The Craig Morgan Special: His Road The Military to Country Artist + Performing His Biggest Hits + His Friendship with Blake Shelton and Gwen Stefani

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hello, friends, Welcome to the Bobby Cast. A bit of
a different episode this week. Today we're highlighting one of
our favorite people in country music, Craig Morgan. I just
thought about this because I was with Craig at the
Opery and he had been working out on like the
farm all day, and then he had spent some time
working with some veterans, and then he came and staying
at the Opery. I mean, just a plus guy has
done so much, you know, he stopped by the Bobby Cast,

(00:22):
he stopped by the radio show, and he had such
an unexpected career in country music after going from the
military to being an artist. So I wanted to actually,
after spending a little time with him, make this into
an episode, and if I'm being completely honest, we're gonna
air it in a few weeks. But I got very
sick this week and had to cancel two different Bobby
Cast that I think you're gonna like real soon, So

(00:43):
this was coming at you anyway. I'm super pumped that
Mike d was so prepared that he had this ready
to go. Mked A nice job for you, buddy. You
get five stars today, and we hope people rate this
five stars. As well. So I hope you like this
the Craig Morgan Special. It's a lot of really cool
stuff put together so you can kind of get the
full picture of one of our favorite people, Craig Morgan.
So here you go, the Bobby Cast Special with Craig Morgan.

(01:04):
Thank you. I walked out of my house and there
was like a massive army jeep out there. If I
were to see you drive up beside me and that thing,
I would I would be scared because it looks like
that like about four guys about to start peeling out
of the back to fix a problem. That that's a
jeep you drive somewhere when something to fix a problem,

(01:26):
or unless you're sitting in a ditch, then you're happy
to see me and pull. I would agree with unless
you have the problem. It's getting fixed. If you're the
problem getting fixed, it's a great vehicle to see. If
you're the problem, you don't want to see that truck
and those guys. Is that a truck that you did
special stuff too? Or would you buy it like that?
We did a few special things. Man, it's awesome. Like
I was jealous. I saw it, and I don't think

(01:47):
I could pull off like a big man, even when
you pulled up, even you pulled up to the gate. Here, Mike,
you know, the camera looks out and I was looking
over some notes for this here and it goes a
little note and I hit it and it's Craig. But
you don't see him because it's so tall. You literally
just see a black door. It's like Bobby, and I guess,

(02:08):
so you are, okay, let me let you know whatever.
My wife can't hardly stand it, though, she says, actually
she calls it the wobbly shopping cart. I was like
a wobble. I think it drives like a Cadillac, but
but I've driven wobbly shopping carts. So yeah, you know.
I was coming over here a minute ago and I
told Caitlin, who you met my fiance? I was like, Hey,
I'm going over to see Kreig by the way, Yeah,

(02:30):
like we're both more than Bobby. Yeah, I said, um,
going over to see Craig. And she goes, hey, check
with him and see if that shirt he told me
about was real. And I was like which one. She goes,
the one that said I'm the guy that had all
these songs. In fact, yes, she said if he's still
making those, can you get me one? Oh, we can
definitely get that. But I told us that I think
he was joking. Oh no, I really did a shirt

(02:51):
that way. You have a shirt that says what on
the on the front, it's got my picture? I think?
Is that my picture on? It's got a silhouette I
mean I'm on the back and has list of all
the hits, well not all of but this is early on,
but there's like ten hit songs and it says the
guy Craig Morgan, the guy who sings, and it lists
the songs she was because at that point in my career,

(03:11):
you know, a lot of people knew the music, but
they still didn't really know who Craig Morgan was. So well,
was it, by the way, one of those shirts? I
want two of those shirts for me. I want for
her because we're both massive fans, and she, as much
as I like you, she may be a bigger fan
I was. I'm definitely gonna get you a shirt if
you still have to sin one, assuming that someone wants something,

(03:33):
because then it's to me, and then it seems a
little arrogant. Hey, I got you actually asked for both
of you guys who have one. The how I found
out I told you this story. But we were I
think we're in Arkansas. We were staying at the cabin
over that we have over there, like deep in the woods,
and we were listening to the conversation that I'm on
there and that's what I love about Sundays comes on

(03:54):
and she's singing it and I look over and she's
still singing it. And I look over and I'm like,
you know every word? She goes, oh, I know everywhere,
all versus all that. And I was like, I said,
you know every word? She was, yeah, everywhere. So I
hit record on my phone and said you her singing
the whole song? And I was like, do you like
Craig Morgan? She goes, this is my favorite songs ever?
So I remember, I remember when you said that I
think I may have been an Alaska. You were an Alaska. Yeah.

(04:16):
And then because you followed it up with a future
you and some huge animal in the snow, that was
your response back. You're like, and here I am with
a big dead animal. What was it for you? That
actually started having people pay attention to who Craig Morrigan
the artist was? Uh? It had to be man, it
was like four or five hits into it. Um. I mean,

(04:40):
you know, obviously Almost Home got the attention of the industry,
but it wasn't like I could go after even Almost Home. Um,
that's what I love about Sunday Redneck Yacht Club. Almost Home, though,
if I remember correctly, wasn't a number one. No, it
was like it went to number three on the charts
on one, five on another. But it was a song

(05:03):
that got a lot of attention. It was just a
real country song. It was very long at the time.
Everyone thought it was too long for country radio. It
came on the charts, fell off the charts, came back
on the charts, and that's rare. Yeah, it was real rare.
And they said, and in fact, they changed after that
happened with that songs when they changed the whole chart

(05:23):
process because of that song. Was the chart process. You
now that you can't come back on the chart. Can't
you lose your bullet, You can't come back even if
you regain if you have the potential to regain the bullet.
And that's that was kind of what changed that So Um,
and we had read nick Yacht Club. I mean, it
was a number one, you know. So I had these
huge hit and I think it was the following single

(05:46):
after Redneck. I remember walking through the airport and Nashville
people were looking at me. Uh. And I had done
at this point, we've done videos for all these songs
as well, so you know that those were marketing tools
in the time, especially, But I was I had done
some TV stuff and I remember walking through the airport
and these people are looking at me, and I was
with my wife and I I mean after about the

(06:08):
fourth or fifth I literally looked down and I'm like,
what is everyone looking at And my wife looked at
me and she says, you're Craig Morgan, you idiot. Like
that's when it hit me. He's like, Wow. Do you
think it was people seeing you on something else and
matching it, matching the artist with the person they saw

(06:29):
on TV. Or do you think it was just so
many hits that you were just present enough for people
to start paying attention. I really don't know. I think
it may have been a combination of things. Uh. You know,
I've been very fortunate to have hits over the years,
label after label um, but but I also managed to
do a lot of other things too. I'm always fascinated

(06:51):
when I do a show, especially now, you know, almost
twenty years later, and go, how many people see me
for the first time and all these people raise your hands.
I'm like, holy cow, man, I've been in this twenty years.
And and and then I'll talk to people they go, yeah, man,
I've never heard of you, and I've seen you on
Risolian isles and I googled you or I seen you
on Nowadays, now it's like, you know, I've seen you

(07:12):
on Facebook or I've seen you with something. It's always weird.
They see me in a different um arena of some sort,
and then they google me and they find out, oh,
I'm I like this song. I like this was my
What's really weird is when they find you and they go,
oh my gosh, Almost Home was my favorite song, always
has been. But they never knew that they didn't match it. Yeah,

(07:34):
So it's taken a long time for me, unlike a
lot of people who it happens right up front, you know,
for me, it's taken a long time to put it
all together. Did you ever have those meetings. I'm sure
you had the meetings, but I guess what were those
meetings like early on, because I've had them too, where
they go, all right, we need to front face you
with what people are gonna know about you the most,
Like are you gonna be the redneck guy, You're gonna
be a military guy, You're gonna be the dad like

(07:56):
where they kind of go, all right, who was what
are we shooting for? Here? We are you on? What
were those meetings like for you? Uh? Do you wear
a hat? Uh? There was a lot of Calgary hat
ball cap you know. I mean I got a ball
cap on now, but I don't always wear a cap.
In fact, I used to be the anti hat guy
because I wanted everyone to know that I had hair,
you know. Yeah, and I still do have hair, um

(08:19):
and you know, but still to this day, we still
have those conversations the management that I'm with and have
been with now for about six years. Uh. That was
the one thing I told them up front, your job
is gonna be very difficult because I'm not one guy.
This is not my whole life. My whole life don't
revolve around singing country music. I love singing and writing music.

(08:42):
I love it and I love country music with everything
fiber that's in me. But I also love riding dirt bikes.
I also love being in the outdoors. I also love
working with law enforcement. These are things that I do
and I'm going to continue to do. So I'm not
going to not do those things in order to make
your job easier so that I am that one guy. Uh.

(09:03):
So they you know, it's it's tough. It's tough for them,
and I respect that. I understand it, but I don't care.
It's I'm not gonna stop being who I am in
order that I might become more famous, you know what
I mean. Did they ever try to make you a
hat act? Oh? Yeah, I got pictures of me in
the cowboy hat? Was that because they said, hey, we
think you should wear one, or you're like, you know what,
sometimes I wear one? Uh? It was a little bit

(09:25):
of both. They asked me if I would wear it.
I'm like, yeah, you don't do it the house sometimes.
It ain't really a cowboy hat because I ain't no cowboy.
But it's a western hat that I use on the farm.
If I'm on my tractor, sometimes I'll wear it. Uh.
And it's dirty and nasty, but okay, well what if
we got you a new one? So I mean I tried.

(09:46):
I did some of those things early in my career.
I wanted to do what I needed to do, uh,
and not just to be successful, but but I wanted
to I wanted to do the right things, you know.
And I didn't know. So I trusted the opinions of
all of the supposedly smart people. And and I ain't
gonna say that I I didn't compromise any of my
beliefs or values. I mean, it's like putting on a

(10:06):
different pair of genes, you know. I mean, if you
think those genes look better on me, that's the ones
I'm gonna wear. I can't see my ass. So if
you think my ass looks good and those that's the
ones I wear. Yeah. And it's not like you don't
own the jeens. Yeah, they just think those genes are
appropriate genes to wear for this in the season of
your life. Same with the hat, you know. And and
I don't like I see guys, now that you know

(10:28):
that I've watched some of these acts that have come up,
you know, that's why I love some of these guys
that they just don't care. Man. I love that because
I was kind of that guy. I didn't really care.
But I did enough to to try to do what
they would ask me to do, you know, instead of
saying no, I wasn't a no. I'm this guy and
I'm not straight from you know, because I'm like, I

(10:49):
don't know who am I to tell these people that
have been in business for twenty years that I'm not
wearing that It's not good for me to wear a
hat in a photo. I don't have to wear it
all the time. And that's what they said, don't wear
it all the time. Don't you don't have to wear
these shoes all the time. You have to wear this whatever.
But we'd like you to try these things. Sure, I'll try,
you know. But some of these guys, now, man, whatever

(11:09):
you know, I'm just gonna sing yeah, you know, and
I love that, and that ends up kind of being
their thing it really. I mean, Luke Holmes and his
Dan whatever them. Holy shoes are the Crocks. I hate Crocs, man,
I'll never have a Croc deal. Now that I've said that,
I actually wear Crocs, but I don't wear the rubber ones.
They make some really cool looking uh like, yeah, I

(11:32):
have Croc slides. Yeah, when you were a kid who
was it that you listen to a lot that made
you go dang, like music is actually cool. Not I
don't want to pursue music, but you're just like, damn,
I really like listening to this person. Uh well, I
mean I listened to a lot of different things, but
there there was a couple in particular really influenced me
that I heard him and I went, man, I love

(11:52):
this line of Ritchie. I always love listening to line
and Ritchie, Luther Van dross, John Connley. I know there's
a big spectrum, they're a big change, but uh uh
and then later on like Garth, you know. But I
also loved Randy Travis, I loved, Uh. I like Jim
ed Brown. I love some of some of the Jim

(12:14):
Ed Brown stuff that I heard my dad listening to.
I enjoyed that. But for me personally, it was James Taylor,
Luther Van dross Um and then in the country round
John Connley, Lee Greenwood, some of that Randy Travis. I
just loved Randy Travis stuff, you know. So it was
a little bit of everything. I loved music, But it

(12:36):
had to be a song that I that uh told
a great story. Uh, I don't know. I liked and
and melodies were important to me. I liked a good melody, um,
but it had to tell a story. I wasn't just
a you know, you were just looking for a hook.
I wasn't looking for a hook. You want to catch
a chorused, Yeah, but I didn't know. I mean, I

(12:58):
was just a guy listen into music. Did you ever
have a chance to me Lionel I did, I was.
I was very nice man. Yeah. I worked with her
now in American Idol. Yeah. I spent for you. And
he is lovelier than he should have to be. Yeah.
You know, I got so frustrated because I love Lina
Richie and I only met him in Passing in an
award show, and and he was very polite, very kind. Uh.

(13:21):
But it's like I I grew up listening and loving
Lina Richie. Like for me, music is impacting at different
times in our life and different people. Like I'm a
big fan of Skip Youing. A lot of people don't
even know who Skip Youing is. But I loved his
music and it was important to me because it came
to me at the time of life. When I was
in Panama in nineteen eighty nine for the outsting of
Manuel Antonio Noriega. So after the war was over, you know,

(13:45):
we were riding around through this battered up country and
I'm listening to skip youing records. So that music stuck
with me because of what was going on in my life.
Same thing with Lina Richie a little later on in
my life, and I sang lin of reches why I'm
mean there h And you know, I felt like I
love to sing that kind of stuff, And all of
a sudden, everybody's freaking singing with Line Richie. But me,

(14:07):
I was like that skegee, this is my thing. You know.
Well he he is a wonderful yes, and it's pulled
me aside and give me advice privately so many times
that you're like, he's also a guy that's been famous
for so long he doesn't know what it's like to
not be famous anymore. Yeah, but still just a wonderful guy.

(14:28):
But I'll be frustrated to I became to talent and
he's like your guy, and then he's like, I'm gonna
do a song with my girl. I'm gonna do a
song with it. You know, um what I get it?
You know, I went at a point in my career
where you know that could should or could happen. You
know you did maybe on our show you did easy Yeah,
I think you played that. Could you sing that back?
It just kind of hits me. I think you can't
play that on the radio show one time. But I

(14:49):
just love it. Man all of his stuff. I mean,
there wasn't much that he did that I didn't like,
and he was he was really good, whether at delivering
the material. Those songs were great, They told stories and
the melodies were phenomenal. So I remember. It's funny you
mentioned certain music that reminds you of certain times. And

(15:11):
I read this book once. It talks about, you know,
if we were at in a traumatic part of life
and there's a certain album or song that we're hearing
a lot, it triggers a chemical in the brain just
for a split second. It gives us that feeling like
we're in that spot. And when you mentioned that, I
think back to, like I read ho Chili Peppers album

(15:31):
more like getting kicked out of a trailer, but we
know we're getting we're basically getting evicted of a trailer.
But I remember listening to that album so much that
Blood Sugar, Sex Magic album for Chili Peppers that when
you said that, I was like, oh yeah, I mean
right now, I can think of red Hot Chili Peppers.
I can think of moving in with my grandma in
like sixth grade when Don't Take the Girl was this

(15:52):
was a song and I would turn like Kissing Nighties
six to be be on all the time. But like when
I hear that song, it triggers that spot again, like
moving back in with my grandma six years sixth grade.
What a wonderful thing, huh. Not so wonderful sometimes, no,
but wonderful that music can do. Yes, it can. Because
I'll hear Accounting Crows album and think about being in
college when I was broke, but I was it was
the greatest time in my life because I was going

(16:14):
I have my whole feature ahead of me. I know
what don't want to do. I'm gonna go tackle this.
But I would go play Ken Good Junior baseball not
all night long with this Counting Crows album one. But
music has the ability to do that almost transcend us
in a way. Yeah, And you know being on this
side of it now because I remember being on that side.
I remember being on the side of listening to music,
and then in my life, time would pass and hear
a song and go oh, and like you said, it

(16:35):
just instantly, I can vividly see everything that's going on
in that time that passed. Now I'm on the other side,
and it's super weird for me to have people come
up and talk about how songs that I have sang
take them to certain places and how it triggers them
and emotionally, you know. And for me that's just fascinating,

(16:56):
and I'm always a little taken back by it and
a little dumb on new buy it. Like you know,
I'm not that guy. I'm not the memory maker. I'm
not the you know, but I am. Yeah, I gotta
imagine too. That's what I love about Sunday does that
with a lot of people, because even with me, it
makes me think about Mountain Pine, Arkansas. Maybe the characters
aren't exactly the same, but you know, when you're from

(17:18):
a small town, yeah, the characters are kind of all
the same because that's just life in a rural part
of America. Dude, I sing that song, and I have
sing it for many years, but to this day, I
can sing that song. If I close my eyes, I
can see my house. Uh, you know, with the swing
on the front porch, kids in the yard. I can
see all of those things, my mom next door, you know.

(17:41):
I mean there's things in that song for me too,
and I'm the guy that's singing there. But that's those
are rare. I gotta be honest. I think those songs
that are that impacting, Uh, they're just not. That's not
every song, and that doesn't mean that every song is
that you know, that's the number one isn't a great song,
but but not every number one us that right, Well,

(18:01):
not every number one is actually good and lasts more
than you know, a chart run. That's why when we
talk about you know, almost Home, a song that I
just thinking, you're sending that writer's room and you're like,
all right, I'm a homeless guy. I'm asleep, I'm dreaming
about almost being back home, you know, a guy in
a bad situation. You wake me up, It's like, oh God,
I go like how does that concept even come up?

(18:23):
And then it's fruition to get recorded to be a single.
Like there's so many steps for that song, but it
all starts with somebody in the room going all right,
like what what what happened in that room with that song. Uh,
me and carry Kurt Phillips. I was actually this song started.
I was on the road and uh. We were doing
a lot of shows that year, and my wife had
called me. And this was early on, you know, early

(18:45):
on in my career. But we were doing so and
and and at this time, they weren't like big paying shows.
But we're doing a lot of radio stuff to promote
not just the music but Craig Morgan and let people
know who I am. By the way, it doesn't pay
at all. So we're literally doing visiting radio station three
sometimes three a day. Uh. And I was calling her

(19:05):
on the way home and she said, you know, she
was actually griping because I early on I thought for
some reason that I told her. She says, I told
her this. I don't recall it, but she said, I
told her, Look, I promise you I won't do over
ten days at a time. I'll come home for a
few days. I mean, we had kids, you know, we
had a life and everything. And I guess I've been
gone for more than ten days. And she was complaining.
I said, look, just relaxed, it won't be long. I'm
on my phone I'm like, oh, that's a great idea.

(19:29):
So I remember writing it down and thinking about it,
and I come back, had a writing session with Carrie
and I told Carry the idea and we started writing
on it. And three months. It literally took a long
time because I was going in and out of town
so much, but every time I would come in and
we would write, we would write on it. And I
was coming. I was going over there one day and
I've seen an old guy on the side of the road.
Then they're holding up a sign literally was holding up
a sign that uh, a lady was holding up to

(19:51):
some force, a pregnant need food something like that, and
he had marked out pregnant need food. And I told
Carry and I said, I've seen s guy I would
to sign And I said that guy was almost home,
and Carry said, stop the boat. And we finished that song.
It was it took that long and that actual thing
happening in the situation. Okay, so the song is written,

(20:15):
but now you gotta decide what you're gonna cut. So
here's the favorite thing about this song from me, for
of all the stories of any song I've written there yet,
we've had. I was leaving the session and I felt
really good about this song and I'm just kind of
singing it to myself. When we did a work tape,
uh and you know then I think it was a cassette,
And so I had the cassette tape, I had a jeep,

(20:36):
I had an O wrangler, and I was playing it
back and forth and going down the highway and Phil
o'donn'll phil Billy called me and he goes, hey, how
did it go with carry? And I said, man, we
finished the song, and he said, well, tell me about it.
So I read him the verse, read him, didn't sing
it to him. I read normality, reality, spoken word, the verse,
and the course, and he said, well, how does it going?
Has it? You know? I just climbed out of the

(20:59):
Godden three. I was running from some honeyy and I
kind of sang a little bit of the melony, a
little different than what I ended up with. And he goes, hey,
let's hear. He goes, you know that forty acres that
I have that you've been wanting over Hickman County. I
said yea. He said, I'll give you that forty acres
for half of your publishing. I'm not making any of

(21:21):
this up half of your publishing period of everything or
that for that song. So he said, I'll give you
that forty acres for half of the publishing on that song.
And I said, Phil, I can't do that to you, dude.
There ain't no way, man. Uh you know, it's I
just I can't do that to you. It wouldn't be fair,
thank God. So you know, low and Behold. We end

(21:49):
up tracking it. I remember taking it the label, and
the label tells a completely different story. They say that
I came in and played it for him and they're like, oh,
this is gonna be a hit. That is not what
happened revisionist history their part. Yeah, So I go in,
I played it for him and they're like, I don't know,
it's awful long that it's extremely country. I will say,
in John Loebe's defense, the head of Broken Boat or

(22:11):
actually was the head of A and R Broken Boath
at the time. Here promotions, he was head of promotion.
Just you know, this is two thousand two two, because
this was all three when it came out late oh two.
And he says, uh, man, I think I think we
can make this work. It's just just country and just
different enough that I think, you know, and he was.

(22:32):
He was confident song. But others at the labor like,
it's too long, it's too country. You know, We've got
other things, other songs that we think will do better,
and blah blah blah. And I'm like, hey, look, you know,
I mean a nanim's decision kind of guy. You know,
I'm there's no way I'm gonna say this is it,
and everyone else says it ain't, so we have to
collectively agree. So we fought around about it, and finally

(22:53):
John's with not telling anyone, he took this song and
he went to Knoxville to w I V E K
H w V. Kid, I don't know some one of
the country stations out in Knoxville, not the one I'm on,
an I suppose I'm not gonna come in so uh
but this is a long time ago too, you know.
And he literally, uh, they wouldn't even see. So he

(23:17):
sets up a tent in the front yard of the
radio station. He set up a tent in the front yard.
He camped out there for three days. Well, he literally
camp there, literally camped out. Three days later, they finally
talked to him and they played the song and that
was the beginning of the history making of that song.

(23:39):
He believed in that song so much he camped out
for three days three days. So, like I said, I
gotta give John Lobo credit because he's the one that
really fought for that in the beginning. And then it
just became it just blew up. And I remember thinking, oh, cool,
we gotta hit you know, what's the next song gonna be?
And that's kind of what I mean. It's terrible, but
it's kind of where my head was, you know. And
and as it started working this and then it fell
off the chart arts, or it didn't really fall off

(24:01):
the charts, it had an increase in spins, but for
some reason it lost its bullet and there was a
big discussion, you know, about the chart about oh, it's
got to not come off, it's got to stay on
and all this stuff. And so I didn't really pay
much attention. I'm just like, I just let me know
where we're at, let me know what's going on, what
I need to do. You know, I'm here for the job. Uh,
anything I can do support it, that kind of thing.
And all of a sudden, they tell me, hey, it's

(24:22):
got this bullet back and um it never lost spins,
but I don't know, something weird happened. I would imagine
a big deal. I would imagine that audience went down
because there are a couple of big stations that probably
played it less, but other stations played it more. So
spins went up and a bit of audience went down. Yes,
it was one of those. Was one of those, and
back then it was there was a lot of questions

(24:42):
as to what, you know, how that managed to stay
on the charts, and because it's different, you know, songs
went on the charts and up and down back then,
they didn't stay like you know, all of a sudden
between that song and uh International Harvester, where a song
would be on the chart for you know, home my
gosh forty weeks. It was insane. You know, it was

(25:04):
terrible how long the song would stay on UM. But
it ended up, you know, going back up again and
it just became this huge, huge hit, which today it's
probably still one of my biggest songs. When I do
a show, I'm I'm fascinated to look out to the
crowd and there's a kids singing every lyric to the
song that wasn't alive when that song was released. Yeah,

(25:26):
that song. That's what I love about Sunday. To me,
I see more than that song. But that song hits
me harder than than anything you've ever done, you know.
And they all have different It's funny. What's really funny too,
from what I've experienced, is it can be different regionally.
You know, International Harvester in the Midwest maybe one of

(25:46):
my biggest songs. It's crazy out there. I mean there's
people riding around with you know, my name on their
tractors and crap because they're so into that song, you know.
But of all the songs, the song that I personally
received even the most response from through all the and
I think a lot of that has to do with
the fact that we now have a social media platform

(26:07):
that we didn't have in two thousand two. You know,
all of the outlets that we now have, we didn't
have then, so we didn't have the opportunity to give
utilize that and to communicate that way. Uh and now
we do. But the Father and Son Holy Ghost, I
have experienced more response, more stories than any song I've
ever released. It's just been amazing. I would imagine the

(26:29):
more you put yourself out there, the more people relate.
And because tragedy lead to that song and so you going.
And I learned a bit about this when I wrote
my first book, because I talked before my mom died
in a forties from you know, drug addiction and alcohol.
And I wrote on my first book a lot of
struggle before she died that I had, and I was

(26:51):
very vulnerable about my situation, her situation, in our situation,
and I thought, no one's gonna relate to this. People
are gonna I don't people fel sorry for me, But
I don't that. I don't want that. But what happened
was people went hey, like I felt that, Like I'm
glad you said that because I feel that, and it
was that to me was such an awakening. And I
have to imagine with you being extremely vulnerable with the

(27:13):
song about something so close to you that people had
to go I felt like, thank you, because I feel
the same way about something in my life, almost verbatim
what you're saying. That's the that's the verbiage they use.
I feel exactly what you're saying in my life, and
I'm glad that you were able to do that. It
helps me in the same way that you're talking about
doing it with your book, and that's that's difficult. It's

(27:34):
really hard for any of us as humans to be
so vulnerable because it hurts, and it hurts every time.
It's scary. It is, it's scary to be so vulnerable.
But at the same time, when you I know, I
can say this now having done it in that situation,
and I'm not I'm not doing it and everything that's

(27:56):
happened in my life, but I'm able to do it
with that for whatever reason, and I can say I
feel like I did the right thing it even though
it hurts and the story's hammer me, man, I mean,
it just it breaks my heart to hear them sometimes.
But but I know that, I know that, I know that,

(28:16):
I know that it was the right thing because it
helped that person. And my pain, it's my whatever I
may be dealing with at that time when I'm reading it,
is what I'm supposed to experience in order to help
other people. I think that's the way it is. You know,
we're as a human race. Sometimes we have to hurt
to help others. That's just the way it is, and
we should do that. We should be willing to do

(28:37):
that that's what I think that's the problem with our
society now. Nobody is willing to hurt to help and
it's okay, it's okay to hurt to help a little bit.
And when I say hurt, be hungry, uh, to help
those who are more hungry or you know, do a
lot without something. And everybody that's listing with probably so
it's easy for you to say, you know you've been
you're successful, but you don't know. I don't know where

(28:58):
where are we hurt? And so I know a question
anyone else's hurt, you know the I know billionaires, but
I know they have pain, and I know they hurt,
and I know that they help others through that sometimes.
So you know, because I'm gonna asking really dumb question
in a second to make up for this, but you know,
I've seen you perform that song alive a couple of times.
And I know at times when I'm speaking and I

(29:19):
have to speak about my mom or my grandmother or
tragedy in my life, like every time, I have to
fight off the hurt. And sometimes I'm good at it,
and honestly, sometimes I'm not am And so when you
have to sing this song and it's about your son
that passed away. Does it feel different every time? Are

(29:41):
you fighting it off every time? Or is it does
it like how just in your mind, in your head,
what what's happening? I have to fight it every time,
even now I'm discussing it. My chest hurt. Same thing.
Everyone has a t Everybody that has experienced some sort
of tragedy has that same I think has that same feeling.
Our feelings are emotions, are reactions, all those things are

(30:02):
a little different, but that physical, that literal physical feeling
is I think kind of the same for all us.
It makes your chest hurt. Like talking about it, my
chest hurts, and you have to breathe a little deeper,
you know, to kind of calm that heartache or whatever. Um,
but I have to fight all time. Sometimes I can't,
I reckon. I've gotten to the point now I can

(30:23):
recognize that. I know that if I'm really tired, if
I haven't rested well before show, there's no way I'll
be able to do it. And so there's times I won't.
I just don't do the song because I know there's
no way I'll finish it. And and and my guys
have they they know me well enough now to know
that there's no way he's gonna do it. He's just
not in the emotional and not that I'm not in

(30:43):
a good state. You know. We all have the ability
to overcome and adapt and improvise. And I can throw
a lot of military terms at you, um, but for
me in that particularly, I don't have to. So I'm
not going to force myself to, uh, to endure that
when I know that the outcome is the outcome of
it is. I don't think we'll accomplish anything for anybody
out there. Um, I gotta finish the song in order

(31:05):
for it to be what that person who's there needs
to hear. And if I can't, even if I struggle
at the end, I gotta get to the end anyway.
But there's times I recognize that I know I won't
make it to the end. I mean, dude, there's other
songs that have absolutely nothing to do with my son,
and I have to scratch him from the show. Sometimes
depending on my mental state, you know, my my where
my headspace is and how I'm thinking about it. There's

(31:28):
good days and bad days, uh, And even on the
good days, it's you know, it can be a struggle. Um,
I just I have to find a good place, you know,
and and and and some days I just can't do
certain songs because I can't help but think about him
and or my wife, you know. And and I hurt
from my wife, I hurt from my kids. I hurt
from my dad. My dad and my son. Jerry had

(31:48):
such a great relationship that it it impacted my dad,
you know, and it's made it it's really tough on him.
So I have to think about it sometimes when I
go see my dad and how I'm talking about certain things.
Fishing that's what they did to there. That was their thing,
going fishing. My wife and Jerry's thing was going to
the beast. They both loved the beast. You know. You
have to be real sensitive. And we have a place

(32:09):
on the beach. Have to think about it when I'm
there and how I approached that, you know, and and
sometimes just freaking sitting back trying to think about it.
What it is you gotta say. And dude, can be struggle,
a struggle, you know what I mean. There's a lot
like you know so, but everybody else has to deal
with something like that as well. Uh. And I can't
help when I talked to somebody. I remember that that.

(32:29):
Uh oh, it's been all over all the socials everybody
talked about. You know, you never know what someone else
is going through at that time in their life when
you're there, and I try to keep that in mind, um,
and I would hope that as a human race, we
all try to do a better job at that as
we moved forward in life. Well, my really dumb question

(32:54):
now is about a song. How many people were like
me and thought that you were harvesting in other countries
international harvest not the actual brands you. Yeah, I did,
and I'm embarrassed to say it. And you know what
we had, you Honestly, there were a lot of and
it wasn't just obviously harvested internationals, a brand we had

(33:14):
all around us growing. Never I was such an it
that I would be like, he's the international harb Like
what other countries is he harvesting? And what am I
missing about this song? And I mean, you know I
have harvested in other countries. Well, I'm a different product product,
hasn't Am I the only idiot that's ever said that

(33:34):
to you? I wouldn't say idiot, but I never heard
that I would say that because I would hear and
I'll be like, all right, but why are you going
to other countries? Craig like like doing you do your
family prows? But I did think that that's the truth.
I'm making your word, you own them. I'm being honest.

(33:55):
I appreciate that. Um what other what what? Other songs?
Like I started about International Harvester. I gotta tell you
something and this is worth the Google for you. So
there is a guy in another country that apparently in
this country they're not allowed to do music videos or something,

(34:15):
so they kind of sneak around and and go to
other places and do videos. It is my favorite version
of International Harvester. Oh he's singing it, yes, yeah, him
and his girl and it is. The video is do
this price? But country I don't know. But he says,
I'm the son of a third generation farm and they

(34:38):
got the they got the harvester, they got the corn fields.
The girl in the denim shorts and boots and tank
top kind of Oh, it's great you're talking. Definitely, I'll
find it for you in Texas him get to see it. Yeah,
most things I get from you are dead animals. I'll
take It's always like, hey, look what I killed. It's
a It's a nine headed platypun three horns coming out

(35:03):
to get you to go hunts attached to it. You
know what was the song I was talking about in
my show. I'd never heard it, but I was playing
them corn Star? Oh please, oh good? And that's what
I said, I'm gonna be honest to I was like,
you know what, I said, I'm the biggest Craig fan
as a person. And I said, but the one song
that he where did you why did you do that?

(35:23):
That he's ever put out? This is a couple of
days ago, right, I said, the one song he's ever
put out that I I was like, I don't know, man,
it's corn Star. And you know at the beginning, we're like,
I look how her boys. You know she's in the
aisle of the store. Tell me about corn Star because
I need to know the conversation about cutting and putting
this song out. Okay, I'm gonna be honest, I thought,

(35:45):
and I still to this day, I think that's a
hit song. I don't think it's not catchy. I think
to me it was a rid solo cup kind of thing. Okay,
just to catchy, goofy fun, but to play on words.
Anytime you can do something, you can play on words
like that, and and it and it worked, and I
felt like that word it was just a matter of timing.

(36:08):
And I told them, I did say, They were like,
this is the next song, Like, no, we are not
ready for this yet. We need a much bigger hit
on this album. Before we released this as a single
and I and I still stand by that to this day.
I still think that it is a great, funny, fun

(36:28):
play on words. All of that is true. I compared
it to a song like Honkey Donk, but Donkey Donk
because without the big hits, I said, that song doesn't
make sense myself. Yeah, you gotta have you gotta have
the train really on all engines running full speed for
that wanted to stay on the tracks. And it didn't

(36:50):
the rest of the show. I didn't even hadn't even
heard it before, and I was like, what do you mean?
It had to be like top ten And then I
look it was and it wasn't. I guess the stations
just don't want to play it because of the uh yeah,
they just do won't play it. It was it was
a timing thing, you know, and and even they said
the same thing, you know, which I'm glad because it
made me look like a genius with the label, Oh well,

(37:11):
we should have listened to you. Maybe you'll listen next time.
You know. The song that I have, I always liked
and sang along to it, but I didn't quite understand
until I U I had met Caitlin, who's my fiancee,
was this old boy. Oh I didn't ever quite feel
it in my gut until you actually have and yep,

(37:32):
and and and you know, and the songs about you
know what, this old boy. You can't believe you have her.
You know, she's the best. And finally, because she loves
to listen to your music. And sometimes I'm like, we
just change it from Craig Morgan for a minute. But
that song, I would hear it and I would be like, yeah,
I know all the words of the song from my
list on the radio, I said, But now I kind
of get it, Like I finally feel like this old

(37:54):
you know who gets you, this old boy right here? Yeah,
you make me look good. Yeah. Yeah. We were at
a restaurant last night is Done True Food. It's a
little healthy place, um, a little chain about six seven
miles away. We were in there eating and there was
a couple and Caitlyn's way prettier than I am, even
on a scale like points wise, I like, I don't

(38:15):
it just isn't and so but people look at her
and then they look at me and they're confused. I
get that every time. And with Mama, Yeah, they're just
like and they go, there's something. There must be something
about him that we're not seeing because she's so pretty
and funny and smart. Everything I'm good at, she's actually
better at, which is weird, Like she's funnier than I am,

(38:36):
smarter than I am, everything. But people look at me.
But but it's like that song, I'm like, yeah, but
you know who gets it? This guy right here like
that I won. Yeah, that's the way I feel most
of my life. And I get the same thing. People
looking they go, oh, that's great moment. Oh look at
this wife. Oh I get it country singer. I don't
know I married. She married the guy. I think they
look at me and like a surgeon. I mean, it's

(39:00):
such a nerd. It's gotta be something like that. Play
a little bit. Do you have this old boy cute
up there my a go she doesn't. We go to
the river and get in the water, and buddy, she's
hotter than South Georgia and Jelave. And when I with
the I can get another other. I gotta kiss her
and I gotta huger brother, she's mine. Oh my, that's

(39:25):
a you know the songwriter the guys Georgia Peach Peach Pickers,
that's who that wrote that. Really, Yeah, yead, I got
that one yet? So you got uh so, what's up
with the Craig Morgan Camo hats right on your website,
Craig Morgan. Yeah, have you seen the Craig Morgan Camlo
hats you have up there? Twenty five bucks? I look good.
Oh yeah, I've just seen those. In fact, I'm flying

(39:48):
up the shelves. Yeah, they've done real well. It's not
it's just like a military and old military pattern or something. Yeah,
I saw that when it came over here. I can't
tell people they need to get one of these, you
know some of the you know, we have merchandise guys
and all these people again that are smarter than me,
and they just they come up with a bunch of
stuff and go to you like this, like Yeah, that's cool,
and they go, we think it of Stummich, let's try it. Sure,

(40:10):
you know COVID was ironically enough was I hate to
use say that it was good for our merchandise sales
because you don't want to think COVID was good for anything.
Um but we did really well during the pandemic. I
want to thank everyone that went and bought stuff, the merchandise. Um,
but I was kind of mind boggled by it, like

(40:34):
I can't believe. I feel like nobody's working and everybody's
buying merchandise and CDs and stuff. So it's kind of
weird maybe, but cool. That's the joy is getting a package.
Like that's the only joy we were getting. People are
leaving in her house. Some things had to come to us.
We're like, order something online. Oh yeah, I should on
stock at Amazon, my wife. Did you stay in Alaska

(40:56):
for a lot of the shutdown we did? Yeah? Alaska.
I've been going up there for about twenty five years
for everything from and I only ask because it's far
because of any other I don't. I don't like cold either,
but some people do. But it's far. For it's it's
far from tennis. It's along. It's I mean, it's quite
an endeavor just to get up there, especially where I'm at.
It's one thing to go to Anchorage or Fairbanks, one

(41:18):
of the major cities, but I'm off the grid. So
you know, you fly into one of the cities and
then you either drive to a spot and then either
walk in or float plane in. Walk in? What do
you mean? I mean, my my my place is about
nine miles from the nearest road, so you have to
you would want, So you drive for three hours, park

(41:41):
your vehicle and then I parked near a big lake
and I can either have the plane pick me up
there and fly over to our lake, or I can
walk in. Or in the winter we snow machine and
you can walk nine miles. You you will walk nine
miles to your place. Oh yeah, with a gun of course.
But you're a country stars. Why are you walking nine miles? Well,

(42:03):
I mean in the summertime, if if I can't get
the plane up the weather, inclement weather and they can't fly, Uh,
there's not a landing strip there, you know, they have
to land on the water. Why even have a place
out that far? Man? Because when you get there, Bobby,
I gotta tell you got to experience it. You need
to come up one. I always tell people to to
come in the winter because getting there and getting out
of there is so much easier in the winter. I

(42:24):
can literally get from where I partner my truck to
the cabin in about fifteen minutes on a snowmobile. So,
and we have a property on the road as well,
so that's where I store everything. So you'll just leave
your truck on the road. Well, on our property there
near the road, and it's a gravel road, so it's
not improved. It's not uh, it's they do great during
the all the snow. Uh. They do kind of get

(42:45):
the snow off the road kinda um, and then we
park it on our property and we hop on our
snow machines and ride in. But when you get there, man,
or if you're not real keen on trying to snow
machine in, if somebody's worried about that, I just have
the plane pick them up an anchorage and land on
the skis on the lake, on the on the ice.
Which sounds scarier. Walking down miles are getting one of

(43:07):
their plants with the things on. Walking is a little freaky,
I gotta say, especially that time of year because you
know that uh, you know the moose are out, you
know that bear are out. Anything ever tracking you, the
bear will uh greasy. Black bears are kind of like cats.
Uh And this is the my personal experience. Um, A

(43:29):
black bear is a lot like a cat. They're skittish
and they'll run from you, and they don't really come
around the fires and stuff too much. But if you
corner them, or if it's a sow with cubs, they
get real ignorant quick. Or if they're really hungry and
you're between them and their food, will you ever be
their food? You could be? Yeah, yeah, easily. That's why

(43:50):
we we don't go in without a weapon. What about
the grizzlies though, Compare that to the black bear? Uh,
different story. Yeah. Yeah, they're a lot braver, uh and
they're very ratorial, much more so than a black bear.
But honestly, the bear don't scare me as much as
the moose. A cow moose with the calf will fight you.
And and there's more people injured, harmed or killed by

(44:11):
moose up there than all the other animals combined. What
will the moose do and told you to death? And
why will it do it because it's threatened to buy
you in any way. It's protecting its territory. It's calves.
If it's a female, she's protecting her calves. If it's
a bull moose and heat, he's protecting his territory. Uh,
to keep you away from his cows. Kind of thing.

(44:32):
You ever had to kill an animal to save yourself? No,
thank god, I have allowed a Uh, I have had
to allow. I harvested a a black tailed deer on
the island of Kodiak, and I did not get to
go get that because the bear got there before I did,

(44:53):
and we set for six hours and watch that sal
and her three calves eat, My dear, because if the
animal gets if the bear gets to the harvest before
you do, you can't do anything about it. It's there's
at that point. You can't shoot them, you can't scare
them off of it or anything like that. By all,
it becomes their food. And so she got there first

(45:16):
and she owned it. Now, if I'd got there there
before she did and then she came up, I could
have shot her and particular itself. But I don't really
want to do that. You know, it's not that's not
my that's not my not the way I want to do.
It was up in Montana about at this point six
months ago, and this was from my my nat Geo
show that's come out in a a few weeks. Um. We
were protecting sheep. There's sheep herders and there's two thousand

(45:39):
of them and they move around. It's all government land
and they're all plots and you know, you lease the land,
you move the sheep around. They can only eat certain
parts in certain orders. They but at night the bears
will come and try to or not just the bears, coyotes,
you know, occasionally a wolf depending on what part and so.
But you know, they had a beau. My job was

(46:01):
to make sure the sheep didn't get eaten all night.
I had to. I had to watch the sheep and
had with uh you know, these night vision scopes. You'd
see like a little bears, you'd see the coyotes and um.
But they were like, hey, you can't you know, you
can't chewt a bear. Like. What you do is you
you have your bear spray and that what they told
me to do is if a bear comes out, you

(46:22):
spray the spright into the ground and it lifts and
then the bear won't come through the bear spray. I
was like, you gotta be kidding me. I've got a rifle.
If I feel like a bear is coming at me,
I'm not grabbing the bears. But I'll just go to
jail for a couple of days if a bear is
gonna attag me. Do you travel with bear spray at all?
Or is it just I've never taken bear spray. Um,

(46:45):
because I just tried to, I will. I will avoid
the circumstance of putting myself in a position. Now. Having
said that, I always have a side arm, and it's
a very large side arm. So if I'm deer hunting,
I got a rifle, but I also keep my bear
gun with me. Um, I would just try to. I
don't want to shoot a bear. Now this is people
are gonna uh god. I'm sure I can't fight, but

(47:07):
I don't want to shoot a bear in defense. I
want to hunt the bear. Does that make sense? If
I'm gonna hunt it, It's like running over a squirrel
in the road. I will hit the ditch in an
attempt to not run a squirrel over because that's not
the way I want to do it. But I do
go squirrel hunting, right, that's an analogy though, But I

(47:28):
also I also don't want to shoot anything that I'm
not gonna eat or someone's not gonna eat or prosper
from that. And I don't mean financially, but I mean,
you know that someone's gonna get that meat. And so
I have a real issue with people who go out
and just shoot crap like that just drops. Makes the
hair on the back of my neck stand up, and

(47:48):
I want to shoot them. Yeah, Yeah, I get it
because as someone who had to hunt to eat the
first same fifteen years of my life age one through six,
I didn't really hunt, but after that it was score girl,
and it graduates up slowly and we had to eat. Yeah,
and we had to catch fish to eat. Same here.
It would piss me off when people would be out
just hunting to shoot and kill just to have the

(48:10):
just just for the trophy. Yeah, I get really aggravated.
And I've been on some hunts in in some places,
in nice places, and we go out and I work hard,
even though I might not be the guy that did
the work to prepare the hunt. You know, there's other
guys that do the food plots and do that stuff,
and I'm I'm fortunate enough that and because of my
schedule demperment, I get to go there and hunt, and

(48:30):
I'll go there and hunt, and I'll be there and
camp and see a guy go out and do that.
Now shoot the animal, go over and take a picture,
and then go back to the lune. It's like, aren't
you gonna clean that animal? Or help them? At least?
I mean, it's one thing to get your picture with
your bigger act, but I mean, and they're like, ah,
you know, no, I just wanted to hunt, you know.
And they're gonna give the meat to charity and not
not that's cool, but at least help them harvest it

(48:54):
so you can appreciate what that animal is providing. You know,
I don't know. It just kind of drives me nuts. Man.
You know your story into country music. I just touched
on this briefly. It's really cool because you were in
the military and like, weren't your superiors going, hey man,
you gotta go chase this music thing. Uh. That's the
reason I'm here today. I would not have left, man.

(49:17):
And I'm from Nashville, but I was born in General
Hospital down here. My MoMA used to always say, I
was supposed to be born at Baptist, but they didn't
make it. They had to stop at General. Um. Um.
Grew up in and around the music business my whole life.
My dad was a musician. Kingston Springs was home. I
graduated in Cheatham County High School. I went to MT. Issue.

(49:37):
You know, so music it was always part of it.
Avoided it. Uh, went in the military, and I think
being in the military really made me a really miss
and appreciate not just music but home in Nashville. Um.
So it was always a big part of my life,
you know what I mean? Uh, what was it? No,

(50:00):
you didn't realize it was as valuable to you until
you got away from it. Yeah, I think so. Again,
it's what my dad did. But my dad also had
another job, and I thought, I don't want to do
something that that. I got to do something else to
be able to do it. Of course, then I got
out of the army and uh and did everything else
while I was trying to make it in the business. Uh.

(50:22):
But if it, to get back to your question, it
was a you know, I didn't. I was always nervous
about it. I'm like my wife and I would talk.
I was writing songs and kind of writing at while
you were in the arm, while I was in the arm,
and you're playing fun you know, were you playing around?
I mean, were you playing around the other guy? Dude?
Like in Panama, I just did ah, I just did
a show, a TV show, And I brought in five

(50:44):
of my buddies that I served with in Panama in
nineteen eighty nine. It was my team. The guys worked
for me, and we sat around and talked about it,
and they talked about how I used to play music,
and like, I don't even really remember that. You don't
remember we should center in the barracks and drink beer
and you would play in tim My buddy was like, man, men,
you played all the time together, like a vague memories

(51:05):
of that. I more remember all of the stuff that
we went through it and they're like, yeah, but when
we weren't doing all those things, this is what we did,
you know. Like so they were all very encouraging, and
it came to a point in my career. I was
ten and a half years of active duty. You have
to make a decision. I was gonna reenlist again or
I was going to pursue the music. Uh, and I
was just nervous about it. I didn't have near the

(51:26):
confidence that a lot of people. You know, I talked
about Blake about it a lot, especially early on in
our careers. You know, Blake left everything. Man comes here.
A lot of musicians that try this, excuse me, They
come here with nothing or no one. And so in
my head, I'm going, well, at least it's where I'm from.
I got family, I can you know, I can work

(51:48):
with Dad. I can at least have that so and
then if it don't work, I can go back in
the army. I'm gonna stay in the active reserve, so
I don't lose any of my time in service, my rank,
any of those things. I never would have done it.
I gotta be honest. If I had been a guy
from Arkansas, from Missouri or Texas or Oklahoma, I didn't,
I would never be I would not be a country

(52:10):
singer today. It's only because I was from Nashville and
my family was here and it was home to me.
So I felt like my worst case was at least
I'm around my family, and if it don't work, I'll
go back in the army. How long until you came

(52:31):
back home? But also you're kind of venturing into this
new world of country music. How long until you realize, Hey,
I kind of do deserve to be here, Like maybe
I'm not as good as I'm going to be, but
like I I can compete. How long was it in
the country music before he started to feel that way?
I'm working on it. Yeah, well who told then? Who
told you? Because we talked to before we came on
the air here. Like people, when people invest in you,

(52:53):
that means they believe in you, and I believe you're
going to make them eventually down the road some money,
right because bus is in friendship. There's there's a lot
of friendship in business. But you know, if someone's gonna
spend money on you that they believe in you, wouldn't
know what that means. They believe that you're gonna help
them make money. Yeah, and that was who believed in you. Uh,
you know, early on it was a bunch of different people.

(53:16):
Ironically enough, it wasn't. One of the guys was a
guy that wasn't even in the business. Uh. He was
a contractor um and he wanted to be in the business,
and he had done very well with his business, made
a lot of money, and he's like, you know, you
gotta do this. You know, I'll if if I will
pay for your house. If it doesn't work, give it

(53:37):
a year. And he's one of the guys that convinced
me to get out of the army because and that
was the reason why he said, if you get out
of the army and you try it after a year,
if it don't work, I'll pay your house off and
you can go back in the army. I got nothing
to lose here, you know. And there was also a
couple of guys that had a small publishing company. Uh
West Mayor's was one of those guys, and they said,

(53:58):
we'll sign you to a publishing deal and they paid
me money. You know, it wasn't much, but it was enough,
and they believed in me, which led to uh Maypop Publishing,
which was owned by Alabama, which led to Sony Publishing.
So it was a lot of those little pieces. Um.
But back the other the Commander, my my colonel at
Fort pok Louisiana, when I was at that deciding point,

(54:20):
I'll never forget setting down with him in the general
and both of those gentlemen said, we believe that if
you stay in the army. You will be the sergeant
major of the Army someday. You're you're fast tracking. You
know you're you're good at what you do, but we
also think that you should at least try this. It

(54:41):
was that conversation that led to me pursuing, you know,
taking those forty weekends when I was off and come
into Nashville, meeting with the West mayors, meeting with the
Brian Schweitzer's and all of these different people, and and
literally within a year of me leaving the army, almost
of the day when I was ready to cash in

(55:01):
on my buddy's commitment and go back into the army,
Brian Schweitzer called me from Atlantic Records and said, I
want to offer your record deal, And how did that
make you feel nervous? Because I was wanting the publishing.
I had those small publishing deals. At this point, I
was writing for may Pop, so I was getting a
little more money which allowed me to not have to

(55:23):
work in vinyal sighting. And I was working as a
sheriff's deputy as well, so I was doing vinyl sighting
on the side, working as a sheriff's deputy and then
doing security as a shriff off duty sheriff's deputy, you
know what I mean, And for doing writers nights every weekend,
and you know what I mean. There was a lot
going on. So it gave me a little bit more confidence,
but it also made me very nervous because I knew,

(55:46):
based on everything everybody told me, as an artist in
the beginning, you make nothing, man on the shows and stuff. Uh,
in fact, everybody else will be making money and you want.
But I was also making a little bit into publishing,
and I started started getting a lot of interest and
a lot of the songs that I was writing, so
I thought, you know, I might try Uh, this is
at that point, so I'm going to try it. When

(56:08):
I left the Army to come here to pursue the music,
it was not to pursue it as an artist. It
was to pursue it as a songwriter because I had
a wife and two kids, and I knew that you
could make money writing songs, and I could still do
other things to make more money, you know. And then
in the process of writing my songs and doing that,
I was doing my own demos, and then I started
doing other people's demos, and in that one year's time

(56:31):
it turned into that phone call. But which was really
weird the where that phone call came from, where he
heard my music. It wasn't through an A and R team,
It wasn't through a publicist or a publisher. It came
from a guy who boarded his horses who I knew
who every time I would demo my music, I would
take it to him and Jeff would play it. And

(56:51):
this guy, Brian Schweitzer, happened to be boarding his horses
at Jeff's stables and heard it and asked him who
is that? And he told him and he called me
and he made a decision that he wanted to sign
you from just listening to a demo. Wow, call me
and said, can you come in. I was on my
way home from a writing session. Had had the third
shift with the Sheriff's department at that time. I said year,

(57:13):
and he said where are you? And I said, I'm
on Interstate forty. But I can turn around. I had
a jeep wrangler, and I'll never get a cuss across
cut across the interstate, right in the middle of inter
state and turned around and came right back. Fifteen minutes.
I was in the office and they asked me to
sing something, and I said, well, I mean, you know,
they heard one of the demonists singing, I want to
hear you sing it live Like well, I don't really
play as the pianist, it's just and Al Cooley was there.

(57:34):
Al Cooley was one of the most horrendous A and
R guys, a brutally beastfully honest A and R guy.
Looking back, he was one of the best. But I
just remember he had this reputation of being like mean, terrible, mean,
you know, but what it was, he was honest and
he probably saved a lot of people's lives. Um. And

(57:55):
they had me sing a song, uh called three or
two South Maple Avenue Acapello and so I sang it
and uh literally right sitting like this right here through
you oh too sound me but ivenue and I sing
a little bit and he says, we'd like to sign
you to a record. Yeah, just like that strangest thing ever.
So I'm like, oh yeah, sure, he goes you ever turning,

(58:16):
I'm like yeah, how about management? I'm like yeah, yeah.
So I walked out of the office and I called
my wife. Uh no, I did not call my wife.
I did not cause I got home and I said,
I just got offered a record deal, And she said,
what did they say? I'm like, I said, they asked
me if I had managers and attorneyship, what do you say?
As I told him, yeah, And She's like, well, you
got a manager like and I'm like, no, I gotta

(58:37):
find a manager. I didn't have nothing. You know, that's
wild that it all came from a horse, from from
a guy who boarded horses. Crazy. He owned Joe go Quick,
the world champion quarter horse at the time, and I
would take him music and if Jeff liked it, he
would let me ride Joe. And if he didn't like songs,
he put me well, how did you and Blake become friends?

(58:59):
How did you? Because see think he got pretty close.
We were and are we still are? Um? You know,
I don't. Blake had got here before I did. Blake
was working on his career long before, not long before,
but a few years before I got here, and so
he had started having some radio success and we we
literally met at a some event in Nashville and just

(59:20):
started hanging out. And then he had lived in Hitman
County and I was in Dixon, so we weren't that
far apart. Uh. Both realized that we liked hunting. I
invited him on a hunting trip on a trip that
I was doing in Kansas. I'm sorry, yeah, in Kansas.
And at that trip we became like we we were buddies.

(59:43):
I knew right then that I liked the guy. Uh
and and and and we were both kind of like
I said, he had already had a couple of songs
on the radio. And and then I started having some
success at Broken Bow uh. And then we just stayed
in touch. I mean, at one point we were we
were with each other all the time. Every time we

(01:00:06):
could do something together, we would uh. And then he
got divorced from Cat and he and Miranda got married.
And I had known Miranda a little bit uh and
really thought that Miranda and I had a decent relationship. UM.
And she used to tell a story about how she
came to Fanfare and it was one of my early

(01:00:28):
on first two or three years of Fanfare, when he
still called it fan Fair, you know. And she tells
the story, and I remember her telling me that how
she waited after the show to meet some of the
artists and and that I came out and was the
only one that came out afterwards and gave her an autograph. Uh.
And so I thought, man, this is gonna be awesome.
You know, my buddies marrying this girl who's turned into

(01:00:50):
an artist of her own right and turned in this.
You know, it's great. But something happened with them too,
got married and it I don't know she she was
no longer a Craig Morgan faan for some reason. You know.
I don't know, um, but you know that's history. And
here we are now. I remember when you can do
in the Opery Blake when him I think him and
Gwen were playing from his ranch. I think, yeah, I

(01:01:14):
was there. I just I've done opery shows in the
past year. But was he setting you up? Are you
setting him up? Are you going back and forth? Always?
It's yeah, it's horrible. I will tell you though. We Uh.
When my son died, a lot of my friends in
this business came out there and and I had, Man,

(01:01:38):
I gained so much respect and admiration. Already loved all
these people. But it's really weird. Uh. And Jerry was
with me. It's it's weird when I know them and
I love them and they're I consider them friends. But
when I got like Trace Atkins, Blake Shelton, Jim and

(01:02:00):
Out and John Colleen, these guys show up at at
my son's funeral and they stand in line with everyone
else out there and asked nothing. I didn't want to
come in early. You know, it just meant it just
floored me. And when I'll never forget, we were we
were downstairs and Ceci had come in and was talking.

(01:02:20):
She's saying, at my son's funeral, and uh, you know,
I'm trying to trying to, I don't know, have a
sense of I wanted to comprehend my people and and
and them to know that I appreciate them being there.
But I remember Blake coming in and we cried, you know,

(01:02:41):
we cried together, and he hugged me, and I felt
such an embrace of friendship from him. Uh, and I knew.
I knew then that there was nothing that Blake or
I could do that would sever that friendship. It wouldn't happen.
And I also, at that moment, became Gwen's biggest fan.

(01:03:04):
I had met Gwen via FaceTime a few times when
Blake and I were together, and he was like giddy,
silly and love FaceTime and her and we would, uh,
we would lay there together and sit and talk to
Gwen or her own FaceTime, you know. And and I
really liked her, but I didn't really know her. But
when he came in the room, I said, where's Gwynn?

(01:03:25):
And you know, was she not able to come? He said, no,
she's outside. Uh. She was being respectful and she did
not want to come in until she was invited in.
And I just, man, I thought, my lord, you know,
if she came in and she too, like cried and
hugged my wife and showed her such an embrace of
friendship and kindness and warmth, and it just absolutely hammred me.

(01:03:47):
And I've never experienced anything from her but that since,
you know, when we're at the award shows and he's like,
let's get out of here for a few minutes, and
we got out the bus and hang out, and they're
just He's in such a beautiful place with her that
I've never seen. And I love that. I love it. Now.
Having said all that, I can text Blake on Monday,

(01:04:08):
April the first, and it might be Monday June one
when I heard from he is the worst man uh,
and then I'll get nothing a picture of him flipping
me a bird or something, you know. Um. But yeah,
so we've been friends for a long time. I mean
he came out when I did read net y'all club. Uh.
And I remember when we did read net Yall Club

(01:04:29):
he had a huge hit and even you know, just
to show you how weird this business is. I remember
talking to Blake him going, man, I don't know if
this is gonna work. I don't know what's gonna happen.
I'm like, you got a big, huge hit. Are you kidding?
You know? And He's like, yeah, but you just don't know.
And now you look where is at? You know, it's
just it's wonderful. What is there left for you to do?

(01:04:50):
You're just thinking about everything that you are doing, have done,
are doing more than have done, between the music, the TV,
the passions, walking nine miles to your house and everything,
the opera, everything you stand for, all of the philanthropic
work that you do. Like what what, What's what's happening?
What what is your vision for the next ten fifteen years?

(01:05:11):
Like what what do you want to do? Um? I
want to do good? And I know it sounds super cheesy,
but if you talk to anybody in my camp, they'll
tell you. And if as long as I'm doing things
that afford me the opportunities to do good things, I'm
gonna keep doing it. And I also want to. I
don't want to be in this business when I'm no

(01:05:34):
longer relevant. I don't want to. I don't want to
do it just because I want to do it. I
want to do it because people want me to do it,
because they want to hear it, and because when when
I do some of these things. For example, I just
did a military benefit UH to raise money for a
organization that provides trips for not only the veteran the warrior,

(01:05:57):
but for his family. And after that event, when I
got a text the next day from the guy who's
over that said, we raised this much money, which is
so much more than I had ever expected. Thank you
for me and a part of that. When I can
no longer do those things, or when my impact at
those events is not impacting, I'm gonna do something else.

(01:06:17):
And that something else is just spend more time in
Alaska with my wife, in Florida with my wife and Dixon,
Tennessee fishing and hunting and you know the kids. Um,
I've already kind of transitioned into trying to do more
of that. But I just want to do more of

(01:06:38):
the good things. I wanna. I wanna transition my life's
efforts into providing for those other things, not me. I mean,
I got all I need, man, I've got more than
I deserved. That is the truth. I want the people
around me to prosper. I liked it when I like

(01:06:59):
to see that when guys that worked for me go
on and are having success of their own, that's cool
man to me. Yeah, final question, have you been recording music?
Are you going? Are you gonna have new music? What?
What's happening here? Because it's been it's been a minute.
I'm as excited about what I'm doing is anything I've

(01:07:20):
ever done. So my wife is a big fan of
me singing certain music life, it's not a big fan
of my country music. Uh I love all music. If
I mean, I can go all the way back to
the very beginning of our conversation, who is Lina Richie Luther?

(01:07:41):
I love I love love love music with the emotion, energy, soul,
you know I love that. Uh So my next project
that I am in the process of working on is gonna.
I'm gonna sing with those people whose music I love.
I'm trying to. I wanna, I wanna. You know, I'm

(01:08:04):
a huge Kelly Clarkson fan. I love to hear her sing.
She's a monster in my opinion, and I want to
I want to sing something with Kelly. I want to
sing something with that Sharon. I want to sing something
with c. C. Janas. I want to sing something with
Liona Ritchie. I want to do those, and it might
be one of their songs, maybe one of my songs,
maybe something that we write, maybe something i'm writing. I

(01:08:25):
just wrote a song. I think it's one of the
better songs I've ever written, and it's it's not a
straight up country. I'm sure it probably sounds country, um,
but to me, it's not a country song. It's more
of a soul song. And I want to record that
kind of stuff. And the label is all about so
that's exciting. Well, listen, we've we've been talking for over

(01:08:45):
an hour. I hope this wasn't too long. I could
sit here and do another hour. I could too. With you, dude.
I love talking to you, you know, and I'm sorry, uh,
you know, we shared a label relationship there for a
minute on Black Ever, Yes, and I remember thinking, uh,
I mean, and I'm not gonna make stuff up. TOLDJ

(01:09:06):
I said, really, I think I'd like to get to
know this guy better because I think there's something there
that I can't see because you know, you were a
national syndicated show host and you had your own band thing,
so you were super busy doing all these other things.
But I felt like there was a person there that
I that I would probably do more with if I

(01:09:28):
got to know. And in this business, it's it's weird. Man. Everybody,
especially early in my career, would try to encourage me,
you need to get to know this guy, spend some
time with this guy. I'm like, okay, cool, I found
you know, and I try, but there was nothing men
this guy had in time. It's like, look, if me
and this guy, that's why I love Blake, Blake and I.

(01:09:50):
If we weren't in this business, Blake and I will
still be hanging out on a Friday night having a beer,
talking about certain things or wine, or we'd be making
fun of each other like we do. You know what
I'm saying. That's that work. It's natural I've never forced
an issue on a I've never forced a relationship in
this business. Not one of the people that I know
and love and hang out with when we're not doing
this is someone that I wouldn't be doing that if

(01:10:12):
I weren't in this business. And I found out long
after the fact that Bobby Bones is one of those
guys that I probably would even if we weren't in
this business. And it's taken a long time to get
to that point. So, which is why I can talk
to you forever. Well, that's nice to me to say.
I think you're a lot cooler, stronger, tougher worldly now
you play that wimpy guy. I think all of that whatever,

(01:10:33):
but playing the act, Buddy, Listen, sell the books, get
the TV shows, play the geek whatever. Craig, good to
talk to you, my friend. That's been fantastic. I'm so
grateful that you can. You know, I'm a fan. So
I'll see you Alaska in February. You guys are coming up.
I'm more of a Florida guy. It's just a long way.

(01:10:58):
It's just a long ways up there. It is. What
if I flew you up on a plane. It's just
a long ways up there. Privately, I hear you. It's
just a long ways up there, Like that's I gonna
hug me. I'll be honest with you. I mean everywhere.
I just you're gonna do it. You're probably she would

(01:11:18):
love it. You get the fun gear and you're warm,
and you set out in a like semi iglue around
the fire, and then at night you watch Netflix movies
on a big screen. Wat electricity. How do you have WiFi?
Nine walk? I actually do have this little WiFi box
thing that we started using, and I put it in

(01:11:41):
the window and you get enough WiFi that you can
send emails and text messages and I've literally been able
to depend on the weather download Netflix from it. We
in our cabin in Arkansas, we did had one of
those little boxing and wife I went out, so we
used it for three days and I got my bills
like seven stream just stream shows. It was like seven

(01:12:06):
and eighteen dollars for a while. Five box. You guys,
follow and follow Craig on TikTok uh on TikTok It's
Craig Morgan eighty five. Uh see Morgan music on Instagram.
You have all these different names. Tell your people, I
know you have them. They need to unify that thing.
You know, I know, and they should. I don't even
know problem. You see they do that stuff and then
I go, I got this, man, I can do it.

(01:12:29):
And then I end up starting Craig Morgan eighty five.
I like, why did you do that? Why didn't you do?
See them all access like everything, Like I have no
clue what's about. And now they're like, can you do this?
And they're like what, man, you gotta show me what
button to push? Just give. My wife hates that stuff, man,
she absolutely hates me trying to get her to do

(01:12:51):
something with me, Like I want to do the thing.
I'm afraid my wife would leave me though, Like if
this is terrible, I don't know if we should say this,
but like there's something trending on TikTok. It's so bad, y'all.
Like these guys fart in a bag and then like
tell him that it's gas and get him the snippet
or to inhale it. Like I'm afraid if I did that,

(01:13:13):
she would force me, she would leave me. Listen, we've
gone off the rails. Alright, alright, but thank you, thank you,
thank you. It's been fantastic on the Bobby Bones Show. Now, Greg,
how are you, man? I'm good, buddy, how are you?
It's good to see. I mean I see quite regularly,
but still it's really good to see in studio you too, man.

(01:13:34):
Today is a special day because never in the history
of my show has my now fiance wanted to come
and watch a performance. No. Once I started following you,
Oh my gosh, you did. I'm not a creeper to
the Instagram. I love Bobby and so I kind of
watch who he follows, and and then I see all

(01:13:55):
y'all's post and so I started following you. Oh I'm
going to follow you back. I turned my phone off,
so wouldn't you off right now? I did? But I stopped.
What did I do? I'm sorry. I just felt weird.
But that's awesome. She might be your biggest fan ever.
Oh you're so sweet. That's awesome. And I didn't know,
but I would just start, you know, I'd have different
playlists that you were on, and she would know every

(01:14:16):
single word, every single song on your playlist if I
turn it on. Craig Morgan artist on Spotify, no skips.
Oh you sweet, that's awesome. What is your favorite Craig
Morgan song of all time? Well, what I love about
Sunday obviously, do you guys know that having it right now?
All right, here we go, here we go, that's the
little of it. Raymond's and his soundy bess, he's usually

(01:14:56):
up to his chairs and Greece there's a moderns logging
in with that mean little freckled face kid who broke
a window last sweet miss Benny likes to sing off
key and the put behind and me. It's what I

(01:15:19):
love about Sunday. I sing along as a quiet ways
every verse of amazing grace. Then we shake the feature's hand,
go home into your moo jeans, have some chickens and
made me pick a backyard football team, not them to anything.

(01:15:47):
It's what I love about Sunday, nice glood. I don't
think once we set you a voice memo her singing
that in the cars was like, correct, you're singing every song.
I can't get to stop. Its awesome. I do have
a question. Can I ask you a question? You do
whatever you want? Okay? Is it Sally and rod Ron

(01:16:08):
or Rob Because I trail off, I hit raw hard
and don't ever know what I don't know you don't know,
So where's that line? Looks like Sally and Ron looks
Ron Sally and Ron n Sally and run. It's up

(01:16:35):
to our interpretation. Ron. Yeah, it might be robbed. It
could be Bob Sally. Hey. So today we're bringing you
for a couple of reasons. One, um, she loves you,
obviously I do. But it's also a Veteran's Day today.
It is which very special day right for all of us,

(01:16:55):
but especially you who served Creg Morgan's Here. You mentioned
almost Tome, which again has probably been played in my
house more times than a month. I'm sorry, and she's like,
this is such a set. Why you love this song?
It's beautiful. It's about a person whose dreams are better
than his real life and he wants to stay in
his dreams and someone wakes him up because they think

(01:17:17):
he's needs to go home, but he's like, I was
home in my head. Oh you just described that song
to the I mean, to its perfection. That is exactly
you know. I just wrote a song called the Mask,
and it's kind of a current description of that same thing.
You know, we have to put on this mask when
we go to work, and I'm not talking about the

(01:17:37):
physical mask that we're wearing, like you have a crappy day. Uh, Bobby,
You've had crappy things happen in life, and you still
get up and you go to work. You put that
mask on. And that's what that Almost Home for me
was about. The old man was laying there asleep, and
he was even though he might have been chilly in
his dream and in his unconscious state, he was happy. Uh,

(01:18:02):
you know, and that and that's okay. That's I think
it's okay that we do that we're supposed to. It's
called dreaming. You know, when you quit dreaming, you quit living.
In my opinion, Craig Morgan's here. Do you guys want
to play a little bit almost Home? Yeah, I would
be glad today from two thousand two. He had plastic

(01:18:24):
bags wrapped around the shoes, he was covered with the
evening news, had a pair of ool socks on his hands,
banks times flashing five below. It was freezing rain and
spitting snow. He was coloneled down behind some garbage cans.

(01:18:50):
I was afraid that he was dead. I gave him
a gentle shame. When he opened up his eyes, I said, oh, man,
are you okay, he said, just climbed out of the
cotton wood tree. I was running from some money bees

(01:19:19):
drim dry in the summer breeze. After jumping into calico creem,
I was wroking down in older ol past field of

(01:19:40):
me that it just spam mold man. I wish you
just let me long because I was almost home. Come on,

(01:20:01):
that's great, man, that's great here. I didn't listen. I
assumed you guys know all of your songs, you too know,
you know I forget the words regularly. I can help
it out if you an when you're on rob who knows?
Will you bring up the mask? And I, I mean,
you guys know enough of that to play a little
bit of that. Now play? Yeah, you guys don't mind, right, No,

(01:20:24):
I don't. I'm here to have fun. You all right.
I've been doing this while I still can't believe people
want to They still listen. You're kidding, here's Craig Morgan. Yeah,
I got pains inside of me. Pains I don't let

(01:20:44):
people see I see I'm fine, cause I know they
see me strong. Behind my eyes. Inside my soul feels
like I'm digging a deeper hole. But Apple it on
a smile a line, and I ho because Man, I

(01:21:07):
get home and it's late and night, no one's around,
and I turn off the lights. I cry and scream
and yell like a crazy man. I don't have to
pretend that I'm doing well. I can tell the world
it can go to hell. It's just me and God

(01:21:28):
when I take off the mask. Nice. That's awesome. Man.
I've been singing one of your songs wrong for thirteen
years now. You know which one? Which one? National International
Harvest again. So we're in Virginia, Caitlin and I are.
We got a Virginia from my Nagio show, and we're
on a farm and Caitlin singing every word. You wanna

(01:21:52):
sing a little bit of it? Go ahead, that's the thing.
She knows it all from the beginning. Go ahead, you
got at that deep point. I'm you already to go there?
I don't know I'm gonna do. That. Sounded like a
little bit of life. Are you sure you're on the right?
I love that, sound like the intriguer A little bit

(01:22:14):
of life. Um. I'm a son of a third generation
farm I've been mary change here, super farmers Dot. I'm
a hard working god fearing combine driver hugging up the
road with a flower checking like a legging five miles
an hour. I'm an international harvest No, no, because I

(01:22:40):
sang I'm an international harvester, because that's how he sings it.
But it's on my Yeah. I was like, where's the
harvest in Russia? China? Are you speaking of? Speaking of Russia,
you guys have to google this. Uh. There is a
a guy in some country e uh of the Russian

(01:23:03):
Russia era, and I guess they outlawed music videos over there,
and him and his remember that him and his girlfriend
do international harvest. They made a video on everything. It
is the best worst thing you've ever seen on the
nothing of Harvey. You have to watch it. I mean
you'll put yourself laughing. Give us a little bit of
that two thousand seven international harvester from the From the

(01:23:26):
mouth of the man himself, I'm a son of a
third generation farmer. I've been many ten years to a
farmer's dog. I'm a god fear and hard working gumbine

(01:23:49):
driver hogging up the road on my flower, lugging five
miles an hour on my international harvester. I think if
people go to you, and this is the most complimentary
thing that I can say, And OBI take it this way.
I think sometimes you go to a show and you're like, oh,

(01:24:10):
I didn't know I knew that song. I didn't know.
If they go to one of your shows, I bet
you if they're not a super fan of just a
casual fan, they go, I didn't know. He's saying that,
because you have so many hits, you're not a fan
in me at all. In fact, I had a T
shirt made then on the back it's literally and we
sell them, he says, the guy who sings International Harvester.
That's what I love about Sunday. I can read lives

(01:24:32):
and I can't tell you how many times I've been
on stage and I see someone go, I didn't know
he's saying that. I love that dude. This Old Boy
is a song that I feel like I relate to
now and I never did. I never really did in
my life until I met her. And then you would
hear I'd hear this Old Boy and it's like a
song about you, just like I'm lucky I get this

(01:24:53):
old boy gets to have all this stuff. Yeah, And
I really never felt like I understood that song. Until her.
Oh that's awesome, that's that's so sweet. And probably her
playing it for me over and over again. Yeah, you
get tired of it. Uh, that's really what it's that
sounds all about, you know, that relationship been. I've been
married to the same woman for over thirty years. Uh.

(01:25:15):
And she just I mean, she has just gotten hotter lately.
It's just I mean, god, dang, she has like, not gray,
but this silver hair. It's natural. I'll show you a
picture in a minute. I'm not kid y'all. Uh. And
she's gotten it back into her health kit. You know,
when we lost our son, it was a real difficult time. Uh.
And and we managed to stay strong in our faith,

(01:25:36):
in our relationship. But it's just tough. Um. But man,
she has gotten back in and good god. Yeah, let's
do Let's do one more. Let's do Redneck Yacht Club.
I feel like if we don't, my listeners are gonna
be upset. All right, I made my But he's out

(01:26:00):
on the lake. We're headed out to a special place
we love. But just a few folks know there's no
signing of no monthly dues. Takey Johnson here, Mercury or
you're living rude and fired up, made us out of party.
Go I come on in the waters fine, I just

(01:26:29):
iddled on over and toss the loud best trackers, May
Liners and a party bart Strong together like a phone
and trailer park angered out and get loud all summer
love South Beside there's five house boat front porches, has

(01:26:51):
to turf launcheers and ticky to orches. Regular Joe's rocking
the boat. That's us, the Redding Yacht. Craig Morgan, Craig Morgan, everybody,
thank you, Greig, thank you all. Craig Morgan's on with
us right now. The tour is happening. Tickets at Craig

(01:27:13):
morgan dot com. You're gonna go October nineteen all the
way through the middle of November. When you go out
and do this tour, Like, what's are you doing all
the hits, Craig? But no, I'm gonna be honest, I'm
not doing them all. There's a few that we don't
do because to do some of the new stuff, new
material um and we have fun with it. You know,
we might do a cover too. I just want aybody

(01:27:34):
to come enjoy the show. Now. Having said that, if
we're in a place and you know, we're good on
time and someone's out of particular song. The guys are
prepared to play all the hits. In fact, they're probably
more prepared than I am. I don't remember all the
words sometimes, Will you play that's what I love about
Sunday though? Okay, that's all I really wanted to know.

(01:27:56):
I just wanted to ask it in a nice way,
because if I came to your show and you didn't
play that's what I love about Sunday, UH might walk out.
That's right, I agree, Hey, I agree with you. If
I went to a show, uh, and and and the
Ticular Arts didn't sing a big fat hit that they had,
I don't know that I was, I'd be kind of
ticked off. So the problem is, you know, I had

(01:28:16):
some songs that were hits that were just kind of
like so so hit that that's so so hit was
really important to someone coming. And so I've gotten text you.
I can't believe you didn't do whatever. You know. I'm
I'm sorry we only had so much time. What about
International Harvester, Yeah for sure, Okay, all right, we're good.

(01:28:37):
Then I want to ask for a refund. We're all good, Mike,
here's my second question for you. Craig Morgan's on with us.
You guys can get tickets to his tour just go
to his website Craig Morgan dot com. What I'd like
to do because I know what you love about Sunday
and I'm gonna I'm gonna sing this to you this question.
I'd like to know what you love about the other days?
Here we go. What do you love about Mondays? Go ahead, Creig,

(01:29:00):
Monday is my Sunday. Oh, because it's like a day
off artist like. Alright, I started to do another one.
What do you love about Tuesdays? Stay night? Okay? I
like all right, right to the point. Every Tuesday, Every Tuesday?
You have steak every Tuesday? Why Tuesday? Every Tuesday? Just

(01:29:21):
what me and my wife has been doing. Okay, alright, alright,
we're gonna try the next one. What do you love
about Wednesdays? I have no idea I could say what
I do? Ok ok okay, Amy take Thursday? Go ahead?
What do you love about Thursdays? That's when I get

(01:29:42):
on the button. Head your way. Oh that's good, that's
pretty good. Well, we got two more days here. What
do you love about Fridays. That's when I get to
stand on my stage. We're good now, he's got to
feel of it. We're singing the song with each other.
Good one more? What what do you love about Saturday?

(01:30:04):
Bike ride and run? Before I play? Every Saturday, you
go get a bike ride, you have a run triathlon?
Basically you have a wrecked before a show? Oh yeah,
every pretty every show. He's like, every show every Saturday. Now,
but Saturday, I do a long ride. How long is that? Wow?

(01:30:27):
Are you not tired when you get on stage? No?
Not at a give energy. I walk on the treadmill
before show and I'm like, I can't even do it.
All right, Craig Morrigan is on with us. What we're
gonna do In a second, We're gonna play a new
unreleased song that Craig is sent up. I haven't even
heard it yet. We're gonna play that. We're gonna talk
about it. The rest of the show. Have questions for

(01:30:47):
you as well that they have prepared that probably are
not as stupid as mine. Where I sing them to
you and let Craig will be in Green Bay October nineteen,
Mason City, Iowa on October and Wisconsin Dell's October first.
Is there anything that I missed? I mean, i'd also
encourage you guys to read his new memoir that came
out God, Family and Country that came out into last year,

(01:31:08):
like September October. So that's out. Oh, I forgot it's
this September. I was wondering, whych that because I haven't
read it yet, and I was like, I'm not a
good friend. So it's this September. Okay, good. I thought
I missed it and I was just all right. Last
thing I remember now what triggered this call. I saw
you were doing your tour and long ago I said, hey, Craig,

(01:31:30):
we really need a tore t shirt from because my
wife and Craig promised me a Torti shirt. And you
know who doesn't have a Torti shirt from Craig Morgan?
You know who still doesn't have it? Me? That's right,
asked him. That's all. That's all I'm saying. I'm still shirt.
Let's Craig, Well, I have to get you one of

(01:31:50):
the older ones. Yeah, yeah, hard to find? Were these guys,
all of my guys. You're not gonna believe this because
of course you asked this now. They have literally been
on Etchy and everywhere trying to old shirts. So you're
saying that they've been looking for me one are looking

(01:32:13):
for you to have old ones, looking for one for
your That's right, that's what it's for. Yes, Okay, well
I mean I can do that. I go to ed
In trying to find one. Okay, no, no, no no,
I got your T shirt coming and we'll make sure
you get one of the new both of your half
one and you'll have to wear it on the show,
the new God Family country shirt. Okay, we're there, we can.
I wait to see you in town here, but Craig

(01:32:33):
Morgan is all over you guys. Go to Craig Morgan
dot com. The book comes out in September, which I
was very confused why I thought it was this past
September And I thought Craig and I weren't here as
close because you never sent me a book other than that.
Hey man, good luck with those tomato plants. And you
know I love you and I'll see you soon now.
I love you guys. Thanks you buch forward to seeing
you all right, Craig Morgan. Everybody. That's awesome, Thanks Craig.

(01:32:53):
Thank you guys, anybody

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