ITS Home Edition: Craig Morgan

make music. But Craig Morgan has a bigger story to tell. He talked with our Quarantine correspondent Jordan Runtog about wondering if he could even get up on stage and perform music anymore after suffering a personal tragedy four years ago. He thought about re enlisting in the arm me or becoming a policeman. Instead, he's stuck with writing and singing songs and concentrated on positive music that he really felt

people needed to hear right now. It's a moving conversation and if you enjoy this episode, be sure to check out the I Heart Radio podcast that Jordan's hosts. It's called Rivals Music's greatest Feuds, and it's available wherever you get your podcasts. Hello everybody, my name is Jordan run Tug, but enough about me. My guest today. Served in the SWO and First Airborne Divisions before making his mark on

the country music world. So it's early two thousand's. He scored hits like That's what I Love About Sunday and Redneck Yacht Club. In May, he released God Family Country, his first album of new material since the death of his son. He addresses the loss on the standout track The Father, My Son and the Holy Ghost, which is top download charts and inspired faith in an untold old number of listeners. I'm happy to welcome Craig Morgan. Thank you you hear the rain in the background. Oh, I

bet you the plants needed out there? Is it hot? Yes, it is hot, so it's uh much needed rain. So I wanted to check on you. First of all, I saw you had a bit of an accident recently with a machete. How are you doing. I'm good, it's healed up. I've already started running again. I'm a big runner and biker. So, uh, that was the worst part of that. Knowing that I wasn't gonna be able to ride my bike or run for a few weeks. Uh, but I'm I'm I'm fine.

I'm healed up and uh running and getting back in shape. I'm actually headed back to Alaska, uh here pretty quick to go back up there again for a couple more weeks. Oh well, what were you doing up there? I have a property, a place up there, cabin off grid. It's about about three and a half hours from Anchorage, about forty five minutes from the nearest town, about nine miles from the nearest road. That's some training for the Idea Ride.

That sounds amazing. Uh, training for the Iron Dogs, similar to the Idea Rod, but they do it on snow machine. So so we get out there as much as we can, and and mainly just to go up there and enjoy our place in the piece. I mean, why not, it's the best time for it. Oh my gosh, I I have so many things to ask you, first and foremost, God, family and country. Your first album in a number of years. What's the story you wanted to tell on this album?

I don't know, if I really I gotta be honest, I don't know if there was a story I just try to record great music right and sing songs that I think people want to hear. I will say in this case, I felt like all of this music with stuff that we need to hear. Uh. These are very uh upsetting, troublesome, aggravating, angering times that we are dealing with a lot brought on by the the introduction of COVID.

So I think it's important that we know that there is sun in the future, there's light out there and and I think these songs kind of portray that. Hence the name God Family and Country. There is a song on there called God Family and Country. It's an actually an older song, but but I just wanted to have some positive music, even though there might be some maybe some dark undertones, like in on the song going Out

like This. You know, the music might lead you to believe it's a little bit uh dark, but it's really a positive song talking about making up and not giving up. So there's a lot of that. And then of course we have the hits on there that we rerecorded, some of the stuff that people are familiar with that I felt like to have a have a positive message. I mean, one of the standout tracks on the album is your version of Gavin to Grass Soldier just incredible song. You

were in the armed forces for seventeen years. What is it about Gavin song that really captures the spirit of the men and women who serve well. I feel like every line in that song is a stand a long line that is descriptive of the moral character of a service member. I mean, it's just so descriptive of the way I feel that the military personnel are. I mean, they have such a such a sense of gratitude for

the most part. Now I can't I can't speak on behalf of every service member, but I can honestly speak on every service member that I know, and I've met a bunch, and they all tend to have this sense of pride and humility which is really difficult to balance, and they do it better than any other entity in the in the world, I believe. And and again, that song, truly, I feel like, represents the kind of people that service members are, the people that are willing to put themselves

in harm's way. You know, I'll be the pain. I'll take your pain. You know, I'll find I'll find the things you need. Uh. And that's what they are, their service people speaking of service people. Tell me about sipping on the Simple life. Your co writers are to airborne rangers, Yeah, just service people. You're right to everyone rangers the mike and I wrote that with him in Washington, d C. One night, after a few bottles of wine and literally

sipping on the simple life. You know, it's again another positive song talking about even though these are difficult times, I've been to places where the difficulties that we're experiencing now are of no comparison to the difficulties we have Christians being slaughtered all over the world as we speak, the kind of stuff that they're experiencing. We truly have a great life in this country, and I think it's important that we appreciate it. And this song talks about

the simple life and how to enjoy it. How did you first link up with Justin and Andrew? I mean, it's it's so incredible. How did that all go down? Did you start writing a song with him? After? What was it a us O Gala? It wasn't us oh galla. We were in Washington, d C. We finished it up and and one of them actually approached me. Justin said, hey, we want to write a song with you. We got a great idea, and I kind of laughed and I said, well, it don't work that way, but that's cool. I said,

I'm honored. I'm kind of honored, but you know, it really don't work that way. And he's, no, you gotta write with us, and no, I don't. He goes, no, you do. You're airborne where airborne? You know we gotta you gotta write with us. And I'm like, now, so does that happen often to you, Like people coming up to you and being like, hey, we gotta write with you. People say it, but generally not as insisted. I didn't say forceful. I said it's insistent, but you know what

I thought about it. And we didn't have anything going on the next day, we were leaving early to get on a plane, so I thought I got nothing to lose. And they were their service members and we do share that, and I thought, well, you know, I'm not going to be an ass and not sit down with them. At least want to enjoy their company. And we did. We had a blast. I wouldn't say we've become like super

tight friends or nothing, but we stay in touch. I've done a few things with Justin since doing some more things with him and for the military where he's involved. Uh, and Andrew, if he weren't in Germany, we're probably doing more with him right now. So I look forward to when he gets home and we get to spend more time together. I've made friends because of that song. Oh that's awesome, and yeah, that's quite a reason to get

into music making friends. Yeah. Justin says that they had the majority of it written, but as I recall, they didn't even have a really good idea. Mike and I sit down and really helped him out. That's the case. He watches, say we cut that part out now, I leave it there. I pick on him all the time. Oh, incredible series of songs in there, of course stand out

for me one of my favorites. And I know other people have said this too, and I understand if it's difficulty to talk about, but I wanted to ask you about the Father, My Son and the Holy Ghost song written for your son, Jerry. How did that song come to be? It sounds like it was divine intervention in a way. It was in fact divine intervention. It was a god thing. I tell people that all the time. I think I'm a decent writer, but I wouldn't consider myself a Harley Allen or any of the great Dean

Dylan's or nothing. But this was very much the caliber of that. I would say, even greater than anything, but not because of me, but because of God. It was a difficult song to write. It took me about four hours, which in that in and of itself, is not normal. It normally takes sometimes days to write a song of that caliber. Again, I attribute that to God and his intervention. I was just the vessel. I held the pen and cried the tears and heard while He put those words

out there for me. And I quite honestly, when I wrote it, I didn't think it would ever be something that I would ever sing in public. But I also appreciate that God did that, and it's important that I do sing it because the response has been overwhelming, and seeing it now hindsight, I now see why he did it. Because this song has helped so many other people. I wish I could tell you that it's helped me, but it doesn't help me to sing this. In fact, it

hurts every time I sing it. But that's okay. That's the cross that I must bear, and I do it because I know that it does help other people, and I think it's important that we do that as a society. You know, in our human race, we've kind of gotten away from that. We've kind of gotten away from caring about other people and kind of thinking focusing more on ourselves and how we feel. You know, you see it on all the social media platforms. I don't like this.

I don't like that instead of thinking about how we're impacting other people's lives. And I think it's important that we do that, and this song does. That's incredible song. As you said, it means so much to so many people. Has there been anything that a fan has said to you that's it's really stuck with you and and and been particularly meaningful in sponsor the song, Oh gosh, numerous

numerous stories. The one thing that I noticed when people would Facebook me, send me on Facebook message, or send me on Instagram message or whatever, however I get these messages through all of the platforms, they said that. I love how most of them start out with I know you will probably never read this, but and they tell me their story. And after reading a few of them, I was adam about ensuring that people knew that I do read every one of those. I read them everyone myself.

In fact, on a plane coming home from somewhere, I was with my wife and I was reading them, and my wife said, what's wrong? And I said, nothing wrong. She said, you got tears running down your face. I said nothing, and I sure enough did. I had been reading those and my wife said, why do you do that. I said, because they told me they wanted to tell somebody, and I think it's important that I hear it. Uh, And they know that I read them. I might not respond.

In fact, I don't respond to most of them, because that entails a long conversation usually, and I just don't have the heart, the hurt, the pain, it's a lot more so. But I do read them all, and I bear their pain and I share it. And that's something that we don't like. Parents that have lost the child say that, you know, we're part of a group of people that we don't want to be a part of, but we are so. But I do read them all, and and there have been a lot of very impacting stories.

The one that has hung with me today still, and it was early on in the life of the song. In fact, I think it was after the Kelly arcs and airing, and that was like the second or third time that it became the most downloaded song of all genres on there. But a man said something. He said he was taking his daughter's school and said, I've never lost a child. I can't imagine what that pain must be.

Never heard of, you didn't know your music. Was listening to the airing of Kelly Clarkson and I heard this song and it made me pull over to the side of the road and cry, thinking about my daughter, who I had just dropped off at school. And I thought, man, this song is impacting someone who can't even relate to what the song was truly about. And and he told me went on to say that he had gotten out of church and gotten away from him, but he prayed this song caused him to think that way. And I

think that's exactly why I did it. That's what God wanted to happen, and it did happen, and if I don't, And it's numerous stories like that, but that one really stuck with me because it made me realize that it's not about me. It's not about my hurt, my cross, my pain, and maybe not even his it's what God intended and to hear him say that, and how it caused him to praying and he's thinking about that and

his daughter. And I mean, that's that's what music does, and that's what we as entertainers and singers and songwriters, that's what we really should be striving for, is to have that kind of an impact and less about trying to have a number one song on country radio, which is important. I don't undervalue that at all, but I think we should focus more on trying to do again,

do something good with what Earth Collins gives. Was there ever a moment when you considered stepping back from music and maybe not not doing it anymore in the midst of all this, or did you always know music was always that was gonna be your north star? Oh? I'm still not sure really, No, no, no, I mean you know, when I first left the military and started pursuing the music, there was about three or four years that I had

songs that were hits on the radio. I mean almost Home was a huge hit, And even then I was unsure if this was what I was intended to do or what I really thought I should be doing. So to speak, it wasn't until about two thousand and eight, when I was made a member of the Grand Old Lobry that I felt like, this is what I'm supposed to do, and I've made my mark and I'm here to stay. It's a pretty good sign being made a member, but it took something so huge for someone like myself

to accept it. I kept saying, you know, maybe I should go back in the army, maybe I should be a policeman, maybe I should do this. This isn't really you know, I didn't. I wasn't sure. But then fast forward to two thousand sixteen, when when our son died, I really considered not going back at all. I didn't know if I just didn't know if I had the ability to do it. I didn't know if I could

get on stage and sing without being emotional. And I'm a man's man, and I, you know, if all I'm gonna end up fighting with somebody, you know, or whatever. There's lots of thoughts that ran through my mind, and I really was contemplating whether or not I should even get back. And after you know, taking some time off and looking at it, I realized my son would want me to do this. He loved me doing this, and I knew that he would want me to do this, especially if it meant by doing this, I'm able to

do more for other people. And that is the reality. If I weren't doing this, we couldn't do the things that we're doing in our in our life outside of the music. Yeah, and as you said, your music itself helped so many people. And I want to talk to you about a song it didn't make the album, but you shared it on social media recently, the Mask, which you you dedicated to the frontline workers. And it's funny the title seems like it was inspired by the pandemic,

but you had that one around for a while, right. Yeah, we actually we actually wrote this song before the pandemic. Had nothing to do with the physical mask you where I was talking about the mass that we all put on to sometimes get through our day. In particular, I was particularly thinking about soldiers at the time, and law enforcement officers and whoever, people that go out and put themselves in harm's way or sometimes that to put on

a brave front. That was the mass that I was referring to, and it did not make the album cut for whatever reason. And I think a lot of that, because when we're working on the album, I just felt like it didn't kind of fit in, and I'm not sure that I had it tweaked to the sweetness that

it is now. I think there was a few things that I did after the fact, after the album came out, and I felt like this was a strong song, especially in light of all that was going on with our frontline warriors out there are doctors, nurses, e m t s, and law enforcement, of all these people out there who were taking a chance on getting this virus but still doing their jobs. And so then we have not only the invisible mask that they put on, but the actual

physical mask that they were wearing. And so we released it out as an individual single for people, with a portion of the proceeds going to help our frontline people. Great track, and your album also revisits five songs from earlier in your career. Um, what was it like revisiting some of those? Had the meetings changed for songs like you know, that's what about Sunday? Or a Lot of Man and that Little Boy? Oh yeah, for sure, a Lot of Man. That Little Boy was a song that

I had not even listened to or thought about. For a long time and now that song as as as compounded emotionally for me based on everything that's happened in my life. And that little man that I wrote that song about has grown up. That was my firstborn son, who is now right, yeah, so he's a lot older, he's a grown young man. So it really allowed me to reminisce about that time in our life. That song

did for me, And it's a great song. I thought, it's I just really loved what that song said, and it's a positive message, and I think we need to be teaching our children these same messages today and for me upcoming grandchildren, you know, we need to be instilling. And because I had a dear friend, you know, you say, we're not raising boys, we're training future young men. And same with our daughters. You know, we're not training daughters. Were raising future young women. This is the future of

our world. So we need to be teaching them the right things, great ethics and kindness and love and those things that we should be doing. But anyway, so that's what that song kind of was for me. That's what I love about. Sonny was such a huge hit, still a big hit, still played a lot, and that song still holds everything that it held for me the day that we recorded. It still holds true for me today. I still get the same images in my mind. That's good to hear. What was it? Was it hard to

choose what songs you were gonna revisit for this? I mean, you've got so many? Is it hard to pick the five? It was? Uh? And I will say that process involved more than just myself. We collectively, between myself management label, everybody kind of pitched in there two cents worth, and the songs that received the most attention were the songs that ended up getting recorded done by committee. That's a good way to do it. Lots of people's inut I see you you're in lockdown now. I'm glad to hear

you've been. You've been going up to Alaska bit. But I see people reacting the lockdown in so many different ways. You've got some people who are are doing every home improvement thing they possibly can and are bacon bread and they're teaching themselves to make all sorts of stuff. And then you've got the people that are just really having a hard time getting motivated and feeling really kind of like, oh I got another day. How have you been feeling.

You've been feeling really productive or the other the other way? You covered both. I cover the gamut. They're literally days I wake up and go I just don't want sh It's got to be over soon. I don't want to do nothing. I'm gonna light here. I'm not a video gamer, but like I might put a game on and play for like four hours and just numb my brain to nothing mush, you know. But then the next day I go out and I'll be able to set up stairs

and I go bushog. I spent yesterday. I was on a tractor pulling a bushog cutting brush for nine hours. That's all I did for nine hours. I burned from the sun. How are you awake right now? Yeah? So I cover the gamut so I can relate to what anyone out there might be going through. I'm very fortunate. We have a lot of property, so I can get out and and go run. I can run my six or eight ten miles and not not have to worry

about being around a bunch of people. But I'm also out there on all that property, and it's sometimes just me and my wife, you know, And I love her more than the air I breathe, but after a few days upset. Uh. And I'm sure I get on her nerves, her nerves worse than she gets online. But I'm taken up. I started doing some painting. Yeah. Uh, you know, you just gotta do things. I'm a big believer in a body in motion stays in motion, a body at rest stays at rest. So and I believe the same thing

about our minds. We gotta stay active, you know, play word games. Even if you just walk, walk outside, walk around the house, do something. You can't just sit on your button expected to not get any bigger. Are you working on new music? Now? What have you? Have you been writing a little bit? I haven't written as much as a lot of guys. I'm not crazy about the zoom writing sessions. I write off of energy, and I'm a very energetic person, even for the ballad stuff. I

require that. So it's a little more difficult for me to write the way a lot of people are having to write right now. So I'm only writing with a very few select people well who I know. We're quarantining so that we feel comfortable enough to at least get in the same room, even though we may not be you know, right across from each other, a high five and hugging like we normally would. At least we can see each other and feel the energy and use that

energy to write. I used superstitious about writing. It all is. You're like an instrument you always play, or a place you always like to work, or a certain time of day or anything like that. Now I believe you right when you I'm fortunate because of the success that we have had in writing and with our career that I try to write when I want to write and when I feel like writing. I've been the guy who in the past wrote every day, five days a week. I

went into offices in Nashville. We would sit down, we would write, sometimes write two songs, go home. It was a job. I'm fortunate enough now that I write when I want to write, if I feel like right. And I like that because I feel like I write better. I write less, but I write better, and I feel like I'm creating better quality material now doing it when I want to do it and when I felt driven to do it. And that's what's what happens a lot

of songwriters. When we are writing good, we all call each other in man, I wrote a hit and they go funny, I did too. Must be something in the air, And that's the way it happens, you know. It's just like when you When I feel pressured or pushed to write, I will write and no instruments, no craziness. People that write with me say that I paced a lot. I'll go in and out of the room. I can literally write two songs with two different people at the same time.

I'll go from one room to the other. A lot of that has to do with my O, C D and my A D D S songs at once. I've I've never even heard of that. Wow. And you can keep the melodie straight and all the harmonies and everything on. Oh yeah, completely. It's like youan of those people that can like write with both hands at the same time or something like that too. That's no, I can't do that, but but I think I can multitask kinda when it comes to writing. I'm able to do that. I'm not

sayings good, I'm just saying it happens. You mentioned painting. What have you been painting? You know? We have a family business called the Gallery at Morgan Farms. It's a gallery and we sell art most of the artist would stuff that I make. I've created bowls from knots of logs, and chacutie boards out of a old hundred year old barnwood and different things like that. We also sell. Some

paintings differ from different things different people. So I just decided to stided one day I had these three old saws I was gonna paint on the sauce. I paint a landscape of an old building with some mountains behind it. I was thinking about Alaska. I'm a big fan of Bob Ross. Now, yeah, joy a painting. Oh man, hey

slapped that brush. That's the most exciting part. Whenever I need to chill out at the end of the day, I throw on the joy painting and just watch him, like get his painting knife out and make a mountain. Though it's great, dude, I just watching him. It's like it's like doing ascid. I've never done acid, but people tell me what it does, and I get the same effect from Bob Ross, like, oh, it's just it's the best. I totally agree with you. Oh man, Now you make me want to go and put them on and try

an and painting. I've never tried that but oh so, I guess is there a silver lining of of of quarantine for you? It sounds like this might be it. Well, the first couple of months it was kind of like a forced vacation, which is kind of nice, you know, doing things that I got, Like you said at the beginning of this, the chores. I got everything done on our farm that I've been putting off for two years. Literally,

I'm not kidding. I work. We have gotten everything done, and then after I finished, everything is like, what do we do now? So I would go to my place in Alaska and spend two or three weeks up there. Uh so we just been kind of working and fittland. But it's like, now I'm starting to get angry because I'm ready to go to do something else. I'm tired of doing chores, and my my wife's chore list doesn't stop.

I mean, every time i think I've got a break and I'm gonna be able to relax a little bit, she has a list of new list of crap for me to do. So I think it's good it has caused us to think about other things. We've focused more we do this Friday's at four livestream on Facebook it's caused us to get more creative. When you think of generating sources of revenue within the industry, we've had to think about that. We are doing shows. We have some

shows that are coming up. But since we're talking and we're gonna talk about it on my Fridays at four as well, we're gonna be extremely pressing on our promoters and everyone involved to try to ensure that people are adhering to the social distancing requirements that are put forth in areas that you need to wear a mask, wear a mask. Look, whether they work or not, I don't really know. There's so much damn information out there. Who

knows what to believe. But what I will say and what I tell my people what I adhere to is if it makes someone else feel more comfortable, if I think it don't work, if it makes that older lady feel more comfortable about being around me, then I'm gonna I'm gonna wear it for that time. Having said that, I try to separate myself from people as much as I can, so I don't have to wear it just because I don't like the way it feels. But we're gonna, you know, do everything that we can to ensure that

we're at least doing our part. I can't make people out there do everything that we're gonna be doing, but we hope that they're gonna at least adhere to the requirements that the show is asking of them so that we can do the shows. Otherwise we won't be able to do shows at all, you know, and there are people doing shows and they're doing these things and it's working. We're gonna ask that when we do our a few

little shows and we're not doing a bunch. We canceled a lot of stuff from motors, canceled a lot of stuff. In fact, it's canceling daily. We had three or four shows left and I don't know if they're going to happen, but the ones that do happen, we're going to do our part, and we're gonna ask people to do their part, and if they don't do their part, then they might be asked to not be there. I don't know. We'll

see what happens. Who knows. If you want to hear live music and you don't want to watch it on a damn movie screen, I mean I can do that. We could go make a video and film ourselves and then put it up on a video screen. But I would rather stand up on the stage and perform and yell and scream and answer questions and stuff. But we can only do that if the fans are doing what they're asked to do so and and then ain't fun. It ain't. It's not back to where we were, And

I think we will get there. Someday. We will be back to where we were. If you could snap your fingers and everything go back to normal. Pandemics over, Lockdown's over, Everything's back to the way it was. What would be the first thing that you would do show? Yeah, yeah, that would be the first thing probably. I mean the other stuff I kind of do anyway. I'll be honest. There's aside from wearing a mask when we go in the grocery store, or you know, not being around people

that much. My friends, you know, we don't get to see them as much. We do that, but some of our friends we do. The guys that we know are quarantine. If I know they've been in their house, are not being out doing stupid stuff for fourteen days, and I see them, well, you know, we visit. You know, I'm not looking on their faces. I licked my wife's face. I kiss her face, so I ain't If she gets it, I'm gonna get it, and it is what it is.

I can't change that unless she gets it and I know about it and I don't have it, and then she's going to sleep in different bedroom and for a while. No, I'll be with her. I mean, you know she that's part of it, you know, you know. But but the other people and the other things, Yeah, I would definitely. We would go do a big freaking show and let everybody stand there and toast America. You know, got crowdsurfing,

oh for sure, not having to worry about it. Craig Morgan, thank you so much for your time of to day. It's been such a pleasure than Huke. Thank you all very much. We hope you enjoyed this episode of Inside the Studio Home Edition, a production of I Heart Radio. For more episodes of Inside the Studio and other shows from I heart Radio, check out the I heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.