Ep. 389: Calling Ducks With Koe Wetzel

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:08):
This is the me Eater podcast coming at you shirtless, severely,
bug bitten, and in my case, underwear. Listening to Hunt
Me to Eat podcast, you can't predict anything presented by first,
like creating proven versatile hunting apparel from Marino bass layers
to technical outerwear for every hunt. First like go farther,

(00:31):
stay longer, try looking for some love. Mm hmm m
listening now we wait, what's that said? Now we ate?

(01:00):
Mh I'm gonna I'm gonna ship two in front. You're

(01:25):
looking at down? No, no, no, okay, colder n great body.
You know I want to state the Texas State dot
Com competition. When I was fucking fourteen years old, you

(01:48):
didn't often see you did when drop You need no
deep me than that I do. When I come to
the day of colling, come walker in the night to
do it like the funk are they doing front the turner?

(02:20):
They're traveling that creek? Take them, take it to take

(02:42):
What the fuck are you kidding me? Bro? This motherfucker
has his face on the goddamn box of the fucking
shelves and shooting. I'll keep shooting these twenty gay when
you got your bismus fucking face a little will I'm

(03:03):
trying to hand you that gum. You kid me every change,
we're gonna change the program. We're just gonna say, shoot everybody.
We're not gonna do calls. He's because you guys are

(03:26):
sucking stopped you bay, We're gonna going I think, honestly,
I think if he's got damn the mill of shells
were shooting made either ships. Are you fucking kidding me? Dude?
I I hand kiss every one of them bullets. Man,
I fucking bet you did every black but we had
to live it back at the housing. I'd already had

(03:49):
a fraud out would have give I give him a
little kissing from that box. Oh my goodness, you know
I shot one of them and look what happened. If
this is an ad, fucking don't shoot ship check check check.

(04:13):
Here you go. All right, let's go around. Let's do
some quick introductions. I'll do I'll do an introduction Join
Today by the by musician k Wetzel. Hey, tell um
a little about yourself. Man, Uh yeah, I'll play music. Um,
you know who else plays music? Chester next to you?

(04:34):
A dabbled man, not even close to the scale of
what you guys, I want to I want to lay
out a scenario for you know, we'll get on with
our introductions. Um, I want you to think, Oh, either
muster up a piece of advice. Chester learned how to
play guitar a couple of years ago because he wanted
to be able to serenade his wife at their wedding. Okay,

(04:56):
one thing to let do another. And we did a
live show and Chester out up and warmed up the
crowd with some singing mediocre. Then me, I'm just laying
out the facts, dude. Then there's a band, there's a
there's a musician we've had on um from the band
Trampled by Turtles, and they have invited Chester down to

(05:19):
Atlanta to open on what's the date, December one, So
keep getting six days before the anniversary of Pearl Harbor
at the Buckhead Theater. So he's gonna go down his
second ever, like right, and he's gonna go down and
open and then he's do a set for how many people?

(05:41):
How big is that place? It's not huge, but big
enough for me. I think people like, we almost played Bookhead.
We're supposed to, Yeah, we were supposed to. Then COVID
hit and kind of funk everything up. So what's your advice?
Give Chester a great piece of advice. Stop playing music.

(06:02):
You know, it's it's a lot of fun. Man, it's
just the ground of it is. It's really hard unless
you're like super super super passionate about it. Just stay married.
And you know, well, I about some kids. I like,
he just did that. He's not even supposed to be
here yet, and he's like old yeah Benjamin Button. Oh man,

(06:27):
I just like playing music. I do not see myself
making a career out of it. So, you know, just
once you get a once in a lifetime opportunity to
open up for somebody. Tramplin was trampline Turtles trampled by turtles,
trampled My dad calls him stampeding turtles. Uh so there's

(06:48):
your advice. Just or stop just stop, give up. Also
joined today by Max barta good morning, Um I can't remember.
Not related to tread barter, not even spelled the same way,
No spelled the same way, but not related to tread barter.

(07:09):
Phil Phil got a little testy this morning. Well here's
a here's a piece of peek behind the curtain. My
I mixed audio for a living and they put me
by the front door, and everyone walks in and catches up,
talks about their weekend, what they're having for dinner that night. Uh.
And I can't hear a goddamn thing, Karen, Uh. JP,

(07:35):
tell everybout what you do? JP? Is this my um? So?
I do UM video and stuff for co UM. I'm
kind of a creative director sometimes. I've done a few
music videos tour with the guy and all the We're
just a big family. And are you from a music background? Um, well,

(07:58):
a little bit. My dad's a song writer, and so
I kind of grew up around it, um and so
I guess I just naturally kind of came. I don't
know how I got into it, but I just did.
It just kind of worked out that way. Is that
row probably one of the most famous wedding songs that
would think for like your father, father and father and

(08:19):
daughter dances like you look wonderful tonight first? That's cool? Yeah, yeah,
I had to. Anytime someone figures it out, will just
bring it up in rooms quiet. I'll bust that one

(08:39):
out real quick. Yeah, has that about that song? And
it's like someone will either be like, oh I love
that song and they'll be like, that's cool, but yeah,
Kylie Archer is your first time on the show, Carl,
I think second, but the first one was just a
I think, just a regular with all of us, just
our staff, So first time with guests. Kylie's just a

(09:01):
man off the street because she's a cold wettele fan.
So we thought we would bring down someone who's been
at the concerts. I appreciate you've got any critiques for
how he could do a better concert. No, no, like
everything about wasn't like the restrooms and it was easy
walk out of this room. No. We were in San Antonio.
We were at the Cowboy Hall. Cowboys. Yes, um uh

(09:26):
there was a Santa getting a tattoo. I just like
that remember so vaguely that was that was read South Hall.
Me and him. We did a like two weeks acoustic
tour and yeah, we we have a guy that travels
around and tattoos and stuff. And we were sitting like,
I think it'd be awesome when Santa Claus is getting
his asked at it on stage, you know how well

(09:49):
we're up here singing and uh, it was good. It
was fun. Mrs Claus probably wouldn't have whatever. Uh, andre
know your last name? R O. C H A sir? Yeah, No, No,
what's up with We'll tell everybody what you do it,
then explain why you're you're hoodie. All right, We'll start

(10:11):
with what I do. I'm coach, tour manager. I've been
with him for five six years or so. I was
his drummer at one point for three or four years
and then made the transition into tour manager. And you
guys knew each other back in high school. Yeah, it
was hundred ducks in high school. Yeah, and he bought
what kind of amil? Would you guys buy twelve nines

(10:35):
at Walmart? Honestly? Yeah. But we've been we've been buddies
for a long time and we've been working together even longer. So,
like JP said, just one big family. We travel around
the world together and have a lot of fun doing it,
and you just got to collect the money. I do.
I do at the end of the night, sometimes before
the even show starts. Hopefully we can have a little

(10:57):
more fun. But yeah, as part of the job, one
of them many things for sure. And you got a
tupac hoodie I do. Now, is it definitively established who
who shot him? No? They say it was sugar Night,
but nobody there's I've watched a million documentaries and still
I'm I'm obsessed with like the that Biggie Tupac thing
that happened. And I mean I've I've watched the movies,

(11:19):
the documentaries, to listen to the albums all the way through,
and they say it was the L A. P. D.
I mean, I don't know. So there's still a question.
Mark lingers over. Yeah, I still think about it sometimes
he goes to bed thinking about it everything. Uh, did
you guys have fun duck hunting yesterday? We had a blast.
That was a lot of fun out. I gotta telling you,

(11:41):
like the way just how everything was laid out, you know,
the snow, you know, not being able to see him
and so they got right in our face. You know
it was and my magnificent duck coom skills run a
lot of men. You know you're shooting good good State
Champion duck caller, Texas Champion. H uh oh hany tight knot.

(12:04):
We gotta make a couple of announcements. Just enjoy your coffee.
How don't you know where you're having this? Our trivia
shirts available now. I mean, I guess I knew about that.
I kind of forgot about it. The hell's the hold up?
So the trivia shirt where it's a squirrel riding uh
soccer with a flag that says game on Suckers. You

(12:25):
get it. It's a squirrel riding a soucker. It's so
good right there in the corner the mediator trivia shirt
Game on Suckers? Is it like available available? Is a
limited number? It's available today? I mean there is like
a limited number, but it's not like really really really limited,
but it's really limited. Oh hey, check this out the

(12:48):
guy cold. Just so you understand guys right in, people
right in and now and then it's something that's interesting,
so we share it. You can picture how this goes. Okay,
this guy had a guy roll in. He had something
called a thoracic syndrome. This plays into a lot of things.
It plays into dogs, plays into bones, cooking, It hits

(13:11):
a lot of things that are of interest to the show.
He has something called thorastic syndrome. Pretty common deal. The
fixes the going and remove the person's top rib because
in many cases the two top ribs are impinging on
the blood vessels and nerve endings in that area. The

(13:32):
surgeon went a little sideways. The surgeon actually cut his
frenetic nerve, so he wanted to bud some heavy duty
pain killers for a while. But he had asked for
his rib back. Okay, I already know where this is.
You read the headline my dog ate my rib and
you're kind of like not buying it. But here him

(13:53):
out after reading I believe that this dog ate his rib.
He wants to rib back. He doesn't anticipate because he
he says he's gonna make some jewelry or some sh
it out of it, just to be like, check that out.
It's my rib part of me. Oh for sure. We
had a guy sitting in the chair I'm sitting in
right now that had his own amputated arm euro mounted.

(14:15):
He can walk around his own arm. I mean everybody does.
But what I should say, what I should say is
he could walk around without his arm or bring it
with him. So he's got this rib and it comes
back to him in a presumably alcohol. It comes back
to him in a fluid and he says he was

(14:35):
expecting it all to be cleaned up, but it's not clean.
Still got a lot of meat, on it. No. Later,
he wants to dry it out so he can scrape
it up and puts it in his oven. Okay, this
isn't some stupid joke. I don't know. We don't traffic

(14:57):
in that kind of stuff. Um lives with his mom
and dad. I forgot to mention that he puts in
the oven to dry it out so he can scrape
it clean. And he says when his parents came home,
they thought it smelled good in the house and asked
what was cooking. He showed them the rib. They weren't

(15:22):
that happy, but he said after a little scraping, it
came out bright white. At one point, as he's cleaning it,
he leaves it on the counter and his dog got it.
It's gone. Now goodness. How old was this guy Nashville, Tennessee.

(15:43):
Well that also kind of brings it home. You gotta
get him out to the show. Yeah, I know, but
you'd want to have him bring his rib, but he
can't co Would you do something like that? Uh No, probably, honestly,
you know, I goes beards depending on how drunk I was,
probably so yeah, exactly the type of thing that you

(16:06):
would do. Another guy rolled in with the ethics question.
This is a good one. I love at Washington State.
There's two Washington things coming up here. Uh, there's a
Washington State where I'm lucky enough to have many acres
of state BLM and d n R property very close
to my home. Recently, I was scouting a piece of

(16:27):
public land and came across multiple illegal bait sites for
blacktailed deer. This gentleman is very liberal with upper case letters.
So super liberal means no, I mean he uses upper
case letters a lot where they don't belong. There's a
thing and I want to do a seminar at it
at this company. There's a thing where people think that

(16:48):
if you're writing like black bear, you upper case black bear,
you'd only upper case English sparrow. The e would be
upper case because which is a proper noun. But you'll
see where people like bighorn sheep and they capitalize it
just kills me, you know, uppercase blacktail deer. Uh, multiple

(17:11):
legal bait sites for blacktail deer. We have both a
gallon limit and proximity limit of base stations in my state.
They got salt licks and feeders. Okay, and he makes
a note of it. Here's this question, knowing that someone
else is illegally baiting the area, does that make it
unethical for him to hunt that area? Ethical? Unethical? I

(17:34):
would say no, I think if he I think if
he were hunting the actual bait station, that's a no
no get away from there. And I mean, you didn't
set those up, you have, yeah, that I'm just we've
heard of people getting busted for for not realizing that

(17:57):
they're hunting where someone's been baiting water. They just think
it's like a great spot and ducks are pouring in
and then it's baited and no one, No one cares
to hear you talk about whether or not you did it,
knew about it, whatever, Like you are doing it. You're
hunting over bait and that's it. So if he's talking
about ethics, let's say you have a spot you hunt

(18:18):
and that's where you hunt, and you go there before
work and some guy comes and makes an I legal
bait pile. So he's supposed like not hunt now, of
course not. But a game warden might not want to
hear a whole lot about who did what, you didn't
do it, but you're just sitting there shooting, dear. I
would I would just call the authorities and let him know.

(18:39):
Be like, I don't want to stop hunting, so I'm
hunting little ways away from these but heads up bait
piles out. Yeah, yeah, that's probably the right thing to do.
There was this on public. I met public and he's
even saying, is it wrong for me to hunt someone
else's bait site. I feel like he's already hunting the
bait stick came from the stand. That sounds like a

(19:03):
master plan. I think he's confusing ethical with uh, legally
prudent ethics and legal prudent ethical Situationally, I would say, yeah,
you can't like be someone else doing something illegal. Shouldn't
make it that you can't go about your business. But
at the same time, no one's gonna care about your

(19:23):
version of the story when you get caught sitting over
in a legal bait station. That was easy. Now here's
another one that guys wanted. Okay, a guy wrote in
kind of bent out of shape by how he was
treated by some game wardens. He was driving home. He's
in Washington from an unsuccessful hunting trip with his wife
and kids. It was after dark. We drove up on

(19:44):
a good sized buck standing perfectly still a few feet
off the road. I stopped so we can look at it.
It looks very real, and he did that like trump,
where all the letters are up the case. Very real,
but it's standing soul still. My wife and I debate
whether it's a decoy. I get out of my truck

(20:04):
and throw a small rock toward it, trying to get
it to move. As I do, it turns its head.
I'm convinced it's real. Suddenly I'm blinded by a spotlight
from behind me. I hear a voice yellow, keep it moving.
I add that inflection, but there's an exclamation point. I
was trying to bring it home. Keep it moving. I

(20:27):
look around, confused at first, and suddenly realized it's a
robotic deer, and there's a game ward and controlling it,
trying to catch people shooting after dark. I related this
to my wife, and after a few more seconds, I
hear again, more angrily, keep it moving, Get out of here.
I get in my truck and keep driving. Around a
corner about a hundred yards away, I see a second
fishing game rig. I stopped and rolled down my window.

(20:49):
The agent confirms that it is a decoy, and he
shows me the controller he uses it to make it move.
I guess you have two questions. Do you have any
insight into the legality of this practice? Lots of It's
very common practice, kran If you go back into there's
a deep cut, get that reference deep cut. There's a

(21:11):
deep cut where of this of this show where we
had on head Warden and Idaho named Eric Crawford. You
want to do a quick scan here Eric Crawford, and
he laid out many adventurers using robo deer in robot
turkeys and lays out all the legality and all the

(21:34):
entrapment stuff. Oh is that episode fifty two real deep cut? Yeah? Wow?
What was it called? That's like way back when we
didn't really have good titles for the shows. Sorry, it
just says Uppard, Bitter Root, Comma Montana. So it's just
like a place name. Yeah, it's like you Yanni and

(21:55):
Remy six we get into the whole robot dude. No,
it's been litigated so much. It's definitely not entrapment because
it is a very common practice. And uh, he explains
why it's not entrapment. Isn't that kind of like like
with undercover cops, Like if you're just masquerading as a

(22:20):
drug dealer seller. It's like somebody could be in your
place who wasn't actually undercover. So it's like hopefully driving
down the road when it's pitch asked dark, you know that,
shooting lights over so you know what they you know
what he you know what? As I recollect, Um, it's
one of my first memories, like you have your first
memories around six. Yeah, one of my core memories is

(22:44):
that game Warden on that episode long ago explaining that
the entrapment question they don't use booner sized deer. Oh okay,
like you can't put on the side of the road
because the judge will be like, well yeah, but I'm

(23:06):
never gonna explaining that. It's got to be like you
definitely would want it, but it's not so crazy that
it would bring about Yeah, it's been heavily litigated. It's
not so insane that a normal person wouldn't be able
to resist the urge to shoot it in the dark.
You know. Yeah, he lays all that out, so I
suggest this listener, um, go look on that, and then

(23:30):
he wants me to opine on the behavior of the
game ward Maybe I'm overacting, overreacting but it soured the
experience quite a bit. If I'm on public land, I
should be able to stop and look at animals whenever
and wherever I want. And I don't like the idea
of the woods being filled with robotic deer. Filled with
robotic deer. There's one there. There's one on the side

(23:51):
of the road for like a couple of hours. So
I don't think it's legs moved, just his head probably.
I don't know that the woods are filled. But um,
the law enforcement yelling at me, um, you know, late
at night, just felt him a little off. I agree.
Why do you got to be like I think it

(24:11):
seems to be like polite as ship, Like here's a guy.
He's like, oh, there's deer. He's not shooting at it.
You think you'd be like, oh, hey, partner. Um, I
know it's a confusing as hell, but that's a robotic deer.
We're trying to catch poachers. And if you don't mind, yeah,
Like it's like, I don't know why I get testy
with like that one was he was he was there

(24:33):
to get somebody, for sure. I just don't see why
you get tested. I like how he got out and
like picked up a couple of just gonna make sure, okay,
I don't. I have one friend that stopped to look
at a robot deer one time and they're looking out
the window and all of a sudden scared the ship
out him because someone's tapping on the other window, and

(24:54):
they just asked him to move on. But then he
get testy yelling at a bowl order. He's probably the
come by. It's probably just like I gotta catch someone soon. Yeah,
And he might have had it out for some defarious
folks that he knew we were gonna be rolling down
that road any minute. Now, someone out too. But still
you could just be real, just like use your use
your use your bedroom voice. Yeah, anybody you want to

(25:20):
creep the guy out there? All right, So you guys
yesterday this for this question for co and Dree, I
want to get back when you guys are youngsters. You
guys grew up in a only caught a portion of this.

(25:41):
You guys grew up in a um chicken raising area,
Chicken Capital of the World, Pittsburgh, Texas at one point,
I don't know the end up setting out. Yeah they
got yeah, I got bought it about Tyson back whenever.
Probably we were in middle school or high school. But yeah,
Pilgrim's chicken, uh bow Pilgrim. He's from Pittsburgh. Um, A

(26:08):
lot of the a lot of the chicken houses. I
mean pretty much all of our friends owned chicken houses,
you know, so so they produced chicken for this chicken
producing outfit. Yeah, and just you know, distributed all over
the world and ship but chicken. Yeah yeah. Yeah. You
you come into Pittsburgh and you smell chicken ship, you know,
like like, oh I love it. You know. It's it's

(26:32):
like you live there your life. You're like, oh, it's
just another day. Everybody else comes in and like what
the funk is going on in this? I get that
with the dairy farms and the same thing. Yeah, but
that gets like a well, all that too much of
that ship allays that ammonious smell, man, you know what
I mean? Yeah, I kind of like it. Though. You
go back and you're like, I'm home, and you are

(26:54):
you found some work in the chicken business A little
bit like assassination worker. My granddaddy he worked, uh like
he was like electrician electrician, so he would go whenever
either they were tearing down or build a new and
he will go in and not all the electricity and
then whatever. They would take out all the chickens. You know,

(27:14):
they'd be ten or fifteen of them left that had
no a broke foot or you know. We would just
he would take us to go pick up dead chickens
and then we get there and they'd be a couple
of them love and he's just like, go have at
and sell me have my buddies. You just go around
and I don't know, and it's such a normal thing,
like you It wouldn't be like we got a buddy
that we both grew up with, Lee McCollum. We'd go

(27:36):
to his dad's to get some money because we needed
some money for something, and hey, boys, come over here,
pick up a couple of dead chickens. Yeah, I'll give you.
Were like all it was just kind of normal girl
t to clean out the dead chicken or something, you know,
whatever it was that day, or move these move these
bags here from here to there. Whatever. But it was
just normal. I mean, we had a lot of chicken

(27:57):
growing up. That's what held me. The next question, even
though you're living around that and smelling that you're still
eating those and like most people will be like, oh,
you know, I could never do it after seeing all that.
But oh you know, I see a lot of worse.
I guess eat a lot worse. Uh, how do you
guys cook ducks? We just breast them out. I cut
them in a little nuggets now from up him. How

(28:20):
Uh just batter them and throw them in a little
bit of a little bit of old man. Just make
a fried wild like wild duck fried duck strip. It's
like a chicken fried duck. I'll I'll put them on
the grill before and the him like put them like tacos. Yeah,
I'd like to have them like you're talking about, Like
I never saw that, Like I've never I've never had
a drum before, never had before. But like we said,

(28:42):
like y'all have, I've never seen that much fat all before.
So back home, I think we talked about it. Like
I think by the time they get to Texas there's
a war out, like they've already stut fits today. I'm
fat on them yesterday, you know. So I think if
we if we did have birds like that, we probably
would cook them that way. But it's not a whole

(29:04):
lot of I hunted last winter down not in Texas,
but down in South Louisiana, and I couldn't believe that
birds weren't like they are where they got all that fat.
But when we get them, when we get ducks, so
our youth duck season is it's like I think, late September. Yeah,
late September is youth duck season. And at that point

(29:27):
there's nothing. I mean, it's like paper mache. Their skin
full of pin feathers, no fat, real thin skin, and
you just brought will breast and take the thighs by
now though, like you said, man, they got three eights
of an inch of just beautiful fat on them. And
so at that point I like to cook them like
that because I like the fat on that ship. Hey, Steve,

(29:49):
for our listeners, can you let them know what like
that is? Like? How you cut that out? Oh? What
what coal is referring to is? I actually stole it.
I stole the idea you from when I was in
I went to University Montana and for some reason they
came out with a University Montana Wild Game Cookbook because
some guy that ran the cafeteria or something was into

(30:11):
I don't I don't never understood it, but I had
the book and I made some things out of it.
There was like a rolled meat loaf of spinach and
pine nuts and ship in it that I liked a lot.
Then there was a uh way that he liked to
cut his ducks. And you plucked the duck. You don't
pluck the back. You plucked the breast kind of down

(30:31):
to whereas bat kind of squares off. Now you don't
need to go all the way to the spine, but
you plucked the side down and plucked the drumstick down.
Then you go to like breasts out, but you're taking
the breasts up with the skin on it. And then
you go down and pop his ball joint at the
head of his femur, and you wind up with a breath.
This isn't all of our cookbooks we always show it.

(30:55):
You wind up with a breast with the skin on it,
the thigh and drums the drumming with the skin all
the way around it, and they're held together by the skin.
And it's a beautiful little package. People to look at
it like want to eat that ship when you get
it cleaned up, nice beautiful. And that's how I always
always like ducks. This time you'd have a lot of fat.

(31:17):
I clean them one way and I cook them one way.
You said, what do you you say? You pans serum
getting any thumb, and I get. I turned my oven
on four. I get a pan ripping hot, like a
cast iron whatever, cast iron pan, let's say, ripping hot,
a little bit of oil on it, put salt and
pepper on both sides, and I put it skin down
on that pan, and maybe five four or five minutes

(31:39):
or whatever, just I keep checking it. When it's gold
and crispy, I flip them skin side up and stick
them in my oven. And I put them in my oven,
not even nowhere near ten minutes, pretty rare, right rare
in the middle, crispy fat. Then we serve it with
like like last night, Well, there's some where my kids made.

(32:01):
They picked a bunch of raspberries and they make a
recipe which is basically raspberries and ship loads of sugar
and they call ice cream topping. It's pretty good. Anyways,
we serve that stuff they made with the ducks last night.
Everybody likes ducks like chut knees. I was trying to
explain shut to my kids last night. Is it like

(32:23):
a glaze it's just like no, I just just yeah,
just spread it out a little bit, a little bit
on it. Sweet is good. You know. I was trying
to explain shot it was someone's like a growing up jelly. Yeah,
I'm gonna try that. Like like in East texts, we
fry everything, So I don't think. I don't think enough
people that we grew up hunting with knew how to

(32:44):
cook it that way. That's why we would always cut
the breast out. And I've never even heard of that.
So when you said that, we were like, that sounds great,
and then you explained it definitely, definitely not. I'm sending
three home with you. I brought him to work today,
got the ducks from yesterday. He's already got I really

(33:04):
wish my kids hadn't gotten sick, because I was looking
forward to having you guys for dinner, cooking a bunch
of ducks last night schedule. Um, that's a good way
to eat ducks. I would do that. And then when
I was little we had them, we would sometimes breast
him out and fry him in a deep friar, But
the main way is we would pluck the whole thing.

(33:25):
And then my mom had caught up apples and whatnot
and stuff them, put foil over, put them in the oven,
take the foil off in the end. We ate a
lot of ducks that way, especially wood ducks, stuff with
like apples and what else is she putting their never

(33:45):
never sit Remember remember remember that salad that like if
you went to a church pot luck when you were
a kid, would be like the main thing everybody brought,
like apples and mayo and ray sasons. You know what
I'm talking about, Like marshmallow, isn't it. I thought it
was like like green and cherry jello. When you were

(34:09):
down to Twin Lake United Methodist Church for a potlock,
there was like some things that were probably gonna be there.
A lot of people are gonna bring deviled eggs, a
lot of people are gonna bring jello with marshmallows and
cut up grapes in it. And a lot of people
are gonna bring apples smother than mayo with walnuts and raisins.
So my mom would basically make a Waldorf salad minus

(34:32):
the mayo and it was good and stuff the duck
with it. We had a lot of ducks like that.
So there's marshmallow, no, no, no no, marshmallting Abrosia. I didn't
know what to twin Church Ambrosia. Yeah, that was a

(34:57):
very powerful their dish and I was a kid man.
It was just coming off of like like my Grandma
Rose would make a dish that I still don't understand.
It was jello and in the jello was minted up
celery and walnuts. Interesting, it was like national lamps, like

(35:17):
like the like the cat and the kibbles and ship
or whatever in South jell. So what the hell are
we talking about eating ducks? Well, Dre when you talk
about air frying the duck, like, I'm still not checked out,
what does that mean? Even mean? I mean, I'm a

(35:37):
big fan of the air fried just because on the
bus we don't have an oven because you gotta live
on a bus. Yeah we we we live on the bus.
But I've got so used to it that I bought
one for the house and now like anything you can
cook in the oven or like smaller stuff like I'll
buy like I got their steak in it the other
day it went bad and then um, I cooked chickens
the best chicken I ever made, Like I cooked it

(35:58):
in their friar. I'm just you can do anything in there.
It's eating salt pepper. Throw it in there. However the
heat and then boom you ever put like a piece
of deer meeting there. Not yet there, I'm not fully
convinced on there far yet it's misleading. It's it's just
a little oven, just a little bit of them. He's
it's like a little convection of it. Right, it's got

(36:18):
like perfect sounds better. I got one. I should have called.
We should have had Dave Williams on to ask Dave
Williams this question. Dave Williams is lawyer, buddy of ours.
He's like a real specialist in fishing game law. Here's
a great question we encountered yesterday. These boys live on
a tour bus. So you clean ducks, right, and to

(36:41):
transport ducks, they're supposed to have a head or a
fully feathered head or a wing still attached, but they
live and eat on the bus. So right, so here
you are crossing state lines, but your ducks are all
cleaned out. Would be a great case if you got
caught in boss that and then got exonerated based off

(37:02):
the fact that you live on the bus and it
is your house. It's home. It's like where you brought
it to, where are you plan on eating it? But
that thing just happens to move. And to add to
the argument, his name is legally on the bus, like
the the titles and stuff, so like he like, legally
he could drive the bus. Not that we whatever want

(37:23):
that situation, but it's like I came from you buying
r V. It's under your name. You can drive it
because you are the owner and you're you're on the
title of the vehicle. So you would win that case
hands down. Similarly, let's say you move, so you take
your freezer and put it in a moving truck and
move it across state lines. No one's gonna no one's

(37:43):
gonna bust you for moving waterfowl across state lines. How
often do you think your buddy that's attorney deals with
that kind of like those cases where like you could
there's two sides to it. Uh, we bring up a
lot of really esoteric violations to him, and he'll point
out that no one. I don't want to put words
in Dave's mouth, but basically these aren't commonly used things.

(38:05):
But when you've done something real bad and they want
to really cook the books on you, so that when
you plea it down, you're still screwed. Then they start
coming in with all the like esoteric, Oh and you
did this, and you did that, and you did this,
you do that, and then you got like twelve counts
out when you have ducks like yeah, And then he said,

(38:26):
that's when a lot of that stuff gets utilized. You've
been up to something no good and they really just
want to make the stack. Yeah, then you get the
violation stacked on you. How'd you guys meet because you
I heard you. He met you because he wanted to
meet you because you partied a lot. Well, it was like, yeah,
So I had a bunch of buddies that were so

(38:48):
towns in these Texas, they're so close to each other,
you know, and pretty much everybody knows each other. And
usually whenever Pittsburgh will go to a mel pleasant or
pleasant go to Pittsburgh, or if you went outside of
your town, you're more or less gonna get into a fight.
In high school, you know, And uh, I was gone
for something for the weekend or something, and he came
down to Pittsburgh with a bunch of his boys, and

(39:10):
my buddy was throwing a party and uh one of
his buddies was about to fight one of my buddies,
and Drake come up to my guys. He's like, hey,
let's I'll know some some ship's about to go down.
Just had a little heads up. I appreciate it, and
she as ship did. And uh, they come back. He's
called Monther. They're like, dude, you gotta just cat dre'
school as fun. You know. He he told us about

(39:31):
you know what was about to go down, and he's
a dog man. I was like, hell yeah then, so
we got just after that, we got to start hanging
out man, and he liked to hunt. We all hunted together,
so and you guys were into music and hunting at
that time. I remember seeing another another reason this was
when either my into my Space or early Facebook, when

(39:52):
whenever you shot ducks at the time, he'd be like
for wood ducks and had a great duck right you
posted every Saturday because you don't have school, what did
your Friday wake ups already to go duck hunting. His
buddies would always have the post of all the ducks.
And I was like, man, this guys the party that
get up and kill ducks. And and I was like,
I gotta hang out these guys and man they had
killed today like me and Hammer. One of those guys

(40:13):
I'm talking about Taylor. We're both in his wedding a
couple of months ago. Like, we still all hunt together
once a year. We go down to a Maila and
hunt with my buddy Toby, and I mean, it's just
pretty cool that we all it started from duck hunting
and fifteen years later we are we're hunting in my space,
that's right. But what kind of wanted was at the time.
I remember Tom was one of my friends, So what
a duck? What? What? What was like a typical duck

(40:35):
hunting scenario for you guys back then? Uh, usually walk
about a mile or two in later in mud up
knees into just uh, we would hunt. We would hunt
like flooded fields. Yeah, a bunch of lose a lot
of you know, not a whole lot of saying it
like flooded timber. But um, when we found it whatever

(40:57):
we did have flooded timber, we get into it. But
I mean we would go we hunt les a lot
as well. Becare's so many legs around these Texas. I
mean we would get done with a football game on
Friday night, get all the gear, put it in the boat,
drive out to the spot, because you know, everybody wanted
to get there like three or four in the morning.
And we would put out our spread, you know, and

(41:18):
sleep in the boat overnight and then wake up Saturday
morning so people wouldn't get into our spread, you know.
And oh, dude, we're mad at him back then. You know,
like we're not as mad now, uh as we worry
back then, but yeah, we were. It was hardcore. It was.
It was kind of you know, you duck hunt in
the morning and then uh go sitting a deer stand
during the evening. So did your dad hunt? Yeah? Yeah,

(41:41):
big big hunter. Man was he got He got you
into it? Uh yeah, not so much duck hunting, but
deer hunting for sure. Yeah, he's a big deer hunter.
Uh yeah, man, always been about it. I saw you
my mom. You're like, so your mom doesn't like huting.
It's not that she doesn't like hunting, it's just like
she just doesn't like she's uh, she's more like go

(42:01):
to the beach and drink a couple of pens lots,
you know, are your mind? Dad's a little together yeah. Still,
and where do they live? So? Yeah, So I have
a construction company up in Lubbick that my dad runs,
so he moves back and forth from Lubbock to Pittsburgh
back in Ease, Texas. And my mom still works for
the school in Pittsburgh. Uh and you pointed sandhill cranes

(42:25):
up by the love Yeah. Yeah, that's good time right
by the sky. Yeah. Do you fish much? Yeah? I
do a lot of fishing, man, a lot of fishing.
We did, Uh, we were just up here actually, I
was telling Karim we we did. We're supposed to fish
the Gallatson, but I think we ended up fishing the
Madison because then you'll have that the big the flood,

(42:46):
the big right and run off. So the water was
kind of shitty, but I mean we caught caught some
good browns. Uh. But yeah that was what to two
months ago? Two or three months ago? Yeah? Yeah, fishing.
But uh, did you like that or did you find
it a little a feat No? I love fly fish.
I've been doing it for I got into it probably

(43:06):
five or six years ago. Like I'm still nowhere near
you know where I'd like to be on it. But
fought fish is just not the biggest thing in Texas.
You know. Uh, it's more about you know, largemouth bass
and going off into the cold gulf and uh stuff
like that. So you know, you know you should do
down in Texas. Man, I should introduce you. You should

(43:28):
go out with you should go out fishing, uh redfish
and and trout with Gt. Vans And you ever met him,
you guys probably hit it off absolutely. Where's he out
of He fishes out of Rockport? Rockport? Yeah, my one
of my guitar players, his wife. Um, their family owns.
I don't know if they own to just me and

(43:49):
them on a play. I know they got a boat
down there. Yeah, I think they have a closer close
to Rockport, but YadA cod fishing. Yeah. JT is fun
to be out in the water with because he's like
a real student of the water. He's one of those
guys who knows everything about fishing like that. Yeah he
Um doesn't he have girls too? Yeah, he's got he's
very good fisherman and uh, he's like a real cheerleader

(44:10):
for the area. But then he gets a couple of
cocktails and then he gets into like what's not right
about the area, So you get a real. Well you
get you get all the love and in the evening
you get all the fear man. So you get the
full package of you get the full package of the
Gulf Coast. You get like all the things to celebrate
and then all the things to be worried about. Um,

(44:32):
so it's a complete tour hanging out there. I like
to just do it already. Did you know Chester that
Um remember the Remember we had the cody from Whiskey Myers.
These guys are talking about him, sending out like, uh,
what's he got a new He's got a new lure. Yeah,
he's got uh, I can't remember what it's called. You
guys got a bunch of top water frogs and he's
send a bunch of it out to the house to day.

(44:56):
Yeah he's he's a big time and he's a big
hunter fisher, but he he spends a lot of time
on the water. Um. And yeah, he just come out
with a prototype. It's actually really good. I was telling
you I was just throwing it in my pool and
you know, working it like they have coady. It's pretty good,
pretty good frog. But those guys sponsor some like elite

(45:17):
bass guys or a elite bas Gut Whiskey Myers. I'm
pretty sure. Yeah, they fished a lot with Jason Cohn
on on fork, same guy. We uh we run around
with two. So yeah, forks, have you ever fished fork
like fork in Texas? No, it's it's the lake, that's
that's the hammer there. Bro, when when did you when

(45:39):
you were growing up and you'd like to hunt, Um,
tell me about how music became right, like how it
became more than I don't know, no, like how it
became like, holy sh it, you can do this for
a living, right? Uh? That was probably like No, I
guess around high school like I've been on stage, That's

(45:59):
how I was sick a pageant kid, Yeah, I know, uh,
just like my mom. She uh she toured around a
little bit, played like old all prey houses and ship
with like with a live band. Yeah yeah, she's singing
her ass off. Man, she sings better than me, seriously,
Oh yeah, she kills it um. And so like I

(46:19):
was a little she had a kid like running up
and down the owls people were performing and you know,
annoying the band and ship. So like I was always
around it. And then I got in high school learning
guitar and stuff. Started writing a little bit and I
would play, like, you know, a little bars around my hometown.
But it was always, you know, it was never a
thing that I thought I would really pursue. Uh. And

(46:41):
then I got into got into college what to Tarlton
State on the football scholarship got up there, and I
was like, damn it sucks. You know, like I could
be out playing and you know, partying and living it up.
And what position did you play? I was a linebacker? Linebacker,
And I was like, you know what, I'm not gonna
make it to the NFL, but you just knew that

(47:02):
I can get some free beer down the street, you know,
and a case of free beer and singing a couple
of songs and you might get a kiss on a
girl later on that night. So I was like, then
screw this, I'm out. So dropped out of school. Actually
I didn't drop out. I got I got kicked out
of school. And then they were like they're like, they
were like, you you go you go to this like

(47:22):
when you got kicked out, I got quit. Okay, this
brings up a co I had to go to a
junior college for a semester to get my grades back.
So I could come back, and so you started doing
bad and great, yeah, and then so they put me
on probation. Had you go to a junior college first semester.
I walked in the classroom and looked around, was like,

(47:43):
you know, I screwed this. I'm not even gonna do it.
So that was it for college. That was it for college.
And then we really hit it hard as far as
gigging and stuff, like a couple of years not frog gigging,
no show gigging, road dogs, hitting the road over Texas
and who's we Me and a couple of my buddies

(48:05):
from back home, and then uh, I think, now I
have I have two guys with me that have been
with me for damn there ten years, my guitar and
bass player. And then um Dre was actually playing drums
from my cousin at the time. And then they started
slowing down on gigs and stuff and I was doing
a drummer and I was like, dude, you just want

(48:27):
to come on the road with us, and he was like, hell, yeah,
let's do it. So we picked up I think I
pulled up to this. I was like, actually, our buddy
had an internship in Austin and they were paying him.
They were paying all of his rent for a one
bedroom apartment in Austin, and he was likensip it was
as construction company, and he was he was you get

(48:51):
an internship at a construction company that puts you up
in an apartment Texas is wild. It was part of
a deal. It was kind of part of the deal. Yeah,
but uh no. So he was like, no, one, why
don't you come and live down with us in Austin
for you know, six or seven months. So I load

(49:11):
it up, I go pick up dre and I pulled
it to his house and he's got his drum set
and like a trash bag full of clothes. And I'm like,
is this everything you have? And he's like yeah, he's
got like tw years old down as he never left.
How pleasant. I was crying and we you know, we
get on the road. You're crying about leaving home. Yeah,
I've never left a whole lot. Born born in that house,

(49:34):
not in the house, but hospital, but came home in
that house. And I thought he was so full of
ship and he's like, dude, we really want to do this.
And we were like we're in the middle of recording
no one's complaining, I think, which is the album that
you know, kind of set everything off for for Co
and the guys. And uh, he was like, let's we're
moving Austin free rent one bedroom and it sounded like
you mean you're gonna move because you're playing on moving

(49:54):
into the construction dudes. Yeah, one of our best friends.
But with our thoughts were Austin is like a bigger city.
We live in a tiny town. We can get more
meet people, music every every d Yeah, there's a couple
of booking agencies and managers and we needed some kind
of direction because we're really gonna do this. Well. Then
he shows up my house and I'm like, oh, ship,
I don't have a suitcase, Like I don't own a suitcase.

(50:15):
I've never really left. And he picks me up and
we're getting in the truck. Like you said, I'm like
tearing up, like texting my mom like I think we're
really leaving, and she's like, oh, yeah, we went to
Yeah crying in Spanish, how that sound? Yeah, Like I
think we had enough money for it. It's like getting

(50:35):
down to Austin and like we're about to get on
the interstate and he's being real quid. I was like, dude,
what's wrong with you? He's like, that's gonna be a
lot had a problemise, And you guys weren't like packing down.
You didn't pack down like you're all you're like, you
weren't moving moving no, I mean just going for a while.
But like, we didn't have a lot of we didn't

(50:56):
have I think we had like a bad I had
a couple of suitcase is and a couple of guitars,
and he had his set and a couple of duck decoys.
Has a couple of duck decoys. All our guns and
uh like I said, and like I said, this is
a one bedroom, one bathroom apartment. And we're you know,
we're not We're not small, man, We're pretty big dudes,

(51:17):
and our buddies just as big as we are. And
uh so he would be gone at work all day
or and we would just sit there and kind of,
you know whatever, waiting for a little bit of this
noise noise complaint money that he hit and finally it did.
I think our first check was like four hundred bugs
and we went to Top Golf to night and spent

(51:37):
three So we're back to Square one were we know,
we thought we were on the top of the world,
all right, next three months wrote some damn good songs
in that apartment though, So, like, did your so what
did your so? Your mom was in the music business,
dad was in construction. Were they pissed when he failed
out of college? Oh? Yeah, you're man, Oh yeah, absolutely.

(52:01):
Did they tell you can't be a musician? Uh No,
that was never that was never a thing. Like they
always been really supportive of you know, like once I
actually wanted to pursue it and I was like, you know,
this is something I'm gonna do, they were really supportive
of it. So, um, I never really had that problem
with him. They've it's kind of whatever I've always wanted

(52:21):
to do there, They've been really supportive. So that's good. Yeah,
that's a hot tip for parents, man. But no, they're great.
Um yeah, I don't know. But like like I like
I always say, like, had I not done that, I'd
be back in East Texas working road construction, a couple
of kids, you know, my mom and she wants a

(52:45):
grand baby so bad. My sister is getting married in December.
I'm like, hey, as soon as this fine lives let's
get to work. We need some grand babies because I'm
tired of this pressure on me, Like I'm the oldest
someone mom wants a grand baby really bad. I'm like, huh,
probably got a couple of them run around out there.
But I don't know about when you were. When you
were when you learn how to play guitar? Uh, Like

(53:07):
when I was a kid, guys in my area, all
the guys in my area to learn how to play
a guitar. We're learning because in order to play like
two songs and they all learned the same Gordon Lightfoot
and like a John Prime song. No, you learned how
to play fred Bear my uncle ted Um, that'd be
like a big one you'd want to learn for trying
what else? Like, it's just everybody would know how to play.

(53:29):
That was kind of like that inspired so many people
to get into guitar. Damn what's that song? Yeah? Like
when what? At what your age? What were you guys
trying to learn how to play? Actually posted a picture
that so long ago, my set list from high schools
that I would go to bars and play. You know,
I'd play three or four hours set, so I would
play a lot of covers and then try to sneak

(53:50):
can songs I wrote or my cousins that wrote, And
that's a lot of songs. Dude. Four Oh yeah, yeah,
you played for an hour, you get like a ten
minute break. He played for an hour, you know as
hell make I'm worried about playing for forty five minutes.
But like, like looking back on it now, like I
can't remember half the half of those songs because you know,

(54:10):
we've been playing all hard music for so long now,
and they all they don't play covers anymore. So, um,
we'll give me, for instance, like an early song that
you'd love to play O Man Friends and low Places.
You know you were born in nine Yeah, for sure.
I was like an old man when that song came out.

(54:32):
I was washing dishes at Steiner's point. Yeah, just like
the crowd favorites, you know, like I don't know Garth
Brooks anything or anything not George just like boy George,
George George straight Yeah, culture club think covers, but we've

(54:56):
covered funny you say that though, back to the original
thing about learning guys how to play around the uh,
like two songs. I don't think most people pick up
a guitargo and this thing right here is going to
change the rest of my life. And I'm gonna, I'm gonna,
I'm gonna write my own songs, play them, record on
people by them, and I'll make a living. Like I
don't think most people. I've thought about that before. Like
I think most of us, the most guys, including myself,

(55:19):
was to pick up chicks or play at bonfires around
like Partester learn he was trying to pick up his
own white I mean, seriously funny, funny. I mentioned Whiskey Myers.
The first song I ever learned was a Whiskey Meyer song,
Broke the Windows. It was two chords and see and eat,
and I learned how to play it. And to this day,
if Drake gets gets hard as that's the only song

(55:40):
pay fourteen miles kind of a minor and there's kind
of hard for me other than that. But seriously, I
think that's what most people start doing it for. And
like like for your in your instance, like now you
get to go open a gig. It what's a pretty badass. Yeah,
that's I mean, that's good for you. That's cool. Yeah,
And I know I've said this before, but like I
picked up that guitar being like, my number one goal

(56:01):
is I just want to try and get through this
song at my wedding. What song was? It was Tyler
Childer's song Lady May. And then people I didn't like clarify,
Oh this is a good story. My aunt uncle were
crying and people were crying and they're like that, I
cannot believe you wrote that. I should have kept going.

(56:27):
Jester had a solid writer version of Stolen valid. I
was like, I didn't write that, thank you. Yeah, that fact.
I can't believe the song Chester. I mean, there's a video.
We have a video of it, which is pretty funny
because there's like pan of the crowd a few times
and people are like wiping their Did they go viral

(56:50):
on TikTok? No, there's another guy that did the same
thing but to a different song. Then I've seen it.
He was like, I just learned how to play this
this song. Like last week, I just made a fun
on the wall the people leaving the wood, Like damn.
He was such a great songs going through Who's Who's
Lady Man? We'll go with it. Were you guys, did

(57:13):
you guys start bow hunting his kids or only later? Yeah?
I started boing when I was eight years old, because
like what brought you into that? Yeah? Yeah, my granddad
and they, you know, they came to bow hunting and
it was an extra month of the hunting. So I
got into it. I didn't kill my first year with
the boat, so I was like probably tiena e Levin. Uh,

(57:38):
but yeah, it was. It's I've just always been addicted
to it, like everything about it, you know. And then
once I got into high school, Uh, I kind of
just went full archery. Like I'm not hardly ever rifle
hunt unless you know, it's you know, somebody wants me
to or you know, however it is. But yeah, I
mean I mostly just both hunt. Now, well, you I

(58:01):
just got my first bow like six months ago. I
haven't trying to get him into it like five years,
and he just said, thought about it. My jps like
been bow hunt for a couple of years. Yeah, Well
I started with the recurve. So it's a little bit
did ye all natural? Ever since I was a kid,
I've I've always shot rabbits and stuff. I never never
went for deer because it was just my dad didn't

(58:23):
hunt a whole lot, so I didn't know how to
do it at all. Um, but yeah, I have a
recurve bow and I love it. And then I was like,
you know what, this is a little too hard right now,
So I went, you know, backtrack. I guess I don't know.
I got a Matthews and started shooting it last year
and killed the dough and I was like, this is
really addicting, so fun. Jesse used to make recurve bos. Really,

(58:47):
that's sick. Slice my finger. When I was looking at
I was like, with shot a dough with the recurve
or a long bow? I built nice? Slice my finger?
You know? Like? What song I keep thinking about Chester
when I think about you and your guitar? Is that song? Um?
That one guitar just blew him away? I don't know

(59:10):
he yeah, he beat up six the second hand. I
didn't know how to play it. I'm gonna rewrite that
for about Chester. Are you gonna hire Steve to be
a backup singer? Sure? So we should be writing about Chester, man,
it'd be so funny. Imagine imagine that that article Steve
goes on the tool Dude, I just you know what

(59:34):
it is. It's um jukebox hero, It's it's called wedding hero,
and we rewrite the whole thing. It's it's juke by,
it's chest It's wedding hero, set the jukebox hero, and
it's all about chester O God that one good time.
He's away, but she's got stars in her eyes. Now

(59:57):
he's got She's a wedding hero. He's a wedding hero.
She's got Stop. And there's that a little bit like tonight,
what's gonna happen tonight? I mean, I don't know what
happened on your weddy night. I don't want to venture
to guess interject when interesting hunting stuff comes up. But

(01:00:23):
so you're running around playing, You're like living in this
this apartment, writing songs, doing covers, making fifty bucks? Is
it like in the I recently watched The Weird al Um.
The Weird al You're like Weird Al Yankovic did a
spoof on music biographies, you know, all the tropes and

(01:00:46):
music biographies. And one of the things I was reading
an interview with them about making the movie, and you
talked about when you're watching music biographies, like all the
major ship happens in one night, like they get an
amazing gig. The record company guy comes backstage. You know
what I mean, it's like in one night, it's like
every Yeah. So, uh how long did that play out?
I mean it could't have played out over excruciating long

(01:01:09):
period of time. Did you not that old? I mean,
so we started hitting the road pretty hard, like in
thirteen twelve, thirteen fourteen, and then um, like I said, man,
I mean we did that forever. Dre was actually he
was playing drums force and booking our shows and uh,
what was your? So we come up with the name

(01:01:30):
for a book because we didn't have a book in Asia,
and Dre made up a fake name to email bars
and stuff and was like, hey, I'm with Cowutzel. What
days all I have? You know? What was you? Andy Weskers?
Because we were drinking soon was whiskey at the time
when we get drunk, like you got any more that
Waskers and so like that became his nickname. And uh

(01:01:52):
so you were an email as an individual? Yeah, you
just I mean think about it. These bars were getting
a thousand kids that guitar or you know, I want
to come play the bar, and they all promised that
their hometown they're they're from there. My all, my family
will come out and all the bars interested in making money.
I mean, they want to help the artist. But my
thoughts are they've never heard of probably Cowtson. If they have,

(01:02:14):
they don't know anything about them. So on our website
put booking agent contacts. Andy Askers made an email. Still
use the email to today. I'll see you an email
sometimes so you can see Andy Asker's still a signature.
And here was w A s k e er. What's
w know? Yeah, yeah, w h A as like whiskey,
but Askers Yeah, and I would just I had like

(01:02:35):
this little copy and pasting that said, hey, I represent
Cowtzon many uh, you want to come play a show.
And sometimes you have to like I have to like
like find like a happy medium because they're like, I
don't know who you are, but I'm never where's your website,
where's your address? This isn't legit, but they but once
we showed up and you know the crowd, that's kind
of when we started getting some momentum, they were like damn.
And I'm pretty sure Andy Astro went through the industry

(01:02:56):
of actual legit people like who is this guy? And
then I meet these people in there that's you, like
and we pulled up the college Stay show all the time,
and it was like we hadn't put out no it's complained,
but we were still pulling pretty good crowds. And up,
what's a good crowd in those days? I mean two
hundred people? Which which are you talking about a bunch

(01:03:18):
of drunk college kids? So like it felt like two uh.
Guy goes up, he goes hey, so where's where's Andy at?
And I'm like, oh, he's like Andy West because like shit,
like right here? And he was like, aren't you the drummer?
And he was like, you know what's going on? And
so we tell them this toy and we still laugh

(01:03:38):
about it to day whenever we get to see him.
But Chris box from But yeah, it's back to what
you were asking. Like, so at the time, we're living
in this apartment, I'm booking these shows. But like when
I when I say like, and I've said this before,
like if we didn't book shows or I didn't book shows,
we didn't have any money to do anything, and that
includes eating food and we like to eat food. Yeah,

(01:04:00):
so I would book a show and like in that
show contract, I would put most importantly a bottle of
Jack Daniels. Food was this pizza and it was like
six of us traveling. At the time, we didn't have
we didn't have a lot. Guy. Now it's thirty of
us traveling together. But the time he was six of us,
one van or my mom's car, his truck, you know whatever.

(01:04:20):
Um so I would put like a pizza or like
you have to supply dinner and I don't. We didn't
care if it was McDonald's or pizza hud. It was
part of it. So we started gaining a traction that way.
And the kind of snowball from there. What's that, Kylie?
We've dealt it? Like, what's that when you do live shows?
There's the Yeah, I just had to do that. What's

(01:04:42):
in your writer? Then? Uh, it's not much. Let me
let me make one to send it to you. You
can send you have hotel for you and six boxes
of pizza. Well, I just didn't know what to put down.
I was like, maybe a couple of light beers. Yeah,
ours was, oh yeah, I could walk ours, and then
they go overboard and you feel it. Bags is all
that they're probably too much ship. Oh maybe I want

(01:05:06):
a little half and half of my coffee. Then you
go there and there's a gallon of that, and you
know it's just gonna wind up in the trash. I
just thought about this but that all the time. We
played in Houston Fire Else to Learn, and we go
to get paid and the guy was like, what are
you talking about? Like, where's our where's our showing money?
He's like, you owe me two hundred dollars and I
was like wait what There's like four people in the

(01:05:29):
bar and he's like, yeah, I need two hundred dollars.
I was like, well, we don't have any where do
we have money to get back home? Like what are
you talking about? He's like, well, your guys drink way
more than that. So like eventually he turned it down.
He's like, made us only pay like a hundred bucks.
But yeah, we had to give them a hundred bucks
to play at their at their venue. So yeah, it

(01:05:50):
was just ship like that did uh? How like how
does it go that you? Because if it's your first album,
it's not like someone commissions you had you know, it's
not like someone like does an advance on a new
album because you haven't proven yourself yet, you know, so
how does that work? Like you make it? You promote it,

(01:06:12):
it gets out there, and then all of a sudden,
someone wants to not publish it, but someone wants to
distribute it. Yeah, so I guess kind of for us,
it was just it kind of spread like wild wildfire
for in Texas, and then once it got in Texas
and kind of blew up there. I went to Oklahoma
and Arkansas is you know, you know places you feel

(01:06:33):
it spread like geographic like, yeah, it was just all Twitter,
straight fan base. Yeah, like people started sharing it, you know,
and uh, we didn't have anybody doing any of that
for us. So once we started getting that momentum and
playing all these shows, uh that's when book and ages started,
you know, hearing about us and other people like that,
and and we didn't want management or anything like that.

(01:06:55):
We just wanted somebody to book shouters for us, just
so we could play in front of people, you know,
wanted We wanted to be playing the two shows a year.
You know, that was a deal. And hell, we did
it for three or four years, and I just slowly
started coming down because we didn't need to anymore. But uh, yeah, man,
it was it was crazy there for a while, and
it kind of happened really quick, but we followed it

(01:07:18):
up a noise complaint with uh. It was like two
or three years later, and I've been very blessed. Man
were just just, uh, the fans like they've done everything
for us pretty much. So yesterday we were hanging out.
I was asking you about the role of Austin and
being a Texas musician, and I thought it would be

(01:07:40):
that it was you know, I think I oughtn't remember
what I said to you, but I said something like,
I assume you had you know that you had to
spend all this time in Austin, and that's kind of
your main proving ground and where you know, you when
you're working on new material, you know, and Austin doesn't
like in for you as a Texas musician. Austin doesn't
hold that well. Austin's has so many different genres coming

(01:08:02):
through of music, so it's not like like we play.
When we started, it was like there's Texas country music,
there's red dirt music up in Oklahoma, you know, and
those two kind of merged to become like a genre
of music. And so, uh, I don't know, like I said,
Austin just has so many different styles of music, And uh,

(01:08:25):
I don't know, there's a place that we do really
good in Austin, but it's not like for like Fort
Worth was like approving ground for us for Stephenville. All
the college towns, you know, East Texas would big that
there's a lot of not a lot of places of
play in East Texas and not a lot of artists
that come out of each Texas. But h yeah, mostly

(01:08:45):
we were just hitting college towns and we were pretty
much just a college bar that you know, I was
writing music and we had a more edgy sound than
what Texas country was kind of brought up on. So
I feel like that connected with the college kids a
lot more. And uh, I don't know, but same. That's
kind of the reason we moved to Austin. Just like
you thought Austin was that hub that's we thought so too.

(01:09:07):
We're like, we live in a town where there's one
bar and it's all the old people smoked cigarettes in
there and play you know, and and just listen to
Yeah it's funny. Yeah, exactly right, because we thought the
same thing. We're like, if we moved to Austin, it's
like our quote unquote like our Nashville for songwriters. We
can go up here and and it's gonna be our ticket.
Somebody will lists or find us. And it's actually as

(01:09:28):
we started getting gaining that momentum that I mean, I
was collecting money at the end of the night and uh,
I was like, I don't know what to do with
this cash, Like they're gonna ask for w N. I
don't even know what that is, do you know what?
I had no idea. But I also I didn't want
to get taxed at the end of the year. And
the kid, yeah, back with you. But that's kind of
how things snowballed for us. But I mean, coach nailed

(01:09:50):
it on the head. It's it was the college town
at the time we were. I mean it's been seven
eight years ago. We were more in college age. So
like those college kids, I think that we came in
at the perfect time where those college it's like, really
needed somebody to be like, those are the guys I
want to go watch. I mean, we drank a lot.
We partied with him, and yeah, it's like, I don't
mus a kid. You know, it's about party and having
a good time, you know, the ship that college kids do.

(01:10:12):
So they we were they related with us a lot,
you know, and I was, you know, around that that time,
we were the same age, and I was doing so
well in college and uh yeah, So I think we're
just really relatable to all the college crowd and stuff,
and it's kind of what helped us, you know. And
still to this day, you know, we'll go to college

(01:10:33):
towns and I like, I keep telling everybody I've been
I've been in college for ten years now, you know.
So I remember you said that yesterday. I didn't know
what you mean. I'm still going strong, mom dad. And
then I told him, I was like, when you're not
a doctor, He said, uh, you know, I keep wanting
to ask you too. And this isn't in any kind

(01:10:54):
of order. Does your family trace their lineage to um
Lou Wetzel The Death Wind? You ever hear Lou Wetzel? No? No,
you hear the Bear Grease podcast, You'd be very wise
to go. It's on our podcast Network News Podcasts are

(01:11:14):
Clay New come out of Arkansas and go look up
his episode about Lou What the Death Wind? The Death
Wind Long Hunter Sociopathic Murder Ancestry dot Com. After this
and Lou Wetzel he for he was you know, he
was from the borderland, so the you know Ohio River

(01:11:34):
between West Virginia and the Ohio territories and stuff, and
then wound up down in Louisiana to wind up down
in jail down there. Um, hey, we might be yeah,
you might trace him back to the same jail. Uh
you shouldn't. You should read up on Lou Wessell. Here's
my other question. But but listen to listen to Clay's

(01:11:57):
episode about Lee Wetsel, and I'll point out, Uh, I
had to lean on him very heavily because here's the thing.
Do you do you know LeWitt, No, No, he was
alive in the Hunters. He he was. Lou Wetzel existed
in that he existed in that time, um, around the

(01:12:17):
American Revolution, in the in the Indian Wars. So we
one day had a historian on and the historian specializes
in the long hunters like Daniel Boone and other guys
that hunted commercial hunters, the hunted the the the Kentucky
Tennessee area. Um. He mentioned how back then there were

(01:12:40):
some real bad such as like some bad people such
as Lou Wetzel and Sam Brady. And I said, I
never heard of Lou Wetzel. Then my body Tommy Edson,
the blue collar scholar, chastises me over text meith stage
of how could I not know about the Death Wind?

(01:13:04):
So I did some research. Then I strongly suggested to
Clay that he do an episode about the Death Wind,
The Death Wind Episode sixty. I'm gonna hit you up
like you're not gonna be leave this ship. Actually, here's

(01:13:28):
my next question for you. Make a note to yourself.
There's actually a whole the Wetsel Boys, whole bunch of them.
Uh sound like, so if you came up so in
your business, you come up very grassroots, like, very elbow
grease right like like outsiders. Um, what were like? What

(01:13:51):
does does Nashville like not need to exist for you?
I mean, is Nashville a thing or is it not
even a force for you to reckon with? I mean
at this point, no, not really just just because like
and nothing against Nashville. It's just we're we've kind of
made it a point to just kind of do whatever
we want to do and be authentic and in ourselves

(01:14:13):
and and you can do that in Nashville. But um,
going back, I want to said earlier, like everything that
we have is because the fans and the way that
they have you know, blown us up, you know. So, um,
we don't need Nashville and they don't need us, you
know necessarily. So um, you know it's just uh, I

(01:14:35):
don't know, man, it's we kind of do whatever we
want to and that's kind of how we've always wanted
wanted it to be. And uh and not saying that
Nashville won't want to allow you to do that, but um,
I'm starting a new country project. Uh in January we'll
start working on and uh, I'll probably hitting up Nashville like, hey,
please let me know. Um what what door do I

(01:14:58):
knock on? Yeah? No, I love Nashvi. So man, we
go there. We go there probably five six times a year,
and I got a lot of friends up there. But
and you'll pull you'll pull a good audience there. Yeah, yeah,
we pull you know, we pull really good audiences in Nashville.
But um, yeah, I don't know. It's it's just a
it's a different world, man, you know, Like it's a
songwriter world, you know, And um, I don't know, it's

(01:15:20):
hard for me to write with other people like so
I have to It is yeah, like, uh, I don't
know if I can't if I'm not feeling what another
person is, you know, like or if they're not feeling
the same way I am. And it's just it's kind
of pointless. Like do you ever bring your stuff too?
If you get stuck on something, do you have people
you bring it to? You just work it out? Yeah? Like, well,
like I'll write like a half a song and then

(01:15:43):
you know, say that and then come back to another
song and either combine them or you know, to where
it makes sense. Or I'll hit up a buddy and
be like, you know, see if you can help me
out with this. But uh, yeah, sitting down and co
writing now, I've I've I've done it twice, I think,
And uh it's not that I don't like it, it's
just it's just really hard for me to do so.

(01:16:05):
Um but yeah, what what what would be the closest
thing to a normal way that you'd work from from
a writing perspective? Um, Usually I start off with melodies, honestly, Like,
I'll have a melody in my head and then I mean,
I never saw in my life, but I don't picture
it that way. Yeah, Kurt Cobain and he was like,

(01:16:25):
melody first, layer, second and so, um, how I do it?
I do it like uh Chester, then I go jukebox hero,
then lady may no, I'll go melody man and then uh,
usually I don't know. Is this annoying for me to ask?

(01:16:48):
How like the melodies in your head? No? Like how
does it occur? Like not how does it decurdy? But
how is it? What is it sound in your head?
Are you here to performed? Are you just hearing it?
Like your hommy? It? Like? What the hell is it?
It's either I mean, it's just like I'll whistle a lot,
like I'll just be like, I'll yeah, I'll be whistling
a Lot's somebody like what is that? I was like,
I don't know. If they're like, it's not bad, and

(01:17:09):
then I'll just go to a guitar and try to
play it and seriously yeah, honestly yeah, and uh and
then after or I mean, I mean, sometimes I'll just
I have a thought in my head or I have
a line, I'll write it down, I'll come back to it,
and then sometimes I'll write this song before I put
the mild to it. Man, it's just kind of what
but you know what it is, and he's got to
figure out where it's gonna for sure. Also, whenever I'm

(01:17:33):
whenever I sit down and try to write, hardly anything
ever comes out, you know, but like I'll just be
drinking a cocktail or something and I'm like, man, that's
really good, try and put that down. Or I'm just
making a note on my phone and then come back
to it and you know, have it, have it wrote down? Yeah,
but some of my best in your phone look like, oh,

(01:17:53):
you don't want to know. It'd be like a couple
of words. Yeah, it'll be like just a line or
out all of a song or you know, I don't know.
Like it's cold as ship outside is snow and I'm
here with Steve Ronillo. You know I can. I've seen
time blowing sounds. We'll be talking. This could be four

(01:18:14):
in the morning, drunk or or on a road trip
or something. Or it could be two pm sober, watching
TV and somebody will say something and co would just
walk off without and you see him like something bad happened,
Like what are you doing? Like who is that? Now?
I to write something in my phone and I know
that's what he's doing. It's already even asked, Yeah, and
I go to the back of the room of the
guitar and shut the door. You don't y'all see me

(01:18:36):
for like an hour. I'll come back and like we'll
here times. Yeah, but uh yeah, man, that's fun. I like,
I like putting together stuff like that, and being in
the studio helps outtle up. And we recorded our last
record and hell Pass and and that's you know, it's funny.

(01:18:56):
My next question is why why is it hell Pass? So?
The studio it's called Sonic Ranch. It's into r Neo.
It's about forty five minutes outside of El pez So.
But it's on a thirteen thirteen thousand acres. It's up
a complant like a pocon farm. You hunt it while
you're there, No, I want to do. There's so many
dove and damn squirrels. I'm getting in pretty good with

(01:19:20):
the owner, so I mean maybe maybe next year. But no,
it's like it's a mile from the border. Like the
wall like runs right next to the studio. So once
you're out there, I think there's a family dollar and
a liquor store and a family dollar there. So once
you get out there, yea liquor but it's like it's

(01:19:43):
it's honestly like a resort studio, but it's in the
Millino where there's no distractions. Like you wake up, they
feed you breakfast, lunch, dinner, get out there. Man. It's
just like and it's for this purpose. It's yeah, it's
a it's for songwriting. I mean there's there's eight studios there.
Every they've got lodging everything. Manu. It's so once you
get out there, you're out there. I mean, wake up,

(01:20:03):
e breakfast, record, eight, dinner, go to bed. It's like
the only Budgie thing about it is all the gear.
Yeah yeah, yeah, it's not yeah, and it's nothing. It's
not like super fancy or anything like. It's it's beautiful place.
It's it's awesome. But but you guys get a mighty
thirst at night, you'd like to go out to bars?
What do you do with Yeah, well that's what I'm saying,

(01:20:23):
Like we'll just sit there and uh, we'll drink a
couple bottles of wine and and don't get me wrong,
on the weekends, will pump into hell pass. I found
myself like probably two yards from where the war is.
That's the next time I went with one of the
engineers from the place, and I was he was like, man,
I got these girls in town. Let's go. And I
was like, all right, let's screw let's go. So we

(01:20:44):
get there and I'm like, where the funk are we at? Bro,
And he was like, war is right there. I'm like
like right there. He's like yeah. I was like, let's
get the funk out of here. What are we doing? Man? Like,
no way, I'm being the morning news man. Give me
out of here. But uh no, it's it's it's right man.
And we're going back in January. We'll be there for
probably there for two months, uh, to do another album. Yeah,

(01:21:06):
I'm I'm I'm starting that country project. But I wanna
I just want to get out there and, right man,
get away from everything and you know, dry up and
just kind of get get reset. And uh we've been
on We've been on tour for damn near all year.
So the guys will get two or three months off
and I'll get some time just to be alone, get
out there and write and record again. So dry up,

(01:21:29):
like dry up on like just clean clean, yeah, just uh,
you know he's up a little bit. What's the country project?
Um Man, it's just I've I've always wanted to, like
I've people consider me a country artist, but our music's
more rock. I feel like, yeah, yeah, we thrown in
that genre, but I mean it's where it's rock music,

(01:21:53):
mad alternative. Me and me and Seth roam at earlier,
me and him listening to hell Pass so continuous loop
for six hours, driving driving from driving, from Ketchum from
catching the Bowsman nice and we got the balls and
I'm like, it's not a country record. Yeah, And then that,
then that then I got to look at how it's
like I'm not the first guy who observe this. Oh

(01:22:17):
people get so pissed or like this is a country
music what's wrong with him? I'm like, oh, this new album,
but uh no, so like yeah, I'm I'm gonna put
out my first actual record country record, you know, like,

(01:22:37):
um oh, but what's go do you mean? What do
you mean? Tell me what you mean here? Like some
like some some fiddle, some skin guitar, you know, going
you're in a stick with your but you're tell me
you're gonna stick with your normal subject and that that
that's a deal. That's like the plan, Like that's why
I'm spending so much time out there because my goal
is to write two records. I want to write a

(01:22:57):
country record, and then that's the I might get out
there and can't route a country record and then go
back on the music that we had been creating for
the last you know, ten years. But lyrically, here's what,
here's what I need to tell me. Lyrically, it'll stay constant.
Oh yeah, it'll just it's gonna be raw and really
like what's gonna be like, yeah, you're not saying something yeah, no, no, no,

(01:23:21):
I'm not gonna no, no, shot I'm I like talking
about like feelings and uh like real world ship, you know,
like it's and not people not distant people that talk
about you know, going down the back road drinking a
cod beer and with my grandpa shot gun rack and
all this. Like, No, it's not gonna be that kind
of country. It's gonna be like like an old like

(01:23:43):
old school you know, just chicken shit. I mean real chicken,
real honestly real chicken ship stuff. But no, just just
honest true ship, you know. Uh not I'm not sure
every day you man, let's put on cambo and drinks

(01:24:03):
coal whiskey, you know what I mean, but you don't
mind doing that. I don't fucking saying I don't get
me wrong, I will do it. I'm gonna send you,
I'm gonna send you the record, and you're gonna be
like you line, son of a bit. I'm you think
it's gonna be tough for you go that route? Uh,
I don't think so. Honestly, man, I've I've, like I said,

(01:24:26):
I grew up around it. I've always been around it.
I still love country music. Um So, I don't think so.
I think more or less just just because we have
been making this sound for so long of kind of
kind of country rock. I think that'll be kind of
the harder part of getting back into like the melodic,

(01:24:47):
like the melody part of it. Um, but that's it.
Like like I said, I might get out there and
may and it might not happen. But um and if
that does, I apologize for I've been waiting on a
cuntry record. You know my favorite parts ball Hell passed.
So was the interludes where you dressed the audience. Yeah,
that's good ship. Did anybody try to talk you out

(01:25:09):
of that? No, that's that's uh. We were we were
in there and we were whenever we're in the studio,
we we drink pretty heavily and uh and you got
you were a little flamy that day. Oh dude, you
have no dude, but uh yeah, especially during vocal day,
I'm drinking a lot of whiskey. Um. But we were

(01:25:33):
so Kimball likes to keep the microphone on just in case,
you know, just to catch you know, stuff that like damn,
I wish would have caught that. So, uh, that was
kind of one of the deals. We were just talking
and I was like, it's a microphone on it. He
was like yeah, and I've had that going on in
my head for a while, Like now that I've got

(01:25:54):
cells attention, I forgot what it was I was gonna say.
And I've honestly forgot what I was going to say
at that point. So he was like, I really like that.
Let's put that on the beginning of that the record. Yeah,
it's nice. Get you're getting like addressed by the musician,
but you're listening to the album for sure. Uh, okay,
we are you willing to play us a tune? Yeah,
I'll play you really eight kind of half to you. Actually,

(01:26:17):
how's it gonna go down? Um? I don't know what
you don't want? You play guitar? The yeah, I think
it's tuned. Uh, step down so I can read and
there's capo. Okay. Before before you leave, I have to ask,
did you ever find someone a damn it? Uh? No,

(01:26:41):
I spent like three days in jail. Probably he was
a sound like ships because the Cowboys lost one day
and uh we had two good of a time at

(01:27:03):
the Cats pop the Cats party story. What's the Max
playing there? Do you guys lose some money in poker?
Mm hmm, I'll play one off of the new record
Yellow Bull Shrug I do with my phone, sat on long.

(01:27:44):
It's talk anybody these days. Let should probably go home.
Let's see my friends. I ain't seen the poet treats
the slash crib Smiths and I'll be down to if
the sun rang on, I wanna go home. I'm seeking

(01:28:11):
home and tell me you why I'm feeling this a
way hometown, he wrote without the Cake, just to poor
motherfucker that grew up on Gellibut show. When my grandpads
still look at me the same, and I feel bad

(01:28:34):
when I tell them, Mama kay, get the people in
this town say I'm too far gone. Well, I'm du
to them most and worst than others. Eyes say, and
I'm way to bless the pitch today. Yeah, sick, tired

(01:29:12):
of trying to clear my head never works, so I
just strain canst it and keep telling myself that it helps,
but it really don't. Everything I've ever won't here. It's
in the palm of my hand. But the trash treasure.

(01:29:35):
Then I'll be a blist to give it to another
man that I can tell me you are I'm feeling
this away hometown. He rode without the cake just to
pull motherfucker that grew up on Getabu and stroll. I
talked to my parents with nothing to say. They told

(01:29:58):
me everyone I was doing okay. They just couldn't believe
that I'm singing on the radio. But I'm better than
most the worst in others eyes say, and I'm way
to bless bitch today, So tell me you are I'm

(01:30:37):
feeling this away on town Here rode down the kate
just to put motherfucker and grew up on yellow boot
and show. I talk to my parents or nothing to say.
They told me everyone was doing okay. They're saying the

(01:30:58):
fact that I'm us and no lady O, I'm did
than most and were signing other signs say yeah, I'm
dida than most and worse sin othersigne saying and wait

(01:31:21):
to bless. It's a bit too Hi you killer get
cats Paul all week All right, man, thanks so much
so I really appreciate you guys coming out for sure,

(01:31:43):
co JP Grey thanks a lot, Man, Thank you for
having you guys. You guys are great to having the
blind about laugh. Everything was great, good stayed appreciate him. Yeah,
thank you all for having all. Thanks man, sp

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Steven Rinella

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