A #1 Song In It's Infancy

kind of recapping where I was. I got off track from the one song, one music video every month that I promised you guys I was going to put out, and there was nothing that would have broken that promise besides a major life change for me, and that's what happened. One of these days, I'll probably get into that and get into my process through that and how me and my family have been since the summer twenty nineteen and

here we are rolling up on Christmas. But I think that's another podcast and I'll probably need to put together more thoughts before I get into that. Amber my wife as much a much better speaker when it comes to that right now, and I don't have as many words.

Does that make sense for what we've been through? And so if you if you came to this podcast to hear something about that, I'll get I'll get into that one of these days and talk about this journey specifically for us and what it means to me and what I what I hope, how I hope will find the meaning through all this. And I've said this a couple of times before that I'm not personally searching for reasons for why life happens. I'm searching for meaning. And I

think there's a substantial difference in those two things. And just like I think there's a big difference between joy and happiness. I feel like happiness can just happen upon you. The sunshines a certain way, and you know, you get rest one night and you wake up and you're happy. Joy is something much deeper. It's cultivated, it's it's a light inside of you, and that's a it's a completely different animal way and happiness, just like reason and meaning,

these are just you know, a lot of thoughts. I've had a lot of thoughts over the last several months. But I'm back to the podcast, and I want to talk about music, because that's how this podcast started. That's how seventeen episodes before this one went down. And there's still story to tell. There's still you know, extension of what we're gonna do. And first of all, I want to apologize for not having this podcast up and running

the last several months. I've heard from a lot of you and meet and greets, and the reason I'm actually sitting here now and spoke inne Washington in the back of my bus firing up the old microphone again is because almost every single day in a meet and greet, and we're we're on a West Coast tour right now, I hear somebody tell me when are you bringing back the podcast? In fact, somebody there's these dudes yelling several

shows ago. Could hear them yelling in the crowd. They were like coordinating it one, two, three, bring back the podcast, you know, yelling. And so I don't know if I hadn't have had that motivation from you guys, I don't know if I'd sit here and talk again on a podcast. Because now I have all these YouTube channels like the Smith. I don't know if you've seen the Smiths, but it's our family vlog channel on YouTube. We put out episodes every Tuesday and Thursday, and that's really been my only

voice these last several months. I've made moderate social media posts, and usually they're pretty deep and not not to surface level come see our show type stuff. But the smith is what I've really been able to dig into. I haven't done any radio interviews yet, i haven't done any TV nothing. In fact, this podcast will be the first thing since The Smiths that I've actually spoken out. So if you followed The Smiths, thank you for subscribing to channel.

Thank you for watching our our little, our little series we have going. It's been very therapeutic for me. I've

really enjoyed talking to the camera that way. I've also really enjoyed the videography involved in that, and I've kind of nerded out with cameras and if you've if you've watched that channel, you've seen it kind of evolve from literally cell phone type stuff at the beginning to really nice cameras and fun angles of the bus and drone stuff that you know, I've gotten into droning and I've really really kind of jumped into that whole aspect of the Smiths and Ye Life and the Granger channel, which

I'm kind of using all three. It's not something new for me, though. I have been doing camera work since I was a little kid. I would borrow my dad's camcorder and create some kind of show or some kind of documentary type thing ever since I was seven eight years old, and I have all that footage. I actually have it right here on my hard drive, and one of these days I think it'd be really funny to kind of release a little bit of it. My old

camera adventures. I got to the point where, like when I was in high school, everyone just knew I had a camera around. So it's really not that big of a deal for me to do the Smiths like I do now, and I actually just love it. If you want to ask me a question something podcast related, something for me to talk about, go to social media. Twitter is what I'm on right now looking at it because it's just easy hashtag Granger Smith Podcast. Ask me a question.

I could easily sit here and search it out like I'm looking at right now. Way cool. Underscore Junior back in September says, do you have any plans on doing the podcast? Again. Well, buddy, yes, here we go looking at another one. Livia one of my favorite fans in the world. She says, Oh okay. So it's been a year since Granger Smith showed a snippet of still Find You on the hashtag Grangersmith podcast and Haley and I still jam out to the short snippet of it. We

would love that song, need the rest of it. Thank you, Livia, You're amazing. Matt balloons. Right after that, he says, hashtag Grangersmith podcast. I think it would be a great idea to interview those guys you used to tour with. I'm super interested in hearing how life was with the old band mates or people you opened for at Granger Smith. Please keep the podcast. I really love them. See you

soon about. There's a lot of them on here, and if you guys want me to dig into that, just go to socials hashtag it and I'm interested in all of this stuff. So to kind of catch you guys up musically on what I got going on since the last time you heard a podcast in April, I was

talking about one song, one music video per month. Now instantly decided that that wasn't going to still be the plan and kind of pivoted towards That's why I love Dirt Roads, which is a song that I had completely finished, and then I went in there towards the end of the summer and started messing with that song. I kind of heard everything in a different light with our new situation, and I went and listened to that song again, and that was one of the songs we were planning on releasing,

and I just thought, man, this song is special. It's really special, and I changed. I went in there and changed up the second verse, kind of altered it a little bit to where I was in my life, which has always been important when I released songs for them to kind of parallel to my life, and so I changed some words around. Got back in the studio, which is for me, my studio. As you guys know, it's always been just a closet, and that's what it is

today right now. It's the back of the bus. But all the records that you've heard me sing have never been in a major studio. That's always me singing in a closet. So that actually makes it really nice for me to be able to go in and change lyrics even when songs are finished. That can go in and re sing some things, and it's typically not hard to get my voice to sound the exact same as it did if I recorded it a month or two ago.

I could quickly find that same voice again, and so it sounds like I sang it all in one day. And reality of that's why the Dirt Roads is. That's like a verse in chorus and bridge or no, excuse me, verse chorus and second chorus, sang it one time. A couple months later, I go in and sing the second verse in the bridge. Totally rewrote both of those for where I was in my life, and I can't even tell the difference if I listen to it all the way down. So now the question is, well, what happened

to the songs that we were planning on releasing. Well, we still have them. In fact, some of them are completely finished, completely mixed, everything's ready to go or just kind of excuse me, I am just kind of waiting for the right time, and I kind of want That's why I love Dirt Roads to simmer a little bit. I have a music video completely finished for that song, and I love the music video. I shot it behind the scenes for it, which I will put on the Smiths.

Whenever we get closer to releasing, when is that going to be? I usually leave that stuff up to my brother Tyler, and last time I asked him, he said, well, I don't want to just throw it out there. There's no reason to just throw a music video out there

just because we haven't finished. We might as well at least be a little bit strategic about it and let the holidays come and go, because it's you know, everything's holiday themed right now, and it's it's not really the greatest time to put out a music video, so we'll wait for that to die down. We have a lyric video finished that I just shot. I'd shot that over at mom and da house and sent that footage over to Paul, my video editor who does most of my editing,

and so we have that finished. So we have two things we need to put out for that song, and then I could start thinking about when's the album gonna come out? And there's got to be an album that has all these songs on it. There's a couple of these songs, guys, I'm really really excited about. There's one of them. I'm probably more excited than any song I've put out that I could remember in ten years or so, and why am I excited about it? It feels a

little different for me. It feels it's a little sad, like a sad country song, but with a cool groove, and I need that for my show. I typically look at songs as pieces of the show, you know, pieces of the ninety minute show, a little little moments, and if I could build up the moments, then the more the better. It makes the show better. And we need this specific song. It's gonna be great for the live show.

And so then looking back on the previous episodes of this podcast, I went back and kind of heard a little bit scanned through episode seventeen, and I was talking about kind of the period of my career where we were just kind of things were just starting to pop. I had the country Boy song out and things were

really working. I had an album called Dirt Road Driveway that changed my life and to this day, that's the reason we got nationwide and we got into a lot of different venues across the country because of Dirt Road Driveway. That included we do it in a field and if money didn't matter, and stick around and bear me and blue Jeans and Silverada bench seat and mud Tires and the country boy song Comfortable Love. So that was a really big deal for me, and that's kind of the

birth of Ye Nation. Was Dirt Road Driveway and after that, after that album came out, I lost my dad in twenty fourteen, and that was just shortly after Dirt Road Driveway was in twenty thirteen, kind of the end of it. So so I kind of had to. I had to endure grief for the first time. And everyone deals with grief in different ways. In fact, the different griefs I've gone through in my life have all been different, even though it's all me experiencing it different people, and I've

experienced grief different ways from different losses. And with my dad, I just wanted to smile again, you know, I wanted to feel good. I wanted to feel good again. And he was such a huge fan of my music and encourager of me and motivator of me and at sometimes critic of me in a good way that I needed and all he wanted through my struggle. You know, he saw me struggle for decades in the music business and he just he wanted to see me get the credit. He thought I deserved, and I think as a father,

that's an admirable thing. You see your son out there fighting and working and being creative and putting blood, sweat and tears into this work. And he just wanted to see me enjoy the fruits of that. And so with Earl Dibbles and dirt Road Driveway, he finally started seeing that. We got in a bus for the first time. We weren't, you know, we were actually sleeping in bunks instead of taking turns driving a van every night, and that it so much to him to see it. It's kind of like,

you know, this proud dad moment. He can kick back and smile and say I knew it all along, and I could truly say he did. He knew it all along. He knew I would get a record deal, he knew we would eventually get fans, and he saw so many

shows with no one there. And then he died in twenty fourteen, so he only saw, you know, six months of that, and there was a part of that that was tough on me, knowing that he never really saw us have success, and success itself, that's a whole different story, that's a whole different podcast, a whole different discussion on how to judge success and how to define individual success, because in a lot of ways, you could say I had it all along because I was happy and I

enjoyed the process, even when we weren't technically successful in any kind of numbers and no one was watching the music. I thought we were having fun. So that's a whole different story. But when Dad died, it was hard to go back out and play. It was hard to play a show. I had the have you ever have you ever lost somebody and had the feeling in the cell

phone age of a ghost text? Or have you ever pulled your phone out and wanted to call somebody and then realize they're gone and you literally are holding the phone wanting to push their number. In fact, I think I did hit his number on Favorites on my home screen several times, and then I would go, oh, what am I doing? I would hang up, and then actually, when we cut off his number, that person would call me back and I would decline it. It's weird, weird stuff.

And I struggled with that on the road, and any of y'all that saw me the summer twenty fourteen, maybe you didn't know, but I was really struggling, and I was struggling mentally without my hero and the person I relied on for so long, my whole life, and the biggest supporter besides my mom, the biggest supporter of my music. I guess I should throw Amber in there too, But Amber, you know, she loved my dad too, so she kind

of went through her own grief in that. So I was on an airplane heading to Portland, Oregon, yesterday, and I was kind of looking back on a decade of my music, specifically my songwriting, and I've always done what I call work tapes, and that means it's kind of

like a demo, I guess you could say. But back before I wanted to pay money to actually have people play on a demo of the song, which I still don't do that, I was making work tapes, meaning I would lay down a click track, I'd play guitar, I would sing, and then I would sing over myself with harmony that I'd play another good part, and I'd played some little lead parts, and they started becoming more and

more elaborate, and I could play some of them. But I have a collection of fifteen years of work tapes, and yesterday on the plane, I was listening back through these work tapes, and I was like, what was the song I wrote after Dad? Like, what was the next song I wrote after I lost Dad? And I lost him in March of twenty fourteen, and then the first song that I wrote was in June of twenty fourteen, and it was Backroad Song. Ironically, my first number one

song at mainstream country radio. Backgroad Song, my first platinum song, and all this was after Dad. Like Dad never knew me standing on the stage holding a plaque with a platinum record or a number one song. He never even knew me on to have any because that was my first mainstream single, So he never even knew me to have any mainstream song on the radio. Isn't that ironic? Like just a few months after was when I wrote that song. And maybe that was by design, you know,

like maybe that was the destiny of Backgroad song. Was it took It took Dad, and it took me wanting to be happy and wanting to smile and wanting to have that nostalgic feeling of driving down the road and no troubles, not a single worry in the world. Windows down, radio up, what's the rhythm of that song, what does that song feel like? And to me, it would be a song let's cut to the chase and just called Backroad song. And I want to play you the work

tape of Backroad Song. This has never been heard before. This has never been played anywhere outside my closest family circle. I don't my band hasn't even heard this old work tape. But it's an example of not only of the work tapes that I was making for every song I was writing. But I also want you to hear this because I was just listening to it on the plane, because it's really interesting. One more little story before I play it. I got connected that year twenty fourteen with an old

producer friend of mine named Frank Rogers. And I think I've talked about Frank on this podcast, But Frank produced the Rimington album. And he's a long time Brad Paisley producer, Darius Rucker, Josh Turner, there's a kind of a long list, Scotty McCreery. There's a long list of not only Frank is produced, but he's also written a lot of big hits. And when Frank and I kind of agreed to do a project together which was going to become the four x four EP, which then evolved into the Rimington album.

He said, hey, send me some songs you have, And Frank's really good at taking kind of the components of a song, the fundamentals of a song, and digging in and making it become a radio song or a mainstream song. He's really good at kind of taking what the song is and then like rearranging these words here and flip flopping this this here and putting She's kind of like

he has the puzzle pieces and it makes it. It makes a cool picture, but he could make it a beautiful painting if he kind of really dives into those pieces. And so what you're gonna hear is the original backroad song that I wrote. And then this is what I sent to Frank. And then Frank called me and goes, dude, backroad song that sounds like a hit. He goes, come to my house. Let's let's work on a few things, and then you'll be able to hear the changes that

we made together. There's nothing like that rhythm of a back road. They're putting melodies in my head and barbed wire fence carvering out of hillside, red sunset slinging dust on a nom gray blacktop. I hear the thirty five whistling by steer the wheel one handed on a two lane, hugging that line. I got the wind those down. No one else around singing. You't know, mister myvi bling on out here cooking two back rows song, A few wheels of a malady. It's so sweet that I want to

sing a long full of cup to the radio. Uh, this is my back road song. I'm pulling up to a no green tractor. I hammerd down and a passing moon. A breeze smells like a summertime hayfield has just been cut. I got to wind those downs way out of town, singing reader, mister mob, I'm known and known. How you including to a back room song? A few music a melody? It's so sweet that I want to sing along. You look up to the radio. This is my back road song.

It's not the kind of song about h there's no heart, eggs are breaking up. It's not the kind of day for that stuff. Free you the mister moth. I'm really on. Who I hear recruding to a back roll song? Pull the wheels like a malady. It's so sweet that I want to sing along. Bill a cup to the radio, and this is my back roll song, bill a cup to the radio. H this is my back roll song. This is my back roll song. The rhythm Huel, the rhythm mother feeling my back room song. That's the end

of money. That's the Ranthom money pulling my back movie song. That's the real mother pull of my back huts on feud in the living, the in the mother live in my back roll song. So those of you that have heard that song for a long time, you probably heard that version, and it's like, oh makes your ears tweak when you hear those different words that are in the spots they're not supposed to be, but that's just because

you're used to the radio version. So Frank gets his song and he's like, man, this is awesome, but I could tell you could you could tell right off the bat like what he said. He said, Man, I love barbire fence carving out of hillside. Let's just make that the first line. I was like, Okay, that's cool. And then there's the part in the chorus about what was it? What was it say? Get a cup turn the radio fill a cup, turn the radio up. This is my back roub song. And Frank was like, what are we

doing here? Are you drinking and driving? I was like, yeah, I guess I guess we shouldn't even insinuate that that's what we might be doing. And then and then the uh, let's see. I I looked at the bridge and it says old green tractor, and I was like, man, it might be cool to say old New Holland, you know, cause you'd have the old and new right together. It's kind of a kind of sounds kind of song right to hit the brakes for an old New Holland. That's so that was an easy change. And then the bridge.

It's interesting because now you see what I'm talking about. With what I was going through with my dad, I was I was trying to write a song that was like, Man, hell no, this ain't no song about love or it's not the kind of day for that stuff, you know. And Frank gets ahold of it, and he's like, man, I get it. I get that that's on your mind. But man, I feel like we got to bring a girl into this song. I feel like we got to be pulling up like the whole thing was cruising to

go and pick her up. She slides on in this truck. That's the only thing that could make this day better. That type of idea, and you know what, he was right, And who knows, Maybe the song was a hit because of that. Maybe not, But it's cool now that now that background song has a girl in it instead of their original way I wrote it was like making sure that everyone knew it absolutely wasn't about a relationship of any kind. You know, there's the time and a place

for those kind of songs too. You know, I have kind of looking at this hard drive. I have so much old stuff, like old memories and work type Like if you've heard a song of mine, there is a work tape version and it's probably not the same as the song, you know, So I've got maybe I've just been uh, maybe I've been bored over the years, but I've documented everything pretty well. I still have all these poets logs, which I know I was playing on one

of these last podcast episodes. It's like these little voice memos I would say on my phone and kind of talk about where we were at the time. In fact, here's one, this is one I'll play right now. Of our last van trip. Right before we were going to a bus like we had the new bus. It wasn't new, it was used, but it was new to us, ready to go at home, and we were making one more run in the van. This is in two thy thirteen. Here it is all right, it's October the fourteenth, right,

twenty thirteen. What's going on? Wait on, Jeff, Jeff, Jeff is uh inside McDonald's. He likes to wait for everybody else to get their food. Let the plays clear out real well, and then before he gets his food, before he even goes in. And this is the last trip in the van. Yeah, it's the final excursion. I'm pissed off about it. I want to stand in the van for forever. Yeah. God doesn't mind because he doesn't jive.

So I've got those little memory gems for days on this computer and maybe if I keep making more episodes, I'll eventually play them all in here. So I'm about to run in here soundcheck and Spokane. And I'm proud of myself that I'm back to the podcast. All those dudes that were yelling bring back the podcast, Hey here I am bro I'm back, and I want you guys, please to go to social media and tell me what you would like to hear more of hashtag Grangersmith podcast,

Insta or Facebook or Twitter, whatever your favorite is. Hey, you could also watch a Smith's episode if you haven't already, go comment below one of those videos and tell me about what you want to hear on the podcast there because I also check those comments. That's another way. Or you can come to meet and greet, which is how I've been hearing about this recently from people that want to hear the podcast back is just go to the

meet and greet you could get. You can get a meet and greet for any of my shows on grangersmith

dot com. Go to the tour schedule or dates or whatever it's called tab and each tour d eight how a little little square that says meet granger and hit that and then gives you an opportunity to meet me at each and every show and then we could talk about this and if I keep them all like this, this is actually manageable for me because I've sat down, I've only been here like what forty five minutes, and the sucker's done, I get to go do sound check.

I want to continue the story from that Frank Rogers story of background song. We released it independently and then that was still before I got a record deal. Now, getting a record deal was a life dream of mine. And that's a whole different story. And I'll tell you soon. See you guys. Happens out of the blue scados Iner Blue last year. When it happenside nothing, the MoES turns right into you. Do it or you can do just to keep her around you. The moon goes down in

your back, into your house. One thing was doing another. You love in each other when you can, you never look back. It happens like that. Spanks for listening to the granger Smith podcast. I hope to see you on tour. Go to grangersmith dot com Forward slash tour. See you soon,