Ep. 19: Dave Simonett on Getting Your Kids Outside, the Boundary Waters, and Trampled By Turtles

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:08):
What's up. You're off of God's Country with Reed also
known as The Brothers, something where we take a weekly
drive to the intersection of country music and the good
old outdoors, two things that go together, like Minnesota and
big o' small mouth.

Speaker 2 (00:23):
Or brand new bands and mini bands produced by Mediator
in I Heeart podcast.

Speaker 1 (00:28):
We got a different one for y'all today. We didn't
know this guy at all. Dave Simonette. He's the front
man for the band Traveled by Turtles, which is like
a Minnesota bluegrass thing. It's pretty cool man.

Speaker 2 (00:39):
Yeah, it's wacky, but I love it. I mean, it's
some great songs, great songwriting. Not a great story of
how they came up with the name, but still pretty
cool band.

Speaker 1 (00:46):
We're going to talk about his love for the outdoors
and conservation and birds. He's a Yeah, he's a part
of a conservation group for the Boundary Waters, which is
a stretch of lakes and river that borders Minnesota and Canada.
It's a really cool researched it. It's so awesome. I
can't wait to go. Also does a lot of work
with Pheasants Forever.

Speaker 2 (01:05):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:05):
He's a really interesting cat, really intelligent man. It's a
just a just a really cool dude, and uh, I
can't wait to talk to him and let y'all hear
about it and listen to it and watch it and
love it and enjoy it and share it with all
your friends and your dad and your mom and.

Speaker 2 (01:18):
The podcast in their life too, absolutely especially this podcast.
I'm a marketplace guy. So I bought a I bought
like a toolbox. I got stand alone. I can't remember
what they're called, but like a toolbox. Yeah, but it's
like the big ones, like chick rodge yeah yeah. And

(01:41):
it had a bunch of razor blades in it. And
it was those razor.

Speaker 3 (01:44):
Blades, oh yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:44):
And I was like, man, I don't necessarily know what
these are for.

Speaker 1 (01:47):
Well, let me see what since that it's a hook blade. Oh,
I've seen that.

Speaker 3 (01:51):
And so the last the last day job that I
quit was two thousand and ten. I quit my job
as a roofer and that's what you used to cut asphalt,
singles and whatever. And it's kind of a little reminder
that wherever it is, tour is not so bad, you know.

Speaker 2 (02:07):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's true, But that that makes sense
as to why that's a yeah, because I because we've
done not legit roofing, but like we've roofed deer houses
and like my own house roof that's not legit, And
that makes a lot of sense. Like if you're on
the end of the thing, you got to cut one.

Speaker 1 (02:28):
And you just flip it over with the two hooks
and use the other hook.

Speaker 2 (02:32):
It fits in a box. Play yeah cut her.

Speaker 3 (02:34):
Yeah, because I'm a utility knife or whatever.

Speaker 2 (02:37):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (02:38):
I've literally been said to like walking out like how's
you right? And I was like, you know, they're like, well,
at least she ain't roofing houses.

Speaker 3 (02:43):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's true. But I will say that
when I was roofing houses, my boss was a friend
of mine and an also musician, and most of that
crew for a while were like kind of transient musicians
in between tours. So it's pretty fun.

Speaker 1 (02:58):
That's cool.

Speaker 3 (02:59):
That's fun as it could have been.

Speaker 1 (03:01):
That's a good crew to be on if you're going
to be riven houses.

Speaker 2 (03:03):
It was a it was good.

Speaker 3 (03:04):
I was the right age for it, and it was good.

Speaker 1 (03:06):
You know what else we got on here?

Speaker 2 (03:08):
My man, I'm talking about my roofing thing for a second.

Speaker 1 (03:11):
And first of all, this is Dave. Yeah, by the way,
David or Dave.

Speaker 3 (03:16):
Uh well, David, but everybody calls me Dave.

Speaker 1 (03:19):
All right, we're gonna go with you.

Speaker 3 (03:21):
I got a couple of relatives that still say David.

Speaker 2 (03:24):
I have a little house roofed, but all my guys
are methods. Now, I don't play music.

Speaker 1 (03:28):
What'd you say you got your house roofed?

Speaker 2 (03:30):
When I was in when I worked at Pickwick, there
was there were roofers there when we worked would work
for gil Parish, Oh yeah, there were roofers there. And
there was this guy named june Bug. I'll never forget.

Speaker 3 (03:41):
His name is j Bug?

Speaker 2 (03:42):
I mean, and he goes I'll never forget. One day
he was walking up the hill and we were like,
june Bug, like, he's ten fifteen, man, where are you
going what? In reality, he was probably just going to
snow store some coke or one thousand per smoke a joint,
you know. He was like he was like, oh man,

(04:02):
I'm like herpes, I'll be back. And we were like, okay,
I was fifteen, Yeah, I was fifteen.

Speaker 1 (04:08):
I was like, what's herpes?

Speaker 2 (04:11):
Yeah? It was terrifying, dude, just and he was like
he was like you he was built like you though, honestly,
and he would like just run up the dang thing
and you know, like h just be cracking little shingles
and flinging them all over. Sweet he like not, he's
knocking nailing with like one swing.

Speaker 3 (04:32):
Loving people find their true purpose, you know what I mean?

Speaker 2 (04:35):
I do.

Speaker 1 (04:36):
That was probably back guy.

Speaker 3 (04:37):
I mean if he wasn't roofing houses.

Speaker 1 (04:39):
Boy, yeah, probably more.

Speaker 2 (04:42):
Math, yeah, probably more math. But he uh June bug man.
I still say, yeah, I'll be back. In my mind.

Speaker 1 (04:50):
It's like dude at fifteen too, when you're that young
and you see somebody like that, like you said, you
are terrified love that guy, like you don't. I can
remember being in like elementary school or I guess no.
It was like I was sixth grades, my first year
of middle school when you go from elementary to middle
and my mom, I ride the bus with my buddy

(05:11):
back to the elementary school and then we walked over
to his house and I remember being on there with
like seniors on that bus. Yeah, in like high school
that were riding to north and you don't look at
those guys. You don't speak to them, you don't look
to them, you don't acknowledge them. You go to your seat,
you sit down, and you look. You put your hands
in your lap, and you look. Do you know it's terrifying.

Speaker 3 (05:34):
And you see people of that age now and the
children's it's relative, I guess you know for sure. Yeah,
I have a middle school daughter. Okay, she's in seventh grade,
and she's scared of the eighth graders. Absolutely doesn't like
to wait to go into school. If there's a bunch
of eighth graders.

Speaker 1 (05:53):
Eighth graders these days, there like a year.

Speaker 3 (05:56):
It's a big deal at that age.

Speaker 2 (05:58):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (05:59):
Where I don't know how old you are, thirty six, Okay,
I'm a lot older than forty three.

Speaker 1 (06:06):
You must be terrified this wolf pack one he has
just Wednesday tatted on his restaurant as a dog. Yeah,
that's awesome. What's your favorite tattoo?

Speaker 2 (06:22):
What? What? What?

Speaker 1 (06:22):
What means the most to you?

Speaker 2 (06:24):
Well?

Speaker 3 (06:25):
I got my kids initials tattooed on my chest. I
want to to go with that.

Speaker 1 (06:28):
Yeah, I want to do over your heart. Yeah kids?

Speaker 2 (06:32):
Good?

Speaker 3 (06:32):
I have two and a uh but let's see thirteen
year old daughter. My son turns eleven on Saint Patrick's Day.
And then I have a ten year old step daughter,
So three all day.

Speaker 2 (06:43):
That's great. Yeah, in the house, it's love work, Okay,
we'll move on.

Speaker 3 (06:49):
If not, we got family checked out a wonderful man.
It's amazing.

Speaker 1 (06:55):
It is tough though, No, yeah, we just we got two.

Speaker 2 (06:58):
And yeah, I just say make sure you want them
before anybody has them. Just make sure you want them.

Speaker 3 (07:04):
I don't think anybody can really know what they're getting into,
you know what I mean. But I remember when my
daughter was born. You know, you go from zero to
one is the biggest jump. Absolutely, and I feel like
my my capacity for joy and for fear like widened,
you know what I mean. My wavelength is kind of

(07:25):
going down the middle. And then we have a kid.
It's like, yeah that it's like the hardest thing and
the best thing at the same time.

Speaker 2 (07:33):
Absolutely.

Speaker 1 (07:34):
I talked about it last week, like out and you
can get so busy and like rs are two under two.

Speaker 3 (07:40):
So like, yeah, you're in it.

Speaker 1 (07:41):
It's chaos and so and it gets it gets tough.
And I got to a point just a couple of
weeks ago where like not a breaking pool or anything
like that, but like at the end of the day,
you sit down and your kids are playing, and the
one kid's playing in the floor and the other ones
in his jumper, and my wife's cooking dinner, and that
isn't that is supposed to be one of the best
nights of your life, you know, like all that going on,

(08:03):
But you take a second, you're so consumed with like
the mess that's that the house is, and what you
got to do tomorrow and everything going on.

Speaker 2 (08:11):
She still smokes cigarettes once she cooks.

Speaker 1 (08:13):
Yeah it's yeah, and drinks a bottle of one a nightying.
We're trying to figure out.

Speaker 2 (08:17):
I don't know if that would change with kids or not.
I guess no, I didn't.

Speaker 3 (08:20):
I remember reading a uh some some like quip about
when you have kids that age, the little time you
put them in the car seat and you shut the door.
In that little little thirty seconds while you walk around
to your door, it's like the most peaceful part.

Speaker 2 (08:34):
Of the day. Hey, I'll tell you that. This is
a true story. So my wife just enrolled our daughter
in ballet, right she's four.

Speaker 1 (08:40):
Yeah, my daughter does that too.

Speaker 2 (08:42):
So it's next door to her salon that that my
wife owns. So I have to bring her up there
on Saturdays because she usually shines working and then I'll
take her over to dance. I'll put her shoes over
or whatever. So they have a screen on the wall
that you can watch the class, like watch them dance
and dance around and like a TV screen, And I

(09:04):
always wondered why everybody was sitting like I would drop
her off, and then i'd take off, you know, and
cut home depot forty five minutes and then come back
and get her something. So the other day I dropped
her off and I walked in and I was like, man,
it's silent in here. And I had had my one
and a half year old son and her all morning long.
You know, this is probably eleven o'clock by the time

(09:25):
I dropped her off, eleven thirty something, and so I
just was like, I sat down and I was like, man,
it's silence. It's silent in here. And I was like
just watching her like do like her little elsa dances
and stuff, and I was like, this is kind of peaceful.
And I was like, I'm gonna go back. So I
went back to the salon, fixed a cup of coffee,

(09:45):
came back to the thing, and sat down and I
was like, I'm just gonna she was like, after the thing,
I come back to the salon and my wife's like,
did you just go over there and sit? I was
like yeah, And it was the most relaxing forty five
minutes of my day, just because it was like she
had boone and there my son burning the place down,

(10:06):
you know, and I was over there hanging out, just
watching my little daughter.

Speaker 3 (10:09):
It's beautiful, like tears in your eyes.

Speaker 1 (10:14):
I was.

Speaker 2 (10:17):
Just singing along with this stuff.

Speaker 1 (10:19):
I didn't know.

Speaker 3 (10:19):
I love that song.

Speaker 1 (10:20):
Watched that movie half of that movie this morning. Every morning.

Speaker 2 (10:24):
You all to want or two to change that.

Speaker 3 (10:26):
I remember when my whole house was branded by that movie.
Every like every towel and you know, dress and everything
around had had a logo on it and that character
on it.

Speaker 2 (10:38):
So let's talk about it.

Speaker 3 (10:39):
That's great, that's over now.

Speaker 2 (10:40):
I'm super cure. I wish we could do this just
to kind of get some sort of mathematical equation going.
How much money? Seriously, would you say at this point
you have invested in elsa Frozen theme? Yeah, Familia, I
never kept track. I mean, but let's just just shooting.

Speaker 3 (11:03):
I mean, give us hundreds of dollars.

Speaker 2 (11:05):
Okay, I didn't think I hit a thousand either, I
would say I'm in the ballpark, but there were shoes
and pretty sure, that's pretty cheap. Yeah, but if he's
four to five hundred dollars a household for girls.

Speaker 3 (11:20):
And how long did that movie come out?

Speaker 2 (11:21):
Right, it's gotta be ten years.

Speaker 3 (11:23):
It's never stopped making money.

Speaker 2 (11:25):
There, no, there is no telling.

Speaker 1 (11:27):
What we were talking about. We were watching the last night.
Griffin was like, movie, watch a movie and I was like,
I was like, yeah, Frozen and she was like she
was like, yeah, Frosen And I was like, what's another one?
And now they have like old lofts, Christmas Adventures and
all that kind of stuff, and yeah.

Speaker 2 (11:42):
We've done.

Speaker 1 (11:42):
And I told Jordan, I was like, man, like, when
you get a when you get a roll like Kristen
Bell or I can't mean a Dinmon's l is that
is that Elsa which I'm team onor by the way,
Elsa's drama because already drama Elsa drives me crazy sometimes.

Speaker 2 (11:59):
But but honestly, when.

Speaker 1 (12:02):
You get that point, when when you get that part
in that movie, you're giving almost like a career. I mean, like,
there's no telling how much money they've made, just working
on that.

Speaker 2 (12:11):
They don't have to do nothing else.

Speaker 1 (12:13):
No, they can just be that for better or for
better word.

Speaker 3 (12:17):
Definitely get stuck as that too, no doubt enough about
the country music team.

Speaker 1 (12:26):
About uh Man. When I found out you were from Minnesota,
I started thinking. I was like, oh, yeah, Minnesota, And
I was like, which one of those is that up there?
You know what I'm saying.

Speaker 2 (12:37):
I get Michigan and Ohio mixed up?

Speaker 1 (12:39):
Ohio.

Speaker 2 (12:40):
Yeah, that's the same area, Michigan in Minnesota.

Speaker 3 (12:44):
Where did are you guys? Where'd you guys from West
c I grew up in Yeah, outside two hours west.

Speaker 1 (12:49):
We've never lived outside the state, Yeah never, and I've
never been up there. Like I was thinking, I was like,
is it the Minton one? But that's that's Michigan, Michigan.
And then there's Ohio. No, bro, how was.

Speaker 2 (13:00):
Lower what I thought you were doing?

Speaker 3 (13:02):
Quit so then Wisconsin?

Speaker 1 (13:03):
Yeah, Minnesota, Wisconsin? Is that how it looks on the map?

Speaker 2 (13:08):
Texas?

Speaker 1 (13:09):
Okay, like that, so it looks like it's the one
that looks like it took a bite of a piece
of toast.

Speaker 3 (13:14):
And then Lake Superior is the northeast side of it.

Speaker 1 (13:17):
Okay, that helps did you grow Where did you grow up?

Speaker 3 (13:20):
I grew up in the southern part of the state. Okay, uh,
it's like south of the Twin Cities, which where I
guess anybody probably knows where that is. Maybe, But and
then I lived in Duluth for a long time, which
is on Lake Superior.

Speaker 1 (13:31):
Is that up north? Yeah?

Speaker 3 (13:33):
Maybe an hour and the only thing from.

Speaker 1 (13:34):
The only other thing I know about Minnesota or the
Minnesota Vikings and is isn't that where the largest mall
in the world is. Yeah, the mall.

Speaker 3 (13:42):
I don't think it's the largest mall in the world.
The largest mall in the United States. Yeah, the Mall
of America.

Speaker 1 (13:49):
It better be the biggest mall. It's called.

Speaker 3 (13:51):
It's not far from my house. Really, Yeah, I guess
I'd just take it for granted, you know.

Speaker 1 (13:56):
Yeah, you don't look like much of the mall. Guy.

Speaker 3 (14:02):
Roller coasters in there. I've been in there playing roller coasters.

Speaker 1 (14:04):
Yeah, this whole amusement parking.

Speaker 2 (14:06):
You think you can ride a roller coaster right now? No,
me neither.

Speaker 3 (14:09):
I know that I can, but I know that I
don't want to.

Speaker 2 (14:12):
That's what I mean.

Speaker 3 (14:13):
That's what I have done it in the last couple
of years, dude, but not well, I didn't do it well.

Speaker 2 (14:18):
I'm going to say in the last five years something
I'm doo the bob Gota is going on. And I'm
telling you, bro forty, that's yeah, that's yeah.

Speaker 3 (14:31):
You're talking about like you can't like turn around without
getting dissy.

Speaker 2 (14:35):
I can't swing next to my kid and look at carsick.
What happened?

Speaker 3 (14:40):
That started in my thirties too. I used to be
able to do all of like tilt the world.

Speaker 2 (14:46):
Oh I love roller coasters.

Speaker 3 (14:50):
No, no, no for that. And I'm glad it's not
you know, I didn't get It's not just me, It is.

Speaker 2 (14:56):
Not just you, brou I'm telling you, man, I can't like.

Speaker 3 (14:59):
Get those like copper bracelets or whatever.

Speaker 1 (15:01):
Yeah, what do you think you better get them? I
mean those commercials are for y'all. Now, bro, let me
tell you this last. The last time I wrote it,
tilt World was was I was like, I remember mine
to fourth grade. I was fourth grade. Do you remember
I was an adult?

Speaker 3 (15:18):
So I found go ahead, this is the last.

Speaker 1 (15:21):
Time, and I will never in my life. When you
talk about tilta war, you talking about the thing that
spins real fast on the track that spins.

Speaker 3 (15:28):
Yeah, your car is spinning and the whole thing spinning.
So it's like the earth rotation around the sun.

Speaker 1 (15:33):
Yes, that's except way faster except war puke bro fourth grade,
I had a crush on this girl. Can't say her name,
Nicole Curtis. I'm just gonna have to say it. And
she she She's like, hey, I'm going to the fair.
You go to the fair to night. I was like,
I am, now, you know. So we go get my
buddy Cody. We go to the I think it's Cody.

(15:54):
We go to the fair. We're hanging out, trying to
be cool. I got my hair spiked up. I borrowed
one of Dan's pokashell net this isn't Warrior. Yeah, and
so we're at this thing. Dude, I'm a funnel cake freak.
I love funnel cakes still. So my buddy gets one.
I get one. My dad gave me like ten bucks.
Cody got one. I got one. I eat all mine.

(16:14):
Cody's half of his and he's like he's like, hey,
I'm gonna go throw this way. I was like, what,
You're not gonna throw the funnel cake away? I was like,
I'll eat it. Eat the rest of his. As soon
as we get done to throw our stuff away, the
girls are like, hey, let's go ride the tills World.
I was like, in, So we get in, I'm like,
I'm I'm like maneuvering to try to sit by the Nicole,

(16:35):
the one I got a crush on, get in there,
you know, hanging out. I was like, man, this is cool.
You know we're doing it. Things start spinning real slow,
and I'm like, bro, this is awesome. You know I
got there, my buddy's there and starts spinning a little bit.
I was like, oh, this is going pretty fast. About
halfway in, so we're.

Speaker 2 (16:52):
I'm just.

Speaker 1 (16:56):
I'm holding on son And about that time, dude, if
you were outside of looking in, bro, it was like
it was like a water hose.

Speaker 2 (17:06):
Like that.

Speaker 1 (17:07):
That's what was happening. It's a trifugal force. That is
the last time we got done and they all everybody
got stepped off the thing.

Speaker 2 (17:16):
Gross.

Speaker 3 (17:17):
Oh my god, that's up.

Speaker 1 (17:18):
Never never dated. Nicole Curzon got.

Speaker 3 (17:20):
What movie there's an old movie where kids standlight Thank you?
They all tried to in tobacco. They're on the roller
coast or whatever. Maybe it's I don't remember, but they
all throw up all over everybody.

Speaker 2 (17:34):
Remember, Yeah, I remember my first dip and I was
playing RBI baseball.

Speaker 3 (17:38):
Remember that one too.

Speaker 2 (17:39):
I was playing rb I baseball and I was like
this ain't that bad? And I was on couch about
like this frumpy little couch. How old were you?

Speaker 1 (17:46):
Where'd you get it?

Speaker 2 (17:46):
I was a freshman in college. That's the first time
I ever tried to dip and I raised up dude
once again. I'm feeling sick right now thinking about in
the room with real and my buddy, he's green. Get
him on the porch and he pulled my lip out
like this and ran his own finger in there, scooped it,

(18:08):
slung it out. He's a hero hero, well kind of.
Unfortunately I ran my tongue in where he had and
I hit some of that grain, literally threw up all
the way home. Oh man. They took me home passed out.
And to this day, that was twenty something years ago,
and I can't I cannot smell.

Speaker 3 (18:30):
When I can't smell, Yeah, I have a similar reaction
to that smell.

Speaker 2 (18:36):
Mine.

Speaker 3 (18:36):
Mine wasn't from from chewing my My first time I
tried chewing tobacco was in class tenth grade eng this class,
passing it under get to the class and I ran
and I threw up in the skull winter green. It
was winter green. And then I had this is I'm

(18:58):
sorry about this was a party in high school. And
I set my beer down and then I turned around
talk and I turned around and grab what I thought
was my beer.

Speaker 1 (19:09):
I've been there full spit her in the mouth and that, yeah,
got it. Bro That brought up like the most disgusting
threw up on the podcast at the same Mine was
through a McDonald's straw. Yeah, yeah, I thought I thought
I was drinking sweet tea.

Speaker 2 (19:29):
It was not.

Speaker 1 (19:30):
It was not sweet tea in the bottom back up,
brous you could stand up in like Hockel right now,
me and that Okay, okay, that's how sweet.

Speaker 2 (19:43):
First forty minutest tears.

Speaker 1 (19:45):
Yeah, let's talk about I went on a deep dive
on boundary waters last.

Speaker 2 (19:55):
I really excited about water.

Speaker 1 (19:57):
I want to take like I want to do it. Yeah,
it's great, I want I want to. My kids are
under too, so we're not gonna do that yet. But
but like my dad just took our nephew's camping for
like three days just around here a little uh when
they went to Montgomery, Bill, and like I would FaceTime
them every morning because like, that's that's what we did
when we were younger. Man, there was I got so
many great Some of my favorite memories are from setting

(20:20):
up a tent and camping overnight, waking up early and
that smell and starting the fire and getting cooking breakfast
and all that. And Dude, I was I was looking
with reading your your statue and uh saw where you
you did some work with that and are from up there? Yeah, man,
I was like, Man, I've heard of the Boundary Waters before,
but I've never I'm in.

Speaker 3 (20:39):
Yeah, it's an amazingly beautiful place. You know. It's it's
for as far as like the eastern United States. It's
very remote. I think it's it's one point two million
acres that's all for those of you listening. I don't know.
Maybe it's all supers. It's all what sorry lakes now
border Canada them, hence the name.

Speaker 1 (20:58):
Eleven hundred Lakes that strip. I think it's like one
hundred miles of the border between Minnesota and Yeah.

Speaker 3 (21:04):
I don't know that, but I believe, I believe.

Speaker 1 (21:05):
I think I'm positive.

Speaker 2 (21:08):
I think that I do.

Speaker 3 (21:10):
Uh, but you know, the camping in there is paddling,
so you canoe across the lake, put everything on your
back and portage your gear to the next lake.

Speaker 2 (21:18):
So it's not connected there waterways.

Speaker 3 (21:21):
There are some rivers through there, yes, but it's it's
mostly connected by a short you know what's called portages,
but second old voyager trail.

Speaker 2 (21:29):
So you are literally popping light to lake. Yeah, but
not it's not like a continual river system that just runs.

Speaker 3 (21:36):
There are some some trips you can do that would
probably you probably wouldn't have to get out of your boat.
But and it's all there's no motors allowed, not even
electric motors. So if you go on there ice fishing
in the winter, you have to use a manual auger,
not even drill.

Speaker 2 (21:49):
How does a manual order work in my mind as
a butter like a butter chain, Yeah, yeah, yeah, and
you just drill down and then.

Speaker 3 (21:59):
But it's because of rules like that there and how
protected that area is. It's amazing. It's an amazing fishery,
right because there's the water is really clean. The only
pressure gets her from people and canoes, yeah, which.

Speaker 1 (22:12):
Only hard cores are going to do.

Speaker 2 (22:13):
That.

Speaker 3 (22:14):
Yeah, and it's great. It's it's it's really I go
at least once a year now my well, all my
family has been in there, but my son has started
to come on have kind of an annual guys trip.
My son started to come on that now. So yeah,
fishing is great.

Speaker 2 (22:30):
Line out. How you could do this trip? Sure, like
would you take little kids? Not really?

Speaker 3 (22:37):
Definitely can Yeah, any any you can do anything from
you know, you can do anything from a day out
on one lake and stay at a cabin, her lodge
or something like that on the edge around. Once you're
in the actual wilderness, it's all just.

Speaker 2 (22:53):
Actual wilderness.

Speaker 3 (22:54):
What that's like, it's a border, right, so drop you
can drive to the to outside of it. So around
the Bondy Waters like picture like a group of lakes
and like around that southern rima.

Speaker 1 (23:06):
Is that the Flint Trail, the gun Flint Trail.

Speaker 3 (23:08):
Gun Flint Trail is one access to it. That's a
road now and there's a few other that come up
from those show of lakes up here that go north
to the Bondywaters, depending on what side you want to
go in. All the lakes on the edge of that
are usually maybe half in the Bondywater's wilderness and half
out or whatever. Although like the little they called Bondywater's
access points, right, a lot of them have outfitters nearby

(23:31):
stuff like that. But yeah, you can go. You go
in and you come out. You have to fill a
permit just telling where your pointed departure is, how many
days you expect to be in. There really no phone
service most of it, but it's yeah, I mean you
can go, like I said, you can stay at a cabin,
paddle around on a couple of lakes, day trip a
few lakes away if you want portage in, or you
can go as long as you want, man all.

Speaker 1 (23:52):
The way back in.

Speaker 3 (23:52):
There's just supposed to cross into Canada.

Speaker 2 (23:55):
It's kind of oh really yeah, so as long as
you is the north side of the boundary.

Speaker 3 (24:01):
It flows right into Canada and the up up there
it's uh, I forget that. Their their name Quetico, it's
the it's the same, yeah, landscape. They have a national
park just like canoes canoes.

Speaker 1 (24:12):
Yeah, it's really canos and kayaks that's all you can use.

Speaker 3 (24:14):
Yeah, I've seen kayaks and canoes are you know, depending
what you're doing, whether you can fit a out of
gear in there.

Speaker 1 (24:20):
Yeah, you have to.

Speaker 3 (24:21):
It's it's nice because it's it's backcountry camping. But you
can be a little heavier because you're paddling it around, right,
So you know we bring like the big pans and yeah,
like the lotto food.

Speaker 2 (24:31):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (24:32):
Yeah, So it's it's it's for us. It's our not
part of the country really the whole Midwest. It's just
like the biggest wilderness that we have.

Speaker 1 (24:40):
So it's a pretty special place. I was reading that.
It was something on the bw C A pages like
the something Angler, but it was an article on that thing,
and it was talking about is like when when you
talk about Minnesota, which is the land of ten thousand Lakes,
right and all the amazing fisheries on that place. Everybody
talks about the Mississippi River or mill Lax or that

(25:01):
type of thing. And I've watched you have done your research. Well,
I just I read about it last night, and I've
watched some some like bass bass tournaments up there when
they're they're finesse fishing for small mouth. Yeah, you know
that kind of thing. But they the guy that was
writing this article was like, nobody ever talks about Boundary
waters and it is one of the most legendary fisheries
and the and I'm not trying and I don't think
there's enough people wo listen to this. Hopefully maybe one day,

(25:23):
but to give that away, but like that to me,
to pack a canoe in there with your family and
take some rods and reels and oh that's it, and dude,
that's it.

Speaker 3 (25:32):
Yeah, we go gross sunding in there too, So it's
all it's all now, it's all part of a national forest,
so it's all like it's a national forest that has
a few extra regulations on it. Okay, Superior National Force, Yes, exactly,
Superior National Force. So that the last two years I've gone,
at the end of September two years ago was with
I'm on the board of directors for organization called Sportsmen

(25:53):
for the Bonder Waters yep. So like I'm fishing and
hunting kind of focused conservation group up there, and we
took a trip together. And then last year the same
time of year, our band trampled by turtles, most of
us and you can your largest group you can go
in with is nine people, right, so we filled it
with band and crew. We kind of like like our
company retreat and jam and grouse rough grouse and there's

(26:18):
spruce grouse in there too, and green grosse. Hunting and
fishing for like a week. It's wonderful. But you know,
it's it's great because I love the hard work involved
in it. It's a it's a it's a real like
you feel pretty accomplished to get back as far if
you want to go back in there pretty far. So
it's a lot of work, especially with kids and you know,
other people whatever, But it's a it's a wonderful way.

(26:41):
It's just quiet and beautiful that way. You know.

Speaker 2 (26:43):
Yeah that sounds gros.

Speaker 1 (26:45):
Yeah, you might as well leave your like leave your
I think you said, like phone animals. Yeah, I leave
it in the truck. You're not going to get service.

Speaker 3 (26:52):
And just in the small case that I might, because nowadays,
sure that boundary has definitely gotten farther out.

Speaker 1 (26:58):
There's a few years ago I was.

Speaker 3 (27:00):
In the Bondy Waters but not very far, maybe like
a lake or two back from the road, and I
had phone service and that kind of bummed me out.

Speaker 2 (27:10):
So if you have like a boogie wife, you just
need to leave her outside the park.

Speaker 3 (27:15):
Oh, you never know, man, you might be. Yeah, I
like to feel I like to think that you can
always be surprised.

Speaker 1 (27:24):
But but there's lots.

Speaker 3 (27:25):
Of comfortable, you know, really easy ways to enjoy that
environment as well.

Speaker 1 (27:30):
The coolest thing I heard, or the one that caught
my attention most is like that was saying how you
can different ways to enjoy it, and one of them
was a lot of people will take Yeah, pack up
a canoe, go in there and set up like a
base camp.

Speaker 2 (27:43):
Yeah, and just fish out.

Speaker 1 (27:46):
Then you just travel. You go to a lake, a
couple of lakes, do the thing, you hit a couple
of portages, come back. I like that.

Speaker 3 (27:51):
That's great with kids too, Yeah, because you can make
your little your little home base, you know, chop a
bunch of wood, a big kitchen, kind of set up
the other way, you know, that's very popular. It is
more nomadic, you just make out.

Speaker 2 (28:04):
Maybe yeah, yeah, it probably doesn't work as well with kids,
but yeah.

Speaker 3 (28:07):
Yeah, I mean if they are speaking to me in surprised, man,
I was definitely nervous the first time I took my
kids on a trip like that, and they.

Speaker 2 (28:15):
Just they slayed it.

Speaker 3 (28:17):
It ran though. First time. That's our whole family went in.
It rained the end four days we were there, it
rained three of the days solid rain. It's still they
were they were just had their little ringcoats on, and
they didn't even act.

Speaker 1 (28:29):
They didn't.

Speaker 3 (28:30):
I didn't hear one thing about it.

Speaker 1 (28:31):
You know, he's so proud of them.

Speaker 2 (28:32):
That's so cool. You say that about like getting your
kids involved in it. I mean, we were just talking
about our nephews going with our dad, and I will
call and check into like because our oh he's gonna
hear this. Our dad's nearly seventy, and so even though
he is completely able bodied, able minded, you still have

(28:53):
to be conscious of where they're at, what they're doing,
especially with our nephews or like what twelve and eight
or something fourteen nine, so whatever. So so you cool, y'all.
You know, it's pretty cool. Like it was like in
the thirties. The first night they were low thirties twenty
oh was it? Many of them nipped into the twenties.

(29:14):
So we were like kind of checking to see if
everything went good than before, you know. And so I
called my dad, he didn't answer. I called my nephew.
He answered. I was like, man, how's it going. He
was like oh, I'm just sitting down here by the fire.
And it was almost like a different energy to him,
like a more like jacked up energy instead of the

(29:35):
sub uncle damn kind of thing, you know, like you're
talking about. He was excited.

Speaker 1 (29:39):
That's great.

Speaker 2 (29:40):
And so after the trip, I said, man, how was it,
you know? And he was like, man, I think we're
I think we're gonna turn this into her every every
year boys trip. So so booed and OK, and y'all
you that's his son, and like we can all go together.
And man, I think just a great point that you
we're kind of making is like, even though there are anxiety,

(30:05):
even though there is anxiety that comes with getting your
kids out into that stuff, if you can just do
it and let them, then it's will put it up
in our heads to be the scary unattainable.

Speaker 3 (30:17):
They're closer to nature than we are, you know what
I mean. They just kind of got here, I feel like,
and they at least when they were younger, especially my kids,
I felt like they could kind of enjoy themselves anywhere.
But I think they really like to be outside. They
just like it. Like I don't know how your kids
are in their babies.

Speaker 2 (30:34):
But their babies.

Speaker 3 (30:35):
But they love my kids are babies. That was one
of the ways I get to stop crying is just
walk outside you and there's something about being out there
that it's very natural for them. I think it's and
you know a lot of people have varying degrees of
comfort doing that. But and it's also not like if
you're going to take your kids fishing. It's not like
you going fishing and relaxing. No, I mean you don't

(30:56):
even fish. So but it's it's an investment than in them.
I think like they if they get that skill set,
whether they want to do it their whole lives or not,
at least they have it and they know what it is.
And to me, that's that's like reading you know, conservationists.
Maybe in a way I just fall in love with you.

Speaker 2 (31:16):
That's my favorite point has been made on this podcast.
The kids are closer to nature than we are because
they don't have the years of annoyance.

Speaker 1 (31:30):
Whatever.

Speaker 2 (31:31):
It's so true, man, And maybe that's I've been making
this point on this podcast a million times. I've said it,
but like I'm kind of buying into like some holistic
stuff in the sense that like if my kids are
outside for an hour. If I can just get them
in mind Yon four and too. Yeah, if I can
get them outside for an hour, they eat better, they

(31:51):
sleep better there more, their manners are better.

Speaker 3 (31:53):
They're I am too, My manners are better. Yeah, actually
better person, you know, dude, I go. I mean you
guys probably if I probably anybody that's invested in the
outdoors in some way, you start to go a little
nuts if you don't get it.

Speaker 1 (32:11):
You know, I'm just coming out of my seasonal depression
because it's been like because it's been rain and cold
and nasty, and you just you're cooped up inside for
since Christmas almost right, and now it's getting the weather's
getting a little bit better.

Speaker 3 (32:24):
You can get outside, and yeah it's the best, man.

Speaker 2 (32:27):
Yeah, it's just that's a great point. Man. I love that.
I don't know, I want to get mine out as
fast as I can. There's still a little toddler.

Speaker 3 (32:35):
I like. I started camping with mine at that age,
and I loved it.

Speaker 2 (32:38):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (32:39):
It's a lot of work, you know, but everything about
being your parents a lot of work. And going to
the grocery store is a lot of work, you know.

Speaker 1 (32:44):
Yeah, man, you can you can sit on the couch
and put a tablet in front of yeah, and get
your time and it's easy. But it's not. It's not.

Speaker 3 (32:53):
I don't know, there's something that you just just watching
them be out there, it's wonderful. I love watching them
like their imaginations work in the woods, you know what
I mean for sure and make a little forts or
whatever they do. And I remember being that way.

Speaker 1 (33:04):
Yeah, and it's and then they're appreciate beautiful to see. Yeah, yeah,
so proud you absolutely what. My little girl got her
first splinter yesterday and she was at More at breakfast.
She was sitting in a chair and she was looking
at it and like she they were telling her what
it was and she just couldn't figure it out. And
last night, my wife, yeah, she was just like this.

(33:25):
And last night we were nervous about getting it out
and all that stuff. And last night, I mean, Jordan
talked to her. She was like, hey, this is what's
gonna and like Griffin didn't even She went in there
and grabbed it with a tweezers and got it out
and Griffin didn't even cry because I think she was
trying to figure out what was happening.

Speaker 2 (33:39):
You know.

Speaker 1 (33:39):
But I was almost proud that, Like I was like splinter,
like here's a spidaddy whiskey. But but yeah, that's a
that's a that's a good point. Ye get them outside, man,
you bet.

Speaker 2 (33:53):
I love that. I love that. I think back to
like I never remember a day where I sat inside
and watched the movie with my dad, But I can
remember going fishing with you. I can We're going camping
with him. I can remember that. Yeah, him killing deer
and me going up with him to see him, and
me and Ree being so excited me we were. He
would come get us if he if he got a

(34:14):
good buck, you know, he would come pull me and
right out of school. Yeah, and we well holiday, Yeah,
we get a little bit of a holiday, and you
know we packed if I anty sausages and crackers and
you know, just go out there and kind of make
a little celebration kind of day of it, you know.

Speaker 3 (34:29):
Yeah, And when you are a parent, you don't really
realize that you're making that, you know what I mean,
Like when you think back, it's just like daily life
kind of. And then I have beencome more conscious of
that if my kids have gotten older, just because they
start to tell me about memories now that they've had
when they were younger. Oh my god, I really messed
that one up.

Speaker 2 (34:47):
So I don't have that yet. So they're telling you
about it maybe, Yeah, And.

Speaker 3 (34:49):
You gotta think it's hard to keep that. I never
really kept it in the front of my mind. But
I think it would be cool to to realize that
what you're doing with them right now is how they
will see you, you know, camping with them or a
hundred fishing or whatever. That's a big deal.

Speaker 2 (35:03):
Make the effort.

Speaker 3 (35:04):
Yeah, wow, it's still worth it.

Speaker 2 (35:05):
So how did that? How does your love for the
outdoors and your responsibilities honestly coincide with your band life?
You know, we talk about that a pretty good bit
with the people who are genuinely caring about, you know,
hunting and fishing. A lot of the time, people outside
of that don't understand that that is a major part

(35:27):
of our lifestyle. Sure, you have to make it kind
of lego fit into your your touring.

Speaker 3 (35:34):
Yeah, I've kind of taken several different approaches to that
my whole career. I think in the beginning, I could
just use the freedom of this way of work or
this like this line of work, you know, because when
I when I go on the road, but then i'm home.
Before having kids, you had a lot of space. I
had a lot of space there, you know. So then

(35:55):
I would just go out and I'd be able to
go out to the woods Monday afternoon while everybody else
is at work. And I got really used to not
spending my weekends doing it.

Speaker 2 (36:04):
But which is great, it's actually not. I love it.

Speaker 3 (36:07):
So there's one way where it works really well. In
the last few years, I've started to use touring as
a way to explore new places. So try to get
a day off somewhere cool, you know. Like last summer
I was fly fishing in Montana two days. We've done
the same in Washington.

Speaker 2 (36:25):
You know.

Speaker 3 (36:25):
I booked like bird hunting trips around shows, and so
now I see it as like a way for me
to get places where I probably wouldn't be going right
now in this point of my life, you know, without
the band. And so to me it works out great.

Speaker 2 (36:39):
Did they hunt fishing?

Speaker 3 (36:42):
A couple of them will come fishing. Actually, our banjo
player took his firearm safety this.

Speaker 1 (36:49):
So we're going to get him. Yeah, he's sitting on
the bus.

Speaker 3 (36:55):
Get yeah, but we you know, I whether nobody's ever
been unwilling to do stuff like this, but you know,
I have kind of pushed the band into some more.
For instance, a couple of weeks ago, Pheasant Fest is
a big it's Pheasants Forever and Quail Forever's big annual conference,
showroom floor kind of.

Speaker 1 (37:17):
It travels.

Speaker 3 (37:18):
But this year it was in in Sioux Falls, South Dakota,
and we did we worked with them and made our
concerts like a kickoff party the night before, and it
was a fundraiser for Pheasants Forever Quail Forever and you
know the band, I'm the only one in the fall
that will probably be bird hunting, but they're all cool
with it. Yeah, and they're all, you know for that
for an organization like that, that's that does so much

(37:41):
habitat work, there's lots of people that don't haunt birds
that benefit from that.

Speaker 2 (37:44):
So I think that kind of there's animals that aren't
necessarily game animals the benefit from that too. We're pretty
tucked in with n WTF and do some stuff. We're
not artists.

Speaker 3 (37:55):
That's a great one too. Yeah, Man, love the world
such a success story.

Speaker 2 (38:00):
I'm so thankful for those you know, I mean the
fact that there are ten times the turkeys that there were.

Speaker 3 (38:07):
It's unreal fifty years ago. And it just takes people
caring about.

Speaker 1 (38:10):
It for sure, you know, and doing something about it.

Speaker 3 (38:12):
And that's what the hunting community does for the environment
in general, is that they care so much that everything
else that lives on that landscape benefits from that work.
But without that, you know, there's I mean, those turkey
would probably.

Speaker 2 (38:26):
Homes or Yeah, man, you know what, dude, we talk
about it a pretty good bit. But man, it's like,
I mean, you can call me a lot if you
want to, but honting is conservation.

Speaker 1 (38:37):
I absolutely agree with that, you know.

Speaker 2 (38:38):
Because if you if there is nobody to regulate and
care about habitat, they go away.

Speaker 3 (38:46):
Yeah, I know, and I know there's a lot of that.
That's kind of a hard sell for some people.

Speaker 2 (38:50):
It is.

Speaker 3 (38:51):
I see it in music a lot. I talk to
a lot of people about, you know, other musicians or whatever,
studio in the studio, just people that work in our
commune unity that it doesn't overlap with hunting and fishing
all that much.

Speaker 2 (39:06):
You would think that it would, but it really does.

Speaker 3 (39:08):
Yeah, you know, right, but I love having open conversations
about it with people because I like to because for me,
I got I have an adult onset hunter, right like,
I started late later in life, and I was surprised
by how a lot of people approached it from the
conservation point of view, which I you know, growing up

(39:29):
not hunting. I think there's a lot of preconceptions about
I mean, preconceptions about hunting is very broad, but I
don't know if the general public understands a lot of
the care that goes in to preserving the landscape.

Speaker 2 (39:43):
So can you lock up yourself now, travel back twenty
years and tap into what some of those preconceptions were.
I'm super curious as to what.

Speaker 3 (39:53):
Yeah, I kind of I guess we were in it
and most people are that I've met, most people that
that hunt I've done so because it's it's not like
an activity you pick up in life, like golf or whatever.

Speaker 1 (40:04):
It's like a lifestyle.

Speaker 3 (40:06):
We didn't have a choice, yeah, and that's kind of
I mean that was with me with fishing too, That's
just what we did. You know, everywhere you looked as
a lake where I grew up, and so everybody just
it was just what you did on the weekend or whatever.
But and so I get that point of view too,
and it's just, oh, this is just how we live
kind of. But yeah, from outside, I think there's a

(40:27):
lot of people think of it as probably less intelligent
than it is. There's also been a lot of you know,
like in any community, there's people that don't do it right,
and they're usually louder and get more attention, and so
what do you know, it seems, you know, so there's

(40:48):
a lot of people have a lot of views about
the firearms, about killing. In our modern you know, food landscape,
people are pretty removed from I think most of us
are very more from where our food comes from. And
I you know, I've had conversations with people while we
were eating burgers about about how they didn't know if
they could kill an animal to eat it, you know,

(41:10):
and it's like, well, that's fine, that's nice that somebody
else can do that for you. But I think that
and it doesn't have to be for everybody. I mean,
if everybody hunted, to be hard to find a spot
to go, but it's already But and that, you know,
in that same vein, the more people that you get
to care about and do it. Hopefully that creates more

(41:31):
what we were just talking about, like it creates more
habitat because people start caring about it and they want
to deserve at least what.

Speaker 1 (41:36):
There is and looking at it through that lens. Like
we didn't grow up necessarily coming up being like, oh
we're conservations, were hunters, but but learning about conservation and
that process through that, you know, the lifetime of hunting,
you know, brought us to where we're at now, you
bet and are all about.

Speaker 3 (41:54):
That com And I think, even if it's not conscious
in somebody's mind, that there's a connection that you as
a hunter when you're out you have a connection to
that particular landscape that's deeper than really than any other
human activity. I think you you can go bird watching,
which is wonderful probably, but it's not the same as

(42:16):
you learn so much about every step that you take
out there. You know why you're there, what the winds doing,
what the groundcover looks like, all of those things. You
pay attention to that. So you know, even if you're
an old guy that that just grew up hunting and
it's you don't even think you know the word conservation.
You kind of area anyway, just caring about.

Speaker 2 (42:36):
If your license, if you're buying, you're contributing, whether you
know it or not.

Speaker 1 (42:41):
And staying within the guidelines of of the.

Speaker 3 (42:44):
You are, within your limit or whatever you are. That's
that's our model of conservation.

Speaker 2 (42:50):
Absolutely, man. I'm thankful that that you came home and
talked about that. I feel like there's a lack of
understanding and a lot what I run into a lot
with people who don't understand it. I get why they
don't get it. If I didn't, if I didn't grow
up seeing an understanding deer coming in, seeing them be processed,

(43:16):
seeing them go to the freezer, seeing them coming out
of the freezer and be turned into meals for my family,
Like I understood the entire process by the time I
was ten eleven years old. And there's always that initial
oh my gosh, I can't wait to kill my first buck,
you know thing my dad fed our family with sauger, crappie,
bass brim deer, turkey. I mean, we it's what we ate,

(43:40):
it's what we grew up doing, and so I feel
like there's a little bit more of a conscious consciousness
to understanding why what happened through the process. But if
I didn't do that and all I saw was the
outdoor channel or whatever. But whatever hunting general you turned to,
and it's just and there was this kind of weird

(44:01):
dark mid nineties early two thousand things where people were
just it was just like you turn on the channel.
It was.

Speaker 1 (44:12):
Without the talk of the contole context.

Speaker 2 (44:15):
It was all it's all dirt. This is conquering, remember,
it was this conquering.

Speaker 3 (44:22):
Look a look at me, which which we have in
there totally, you know, instead of more, instead of more
of like a partnership with the animal right.

Speaker 2 (44:32):
And I love what's happening as far as like kind
of an awakening of man. We're responsible for this. We
can contribute to this. It's just it just happens to
be our time, you know, to to enjoy it as well.
But man, turkey and deer and I mean elk and
pheasants won't hopefully be here well well after we're gone.

(44:55):
But we have to do the work now. And or
when I when I say work, I mean contribute. Reading. However,
you can contribute to having that habitat and to having
those animals, you know, be able to grow and continue
to numbers to rise.

Speaker 1 (45:10):
We're being able to enjoy it the way we are
because people before us did that, like just set their
course to preserve land and the animal.

Speaker 3 (45:20):
And when you have freedom to do the kids of
your own, you start thinking like that, no doubt, you
know what world are you going to get? We were
just talking about with turkeys though they were pretty much
gone at least in Minnesota they were gone. They were gone.

Speaker 2 (45:42):
Now they're like forty nited states. I think, yeah, everything,
but the last.

Speaker 3 (45:45):
We had no eagles. When I was a kid, I
remember seeing a bald eagle.

Speaker 2 (45:48):
And it was like, I feel like we've been seeing more.

Speaker 3 (45:51):
Wild and there. I mean on the Mississippi Mississippi Flyway,
you know, Minneapolis, Mississippi River goes right through there. They're
everywhere now and so there's the that's a real visible
kind of tactle rewards that we've been able to see
evenion just in our lifetime. And how fast you can really,
like if I like what we said before, if a
bunch of people really care about something, it can really

(46:12):
make a difference fast, no doubt, incredible. I mean, nature
regenerates itself if it's allowed to. If you burn a
field or whatever, that next year. It's the best it's
ever been.

Speaker 2 (46:23):
Yeah right, absolutely, Yeah, we're on that where I'm on
that same program of letting just all. I've probably not
my entire place, but I'll probably had twenty or thirty
acres that we're just letting, oh yeah, just grow. And
then because I would love and I was, this is
getting a little line king, and I apologize, but like
me and my my son and my daughter will go

(46:44):
out to the tallest point in our place and just
kind of look over everything and you can kind of
see into that valley, and uh, that's all he wants
to do. Go for a ride, Go for ride. I'll
take them with Siler and we'll ride out there almost
every night. And so as we're sitting there, I'm like, man,
I really hope in my lifetime that I can hear
Quail in this section. Occasionally we would run into him.

(47:08):
I remember running into a cove in you know, Ali,
like ten years ten fifteen years ago, seeing some quil.

Speaker 1 (47:13):
Yeah they're around, They're sparse, but they're around there.

Speaker 2 (47:15):
So I mean, how cool would it be though, if
by the time he's sitting up there with his kid
looking over you know, this property, going man, my dad.
I mean, Mom, I'm out right right, I'm up there
hanging with Jesus. And he's going, hey man, my dad
allowed this stuff to grow up. And now we're on
a four year burn cycle or three year burn cycle.

(47:37):
And listen to all those quil and there's just Quail
out there, like just going.

Speaker 3 (47:41):
Nothing definitely happened that fast. You know, if they have
the habitat, they just show up. Magic kind of. There's
a book. It feels like there's this great book called
for a Handful of Feathers. You ever heard that? I
haven't author Gee d love Alden is this He's got
an interesting story. But he is a French from France,
and he's like.

Speaker 2 (48:01):
He's like.

Speaker 3 (48:04):
He's noble, like he's a blue blood and he kind
of when he was young and he kind of like
withdrew from that and bought a place in Florida. And
that book is about he's a bird hunter. And that
book is about how he managed this farm that he bought.
It's kind of like decrepit old like abandoned farmhouse or whatever,
and he manages that whole property for doing exactly what

(48:25):
you're talking about for Quail, and it's his the kind
of journey through that the Cobies come back.

Speaker 1 (48:31):
It's great. And he's also like I don't know if.

Speaker 3 (48:33):
You ever read any like Jim Harrison or he's kind
of debaucherous seventies, you know, like big appetites and yeah,
but they pretty much spent all the time fishing and
hunting or whatever. He was in that crew. But it's
it's yeah for a handful of feathers.

Speaker 2 (48:50):
And definitely checked that out because I can't remember the
last time that I remember it.

Speaker 1 (48:56):
Read a book, read a book.

Speaker 2 (48:57):
No, I'll read about talking about my busting a covey
of quail. Yeah, on our west.

Speaker 1 (49:05):
And you go out to Kansas or somewhere like that
where they're they're everywhere everywhere, man, and it is a
spectacle to watch. Cool watch them do the thing. Super cool.

Speaker 2 (49:13):
Talk to us a little bit about bird hunting. How
did you had you get into that?

Speaker 3 (49:17):
I well, I got into it kind of in my head.
It's by accident, but I don't really believe that. But
there's an outdoors radio show in Minneapolis Fan Outdoors, and
it's not it's like on local sports radio station.

Speaker 2 (49:32):
There's a sports radio station that does.

Speaker 3 (49:35):
It's like seven times it's early morning on Saturday morning.
It's awesome and it's just these two guys that talk
about hunting and fishing for a couple hours and all
that would be great on that uh And you know,
like we were saying before, I wasn't hunting at the time,
but I grew up fishing and I still I trout

(49:56):
fish whatever. And so it's kind of the only I
just head on at the house every Saturday. I get
up and I uh, you know, making breakfast or whatever.
And it was just on the radio, and I got
to become a fan, as you do. I love I
love I love talk radio in that way where people
just kind of you just kind of get used to
the voices. Maybe I just became a fan of comfort One.
One of the co hosts of that show is Bob

(50:18):
Saint Pierre and he's uh, I remember his title vice
president of marketing or something, sorry, Bob pro peasants forever.
And he says something about our band and he had
like seen us or whatever it was, and I was like,
I was like, oh man, they're talking about And so

(50:38):
I reached out to him just to say thanks for
the plug, and hey, I'm a big list you know,
I listen every week and I was, you know, I
was streaming and on tour and everything. Yeah, so we
started this conversation and uh, Bob is a is a
hunting recruiter man.

Speaker 1 (50:52):
He loves to spread.

Speaker 3 (50:53):
He's a diehard conservationist and he loves to spread his
love bird honey. And so he invited me to come
out for pheasant Opener. And they have an annual trips. Yeah,
and they stay at the host, the radio host cabin.
His family comes in and it's a big, you know,
annual weekend. And so I, yeah, I and the same

(51:14):
as our banjo player before or this year. I took
my fire I'm safety on tour and you know, before
shows or whatever online and got my license, got all
got all set and and he took me out very generously.
Now that I know what it is to take somebody
out like that in a group that he's known his
whole life, you know. And it went great, and I
was I was hooked man for.

Speaker 1 (51:35):
That first trip.

Speaker 3 (51:36):
But we had a we had I got we saw
a bunch of birds. I saw that whole process for
my first time in my mind was fully blown. It
was yeah, man, it's you know the relationship with the
dogs and just watching this whole thing. And then at
night we stayed stay at the cabin and we had
a big game bird feast over dinner, and I was like,

(51:58):
I love this. I do this a lot more, and
now it's become a real central part of my life.
That's all in the last you know, that was now
six years ago.

Speaker 2 (52:07):
That's awesome.

Speaker 1 (52:07):
People are like, man, I thought, I thought these bands
like partied and rock Stars, and no, we're taking hunter
safety courses before we're going out.

Speaker 3 (52:15):
Of Yeah, there is a little bit of yeah, I
had a beard at the same time.

Speaker 1 (52:20):
Let's go, let's go to Trample by Turtles lamb uh.

Speaker 2 (52:24):
Here's what happened here and I we talking about Someney
and then I even tried to into the second.

Speaker 3 (52:31):
It's supposed to be a music podcast.

Speaker 1 (52:33):
This is what we get. We get fifty three fifty
three minutes, and we're like, dude, it feels like we've
been here for fifteen because we were talking about what
we love.

Speaker 2 (52:40):
I tried for the record jumps. I tried with the
the uh so, how does honey intertwined with you?

Speaker 1 (52:48):
I tried it felt a little scripted, Okay, I wanted
to just say best band name of all time, the
best best band name of all time. Is there a
story to that or does it just happen.

Speaker 3 (52:59):
I've been trying to come up with one for twenty
you know, we have made up a few stories about it,
but now I just kind of default to what actually happened.
And we were a side project. Most of us were
playing in other bands Dluth, Minnesota, but we were playing
rock bands, most of us, and we wanted to try
an acoustic thing on the side. None of us had

(53:19):
ever played country music or at the time we were going
right for kind of traditional bluegrass music. Never even really
listened to it, and I grew up with punk rock,
and I do find some similarities there. So and this
was also in early two thousands, so we went I mean,
I sound like a grample when I'm talking about this,
but we went to the record store and bought records

(53:42):
and listened to them and learn the songs. And so
we learned a few bluegrass songs and started playing them.
And we didn't know anybody else in town that was
doing it, so it just seemed kind of like a
kitchy but it was really fun and started to really
enjoy it. And then we had a couple show his book.
We didn't have a name, and then we got asked

(54:02):
to play. The Louth has a Every year they have
the Homegrown Music Festival, which is like every local band
in town, like a really small cold south by southwest
and it's only but it's only bands from the luth.
It's very in school, many hundred, one hundred sound bands
and everywhere it turns into a venue and it's the

(54:23):
coolest gig in town.

Speaker 1 (54:24):
Yeah, and we got asked.

Speaker 3 (54:25):
To play, and we were like we needed We don't
even have a name, and so we were we were rehearsing,
which is something we did back then too, apparently, uh.
And we were just throwing out phrases or whatever. And Eric,
our amandolin player, he said, I don't know how he
got up, but he said trample by turtles. And it
was the first one that we didn't immediately hate, you

(54:46):
know what I mean? It was and we're like, good enough,
And that's the story. It's about taking peyote, and.

Speaker 2 (54:54):
Yeah, that's what I want to hear.

Speaker 1 (54:55):
Thanks whatever in their story out there about you got
some stuff stolen?

Speaker 3 (55:02):
Yeah, yeah, so that that's and that was a catalyst.
I think that's probably been made a bigger deal than
it really is. But my other band was playing its
last show. We were splitting up, and I played electric
guitar in that band, and while while we were loading
our gear out, it was you know, we were drinking
and it was kind of chaotic and it was a
big party, and somebody walked out with my guitar. I

(55:24):
am and I never saw him again. And I was
living on a friend's couch at the time, and it
was an epiphone, so just but you know, it was
like it was all the way home. I was very thankful.
It wasn't like an heirloom. Yeah, well I didn't have

(55:44):
any you know, I had I had then I had
an acoustic guitar that I just played and when I
was at home and so we were playing, Yeah, it's
different me. You have no money. It was just like,
there's no way that that was coming back. But it
wasn't like I was playing in that band. Mike, You're
got stolen, and I was like an acoustic guitar.

Speaker 2 (56:03):
Now.

Speaker 3 (56:03):
It just kind of worked out that that tramplet had
started to play and I was I was going to
be focusing on that regardless already and that you know,
not stuff getting stolen. But everybody else's band kind of
similarly split up, and we were kind of left to
decide if we wanted to pursue this as our main focus,

(56:25):
and everybody, yeah, we love playing with each other. It's like, well,
I'd like to start writing songs in our own songs
for this, for this instrumentation. Sure, I don't want to
really be like a bluegrass cover band or whatever if
it's going to be the main project. So that was
two thousand and three.

Speaker 1 (56:41):
It makes sense you're saying that like that. You didn't.
You're all punk rock backgrounds, you are all in rock bands.
You really didn't even know what bluegrass is because your
style of bluegrass is different. I mean, it's the same instrumentation,
but like the phrasing and some of those things. You
can tell that like trample by Turtles has their niche

(57:01):
in that market.

Speaker 3 (57:02):
We always just thought we weren't is good.

Speaker 1 (57:06):
Which which could be genius, But we're not honest.

Speaker 3 (57:09):
We're not like I mean, I love I feel like
I almost hesitated to say this because I think the
word honesty gets used too much talking about music like
it's an honest or it's genuine or whatever the hell
that means.

Speaker 1 (57:23):
I'm glad you said that before I said my next thing,
But yeah, you gonna say that so honest, But I do.

Speaker 3 (57:30):
I have my own version of what that is. But
I think when people say it, they're like, it's it's
real or something, And to me that's just both, like
it's we all have access to everything. I didn't grow
up in a coal mine in Kentucky. That's to me
that like that blue grass I'm talking about that you
that sounds like the earth you know from where they live,
and early like fifties country music in Nashville, like it

(57:52):
sounds like Tennessee absolutely, and that that's what I think
they're talking about, but we're not. I mean, we grew
up in Minnesota where you know, and why I take
influences from all sorts of stuff. So it's to me
it's honest because it's naturally what comes out of my body.
But I don't really have another choice.

Speaker 2 (58:11):
I love that I've never even that's great.

Speaker 3 (58:14):
I love things that sound like where they're from. We don't,
I really do. And I love like zydocho you know,
and you know what you can smell like the gutters
of New Orleans when you hear that, and that's really.

Speaker 2 (58:26):
Cool taste that cagency.

Speaker 3 (58:28):
We now have access to all the music in the
whole world, and it's all in my pocket, you know,
And so you're allowed to get influences from wherever you
get influences from, and now you get them from I mean,
you know wherever man, which is.

Speaker 1 (58:42):
Wild and to see music that comes.

Speaker 3 (58:44):
Out of that distillation is you know what's happening now probably,
but I mean I.

Speaker 2 (58:47):
Think that's what you got. Beyonce releasing count Radio. I
think that's what you got.

Speaker 3 (58:52):
Everybody's making a country record right now. Yeah, yeah, but
I do think that when I think that's kind of
a pendulum swing and music, it's very you guys, you know,
you write songs, you've been at studios. You can see
how you can create what people might consider artificial. You know,

(59:14):
you can everything can be programmed and perfect and robotic.
And I think when things get that way for a
long time, people start to crave like a lifelike sound, absolutely,
and so they come back. That's why people keep probably
coming back to like folk music and country music.

Speaker 1 (59:29):
Zach Brynt. I mean, you know from just experience like
that guy is on a track that's incredible. It's insane.

Speaker 3 (59:38):
I've never seen anything like that, And I.

Speaker 1 (59:40):
Think you're right because people are craving. People are craving that.
His fans are craving that.

Speaker 3 (59:44):
Man. They really it's really it's rareer. I mean, I
hate to say it, but zach' spand gets on stage
and there's there's nothing programmed about that. They're loose. They're
a bar rock band and they're awesome, and it's like,
you know, maybe a kind of a more cunt his
version of like the seventies Rolling Stones or something like that.
They're loose, and it's it's like it's dirty, and I

(01:00:07):
mean people love it because it feels good man. Yeah,
you know, and it doesn't. We don't. We don't beat
to the clock of a click track.

Speaker 1 (01:00:16):
You know, sure, bro, I know that wait until listening
to wait so long. Yeah, But it was almost like
the produces like, all right, so we're just gonna play
as fast, play as fast as possible can and everybody
try to.

Speaker 3 (01:00:26):
As long as we all stayed the same relative to
each other. When it doesn't, it's it's a train wreck.

Speaker 2 (01:00:35):
Can I ask about alone?

Speaker 1 (01:00:36):
Yeah, oh man, I like that got me.

Speaker 2 (01:00:39):
I mean I once, okay, here comes the word the
world again. Here here comes honesty. Uh. We live. We're
a commercial songwriters, so we have we very polished, we
very stay in our commercial lane. And I didn't know
a lot about your band and what y'all do. Uh,
And it was very very fun to do the research

(01:01:01):
and and honestly kind of steal a little bit of
your inspiration of of you know, in some inspiration from
your music.

Speaker 1 (01:01:10):
Man, I mean it was it was another word for
that's plagiarism.

Speaker 3 (01:01:14):
Yeah, you guys got to me sign or yeah, I
make some money.

Speaker 2 (01:01:18):
If I make some money on it, I buy you
a three wheeler. All right, I'll buy you three Yeah,
maybe a new paddle. But no, I'm just saying. You
were just literally talking about pulling an inspiration from your
from the pocket, you know. Yeah, you got all everything
you need and you're like on the phone as far
as music goes, and uh, I was just bumping through

(01:01:39):
them and I was like, man, this is it feels
organic and fun, you know, it felt fun. And then
I got to a loan and I was I was
really listening to the lyrics of that and I mean
the first thing is like, you come into this world alone,
you know, you leave this world. And I was like, man,
that's something commercially I would probably never say, but I

(01:02:01):
identify with that so much and just appreciate the I'm gonna,
I'm gonna. I appreciate the integrity of that, Roddy and
I'm just curious.

Speaker 1 (01:02:12):
Hey, I love that.

Speaker 3 (01:02:13):
Thank you. I mean that I often have a hard
time talking about exactly where a lot of lines come
from specific way, but that one, I was a direct
result of having a kid, and that made me think
about that. And my daughter at the time was, well,
my son wasn't born yet, so she was, you know,

(01:02:33):
one and a half or one, and uh, that's it
was just like a simple meditation kind of on that.

Speaker 2 (01:02:40):
You know, well, it doesn't feel simple, it feels smart.

Speaker 3 (01:02:43):
We were told that that wasn't commercially viable to actually
at one point of course, you were it's a whole
other podcast.

Speaker 2 (01:02:50):
So they said, it's not commercial less.

Speaker 3 (01:02:52):
To talk about that on this one. Fine, it's fine.
You know what, you know, what got me nobody works
there anymorening.

Speaker 1 (01:02:59):
You know what got me was it takes a lifetime.

Speaker 3 (01:03:05):
You you give me, well this, I didn't write this one.

Speaker 1 (01:03:09):
It takes a lifetime to get the.

Speaker 3 (01:03:11):
Live Yeah, take a lifetime to find it. Takes a
lot of time, like the life you had in mind.

Speaker 1 (01:03:16):
That's Jeff tweet you.

Speaker 3 (01:03:17):
It takes a.

Speaker 1 (01:03:17):
Lifetime to find the life, like the life you had
in mind. Yeah, it's crushed me.

Speaker 3 (01:03:23):
Borderline tongue twister to say, yeah, tweeted, Yeah, he can.
I can write a song, don't you produced a record
for y'all? Yeah, our last one recorded and he asked
us if we would record put that song on it,
and they put it on there. They came out with
a country record to a cruel country sorry uh, and

(01:03:43):
they recorded their version of it, and he asked if
we would do ours on it, And recording with him
was great.

Speaker 1 (01:03:48):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:03:48):
I mean I've been a big fan of his work
for a long time. But it was very comfortable. And
I don't know, the guy is like he just he waits,
He lives in the song, you know what I mean.
He spends I mean, you guys spend a lot of
your time songwriting, and so that's what Jeff does too.
He does it in his own space. You know. He

(01:04:11):
was an inspiration in a lot of ways to me
while we were there. It's hard for me to do
with my lifestyle, but he's he keeps regular hours. So
I've always like been fascinated about writing with you know,
he shows up and he works at that studio. If
he's on tour, he shows up and does something in
there all day, the studio Chicago, and I love that

(01:04:32):
and I loved being a part of that, and it's
I've tried to take a lot of that with me
back home to focus on the craft of writing more
and because the older I get, the more I want
to do it, which is I love that I used
to write songs. We started off, We started songs that
just kind of like spill out and then be a

(01:04:53):
song cool, and then maybe in a couple of months
another song would just kind of happened or whatever. And
now I sit and I work on it, and so
hopefully the result is me liking it better, which it
has been so far.

Speaker 1 (01:05:05):
Sure, watch y'alls, because a lot of the songs you
have written with.

Speaker 3 (01:05:07):
Your band, right, No, I write them all myself.

Speaker 1 (01:05:11):
Really, yep. That's awesome.

Speaker 3 (01:05:13):
Yeah, And I've collaborated with one or two people in
the past, but it's very rare, not something that I'm
not open to at all, but it just hasn't ever
really come up for me. And so in my band,
nobody else really had an interest in writing. Well, we
all arrange it together. Music is all taking care of together.
I usually come to the group with, you know, the

(01:05:34):
basic chord, structured melody lyrics.

Speaker 1 (01:05:36):
What does that look like for you? Where do you
find And I know you're trying, you said you're trying
to get better at it and trying to do a
schedule thing, but like, is it just is it random?

Speaker 2 (01:05:44):
Yes? And no?

Speaker 3 (01:05:46):
I mean I write every day, and I write whatever.
I'm working on a lot of different like pros writing
projects too, and so in that kind of mix of
just words, a lot of times I will just come
up with something, Oh man, I kind of like that part, sure,
that little that little like two line phrase or something
not set that aside, and then I do spend part

(01:06:07):
of my day with the guitar coming up. You know,
I have some some melodies, and you guys probably have
these on your phone, but just like little gibberish, here's
you know, here's the four chords, and here's how I
see the melody going and often, and I just try
to put them together. It seems it's all I've never
really had a method that's regular. That's that I've tried

(01:06:28):
to repeat, But that's kind of the basis of it.
It's just like it starts very abstract and then you know, uh,
the song is just trying to make these words, you know,
rhyme and on top of these certain chords or whatever.

Speaker 1 (01:06:42):
Try to do that. And I feel like a lot
of songwriters when they come to Nashville feel like you
have to write within the walls here on this street,
you know, and you can put yourself in a box
that songwriting is.

Speaker 2 (01:07:03):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:07:03):
Man, we show up at ten thirty, eleven, sometimes eleven
thirty and write from eleven to three. But man, you
got to you can't turn it off, you know, you
got to keep it going and it keeps going and yeah,
you just got a jotty thought down and figure it out.

Speaker 3 (01:07:15):
Yeah, And it's good to write without an expectation of
a result.

Speaker 1 (01:07:19):
I think.

Speaker 3 (01:07:19):
So if you're when you're in when you're in the
office and you're writing, you're you have a particular I
don't know this, I've never done what you're talking about.
You have a particular goal in mind, right, and your goal,
I mean is the ultimate goal. It's like a hit
song radio by right. But it's also nice when you're
not doing that, to keep writing, I would imagine, just
for the sake of writing, because it's beautiful, you know,

(01:07:43):
I guess my favorite art form. Yeah, And to write
a song or a poem or whatever without even thinking
anybody might ever hear it, and that that's a kind
of a pure moment. I feel like, you know, it's
probably a good palate cleanser for sure.

Speaker 1 (01:07:57):
For sure, because there's a lot of story there.

Speaker 3 (01:07:59):
You got to get a lot of it, and it
kind of boils down to you really are thinking so much,
putting so much energy into what other people are going
to think of what you're doing, which I think would
probably for me, I'd have to probably balance that out
of a little with Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:08:11):
I think that's a stage probably of we call them
lunch pale writers, right that you when you first come
to town, you feel like you have to write your story,
your truths.

Speaker 3 (01:08:21):
Your inspirations, honestly.

Speaker 2 (01:08:23):
And then you recognize through co writing year after year
after year that other people are inspired differently. And it's
fun and there's kind of a second base, if you will,
of oh, man, this is kind of fun to tell
their story, right, And then you start realizing, oh, it

(01:08:43):
seems like people identify with our listeners identify with some
of the same things that we're saying. And so when
you just put that all in the bowl, you have
your commercial days, you have your inspired days, you have
your absolutely drained, can't do anything but still come out
with a pretty good song days. You know it, Really

(01:09:03):
what you're saying is absolutely true. Especially you know, it'd
be like eating a steak every single day. Eventually you'd
be like, man, I could sure go for chicken, you
know what I mean. So I know that feeling in
the in the in the balance and the swing of
commercial song running. There's a little bit of both of that.

Speaker 3 (01:09:22):
I think that for me, the more I write this
sounds dumb to say aloud, just realize that the more
I write, the more I write, you know what I mean.
So if I work, if I make time for that
every day or at least most days, I have a
hard time doing something every day, Uh, then I just
my output grows exponentially. And if I shut that faucet

(01:09:46):
off for a week, or something like that. So much
harder for me to get started against, probably like people
going to the gym or whatever exactly. You take some
days off, you're like to help getting off because it's
a muscle, you know. For weeks ago, I had two
weeks I had I had been in the gym month
and a half. We had some family stuff go down,
catch a sickness. I don't go for two weeks. Started

(01:10:09):
back on Monday.

Speaker 2 (01:10:10):
Dude, hurts. I don't know if you've done a lunch
and I just stack about three sets of twelve on
them jokers, and I mean the inside of my thighs
are cooking right now.

Speaker 3 (01:10:20):
I think creative pursuits are the same thing. If you don't,
it's you know, there's lots of cliches about it. But
so I try to keep on it. And I feel
like I write more now than I ever have, which
is our great I'd love to be a fly on
the wall one of those things sometimes see.

Speaker 2 (01:10:35):
That me doing lunges.

Speaker 3 (01:10:37):
Yeah, I mean a songwriting commercial song.

Speaker 2 (01:10:41):
I mean, we love that. That'd be fun.

Speaker 1 (01:10:43):
That's part of the we always tell people, that's part
of the fine print that you don't read everybody.

Speaker 3 (01:10:48):
It's a song.

Speaker 2 (01:10:49):
Yeah, you have to be to put us on the
right you have to put us on your record.

Speaker 1 (01:10:53):
So y'all are y'all are headlining Red Rocks for the
tenth time.

Speaker 3 (01:10:56):
Yeah, tenth time. That's all right, that's cool.

Speaker 2 (01:11:00):
That's sick.

Speaker 1 (01:11:01):
That's my favorite. Man, it's the coolest.

Speaker 2 (01:11:04):
Underground backstage areas. Crazy.

Speaker 3 (01:11:08):
Yeah, it's like playing a show up mars Man.

Speaker 2 (01:11:10):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:11:10):
Yeah, really, it's really the coolest.

Speaker 3 (01:11:12):
It's like we have a Christian my manager over there
will have a We have an interesting relationship with that venue,
and it's because it's for most of our career that's
been our biggest show every year, and so it comes
with a lot of added pressure and family members and
all of the things that it's not just another No

(01:11:34):
show is ever supposed to be just another show, but
you know how it is. It's it's the unique experience
and so for us it can be a stressful day
and then at the end of it's always like the
best day in the world, and when it comes down
to it, you walk out on that stage and there's
nothing like that anywhere else and it's a real honor,
you know. I mean I remember going when our first

(01:11:55):
tour to Colorado. We were driving our band of players
minivan all packed in there.

Speaker 2 (01:12:01):
Red Rocks.

Speaker 3 (01:12:02):
No, this is four or five, and we had a
day off on our way to Denver, and we stopped
at Red Rocks because it's it's just like it's owned
by the city, so during the day anybody can just
kind of go and people people take around. And we
walked up to the top and uh, looked at it
and that just seems such an unattainable location for us

(01:12:23):
to play with the little little tiny bars we were
setting up our own sound systems in at the time. Yeah,
like limped in.

Speaker 1 (01:12:32):
Uh.

Speaker 3 (01:12:33):
And so it's important for me to look back at
that and you know how young we were and how
how cool that really is. And when I get crabby
about having to do a few extra things that day
or whatever, I try to keep that perspective that it's
it's still cool. Yeah, Like it's so cool. It's you know,
I've my daughter and my stepdaughter have both come out

(01:12:54):
and sang songs with me on that stage now, and
it's it's I mean, it's really nothing looks and sounds
like that place. So I mean it's a big turned
into a big Red Rocks advertisement, but be there in July.

Speaker 1 (01:13:05):
It Yeah, I love it, Actually, I love it.

Speaker 2 (01:13:08):
That's that place is special. Yeah. Cool. It's good, like
to have perspective, like you're talking about, to look back.
I do that all the time too. It's like look
back on you know, if I have two riots that day,
or if I got to finish at nine, or if
I got to drive. Because we live kind of out
so we grop about having to How.

Speaker 3 (01:13:30):
Many people are just showed up in this town today
that would kill for your job?

Speaker 2 (01:13:34):
Oh my, we talked about twenty years ago me. You know,
like playing seven people in Greensboro, Mississippi, where nobody cares
about what you're doing or what you have to say
or how you sound. And then you've come all this
way losing money, yeah, getting broke, I mean just broke,
you know, and then you get to this place and

(01:13:57):
you just become accustomed to it. Right. What's crazy is
in song around here I go again. Songwriter is like
I draw. I can always go back to those places
the Miniman days, you know, and go and draw inspiration
for for now.

Speaker 1 (01:14:14):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:14:15):
That's a good point.

Speaker 2 (01:14:15):
A deep, deep well that you're building or digging when
you're when you're coming up through those struggles, and I
bet it has a lot to do with your music
and who you are as a person.

Speaker 3 (01:14:27):
Yeah, I never saw any of it as a struggle
even really it was like the great adventure of my life,
you know, really, I mean, I dropped out college to
do this, and it was I mean, yeah, that's a struggle,
but it's not like Actually, Steve Vanneller pointed, like he
told me a difference between whatever being like being poor

(01:14:54):
in that way, sleeping on floors, eating food, touring when
you're young and not making any money and versus like
poverty like that's like if you're a.

Speaker 1 (01:15:04):
Single mother money like that.

Speaker 3 (01:15:08):
Like for me, I was drinking whiskey and playing music
every day. And so I don't I don't put that
word on it. But it does come with a lot
of challenges and it's a good perspective, you know what
I mean. Like looking back at that, that's where I
get a lot of my appreciation because I had that time.
You know, I didn't our band. We're still growing, you know,

(01:15:30):
we've versed like a slow and the Turtle pun in
there probably somewhere, but we didn't you know, and some
other bands or some artists or whatever have a different
path that they started a different place, and I'm really appreciated.
I really appreciate where we started out because it gives
me something to look at and compare it to and

(01:15:50):
be like, you know, I can. I remember that those
seven movie had our lowest ticket sales ever was zero
in Philadelphia. Got paid with a cart and the camel lights.

Speaker 1 (01:16:00):
Yeah, smoked that whole pack.

Speaker 2 (01:16:02):
We got paid in Tomali's. Yeah. Literally, they give you
some food. Man.

Speaker 1 (01:16:10):
That's that's that's.

Speaker 3 (01:16:11):
Uh, it's people can. People will find challenges in every
walk of life. You know, if you're born a billionaire,
that has its own challenges whatever. But my my particular
ones or what have made me, you know, and you
always have made you whatever, but those I to me.
I love thinking about that. I hope my kids do
it too.

Speaker 2 (01:16:29):
Same.

Speaker 3 (01:16:29):
I hope they're getting a van and drive around and
lose money playing guitar.

Speaker 2 (01:16:34):
Yeah, man, grow up. I wonder how they're getting home.

Speaker 3 (01:16:36):
It's also just like so many people wish they would
have tried, you know, I wish they would have done that. Yeah,
and that's a lonely feeling.

Speaker 2 (01:16:43):
I remember driving across Chicago and having us having we
had a fifteen pasture van that was like late seventies van. Dude,
we were pulling a trailer. Yeah, and we had a
tire blowout, and I remember all of us like, what
are we going to do? What are we going to do?
We haven't made it to the gig yet, so we

(01:17:04):
don't have any money to pay for the tire. So
it was like, well, how much cash you got? So literally,
you know, the vands sitting like this, yeah, right, Well,
I remember we had a guy in a driver's seat,
I was in the shotgun seat, and then our band
was on that back row and we just had like
somebody had their hands out and we were just putting
our cash into the hand to see if we could

(01:17:26):
get enough to get a used tire. And we found
this place. If somebody stopped and was like, well, I
can run one of you up to the tire, and
we literally took the hub off through at the back
of his truck, drove to a tireplace. Got to use
tire for thirty bucks or something.

Speaker 3 (01:17:43):
So you could spend a whole day on that side
of that road and nobody'd stop.

Speaker 2 (01:17:47):
Yeah, that's well, then I feel like it wasn't so scary.

Speaker 3 (01:17:51):
Yeah, you knowed. We've definitely been helped out like that
in the past two Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:17:56):
Yeah, it gets uh it's but those days it would
make you right. Yeah, like I I really, I really
believe that.

Speaker 3 (01:18:01):
It's good to know how to get through a challenge
and whatever. I mean as a basic but as an
adult you have to do with it a lot, and
you know, it's good to get those lessons when you're younger.

Speaker 1 (01:18:11):
I think. And now you're you're playing with Turnpike in Troubadour.
It just came up along weekend with them. Yeah, your
co headlining a run with Shaky Graves.

Speaker 2 (01:18:20):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:18:20):
Where where you're playing?

Speaker 3 (01:18:22):
Uh Shaky is Where are those shows? East Coast?

Speaker 1 (01:18:26):
I don't know.

Speaker 3 (01:18:26):
There's one main d C. You have to tell me
of State, New York. It's four three. Oh yeah, I
get so East Coast. That's Shaky very cool. Yeah, Turnpike
guys were amazing. I really like that band, so it's
really cool to play with that.

Speaker 2 (01:18:43):
There's some Bird guys too.

Speaker 1 (01:18:44):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:18:45):
Yeah. Evan has a big ranch. I don't know how
big it is. He has a ranch, but it's got
some quail.

Speaker 1 (01:18:58):
Bluti.

Speaker 3 (01:19:03):
Oh yeah, I was warned about this.

Speaker 1 (01:19:04):
Yeah, I.

Speaker 2 (01:19:07):
Even hit it hard.

Speaker 3 (01:19:09):
He still you didn't put the effects on because he
was talking about his tour.

Speaker 1 (01:19:12):
Dude, that you gotta we gotta let him promote his
band and where they're gonna play. What are you doing things?
Is that part of him?

Speaker 3 (01:19:28):
That was a great song.

Speaker 2 (01:19:29):
Guys, you can finish that with us not giving up
any publishing all that one.

Speaker 1 (01:19:36):
That the one that got away. We say it could
be a fish, it could be a it could be
a song, it could be.

Speaker 2 (01:19:42):
The rapidness of that was a career, yeahroofing career.

Speaker 3 (01:19:49):
So I was thinking, Uh, I was thinking about that
this whole time I've been talking.

Speaker 1 (01:19:57):
That's what I told you about that.

Speaker 3 (01:20:00):
Maybe give him like a little bit of roadway a
couple of days ago, and I've maybe I feel pretty
lucky to say that I had a hard time coming
up with him. I've missed plenty of birds, I've lost
plenty of fish. One that did stick out was my
son Jack and I were in a canoe. I'm going
to go fish in Minneapolis. In Minneapolis has a few

(01:20:22):
lakes right in the middle of the city, and we
lived in right in Minneapolis at the time, and so
we take my canoe and go fish smallies around these lakes,
but they also have they're also very deep, and they
also have muskies in them. So we were fishing kind
of by the shore and I just I hooked into
something massive and this is the thing. I never got

(01:20:44):
to see it, but it was like a cartoon because
it was pulling the canoe and Jack Is he was,
oh god, I don't know who. He was seven six
seven years old at the time, so he wasn't much
helping stopping the flow right this paddle and we just
let the fish pull us all around. And I fought
it for probably twenty minutes, and.

Speaker 2 (01:21:04):
We were like, are you in a bass rod? It's
probably ten.

Speaker 1 (01:21:09):
Yeah, no, not even I had eight pound tests. I
hope it was a smallie because I did it was
like a twelve pounds, but it never came to the top,
so I don't know.

Speaker 2 (01:21:17):
I don't know.

Speaker 3 (01:21:18):
It could have been could have been a cart but
I'm gonna I'm gonna go long.

Speaker 1 (01:21:23):
Yes, yeah, but that's something I still talking about that.

Speaker 3 (01:21:26):
And eventually it broke off, and so it's yeah, some
kind of sea monster and lake the Comas Minneapols, that's
a good. One has a spinner and some eight pound
test hanging.

Speaker 2 (01:21:35):
Give me a little to you because because i've never
I've never seen a musky, I don't think I'm definitely
never caught.

Speaker 1 (01:21:40):
I've never caught one.

Speaker 3 (01:21:41):
Really, Yeah, can you give me fish?

Speaker 2 (01:21:43):
What do they eat?

Speaker 3 (01:21:43):
What do they like? Young?

Speaker 2 (01:21:46):
Oh?

Speaker 3 (01:21:46):
Yeah, they eat everything else. They're the big, they're the
big dogs.

Speaker 2 (01:21:51):
You know how much bigger are they than like pike?

Speaker 3 (01:21:54):
I mean they can be similar size, for sure, but
a big, a large musky is I don't it looks
like an It.

Speaker 2 (01:22:01):
Looks like an alligator fifteen inches?

Speaker 1 (01:22:03):
Yeah, oh they're and they got the bones coming at
the back. How do you call I've watched TV okay,
I've never called.

Speaker 2 (01:22:10):
Watched one episode of about it.

Speaker 3 (01:22:12):
Yeah, I know what I would love. I would love
to go musky fishing. I've never It's a it's a
unique you know, it's like that's a separate rig that
I didn't I didn't grow up doing it. I've never
done it, but I will.

Speaker 1 (01:22:23):
Have You caught a giant smally up there? Yeah?

Speaker 3 (01:22:25):
The body waters a few how big? I mean big
smallies up there are probably not the same as they are.

Speaker 1 (01:22:29):
What's a five pound massive. Okay, yeah, it's a giant.
I mean, can you can catch those down here? Five pounders?
But they feel like yeah, they feel like ten sons.

Speaker 3 (01:22:39):
Jack caught a four pound in the Bondywaters.

Speaker 1 (01:22:42):
Two years ago. It's a football.

Speaker 3 (01:22:43):
It was the coolest thing, and it was it was
it was this crazy fight. I wrote an article about
it actually for an outdoors publication because it was it
was amazing watching him do that. We you know, I
had to help, I'll do It's hard to catch him.

Speaker 1 (01:22:57):
It was.

Speaker 3 (01:22:58):
Yeah, he hadn't caught a fish all can It was
this this whole backstory to it, But it was one
of the coolest moments we've had outside.

Speaker 1 (01:23:04):
That's all.

Speaker 3 (01:23:04):
He got this thing in the boat and he was like,
oh my, you know he had never caught it. We
catched sunnies together. Yeah, yeah, a little little sun fish
and that was the first time you call like a
big fish. It was very cool. I love smallies.

Speaker 2 (01:23:16):
Man. Did he catch it on a smally rig or well?
Were all perch fish?

Speaker 1 (01:23:19):
No smaller rig? Yeah?

Speaker 3 (01:23:21):
I was using this like it's a map spinner with
like a fake mantal on it gotcha.

Speaker 1 (01:23:26):
Yeah, there ain't nothing like catching up three plus. It's
even if you go don even if you just kayake
down some of the rivers down here, like the harps
south of town and just throw little lightweight tackle ultra
lights and stuff and catch a pound smally. I mean,
you're still in for a freaking ride because you got
lightweight tackle with a fish that that polls at five times.

Speaker 2 (01:23:48):
It's weight.

Speaker 1 (01:23:49):
Man, it's crazy.

Speaker 2 (01:23:49):
We catch them root balls like where a tree would
have fallen over there be that depression down out there
in the in the Duck river.

Speaker 1 (01:23:56):
Yeah, you can get into some dal hollows, a great
lake in Tennessee that the state record smallly coming kicked
me out.

Speaker 2 (01:24:03):
Sometimes we gotta get through this kid era and then
we'll all right.

Speaker 1 (01:24:08):
Gravorite gravorite song for for you explain that word slash
for those gravy just kidding, uh, greatest slash favorite song.
We started off like the first few episodes were doing
the greatest song of all time, But then people are like, well,
what are you that question?

Speaker 3 (01:24:25):
I also can't say my favorite song. I picked a
song I really like there.

Speaker 1 (01:24:29):
And that's that's what graver it is. That is the
song that you think is great but as you love.

Speaker 3 (01:24:33):
It came to my mind because we've we've covered the
song before. Our bass players sings it, but it's sheltered
from the storm about that, and that's always been one
of my favorite songs. I don't know why that once
stuck out today, but if you listen to it, it's
it's on blood on the tracks. The whole thing is
it's just like a beautiful breakup and kind of like
clinging to love thing. And I think it's one of

(01:24:55):
the most poetic group of verses I probably ever heard.

Speaker 1 (01:24:58):
That's awesome.

Speaker 2 (01:24:58):
Yeah, yeah, that's strong. That's a strong Nobody will ever
say that. So let's give me shelter play that one.

Speaker 4 (01:25:03):
Man with the chorus always picked up just in case
I'm like, no, amen, Dave, some of that, bro, We
appreciate you do.

Speaker 3 (01:25:18):
This is this is for the chat. Thanks for the virus.

Speaker 1 (01:25:21):
Yeah, absolutely, little stuffy over here, start stuffed up.

Speaker 2 (01:25:26):
If you start tamming flu today, you should be feeling better.

Speaker 1 (01:25:28):
Yeah. It's it's rare that we get people in here
that we literally don't know anything about. And it's always
an adventure and it's always fun to figure it out
and talk to him and and I really appreciate you.

Speaker 2 (01:25:39):
Thank you for your music, and thank you for what
you do for the boundary waters and and and protecting
them and preserving them.

Speaker 1 (01:25:46):
But I'm coming, bro.

Speaker 3 (01:25:47):
Come, yeah, let me know that can help you plan
that that's absolutely going to happen.

Speaker 2 (01:25:52):
We'll trade you a hit for a couple of big smallies.

Speaker 1 (01:25:54):
That's great, y'all. Y'all check out trample by Turtles man
w w W dot tramvel By turns dot COM's kind
of their hub. You can get their music on Spotify,
Apple Music, Amazon, anywhere you listen your music. They're everywhere
this year. They're torn all over the place. Ye you,
you can't miss us, you can't miss him. Go check
them out. This guy's cool, cool shout on his arm.

Speaker 3 (01:26:16):
But wherever you are, yeah, I'll tell you.

Speaker 1 (01:26:21):
Dave travel By Turtles appreciate you hanging out in God's Country.
I hope you like our new dimly lit sign over here.
A pretty pretty pro All right, we'll catch y'all next time.
Take your hanging out in God's Country.

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Ep. 19: Dave Simonett on Getting Your Kids Outside, the Boundary Waters, and Trampled By Turtles