man. The story I tell is I would go sit down with him at this bar called the Ten Roofs on the Bummery Street. It's a hell of a party bar. Still to this day, you probably have 10 Roofs.

We've been to 10 Roofs.

It's the spot. My dad went there every day. He was like the bar father. You know what I mean? He would hang out in this booth, and all the people that worked there would come holler at him and stuff. I went to go see him one day. Man, I was probably... I'm going to say no bullshit. I'm going to say right around your age now. I'm going to say 29. And I go, Man, I'm over it, dude. I've done all I can do. I've pushed this thing as far as I can. I'm making like 38, 40, 40, $50,000 a year, and I'm spending it all just sleeping in the van and just chasing the next thing. It's costing me that much money to just stay alive and send money back to Bayly. I was like, I just feel like I'm failing as a father. I'm just spilling my problems off. My father's a man of few words, polar opposite of me. Gangster. You know what I mean? Sitting there drinking his vodka. When I'm done talking to him about it, he goes, All I'm going to say is, Jason, is that if you would have put this same energy into being a brain surgeon, you would probably be on your sixth or seventh year of college right now.

Why would you let yourself get that close to your dream and not get there? In his mind, he didn't know nothing about the entertainment business. He just looked at it like, There's no way you're working as hard as I'm watching you work, and this thing doesn't pay off. If you were to work this hard at Vanderbilt University, you'd be finna get a doctor's degree in the next two years. Why would you jump off now? That was the way he paralleled it to me because he was like, That dude at Vanderbilt is not making no money neither, but he's two years away from having a doctor's degree. I left there that day, and I thought about that, and it inspired me. It was one of them many of times he gave me talks like this, But it's the one I remember the most, you know what I mean? Of putting an extra set of... We've all been there where you just need a little more wind in your scene.

There's that click.

Just a little more. You just need somebody just to just let you know that, man, what you're doing is funny, Saline. Fuck everybody. It's going to work. It don't matter what scale it's working now, I promise you, you're funny. Your pranks are really good. You know what I'm saying? You feel me? It's like that happened to you at some point, I'm sure, too. That somebody came in and was like, Yo, that shit's actually like it could work. That was always my father. My mother My brothers, sisters, my family, believe it or not, always was really like, never once. They were always like, If anybody will figure it out, it'll probably be you. But they also knew I had the eye of a tiger. You know what I'm saying? You grew up in a household. They probably see something me. I didn't even see. But I didn't have... Friends, I guess, struggle. He's been my best friend for 20 something years. We've been making music together. We've been to jail together a few times. Had a couple of cases. We came from the streets to the music together. He always believed I was going to... He always believed it, too.

Yeah, man, I don't know. Your story is just fucking dope.

Yeah, you're like a modern day preacher. I don't know. You seem like an angel or something. I swear to God.

Everything about you, too. It's so unique. Even your look just doesn't make sense to most country guys, right? I don't see anyone with your look. Yeah, for sure. It's so unique and different.

I think Steine needs to bear it.

It seems like you went through these trials to now you've gotten through it, now you can help so many people based on what you've been through and what you've learned, right?

That's all I want to do, I just want to help. I've been using this quote lately as, I don't want to be happy anymore. I want to be of service. I can't remember who I think I heard Shia La Buff say it, but it was such a concept to me of like, I'm even past the point of wanting to be happy anymore. I just want to be useful. You know what I mean? I just want to be of service. I just want to make sure that I can... I spent so many times tearing shit down and so many years being the part of the problem, that now I just want to be as much a part of the solution as I can be. I'm also conscious of it, too, because I know how this game works, is that people are only going to care what I have to say for a certain amount of time, and I want to make that time useful. My acceptance speech, most viral moment I ever had. Did you all see it by chance? Yeah. I talk about the windshield being bigger than the rear view mirror. Man, I'm looking up at that clock, and when you accept an award, there's a big screen TV out there that's just like the run of show shit.

You know what I And I looked up at it right after I held the trophy up and it said '58, '57. I was like, Oh, I only got a minute. I was like, Man. My first thought was like, You better say something that matters. That's what I'm telling myself. You got a minute, boy. You better say something that matters. It might be the only time you ever get to stand up here. It might be the only award I ever win. Again, it might be the last award I ever win. You know what I mean? I was like, I got a minute here where the world might listen to what I got to say. I better say something to make a motherfucker feel good. You know what I'm saying? I spent so many time behind the scenes making people feel bad. I want to push, baby. That's the shit I'm on these days, man. Trying to be a happy dad, dude.

I can't imagine how many people you've inspired. I don't know, just a lot of people, right?

I hope to do it again. When I drop this weight and get my shit straight, I hope to get a whole new- That'll be crazy.

That'll be fucking- I told Gary Breck, I was like, Man, I got a chef Ian Larios.

He works with a bunch of UFC guys. He helped Balal cut for the fight, the Coventry fight. I know Balal didn't fight, but you know Balal was waiting in that day in case he was the backup. So he went and cut him. He came from George Lockhart's camp. He's moving in with me next week. That's the making it changer. So between him and Breca, dude, I think, man, you all are going to see a dude. I'll get back on this pod later, dog. It's going to be old skinny roll.

Well, that's a blessing, too. If you can have a chef that... Because he's going to cook you tasty ass healthy. That's a fucking blessing. We have a chef, too. She's more just like a grandma. She's a shitty cook. But she's more here for energy. She gets the job done. She's more here for energy. She's like our mom. She's like a host mom. But it definitely helps. That's a blessing. So that's going to be key for 100%.

You talk about how much you love the rap game. What about today's Rapper's collab you would ever do or you would like a project you want to work on?

Oh, dude, man, I love everybody, man. I love NLE Chapa. We talked a little bit. A big fan of his. Kevin Gates, Joyner Lucas, NBA Youngboy. Man, I listen to everything. I listen to all the up and coming stuff. I love Dirk. Dirk and Morgan do so much stuff together, though. I don't know if I could get in over there.

You and NBA would be fucking so I'm crazy, bro.

I fuck with Young Boi, man. That'd be crazy. I love his melodies. I think they're just so incredible. I love that whole era, though. I love some of the new stuff that's happening. I think people think people are giving hip hop a hard time right now.

What do you mean by that?

Because I don't think I had a number one album this year. I think Drakes might have went number one, but he's the goat. He's going to go. He's literally the goat.

Is country bigger than it's been?

Country is biggest and coolest it's ever been right now. It's really It's a really cool moment to be in country music. I'm honored to be in the middle of the wave of what is country music right now. But Morgan Wallen is almost single-handedly doing that. Him and Zack Bryant and me are doing it by themselves. As far as I'm concerned, they brought the national spotlight to the rest of us. We're all just trying to get a little piece of that sunshine they brought over here.

Morgan's a superstar, but his music's just really good. It's so good. His music's fucking fire.

It's so good. His voice is so good. His songs are so good. Morgan is a songwriter, dude. Yeah. He He'll cut outside songs, but his ear, his understanding, his songwriting, the streams give him the credit he deserves, but critically, he's more brilliant than he gets credit for. I agree, yeah. You know what I mean? He is truly brilliant, man. I've been in a room with him. He's special. Because to me, all this boils down to songwriting. Who can actually hold their weight? If we cleared this room out right now and I said, I need two people to stand here and write a song with me, or one person to stand here and write a song with me. That's when the rubber meets the road. Can we sit here and cook up something that actually matters? You know what I mean? You find out who brings what to what rooms when you do that. Morgan's brilliant. You know what I mean? Because I say this with love to my LA friends, but There's no harder town to cut your teeth in songwriting than Nashville. I've wrote in LA. I've wrote with hip hop dudes, I've wrote in New York, I've done all the writers rooms, the pop rooms, the TV rooms.

I'm a songwriter above everything. When I quit doing this and we just all hang out and fish and get drunk together and you're like, You should go do some shows. I'm like, Never. But I've been writing songs. Listen to this one. I'll always write songs. Long after I quit performing, long after I quit doing all that other stuff, I'll write songs forever. To me, that's the core of it. In Nashville, there's no place to write a song like that, city man. It's the best of the best.

Just because everyone's there.

Yeah, it's the fucking UFC of songwriting is the way to look at it. You know what I mean? La, respectfully to me, I don't know. Don't get me in trouble here. But yeah, to me, it's as big as a great song writers in LA, hit songwriters. But Nashville is different. Everybody knows it.

Do the songwriters in Nashville write for all genres or mostly just country? Or are they writing pop shit, too?

They write pop shit sometimes, but they're normally just like country music. For other artists and shit. Yeah, they're normally just like country music. It's really cool, though, man. We're going there and I'll take a writing session with two other people, and we'll go write a song for another artist. It's not even in the room.

Have you done that? Oh, yeah, for sure. Any songs that we would know?

Yeah, we'll talk about it Okay, cool. But do you decide? My credits are out there anyway, but I'm not like, I don't want to take away from it.

Do you decide after the song, you're like, this would be good for this artist, or do you that beforehand?

Both ways is the cool thing. Sometimes people start writing, they'll have a cheat sheet The publisher will send them and be like, Hey, such and such is working on an album. Or such and such is looking for a song that feels like. You'll take that cheat sheet and be like, Let's target write this. But some days you just write one and halfway through it, you're like, Man, this would be really cool if such and such got on this. You know what I You'll hear artists. I have my artist friends that are singer-songwriters, send me songs. You know what I mean? My boy Hardy. I don't know if you all ever heard of him. He's the man, dude. He's fucking awesome, right? He sent me one the other day. He was like, I just can't not hear you on this. Let me know what you think about it. It's just how songwriters, how we write. You know what I mean?

It's really cool. Would you say that in this space, everyone's pretty supportive of each other, or it's still everyone's competitive?

I think everybody's really supportive of each other.

I don't want to cut you up, but I will say the one thing with country is it's unique because everyone's in Nashville. In every other, everyone's spread out to the country. Everyone's in one spot.

No, we're all there. Country Music has three major award shows a year that actually matter, really matter, like nationally televised, big deals. Country music has tons of festivals, more festivals than any other genre as far as just music festivals. It's such a community that not only does everybody live there, we're all doing the same media, we're all at the same award shows. If I don't plan on seeing... Cody Johnson is a friend of mine. I'm just like picking a country dude here. Cody Johnson comes in my first. Cody Johnson or Raleigh Green. We don't see each other much throughout the year. We talk a lot. We're all really good friends. But we know that, whether we try to see each other, we don't have to try to see each other. We're going to see each other seven times this year, no matter what. We're going to see each other CMA week. We're going to see each other CMA Fest. We're going to see each other ACM week. We're going to see each other CMT week. You know what I mean? We're going to see each other CRS week. We know this. You know what I mean?

So we plan our parties around it. It's a really cool thing when you see that in the community. It's like the backstage at a country awards. Listen, we'll talk about it after the Grammys because I'll get to see one of the other ones, finally. But I'm willing to bet the Backstage in a country, one is way different than the backstage in one of those. We all fucking really know each other. You know what I mean? So it's really cool.

That's dope. How important is it when you met your wife and she came into your life?

Besides the birth of my daughter, the second single most important event in my life was meeting my wife. Nobody would have ever been able to... Nobody's seen in us what we've seen in each other. I think that's what makes our love so special, was I looked at her and I knew that she was more than what she was in that moment. I don't know if you know the story, but we're open about it. My wife at the time was an escort, a hired escort in Vegas. She grew up in Vegas. At the time, I was $500 shows living in that white van. You know what I mean? I I didn't have a key to an apartment. I just let my little place go. I was down on my... I was trying to figure it out. I was regrouping in life. I looked at her and I didn't see that, though. I was like, I see a woman that's really could do something. I see a woman that could be a brand. I see a woman that could be a boss. I see a woman that could run a business. I've seen that in her. You know what I mean?

She looked at me, and at that time, I've been wrote off. Every record label on Earth said no twice. You know what I'm saying? Big part of the Cheli Roll story, they said no like a motherfucker. You know what I'm saying? Here I am putting out independent records, and I'm just trying to find my way and find my sound. She looks at me and we're early into our dating phase, and she's like, You're going to be a superstar. She's like, You don't realize how much your music is going to touch people. You know what I mean? This was one of our early encounters. You know what I mean? I just remember nobody's seen that in her. Nobody's seen that in me, but we've seen it in each other. You know what I mean? We've seen that in each other. The fact that she has I don't know, 50, 60, 70,000 Patreon subscribers for her podcast. It doesn't surprise me.

That's amazing. 70,000?

Yeah. Wow. She's got a real thing. That's fucking dope. She does a TV show on her Patreon. You know what I mean? She's huge. She does millions of downloads a month on her podcast. I mean, she's crazy. I'm going to talk to John about her soon. Her shit is insane. Her TikTok is huge. What's the podcast? The dumb blonde podcast. Yeah, you all check it out.

We'll put the link in the description.

But she's Yeah, she's so brilliant. You know what I mean? But it didn't surprise me. I knew it. You know what I mean? We used to joke all the time, she'd take these sexy pictures for the internet because it was the thought era. Remember that era? You know what I mean? I'm leaning in on it. Is that era still around? That's how I know I'm old. I partook back then. Yeah, that's still a lot. I partook back then. I would tell her, I'd be like, Dude, I'm telling you, you'd get more attention if you just get on there and talk. You know what I mean? Because I just knew how funny she was. She's so intimidating because she is cool. You all seen her, right? Yeah. She's beautiful. Like 100% just undeniable, like bad bitch. You know what I mean? But I was like, But what you don't know about her is now you know because she's so big on TikTok, and she's goofy as fuck. Bunny is goofy. Like me. She's silly. You know what I mean? In a gentle, genuine way. I was like, This is the stuff that the world would go crazy.

It's the jelly roll thing. I don't look like I would be this jovial. I don't look like I could sing good neither. So I have two things going for me. I'm a relatively jovial guy, and I got a decent voice. Two things you didn't see coming. I was like, They're never going to see you being awesome. Just go be yourself. And when she leaned into that shit, man, it's like, Yeah, sorry, I went on that tangent, but I just fucking love her, dude. And I'm high. I got high with Saleen before this podcast. I'm talking too much.

How dope does it feel to find a girl that she's just the one?

Oh, dude. That It must be dope.

It's such a good feeling. And when your world shrinks-I'm serious. I know. When your world shrinks, dude, you found one? You got your one? No, I'm still looking for that, for the one.

We're all still looking for the one. That's why I'm asking because I'm trying to get advice, too.

No, it's a real thing, man. It's like-How long you been together? I can only imagine, Kyle, how successful you'll be when you find the one.

It's just so hard.

No, it scares me because-But it's also what timing, too, right? Yeah, it's all about timing. But it scares me because, man, you have done so incredible with your mind scattered about birds everywhere, that when you focus on one bird, and that's all that matters, dog, you're going to fucking be the next Donald Trump or some shit, dude. You're going to be the next President of Canada, if you want to be, or something like that.

I might do that. I might have to. I might have to pull a Trump and say Canada one day.

I'm being for real, because that's what happened to me. My world shrunk. All of my focus and attention was like, I didn't realize how... Even now, you don't think you put a lot of time and energy in there? Is you're going to chase some pussy?

No, we've been talking about that.

But if you look at your text, just little brain cycles of just waste that you know is a waste.

It's all just like-I'm trying to tell Steiny that, too.

Especially when you don't get it done, too.

Oh, your God forbid. You run out and chase something around and I'm stuck in the front door with a good night's.

I invested three weeks into this fucking bullshit. Could have put that time elsewhere.

Yeah, for sure.

When you really think about how much time you waste just Chasing Pussy. That's when I got in shape is when I just said, For the next four months, I'm not going to chase Pussy. I'm just going to focus on this.

Are you still just drinking once a week?

Yeah, once a week. If maybe even less. This month, I have a calendar in my room, and we have to do something in South Carolina, we have to do something in Toronto. I just mark it two X's on the calendar besides that. If there's nothing crazy going on, I'm not just going to go out.

How cool is it to be in a situation? I think about this all the time, to be in a situation of life where you look at work like, Oh, got to work that day, so I'm drinking. Exactly. It's like the opposite of every other job on Earth, where you look at days and go, I didn't want to drink today, but I do have to work.

Now, it's just like, I've been doing it for so long. It's got to be something cool. We're going to go to South Carolina for Happy Dad and do a cool event there. I haven't been there. What part? I think we're going to go everywhere around the state and just activate it.

Do it like you all did Texas when you all just ripped through the whole state.

Yeah, so cool shit like that. But then besides that, I'm trying to just gain diet.

Did you see that March ninth competition that we're doing? Are It's like a physique competition for March ninth, so we're dialed.

We got all right. Just the note boys. So us, Steve, Gabe.

Ain't that the night of the fight?

Yeah. Okay. So that day we're all going to do whoever makes-So this is where you all can party that night.

Oh, 100 %.

Stani is not really in it no more.

You already dropped out, Stani.

I just don't post my shit all day. I want a sneak attack. You know what I mean? No one's expecting it, and I fucking win that bitch.

That's awesome. Who you all think is going to win?

Salim's pretty dialed. I'm dialed, I know.

Are you really? Perfect.

Oh, this makes me happy. I thought about joining Bert. Bert Kreisler is trying to do a 5K in May. Is he? I swear that's his thing. We're doing a 5K by May. Bert wants to do a 5K by May. That's three and a half miles, right? Am I tripping?

Yeah. Is it three and a half? I think it's more. What?

So you just have to run three miles? Yeah.

But Bert is trying to get... Well, I got a little worse. By May? That's late for me, bro. No, by May for sure. But I thought about it. Five months? Five months? You're going to run. Gas me up.

You can run aCast me up. Half a marathon by then, buddy.

Let me do it. Cast me up.

You got the chef coming. You got Gary Breck. Bert is done.

You should post it, too.

Bert and Tom Seger. It's official. I'm joining you all for the 5K in May. Fucking Kyle said it. It's done. You should post it. Five months, you got that. I've been walking every morning. I'm feeling good. I'm walking like two miles every morning. Two and a half miles every morning.

He should definitely post it. That's how he got me to do it. He told me to post it.

When he posted it, that's what I did. Now you announced it, so now you have no choice.

That's why I did it. That's why I looked straight to catch my camera.

It's eight miles, bro.

Yeah. No,5ks, 8 miles? Oh, God, damn. Fuck you, Stine. He scared the shit out of me. I was like, Tom, I take it back. I was willing to do three.

Yeah, dude. So when did you know she was the one?

When I met her.

What moment?

When we first met at the bar and hugged.

The first meeting? I swear.

We didn't end up talking. She had a dude then, so we didn't chat. Love it for her.

That's a real thing, bro.

I'm telling you. But how do you do that when you know she's with... When she has somebody else, that didn't kill your...

I knew enough about the situation that I had I had a leverage up. I knew who she was and what her story was, and I knew who he was and what his story was. So I had just enough of the low down to be like, Oh, yeah, this is like... It was a very violent relationship, and I knew that. It was notoriously violent. So I instantly was like, Why would that girl be with that? I couldn't figure that part out anyways. She didn't look like the woman... Because some women, I don't want to say that, but some women are in arbitrary relationships, and that's their thing, which is still a problem. You know what I mean? They should never be abused. That's a deeper-rooted issue. But she didn't look like the woman that wanted to be in an abusive relationship. You know what I mean?

You observed it?

Yeah, immediately, I could just feel it. I feel the energies, man.

Energy is a real thing.

It's a real thing.

We have good energy in this room, right?

Yeah, it's a great energy in this room. I was worried about you because you've had some rough runs on the pod with different people. So I was like, I wonder if Tiny has got good energy. But When I hugged you, he feels like a great kid, man.

I'm two for two with that today, actually.

You could tell by the hug.

Yeah, I want to feel your energy. It's not about how much you embrace neither, because I know everybody's not a hugger. I'll still feel your energy if you're not a hugger. I know some people will be a little stiff, and I'm like, Oh, they're just not a hugger. But you just feel, I don't know, it's an exchange of energy. I feel like anytime we get this close to each other, you start to really feel there's a thing in the room that happens. Especially in these settings, because you're coming in to talk about real life stuff. Real shit. Shit, and chat a little bit, and there's cameras everywhere. It's a whole different approach. You really feel the energy in these rooms. Because you walked in to somewhere, you walked in and sat right down. I was like, They don't want to be here. We've all done them. We've all done media. You all might not have. You all been on fire a long time. But I spent a lot of time not on fire. You walk into places and be like, I don't really... Nobody's into this. This is on autopilot. I didn't feel that. When I walked in, I was like, It's a cool situation.

Dude, I wish we could go back and see one of the $50 shows. Experience that. Yeah.

Come to Nashville. We'll do a bar night. We'll go out and get drunk and we'll sing at the bar for fun. That'd be down.

What are you doing this weekend?

Come on. Are you coming this weekend? We could. I'm in town.

I've never been to Nashville.

Oh, yes.

Should we come out? I've never been. We'll just do it one night, Saturday. I'll take you all out on a Saturday.

We'll fucking rage, though. We'll get to have Eats set up the next day. It'll be a hoot and a half. It's a thing.

We're talking about our health grind, though.

No, but it's once end of the week.

Yeah.

We could have once end of the week.

Okay, fine.

I'll participate in the send.

Maybe we'll fly on Friday night. Saturday, we'll rip a fucking early morning workout, then we'll have a country day, and then we'll go out at night.

We'll have a country day. We'll go ride some four-wheelers and fuck off. And then we'll drink at night. And then that night, we'll go hit the hockey tops, and we'll play some songs. We'll get up there and sing. You know any country music?

I know some, Morgan. I like Chris Stapleton. Chris Stapleton is pretty good.

He's the absolute go.

Morgan's good, yeah. But yeah, mostly Morgan.

What about you, Stani?

Yeah, I used to like Florida Georgia Line a lot. That's when I got into it, like 2016.

They had some real bangers. Morgan Up Down was one of his first big ones for down. My buddy Ernest wrote some of that stuff with him and Morgan and Hardy early in that stuff. Big friends with Tyler and BK. They're good guys.

Cole Swindle and what's-Love Cole. I just have it all over my fucking-Love Cole.

When Cole won the ACM this year for the... I never going to tell you stories. When Cole won the ACM for the Heads Carolina song this year, we were down in Austin, Texas, and I went to the mothership the night before the awards show and got racked. Like, racked. Kill Tony. I went to Kill Tony with Tony Hidscliff. Or it might have been a Ron White show, actually. Then I went Monday for Kill Tony and got racked. We were down there fucking often. That night of the ACM, we go out and party. The last party I went to was Cole Swindles, and I showed up. I don't remember hardly being there, but I just remember Cole being on top of the fucking world, man. He's a great dude, man. You know any country music?

Morgan's my favorite. Who else do I listen to? Well, since Morgan, you all I like Mitchell Tenpenny's music. He's the best.

His music's fire. He's from Nashville, Tennessee. He's from my city.

We've hung with him before. It's like a sleeper one. I think his music's really good.

So good, man. His voice is unbelievable. And the big course. All his songs are fire. Yeah, he's... I don't fuck with bitches no more. Yeah, he had the Bitches song. I love all of Tenpenny. Any stuff.

Yeah, his shit's good.

If he's in town, we're going to go out and rip with us. But we'll get out and have some drinks. It's called a sit-in. So the old cowboys in the '70s is from when I learned the term, whaling and known would go to... The Rhymen Auditorium is in the Alley against Tootsies, which is the world's most famous hockey talk in the world. It's an original hockey talk, which connects to Layla's and a place called Roberts, which I'll take you all to all these little spots. These are the hockey talks on Broadway. You've probably been, but I'll show you the history of them. But that alleyway connects to the artist entrance of the Ryman auditorium, the historic Ryman, the mother church of country music. These stories were these guys would leave the Ryman, and they'd get drunk, going to Tootsies, and whatever band was in there, they'd say, they just We mind if we sit down? And they called it a sit-in. So like, Wayland Jennings would be at a Hockey Talk on a Thursday night just off. And him, like comedy, like how comics go in and work out their set. They just go into these bars and take over and just play music.

Imagine being a Saturday night, you're just watching some house band play, and then fucking Wayland Jennings shows up. You know what I mean? You're watching Wayland Jennings sing his favorite Buck Owen song. You know what I mean? It was just a different era. So we try to keep that spirit alive. And a few times a year, we'll get drunk, go down to Broadway and hit every bar and sing.

That's fucking cool.

I've never been to Nashville.

It's a ball, dude. It's mad different.

You have a girl opening for you right now, Jessie? Or am I wrong? Is Jessie Murphy open?

Jessie Murf. We did a song together. She didn't open for me. You heard that record, The Wild Ones?

She's so good. She's all over my TikTok.

Yeah, she's huge, man. You all check it out. She's really... She's special, man. She's like my little sister. Yeah, she just did the Jingle Balls with me. And she did New Year's Eve. She did Dick Clark with us. She came out. She comes out anytime she can to do The Wild Ones with us.

She's 19, right?

Yeah, she just turned 19. That's cool. One of my fun moments where I think I became a fan because my daughter... I heard her voice, and I asked my daughter, Are you hip to this kid? This voice? And she was like, Yeah, she's young. She's my age. And Bayly showed me her TikTok, and I think that's how it all launched out. She's really, really... She is a different talented... I tell this story very openly. I invited her to come sing at one of my shows because I love covering songs and stuff. It's just like a passion. I just love music, whatever. I just love it. I was like, Yo, let's do Simple Man by Skinnyard. We'll do the Shinedown version of it, though, because I just got off tour with Shinedown, so I was just in a routine of singing it anyways. What I really wanted to see was how that voice worked in person. Because when you hear her on TikTok, that voice is so distinct and smoky and just so draws you in. I was like, I wonder if she's hurting her voice trying to sing. So I wondered how she sang it, at what level?

Man, pitch perfect. That girl is phenomenal. I mean, everything about... To be that young and have that much of an understanding of what she wants, she's going to do whatever. She could be like our next Amy Winehouse or something crazy. Wow. Damn. She could be big. I mean, dude, she's 19. Yeah, it's fucking-You know what I mean? It's the same way I look at you all being all young and shit, dude, I'm old, man. I'm going to do this a few more years and retire just as soon as I got famous. You know what I mean? You all are going to have long runs. She's going to have a long run.

What's your favorite cover to do?

Probably Old Time Rock and Roll, just because it's the song that got it all started for me as far as singing.

Do you ever try... Could you do any... You said you did Hard Out Here for Pimp. Could you do like, Mask Off Future?

Yeah. Oh, dude, all the future tapes, man. Did you see the mixtape? You're a hip hop kid. Did you see the mixtape Mount Rushmore?

Is that Future?

No, did you see what they said about it? So they said, who are the four biggest faces?

Who said this?

No, I forgot. It was like a hip hop blog site. This was a huge argument on the internet a month ago.

Okay, what's on it?

It was Future.

He has to be.

Gz, Wayne. I'm trying to remember who the fourth was because the fourth one wasn't Gucci.

Gucci has to be on that.

And I There were people arguing if it should have been Gucci or not. I thought for sure it was Gucci.

He's got the most mixtapes ever.

Somebody said the coolest thing about Gucci and Jeezy. We were talking about this. I don't know. Fuck, I can't believe I'm talking this open with you all. We were talking about mixtape eras. Were you a part of this era at all? You were in it. A little bit, dude.

I was on that pitch.For.

Sure.yeah, I was on that. I think Gucci had the longer, more consistent run. I think Jeezy had the bigger individual moment because Trap or Die ended up being was such a classic mixtape. To me, it was like the beginning of that mix tapes being consumed like albums. That's my thing is I think Gucci had a longer run and a more consistent run, but I think that- Dude, people forget Gucci has fucking mixtapes with Drake features that no one has even heard.

Dude. I used to listen to a lot of that.

To me, we're still talking about second no matter what. They were talking about 50. 50 was the fourth one because you remember 50 had that big wild mixtape run right before Get Rich or Die, Trying.

I don't know if you remember that era. Well, Get Rich or Die, Trying is the best. I think that's the most timeless album ever. It's the best album.

It's top five albums ever, Peter. It's in hip hop, for argument, the best one ever.

You can listen to that shit today, and it bangs just as hard. Bangers.

Yeah, 100%. Anytime I hear Many Men, I still just get goosebumps into my armpit. It's a hard one, too.

Many Men is a slupper.

Heats a hard one, too, by 50.

We were talking about 50 Cent mixtape era. Do you remember his mixtape era?

I didn't really listen I listened to 50 as much. I listened to them now more.How.

To Rob the Industry era.Yeah.

But back then, I was pretty much a kid. I wasn't really... But my brothers and sisters listened to it.Yeah, it was different.But now, I'm listening to everything that he was making back then.

The cool thing about Where I'm at in age is I got to see all these mixtape areas in real-time. None of them were as hard as Wayne.

No. Well, he has no ceilings, and then he has... I don't know what other mixtapes, but no ceilings was crazy. For sure.

I forgot what the drama... What The Drama Gangsta Grills.

He did a lot with DJ drama.

He did so many of those Gangsta Grills. But to this day, his biggest records to me were the mixtape records. You know what I mean? The records that went off in the clubs in the south, especially, were all that mixtape area. I stole all that, by the way.

That was some of the best rap ever. Future Gucci and Wayne.

For sure. I stole all that, by the way. Futures Go, too. Futures Mixtape Go, for sure.

That guy's crazy, man.

100%. I wanted to put out music like a hip hop artist, tour like a rock and roll artist to write songs like a country artist. Because for me, it was easier that way. I watched the hip hop dudes. Nobody put out more music than a rapper. To this day, they are the best at creating content and consistency of music. If you looked at music like content in your business, nobody does it better than a rapper. Nobody tours better than a rock and roll artist. Every time you look up a rock and roll artist is fucking gone again. You know what I mean? Rock and roll dudes do 150, 200 dates a year, no problem. Man, the singer songwriter The songwriters in Nashville are doing 200 songs a year. They write 200 songs a year. I wrote 80 last year with my schedule.

When you say 80, is it like 80 that you submitted somewhere or just How does that work?

No, I'll submit some to my publisher to pitch to other artists to see if somebody around town wants to cut the records, but mostly just trying to write to figure out what the new sound is. I write like that every time. My goal was I put out 13 songs in '23. I want to put out like 30 and 24. For me to have the right 30, the game of numbers for me is I'll probably write 120.

How do you decide what to put out? Do you run it by other people?

Yeah, man, you're now stuck in the Jolly Roll folder. You'll get songs. You'll get songs. It's going to happen. Get some Dropbox folders. Yeah, you'll get some Dropbox folders, man, because you know what I do? I do SoundCloud links, private ones, and I'll tell you why. Because if you want to tell me what you think about it, I want you to. I encourage your input. But don't feel obligated. I'm going to see what you're listening to anyways. I don't get that in a linda called Dropbox.

Oh, okay. I see.

See on SoundCloud, I can look and see what songs are playing the most. So you ain't got to call and go, Hey, man, that song number seven is banging. I'll look and see it's got 700 plays compared to this one. You know what I mean? It's really cool. And not just you. Everybody gets the same link, but that's how I start picking singles. That's how I picked Son of a Center for my first country radio single. Really, Yeah. We just sent it to... We sent the Dropbox link to everybody. I mean, the SoundCloud link, and that's the song everybody kept going back to.

Why? Do you get worried that somebody might not keep it real with you?

Yeah. It's hard to be honest, right? You know what I mean? It's hard to be honest and critique somebody, especially when you're not in that world. Because I could imagine, but that means the most to me, though. If you were Cal or one of you all tell me something about one of my songs you don't like, that would mean a lot to me because you got the ear I want. You're the ear I'm going for. But I could also imagine you sitting at your house going, what fucking business do I have? Telling a fucking award-winning artist, I think the fucking bridge sucks. You know what I'm saying? You know what I mean? But it's like, that means a lot to me because that's who I'm writing for. You know what I mean? I'm writing for that. So that's why I'll start sending songs out in small package. I'll send you three or four. Because if you send somebody the album all at once, they might miss a good song because another song was better. You know what I mean? So I'll send a song. But yeah, I'll plant my wife, my daughter, Bayly. She's my biggest critic.

Man, my 15-year-old dude light my ass on fire. She'll fry me. She talks so much shit to me, dude. She'll make fun. They'll make me mad, almost. They'll carry it too far sometimes.About the music?Yeah.

About anything. You ever got your feelings? You actually ever got your feelings hurt by what? No.

But you snapped him and like, you don't know what you're talking about. You're just a kid.

No, never. Fucking dumb ass. No, never. But she has. It's funny, man. She'll lay into it. That's awesome. You all love her, dude. She's different. Me and my wife had cussed here for eight or nine years. And how I am in this room is how I am in life. So best story I can tell about my daughter is go back to that state Championship game. I'm pulling up Kyle, and I'm calling her phone, but I'm old, so I go, Hey, Siri. You know what I mean? Because I'm just whatever. That's a dad mom thing. It's a dad thing, right? I know I'm old. Fuck. Thanks, Tiny. So I'm like, Hey, Siri, FaceTime Bayly Ann. And I had forgot that she had got a new number, and I got another Bayly Ann new. So she didn't answer, so I called her friend. Now, I'm sidelined at this football game on the field. And she answers the phone. She goes, What is taking you so long? I go, Where are you? She goes, In the bleachers? Where are you? And I was on the field, and she was like, I was like, You need to come. And she was like, You need to come.

I was a little frustrated. I was like, Why are you not answering my call? She's like, You haven't called me. And I was like, Whatever. I was like, Come over here. She was like, Whatever, asshole. She tells that to me and hangs up the phone. And when She's walking over, I'm getting madder. I'm like, Why is she being so confident that I didn't just call her 20 times? And it was me. I fucked up. So when she gets up, she's like, What are you being such an asshole about? I was like, Look at that. She was like, Wrong number. I was like, I'm so sorry. Then I'm having to apologize. But I love that we had the relationship. I wasn't mad at her because I knew her confidence was like, she could tell she was just happy I was calling. She's like, What are you doing? But just to show you how she is in general. So, yeah, that same kid will be like, This song sucks. Then she'll tell me why the lyrics sucks. She'll be like, You know how corny that lyrics is? She's like, It makes you sound 48. When I walked up to her, that dad said, Everybody at your school has been talking about how I look too young to be your dad.

She says, That's crazy. They keep telling me you look too old for the music you make. That's the asshole I have as a kid. Welcome to parents.

They know how to talk shit.Yeah. Damn.

Maybe one time just double down and check her. You didn't tell me you were changing your number. You can't submit that easily, bro.

I changed her number. That's the problem. This was an all me moment.

Yeah, you're going to take the L.

This was an all me moment.

How much of the social media stuff do you pay attention to? Of what's going on? Not much. No?

No, I'm a YouTube guy. So if it's on YouTube and I see it, I'll see it. But I'm pretty much stuck on YouTube. I'll scroll through Instagram or whatever, but it's just not my thing.

Do you ever read all the love that you get in your DMs?

Yeah, sometimes. I'm in a fragile place in my changing of my life right now, so I'm cutting out outside things just because I don't need a lot of voices in my life right this moment. I'm trying to make some big decisions here. You know what I mean? I want to change my life. I want to get I want to be healthy. I want to live longer. I want to be happy. I want to feel better. I want to be of service. Sometimes you catch the love, but you catch that other shit, too. You know what I mean? I just don't care for it. I'm at peace with however it shakes out. I'm just fragile. I just need to work with you right now.

Yeah, I would agree, especially when you have that vision of something that you want to do. You don't really need to listen to all those other opinions.

Because it's game time for me. I don't feel like I'm sitting here. I feel like I'm sitting here with a lot to prove. Even the year I had, as blessed as I was with the award and the Grammy nominations and the sold out arena tour and all that stuff, I still sit here like a man that feels like there's a lot of people that don't think I can do it again. Yeah. That's a healthy place for me to be.

No matter what, you're always going to have people fucking doubting you and trying to take you down no matter what you accomplish.

Yeah. Change your whole life and do it. The quote I lived by, though, is they said, They could watch Jesus walk on water today, and they'd say it's because you can't swim. You know what I mean? To me, that's just it. But I'm in a good place where it's like, I know whatever group of songs I put out next will determine if I do this for the next 10 years or the next two.

I know that.

You know what I mean? It's different. It's a lot, right? It's different. Y'all's business is different, dude. You know what I mean? Y'all can We have a week where you don't put out a hit. You know what I mean? On here. You know what I mean? You could miss a hit here and there. You just got to come back with a hit.

That music is tough, right?

It's tough, man. I got a real big go. When we come out here and do these, I'm doing an off cycle, but when we come back and do the album thing, when an artist is in here talking to you all about their album, then they're betting their whole career on that week. They're betting their entire career. Every single time, we're betting our whole career on that album week. You know what I mean? Because it determines where we land at for the next until we drop again.

Yeah, I know. That's tough.

That's true. That is a huge difference. We could put up another YouTube video two weeks later and make a quick comeback.

For sure. It's okay to have a bomb. You know what I mean?

We can go away with them here and there.

Yeah, it's like we're okay to have songs that don't work.

It still sucks when you bomb, but you can recover quicker.

We're in a place where it's like, I can have a couple of songs, and I know every song of my album is not for everybody anyways, but I can have a few that don't connect. But when that album finally rolls out, the first few I put out didn't I'm like, The album better have a smoker on it. You know what I mean? Or I'm fucking in quite a spot. You know what I'm saying? A bit of a pickle here. I'm in that moment. I'm in album mode right now, so I'm super fragile. I ain't fucking with that internet right now. They're not going to gas me out of my spot.

Dude, there's nothing on there right now anyway.

I went to go see myself get wasted on New Year's whenever they lit me up for the New Year's performance.

I missed that.

No, it was just a small thing on Twitter. We talked about it. It was just funny to me because there was 25 million people watching It's that big of a thing.

People were throwing shame.

Oh, yeah. Well, imagine if you didn't know me from a Man on the Moon and you didn't like country music or my style of anything. Keep in mind, they don't know anything about me. They're just like, Who in the fuck is this morbidly obese man? They thought I was rapping because the first song I did was Halfway to Hell. But I'm a county gym, revival. I'm not rapping, but it was still, once again, the box, the genre thing. You know what I mean, motherfuckers? To somebody, that was rap. To some country, dude, I'm not country. Somebody out there thinks I'm a rapper right now. Do you know what I'm saying? To watch the Dick Clark for not ever rapped in 10 years. You know what I'm saying? It's just crazy.

Like your Action Bronson or something?

Yeah. I got mistaken for him for so many years. Until he lost weight, and we're finally... I joke with him about that all the time. People would always say, You're like the Southern Action Bronson. I was like, It's accurate, though.

That's funny.

You all had Action on here yet? I hadn't seen them on here.

No, we haven't done Action Bronson.

He's a hoop and a half, dude. That'd be dope. He's fucking He's a ball, man. I did his cooking show, and it was like, I probably showed up too high to be there, but it was just high enough to be there, but instantly I was like, This is crazy. But he shoots his show so loose. We just walked in, he's cooking and talking shit, and I was like, Well, I'm finna roll. He was like, See you later. They just kept filming. You know what I'm saying? It was like, why it was so awesome? That's dope.

So what else you got next? Grammys?

Grammys, man. Grammys in first week of February. February fourth, tune in, you all.

That'sbest New Artist nomination?

Best New Artist. Best New Artist. How does that feel? Best Country Collab. It's unreal. It's man. Especially being from the country music genre, anytime one of us gets nominated in the all genres category, it's a big deal for the whole city. The amount of love I got from Nashville for that nomination was really special.

Who else is nominated?

Noah Khan, who I think probably deserves it, frankly. I think he probably did a little more than me this year. I'm also just a fan. You know what I mean? I thought Zack Bryant was just as probably more deserving to me of the new artist from the CMAs. But Noah, Ice Spice, Coco Jones. Ice Spice is there, too. Ice Spice is there. Warren Treatey is one of them, which are friends of mine. They're Nashville people, too. I feel bad that I'm not thinking of the other two off top right now. I'm blowing it. I feel embarrassed, but I know those four for sure.

Is that a big thing for you? Obviously, it's a big thing to win a Grammy, but if you don't win, is it like...

Man, I don't think I'm going to I'm just walking in there in that mentality, which is not the mentality they told me to walk in with, but I just... I thought I walked into the CMAs. I'm such a fan. I don't think I'm going to win because I think Noah is so good. You know what I mean? It's just a fan of me. You know what I mean? Now, I hope secretly Noah is somewhere thinking, Jelly is so good. I hope he wins. You know what I mean? But he probably don't even know who I am. But it's like, that's my mentality walking in. I can say not winning. I'm always going to be a Grammys nominated artist, so that's cool. But, Kyle, if I win.

That's dope.

That's sauce. Can we daydream for a second? Can you imagine if my story ends up being the year of my 40th birthday, I won New Artist of the Year. I won a fucking Grammy for the New Artist. I'll be the second oldest one to ever win it. The oldest person, I forgot who it was, but they were like 40 or 41. They were only 10 months older than me when they won it. It would just... I don't know. I think it's a Cinderella story to a degree. You know what I Obviously, I'm cheering for myself a little bit. You know what I'm saying? I'd love to win one, but I could tell you this, I'm going to cry like a baby. I don't know if you all know what the Grammys mean, but let me explain it to you from an artist's perspective. You can win VMAs, CMAs, MTV Music Awards, ACM, CMTs. You can win Billboard Music Awards. You can win all these different things that acknowledge us as musicians. You can win all that. The day you get just nominated for a Grammy, just nominated for a Grammy, not even winning one, you are no longer...

That's not your intro. Your intro would Right now, my intro would be... Before I was Grammy nominated was CMA, New Artist of the Year, Jelly Roll. Now, if you look at when I went to that call, back to that state game, the next day, the newspaper up there put me on the front page for being at the Game?Grammy. It said, Grammy nominated artist, Jelly Roll. Just being Grammy nominated, Kyle, meant more to that newspaper publication than me winning three CMTs, Four People Choice Awards and one CMA. That's what I won last year, humbling. I'm not bragging, just can't believe it. But that's the truth of my year. I won three CMTs, four People Choice, and one CMA. And the headline was, Grammy Nominated. So when you win one, that's it. That's crazy. That's all, though. That's how you get introduced the rest of your life. You know what I mean? You get congratulated on your Grammy-Forever. Forever. You get congratulated for... I'll be congratulated for my CMAs until next year. Somebody else wins one. You know what I mean? You're congratulated for your Grammy. Congratulations on your Grammy. 20 years after you won it. It's crazy.

Your guys won a three, six, Mafia won a Grammy, didn't they?

No, they won an Academy Award, even crazier. They won a fucking Oscar. That's crazy. For a hard out here for a pimp. That's not awesome, dude.

Did you see their speech?

Yes, I did. I went and watched it again the other day. It made me so happy. You know they gave me one of my first chances, Little White. Oxycontin, Xanax, Paul, Percisus, and Lourdes, Little White dropped me down. Juicy Jay talked about it. Yeah, for sure. Juicy is my boy, man. That's my dude, man. Juicy and Paul, man. They've been in my corner from day one.

So if you do win the Grammy like- Bro, please.

I'm going to do it, too. I'm going to get your number two, Salim, all you all. But I'm going to send you all some playlist with some all three, six Mafiana and some UGK. Next time you're working out, just trust me. Just bang. You might not love it all, but it'd be cool for you to familiarize yourself with that era of Southern hip hop. It was the outkast.

We'll slap some this weekend, too. Yeah.

Oh, dude. Well, bang. I'll show you so much music, though. It's fucking... I'm like my mama. I'll play records all night.

We got ourselves into a Nashville setting.

Ain't this great? Let's go.

I think this is fucking great.

Was it good? That I finally talked a lot all the time.

You all gotThat's how I'm nervous. It was one of our best episodes.

Are your fans going to hate me?

No, they're going to fucking love you, bro.

It's just, yeah, it's dope to sit down and just chat with you.

I wanted to get in front of your fans because I'm a fan. I know I've said that a few times, but it's real. It's like, sometimes you want to... That's how I got with Bert, you know what I mean? With Brennan Shabb and then I'm like, I was just a fan. Theo and all these cool guys that have came into my life. I always felt like if I could get on that podcast, their fans would get me because I am their fan to a degree. I represent a slice of their fan base. I don't know. That's what was cool about this. That's fucking cool. Thank you all for the opportunity.I appreciate you, bro.Thank you for coming on.

We're going to be boys for a long time.

We're going to be boys for friends forever, you're stuck now. Let's do some country shit, man.

Come on, bro. Especially after we drink together.

We'll write a song. Let's do it.We'll have a drink and write a ride. Just no dark night down.

Grab a cold one.

We'll write a fucking Note Boy song for the YouTube channel.

We should do that. We are going to do that with Whizz, too. Yeah, we'll do it with Whizz.

Let's call Whizz and tell him to meet us out there on the mic and record it, though. No, I'll talk down. We'll get on the mic and record it. But I mean, we should call Whizz right now and be like, Yo, fucking meet. I bet he'll come. I bet if I call Whizz right now and go, If you're off Saturday, come to Nashville going out with the Nelk boys. I bet Whizz will be like, Fuck it.

Yeah, he might come. Whizz don't care.

No, we did him three weeks ago. He was in.

Yeah. No, he don't care.

We're going to make a fucking party.Track. Yeah.

He wanted to call it dry streak. Yeah. Because he's on a dry streak. We'll all have a different experience with the dry streak. It could be funny.

Love you all, boys, man. Thank you all. All right. Let's go. Peace, boys.

All right, boys. Just want to let you know real quick, we are available now officially at Walmart in California, Texas, and Florida. And then March first, we're going to be in over 3,000 Walmarts nationwide. So let's just We're making huge news for Happy Dad. If you guys have a Walmart near you, go to happydad. Com/fine. Go and pick one up. I'm going to go fucking grab some right now. Got some Happy Mom. Nice and cold. Two Cases of Happy Mom. Try to pick up a milk later. All right, boys, we're going to grab these. Make sure you hit your local Walmart. Grab a case of Happy Dad. We're also available at Fountain Blue in Miami and Jensen's Liquor in Miami as well. So hit those two spots for Happy Dad as well. Happy Dad's in Walmart, baby. Let's go.