I didn't like calling it a craft or work or anything, because I just wanted it to be more magical and mysterious than that, because all the great songs that I've ever loved just feel like they've you know, either existed forever, but they just come from this place that's so otherworldly, you know, like how can this exist? How did somebody create this? You know? And it's good when they can feel like that.
I got thoughts in my head, can't get them out, try and not the thing what I'm thinking about, not count of thoughts in my head, can't get them out, trying not to thing what I'm thinking about.
Hello, this is Alan Ship Knock Back for another Fire Drill podcast. That evocative intro music you've gotten used to listening to. It's by Griffin Howes, very talented singer songwriter. After all these fire drills with that beautiful song, we figured, you know, let's bring the man himself on to talk about the connection of golf and music and a little bit about his life.
And he's got a new.
Album, and we figured the best place to convene this roundtable is here at sam Valley. We are here for the Uncle Tony Invitational brainchild of Matt Janella. He's podcasted about it. I've written about his long standing Ultimate Buddies trip. Matt's here. We're joined by Jakira King Grammy Winning, a producer who collaborated with Griffin on his most recent album, The Patriarch of This Whole Deal, John Ashworth.
Uh, and we're.
All wearing linksoul clothes.
You know, we love Ashley.
He's sort of the spiritual godfather of this gathering. And of course Griffin hollis who' stromling a guitar. So Griffin and John ed Schkeer and Matt, thanks for doing this. Let's start with you, Griffin, like, this is your first UTI, as we like to call it. Uh, what do you think this little gathering?
It's a pretty special event here. It's so much golf, and it's so overwhelming to be out here playing in these places. I feel like I'm on a different planet out here, you know. But I'm always trying to escape and clear my head and play golf as much as I can when I'm not playing music. So definitely getting my fill out here. It's been wonderful. It's so fun for the listeners.
You should know that Griffin is a very strong stick playing off too. After watching him hit an eight iron about one hundred and eighty yards, I said, what is your your clubhead speed with a driver and he said two three. I mean that's upper echelon of the PGA to or the guy can move it. So you have a background in competitive golf, Like, let's hear a little bit about your your journey through golf, because it's been a little circuit.
It's Oh.
Yes, I started playing when I was a little kid, probably eight or nine. My dad was a great golf for He quit about I don't know, ten fifteen years ago. He had kind of a bad back, but he was he was like a plus two plus three great ball striker. Taught me how to play, and it was a pro in Springfield named Pat Delaney that taught me a lot.
I always go back to that. But I played in tons of junior tournaments and stuff when I was a kid, and you know, traveled around and played and played a lot in Ohio and kept playing through high school and
had an offer to play at Ohio University. But I was just super burned out to go off at that point and a little discouraged, to say the least, and I just kind of decided to go off to school, and when I got there, I was like, man, that can be whoever I want to be here, Like, no one knows who I am, no one knows this former identity that I've had. So I had a guitar and I taught myself to play with these guys that lived in my dorm. They were a bunch of them, are
music majors that lived in an arts dorm. So I learned a bunch of stuff from them, and one thing led to another. I started singing in a band and started getting a little bit better at guitar, and I was an English major. I couldn't do much with the English major degree. So I was in a poetry class at the end of the term and I played a song and read the poem in class, and my poetry professor said, yeah, I would do that instead of becoming a poetry professor. So he gave me the green light
to go try it out. You know, I said, had nothing to lose, So I just kind of went and I had some beginner's luck and just kept going and kind of snowballed into being what I've done for the last twenty years. Do you remember that teacher's name, doctor David Schloss. Yes, he was from Manhattan. He was a really funny guy. He used to read the Onion before class every day. It was a pretty laid back environment, but took the poetry serious. But we had a lot of fun with it.
I feel like everybody in life has. Everybody has a moment in which someone sort of them into like what actually they really want to do? We hope, hope, hopefully everybody gets that opportunity. So here you are then sort of charting this path to music, and you're incorporating obviously Englishman, you're writing, and you're recording. How has the path been to sort of being a musician.
Well, when I moved to Nashville, it was a very different town. It was much smaller, and there was not a lot of people doing like an alternative type of singer song writing stuff. There was a big Christian music industry and obviously a big country music industry, and so
it felt a lot easier to get noticed. I don't know if it was just like right place, right time, but I moved down there without really having the idea what I was doing, and I kind of went full speed and within I was working downtown on Broadway selling trinkets at midnight to make six fifty an hour, and one day I got a call from a major record label in New York City, and all of a sudden, I'm like, whoa, I got it. I got the call, you know, I got the call. That was the big break,
and I made a record. It came out in the US and Europe and Canada, and it was just like kind of beginner's luck type stuff. But all this crazy stuff kept happening right out of the gate, like I was opening up for John mellencamp Er. Then I was like the next night, I was meeting Willie Nelson and like Bruce Springsteen, and I was like, man, this this is crazy.
You know.
It was just like you have this wild dream in your head that you dream up as a kid, and then all all of a sudden it starts coming true and you're like, well, I guess I was right, and this music business thing doesn't seem so hard when all that stuff's happened so fast. And then after that, you know, I put a record out and I realized like how
hard it was. After that, it was like, definitely it turned into much more of a wow this is going to be like, hopefully if I'm lucky, like a twenty or thirty year slow work really hard career and try
to climb one step at a time. And you know, and I've lived through the music business changing from like when record stores were open and people were buying physical CDs to going you know, from Napster to Apple downloads and then streaming, and just I've seen the whole music business change from like the time I started until now, and I think I've just been lucky enough to early on I kind of built a live following and that's kind of how I've maintained being a musician over the years,
is just being willing to tour a lot and even get out there by myself, you know, driving myself to the shows, carrying my own gear, selling my own merch just kind of doing all that stuff. And I've played on the band on the road with a band for years. But now that I've been married fourteen years and you know, just just touring around by myself and playing a handful of shows and coming home so I can be with
the family is like how I make it work. So I've just kind of found my own way, you know, just by trial and error and trying to figure out how to keep making music and keep playing for people. But I still love it so much. Feel was so lucky to be able to do it.
Griff, you told a great story about how you kind of linked up with John Ashworth. It just you were at Approach Off you saw a cool shirt, you went to the website, You're like, wow, this kind of looks like the kind of stuff I would want to wear. And yeah, and then and then your manager you reached out to the company and John tell us from your perspective, like how how this guy entered your life and your world and what it's meant to you.
Yeah, No, it was great. It was he reached he saw it, researched it, and then sent an email I think. And then anyways, Patrick Keegan, who was We were like, who's this Griffin House guy? He seems to really like link So I didn't really know who he was, and I don't think Jeff did either, and Patrick was like, oh, yeah, this guy's awesome, Like you got to see this guy. So that's kind of how we get started, right.
Yeah. Then we went down to you guys without meeting me, invited me down to Mexico Town to Mexico.
The magazine puta Mia Yeah it was great, had a blast and and then of course, you know, I listened, I heard his music and absolutely loved it. And then we went and teed it down there, and all of a sudden, I feel like I'm playing with Ben Hogan, you know what I mean. Like his swing is like beautiful, it's flawless. So he's got it all going on man, music and golf. I'd like to do a little yeah totally.
So you have this new record coming out, and sit next to you at your right elbow is Jakir King, who helped bring it to life, like Jaquir tell us in your words, like what this this this album's about and why it's You've worked with a lot of big time musicians and you've you've been in the room where it happened for a lot of great music. But what is it about about Griffin that's kind of special?
Well, Griffin lived in Nashville for how long twenty almost twenty years, and so I've been there for almost twenty three now, So we were around a lot, We shared a lot of common friends, and I was an admirer of his from a distance, and you know, we had the opportunity. Matt brought Griffin to an event last year.
Three of us were at and we started a kind of a you know, it was really wonderful to meet Griffin and I would kind of talk to each other about, you know, our awareness of one another, and and Matt you know, suggested, you know that I could be really cool if we recorded some music together, and you know, we started talking about it, and we just kind of took the bull by the horns and in the spring, you know, because Griffin also shared with me at that time that he was he'd been inspired to get into
writing some more kind of comes in seasons. You know, he was feeling inspired, and I was like, well, you know, let's just talk about let's talk about making some music together, because it's I've been an admirer of yours.
And so he sent me some songs and you know, some beautiful songs. Griffins is a very talented songwriter, and yeah, we just we kind of made some plans from there and partnered and made a very beautiful EP.
It's called The Tides five five songs. Yeah, I think I'd like gripping, I'd like you just kind of tell tell us a little bit about, you know what, where some of the inspiration comes from.
For lack of a better I mean, I call him like, I don't know if they're like synchronicity or you just like follow your gut or like my wife would call him God moments or something. But I think when when we all met, and you know, Matt and John came to my show in San Diego and you liked the song try not to think that you that you put on the podcast, and there was just like a there was a vibe and energy happening, and we got just talking about making making some music and working together in
some capacity. And it's kind of weird how like golf in some weird way brought us together to create this, uh, this creative moment. And as we kept talking, I just got inspired to like, wow, we're gonna do something. I better start writing some songs. And so I had the inspiration to just sit down. And you know, I'm not always doing that because I'm like busy with life and family and everything else. So sometimes it takes a little kick in the pants to get going a little bit.
But uh, yeah, the the muse came in the room and started talking to me, and I just said, okay, I better listen, and I just tried to start writing some stuff. And before I knew it, I had, you know, a handful of songs and felt felt lucky. I didn't know if they were any good, but I sent them for you, and I was like, well, let's if you like these, let's let's record some stuff. And so yeah,
it's just cool. How meeting, uh, meeting new people that are on on like paths and or whose pass are crossing for whatever mysterious reason, we don't know, but it felt felt right in my gut and it all happened really naturally, and that's kind how I don't know. That's how I entered through the world and through the through the music business and life in general, just kind of following my got and doing what feels right and just felt right.
So it's it's been an amazing journey. You were doing some meandering out there and the lido today. I was watching your step it out out there. Man. You you you're your your chat, your chart and your ball you.
Step over the ball boom.
You were hitting some shots.
No, dude, I played with them. I played with them. I saw all day it.
Was I'm just going to look towards the pin and yeah, every time the ball was nuts, really fun fun before before I mean, it's it's this whole thing, you know, in terms of called link so your care maybe Griffin golf. Here we are Uncle Tony, you know.
Linking souls.
We're around golf in Sand.
Valley and playing music. But so all of that is amazing, and that is golf.
That is what this is.
This is the and Uncle Tony, by the way, who was the ultimate link soldier, Like Uncle Tony was the real He was the one who basically taught me in life, it's about relationships.
It's about the people.
You know who or who you hang around with, and getting good people together at a place like this to have a sort of camaraderie building is what it's all about. In terms of your album and a song, like, would you want to talk us through sort of the writing of a song and play a song for us, give us a little background.
I had no agenda with what I wanted to write about. I was just like, can give me some songs here? And need some songs?
So is it a word like when you say that that I mean I can kind of you know, I get what you're saying, But is it Is it a word? Is it a moment? Is it a is it a movie? Is it something you see? Is it like where? What does fall out of the sky.
I was in Seattle one day and I was walking down on the streets of this neighborhood that I really love. It's the Scandinavian fishing village just north of Seattle called Ballard and I like to stay there and I play across the street at this place called the Tractor Tavern, and I just stay in town. I kind of like lived there for a few days and just soak up the energy. But there was all these locks and waterways and boats, and it just feels really this little mystical place.
It's enchanting. And they had like a farmer's market going on or something, and I was like walking around town, just people watching, and all of a sudden, I just started like this old familiar sea shanty melody that been recycled a few times and it's definitely out there, but it was going through my mind. I just started going like, Ballard Town, Oh, Ballard Town. There's no place like it
anywhere I found. And I just kept doing that and I had that in my back pocket and I went home and then I just wrote this huge verse for that and that was kind of the beginning of a song. And then then I just couldn't put down my guitar for like a month. I just kept trying to see
what was going to happen next, and I wrote. I wrote four or five or six songs, maybe more than that, but we we picked like the five strongest ones and went after those and the song we kind of picked for the for the song to focus on, and the single of the album is a song called Lifeline. It's just sort of about finding a finding a friend and and some support and kind of a hard you know, hard time and help kind of people can pull you through hard spots. So we picked that song too to
be the single. So yeah, I could play that one, I know, play it here on gitalp.
Yes please.
I was dying like the autumn leaves. I was burning out, I was on my knees, I'd given.
Up, I was almost done.
I was fitting fast as the setting sun.
And then you.
Came out of no where, and I'm.
Safe whenever you are there.
I used to get so dark, and now I feel so light. Suddenly the whole world looks bright. I used to really wanna leave this place, but I haven't been the same since I found your face. You're my life flying, You're my life line.
You're my life line.
You're my life line.
I used to worry all the time.
Now I don't.
Care a dream sweet dreams, because I know you're here. I used to get so mad, I used to get so blue. I used to not know how.
To make it through.
And then you.
Came out of know where, and I'm.
Safe whenever you are there.
You're my life flying. You're my life Lie. You're my life line. You're my life Lie.
I was sick of being tired. I was tired of being sick.
I had a wall around me ten feet thick.
Nothing was working, nothing ever helped, And then.
You saw me in a way I couldn't see myself. Fam. It feels good to be happy again. It feels good to finally find a friend. You're my life Li. You're my life Lie. You're my life Li, you, my lifely you, my lifely.
You, my lifely.
You, my life fly, you, my life fly.
That's amazing, I mean, and again the writing is the to me like you, like you know the idea when you described as it falls out of the sky, and then you must flush all that out and create that narrative.
It is just it is just amazing.
Yeah, it goes through like many iterations. I mean, I must have written seven or eight or ten different versions of that song with all different lyrics. And then I remember one night I was in a hotel room. I normally stayed with my friend in Austin, but he had moved into another house and he didn't have room for me. He was like in a condo this time or something.
He sold his big, nice house down in Congress, and so I wasn't able to stay with him, and I ended up in this hotel room for the first time. And it was right around when I couldn't put my guitar down. And then that night, like all those words just came to me, and I stayed up several hours and wrote them all down. And then all of a sudden, I had this song called Lifeline, and I'd been strumming on those chords for weeks, you know, and then all of a sudden it just appeared.
The music fit right into the chords kind of yeah, yeah, that's beautiful.
I mean, you're not give yourself enough credit, Griff, Like, I know how much craft goes into into writing, like the inspiration comes to unexpected times, but clearly there's there's a lot of labor.
There's a lot of toil to bring that song to life.
I mean, what's the longs you've ever worked on a song and had it it like haunt you almost until you got it right.
I don't know how long I've like worked on a specific thing, but I know that sometimes you'll have like a little you know, like the little guitar part for the guy that says goodbye to you is out of his mind was something that I remember playing in college at some point, and then the words didn't come till like five years later. So I knew I had this part that was kind of cool, but I had never put anything to it. And then one afternoon, just like
the whole kind of poem came to me. And I don't know how that happens, but whether it's like here and something else that inspires you, or you just get a little click in your mind that tells you what you want to write about, or you're just ready. But I think all the practice that you do of like doing it wrong a million times is like prepares you for the moment when like it walks in the room
and you just have to catch it. You know. It's like it's just sort of a moment, where like Charles Bukowski said that all writing is basically just like waiting. You wait and wait and wait until the like fly lands on the wall, and then you smack the shit out of the fly. And that's basically like how he
described poetry. And I kind of find that too. It just and I didn't like calling it a craft or work or anything, because I just wanted it to be more magical and mysterious than that, because all the great songs that I've ever loved just feel like they've you know, either existed forever, but they just come from this place that's so otherworldly, you know, like how can this exist? How did somebody create this? You know? And it's good when they can feel like that.
That's cool.
One of the things that's I love about this tournament. When I'm at home, the guys I played with don't really listen to music on the golf course, and so yeah, but then you come here and we have different pairings every day and every single group. There's always music playing on the speakers, and depending who you're paired with, it might be hip hop, it might be seventies rock, it might be more modern stuff. I'm just wondering for all you guys like that connection between golf and music. It's
pretty profound for a lot of folks. How like for you actually, how.
Today we didn't have music, did we?
We didn't have music.
We did have music, we.
Didn't have music.
We're full nature trotting.
Yeah it was good.
Yeah, no, it was fine.
I love it both, you know, either way music or none. Yeah, nobody was carrying today, so it was great though it was it was a little bit of a zend out course anyway, you know. I mean it's full that thing. Lito was just a piece of artwork, right Yeah, I mean that's an amazing spot to be able to. Tom doak Man should take a bow on that one. Don't you think it's pretty?
It's otherworldly? It's just it doesn't I.
Just I just feel like if you could how you could do that to bring a course that was set famous back in another spot and get it, you know, within the inch, it's just crazy.
Yeah, I mean, Griff, a lot of musicians love golf. What is that connection that you guys have?
And it used to be so uncool to admit, Like if I if you knew of a musician that played golf, he didn't want anybody to know about it, you know. And I've played a couple of rounds with Todd Snyder and Easter Nashville, and he, like I swear, he told me not to tell anybody he was playing. I thought
it's going to ruin his street cred or something. But now it's just become you know, I think it's as golf's gotten more popular and there's it's changed over the years, and it's been seen in a lot different different through different lens. You know. Even for myself, it was like I wanted to put that old person behind me and like become something completely different. You know. I was almost like I don't want anything to do with that world anymore.
And now it's really interesting how for myself personally it's become really integrated, and I think it's been you know, for the world in general too, it's been really integrated. I think in this weekend feels like that where there's a lot of it's like a different style of golf, and you know, like guys are walking around with basketball socks on and like super cool outfits. There's music playing
on the course, and it's really different. But yeah, it's nice to see some of the like some of the cliches about golf go away and have it become, you know, kind of a deeper, moral, inclusive sport.
What were your thoughts on the lead.
Though, I thought it was really hard. I could tell from the first hole. I mean, I knew that those greens weren't gonna hold, and I was like, how but how much aren't they gonna hold? Like if I you know, if I don't but I don't play a little bit close to the hole, I'm gonna have a fifty foot putt. And then sure enough, on the first hole, I had a fifty foot putt and I'm just like, oh man, if I'm gonna have to get these down in two all day, it's gonna be a long day, you know.
But it was kind of like that, and every time, like I hit one on the second hole and it was a pretty good shot and I'm like growning when it's in the air because I know it's gonna be a thirty foot putt. And John's like, what's wrong with that one? It's like, I don't want to put.
The thirty foot putt.
I want like a fifteen foot butt, you know, because I just I hate three puttons so and then when they're on greens that hard. It's just like trying to get a feel for the course. But it was certainly unusual in the in the sense that like no trees, hard to know where to aim, probably a good thing. We had a couple of caddies out there. But it was really spectacular.
It is really a stroll through a museum. It's it's very much a it's very much a feels like there's something much different going on than anything or anywhere else you see. I think National Golf Links is the closest thing that I can compare to. But it just is so much more pronounced, you know, you know, yeah, the walls, urn of walls and bunkers. I said earlier in our person thing, it's no wonder why golf took so long to catch on because if they were playing that that golf course back in the day.
But what was the original When was I should know this? When was the original one designed and built and everything?
When did they think it was in the teens.
Yeah, nineteen yeah, yeah, yeah, no, So I mean, yeah, how did people hear keep playing? They published played it once.
And said what the Yeah, it's like Rob Williams retis designed to torture people.
Oh my god, that was a torture chamber.
You have to be so precise tea, and then from the Fairway and around the greens.
And you don't know and you don't know what's lurking out there, you have no idea. It is a beast.
Yeah.
The greens were just insane too, right, I mean there was I went, I walked up on severals, going I could fit nine of Goat Hill parks on his green, easy, easy, nine on one green.
Eighteen.
That's the one.
I was like, Oh, got approach out to eighteen.
I was like, what is happening to me right now? I mean there were dance teeth yet the one I mean I was curious about Chakire. First of all, what do you think about the lido? And then I also wanted to get your take on sort of Griffin and his writing and how you know what listening to him about that writing sort of ring you know, sparks to you about in terms of all the artists you work with, and they must all be different.
Yeah, I mean, well just at the lido. It's just to get that out of the way. It's spectacular course, very hard. I didn't have I didn't have a great day out there, but it's uh, it was really special.
He did hit probably the best shot in the Part three number whatever.
That was six together today.
Yeah, you know, he had a rough day, but he held it together and he played great at the end, and he he had an amazing shot on that Part three that that kind of wraps down to the pen was way in the back left. Yeah, sixteen he had till like twelve feet. Unbelievable, Yeah, unbelievable. So anyway, there was one that was good.
You know, it's it's super cool. It's honestly, I was a little disoriented out there, yeah, just because there's nothing, you know, there's no trees on the course. But it's spectacular. There's a lot of blind shots. It's it's it's really cool. You have to be accurate.
It was.
It was fun.
Disoriented is a great.
Yeah, it was very disoriented totally.
That sums up my day.
Yeah, Vertigo, total vertigo.
You're looking around.
Yeah, where am I going?
Yeah, get dizzy.
I mean I haven't been overseas to play. But it was just like, okay, this is Lynx golf. Like you're not flopping any shots out here, Like you've got to be really creative with how you're chipping, even chipping into
the greens. And I was thinking about the kind of the lynxoul connection because my dad was had read this book, uh called Golf in the Kingdom that he was really into, and he gave it to me to read, and I must have been fourteen or fifteen, and you know, it's just mystical, magical tale takes place in Scotland, and there's a character in there that is like Peter Beams, like
shit as Irons. He's like this guy. It's just like this artist, but this really spiritual being that's also some tuned into golf in a really weird like fifth dimensional way somehow. And and you know, I had found out that John knew the book really well too, and that the name had come from Link Soul had come from the book, and so we had that you know, that link Soul connection through doing that reading. And then Alan
and I talked about that too. I guess you're friends with Michael Murphy, right, And we talked about Esslyn and Big Sir and all that stuff because love that area. But I thought like we had to mention that because that was definitely a cool connection that we discovered that felt like it came alive a little bit today out there from me at least.
Know that the way all these things come.
Full circle is really unique. And that's what makes this this game and this sport so great is just the lifelong friendships and the connections.
And it's, uh, you know, I.
Play a lot of pick of basketball. I play a lot of tennis, but you don't have the community like you do here.
It's just no doubt golf and golf in the Kingdom. Honestly, for those people that have never heard of it and haven't read it, you should go read it.
It is.
It's definitely a benchmark, and you know, sort of like learning the esoteric side of the game, you know a little bit.
It's probably the best podcast I've ever done at the Five Pick Collectives. When we did need a fourth of Michael Murphy and Bamberger and Jeff Ogilvie, like we went, we went way down the rabbit hole on that. But I feel like we should play another song here. It's that time in this podcast you mentioned you mentioned Ballard Town.
Oh yeah, that one we'd like to.
I could play that one. I could play an upbeat one. I could play.
Well, it's dealer's choice. Whatever you want to play.
We want to like that.
Well. I made my way to the great Northwest, to the sleepy little town that I love the best. I rode the ferry in the salty breeze as the fog came, rolling through the dug fir trees, beheld the water on the Puget Sound.
Once upon a time in Ballard.
Town, Ballard Town, Old Ballard Town.
There's no place like it anywhere.
I found.
Six miles north of King Street Station, if you ride those rails into Washington.
On the Salmon Bay in the misty rain, I took a stroll down the old brick lane as the autumn leaves.
Gathered on the ground. Once upon a time in bathered Town. Ball down, Old Bathered Town. There's no place like it anywhere I found. She whispers to me as the full moon glows in the early morning hours, when the foghorn blows. She keeps a secret in the pink blue sky, where the sidewalks glitter and the seahawks fly above the harbor as the sun goes down. Once upon a time in
Ballard Town, Ballard Town, Old Ballard Town. There's no place like it anywhere I found in the bars and the taverns, in the old hotel on a warm October.
I remember well.
I passed the docks, past the fissure men, in the garden bytto locks where the ships.
Come in, where I dream my dream man.
I drank my fill and I wrote my story while the time stood still, as the shadows fell and my sorrows drown. Once upon a time in Ballard Town, Ballard Down, Oh, Ballad Down.
There's no place like.
It anywhere I found. Balled Down, No Ballad Time. There's no place like it anywhere I found.
Yeah, I just need to know the story behind the song. One thing we were talking about Griffin was the joys of being a traveling musician is you get to play a lot of golf on the road, and so you have probably to support the CP and probably just because you do it all the time, you've got a lot of shows coming up. Can you give the listeners an idea of that the sweep of your travels here in.
The Oh, yeah, I'm coming. What am I doing next?
So right after this, I'm on my way to the Sisters Folk Festival, which I've never done before. So I'm gonna teach some songwriting workshops with some other artists for the first three days and then play three days during the concert festival, and then where's that that is in Sisters, Oregon outside of Bend. Cool, And then I'm going to Seattle to play a show at the Triple Door. And then I'm coming back for a little while. I know.
I have some shows in Atlanta, Texas, Florida, and then I do a little Midwest run Gosh, Lsu Illinois, Madison, Wisconsin, Evanston, Illinois, Saint Louis, Pittsburgh. I think I'm missing a bunch, but I've got like twenty five shows left this year, so I'm going to be really busy. And my daughter called me today and she's like, Daddy, I miss you so much. I'm like, I got another week and a half before I'm home. He got used to me being home this summer, you know, So talk to her today after the round
and yeah, it's hard, man, it's hard. Being away from them. But when I'm home, I'm home. I get a lot of quality time with them when i'm back. So I'm only on the road like sixty seventy days a year, probably maybe a few more.
But on the link to this podcast on the Firepit website, we'll have a link to your your schedule too.
Oh it'd be great.
Yeah, what's your best tale from from your life is on the road golf wise?
If you sneaked on any remberl.
Courses, or did you play with Willie Nelson in his backyard orthing like that.
I played with Alice Cooper in Scottsdale, and he was so nice. I had to tell everybody. I'm like, don't worry, I won't tell everybody.
What a nice guy you are.
You ruin your reputation. I couldn't wait to say hit the ball, Alice, which I think I had to at least get that in there once. But he loves golf. He's a good player, the nicest man, really really nice guy. But trying to think I mean a couple of the great you know. I always love being in San Diego because I can stop by it and see these guys in ocean side, so I love when that gets to happen.
But I've been out like fortunate enough to be in the Carmel area a few times when I've already been out there and I could justify the price stag on Pebble Beach because I'm already there. And so I went there. I remember for the first time, oh gosh, I don't know, seven eight years ago, and just had such a blast. I mean, it's golf heaven. It was just so beautiful driving up around there by Cyprus Point, the whole areas, like, oh man, I never want to leave, so getting to
be out there. I opened for Jewel one time and played again there at Pebble Beach. I was already out there, So yeah, those moments, but there's there's it's of great, great moments on the road. I mean I played thousands of shows, so it's hard to pick out it just a couple, but certainly great when I can go take my sticks with me too and do that during the day and play a show after love.
Well, next time you come out to Pebble we're going to work on your golf ight ten.
There you have a few more to check off the wish. Absolutely, I'll be delighted to help be amazing.
Just going back to Jakir just for a second and going back on the writing it, back on the album and sort of the role you played. I mean, I've only we peered in on sort of you working with Joe Horowitz on working on a song and making songs. So when when Griffin comes to you and he has these songs and he's done what he needed to do to get you know, something prepared for presentation, So then what what kicked in there? What what do you do from that point to really sort of get it where it is now?
Sure? Well, because I didn't answer this, yeah question a little bit earlier about his songwriting, I just would say that ballad Town, it's like it's the tone and the feel and the words it takes you somewhere. I mean, I was like, I'm I'm into ballad Town. I've never seen it, but I kind of feel like I know what it's like to walk the streets. And Yeah, So that just that the gift he has for painting that picture is extraordinary. It really moves me. I feel something
from it, you know, the process, the processes. Yeah, well, you know, we talk, we get to know each other a little bit more kind of find you know, I want to know about the person a little bit and I want to share who I am because it's like a kind of a it's an intense thing to make a record, you know, It's like, you know, it's it's an ambitious effort. It's kind of like pulling something out
of the air. It's kind of like, you know, it's like the second phase of discos, like discovering something and having something kind of brought out of the air of the universe. It's so you know, you kind of want to at least I like to spend some time getting
to know the person. And because it also sets up the communication to talk about things that are hard to talk about, you know, just in terms of like creative creativity and interpreting and painting a sonic picture that supports that story and that that feels that doesn't doesn't take you off the narrative completely. It fills it out and gives it some support.
And so that is the act of productive that's the producing of it all.
Yeah, that's I mean, there's definitely that's a I mean, there's a lot of ways to do it, but you know, for me, that's it's important because you know, there's you know, like a lot of times and even even if it takes five years in the case of Lifeline, I mean, it starts with the seed of an idea. You know, there's a moment of inspiration if it's just you know, playing some chords or walking in valid town and just singing that that you know that phrase.
Uh.
But so that's that's my goal is always to find that truth, you know.
And we had a false start with the first song. We were gonna do the easy one, which we thought was Lifeline because it was the most together song, and we started playing it and just wasn't working at all.
It wasn't vibing. And so like part of what Jakiir and I have to be able to do together, which requires skill, is like, okay, how do we It's like you're kind of we're heading down a bad road here, like we need this is the first song and this is not working, and you start thinking you're a tempted to think like, oh ship, is the whole session gonna go like this, Like is it gonna We're gonna turn this around? And so we have you have to be creative about I thought you could explain that you.
Have to you have to be got off to a little bit of a rough Yeah.
That's uncommon.
I mean, that's not uncommon.
It's like first t jitters, like.
We doubled our first.
We were back the Yeah, but you have to be there, you have to have a conversation. You have to be honest and just kind of like you know, you have to address it and kind of try to redirect it and you know, just kind of just be honest. That's the that's the thing that's the important part of building relationship is because he hadn't need so much honesty and transparency, you know, because not all I mean it's just like
these are Griffin's like his songs. You know, that's like this is like this amazing thing that he pulls together. You know, so you have to yeah, communication and being honest and finding the truth. Really we talked about you know, Griffin started sending me songs and I would listen and you know, I'd have some most of a lot of it was just very encouraging because he's he's an excellent
song crafter, you know. And then in terms of like the record making perspective, i'd you know, maybe say a few things about like the structure or I think we might have dropped a verse from a song or something like that.
Well you put it, You put a great band together, and then you you also spent so much time, you know, trying different mics and taking so much care and getting the right sounds.
You know, yeah, well yeah, I mean you know it's like, you know, you pick the songs and it's like, okay, what musicians are gonna what you know, what professional musicians can I bring together that are going to come in the room and immediately switch, you know, switch into being a band member. Like they're going to show up and they're going to be invested.
They're not just add value.
Because you know, it's just like they have to you know, they have to be creative on the fly in a way and and sort of respond and react to you know. You know, it's like you said, we send them the songs before, but then there's a difference being in the room and playing with Griffin. You know, it's just like so assembled we were, they were five in the studio, you know, playing live together, and we spend a little bit of time and we listen back to the demo,
we talk about what everybody's feeling. They go out in the room and they play a little bit. I'm working on the sound, you know. It's just like trying to get you know, where everybody's sitting and how all those things kind of work. And you know, there's a dialogue back and forth about the nuances of maybe the way
the drums are working with the vocal. It's like, you know, because Griffin's used to playing on his own a lot, you know which, Right, so there's a lot of rhythm yeah, and stuff that he implies or he's playing that's implied that has to be honored, some of it stripped away, you know, you kind of have to like, Okay, well we need that. But you know the drums need to do that, you know. So it's just like so he's got to he's got to adjust to something that he's become familiar with.
Yeah, I was going to ask Griffin, how is that for you to play with a band instead of yourself, because it's totally different, right, I mean.
Yeah, I mean you dig it or I love any chance I get to play with the band, and I don't get to do it very often. But it's, uh, it's also like kind of what has shaped the live performances that I do because it's almost forced me to talk more and tell more stories. So I've ended up people tend to. The feedback I get a lot is like, oh, I like when you tell stories, you're a good storyteller. I'm like, I'm just trying to, like, you know, make something up, you know, just to try to make a
connection and talk to you guys, and you know. But playing with a band is it's so exciting in the studio actually, I mean I felt so fulfilled every night when I went home, and it felt really magical when
it all came together. And it's always really exciting to be able to be in the studio, and I wish I could do it all the time because there's so much collective energy when you have five, six, seven people in the room all working on the same thing and you hear it back through the monitors in the control room and it just sounds like it's come to life,
you know, and that's a beautiful feeling. So I remember being really really happy that week, and I often don't feel like, oh man, I mean I forget that I even do that sometimes with how busy life can be, you know, and then it's almost like, oh no, like this is what you're supposed to be doing. Like it's kind of like gives you a nice confirmation of of doing you know, that you're on the right track or something. But it was it was great playing with that band. They were a great band.
On drums. Logan Todd played drums, Eli Beard played bass, Drew Smithers on guitar, electric guitar, and then Elliott Blaufis's on keys and a couple other things. Yeah, I think he played did.
You play, he played a he played some guitar, he played some court, didn't play.
What do you play?
Accordion?
On accordion?
Yeah, high strong guitar. Yeah, it was a yeah, it's it's a lot of fun.
You know.
Then get out there and kind of work on it a little bit and they come in and listen with me and we talk, you know, and that's like a constantly you got to constantly pay attention to what, you know, the artist Griffin's how he's feeling.
You know.
It's just like so it's it's a very fun, dynamic thing that moves very fast, you know. But but then you know, sometimes you can have false starts and you gotta gotta redirect. Sometimes you take lunch, sometimes you just have a long conversation. You just kind of keep pounding away. It depends.
Well, nice work, boys, Well, thank you for all the work. We're gonna enjoy the fruits of your labor on on this on listening to all the songs on the album, but we might maybe rap with one more here.
Yeah, I was working on this one and Jakir was like, oh, you need a maybe give me like one up tempo one. And I was like, oh, that's cool because I'm actually kind of working on an up tempo one and i'd been I took a trip to play a private show down in Costa Rica right after the day after Thanksgiving, and I had my guitar with me and there was a lot of downtime. So I was in my hotel room there again and I came up with the chorus down there in the hotel and then so I had
this chorus. So this course is pretty good, but I needed some verse, and so I don't know where it came from, but it was a little bit autobiographical of like these snapshots of just remembering kind of how my wife and I met and where I was at the time. One of the images was when I was driving from Oregon down overnight. I played a show and then I drove with my buddy like nine hours through the night to see a high school friend who had ended up
he kind of through unfortunate circumstances. He ended up on death row in sam Quentin, and I got this idea, like I just felt like I needed to go see him. I was supposed to go see him, So I went through this long process of getting permission to go into San Quentin prison and visit this guy who I went to high school with. And so we drove through the night and I went across the Golden Gate Bridge for the first time and went in seeing in San Quentin.
And then I remember that image of the Golden Gate Bridge and that view for the first time, driving around the bend and looking out at the bay. And then several years after that, I met my wife in San Francisco and we were married in city Hall in San France. So San fran there's a lot of symbolism for me, and that just like crossing that bridge and eventually moving to Nashville with her. And she had a dog named Floyd, so all that might make sense. When I played the song, I guess.
I was standing out a dream.
I was trying out to fail.
I was on the outside. I had a friend in jail.
Love was on time.
When I was running late, I was head and South lost the Golden game.
It was human invaded, pretty boy, Floyd. It was us against the world trying to fill that boy. It's a miracle. We made it. But I do it all again. It was just a couple of folds rushing in.
I was gonna stick it out through thicking thing.
You red and now was black and blue. Dead set on.
You, dead set on you. I had my mind made up and my heart dead set on you to kill a mocking bird in Nashville, Tennessee.
Out of the corner of my eye, you were look inside. Please. There was no giving up, there was no turning back.
And we lost that first child and I had sober up another day. In this slide, felt the slack suicide draped it between the false and truth.
Dead set on you, thatad set on you. I had my mind made. I've been my heart dead set on you.
That set on.
You, Dad set on you. I had my mind made, I've been my heart dead set on.
You come a long way since those run awake.
Sometimes, looking back, I can't believe what we do.
Neither one of us ever really black.
Doing what if we're told fell My currnory were spinning gold. I was trying to break you, trying to fix in me heart and had me yell and ricks did set on.
You, did set on you. I had my mind made up, in my heart dead set on you. Did set on you, did set on you. I had my mind me up, been my heart dead set on you. I had my mind me up, been my heart dead set on you.
I bed big round, played the wind, made a fortune with my shuk, came in, ran the table. I never thought I could fall down in the winter time hit me like a cannon in the ball, And now.
I can't shake this losing streak. Every road I take is a dead end street.
I got thoughts in my head, can't get them out, trying not to think what I'm thinking about.
I got the thoughts in my head.
I can't get them out, trying not to think what I'm thinking about.