Industry Series: Country Central

Speaker 1 00:00:14 What's going on everybody? Welcome back to the In The Round podcast. It's Your boy Matt Perillo. We are in the luxurious DM Monday Studios here in Music Row, Nashville, Tennessee, right in the heart of all the good stuff. And today, a very special episode, uh, episode I believe at 94. Um, and we have got my boys, Josh and Ben, they run a site. They run a, it's a platform. It's really big on Instagram. You may have heard of it. It's called Country Central. And, uh, they're killing it. They're not even here in Nashville yet. They happen to come in for the week. It was Benji's, I believe, fifth time coming out here. And Josh's first time coming out, so met him at Whiskey Jam the other night. It was like, fuck it. Let's do a podcast, a little industry series and introduce you to those guys. Speaker 1 00:01:00 So, great conversation, some hot takes, and we get the full story about how Country Central came to be and the two guys that have, uh, been a part of it since, uh, pretty much day one. So y'all stay tuned for that. Gotta tell you about our sponsors. Shout out to our man, Mike Allen, MRL Music Group Touring Logistics. They help you with tour support. They're booking shows all around the country, promoting 'em. Y'all be sure to check 'em out. MRL music group.com. Next, we got our friends at Sackman Studios, Grady and the boys over there in Mount Juliet, uh, they do a great job and, uh, they've got a great studio. A lot of friends working with them. We're looking for a spot to record. Hit up Grady and the folks at Sackman Studios. We also got Whale Tail Media, whales, Beezy, Gracie, the whole team. Speaker 1 00:01:41 You're getting hitched, you're looking for something here in town. Video photo wise. Hit up the friends at Whale Tail Media and of course last, but certainly not least, our boy, Mitch Wallace with the Digital Marketing Agency hit him up on IG for all your content needs. We're gonna get into it now. Great conversation. One of my favorite industry series episodes that we've gotten to, do y'all stay tuned up for this one. It's with Josh and with Ben from Country Central. This is the In the Round podcast to Boys. Oh, how the hell are we doing? Like, we're in Nashville, Tennessee. Y'all are visiting for the week. How's it been? Speaker 2 00:02:17 I think what, fourth day? You don't, Speaker 3 00:02:19 I don't even know. I can't keep track of it anymore. Like, I don't even, we didn't even know what day it was. We keep playing day. Speaker 2 00:02:23 The only reason I knew what day it was is because we were, we we're watching basketball. So Jose, I know the Mavs play on a Wednesday, <laugh> and I got a rep for Texas tonight. Yeah. So, um, yeah, so it's been a blur, but Nashville's sh us Well, so can't complain. That's Speaker 1 00:02:37 Awesome. So Ben, you've been out here before. Uh, Josh, this is your first time. How did you describe it? Because I'm, I'll get into how you guys met and, and your stories and all of that stuff and Country Central and all, all that good shit. But how did you like, describe it to him? Like, dude, did you just say like, dude, you gotta go to Nashville. Was it like, you wanting to come out here? I'm guessing you probably did a little bit of a Speaker 2 00:02:58 Job. I mean, yeah, obviously. I mean, I'm, this is my fifth time here, so I just told him like, this is number one, just like the one city, especially obviously for country music, that man, everything is very close to like, to one another. And man, like anywhere you go there's something to do. There's never a lack of things to do, which is why last night was like, kind of like a catch up on sleep night, you know? And I catch up on sports. So I told him, Hey, like, if, if I'm coming, like, hey, I plan to come here regardless. This is gonna be your first time to roll. And like, we planned it out a couple months in advance and we're here now man. And it's, uh, everyone's amazing here, has treated us super well. So I mean, it's, it's working out so far. Hell Speaker 1 00:03:34 Yeah. What's been your favorite part so far, Josh? Speaker 3 00:03:37 I'd say like the ease of finding stuff to do. Like there's never not something to do. Yeah. Um, just walking down Broadway, it just felt like a cleaner version of like what my college town was. Speaker 1 00:03:49 Tallahassee. Right. Speaker 3 00:03:50 Tallahassee. Cuz that would just, it it just reeked. Yeah. And just walking around. But even when we went on Broadway during the day, obviously it was a Sunday, so it was a little bit tamer. But even just going out at night, it was just like a good environment. Everyone's just in a good mood. Everyone's just happy to talk to you even if you've just met them. Yeah. So it was just been a nice environment overall. Like everyone's just in a good mood. It's just great music. Like no, everywhere you go it's not just gonna be like, uh, I don't know what's playing on stage. Right. Like I'm not really liking what's on stage right now, but it's like everywhere you go it's just like good music. So Speaker 1 00:04:21 Yeah, like everybody is, um, like everybody's solid. Like even the cover guys and girls that are on Broadway, cuz there is that kind of like stigma around Broadway. Like there's people that say, I don't wanna play Broadway cause I don't wanna get stuck on Broadway. But then Broadway teaches you how to be a performer and you see folks that literally are, are working it to make their living on, on tips and all that. Do you have a favorite bar yet? Speaker 3 00:04:42 We haven't been in one for more than too long. Speaker 1 00:04:44 Oh, you've been doing the Good Hot I will Speaker 2 00:04:46 Claim, I will claim for him. It's right here next door, tin Roof. Okay. Best Bar in Nashville. Yeah, Speaker 1 00:04:51 It is. Tin Roof is, is a, is a vibe on the weeknights cuz there's always something going on. And then day drinking on the weekends, Saturday and Sunday at Tin Roof. It's Sunday. Speaker 2 00:05:01 I call it the cheers, uh, the Cheers of Nashville. It's like, yeah, your family here that we walk Speaker 3 00:05:05 In, watch the game. That's where we watch once Speaker 2 00:05:06 We watch a Game, Speaker 1 00:05:07 Man. Yeah. And it's the oldest one. Like I had David Nail on here like a couple months ago and he was talking about when Tin Roof first opened and it's like now they've got tin roofs all over the country. But that original one is the, that little one on Damian. Like, that's where that whole tin roof kind of concept started and to see it's been here since 2002. So 20 years of being on the same street where that street has changed over so much so mm-hmm. <affirmative>. So that's cool. So let's get into how, how you guys kind of met and how Country Central started, because there's like different pages. Obviously I work in that, that media, country media kind of thing too. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, but also work with artists and touring and doing all that stuff. And I always am like, I wonder, I wonder what Country Central's gonna post today. Speaker 1 00:05:42 I wonder what the hot takes are gonna be. I wonder what the, what the reviews are gonna be of the songs that came out this week. Like I, and also like the throwback content you guys find, like the different showing the streaming stats, like all the stuff that we don't, like I can see the artists that I work with, stats, stats on their Spotify for artists. Yeah. But I don't, I don't think to go and look at everybody else's and you guys put it all out there for a country fan like me to check out. So how did the idea come about and how, how'd y'all end up meeting up? Speaker 3 00:06:08 Because we can go chronologically. Go ahead. Yeah. So yeah, I was in, it was like post pandemic or not post pandemic, it was the middle of it. So I graduated June, um, May, 2020. Speaker 1 00:06:22 God bless what, a year to graduate. What a year to like be like, all right. Oh yeah. Turn the go to the world. Yeah. And by the way, the world was you screwed, fucked. Yeah. <laugh>. No Speaker 3 00:06:30 I didn't. Yeah. I got to watch, um, the uh, dean or the president not even say my name on camera. That was really fun. <laugh> 11:00 AM I'm just sitting there drinking a beer. My parents like, congrats, congrats. Congratulate. They didn't even send me a, um, the gown, um, the order, the company in which, um, I ordered from. They're just like, oh by the way, we're just, they got Speaker 1 00:06:49 Shut down cuz of Covid problem. Speaker 3 00:06:51 No, they, no, they still got their money. They're just like, we're just not gonna send it to you, by the way. Geez. So thank you. Thank you. Hear Jones for that. But um, anyway, so yeah, I kind, I graduated, my degree is in physical therapy. Well athletic training, but I was gonna go into physical therapy but it was just really hard to like do anything, especially cuz that's such an in-person thing. But I worked for, uh, I did a law of graph design at Florida State. I worked for the division of student affairs, I worked for the health services. So I was designing constantly. Yeah. But I had never taken a class in it. So, um, basically I started working for this like hip hop guy in Australia. Um, so I would work every night from like 8:00 PM to 2:00 AM cuz they're 14 hours a day. Speaker 1 00:07:30 Aussie time baby. Yeah, Speaker 3 00:07:31 Aussie time. He'd wake up and he is like, all right, let's get going. I'm like, it's 10 o'clock and I gotta design some stuff for you. So basically, um, the hip hop world is just crazy on online. It's just so cool how much stuff like there's for every one country central, there's like a million rap pages. So it was really fun to learn through there. And I had six month contract with him and that ended and near the end I was just like, I was hungry. I wanted to post more graphics. I was finding like obscure magazine articles of my favorite artist and I was like quoting them on really cool stuff. Yeah. And I was designing stuff and I would send it to him and I think he just kind of lost his drives so he just wasn't posting anything I was doing. But I was making like four or five graphics a day. Speaker 3 00:08:10 Geez. So I'm just like, I'm just like, let me, I, I wanna start something new like this, but rap is so saturated. And I was like, I don't think there's anything like super graphic, um, oriented for country music. Yeah. And I also didn't really know too much about country music at the time. So I literally found the first handle available that sounded like good. And it just happened to be Country Central. It's like perfect alliteration too. I'm surprised it wasn't taken. But yeah, it started as an Instagram page and I would just, I just made a goal to like let me trust, try to curate news and bring it forward to just casuals like me. Cuz it was really hard to like find news as someone who's trying to learn about country music. There was only a few places I was really able to find out about artists Speaker 1 00:08:52 And it was all very much like the regurgitated kind of stuff. Yeah. Like what you're seeing on one website is gonna be very similar to what you're seeing on the other world. Speaker 3 00:08:59 No, it'd be copy pasted often. Yeah. Speaker 2 00:09:01 Like press release style of news reporting where like there takes, there's no thinking involved. Like everyone is the same. Yep. But they're the only places that people know to go. Yeah. Speaker 1 00:09:10 Cuz there's, there's no editorial in there at all and it's all being what's given to them and yeah. Like you said, yeah. Not as much work or journalism involved. Yeah. Speaker 3 00:09:18 It would be a paragraph saying like, Luke Holmes announces new song and that'd be sentence one and two and three and then just be like three more paragraphs of like, his last song was this, his next song might be this, this is the last thing he did was just like so much just extra information. So I just kind of made an effort to try and make it as quick as possible. Cuz in all my time studying graphic design or cuz I used to do a lot of infographics. Okay. You have like five seconds to get someone's attention. Yeah. So, and especially on social media, I think it even cuts down like three, like you have less time to get someone's attention than the memory, the short term memory of a goldfish. So really, yeah, it's, that's why even billboards are getting like quicker and straight to the point Speaker 1 00:10:00 Cuz Yeah. And they're flipping over what's on there. Like the time that they're actually on the screen is going every few seconds. Speaker 3 00:10:05 Yeah. You have such little time to gather someone's attention and then make them engaged. So that was the whole goal was just to keep it as streamlined as possible. Like for example, if one of your favorite artists releases a new song, if you don't see it from their feed, like you don't wanna read a whole like four paragraph article about, you just wanna say like, oh wow, Luke Holmes is dropping a new song and you, you got that information in two seconds and now you have the other two seconds of your short term memory, like of the five seconds to share it, save it, comment on it. So I think that's kind of like what the main starting point was, was it with it. And I did that for like, I was doing that for six months. I I, every day I would challenge myself to make a post just like, and learn about it. So over this time I got to learn about who all these artists were and who people actually liked and didn't like. Cuz there is a really weird disconnect Speaker 2 00:10:49 And what's like mainstream and like well known and Speaker 3 00:10:52 Then what I read. So regular people are interested. Yeah. I'd read something, it's like there'd be an article about Kane Brown and it'd be really positive and like, oh cool, this, this guy must be really loved by most of the mainstream community. So I, I would make a post about it. The comments would just be like bashing him. It's like why do you guys hate him so much? I had to figure that out over time. Yeah. But yeah, so I did that for a while and I kind of was losing steam a little bit cuz I think something else is like, especially in social media and digital media, you need a bit of a personality in order for people to relate. Yeah. So, um, one day I just keep seeing this dude in comments and he's just like, I'll post something about song and he's like, oh that's my favorite song. Speaker 3 00:11:28 It was written by this person, this person and this person. And they actually also wrote this song, which is a great song like Dude, how do you know all this stuff? And it's, it was this, all he had was a bitmoji. So it's like this like emoji of a black guy with a cowboy hat on and he just had a TBC for the Benji cord. I'm like, who is this dude? So I just reached out to him one day and that was back in late May of 2020. That's where, that's where he comes in. That's uh, since then it's been like, it's blown up since I'm Speaker 2 00:11:55 His uh, country music encyclopedia if you will. I mean he, he knows about country. I mean he likes like Tyler Children's of the world, Speaker 3 00:12:01 Bluegrass Appalachian. Speaker 1 00:12:02 So you're more in that Americana kind of. I Speaker 3 00:12:04 Spent a lot of time in North Carolina. I know like hiking and solo hiking. Yeah. Speaker 1 00:12:07 Tell me about that. Speaker 3 00:12:08 So as far as Speaker 2 00:12:09 Everything, I mean like yes I can, I can tell you random stats or facts about song, how long it was, you know, at the top of the charts, things like that. And I think it was cool, I mean I saw what Josh was doing, obviously it's like eyecatching, you know like beautiful looking graphics, but it's like curated for every kind of country fan. And that obviously appealed to me because I feel like I love every style of country. Yeah. You know what I mean? Like even Speaker 1 00:12:35 If you don't love it, you at least app appreciate you respect it. Yeah. You respect everything, what someone's doing. Speaker 2 00:12:40 I just respect a well-written song, you know what I mean? So I saw that and I was like, hey, like we can talk about Kane Brown, but we also can talk about Zack Bryan culture Wall Morgan won. We can do, we can touch upon everything and curate it for every style of country fan and give them that, you know, three seconds or less I catch a news where they'll be like, oh I actually know when my favorite artist is dropping music. I don't have to maybe pre-shave everything. You know, that's what everyone sees Yeah. These days. But like they now know that hey like this is what's coming out. This is, this is my favorite artist. I'll know how well they're doing. I know that what I'm doing, like my fandom, my listening accounts, like we just are able to share it, make it look great. Speaker 2 00:13:16 And yeah, it's been a cool partnership working with him because I just get to put in just something that's a passion of mine. Like I worked in country radio in Texas and I've always been a fan of like the songwriters what goes on behind the scenes. Yeah. But also just, I mean like I said before, every kind of country artist. So this has given me a platform to, you know, to talk about what I love about music. You know, the good, the bad. But I also love to let people know like this is what goes into it. So we spotlight songwriters and they really appreciate that cuz they could always, you know, they always deserve more credit. Absolutely. Speaker 1 00:13:47 And it's Speaker 2 00:13:47 Awesome just to see that, hey, like we have a small little part where we can not only talk about our favorite artists, but we can also spotlight who's behind the scenes, all the work that goes into it. Do some, maybe some tour footage that gives people insights to be like people all around the world. Country fans. Yeah. And they're able to see a little bit of that and say, oh wow, I see how amazing Midland or Morgan Wall is in concert. Hell I'm gonna buy a ticket to us. Or I see a Trey Lewis video and or we spotlight a random song off of like an upcoming release and they're like, I maybe I never saw that side of him. So it's really fun. It's been super collaborative as well. And yeah, it's uh, Nashville's a very inviting place. Yeah, you're very inviting like environment Speaker 1 00:14:24 Now you're a Texas guy right? Yep. So how, what's it like being involved? Cause you have your feet, you're literally, you're still living in Texas. Yep. But you're coming here and you have a presence here. What's it like the, how different are the two scenes? Do you see 'em coming more together like cuz right next? Cause there are a lot of Texas guys that come out here now and have their businesses here. Yeah. Like have part of their team here in Nashville. So, and Texas has like the, the fuck you were from Texas Rock. Like you're co wetzels, Kobe Coopers, you're Dylan Wheelers, Giovanni, all those Peus, all those guys. And then you have your more traditional guys and then you have your more songwriter and then you have your mainstream kind of guys. Exactly. What, what is it like kind of being in part of both scenes? Speaker 2 00:15:02 I mean for me I just think that there is, there's more, like I said before, there's space to collaborate. Yeah. There's overlap everywhere. Co wetzel doesn't, I, I think he even said this himself, like he never intends to live here or move here. He will always come and visit but he will always stay in Texas. But he has a place in Nashville. Yeah. People like you said, to your point, he is definitely like more like alternative rock. But he has like a place in the scene of country music and I just think that's all that we're seeing happening. Of course there's Texas based, but everything's like kind of blending together. It's becoming more of a melting pot where they all can have their place in Nashville. They don't necessarily have to say I'm a Nashville based artist. Or like for some fans like sell out to certain sound. They can even completely be their own. And it wasn't always like, that'd Speaker 1 00:15:47 Be Speaker 2 00:15:47 10 years ago it'd be much more sharp difference where like, I don't want to be associated with Nashville whatsoever. Yeah. But now it's like, hey, like everyone can kind of play together. Where Speaker 1 00:15:57 Do you think the, where do you think the, the change started Speaker 2 00:16:00 As far as like, Speaker 1 00:16:01 Like who was, who was the one that kicked the door down to be like interesting? Like I like being a Texas guy saying I fuck with Nashville. Well Speaker 2 00:16:07 I mean I know Cody Johnson was around. I know like he wasn't Speaker 1 00:16:10 And he's got the deal of all deals where he owns every single sentence. Yeah. He was Speaker 2 00:16:13 Accept, I mean at least by like radio he wasn't accepted initially and they weren't given a number one singles cause he was two cowboy. He would wear hat like if he lost a hat maybe. And like that's nuts. But I don't know. I wanna say, I'd say it's maybe like the past like five years where you see like a shift where Texas country artists are now riding with people from Nashville. They're finding a common ground. Cause people in Nashville love that stuff. Music. Yeah. And we're also seeing, I think it's truly, it's streaming. That is what's changed it streaming the pandemic definitely sped it up fast, forwarded everything. Because now I can be a fan of freaking bluegrass. But also I grew up listening to rock and roll, you know what I mean? So I can, I love what co Wetzels doing, but I also love Cody Johnson style Texas. Speaker 2 00:16:55 Like I would go to the rodeo every single year where I'm from in Houston. He would play every single year. Yeah. And so I love every style of it. And that's all. It's like, I think everyone is open. They just don't know. People don't know where to look. And now it's streaming being so big they can listen to co wetzel working out. They listen to Cody Johnson on like a long road trip. They can listen to Morgan won when you're done with the bars and your girlfriend broke up you or something like that. Yeah. And it, and I think that's just been the whole melting pot dynamic is the fact that streaming blew the door wide open. Artists can make a little more money doing things their own way. They don't have to say My only path is a very Nashville style of music Speaker 1 00:17:31 And having to cater to radio and having to go to this market. And there still is a lot of that still matters going on and stuff. Uh, but I want to get back talking about the, the country such stuff. So when did you guys start seeing like the growth and like, I know it's more than just you two doing it right now. Like you guys have like writers, you guys have like a team now. Like when was the moment like, oh shit, this is snowballing into something pretty fucking cool. Speaker 3 00:17:52 So it's gonna sound like insane that I do this Buy have recorded every single follower account on every single platform. Speaker 1 00:18:01 You love numbers, Speaker 2 00:18:02 You need a brand. Like you Speaker 1 00:18:03 Need a guy that has the numbers and you need a guy that, Speaker 3 00:18:05 That's the first thing I do every morning. Personality. Like my morning routine. Most people are like, wake up, you know, do a little journaling or yeah, make a coffee. It's like I gotta get into the drive and I gotta go into my spreadsheet and I have to count every single platform. Like I just have to do it. So I can tell you the exact day, <laugh> that it all starts. What was the biggest, Speaker 2 00:18:20 When did you, when was it the, the change? Speaker 3 00:18:22 It's been a lot as late because, um, obviously well specifically on Instagram with reels, Speaker 1 00:18:28 That's where I see the move. That's where I, that's where I intake your content. It's Speaker 3 00:18:31 A Instagram, it's a different algorithm for reels different from post. But I'd say probably when things started really coming together was November of 2021. Um, I mean it was always a slow growth. We've actually never had specifically on Instagram, but on TikTok and other platforms, we've never had a net negative day in terms of like follower except for one time on Instagram we had net follower gain of negative one and I was like, I got delete. She didn't make Speaker 2 00:18:59 A Gordon Bomb post man, you dropped the ball. Speaker 3 00:19:01 But um, yeah, I'd say it was around then, um, we're basically, it's just about optimizing workflow and we got to the point where it was just like we could turn two news around really quick. And once we started really dedicating and it was, it wouldn't take me like an hour and a half to make a post. It takes me eight minutes. And once we started really like giving responsibilities around where it's like, let's say Cody Johnson released a new song, Speaker 2 00:19:25 You at a Miami Heat Game. Speaker 3 00:19:26 I'm at Miami, Miami Heat Game or something. And it's just like, it's come to the point where I don't have to be at the computer to make this graphic, but like he'll tweet it, we'll have someone write up a caption, we'll have someone attempt to make a graphic somewhere else and send it to me. And it's all just so streamlined. So once that all started coming together, mixing in with um, the re-sharing of video content, um, from other people, I try to credit as much as I can. I just wanna say that. Um, but once we started doing that Ally, it's just like the growth started coming and um, spec, I think it just took a little bit of time for people to get comfortable with someone being like the face and personality. Um, and especially when the reviews start coming in and people start seeing that and they're like, they're being honest about how they feel and even when people are like, your, your scores are too high. Like they just defend it in the comments. And I love that cuz it's, we weren't changing for anything. I think when all that started coming together and like this giant like melting pot of, you know, the workflow reviews videos became a hub. It became a hub and all of a sudden just started blowing up. And, um, specifically on Instagram by mean eval on TikTok that like 50,000 followers there too. Speaker 1 00:20:27 Yeah. That's not too shabby. That's that's pretty fucking Speaker 2 00:20:29 Weird. That's like to your, I think you brought the point about just like traditional news publications. I mean this became a hub where Trailer Loose can drop his new EP Morgan Wall dropped a double album. We reviewed the entire thing. And I don't think when, like say just the morning wall one, when that came out, no one was doing like long form reviews. No one was doing like the deep dive anymore because I don't think you really have to necessarily in this day and age with social media. Um, but we did. And like fans would be, and like I would write my thoughts about it and you could see a fan of the comments saying that's exactly what, how it made me feel too. And these people were from Sweden, people from Australia, Speaker 1 00:21:03 The limited reach, the world of social media. Speaker 2 00:21:06 It's incredible. And that's where you really saw it popping up. Cause every single week, like I joke with him, country music's truly like the most, and not even in a bad way, it's like the most corporate, almost, um, genre because it's like a nine to five genre every single week. What do you call it? There's a big release every single week Friday, there's gonna be a big release from some artists that you know about either album or song. And we are gonna be somewhere where you can go to to Speaker 3 00:21:28 Talk about it usually announced at 9:00 AM so it'll be 10:00 AM Eastern Time. So I'll just be around the computer. I'm like, all right, who's posting right now? And all of a sudden's like Brian Kelly announces new song. It's like, all right, here's a Brian. So we, it's, that's what it is about corporate. It's almost comfortable that way. I love Speaker 2 00:21:42 It. I mean, I know there's always going to be some content to talk about. Yeah. To Spotlight for fans and like, like I said before, every kind of fan, every style country you like, we will talk about it. Yeah. And you don't really have that anywhere else. I believe so it's cool to have a hub where anyone can go to and say, Hey, what's coming out on Friday? And there's just, they're, we're not doing anything new. Not reinventing the wheel, but it's curated and it's convenient for people. Yeah. And it catches your eye in three seconds and they're saving Speaker 1 00:22:08 It. Yeah. And the way you guys do the reviews, it's not, Hey go look at this article. It's, Hey, look at this, this graphic, and then swipe right and see the next one. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, it's very quick and accessible to look at the reviews as opposed to having to go to a another country website. And yes, scroll down a page and it just, we like as cuz how old are you guys? I'm 27. How old are y'all? I'm 31. Speaker 3 00:22:28 I'm 24. Speaker 1 00:22:28 24. Okay. So we're, we're all like part of that age where like it's, we've seen the, the social media thing and like, like talked about the attention span and it's just delivering that same message that's always kind of been there, but instead of looking like the editorial page of like a, the back page of a sports article. Yeah. Like the, the New York Post or, or um, or the Page Ernie Houston or Paper Miami or any of that stuff. It's like getting it all and just having it. Yeah. Nice and easy. So. Absolutely. The other thing I've noticed is you guys have have made a lot of, lot of friends here in the country. Music, we're both on the media side. Like, like I, I went to Whiskey Jam with Nikki t the other night and we come over and we we're hanging out with you guys and fucking the king of country YouTube, Mr. Grady Smith is over there <laugh>. So how did that, um, how did that relationship and friendship come about? Speaker 3 00:23:10 So yeah, I remember Speaker 1 00:23:11 Cuz he's another guy kind of says it like it is, he's like, you guys were Oh, I love that. Yeah. He says it like it is, which I respect. Speaker 3 00:23:18 So being so like distant from the whole country culture and world, like people would always say, you see that new Grady video that dropped and I think that was in like, like early 2021. I'm just like, who's Grady Smith? Yeah. And people are like, what are you talking about? So I think I started following his Instagram cause that's where I base most of my operations out of. And he was doing like a thumbnail for like, uh, up and coming artists. I think he was talking about how he had to do some like, some like Photoshop magic and stuff. And that's, I love that stuff. I love media, I love all that type of stuff. Yeah. So I messaged him about that. It just didn't open. I'm like, dang, I guess I'm not cool enough for greedy Smith <laugh>. But at one point I think he, I think I tagged him in something and he shared it. Speaker 3 00:23:54 He is like, oh, I love Country Central. I'm like, we've never spoken, but that's awesome. So I think we just started talking a little bit. I think I finally got his attention through the dms and um, I guess him and I just started talking. I think one day he may have just tested the waters to see if we were like psychopaths or if we were like just normal dudes. So we, we had a little call with him and I mean, we just clicked. It was great. It was great being able to, um, to speak with him like that. So now we kind of have like a little frenemies thing going on where, yeah, I take, I took one of his thumb, I took his like profile picture and I warped his head to have like a giant forehead. You Speaker 1 00:24:27 Don't, you don't fuck with a graphics guy because he will Photoshop something or dangerous, dangerous, don't get on his wrong side. Don't get on Josh's wrong side. That's snoring. No. Speaker 2 00:24:35 And now Grady's crashing at our Airbnb right now. He's Speaker 3 00:24:37 Sleeping on, I woke up this morning and he's, they're snoring on the couch. I'm like, I could put this on the Instagram story right now. I can just like, Speaker 2 00:24:44 To your point though, that's like the Nashville whole community, it's stu to me at least, it's super welcoming. Like I've never, you know, come across anyone, you know that is just maybe having, even if they're having a bad day, everyone's super inviting. I think the first time I came to this city was, was during the pandemic. So it was like 2020, like it was an Easter weekend. I come up here and I was still like, kind of like, we're getting out, not outta the pandemic, but like, Nashville's kind of like bars are like, we still want to exist and have to make money. Yeah. So yeah, I roll up and like, I, I did my first night solo until some friends like showed up later in the week. But like I did, I just by myself and people were like, come hang out with us. Speaker 2 00:25:20 What are you, what are you here for? Like, like, Hey man, just love the music. Just wanted to explore this city and like come, come show with us. And like, that was like my first exposure to Nashville. Super inviting community environment. And um, the funniest thing was, I think I walked into Tootsie's on, um, Broadway, like rocking my mask and everything. It's like, oh don't man. Like in Texas they're even, they care even less, you know? Yeah. But I, I don't know how people are gonna act. I don't know how every city is like, I walk in with it and like, just like obviously a bachelorette group walks up to me and my buddy and they're like, why are you wearing that? I'm like, oh well good to meet you <laugh>. Uh, number number two. Like, oh, well I don't really know. Y'all know I'm gonna rub you the wrong way. Speaker 2 00:25:56 I don't really know you that well. She's like, well I'm a nurse and I'm not wearing it so you can take it off. Yeah. So I'm like, that was Nashville. Boom. Yeah, let's, let's let's live our lives and go. And, but super inviting man, great energy. And that's why I feel like, and I told him this a lot, I feel like country music's really having this like pop culture moment. It's always been relevant, always had the most diehard fans. But right now it's definitely cool, you know, to be country to embrace it. And people are really discovering a lot of great artists, a lot of great music. There's a lot of ways to Yeah. Kind of put yourself out there nowadays. Speaker 1 00:26:27 Yeah. And to me that's the, people talk about streaming and, and Spotify, some people, I mean as a music consumer, you, you gotta love it because it's introduced us to so many different people. And, and as as like a guy that's worked with independent artists, it's, it's helped us out a lot cuz we're not out there to get in the radio play and stuff. But then you have the battle with like the songwriters and the royalties and all that. And it's, but it, for me it's like the, the without streaming music as a whole doesn't grow. But especially country music like we were talking about, like the fact that there's someone in Stockholm, Sweden commenting on a country central post is like it. And the fact that they're getting, they're able to access that music that we're accessing. They don't have to be at a market point 20 Speaker 2 00:27:06 Years ago, what the hell, what could you do if you were an independent artist? You wouldn't, would you be heard in Sweden 20 years ago? I don't know, maybe like one day if you shipped mass, shipped CDs. I, if you're Speaker 1 00:27:17 Texas or if you're, if you're a Texas artist or if you're like say a Tristan Marez or somebody like that. Are you, are you having some fans in Buffalo, New York? Are you I don't going doing shows around the country. Like it's grown everything so much. So how do you guys go about like, curating and like deciding on stuff? Is it, is it personal preference? Is it kind of keeping an eye on what's going on in the industry? Like how does that all work? It's Speaker 3 00:27:37 A bit of a mix. Um, obviously there's, there's a little battle that you have to do with social media algorithms, but I think people forget that it's just like, just because something isn't working on the social media algorithm doesn't mean it's bad and to never post it again. So there will all, there will always be the tried and true things to post about Morgan Mullen, Cody Johnson. Zach Bryan, uh, surprising as a late house. He's great. Speaker 1 00:28:01 The last scene, few months. Yeah, it's, it's, you see a post about Zach, Bryan ev people are clicking on it freaking Speaker 3 00:28:05 Out. We've been very thankful that him or his management have sometimes shared some of our posts to his story. So it makes us feel like a lot more legitimate too. But um, yes, so it's kind of a mixture of, for one, we always have like a series. Um, I have a really dense content calendar in terms of what I know we can pose to pose questions and increase community engagement involvement. So like keep one, delete one, um, Spotify charts. Um, we'll do a lot of questions like rank these tracks. We just did one on Tyler Childers for um, purgatory. So we'll have that set out throughout the week. So we'll always have something to post even if there's no news. But when news comes around, it's kind of determining on, would if I was scrolling past this in my Instagram feed randomly, would I stop and would I look at this for a second? Speaker 3 00:28:51 Um, and is this artist, I wouldn't necessarily say relevant enough cuz that's um, I'd say disrespectful to artists that are coming up and everything. But it's pretty much a way of testing the waters with someone that's new and trying to organically push them in as well. So it'll always just be news charts, quotes, um, and then our form of engagement. But then everyone, once in a while, there was one, uh, Clayton Mullen, I think he just hit me up one day. I listened to the song like, I feel like people would like this. And I posted and it did, it did better than like when we post about Carrie Underwood. Yeah. And then we did again. I'm like, okay. So this dude definitely is something that works. So that's where some of the curation comes from. But when in terms of like new music, um, we'll do new music tonight on Thursday. So anything that we know about we'll post about. Speaker 1 00:29:35 Yeah, I love that. And I love how you guys break it up between singles, singles and projects. I find out what's new from that. Like I have my, my, my sources of like going around and like seeing if it's on this playlist or whatever, but I always now Thursday nights I look and see, oh, what are the boys talking about? Speaker 3 00:29:51 We'll just do, if someone says like, Hey, I got a new release coming out. It doesn't matter if you have a million followers or like a hundred, we'll post 150. I'll be like, Ben, add to the list. And then when Thursday comes around, I'll make sure I'll put as many as I can. If someone does a surprise release or they weren't added originally on the follow up graphic, which, um, I'll, which we split into like two since there's obviously more that's come out. We'll put anything that we missed there. And then we'll let people say, Hey, what was your favorite release? And we'll throw it up on the stories. And if it's, even if it's a small artist, um, and they, someone says, this was my favorite release, pull it up on the story, have a clip of the song. So that's where the curation is. Speaker 3 00:30:27 It's very community driven and I think that's just, it pays off because it's like people who engage with the content, if they have something to say, they're going to engage with something that they've said or if they know that their voice is being heard, they're just going to keep coming back and engaging. So it's just self feeding. Um, very organic. Yeah. But yeah, a lot of it's just, it's always like, even if there's no news, we will always have something oppose because it'll always be polls or questions and um, that's, that's, that's where the curation comes from community. So it's just community driven curation essentially. So whatever people are talking about in the comments, we're always watching and we're gonna, so someone will say like, oh can you do a keep one, delete one for Kenny Chesney? I'm like, yeah, sure, let's do that. And they get, so they'll message me like, thank you so much for like doing that. It's really cool to see all the votes and stuff. So that's just how it is. It's just self feeding. It's not too much like critical thinking. Yeah. Speaker 1 00:31:15 How many, how many dms do you guys get on a daily basis? How many are you up to now? Here's the thing, you're coming up, you're coming up on six figure followers. So Speaker 3 00:31:22 Here's the thing, it's hard to track because I live on my phone and if you message me, I'm probably gonna respond. And I've like, you know how the request thing, sometimes it'll be like 99 plus. Yeah. I don't let to get, get above um, single digits. Cause I'm always reading really. Even if it's someone, no shit. Yeah. If someone says like something to a hot take, like, ah, who, who would even say, is it this? That's crazy. I'll open it and I'll respond it, respond to it and start a low conversation. Even if it's just that one time. Like, uh, one time we did, um, Spotify wrapped when that came out, um, some people were talking about it and we posted our own cuz it was like, Hey, there's our Spotify Speaker 1 00:31:57 Wrapped. Yeah, why not Good content. Yeah. But Speaker 3 00:31:59 That was like, Hey, we care about your Spotify rap, send us your Spotify wrapped. And I opened every single message of everyone sending me their Spotify wrapped. Cuz I just wanna talk to these people. Like Yeah, they like, and people have even told me, they're like, I just like following. Cause if I message you or you guys, I'll know who I'm talking to. But yeah, it's nice to hear someone respond to me. It's not just like we post something and disappear and we're not in the comments. We're we're, we're there, we're talking, we're we're joking around in the comments. I think that's what really helps it too. Like, and that's why the algorithms often favor us is because we're just Speaker 2 00:32:29 Yeah. It's not consistent engagement. It's super organic. Just like, like someone Josh mentioned, like he's learning from what regular people from all around the country love. And then boom. Like we find that maybe a smaller artist actually has like a very diehard fan base and will spotlight that person. That's Speaker 3 00:32:43 Happened with Connor Smith. Speaker 1 00:32:44 I was gonna say the Connor. Speaker 3 00:32:45 Yep. Yes. Someone hit me up cuz I was like, I don't know if you ever saw the story about that, but basically I started the hot take thing. It was just like, oh, white background, which is like our most popular series too. Yes. Um, I think it's already like, it's like 20,000 views on that already, which is insane for um, uh, non-artist story, um, engagement. So, um, the first one was someone, this one guy that I'm friends with, he was like, he saw Connor Smith in New Jersey I think. And he just submitted a hot take like Connor Smith is the next big thing. And I was pretty much posting anything at that point cuz I have to filter so much of the hot takes. Yeah. But someone said that I posted it and it was funny how Connor Smith actually found it. He's like, he, he had this TikTok video where he is like, oh, I came across this country page and he, he kinda like, he cropped it out cuz he was like, I think it was a little bit of shade there, but um, yeah, it was like Connor Smith is the next big thing and he is like, oh agree. Speaker 3 00:33:38 And it was like 18% agree and he was like Speaker 2 00:33:40 Overwhelming. Like, that's not happening. Speaker 3 00:33:42 But then over time it's just like, especially with his EP dropping and his war announcement and everything now it's like, you see how much it's shifted since I think August where I I I'll do it every once in a while I'll do like, um, Connor Smith is the next big thing now it's at like 70%. Yeah. Agree. Yeah. And it's really cool to see how people's minds have changed, especially as like we've gained more followers. Well Speaker 2 00:34:02 Then like I hate Alabama comes, Speaker 3 00:34:03 I hate Alabama comes out like the Speaker 2 00:34:05 Viral success has nothing to do with radio just yet. And like, it just went like literally upside down as far as like now. Yeah, we see it, we understand it, we like it. And that just regular fans that are like, hey, like we may not be maybe that stock country fan, but like, damn we heard this song that the guy happened release and we went from maybe not knowing much about him until like a couple months later. Boom. Like, we love what he's doing. We're excited for, Speaker 1 00:34:27 To where we're gonna go and see this Thomas Rhett show. He might not be huge on Thomas Rhett, but we're gonna go watch Connor Smith and his band play for extreme minutes. Extreme Speaker 2 00:34:33 Huge. That in my mind, I think it extreme gives everyone a place. Well but, but Speaker 1 00:34:37 People are fine. It could just be a, a random person that's following your page and they find Connor that way and it's, it's cool to be that part of the community. Yeah. Like be in it in that avenue to where you're Yeah. You're getting to show new people. So, so Connor Smith, who else are some other ones? Like I saw you guys did the interview with Hardy, which was cool as fuck. Oh Speaker 2 00:34:54 Yeah, that and that was awesome for me just cuz like, I think before I even got involved with this, I think I'm just a fan of, of all sides in country, even if it is kind of mainstream. And I know we all love to hit on bro country, but when I worked in radio, like we did like a worked the Floor Georgia Line show and I mean, regardless what you think about them, like they put on like a rock show. They do like, they have like old young, like middle-aged people like dancing and rocking out in the crowd. Speaker 1 00:35:19 Yeah. I I've seen them like eight times in my life. Maybe it's cuz I grew up in New York and was involved in that jersey, New York tri-state country scene and that stuff is huge up there. They love in that there's certain hacks that just sell really fucking well up there that don't carry as much weight around the country anymore. Yeah. But if you don't have bro country, like again talking about some, some hot takes here. Yeah. Like if you don't have bro country, you don't have what Wallen and Hardy are doing right now. You don't, you don't get that walling and Hardy to me are the extension of what Fgl l and those guys were doing Speaker 2 00:35:46 Wrote it. I mean that's what kind of got me into Hardy was he wrote like all the song the half, four Georgia Lines, like not like second to last album they put out. Yeah. I was like, who is this guy? Like I like the songs. And then I was like, I found out who the writer was, then I saw he was doing his own thing and then I also saw that he wrote half a Morgan Wall's album. Yep. And like I worked a show with Morgan Wallen and I was like, this guy Hardy, like I I like every song that his name's on across different artists. And then boom, we dug in a little deeper there and then you just saw it. Like, to your point, the style of music that him and Wall Make it is obviously has Pop sensibility, but dude like the, it's Joey Moy producing, right? Yeah. So it might as well just be like a pop rock song. And that to me, like, like I'm wearing freaking moly crew. Like I love eighties rock. Yeah. I love nineties, mid two thousands. And then I also love country and like for me, the best of both worlds is some sort of fusion of, of rock music and country music that to me is my favorite style of music. And like these guys have now taken that blueprint and run with it. Yeah. And Speaker 1 00:36:45 It's so like, incredible success. It's, and and it's continuing to come on from other artists because like if you've, if you've been to an Aldeen show, Aldeen show lots of pyro, lots of rock to go to a, a Brantley Gilbert show, lots of pyro, lots Rock mean hell, you even go to a fucking Tim McGraw show, there's, it's more rocking than it was 20 years ago. Yeah. When he was in, when he was in in his prime. But it's like, it's cool to to see because I, I was one of those guys that Yeah. Hated on bro country. Yeah. Especially being up in New York and New Jersey where that's all we fucking really had <laugh>. Like it was very much like one of the, like the first big album that like I saw, um, or what was it was the, it was, um, anything Goes was a big one. You Speaker 2 00:37:24 Can hear you Here's a good time Cruise on that anything goes. Yeah. Speaker 1 00:37:27 Because those albums are like, when I started doing college radio, like those were the, the big ones. And I remember seeing Fgl sell out Madison Square Garden on a Tuesday night. No, Tuesday night they sold that fucking Madison Square Garden and a country act selling out a 25, 30,000. Never. Speaker 2 00:37:41 It doesn't happen like that, man. Speaker 1 00:37:43 Yeah. And, and since then they kind of kicked the door down on that because Wall did it back to back nights. Yeah. Combs. Speaker 2 00:37:48 And they made it wide open yet Combs did Speaker 1 00:37:49 It back Speaker 2 00:37:50 Combs back nights. Luke came in. So I mean, that's to me the beautiful thing. And then like obviously being able to speak to Hardy, it's like you can talk to him about hey, like about this style that you're able to run with and like you can just hear him be passionate about like, yuck. Kind of like you, I grew up really not listening to like a ton of country really. I just, I'm like a rock and roll guy, but my life I grew up in like Mississippi, you know what I mean? Yeah. And he could be like, I can, there's something innate in him where he can write about the themes and then say, let me dress in my production in the music I love. Yeah. But now in 2022, there's a place for that more so in my opinion than ever before. Yeah. There'll always be people that say, that's not my stop country. But that has brought in so many more fans. And you're seeing him with a jelly roll today too? Speaker 1 00:38:30 Oh dude. Yeah. We just, we just did a show with him on Saturday. It's incredible, man. It is a experience like town. It's, it's really cool to see. Is there a style of country that you're not super big on? Like is there, do you, is there a preference that you don't really like? What do you not like? Like I'm not a pop, I'm not a huge poppy guy. Like I respect what Mitchell Tenpenny and those guys do, but like, it's just not my Yeah. Chris Lane, that's not my cup of tea. Speaker 3 00:38:50 If, if I'm being honest, I, I pretty much just only like, like Appalachian. Um, I mean, I'll listen to contemporary, but like, I just don't really listen to contemporary too much. Yeah. And that encompasses like, like they'll mention a song on an album that I like listened to once or twice. I'm like, I did not saved that. I did not saved that Speaker 1 00:39:09 Song. It ain't, it ain't for me. Yeah. Speaker 3 00:39:10 But the thing is like, if I don't like it, I'm like a trash it. Speaker 1 00:39:14 Yeah. There's no reason to to trash it. But I, yeah, I was just curious. Speaker 2 00:39:17 No, no, there's like a lane. I mean, I think the, what obviously we have our superstar Walker Hayes, right? I mean, he's the guy that's been around forever and ever. But like, it's just even like for me, like, it's not even about not being country. Where's the guitars? Like I, so like for me, like that's usually something I need actual instruments somewhere. Yeah. Speaker 1 00:39:35 I can't do just the production. Speaker 2 00:39:36 I can't just have like, you know, tracks the whole time. So I see why he's been successful, but to me, I'm like, obviously I, I want to hear more instrumentation. I'm a God's always going to, you know, appreciate some traditional, you know, instrumentation in my music too. And that's the cool thing now is that you can have a Walker Hayes and be like, that's not for me. Or even like Dan and Che, who I love those Speaker 1 00:39:56 Dudes. Not, not my, not my cup of tea at all, you Speaker 2 00:39:59 Know, but the vibe, I'm like, hey, it's, it's for some audience somewhere that's into it. But damn, at the same time I get my harder edge style country. I get my very traditional throwback style. Then I get like freaking Texas country too. So like, I'm the happiest camper ever. Like I just say I'm 31, like when I grew up, I would have to wait four years for artists to drop like maybe 10 songs and maybe there'd be like filler on that 10 song album. Then they'd run away and record and I'd never hear from 'em. Anytime now I have as much music as possible. I can curate my playlists exactly how I want to. Like, I have very little complaints, you know, in this day and age I'm like the happiest fan and I try to tell even the younger fans, I'm like, y'all should be happier than ever. You should've know how it was back then. It was rough. Speaker 1 00:40:41 You remember going to Walmart and Target and buying the fucking cd? Jeez. That's what I used to do, man. I re You remember that shit? Yeah. Speaker 2 00:40:47 My parents man, they, they didn't know anything about explicit content. So I got to enjoy all of my Blink album lunch growing Speaker 3 00:40:53 Up, Speaker 2 00:40:53 Man, I got to have a blast. Speaker 3 00:40:54 I had to buy the clean version every time. And then when I finally turned 13, because this was iTunes, my parents were like, oh yeah, you can start buying the explicit. I'm like, why am I wasting another dollar for the exact same song? So it's like, I have, I miss you clean from Blink Point to Clean and then explicit and now that's all in my library. It became such a mess. But Speaker 1 00:41:12 That's hilarious too of each song. That's hilarious. Speaker 2 00:41:14 The world has changed so much and, but like I really do think this is the best time not only to be a creator of music, but to be a fan as well. Yeah. Like it's, it's, you own your listening world. Like radio is still important and I worked in radio, but it doesn't dictate Speaker 1 00:41:27 Same, same bro, same. Doesn't dictate Speaker 2 00:41:28 What you listen to. Right? Yeah. So in my opinion, like you should be a happy camper. Speaker 1 00:41:32 They're, they're looking at the streaming numbers just as much as, just as much as you guys are a lot more for Speaker 2 00:41:37 Them, you know, than they used to have to deal with. Speaker 1 00:41:39 Yeah. Who are some, um, artists you think people are sleeping on? Who are some people that, that you've, that you've, you're like, this one's, this one you think is going pop. Like who are some people that our audience should be checking out? Speaker 3 00:41:49 Okay. If, if you looked in my hot take, the things are in the Speaker 1 00:41:53 Hot take. Yeah, I was, I'm scrolling through some of those to bring some of those up. Speaker 3 00:41:56 I'm gonna tell you right now, like 60 to 70% will just be Morgan Wallen is underrated. There was one that last night, just a real quick aside, there was one last night that was like, Morgan Wallen needs to drop another album or he's gonna be irrelevant. And I'm just thinking like, what planet did you just fly in from? Speaker 1 00:42:12 How the, how the hell? Speaker 3 00:42:13 It's like, I'm like irrelevant. Like he's in the middle of like one of the largest bad tours. Speaker 1 00:42:18 Yeah. Oh, if you can't get a Morgan Walling ticket because there's no more available, because they all sold out in the first fucking hour. Speaker 2 00:42:25 I got, I got one for you. I mean, obviously man, I love old sells the country. I mean, I grew up listening to like Tim McGraw, Kenny Chesney, Speaker 1 00:42:32 Faith Hill. Tim was my first concert in like the third grade Speaker 2 00:42:35 For me. Like the best combo, just like the male female, like, you know, melodies, you know, and even when they wouldn't like have like a featuring someone on like, you could hear there's like some female background vocal in the, in the background. Like it always sounded amazing to me. So there's so many awesome female artists doing today. I mean, you interviewed Meg, Megan Moroney the, the other week. Speaker 1 00:42:54 Yeah. She's, she's become a good, good artist. Speaker 2 00:42:56 Her, her, her current song is awesome. And her, I think her co-writer Mackenzie Carpenter, she's announced. Who did she, did she sign with someone today? Yeah. Speaker 3 00:43:03 Oh, we were just talking about how she signed song. Yeah. She Speaker 2 00:43:04 Signed, or is Speaker 3 00:43:06 It Warner? I don't wanna get it wrong. Yeah. Song coming Speaker 2 00:43:09 Out. She, she wrote that, uh, and Speaker 1 00:43:11 Then you, and then you know who her brother is, right? Speaker 2 00:43:13 Yeah. He, he wor he's like a Connor Smith's guitar. Speaker 1 00:43:15 Yeah. He plays in Connor, Connor Smith's band. And they're both signed at, um, what is it, major Bob or something. I forget what the Publishing house is, but she did just Speaker 2 00:43:22 Sign some, Speaker 1 00:43:23 But they, the two of the, two of them of, of like Thv just an incredible brother, sister writer duo. Yeah. And it's like she's doing her artist thing and then she would go out, I think she opened some shows for Connor and Micah would pull double duty and play with her and play with him. Speaker 2 00:43:36 Yeah. I saw him a whiskey jam. That was the first time I, I got exposed to like all their like, you know, her Mackenzie music and I was like, obviously great voice, but like seeing that she also is like a really great songwriter. Yeah. That to me is what is very cool nowadays is that I know there's always been a case where you can come to Nashville to be a songwriter and maybe a lot of these people never get anything else because they maybe were able to make a living. But I know it's kind of tougher these days for songwriters that get their fair due. So it's cool to see a lot of these really talented songwriters have an artist's career as well. But it actually translate a lot of songwriters are now very popular artists in my mind, thank you to streaming. Yeah. Like now they can put their music out there and people say you should sing this song. Not just, you shouldn't be sending your best song to someone else. Yeah. So like, she's killing it. Like that's how hard he was. Like he's the guy that now can just be his own entity. Yeah. And it works really well. But, um, Meg Marone's killing it. Um, who else? There's, there's a lot of Connor Smith obviously is the dude. We're really excited for him to be touring with McCullum and um, Tiar this summer. So like, I think I'd really like his style of definitely. It's, it's popular. I'm Ting country. Speaker 1 00:44:40 He's also I'm sure. Yeah. And again, a little, I'm dumbing joy in being able to make some takes right now. Yeah. He boys here, I think in the, I mean in the summer all country music tends to stream better. Yeah. But his songs like, like learn from It and College Town and um, all that stuff like that, all those songs are gonna stream. Like he's gonna see an uptick. Like it's perfectly timed that he's on a big summer tour like that. Yep. Because all those songs are songs. You, everything falling Speaker 3 00:45:04 In place. It's, it's gonna be in Sound. Speaker 2 00:45:06 I wrote about it too though, because like, I think his producers Sam Hunt's producer, Zach Crowell, but like that was what differentiated to me. Like it was very catchy, like, you know, melodic melodic course, but there it is. But I'm pretty sure with Connor Smith though, his production is much more real, like driving guitar sounds like real drums, stuff like that. So like, I appreciated that they saw this kid like, hey, he's playing the college towns and they do for whatever reason nowadays people love the rocking environment at a live show and that's kind of the energy that he brings. Yeah. Like him. So his whole crew, man, they're gonna, in my opinion, they're gonna do really special things in this town. Speaker 1 00:45:39 And they're so young. They're great riders. Speaker 2 00:45:41 They're Speaker 1 00:45:41 So Marlow. Yep. Dylan, he's Dylan. Speaker 2 00:45:43 He's the dude too. I'm really excited about his new music as well. He's a guy that same kind of thing. He can just play a live show. He can open and be the opener and people be like, oh, I left that show becoming a huge fan of Speaker 1 00:45:55 Him. And he's, and he's writing some fucking hits and he's been writing it Speaker 2 00:45:58 Single right Speaker 1 00:45:58 Now. I mean that first, um, you guys are familiar with Noah Hicks too? Yeah. Love Noah. So Noah Song raised on the radio, that first one. They've um, they were used to write over Zoom together. Noah was up in Carrollton and Dylan was down in Statesboro. And it's like cool to see that whole crew come up and like, we're seated two with the Alabama folks, you know, like, like Trey seeing Ella, Ella Langley right now. Yeah. Speaker 2 00:46:18 She's killing it. She's doing the same kinda like rock style too and like, but she's doing like as like a female artist and like people love that Speaker 1 00:46:24 Stuff and the, and the tour slots that she's been on. Like you think about like Randy Houser Yep. Co Wetzel. Yep. Which it takes a lot to be a female to open for co wetzel and to have that respect from her fan Speaker 2 00:46:35 Base. Like any of the crowd in your hand, like Sheda could just like kind of run, run her own show and people leave saying like, damn, let me go on Spotify. Let me find out what's, have Speaker 1 00:46:42 You been to a co show Speaker 2 00:46:44 He's playing? I haven't. Oh actually I did. I went in Austin, Texas. Okay. And his deal, man, like his fans, that's a whole nother laugh Speaker 1 00:46:51 Too. Yeah. They, they are wild. Cuz I remember back, back when I was out with Musk Andon, we did quite a few shows with, um, with CO and I remember hearing it didn't happen to them, but if you're opening for co wetzel and the, and the fan, maybe this was like back in the con co in the convicts days. Yeah. But the, the fan base would chant co fucking wetzel. Yeah. While the opener was playing until the opener finished. If they didn't like the opener, they'd basically co fucking wetzel off the stage. She, so Ella hasn't said that that's happened to her. So for me that's like, that means she's, she's doing well, you know. Exactly. Which, granted, I mean the, the co wetzel crowd around the country might be different than the co wetzel crowd in Stephenville, Texas. You know, the east, that East Texas crowd, they're die. Speaker 2 00:47:28 They will ride or die for him. And um, yeah, like you just would have no idea. I think the big thing was he actually has like his shirts Right? Like fuck Kozel on 'em. Yeah. And uh, like when I saw Hardy and Austin recently, like that was the sh he was like wearing that shirt and like his tour folks were wearing it and like people Instagram were like, do y'all have beef? Like what's the dude like co wezel designed that's shirt like, that's like his personality. So it's cool like co wetzels fan base man, they're like, they ride or die for him. They're very passionate but also like he's built this own lane for himself where yes he's signed a major label. But I think, like you mentioned before, some other artists like Cody Johnson, he owns his creative process and direction. Like he doesn't have to go to radio and still can have like I think his son drunk driving like went gold right. Speaker 3 00:48:10 Drunk driving went gold. April showers topped pretty much it topped Apple top songs. That's Speaker 2 00:48:15 No radio. And like that to me is the coolest thing ever. So that means that he can still be like a rock focused guy and people are gonna sell amphitheater that can never happen 20, 30 years ago. So I think it's just such a cool thing for artists nowadays, man. You can be who you want to be and some pocket of fans across the country are gonna be in love with it. So you can be confident in like what you're making. Speaker 1 00:48:37 Yeah. Are you guys planning to go to a lot of shows this year? Or have you guys, I know you were, you've been out to quite a few already, but have you been to like a major like festival or gotten to see some of the, some of the guys and girls that you guys have talked about on the, on the page Speaker 3 00:48:49 I saw I was at some weird radio thing cause no one comes down to Miami. Speaker 1 00:48:52 Yeah. You're in a very, very tough market. Yeah. No, Speaker 3 00:48:55 Not bar. I'm in the area where it's like if they've come, if they're coming down it's for a radio show and it's because they're, they have to hit their quota for radio to keep supporting them. Yeah. <laugh>. Um, so I was at that um, show. That's where I met up with Connor. But like they, they straight up put his um, they put his like set in like the parking lot and I came in the other e entrance. So by the time I got around to there, it was an acoustic set too. Like I didn't get to see him and I was like, ah man, I came all the way for you. But, um, I, I saw, I think who was there, Jameson Rogers was one of them. Allen, Jimmy Allen and Jake Owen was the headliner. That was great. Jimmy Allen was way better than I expected live cuz he's just a performer. Yeah. Um, and then I actually, there was another weird uh, radio event, um, where Zach Brian came out and I was like, Zach Speaker 1 00:49:38 Brian at a radio event. Speaker 3 00:49:39 It was like a radio sponsored by also by Whiskey X. Okay. Um, so it was some like whiskey brand thing and it was down in like the design district in Miami. And what Speaker 1 00:49:50 An interesting spot for it was like for Z Brian. Speaker 3 00:49:52 Here's the worst part cuz it's just like, you know, he's got like, he's not like a small name by any means. Speaker 1 00:49:58 No, not at all. Speaker 3 00:49:59 So when we were there, um, I went with my friend and she didn't even know who he was and I'm like, I'll just buy your ticket. And they just hand you a glass and you walk around. You could get free whiskey everywhere. And after about two glasses I'm like, all right, I'm sick of whiskey and all these random flavors. So I'm just standing there waiting for the show to start and they're playing his music around, they're playing a lot of cool songs and uh, heading south came on out the ch the crowd started chanting it cuz most people that came out there weren't coming for like the Rand Whiskey stuff. They're coming to see Zach Ryan on that small stage. Yeah. And all of a sudden the radio guy came out and he's like, he's like, wow, I'm surprised you guys were like singing that song. Speaker 3 00:50:31 This guy isn't really well known and, but like in like dead serious, like that's how he opened. And I'm like, why would you say that about your one act that you have come out? But he came out and he killed it. Um, I mean just to hear revival, the seven minute version of it in which everyone gets a solo. Oh my God. That was insane. Like my friend who didn't care about him just left and I was just staying there in the crowd alone. So that was probably my favorite one. And then of course when, uh, thank you Big loud, uh, Speaker 2 00:50:57 And Morgan Speaker 3 00:50:57 Wall Show and Morgan San to Morning Wall show in San Antonio. That was actually one of the, that was like, I Speaker 2 00:51:01 Felt like you were at freaking like kiss back in the day or something, bro. It Speaker 3 00:51:05 Was insane production. Speaker 1 00:51:07 Yeah, I saw, I saw him here in um, here in Nashville on, at Bridgestone on St. Patty's Day. And then his first show back last year was, uh, the Auburn Rodeo. And um, Trey got to open for, uh, we were, we were, first of four was us, uh, John Langston, uh, park McCollum and Wallen and it was Wall's first one back and it was show. Yeah. It's, it was a show. Crazy. It's absurd. And being on the touring side, like seeing what goes into all that stuff, I'm like, these motherfuckers bald. I Speaker 2 00:51:36 Wanted him to, I wanted to see that concert because it's like, Speaker 3 00:51:39 I love the logistics of it all. Like to the fact that they're like the, the entire like production crew is like a city ahead. Yeah. Because they have to set up like all that. So they got all these trucks moving in. Yeah. It's just like by the time they get to the arena, it's, it could be 2:00 AM they're setting up, they're setting up cuz of how massive that show is and everything that goes into it. So I think that's the cool, I love the logistics and media side of it in Speaker 2 00:51:59 Regards of what you think about him as far as like what you like the music or not. This is like a moment in time that it doesn't happen to lot of artists across genres. So it's a really cool moment to see kind of even like with Trey Lu is like with his acute single, like you gotta just enjoy this while while you can. Cause it's unreal. Like I've never seen anything like what Wal i's doing today. Like I was like Trey Lu song to me too. Like just seeing that journey that can take you and it the doors are gonna open up for you for the whole genre for a style of the genre. Yeah. Speaker 1 00:52:28 It's cool. Now I've got a hot take thought because it's something again that I've noticed and I want to get your thoughts on it. Sure. Um, who do you think as far right now? Because it's like before Covid Combs was the guy Yeah. Covid happens. Wallen has his shit. He comes out is now the guy Combs getting ready to put out new music. They're both kind of on that trajectory of doing stadiums arenas. Like they, they have that they're getting fuck you money to play festivals. Yes. Like the big, the big thing right now. Do you feel like there's kind of this arms race there? Do you feel, because they're different styles, they're both very authentic. Yeah. One crosses over more than the other. I mean Luke did that stuff with Leon Bridges and Yeah. He's done kind of that shit long, Speaker 2 00:53:06 Like put out like a pop song Yeah. The other week, you know what I mean? So I do think I, I think come's already on the peak as far as like he's the radio darling link. I mean Walden's may have number ones too, but Luke comes, they're not gonna Nike him a number one. Speaker 1 00:53:18 He has, he hasn't put out a song that hasn't gone, they Speaker 2 00:53:21 Won't allow it at this point though. He's now like their Tim McGraw. Yeah. You but he's for Radio Wall's, a weird mix of both. So he's gonna have number one radio hits and then just hits the, the fan's force to become a hit just streaming wise. So I, I, I won't say who's bigger, I can't, I don't know if I can argue that, but Wallen, I kind of like this, the, this the place he's sitting at right now cuz he has fuck you money from his radio hits and then just the success he has Fuck you money for. And it doesn't matter if I'm on radio anymore. Speaker 1 00:53:48 I mean, I think the, the amount that he's getting per show, which we could talk about off mic <laugh> is just absurd. He's getting more than, more than, more than Luke Bryan was getting in his prime more than um, Aldeen and even like George Strait and those guys. Like, and he still Speaker 2 00:54:01 Won't buy a Tesla dude. He'll just buy like a regular pickup truck Speaker 1 00:54:04 Probably. Yeah. He'll buy a night find that Silverado for sale and, and Speaker 3 00:54:08 I also just like how his media team is, um, helpful. Very small. Yeah. Not only that, it's just like the photography. David's fantastic, but even so, like everything that they're doing, it's just like, it's so interesting to watch when he posts something on Instagram. Cuz that's where I watch all like my like digital media success. Yeah. It is insane. I'll check, I'll, I'll have a notification on, it's like Morgan Wall just posted, I'll see it 33 seconds after he posts it. 26,000 likes. I'm like, I would love to get 12, 6,000 likes. And Speaker 1 00:54:37 The, the engagement of how big he is, Speaker 3 00:54:39 He's doing like, Speaker 2 00:54:39 It's, he's like kind of like it's, it's, I don't know if it's can, maybe they do like a hiphop. Like they just cut up like just a really nice high quality like Yeah. Like a peak into this is what a show could be like Speaker 3 00:54:49 Come out it almost a bit enigmatic in the sense where it's like you won't hear from him for like months and when he does do something, it doesn't feel like gun to the head. Um, read the script about promoting your next single, it's kind of like, Hey, by the way bro, you need to talk about your song you're putting up. So he'll get on his own story and it just seems authentic but, and you almost feel like he's living just in the woods. And then his media team is like, I Speaker 1 00:55:12 Think, I think he is, yeah. <laugh>, he's living Speaker 3 00:55:13 In the woods and then his media team puts out some of the highest quality photos, um, and video camera and then you won't see anything for like a week or two and then it's like another round of high quality photos. Speaker 1 00:55:23 Yeah. And then it's like the recap of the shows Speaker 3 00:55:24 And that just builds up, um, for the, that's why I really like about, it's just, it seems like mysterious at the same time he also seems down to earth and I think that's what fans come, so they'll like, they'll obsess over that type of stuff. So I think in terms of like, I think Luke Holmes's just cemented, but I think Wallen is just like his ceiling. It hasn't, there's no set ceiling yet. Like it's still growing as his beyond everything as his fame grows. So that's what I really like seeing about all that. And Speaker 2 00:55:49 I think I, I keep bringing up Trey, like y'all do a good job of that too, where you put out like video content that will give fans even more than just the music to latch on. Like, damn, this guy's a hilarious dude. Yeah. So they love the humor part of it. But then like just the aesthetic when y'all release like a video that's like recap and tour as well. Yeah. It engages people and it comes off as like this is who they really are behind the scenes. Yeah. It, I should probably get a ticket and see Speaker 1 00:56:11 Har Hardy's team. Tanner does, I think they crush Tanner the most. Speaker 2 00:56:14 Tanner's the Goat bro. Speaker 1 00:56:15 Tanner is my, my favorite. And I, I love, I love, I love um, Trey Bonner who comes out with TL and with our crew. But like seeing what, seeing what Tanner does and the, the mixing in of the, of the black and white and the, the drone flyover and just Yep. It's, it's Speaker 3 00:56:28 Clean. That's the one time I geeked out when we met because I don't really get star. You Speaker 2 00:56:32 Think about the hardest he got started by Speaker 3 00:56:33 Tanner, like no when we were on the Tanner. What's up? No Tanner. Literally when we got on the tour bus, I think like Hardy's like speaking all of us and everything, I'm just like, oh yo, what's up? I gotta set out this camera and everything. But then when I saw Tanner I'm like, oh my God, I'm such a big fan of your work cuz I am, I love the media side of it. So that was the one time I think I've actually like geeked out. I'm like, all right Josh, you gotta calm down a little bit. Like these are all regular peoples' Nice level stuff is crazy. Like I wait for his next video is cuz of how well composed. But that's Speaker 2 00:56:58 Another way promotion, which is such a cool thing using social media is that that's a way to get you hyped on like instead of being on TikTok, which I don't think Hardy does shit on TikTok, but like they can put a clip of like a new single or like a piece of it and like it can be kind of blended in, mixed in. Well with like a tour video and people say sold Speaker 3 00:57:15 Out. Yeah. The Out is that a Speaker 2 00:57:16 New song is like, is that coming out soon? Like fans will get excited and keep rewatching like a Tanner Cut video and it's, it's just like you have to be smart and pivoting in today's day and age to, you know, be ahead of the curve in my opinion. So that's something that like their whole team, their label does incredibly well. They're like very future focused and they're looking forward to say how can we be creative and promote our artists, all our artists, the the ones that are coming up like the Sean Stemly of the world too, you know, they've done a good job. Ash Craft Love Ashland Speaker 3 00:57:43 Craft. She's gonna mention that when you were saying undergrad, she's an up and coming coming artist. Speaker 1 00:57:47 Very underrated in my book. Speaker 3 00:57:49 I actually like, it's hard for me to actually come back to listen to an album again cuz I have my favorite size stick too. But like, um, yeah, traveling Kind. I think that's the name. Yeah, Speaker 2 00:57:58 That's the name of the album Leading You Again. Love that one. Speaker 3 00:58:00 No, the entire album. I'll just come back and find a new favorite song. Speaker 1 00:58:02 Can't Make It Past Georgia. Make Speaker 3 00:58:04 It past Georgia. I had on Repeat. Yeah. And that was right after like around the, I have that song cuz it was around the time, uh, I think Gunner released, uh, pushing Pete. Well that whole album. Yeah. So I have the song Pussy Power and then right after that is Make it Past Georgia <laugh> and I listen to my, I listen to it and like I have it in chronological order. So it's just like she wanted to go. So you'll have that and it's just make it past Georgia when the uh, the guitar riff comes Speaker 2 00:58:26 Down. I think Jonathan Singleton produced that for me. Speaker 1 00:58:29 Yeah. So John, yeah. So she's got one of those interesting deals where she's, Speaker 2 00:58:32 Well she, it's not good Joey Moy production, but it freaking works. Yeah, Speaker 1 00:58:35 Well it's, it's Jonathan Singleton, which is another, another another staple. He don't got that nickelback cred, but he, he's he, he, he ain't no slap. Speaker 2 00:58:42 Her album sounded perfect the way it was and I mean she, she's definitely something in my mind that's up and come. It's like I'm just really excited for the, a lot of the younger artists, they can do it all. They can write, they can produce even nowadays and then they can sing on top of it. It just hasn't always been this way in Nashville. It'd be like very talented singer that like will find the best song for 'em. But now we got people that can do everything. Yeah, absolutely. And it's, I think it's really exciting for the whole genre. Speaker 1 00:59:06 Yeah. So speaking about exciting in the future, so you guys obviously the last two, the last like what until you start year Speaker 3 00:59:12 And a half year you're in a half 2020. Yeah. Speaker 1 00:59:14 It's just been this explosion and it just seems to keep growing and growing. What are some, what are the goals for here in the year 2022 as we go into summer? Speaker 3 00:59:23 I think it's just continuing to expand. Um, we're definitely getting boots on the ground a lot more to actually meet with people so we're not just some like shadowy figure that covers and knows every single Speaker 2 00:59:32 Person. We're not, we're not CMT just yet. <laugh>. Yeah. Speaker 3 00:59:35 Um, but yeah, it's just continuing to build this like community driven focus. Um, continuing to adapt to any platform that we set our minds to. Um, YouTube we're gonna start getting into more like actual, not necessarily opinion pieces, but more like video essays, like high produced videos. We're gonna try to get as many interviews and me as many artists as we can give them the opportunity to do that. Hot takes stuff. I think the hot takes are hilarious. Yeah. Um, but yeah, continuing, we got the website coming soon. We got, um, just a lot of events that we're trying to build up more so we're not just known as an Instagram page. We wanna be known as like, when you think Country Central it's because it is the center. It's a, it's a platform. It's a platform platform more so than is just in a presence on social media and just for everyone to know that they, their voices can be heard. Culture. Speaker 2 01:00:22 That's a culture Speaker 3 01:00:23 Thing. Message message me and I'm gonna respond like Country Central, you're gonna have it in your DM saying like, what are you talking about? Like when you say some random hot take or something. So I think that's the plan for the future is just the growth isn't Sting at all. It's just always gonna keep expanding. And I Speaker 2 01:00:35 Mean people have joked like country's genre is like five years behind sometimes. But I feel like right now I said pop culture moment, like to us, like Country Central is a culture, as I mentioned before, there's people in freaking Sweden, Australia that Norway, country music Norway that will reach out and then they, it's a self kind of organic itself building thing where like everybody's opinion's heard songwriters be able, are able to be spotlighted. The songwriters that I love that people just may not know about. I think that they have a place where maybe you don't even have to become an artist. Like you can just have, you can post your own versions of the song, hit songs you've written. There's gonna be some group of fans are like, love that version more than the hit version. Put it out real Speaker 1 01:01:15 Like what Ryan Heard did back in the day Exactly. Speaker 2 01:01:17 With his Ryan Heard and oh he did his version of like Luke Bryan stuff. Yep. So we are a place not just for fans, but it's a community driven deal there, but also with the artists. This is a very, this is a melting pot I've said before, there's a huge very strong like familial, you know, community here in Nashville and like we want to be a part of that where if I see like an up and coming younger artist or songwriter and even songwriters that have been at it forever, I want them to know that they have a place, they have a platform. Absolutely. And they obviously deserve more money, but we're gonna be there to say, y'all should know about your favorite artist songs. This person wrote like 10 of 'em. Yeah. You should know who they are. And then they can, we can continue to become fans. So it's something we're very organic. Um, and yeah, just very community driven. So Country central man. It's gonna be more than just a page. It's gonna be a platform and brand that can kind of continue no matter where you're at. Got yeah. And meeting people where they are. Man. Just would love to do like pre-game events if there's a Trey Lewis show in town. We're let's let's, let's have a bar tab man. Let's have Speaker 3 01:02:13 Got bar tab. Bring collab swag. Outies Speaker 2 01:02:17 Fans have come through. Yeah Speaker 1 01:02:18 Bro. We're coming, we're coming out to Texas. Oh yeah, Rowdy's in spring. I had a really good time there. We'll talk about that off the last time I was out there, but, uh, but yeah, we'll, we'll definitely have to link up. Uh, which of you two's gonna move out here first? Cuz it's gonna happen one day. Speaker 2 01:02:31 Hmm. Speaker 3 01:02:33 Mean we haven't we haven't flipped the coin yet. You should. Speaker 1 01:02:35 He should. It's my in Austin though. You should. Those Speaker 2 01:02:38 Are great things, but I, I but Austin and people joke that are not joke, they say Nashville's already too expensive. Austin is worse and it's weird. So I'm, I'm ready. Oh, Speaker 1 01:02:47 I gotta ask you about the Chicken Man. You ever seen the Chicken Man Naked? Naked Dude that walks around with the chicken on the shoulder and Austin there, Speaker 2 01:02:52 There's some Naked, Speaker 1 01:02:53 The Brewster man there are a lot. They they say chicken. Speaker 2 01:02:55 There's a guy in Austin with the freaking like American flag underwear that's always on sixth Street. Speaker 1 01:03:00 Yeah, it's, they say Keep Austin weird and it's like, I don't know how like I've, it's so weird already. Like I think it can, they can get away from the weird a little bit. But we had a dude with a roo that this naked dude apparently he's the, he's the rooster man and he is like all in shape long beard, like just looks like a crazy homeless dude. Yeah. Rooster on his shoulder came up, peed literally on the side of our bus drag when we played in Austin. Austin. He just peed on, peed on the side of the bus. Speaker 3 01:03:23 Sounds like a perfect brand representative that we, on the Speaker 2 01:03:26 Topic of that question though. I mean they argue that Austin's uh, music city, capital world and I don't believe it. I think it's Nashville. Yeah. So with that, I believe I would move first cuz I just text to me it's not the capital. Speaker 1 01:03:37 Yeah, you're ready. You're ready. Get Speaker 3 01:03:39 He's gonna kick me out. He's be like, Josh, you're not here <laugh>. It's like, what do you mean bro? I have all the passwords. How are you gonna kick me out? <laugh>. Oh, Speaker 1 01:03:45 I'm, I'm the admin. Speaker 3 01:03:45 Josh, we're gonna have to kick you out. I'll get kicked out my own group chat. Like <laugh>. Speaker 1 01:03:49 Hell yeah. We working guys, uh, find you on the personal page and plug any of the, all the country search Speaker 2 01:03:53 Platforms. Sure. I mean obviously we all know Country Central at Instagram. Um, well Speaker 3 01:03:57 You can just go to country central.com where all of our links are Oh, Speaker 1 01:04:00 Say Speaker 3 01:04:00 So, um, we, yeah, we do own the domain. So, um, as the website is still being built, you can go to country central.com, you'll find everything from our new music playlist, YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, Twitter, Facebook. We're everywhere on all that. So, um, yeah, country central.com you just go, there'll be the redirect and then, Speaker 2 01:04:17 And for me it's just at the Benji chord. Um, and you can just find me obviously on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram. But yeah man, just trying to show people that every kind of person can be a country fan. We Yep. Everywhere around the country, everyone loves it and it's having a moment right now. So I'm super excited to, you know, work with him, be able to meet a lot of awesome people here in Nashville and just keep rapping for in my opinion's like the best genre, best space to be Speaker 1 01:04:41 In right now, man. Hell yeah. That's what it's all about. Thanks for having us bro. I appreciate you boys. Coming on y'all be sure to check out Country Central. Thank you to Josh and Ben for hanging out with us. Also be sure to check out the sponsors. We got M r L Music Group, whale Tail Media, Sackman Studios, and of course our boy Mitch Wallace with the Digital Marketing Agency. This has been the In The Round podcast. We'll see y'all next time.