Nashville. Scratching the surface.
Emmy award winning songwriter Andrew Rollins and songwriter and broadcaster Alison Craig talk about the songs, the songwriters, the highs, lows, heartbreaks and beyond of Nashville.
Guests give their insight into the process, the town and the highs and lows within.
Andrew has 9 songs on Nashville The Show and a million stories to tell.
Find out where and how some of the best known songs in the world were written.
Meet some of the extraordinary people who are working and living there now.
40 years of songwriting experience and he lays it bare.
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Nashville. Scratching the surface.
Ep. 5 Nashville, Noshville.
Text us here - we would love to hear from you
Pay tribute to Brett James, a remarkable songwriter who tragically passed away last month.
Nashville - a totally unique city - with unique lifestyle and stories.
Writing a 'copyright' a song that keeps you fed and watered for the rest of time.
https://nashville.buzzsprout.com
Hello, Alison. Hello, Andrew, and welcome along to Nashville Scratching the Surface. And we're going to be digging deep again into Nashville the series, Nashville the City, and everything about it. The buckle of the Bible belt.
Speaker 00:I've never heard that before.
Speaker 02:Yeah. When I was there last year, this guy that I met, a young guy, said that was what they called it. There's more churches in Nashville per square foot, no per square meter or whatever, than anywhere else in the world.
Speaker 00:It's crazy. No, I don't think we were actually. On Sunday, they have the police almost at every intersection for when church starts and when church church lets out. Because the traffic is so insane. Really?
unknown:Yeah.
Speaker 00:Yeah, it's crazy.
Speaker 02:so how do you how do you deal with all of that? I mean, that's quite extreme. I don't know anywhere else in the world that has that.
Speaker 00:You stay wherever you're staying to avoid it and everyone goes to Cracker Barrel or the Pancake Pantry or or Nashville or Noshville. Is that the name of a restaurant? I met so many iconic songwriters. Anyway, so I go I would always go into Noshville and say, I'll sit at the bar, because they had you know a bar like an old coffee shop, too. And I walked in and I'm sitting there and I look over and and Lee Von Helm. Now, if you don't know who Lee Von Helm was, he was one of the lead singers and drummers, uh drummer in the band.
Speaker 01:Oh what?
Speaker 00:And and um the the Brown band album cover, it was just called The Band, and it was Brown, the album was brown, and it had it had Up on Cripple Creek, The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down. Great country songs, and and they weren't really a country, they were like more more country rock. Yeah, you know. Um and the band also played with Bob Dylan, they were Bob Dylan's band for a while. Um, but anyway, so I'm sitting there and I look over, and Lee Von Helm is sitting right next to me. And I just like I'm I'm sitting there and I order my food, and I'm I always get two poached eggs, cottage cheese, and toast.
Speaker 02:That's what I had for breakfast this morning.
Speaker 00:Did you really?
Speaker 02:I really did.
Speaker 00:And then I I would um uh anyway, so I'm sitting there and and I look over and I go, okay, I'm gonna introduce myself, right? So I go, you know, I I the Brown album changed my life. And he goes, um, well, thank you, thank you. And he goes, uh, where'd you grow up? And I told him Cleveland. And he goes, Cleveland, yeah. He goes, you know, we had a song on that album called Look Out Cleveland. And I said, Yeah, you did. And uh so I said, you know, I I don't mean to bother you, and and I'll let you get back to your breakfast. And he goes, well, let's talk a spell. And he goes, What did you what did you like about that? And um, what songs? And I said, Well, Rag Mama Rag, um, great song. Uh Up on Cripple Creek, the night they drove old Dixie down, and I named every song on the album. And he goes, Wow, you knew that record, huh? And I go, it's to this day, it's it's one of my favorite records. And he goes, So what are you doing in Nashville? And I go, I'm a songwriter. And uh this is before I'd had any success with Nashville, and uh, but he was such a kind guy, you know, and and uh I think he I I think he was from either Oklahoma or the Ozarks or something. Um but he was just such a nice guy and and and he influenced so many musicians, you know. I'm pretty sure Don Hley was inspired by him because Levon was a guy that played drums and sang, and so was Don Henley, you know. Okay, and they were very similar in their playing style, you know, a really solid groove when he laid down, you know, and then a great melody. Um but yeah, it was it was really a great meeting, and um, you know, not uh last week. I don't know if you saw my post about uh uh Brett James.
Speaker 02:Yeah, tell us about him because he I I read obviously about him, and he he was an extraordinary songwriter.
Speaker 00:I I immediately I I hadn't talked to Brett in a couple years, and the last time uh I talked spent any time with him was I was um uh I was on a bus tour with uh Lee Bryce, and then a friend of mine, Drew Green, who I wrote um uh The Rest of Our Lives.
Speaker 02:Yeah, it's a lovely song.
Speaker 00:Uh anyway, so the my co-writer on that song was a guy named Drew Green, great writer, great artist, and Brett James managed him. And uh Brett James had a publishing company called uh Cornhole, um, or Corn Man, Cornhole.
Speaker 02:That sounds obscene to I don't know what it is moving along.
Speaker 00:Right. When I was on tour with Lee, Drew was on one of the shows, and Brett had traveled with him, and so I went over and hung out with uh with Brett and and uh Drew Green, and we just started talking, and and and uh I'd written with him years before at my house, and we wrote a song um called Let Me Know. Just let me know. That's what this, and it was like, you know, if you love me, you gotta let me know. You know, Brett was the kind of guy that Drew said, Oh, um, you need to hear a song that Andrew wrote uh called You Think You Have Time. And I I I said to Drew, I said, Oh, you know, man, I I don't want to bother, I don't want to put him in demo jail. We have this thing in Nashville where songwriters will go out and they'll they'll like play each other their songs, you know, at a at a bar or a club or something, and and uh we call it demo jail. You know, you can't leave, you gotta you know be respectful. So I called back I said to Drew, I don't want to put him in demo jail. And Brett goes, No, man, let me play, let me hear it, let me hear it. And so I played it for him because man, that is such a great song. I said, Thanks, Brett. And and so we talked for a while, and he was just always the kind of guy, kind of like Randy, where he makes you feel like you're the most important person and gives you his undivided attention. That's the kind of guy he was, and it wasn't fake, it was genuine. Yeah, I really cared about people. And every person, every comment I've seen about Brett, those same words are repeated constantly in stories about people, you know, when they first came to Nashville, you know, they got the opportunity to write with him. You know, Carrie Underwood said uh I was just in the room with him, and he put my name on the song, and I've contributed maybe 10 or 15 percent to it. You know, just kindness, very kind. Anyway, um he was killed last Friday in a plane crash with his wife and his daughter. Um and so, you know, I was in a room on Clubhouse, another social app, and we were all talking about it. And um the guy that runs the room said, you know, Andrew, your song you think you have time, but has never been more apropos. You know, because you know, you you you think you have time to learn to play guitar and rebuild that Chevy in your barn and and in time to walk your daughter oh, all the grade school plays and then the graduation days, and time to walk your daughter down the aisle.
Speaker 02:You're in tune with Nashville, scratching the surface, with myself, Allison Craig, and Andrew Rollins. As this song is discussed quite a lot in this episode, Andrew's given us permission to play it. It is copyrighted, it's not released yet, and it's an absolute belter. So, in the context of this podcast, have a listen to this wonderful song, You Think You Have Time, by Andrew and Martin!
Speaker 04:It seems like only yesterday.
Speaker 02:It seems almost criminal that these songs are written and then they don't see, you know, uh any traction or or life. I mean, is that just do you just accept that as a songwriter that a lot of stuff will exist but never take on a life of its own? Or how how do people find that gold? Because it's it's still a brilliant song.
Speaker 00:You know, okay, so I wrote that song. Neil Diamond's wife, who manages him, loved it. There was some talk that he was going to record it.
Speaker 02:Does he write his own stuff? Neil Diamond? No.
Speaker 00:He wrote all his hits.
Speaker 02:Oh, he did write all his hits, right? Okay, I'll let him off then.
Speaker 00:Yeah, all of them, Cherry Baby, Sweet Caroline. I I'm pretty sure one writer, him.
Speaker 02:Wow. Yeah. So that would have been a bit of a mark of something very special if Neil had recorded it.
Speaker 00:The way I feel about that song, and there's never some anyone that I've played that song for that is gone. I don't like it.
Speaker 03:Yeah.
Speaker 00:I mean, Chuck heard Chuck Cannon heard it, and he said, Man, what a song.
Speaker 03:Yeah.
Speaker 00:And I said, Did you do your rhyming thing in it? And he goes, Yeah.
Speaker 02:And if you're wondering what Andrew's talking about, you can hear Chuck Cannon and some of his gold in the previous two episodes about how important hard rhyming is. And yeah, it was really interesting. Chat is such a nice guy, and as you say, appreciating good and great songwriting. So that song, tell me more.
Speaker 00:Well, the faith that I have with that song, um, I wrote a song called Malibu Blue. Um it didn't see the light of day for 10 years.
Speaker 02:Right.
Speaker 00:I wrote that song ten years before it got cut. Really? So I think I hope, Pray to Buddha Allah Jesus, um, that at some point someone stumbles across that song and it gets used. Because I think those kind of songs, uh, a friend of mine that heard it um wanted to use it for his daughter's wedding.
Speaker 02:Oh gosh, I mean not a dry eye in the house.
Speaker 00:And and that's you know, that's the thing. You you when you write those songs that not only touch you here but touch your heart.
Speaker 01:Yeah.
Speaker 00:You know, well done. You know. And I'm proud of that song. I'm proud of the time I spent with Martin writing it. It it was it was I won't say divine intervention, the writing of that song, but if there were so many emotional things, spiritual things that happened with it. You know, Martin had been reading the Dalai Lama book and uh or an interview with the Dalai Lama, and they the interviewer asked him, What is the one thing if you one wish if you could it would be? And he said, I'd want more time. And so that you know, we came up with that title and talking about all those things about regrets that we have, and you think you have all this time to do that, and I could get up, walk across my yard and fall down dead, you know. Yeah, and that that's it, you know, that's all you know. We only have we we can't everyone needs to stop worrying about tomorrow or yesterday because yesterday's over, there's nothing we can do to change it. Nothing there if it's a bad, you know, it's like childhood trauma. Um and coming from an abusive childhood, there's a point in your life when you have to go, that happened, I can't change it. But what I can do is determine what I do today, yeah, and make plans, although they're not guaranteed, for tomorrow.
Speaker 01:Yeah.
Speaker 00:And always, you know, I always try, and I was talking to someone earlier today, and I said, How do you keep such a positive attitude with all that you're going through? And I I said, I cried because I had no shoes till I saw a man that had no feet, and I know that gets old, but no those words never have rang truer for me than now. And I I also try to be a better person today than I was yesterday, and try to be and plan to be a better person today than I was today, tomorrow. And and that's what you know, you know, everyone is so hateful and vengeful with everything going on, and I'm generalizing here. But everyone needs to go if you want something to hate, hate, hate you want to hate something, hate hate and love love. Yeah, I know the world's gonna be that l are loving and giving and and that's you know, that's what we have to do. And and uh, you know, I went down a serious rabbit hole with this, but those people that influenced me, um like Lee Von Helm, uh Eric Harman, Brett James, you know, I was I'm older you know than him by I think eight or nine years, but he was a shining example of a great giving, loving person. Yeah and look, I didn't know him, I was not best friends with him. I consider him him a friend. Yeah, but I didn't know the inner workings of him.
Speaker 02:Um give us some of the songs that he wrote, Andrew, because I think a lot of people, as ever, knew the songs, but not necessarily the songwriters, which is you know, seems the wrong way around, I think, now.
Speaker 00:Jesus Take the Wheel.
Speaker 02:Right.
Speaker 00:I wrote that with K for Carrie Underwood. Um When the Tun Goes Down for Chick Kenny Chesney, and then he wrote a song uh for Kenny Chesney called uh We Went Out Last Night, which is about going out and getting drunk and having a good time. So he not only wrote serious, impactful songs, he wrote fun. Fun, fun songs. Um he wrote a song for um Jason Aldean called Just Don't Tell Him the Truth. Cowboy Casanova uh Blessed by Martina McBride at the end of the day. Um Drugs Are Jesus for Tim McGraw.
Speaker 02:Uh was he ever an artist himself?
Speaker 00:Um he could have been, but he well, here's his story. He was um he was pre-med.
Speaker 03:Oh, really?
Speaker 00:In medical school for two years, left, went to Nashville for a minute, I guess didn't have any success, went back to medical school, and then his song started getting noticed, so he, you know, he it's like that thing we always talk about, that passion that that drug that's in your blood, and and it it's your heroine, it's your everything, you know. And he and he was very successful. Um uh I Hold On. Great song by Dirk Spendley. Uh I Wanna Live for Josh Grayson. It's a business doing pleasure with you. That was a Jim McGrove.
Speaker 02:That's a great title.
Speaker 00:Uh uh Love Wins for Carrie Underwood, The Man I Wanna Be for Chris Young, Kelly Clarkson, I know it all. Uh gosh, prolific. Yeah.
Speaker 02:Uh it is interesting, you know, listening to Chuck Cannon as we did last podcast, how and yourself, you write these fabulous songs, and it's just almost serendipity if somebody binds it.
Speaker 00:Yeah, then he wrote a song for uh Jason Aldean called uh Just Don't Tell Her the Truth.
Speaker 03:Yeah.
Speaker 00:And it's a song, you know, it's a song about a guy that is just devastated after his relationship ends, and and uh he runs into somebody that is friends with both of them. And he goes, he he he goes, um you know, tell her that you know you saw me, you know, and I was happy and you know doing great. Don't tell her that you know you you saw me in a bar and I was drinking all night long and crying in my beer, and you know, just don't tell her the truth. Don't tell her the truth. You know, and it which is you think about it, oh my god, you know.
Speaker 02:Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, but these these songs come from that place though, and that's why they hit hard, I suppose.
Speaker 00:Just like we talked about a couple, or actually when we the last uh one we had with um uh Chuck Cannon, what impression do we want to leave? You know, yeah, I'm sure at his memorial, everyone was talking about nothing but singing his praises. Yeah, singing his praises and singing his songs. That's why right songwriting is so it's such a magical thing. You know, um and I I I my heart kind of breaks for people that can't write because they don't care if if I'm hurting or you're hurting. We can sit down and tell that story.
Speaker 02:Yeah, it's funny though, isn't it? Because you it's not like you plan it. Yeah, you know? I mean, I as you know, my because I've been in a bit upset the past couple of weeks to my dog who I adored.
Speaker 00:Um have you started to write about it?
Speaker 02:Yeah, I was gonna say two desperately sad songs, you know, really sad that I can't even play yet because they're so sad. But yeah, it is therapy, I think. You know, for me it certainly is. I think it really is really.
Speaker 00:It's you know, though it it you know, after I wrote um You Think You Have Time, it was such a I and I put on my headphones and listened to it and went outside and sat in a chair and just looked up and and and thought about Eric and and the indelible impression that he made on my life. And you know, that's what I want, you know, when when I'm gone and I've left this mortal coil, um that there's that songwriter that goes, I'm a bad song because of what he taught me.
Speaker 02:Yeah, well, I'm sure there'll be many people see that, but that's not for a long time, so let's not go down that route to any stuff.
Speaker 00:Right. But you know, uh talking about, you know, and there's a lot of songs that people have written that have impacted people. Um do you remember Gilbert Gilbert O'Sullivan, you know, Alone Again Naturally, right? What a great, great song. And um he had a song called Get Down.
Speaker 02:Yeah, remember that?
Speaker 00:That was a dog. And that was about his dog.
Speaker 02:Yeah. I remember that.
Speaker 00:Bad dog, baby.
Speaker 02:Get down, get down, get down, yeah. He wrote that about his dog. I think he's got a new album out, you know. I saw him recently doing something in uh social media, so he's still out there doing it.
Speaker 00:He was at the Troubadour and I pissed it. I think I was in Nashville. Uh I would have loved to have seen him because you know, there's there's there are people that write songs um that make such an impression on us. Um that song was I love that song because the poetry of it, you know.
Speaker 02:Um you were when you were listening to that album.
Speaker 00:I had a I had a 1968 Volkswagen that it had so much rust in it, when I would drive in either the rain or the snow, my feet would get wet because there were so many holes in the floorboard. And one day I'm driving, I was when I was a lifeguard, I'm driving to work and it's really hot, there was no air conditioning, and I'm listening to the radio, and all of a sudden I go to steer it, and it's not it's steering weird. And I look and and out of the corner of my eye, one of my tires has come off and is going down the road. Get back, get back, get back. Also, I was listening to Alone Again Naturally and that Volkswagen, but when the wheel fell off, uh the song that I was listening to was not enough. Oh god. I was broken up with my current girlfriend at that time, and that song came on, and it will I think it was around the same time when it when the girl goes, be quiet. Oh, big boys don't cry, yeah.
Speaker 02:Big boys don't cry.
Speaker 00:And the wheel came off. And I've like got kind of tears streaming down my face. You know, so a heartbreak is such a funny thing. And and you know, you you know you're gonna get over it, but looking back on it now, if you told yourself, you know what, you'll be fine. Don't worry about it. But you wouldn't believe it if you told you know, if you heard it, you'd be like, no, it's the end of my life as I knew it. At that time, it's the most devastating thing that happens to you. Yeah, we get to sit down and write that.
Speaker 01:Yeah.
Speaker 00:And then All the like Chuck said, remember when he said, as long as there are 13 and 14-year-old girls that fall in love, there will always be room for ballads.
Speaker 02:Yeah. We're always gonna and I think I still feel 21 inside, really. You know, I think we all do. Oh god, yeah.
Speaker 00:Yeah, and and you know, I I wrote a song with Jeff Silbar, who wrote uh uh Wind Beneath My Wings.
Speaker 02:There's a song.
Speaker 00:Uh and um, yeah, really, that's a copyright. That's the fourth uh most requested song of all time.
Speaker 02:I love that. That's that's the one, isn't it? That's the one that pays for your everything, a copyright.
Speaker 00:So anyway, getting back to you know, the power we have as songwriters, you know, and that's the thing you have to remember is you might write a song and nothing happens with it for five years, ten years. You know, and then you write one like Chuck was saying, or like when I wrote This Town. I wrote it and it was four days old. A week later it was on network TV.
Speaker 03:Yeah.
Speaker 00:So there's no planning. Don't plan what's gonna happen.
Speaker 01:Yeah.
Speaker 00:In life. Yeah, you have to have a plan in life, but I mean, as far as songs go, you don't know what's gonna happen. You don't know, you don't know if someone's going to hear it and go, Wow, I want that for my next record. Yeah, all those timing things, you know. Um, I a friend of mine wrote a song uh for it was Lee Bryce's first uh first hit, and what he did is he wrote it, and he he thought that it would be great for Lee Bryce. So he um he found out that Lee Bryce was at some restaurant or or bar. And so as Lee Bryce was coming out of the bar, he came up to him and he goes, Will you listen to my song? And Lee said, Yeah, come on, let's go listen to it. And they went and got in his his pickup truck, and that's great, recorded it a couple days later. Those are really um rare circumstances, but it's how bad you want it, you know.
Speaker 01:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 00:What you're willing to do within the law, yeah. Don't don't don't be a uh don't go breaking into somebody's house and stand at the foot of their bed and say, here, listen to my song. Probably have a good reaction from that. But your persistence, you know, that old saying, the squeaky wheel gets the grease, and you know, so make sure don't give up, you know. Just keep if you believe in your songs, um, and people around you believe in them, build your team, build your team. The more people you have raving about a song, the more you're going to see some positive influence.
Speaker 01:Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely.
Speaker 00:The the journey, and I call it a journey because it's it is that.
Speaker 01:Yeah.
Speaker 00:You're you start out as a young songwriter, and all the potholes and sometimes abysses we fall down into, we just you know continue to persevere and have that intestinal fortitude where we don't give up.
Speaker 01:Yeah.
Speaker 00:And that's what it takes. Now more than ever. You know, I I believe this so in my heart and soul that if you want to succeed, you're gonna succeed.
Speaker 02:Yeah.
Speaker 00:Give up, you give up, and you'll never know.
Speaker 02:Yeah, that's it. And I think that's the worst thing, isn't it?
Speaker 00:What if and surround yourself with people that are your biggest fans, yeah, business, your manager, your publisher, your record, whatever. You know, your you know, your audience. Um and and put yourself out there. Because I don't like you you were asking me, you know, had I cook recorded my version of of this town yet. Um no, I haven't. But the reaction I got when I played the Hotel Cafe with that and um uh you think you have time. Yeah, I need to go in the studio and and great.
unknown:No.
Speaker 00:So do it. That's on my to-do list.
Speaker 02:Great, you know. Absolutely. I mean, this town is such a fabulous. Well, I mean, a lot of the songs are fabulous, but that one is you know, it's absolutely anchored in Nashville, the series, and people would stream it, listen to it, want it, you know, because it's you wrote it. That adds so much more to the dimension when you're listening to a song, knowing the person that sang it has wrote it, you know. It's a problem with that because this is now you've got a few witnesses.
Speaker 00:Getting back to Nashville. Um the the the final note I have for young songwriters is don't be afraid to put yourself out there. You know, don't be afraid to walk up to that known songwriter and go, hey, I've loved your stuff, I'm really good. You know, is there any chance we can, you know, what's the worst thing that's gonna happen?
Speaker 01:Sure.
Speaker 00:No, sorry, no, yeah, you might get someone like me or Brett James, or you know, a plethora of of other songwriters that'll go, yeah, okay. I will always write with a new songwriter.
Speaker 03:Yeah.
Speaker 00:At least once. Yeah. Because that's you know, you gotta give people a chance.
Speaker 02:Well, that's it for this episode of Nashville Scratching the Surface. We'll be back again next month. Thanks for your company. If you've enjoyed it, please follow us and uh tell your friends. Until next time, take care.
Speaker 03:Bye.
