Unknown: Hey, this is episode two of our interview with Trace
Atkins. So, get ready for some fun stories and some craziness.
Yeah, you're not gonna see all of the fun and craziness in just
one part. No, it's in part two, and I believe we've got a part
three we're gonna do. Right,
get out of town, we do.
So, there will be craziness and great stories in every episode
coming up with Trace Atkins on Circling the Drain. Welcome to a
podcast about music and entertainment. Before it all
goes down the disposal, this is Circling the Drain. Would
hypothetically, you got to pick a band to tribute for the rest
of your life. Can't do any of the trade stuff or anything that
you did. You got to pick a band, and this is the rest of your
life to tribute act. Who would be the tribute? Only
one I could do would be Dire Straits. Mark Knopfler never got
out of my range, you know. If you listen to Mark Notley, I
mean, you listen to Dire Straits, he got a pretty low
voice,
and he's almost like he's talking,
yeah, more than singing. Yeah, yeah, I do Dire Straits.
That's a good one to pick. There's not many Dire
Straits tribute bands out there, I do too, man.
They put out some great, and plus a lot of those songs
translate well to country. Yeah, you know, like Waylon did Set Me
Up, and he did a great version of that. I thought,
yeah, yeah, I love that song, man.
See, the thing I dig about you and Waylon is like when I first
saw Wayland Honky Tonk Heroes, the album cover, it didn't look
like cowboys to me, looked like a bunch of bikers in a bar, and
that's what you kind of.. I have
an album cover on my Dangerous Man album, that when I told him
that I was so sick and tired of that at that point of the photo
shoots and the makeup, and the crap, and the wardrobe, and all
of that stuff, and I'm, and I showed him, I said, 'You see
this? I showed him that album,
yeah,
Honky Tonk Heroes,
great, great album.
He was there. Who else was there? Oh, there was somebody
else in the, in
the.. Oh, there's Billy Joe. Billy Joe Shaver was there,
yeah, and
there was like seven or eight guys in a bar, Wayland sitting
in front of them with a cigarette hanging out of his
mouth, and none of them looked like they'd been close to a
shower for days. Oh, you're Richie
Albright. One
of them must have just farted, because they're all laughing,
they're all laughing, except
for Roger Scott.
He farted, and so somebody snapped that shot.
Yeah,
and it to me is one of the most iconic album covers ever.
Oh, it is,
and that's what I wanted to do, and I was like, I just put on a
T-shirt, and I got rug grease on it, and I had on a pair of dirty
jeans and cowboy hat, and I sat down in that shop, and I said,
"Take the picture. That was it. I'm not doing all that crap
today. I don't feel like it. I don't want to do it. It's just
weird. This is going to be the shot, this is going to be the
album cover, and that was
it. When I was, I was at MCA Records for a number of years in
their promotion department. John Schneider was, you know, on the
Lamborghini, and we did a.. I was part of his album cover
shoot for one of his albums. You remember where down on a fad
there's a pool hall down underneath there's a bowling
alley and stuff where the sutler yeah
yes
anyway we shot it down there
oh yeah I remember that place and we were
down there all day long you know just like you say you know I
mean I'm I'm kind of vaguely visible on that album cover, but
yeah, I can relate to kind of some of what you're saying. We
were down there all damn day, for you know, just a couple of,
couple of photos,
way it ought to be, man. You know, make them real, but we got
to get to great song, because this is the first time that I
really got to talk to you was because even though song was
great, I was, I got to explain this, because at the time I had
girls that I was a stepfather to, and one of them loved
country music, and so every time I take her to school she would
commandeer the radio and jump from station to station, and she
loved Honky Tonk Badonkadonk, and it got to the point I liked
it when I first heard it, but after a while with her
constantly zeroing in on the song, I got a little. I'm tired
of it, right. And so I, we're on the Phil Valentine show, and we
start talking about music, and I blurt out, I said, man,
anything, but I just don't want to hear honky tonk but donkey,
not one more time. And then all of a sudden I get a call and ask
who their name was, and this is Trace, he's gonna whip my ass
right here, Trace ad, because he goes, wait a while, he goes, the
only trace in this truck, and then he let me know on the ear,
he goes, you may be tired of it, was gonna put my daughters
through college,
yeah. Well, you know, and I love
the song. In fact, I like it more now that I'm older, because
it's just a cool song. It's a well, fun song. It's
a cleverly written song. If you, if you really look at that song,
I mean, Dallas Davidson and Randy Hauser and Jamie Johnson
wrote that,
right?
And those are three of the finest country writers in this
town. Yeah, you know what I mean. And the demo that I heard
of, it was Jamie singing the demo, so if you can imagine that
cornbread mouth, he was singing that demo, and Scott Hendricks
played it for me in his office, and both he and I just, just
laughed until we almost pissed ourselves, because it was so
funny, Jamie singing that song. Yeah, and I was like, man, but
listen to it, I said it's cleverly written.
Yes, it's
cleverly written, and I don't mind novelty if it's cleverly
written. These are three songwriters you know at the top
of their game, and it's a well-crafted, cleverly written
song. Yes, it's stupid, and it's a novelty thing, but it's still
cleverly written, and so, and I thought it was funny, and so I
never expected it to be a single out. Oh, it was huge. Let's just
cut it and see what happens. It's funny, you know. So, yeah,
there was no more thought that went into it than that, but, but
I appreciated it, for it was clever. But now it's like that
is the number one, the most played country song, most played
country song in strip club history, not everybody can say
that. I
can't say that.
Have you ever had to be had to have been talked into recording
a song? You know, you hear stories about George Jones. He
didn't want to do, he stopped loving her today because he
thought it was too morbid. There's a
couple, there are couple that, yes, that it wasn't. I, that I
was talked into recording, it was that I had to make a deal,
because there were songs every now and then that I wanted to
cut that the label didn't want me to cut, and so in order to
cut the one I wanted to cut, I had to cut the one they wanted
me to cut, so you make those deals every now and then, you
know, but those songs weren't ever singles, but there was one
song that became a single that I only reason I recorded the song
was because I wanted to have a track that I could sing to at my
oldest daughter's wedding reception, because I thought
this will be a funny song, it'll make the mamas cry, and so you
know, I recorded you're going to miss this, to just sing at her,
and then Mike Dungan was at the wedding, and he was like,
"Where'd that song come from? I just, you know, Lee Miller gave
it to me. It's a song he wrote, and I thought it'd be funny to
sing it at the wedding reception, make all the mamas
cry, but it made the dads cry. Yeah, there's
only been like before we moved to Nashville, it was oh four,
and we started getting with the notion of moving to Nashville
started coming around when we were working radio out there,
and what came on the radio was Bad Brad Paisley, what Kay Lo's
song Kelly Lovelace wrote it, where basically he's the
stepfather, yeah, the dads, yeah, they didn't have to be
right. Oh my gosh, my wife and I'm like, I'm not crying, and
you're crying, you know. And then the Neil Thrasher song that
Kenny recorded, who's.. I can't believe I can't remember these
names of these songs. My life, there goes your life,
there goes your life. That's another one that got me,
and that one got me, you're gonna miss this, so yeah. Thank
you for that.
Dungan was like, let's put that out as a single one. I was like,
yeah, it's too sappy. They're never gonna play that on country
radio, they're not gonna play. That was my first multiple week
number one, and so you know I. Yeah, after, and that year I won
single of the year, or something like that. Anyway, so I got up
there to accept the award, and Dungan was sitting right out in
audience, and I just pointed at, I was like, this song proves
that I have no idea what I'm doing, because I didn't think
this song would be a hit, I didn't think it would get played
on the radio, and that guy told me that it would, and he was
right, and so here we are. Thank you very much. That was
one of Ashley Gourley, being another one of the writers on
that, yeah, one of his, what, 84 number ones that he's.. oh my
gosh, have you heard about that? Oh, you know, Ashley's like
Juggernaut,
there are people sitting outside his door, wherever he is right
now, hoping that they'll get clean. Yeah, just, just what's
Ashley writing next? Because we want it, you know? Yeah,
everybody wants an Ashley Dorley cut. I've recorded several
Ashley songs. He's great, man. He wrote that with Lee Miller. I
just saw Lee the other night, and we just got to laugh about
some old times. Are
you still writing anything to see? You have your radar. I
write some stuff,
man. I just wrote, actually, which is going to be my first
single coming out. They may have dropped it Friday, I don't know,
but it's a song that I wanted to write something for the for the
250th you know, so some couple of writers came to me with this
idea, and, and we wrote it, and so it's coming. It's called
American Made, and should be coming out pretty soon.
Well, your song, Arlington,
yeah, another one that made me, yeah, that one an empty chair,
man. Both of those just really,
you know, you know, I still do stuff on WSM FM, you know, from
time to time, and you know, Memorial Day, you know, whenever
I'm on the air, Memorial Day, that one's always a go-to. I
mean,
that's how do you get
through that song, that's a
great.. did it one
time at Arlington Cemetery. It was at the dirt just before
Christmas when they put out all the wreaths on all the.. you
know, that organization that does that.. I can't remember
what the name of it is. Shame on me, but they put Reese on all
the all the monuments there in Arlington, and they asked me to
come up and do that song. That's, that's was the one time
that I got so choked up that I just couldn't hardly get the
words out, you know, and I had to actually just kind of speak
some of it, because I couldn't sing. It was just, I was
overwhelmed by the whole thing, you know, it just was too much.
I would imagine when you're in a situation like that, the
audience has got to have - they're going to have grace for
you, because I mean it's humanity. I did it at the
Ryman the other night, and it choked me up, you know, because
I did two shows at the Ryman on Memorial Day weekend, and so I
did that song. I see, I, and I explained to them that night, on
when I was on stage, I explained to the audience, this is a song
that you very few people have heard me do this song live,
because, and there's a reason for that. I have such respect
for this song, and I have such a reverence for the subject matter
of this song that I don't subject it to audiences that I
don't think will listen
to it,
if they're not going to listen to it with that kind of
reverence, then I won't do it. I don't do it in front of drunks,
I don't do it at festivals, I don't do it anywhere that this
song, because I swear, if I saw somebody down there goofing off
in the middle of that song, I might jump off the stage and
kick their amen, and I don't want to have to do that. I don't
blame you,
so I don't do that song very often. I do it at Memorial, I do
it on Memorial Day, and I do it when veterans organizations ask
me to. Yeah, and that's about the only time I'll ever do.
So, the first time you heard that, the demo, or what have
you, I mean, that had to have just reached out and grabbed
you, huh?
It killed me, man. And the story behind the song, you know, I
don't know how much time y'all would have spent on this. Oh,
definitely, as long as you wanted you. So,
Dave Turnbull and Jeremy Spielman wrote that, and Dave
had written a couple of big hits, and he wanted to go buy
his mama a new car. She came to visit him. She lived in
Arlington, Virginia, and she came to visit Dave. And so he
took her downtown to a car dealership, and they took a test
drive. And on the test drive, the salesman was in the back
seat, and he was like making small talk, how you know the way
they do, and asked her where she was from, and she said, I came
to, I'm from Arlington, and he said, Oh, I have a son in
Arlington, and she was like, what part, and he goes, no, he's
he's in Arlington Cemetery, and then he told them that story,
basically of how he. His grandfather was a marine, and he
was a marine, and then his son was a marine, Lance Corporal
Patrick Nixon, who the song is about, and he got killed in
Afghanistan, and so his father, David Nixon, told Dave and his
mother that story, and Dave couldn't wait to get back to the
car lot, so he could go home and try to write this song from this
story that he had just been told, and he got together with
Jeremy, and they wrote it together, and it was.. it's..
it's just an unbelievable song, and. and after we recorded it, I
was so nervous about it. I didn't want it to seem like I
was going to try to, you know, make money off of this tragedy,
and so we invited the family, David Nixon and his wife, and
his other children and grandparents, and they all came
downtown, and they came to Scott's office, and we played
the song for him, and I said, before I played it, I said, "I'm
not going to put this song out if I don't get your blessing,
because it's about your son. And so, and this song came from the
story you told, and if you don't like it, we're not going to put
it out, and we played it, and everybody sobbed, and we got
their blessing, and that was that.
Well, I remember when you brought it to Phil Valentine's
show, and we played it. You got emotional in the studio that you
were sitting with me, and I was quite concerned about you,
because I think I even asked you, you said this song, just,
yeah, it
does, man, yeah,
and it does to anybody, yeah. Well, I
admit, you know, I've been on the air playing it, and I can
hardly key the mic.
Oh, I know,
you know, because it does, it does get to you, man. And
speaking of the should,
speaking of the Phil Valentine show, on a more lighter side, we
loved having you on anytime you were on, we always look forward
to it, Phil and myself, because we thought the world of you.
Well,
still, I still, the
feelings mutual. I think the world of you, and I loved Phil
Valentine. Oh,
you did,
and you know, we had a great relationship, and he was so
funny, and so quick, and so witty, and anytime that you do
an interview with Phil, it was like sparring, it was, man, it
was like doing the
radio show with him, it was like sparring. Can
I keep up with this guy? You know, that's all I was worried.
There are a few people that do that to me. You had a few
interviewers that are like that, man. And you just cannot cross
swords with this guy and stay with him, you know, because he
was so funny.
We got the biggest kick because you left me a message one time,
and we recorded it. We, we used it on the air because it was
hilarious, because you were, you were, we were trying to get you
on, and you left me a message, you said, Johnny, I want to find
out what time your little radio show airs and what time you want
me on this little radio show that y'all do, and so we played
it, and then after I got, after it got done, I said, Well,
Trace, as soon as you get done with your little, your little
hooting nanny, whatever, song, you know, playing that little
club you're in, about 230 if you can come in. We had more fun
with you, man.
Well, I always enjoyed talking with you guys, and Phil was,
yeah, he was, he was a legend.
Well, and he was a good guy. And I also, I don't mind, I don't
mean to get all heavy here, but I really appreciate when he
passed away, because I was really, I didn't know what I was
going to do. In fact, I felt like I wanted to leave radio,
and really didn't know what to do, and you, you actually called
me and gave me some good advice, and I really will never forget
that.
Well, I know what he meant to you, and I mean, you don't have
that kind of relationship with somebody for that extended
period of time, and it not change your whole life and your
whole world whenever you lose that. Yeah, I knew you were
feeling like that.
Well, I appreciate that, man. It meant a lot to me. And, well,
I've never forgotten it.
Well,
you're a good man.
Those were some good days, man. Yeah,
they were.. I remember one time I went to the rodeo with you,
and you were in the car, and you said, 'Man, I thought you guys
were gonna get fired one time. Yeah, when we were doing that,
still remember that. Yeah, it
was the weather woman. Oh, don't even
say her name. I won't, don't, I won't, but. She said it's gonna
be, it's gonna be juicy out there, hot and juicy, hot and
juicy. Oh my gosh, and then they just started going
over and over, and y'all just
kept.. you wouldn't let it go. No,
we kept.. in fact, I said, I think I said, you know, I.. I
would gladly pay her to just wake me up that way.
Local weather woman, yes. Really,
yes. Somebody that's
been around for a while,
and she said those words, yes. And then they cut it out, and
they just kept looping it for the rest of the show, and it
really went too far. It really went too well. I was the guilty
party.
I thought you guys were gonna get fired.
FCC was gonna come break the door down at some point. Now we
gotta know who it is. You don't want to say it. No,
you don't. No, we're not gonna make it easy on these.
I'm not Lisa.
Y'all stepped over, tiptoed up to the line, and tiptoed over
several times, especially
dancing on the booth, man. That was old. Did you ever hear the
story about, well, it was Pamela first. She, she kind of, she,
she kind of pissed me off one day because we were getting
ready to do dance in the booth, and she calls me with an idea,
right when we're getting ready to do dance in the booth.
Pamela, I'm sorry, I'm telling this story,
an idea for dancing
right when we're starting, so I'm pissed off, and then I'm
having problems with my ear. My earphone jack comes out. Well, I
forgot that I'd hit my mic, and I'm sitting there cussing like
there's no tomorrow. Actually, Phil doing this. It, we had some
times on that show,
you guys,
and he actually cut a great promo for us. I forget what he's
probably got the voice for it. Oh, he did,
I think I ended it with, or I'll kill you. Yeah, listen to the
Phil
Valentine's show
played it all the time. Yes, we did. We
played that a lot, man. Jay, is it
weird to have somebody in here that's got a deeper voice? Oh,
no, no, not at all, not at all. It just makes us feel like
little boys, doesn't it? Don't whip me, Daddy. It was
fun to hang out with at the rodeo. That was my wife's first
rodeo.
It wasn't your first.
No, I've done.. I've.. I grew up in Kansas.
Yeah, I just
set up a new production company, and I called it Fifth Rodeo logo
for it is a cowboy on a bucking horse holding the fifth of
whiskey. Any
plans to do something like a podcast or anything like that?
Yeah, a lot of people ask me about that all the time, but I
just, you know, I don't, I don't, I just, I don't need that
kind of pressure, need to try to find something cool to talk
about every day, because there are days I don't have anything
cool to talk about, obviously I'm heading back to me. me off a
tractor and brought me down here. We talked
about, you know, Lululemons and voiceovers. See, there you go,
good examples, good examples of just the
degradation here.
Well, you know, I love the farm life, but I also love the
ultimate cowboy showdown. That had to be a lot of fun to do.
It was fun. It was fun to do the stuff, it was like sometimes
though I felt bad, I felt bad for those guys and girls,
because man, that was a rough, it was a tough show,
yeah,
and the challenges and the things that they had to do
sometimes were putting those horses in danger,
yeah,
and I won't see them hurt their horses just to be in this
competition little show, and I didn't, I just didn't think that
the prize money was enough for what these people were risking
on that show, and it, it bothered me sometimes to ask
them to. Some of the things that I asked them to do, I thought
some of it went just a little too far, and I started voicing
my disapproval about some of that stuff, but yeah, it was
fun.
Well, it looked like it.
We got to go to some cool places, and I met some really
cool people, and there are still real cowboys out there,
yeah, there are, whether
you believe it or not. I mean, they're still out there.
In fact, you know, that was always my dream to be a cowboy,
but I've never, no way, I would have made it. Asthmatic cowboy,
don't think that's gonna happen, you know.
And some on some of those, you know, those big ranches, I mean,
they're, yeah, they're things today that make it easier and
more efficient, and you know, machines do a lot, but there's
still just some things that you cannot do without a horse and a
cowboy.
That's right,
there's some things in the ranching business that have to
be done off horseback. There's no other way to do it, really.
Yeah, you know, so yeah, there's still some of them out there.
Yeah, being on the ATV ain't gonna cut it for everything.
Plus, I loved your Christmas show that I got to see. Yeah,
man, we love because that year I was not in the Christmas spirit.
I was just kind of wasn't feeling it, wasn't getting into
it. Phil couldn't go, so he gave me his, his, I guess, ticket to
go, and my wife and I went, and my gosh, we enjoyed it. God,
that was a.. I love the way you did it, the whole production of
it, and plus you stepped out of your comfort zone. You were
playing a lot of.
it was more Celtic one man play most not just not just a musical
thing, it was, you know, yeah, it was. I had a lot of dialog
that I had to remember, and all the anecdotes, and you know, the
stories about how these songs came to be, and I thought it was
doing the research to put that together. It was fascinating,
and that's my favorite show that I've ever done. I love doing
that, and for the same reason, because every night we'd finish
that show, and I was in the Christmas spirit, ready. It felt
good to me, and I, you know, I don't know, man. I think it kind
of goes back to my gospel roots and my gospel days, you know? I
mean, I felt good about what I had just done when I got off the
stage after doing that Christmas show.
Yeah,
you know, there's.. I got a little bit of a Johnny Paycheck
thing. I get off the stage and I just, you know, did Badonkadonk,
and it's like, you know, yeah, I'm sorry, Lord, chicks digging,
walking outside, yeah, but it's not the most.. I don't know, I'm
not changing, I'm not changing people's lives with the stupid
stuff I do, but you know it's fun.
Well, you mentioned how you had to remember a lot of dialog and
stuff. I mean, is has that been a struggle for you to remember
lines and things, or does that come easy to you?
It does come pretty easy, man. Yeah, I think maybe you know
being a singer and entertainer for all these years, you know,
it helps in remembering dialog, just like you have to remember
lyrics, I guess maybe that's helped me some over the years,
but it's always come pretty easy to me, remembering my lines.
Yeah, have you had directors that are just insistent that you
remember it word for word? Yes, or can you get those that are
like, hey, just give us the essence of the part? In some
ways, with respect to dialog,
most of the time they want you to stay pretty close. I've been
on some things where I took some liberties, and usually they
didn't mind too much, but I've been on some where you know
you'd do it, you'd do a take, and then script supervisor comes
around with the folder, this is what you're supposed to say, not
what you just said, whatever that was, you're supposed to say
this. It's like, I don't like that. Yeah, but you got to say
it, okay? You know, so whatever,
you're signing the checks, yeah.
Some of them are really adamant about it,
yeah. And that
usually comes from the writers,
yeah.
You know, usually if one of the producers or the director was
also the writer. Then they're really hardcore about it, and
you're not the only actor in the, in your household. You've
got, oh no, my wife got a beautiful..
she's the actor in that
man. She is.. you talk about a cool gal.
Yeah, she's great.
She is really glad you got. Meet
on a movie set,
Virginian, the Virginian, yeah,
doing the Virginian in Vancouver, and yeah, she was on
set for two or three days, maybe. I don't know, that's
where we met, yeah.
I can see why you fell for she is a beautiful gal, and she is
also very down to earth, not what I was expecting,
and very talented too. Oh, yeah, she's a great writer, she's a
great actor, she's, yeah, she's all the stuff,
and plus anybody that names their dog Gary Busey, and he
looks like Gary Busey, that's why he's named Gary Busey, he
looks just like him,
we were, we were doing, I was pulling a float in the Christmas
parade years ago, six or seven years ago now, and she
volunteers at a, at a shelter there locally, close to the
house, and you know, she likes to work with animals and stuff,
so anyway, they had a float in the parade, and they had all
these dogs that they're trying to find homes for, and and she
had this tiny little dog in her hands, and she comes up to the
truck, I'm pulling the float in the parade, and she comes up and
says, "Look at this little dog, and I looked at him, and he's
got this blonde thing that sticks up on the top of his
head, this crazy blonde hair, and at the time he had his, he,
he still had his puppy teeth, but his big teeth were coming in
too, so he had like two sets of teeth in his mouth. She brought
him up to the truck, and his teeth were sticking out, and his
hair was sticking up, and he looked like Gary Busey's mug
shot. And so I said, wow, that dog looks like Gary Busey, and
we took him home that day, and that was his name,
fitting, he's
crazy like Gary, that dog's a trip, but she's great. Yeah,
now you had mentioned that you're writing a song for the
250th anniversary of the country.
I wrote it, we already got it,
already got it, releasing it for that purpose. Any thoughts on
the, like, a lot of hullabaloo and controversies been coming
around the Freedom 250 concert recently, and people speaking
for it, and dropping out, and all that fun stuff, is have you
been asked to be a part of it? Are they, have they finalized
the list?
I don't know. I don't know anything about that stuff, man.
I'm doing.. I've done the PBS Fourth of July celebration on
the in front of the Capitol Building. I've done that show
several times over the years, and they reached out and wanted
me to be a part of this year, and so I signed on to do that,
probably in the winter.
Yeah, right,
you know. So I'm doing that, and I'd already told them that I was
going to do that, and then when somebody reached out to me to do
something, and then when Trump's thing came along, they had to
move the july 4 PBS thing to the third.
Oh, wow,
you know, because they didn't want to be in competition with
that, because that show was supposed to be on television,
right?
And that's that was that was what we were told a couple of
months ago.
Yeah,
so it actually give me in on the third, and I was like, cool, I
don't care, whatever, you know. And now I don't know if that
thing's even still going to happen or not. Well, I think it
is. Last I read that Trump named off the list of people, and it
wasn't long. I mean, it was like Lee Greenwood. I don't see him
on here. I see Flo Rida, Vanilla
Ice,
Vanilla Ice, Young MC, CNC Music Factory, Martina, you know, she
dropped out, yeah,
yeah, Martina, yeah, she dropped out, she's the
only real country artist on there, yeah,
but he basically said, well, you know, I don't need them, you
know, I'm more popular, wonderful, it's gonna be great
because I'll be there, your favorite president does
a great impression to him, is John Rich Desi Rollins. Oh my
gosh, he's freaking, yeah, spot on. I
tell you, the best one I've ever heard, actually, is I forget the
guy's name, it's Sean's, yeah, Sean.
I follow him on social media, he is very.. he's a young guy, too.
Yeah,
and he.. I was listening to Michael Del Giorno show, and it
was the first time I turned it on, and it was a Friday, and all
of a sudden I hear the presidential thing go on, and
all of a sudden thinking, good God, he got Donald Trump on,
because the guy does a spot on, I mean, it sounds just like him,
yeah, sir, sir, that's what I love about Sean. I
don't know who you're talking about. Yeah, I don't know
either. I don't know
the whoever his name is, Sean
Farish.
That's F A R A S
H. Oh my god, he
is really gosh. I think
Trump is really kind of like doubled. Down on that, like that
whole, he kind of embodies that impersonation. Yeah, like
Christopher Walken kind of just doubled down on all the people
impersonating him. Yes, after a while,
and
he has started to, like, you know, really amping it up. I
think Trump's doing the same thing. I think he is. Let me
tell you, you're gonna love it. You're gonna love it. It's
wonderful. It's gonna be the greatest thing you ever seen.
Trump were talking about cereal. I'm bigger than Elvis, I think.
He said that he's
unlike Elvis. In fact, he said I'm more popular than Elvis.
Actually, that takes some, that takes some cojones
trip. I was sitting in the back of his Rolls Royce limo one day,
I was after I'd won The Apprentice, or anyway, and he
wanted me to come back and just be a judge on one of the things,
and sit with him in the room to tell whoever is fired, whatever,
and so we were going to pull up to this venue and then get out
of the car and go inside, and of course the directors and the
producers are up there setting all this stuff up like they
always do, and it takes forever, and so we're just sitting in the
car waiting, just he and I sitting in the back of the limo,
he looks over at me. He goes, "Trace, are you reasonably
faithful to your wife? That's what he asked me. You know, and
I was like, "Dude, you know, I've found they're not ever
reasonable, you know. it's pretty good,
and if you're not, you better be very rich. He's got to be an
interesting character to be, he
is, man. Yeah. Oh my gosh, and, and, and Junior, he's a cool, I
like Junior, and he, we were talking one day, and I was like,
"Man, let me ask you something, what exactly do you do? And he
said, "You'll know the truth. I was like, "Yeah. He goes, "I
follow him around and put fires out, that's what I do, tough
gig,
right?
Didn't you one time when Trump was running for president, you
asked him if he was really serious? Yeah,
I didn't, I didn't think he was really going to do it, yeah. I
really didn't. And you
wanted, you wanted a cabinet post. I do remember that, yeah.
Well, I wanted to be ambassador to Australia,
yeah.
Yeah, I thought that'd be a good gig.
I thought you wanted to be the office of hell no,
yeah. If not that, I'll take Ambassador to Australia. Yeah,
he's always been good to me, man. He's always been good to my
family. He's just always been, yeah, he's always been good to
me. And that, and that's how I judge him, too. You know,
people, you know, they, they have their opinions, and they
treat him the way they want to, and they think he's whatever
they think he is. You know, I, he's always been good to me.
Yeah, you know, he's always been fair to me. He's always been
good to my family. And you know, you say what you want about
Trump, but I'll tell you this: he's, you know, he's not evil,
right? There are people out there that think that, well,
he's not
Hitler, that he's
this sinister bad guy.
Yeah,
he's not. He's a rich old asshole, that's what he is.
Well, and you just.. there's nothing sinister, there's
nothing evil here. There's.. he's not trying to take over the
world, he's just a rich old asshole, and he's used to
getting things done the way he wants them done, and getting his
way, and, and you know, it really makes him mad when he
doesn't.
Yeah,
yeah.
Well, you know, I mean, property, property development
in New York, you know, you got to be ruthless, and in many
ways, you know, yeah, and as you say, man, it's like, you know,
he's used to getting stuff done and not all the BS that,
yeah,
that Washington brings with it. Oh
God, I can't imagine any.. see, that's what you got to give the
guy credit, because anybody that would want to put up with that
BS in Washington, DC, all the crap that goes on there. Good
Lord, not me. No way, man. I
mean,
and he doesn't have to. That's the whole thing. He doesn't have
to. People forget that. Yeah,
no, he doesn't have to. But shoot, man, I mean, he is an
arrogant dude, man. Oh, yeah, he is every.
Somebody, yeah,
you know, and you know,
I got to meet him, and I was part of a press junket in South
Carolina, and went up on his plane, and met him, and he
showed us the plane, and all that, and the guy couldn't have
been any more, oh yeah, funny and warm and friendly, you know,
the total antithesis of the image he puts out there, you
know, it smells like
super engaging. Yeah, he is. Yeah, he
is. Yeah, yeah. I got to go up to his.. how to his.. I don't
want to call it, you know, his
pen house.
Yeah, that's unbelievable. But he was very kind to me, and
toured his offices, and all that stuff with him, and walked along
with him, and, and he's very, very proud, rightfully so, of
what, what he's built, and, and he's just, but he's still, he,
you know, he's, he's a jokester, and he's, he's, he's got a great
sense of humor,
yeah, he does, you
know,
yeah, and I think a lot of what he puts out, all that hyperbole,
it's, it's a joke, yeah. And people don't get it, no,
they don't, yeah, don't. And he's always like, yeah, it's
like the Greenland thing, you know? People freaked out, oh my
god, he's going to take over Greenland. No, he's not. He says
he is, so that he can maybe do this,
yeah, this
one little thing that he's trying to get done, like maybe
he wants to put a new base on Greenland, or whatever, and so
he comes out and says, I'm going to take Greenland, that's not
really what he wanted to do, we're going to
make Canada the 51st that's right, same thing, it was a
negotiating
trick. Yeah, he does that stuff all the time. Yeah, he always
has. Shooting for the
moon, landing on the roof, that's it. You ever seen the
Dave Chappelle bit that he does about Trump? And he says, 'Look,
I get it, I understand. He says, 'But one thing you guys aren't
missing is what happened in that debate in 2016 He did something
nobody else did, and that was when she was trying to corner
him on all the loopholes with the taxes and everything. He
completely like tai chi to her and absorbed her blow and put it
right back on her and said, "Yeah, absolutely, I do this,
and so do your friends, and it was like nobody's ever hurt. I'm
like, "You know, he's not wrong. I mean, that was a.. that was
like a, like, ripping the curtain off, man. Well, I think
that's
why, that's why so many people voted for him, right? That, that
this guy wasn't afraid, right, like the other politicians, to
call, yeah, you know, yeah. And he
says, you know, you've been in charge this whole time, and you
did nothing about it. You were using the tax code, according to
what's written there. This is the law. This is, we're going to
use the loopholes as they say we can use them. And guess what,
all your donors do the same thing, and you've been in charge
this whole time, and you didn't do a damn thing about
it.
So,
well, I loved the.. I loved the first debate with the
Republicans when Rand Paul, God bless him, was going to try to,
which I thought this is not going to work, and my wife,
because at the time I really wanted Rand Paul, I liked him.
Yeah,
and my wife asked me before we watched it, Who you for? I said
I'm for Rand Paul. Nobody gets it. And after Rand Paul gets up
there and starts trying to get Trump, and Trump said I donated
1000s of millions of dollars to his campaign, and it just kind
of made Ron Paul just go, and my wife looked at me. She goes,
'You're for him.
He was just knocked out.
I think you're out of luck.
His goose has been cooked. Yeah,
well, Trace, I mean, I know you're, you're part of a label
off a broken bow, now are you? No,
no,
you're okay. What are you self-labeled at the moment?
How's that working? I mean, you know, because things, as we
know, have changed in that, in that world, in the record label
world these days. No,
I was at Capital, and then I was at Capital for 10 or 12 years, I
guess, something like that. And then Toby, I was talking to Toby
one day, and he was like, "Hey, man, Universal just, you know,
offered me however many millions of dollars to do this joint
venture with Show Dog, and yeah,
right,
and you know, they made me an offer I couldn't understand, so
I was like, you need some help spending that money, he was
like, yeah, so I went to Show Dog, and I was there for a few
years. Then I went to Broken Bow, yeah, and I was over there
for a while, and then I was on Verge, and, and you know, on my
30th anniversary, I was like, I would like to go back home and
finish where I started. And so I signed. There is no capital here
in Nashville anymore, but MCA, right, right, yeah. Took it,
yeah. So, so capital is in the whole MCA Virgin thing. So I
signed with them, and I'll put out an album this year, and I
don't know, yeah, maybe the last one I do.
Okay,
and I wanted to, I wanted it to be back where I started.
Right,
as far as new artists go, are there any out there that are
turning you
on? I don't, man, I just don't pay enough attention to it to
give an educated answer to that. You know, I like Ella Langley. I
love her. Oh, I think she's great. I love her voice. It's
got that sultry thing. Yes, it does. Plus,
she's just drop dead gorgeous.
She's got everything, got every every tool is in her toolbox.
Well,
you're not. I love the Shine. Have you seen the Shiner beer ad
she does, where she kicks the bottle and the top pops off,
it's just.. it's just, and she's not even trying to be sexy, but
it's sexy. It's like, man, this girl's got it all,
and she's country. Yes, yep.
There's certainly.. in fact, Dan Mandal and I on this
very, very program made a bet because he said, 'Well, she's
going to go the route of Taylor Swift, I said she will not. I
guarantee you, she'll stay country.
I don't know about all that stuff. I just think she's good,
and I don't.. I just don't keep up with much of it anymore, you
know. I don't even know. I have guys opening for me or closing
for me these days, and I don't even know who they are. Who the
hell Shaboozy? Sorry, it hurts your feelings, but I have no
idea who you are. I
thought you were a new brand of whiskey, that's what I thought
Shaboozy was.
You know, I started country radio 1978 you know, and I'm
more of a traditionalist at heart, I mean, you know, kind of
like you, you know, my dad was the, you know, and he was oil
field, you know, where that's why we moved to New Orleans from
Texas, you know, to Orton oil fields down there, South
Louisiana, but anyway, you know, I grew up on the Conway Twitty
and the Merle Haggard and Buck Owens and all that stuff, I'm
really liking what Zach Topp is doing traditional country
artists, young man, that is hopefully will help swing that
pendulum back a little bit toward the more traditional
stuff. You know,
I don't know, man. Yeah,
it just.. it does seem to, you know, it's always been cyclical,
that's for sure.
It's always been that way,
yeah.
Any particular piece of advice you give to artists that are
coming into, like, you've been there, you know where they are?
What would you, I mean, especially with the changing
landscape as it is with AI and live music, is basically going
to be the main revenue stream of all what they're doing, and
well, and that's the only thing, too, that's left that the fans
actually know it's real, yeah, you know, and I, and even then,
I mean, some people are lip syncing, and they're using
tracks and all that kind of stuff, and it's like I always
open my shows up, and I do three or four songs, and then I do my
greetings and salutations, and I'm like, oh, by the way, this
is us doing human stuff tonight. This is not.. I'm not lips.. if
it sucks, if I suck, it's gonna suck. You're gonna hear it suck,
you're gonna know that it's real, you know? And that I'm
real.. we're here doing some real shit, you know, and you
know that that's the only thing we have left, it's nothing that
you hear anymore. I mean, you don't. It's hard. I got fooled
the other day, somebody pitched me a song, and I thought it was
real.
Wow,
and it was AI, and, and it, and it faked me out, man. And some
of them, it's hard to tell.
Oh, yeah, hard to.. well, there was
one that Jay,
yeah,
got turned on to anything to
me, man. And I
even said, "Man, we need to get this guy on AI. Yeah, it was all
bs. Yeah,
yeah,
breaking
road. And so the landscape and the rules of the game have
changed to the point that I don't even think I can give any
good advice to anybody anymore. I'm such a dinosaur, I don't.. I
don't even.. my advice used to be to the young guys coming up
and girls was just don't spend your own money. Yeah, if anybody
believes, if anybody really believes in you, they're gonna,
they're gonna put the money in, and they're gonna pay to produce
your record, or whatever. You shouldn't have to ever come out
of your pocket and pay for any of that stuff, you know. If they
believe in you, they're gonna pay for it. If they ask you for
$1 you turn, walk away, because it's not, it's not good, you
know. They don't really believe in you. If they did, they'd
spend their own money, so you know that's been my advice over
the years. But I don't even know if that even means anything
anymore. Yeah, you know, I don't know, man.
So, are you ever going to write another book? Because I love..
I'll show
it to the.. I don't know. I
love this book, by the way, I thought was very, very well
written, and
man, I sat down with a couple of guys, they were twins, and it
was really creepy and weird, because these two dudes were
those kind of twins that finished each other's sentences
when they would talk, sit exactly the same way, and I was,
I was on the West Coast, out doing a run out there, and so I
stayed over for a few days. I went out early and spent a few
days in Pasadena, cooped up in a bungalow out in big some big
hotel out there with these two guys. We stayed several days
there, and it was all day things all day for like four days in a
row, and then at the end of my tour I was up in Washington
state somewhere, and they came up there and I spent like
another week with them, and all it was was just us just trying
to figure it, because they were writers and we were trying to
figure out how we were going, because I didn't know where to
start, you know. My manager wanted me to write a book, and I
was like, "Okay, well, I may have a story to tell, but I
don't know how to tell it. So those two guys steered me
through this thing, and this is how you do it, and this is where
you start, and this is, you want this roller coaster ride to do
you know and they walked me through all of it and and helped
me immensely and then they basically presented a book to me
of everything that we had written and talked about for
those two couple of weeks and then I took it and edited it and
did my thing to it and changed some stuff and rewrote some
stuff and and made it made it sound exactly like my voice and
and that's how it ended up so I don't know if I have anything
left really to say anymore I mean I thought some of that
stuff in that book was actually turned out to be pretty
prophetic, yeah. Did looking back on it now, you know,
especially with some of the immigration stuff, and those
things I was on on the right path.
Yeah, you were, and in fact, it, it for me personally, it really
made me feel good, because during, like, I guess during
2009 I didn't feel real good about the country, and this gave
me hope. I thought, well, thank God somebody thinks this way,
you
know, and I was afraid to put the book out. I remember when
the book was about to come out, it was about to be released,
and, and I was worried about it, and I called Charlie, and
Charlie Danielson, because Charlie had, you know, Charlie
had written several books, man, and I called him, and Charlie, I
need to talk to you about something, man, I'm worried
about this book coming out, because I kind of, I laid it out
there, man. I, you know, I bared my, you know, soul in this
thing, and you know, I don't know how I think I'm gonna make
some enemies, and people aren't gonna like me because of this
book. And he was like, "Son, he said, "Let me tell you
something, the people that may read that book and not like you
because of what you wrote in that book. Let me tell you
something, they don't like you now, he said, because there's no
secret of who or what you are.
Yeah,
and all your fans know who you are and what you stand for, and,
and your first of all, people that aren't your fans aren't
going to read your book, so they don't care,
yeah,
and they're not going to read it, so what are you worried
about? And I was like, he's, you're right, I'm so stupid,
what was I worried about this, Charlie? Yeah, he was so great,
man, he
was a great guy, so
wise and caring, and just he was, he was a great, great
American, a great guy, and a great friend, and
great talent,
everything, great writer, he was just, yeah, I loved him, yeah,
singing at his funeral was, you know, a feather in my cap, you
know, glad I was able to do that, but yeah, he settled my
nerves. He's like, don't worry about it, and he was right.
Yeah, he was smart, man.
I didn't sell enough of those books. Fill his hat up. Why was
I wore. Worried about it in the first place.
Well, I got one, so you
did an audio book of that.
No, yeah, I was gonna say
another dude.
Yeah, I don't even know. I guess the publisher, publisher, must
even ask me about it. Yeah, read my book. Yeah, right. No
wonder it didn't sell. Still do it. It would be better
in your voice. Yeah,
well, I mean, because
you got a great voice, man. You've got one of those, you've
got one of those future Sam Elliott voices.
He really does. Yeah, you really do. Both, you guys, man,
it's like it's all the way down the kneecap. Well, now you know
me, you could record
it here if you like. Oh, there you go. Thanks, man. And a
reasonable price. Yeah, wait a minute. Here we got ahead of
ourselves. Maybe I would finally
sell some of them, if I did that, do your own audiobook. I
think it would, yeah.
I think that's a great idea. See, we've given old
news now, though. Yeah,
but you could have 15
years old,
add a couple of updated chapters. Yeah, exactly. You go,
oh,
maybe so. Yeah,
there you go. Yeah,
more thoughts. Yes, addendum thoughts. Yes,
exactly. I hope you're enjoying the Trace Atkins episodes that
we've been giving to you. We've got one more to go. Number three
is on the way, so get your Badonkadonk ready, because Trace
is coming back to Circling the Drain.