This Past Weekend - E385 Jelly Roll

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Starting point is 00:01:15 That's K-E-E-P-S dot com slash T-H-E-O to get your first month free, Keeps dot com slash Theo. Today's guest is a musician, an entertainer, and really is a smooth criminal honestly. He's one of the most infectious human beings that I've been around and I'm grateful for you guys to get to hear his story. Today's guest is Jelly Roll. Bender it is, baby. The song, what is it? You got the... Dead Man Walking. It's the number five song on rock radio. It's called Dead Man Walking. It's fucking crazy. I've never had a song on radio ever.

Starting point is 00:02:38 Gang, baby. So, yeah, it's big shit. Is that crazy? It's weird. Yeah. But in a cool way. As a kid, I don't care who you are, especially like my age group, you dream of having a song on the radio. So, having one on the radio is like surreal.

Starting point is 00:02:52 You know, that is kind of a thing. When you're young and you hear that radio, it always seemed like it would be impossible to get your song to come out of it, I bet. Oh, yeah. Imagine being a little white trash kid like me and you and you're wondering how it's coming through the radio anyways. You're looking around like there's no cord on the car. How's this even coming through right now? Yeah, yeah. In fact, they were sitting inside of your motor and playing for you personally. Yeah. I used to have a dream that at one point in automobiles, they would have a disk or something you'd put into the dashboard.

Starting point is 00:03:26 Right. And then the band, they'd have like hologram. I always had this vision that hologram was really going to pop off. And the band would come out onto your dashboard the way it would be built and the band would perform right there for you. Right there. Yeah. And I was like, that could make money. It could make some wrecks. Yeah. Sure, dude.

Starting point is 00:03:45 First day I smoked a dubious look over there and see Hendrick shredding. I'm fucking crashing. Yeah, somebody's just locked in on Wiz Khalifa. They can't even handle it. No, it's cool, man. So what was that for you? For like me as a kid, it was like radio was like the thing. Like you wanted, like as an artist, you wanted to have a song on the radio. So what's for you? Was it like, I guess was it, did you come up with like the disc comedy era? Like you wanted a comedy album or was it like Comedy Central or? Yeah. Getting on Comedy Central was big doing that. And getting the album out and getting it on the iTunes charts was real big, you know? I remember 30 Pounds of Hamster Bones was like my first real album release. And that got on to the like, I think we, I think we got to number one at some point, you notice based on the way the sales go.

Starting point is 00:04:36 And so that was pretty wild. But I remember my first, do you remember the first song you ever heard through the radio? Oh man, probably not the first song I ever heard through the radio. I know the first like album we wouldn't bought or like cassette tape my sister bought. Yeah. But I can't think of like the first song I heard on the radio. You remember the first song you like remember hearing on the radio? Yeah, I remember I had a, my mom had some, some like babysitters took us to summer camp, right? So they come pick us up in the morning and they would take us. And this one lady picked me up. I feel like her name was Heather, but I don't know. But she picked me up, man. And she, they had Bon Jovi she had playing. And I'd never, I think because there was a woman involved also. There was like a babysitter and she was like hot and she like had tits and everything. And so like, I remember it was, what was, what was one of those Bon Jovi hits?

Starting point is 00:05:38 It was, what was like one of his biggest, most popular songs? Oh, fuck dude, I just woke up and I'm high. I haven't even ate breakfast and I'm stoned. And I'm sitting here with Theo talking about Bon Jovi. I'm like, fuck this is wild. I'm on the radio and Theo's telling me about Bon Jovi. I would like to touch on Heather for a second though. I would like to as well, brother. Baby, I'll tell you that dude. I think we all have a first teacher as dudes that we like. Mine was my kindergarten teacher. I don't remember my first grade teacher, second grade teacher, third, fourth, fifth. No, none of them. But I remember my kindergarten teacher's name was Ms. Harris and that is when I knew I liked asses.

Starting point is 00:06:16 She had the fats, not the flats. I mean, she had boy, that thing, man. She had a monkey on her back dog. She real doubled up, huh? I remember going home, my brother had to explain to me what I was feeling. I was like, I think you could pop it. I was like, you know, as a kid, I was like, my brother was like, oh yeah, you're gonna like asses when you're old. Flew over my head then. Later. Oh, dude, my wife's got Ms. Harris's ass to the tee. Yeah, schools and session. I'll set an apple. I'll put an apple right between them cheeks, baby. For you, it was Heather for meals, Ms. Harris. Dude, I remember and she, I would always be like, hey, can I put your seatbelt on for you all the time?

Starting point is 00:06:53 We'd be in the car and I think we had to sit in the back, but I'd be like, can I put your seatbelt on for you? And she would just take it off and I would like reach across her and it's like, put that seatbelt on. Oh, it made me feel so good. While listening to Bon Jovi. Yeah, yeah. I wish I could remember that song, man. It was, but anyway, it was one of his hits, man. But yeah, for my listeners that don't know about you, man, so you guys start to take me through the story, man. Your story is a really inspirational one. And also you just have this infectious energy, man. You just notice that anytime I'm around you, I wish I was you.

Starting point is 00:07:30 Oh, dude, thank you. I feel the same way about you. That guy's having so much fun. I like, I want to be that guy. I love you, man. Thank you, brother. Yeah, you bet, man. You got that tan, man. That's why I'm fucking blowing it. You think? You spraying that thing on, man? Are you laying in the bed or what? Dude, I just went to damn, uh-huh.

Starting point is 00:07:48 Oh, you were fishing? Oh, yeah, I was fishing. I just seen Happy Bladed Birthday by the way. Oh, thanks, man. What a fucking way to spend a birthday, dog. Dude, you're too kind, man. That was with the Jimmy John, by the way, like the Jimmy John, Jimmy John? Yeah, dude, we went out there, it was like, we caught.

Starting point is 00:08:01 I mean, you go out there and it's night, like the vessel was damn nice, dude. I got to, it was like Noah was on that bitch, you know what I'm saying? It was damn, dude, they had animals trying to get on. Fish were trying like, damn, that Jimmy's looks nice, dog, you know? You'd see all these Mexican fish were like, hey, y'all, give us a ride back to freakin' Cuba. You know, like they had fish jumping on that, panthers were getting on that bitch. They had animals, I didn't even know existed out there trying to get in. It was a luxury boat, right?

Starting point is 00:08:30 So, you're out on there and they had a couple, they got like some fish or men, like men that are just, you know, just a couple damn Moby Dick larkers out there. And then bitches, they show up and so they put in, sometimes if you're in like the deep water, they had these big electric rod and reels on the sides. And they would cast those down to like 1500 feet or something. So, you would just cast them down and then you would see the thing go like that, you know? And so, you were pressing these buttons instead of doing reeling. Oh, shit, it's like playing an Xbox for fishing. Yeah, it was, bro. That's fuckin' nice.

Starting point is 00:09:05 It was like, you could catch the past, you could have memories come up. Somebody pulled up a memory of something when you were a kid, you're like, damn, that was deep, bro. So, that was unbelievable. I was like, is that the real Jimmy John? That's him, baby, that sandwich jockey, dude. He, um, yeah, that man Turkey Tomed his way into the abyss. You know what's fucked up? I look at you and I get jealous because I'm like, you have all the friends I want, but don't need.

Starting point is 00:09:28 It's like Todd Graves is your homie, too, if you can. I'm like, I'm already fat. I'd be like, I'd die if I had your friend list right now. I'd just like live in a house full of sandwiches and fried chicken. I'm like, you're cool with everybody I want to be cool with, but God knows I don't need to be cool with. Some of those people, I'm not even going to introduce you to, man. I've seen y'all carry the Jimmy John sandwiches on. I'm like, fuck me.

Starting point is 00:09:53 In honor of your veins, on behalf of your veins, I'm going to say I'm not introducing you to those dogs. Especially not the chicken man. Yeah. Oh yeah, man. I've been pretty lucky. And those are the guys that have just come on the podcast and then you kind of get to, you know, have a relationship with them or become friends with them. Um, but that was unbelievable. And then there's some points where you get a rod and reel and you're actually doing the fishing, you know.

Starting point is 00:10:13 And it's like an industrial size. It's like something they'd sell at Home Depot. Oh, dude. I just think about the distance from what looked like where you were out on the boat to the water. Yeah. It wasn't like when you're sitting on like the little, you know, like the little boat in the bayou. You probably used to get on where you just kind of tip your little toe in the water. I mean, it looked like it was a full blown dive.

Starting point is 00:10:30 We didn't. Nobody touched the water. I was at one point I jumped in for like 30 seconds because they had some real bad sharks in there. And, uh, but you couldn't reach out and touch the boat. Yeah. Touch the water. Yeah. Touch the water.

Starting point is 00:10:43 And then you go inside and you're like in a damn Marriott plus or something. You know, that bitch is nice. How many days were you sleeping on the water and everything? Yeah. You go to sleep out there, dude. It's like being in somebody's, it's like being, I feel like in a, just like in a damn black lady's womb. I think comfortable.

Starting point is 00:11:00 Did you sleep good or did the rocking fuck with you? The rocking sleep. That rock put me out. It's like being on a bus without the sound of the engine. Oh yeah. The furniture is all made out of percocet baby. You fall straight to sleep on that shit son. I was.

Starting point is 00:11:15 And it was his boat is Jimmy John's boat. Yeah. Yeah. As Jimmy John boat man. So that was awesome. He took me. It was my birthday. So he took me out there.

Starting point is 00:11:24 And so we, we flew out on Friday, uh, straight down to Bahamas and then we, uh, jumped on the boat. Yeah. There's some dude like an island guy. Like you want that? Uh, Rosebeam somewhat. They don't even have a Jimmy John for a thousand miles. Just sitting there with Jimmy John.

Starting point is 00:11:40 With a box of Jimmy John. Listen, Jimmy John, this is for you. Uh, would you please bring back the chicken Caesar wrap? It was fire. And it was, it was limited time only. And I think the time was too limited, sir. You'd like to bring it back man. Use your influence to help your boy man.

Starting point is 00:11:55 It means a lot to me. Yeah. We'll see. I'll put that word in baby. I'll send that. I'll send that off the ladder. That's the only promo clip I want from today. It's me asking Jimmy John to bring a discontinued sandwich back.

Starting point is 00:12:09 Hey, I think we get that. I think we could help. I fucking hate you. I think we could help man. Um, so how did you find Parker? We were just talking off camera about it. Yeah. Who Parker will call him?

Starting point is 00:12:22 Call him you know. How does Theo find music? That's what I'm really getting at here. Oh, that's all right. And then I want to learn about how you got into music man. Cause I want, I really want my audience to know that. You know what I do man? I'm on tiktok man.

Starting point is 00:12:35 Yeah. They got this. They got this fellow four track that I listen to. I think he's out of South Carolina. Is that the guy you came out to the other night at the comedy club? Yes. Yes. That show was banging.

Starting point is 00:12:47 Yeah, bro. I don't know who it was. Can you pull it up? See if you can get him on here. Gang gang gang, baby. Gang gang, baby. Honey, I'm gonna rest another gun in the rack. I'm country thugging.

Starting point is 00:13:06 Left in the front, squat in the back. I'm country thugging. Better watch out when you're talkin' loud. Damn my cousins. Got locked down, I'm poppin' now. They're country buzzin'. Honey, I'm gonna rest another gun in the rack. I'm country thugging.

Starting point is 00:13:22 Left in the front, squat in the back. I'm country thugging. That's good, man. Because I remember the other night when we were at the SHOP show, you was tellin' the sound guy, it was like, yeah, play this song. And I think I asked you afterwards, you came out and I was like, that song was fire, who is it?

Starting point is 00:13:36 It was like four track. I was like, how do you, you were like, I just found them. You were like, I just like, I just found them. That's TikTok. Look, man, when you don't have a family or nothin', bro, you TikTok at night by yourself, and you come across a little four track, you know? You said TikTok's so popular now,

Starting point is 00:13:51 you do that when you have a family. Yeah. They're sad. Some nights I lay in the wife of my bed, and we're just watchin' two separate TikTok feeds. You guys are just sitting there, just inadvertently hooked on Walker Hayes' TikTok. I know.

Starting point is 00:14:06 It's like hell. I'm just watchin' fancy like on repeat, like I'm finally gettin' punished for my sins of life. Oh, especially since they talkin' about Applebee's, I bet they get too bent out. Maybe some of them lyrics. Oh, dude, fuckin' milkshakes. How do I find music?

Starting point is 00:14:21 I don't know, dude, but the Oreo shake. How do I find some music? That's probably how. Actually, my buddy, I was telling you that story, my buddy, back in the day, when you were just ejaculating was a big thing, you know? Now it's kind of like all over the place. It feels like so much pornography.

Starting point is 00:14:41 Back in the day, you had to really, I remember we'd buy a drawing of some cooter or something for the weekend. We had this buddy, we had this dude, Nicky, would sell us a little sketch, just a little bit of cooter for the weekend, and we'd take that bitch home on Friday

Starting point is 00:14:54 and bring it back on Monday, you know, because you got $2 back if you brought it back. Yeah, you had to piece your own magazine together, where this guy had a page from this one and this guy had a page from this one. You take three, four pages and take them together, be your own kind of magazine. One be a hustler, one be a playboy.

Starting point is 00:15:09 It actually had yarn keeping it together, like this is dicey. This is my shit. But my buddy, Scott, would put a map up in his car. He's ridin' with his folks one time. He puts a map up in the car, because at that age, if you start masturbating, that's the thing, it gets you hooked.

Starting point is 00:15:23 The devil gets you hooked on your own dick. And you just start, bro, you sittin' there, man. And my buddy, Scott, did it. He was just telling his family where they were goin' and the whole time he's behind this map. Just ruinin' Maine. That's all he was doin', bro.

Starting point is 00:15:41 And I thought I was a gangster because I could pull it sometimes if my cellmate was asleep when I was in jail. And even then, I felt pretty sketchy because there was another grown man there. But could you imagine just havin' a car pole, dude? Your sister's in the back seat,

Starting point is 00:15:54 kickin' the seat. Dude, that's family to you. Where's Steve Harvey when that shit's goin' down, you know? Bring that question up. You over there addin' tributaries to your own frickin' map. So take me through, man. So how did you get into music, man?

Starting point is 00:16:08 How did it start for you when you're comin' up? Where does music hit you first in your life? My mother was probably like the sad part of the story is my mother always struggled with mental health issues and addiction. And she didn't leave much at all when I was a kid.

Starting point is 00:16:26 She was a recluse. She never really left the house. And she would like, her makin' it to the kitchen table was kinda like a big deal, you know? And you'd walk in the house and mom would be at the kitchen table and she'd have a cigarette lit

Starting point is 00:16:39 and she'd be sittin' on a wood chair, Indian style right there in the kitchen back when you could smoke it. Back when restaurants had smokin' sections. Smokin' inside places was a thing, you know? And she'd be there smokin' a cigarette and she'd have a record playin'. And she'd just have her eyes closed

Starting point is 00:16:55 and I just, I could tell that the music was doin' somethin' to her, man. Like, I just remember watching her and thinkin', man, this music's like, whatever that is is helping her, you know? Or she'd play, like, bet middle of the rose and cry. I could still hear in my head,

Starting point is 00:17:12 play this in my funeral. Until this day, if you play bet middle of the rose right now, I might tear up. And she'd play my funeral, Jelly, play my funeral, baby Jason. She'd just smoke a cigarette. And I just remember thinkin', man, I wanna make people feel the way

Starting point is 00:17:25 this makes my mother feel. That's the songwriting aspect of it, right? That was what ignited the songwriter in me. Now, the influences are cool because I was the baby, right? I was the youngest. How many? Two brothers, one sister and my sister,

Starting point is 00:17:42 who she's still with to this day, was with then. So she's been with this man 30-something years. He pretty much lived with us from her high school years up. So I say I had three brothers. Two brothers, a brother-in-law that lived with us and a sister. And we always had some broke cousin on the couch or some broke family in, you know,

Starting point is 00:17:57 in the living room with blow-up mattresses or something. This was just like... Future convict. Yeah, this is our current convict or somebody on the run from the police. We had that kind of a house. And we would like... Yeah, when Haydn Goseek was Haydn Goseek.

Starting point is 00:18:11 Yeah, first year. I'll tell you a story about that in a second. It's even better. But when I got in the car with anybody, because I was the baby, I had no fucking control of the radio dial. I was the last motherfucker that got to pick the radio. Oh, yeah, and Ray, it was so important.

Starting point is 00:18:25 You got the car. Who got to pick the radio? Who got to pick the radio, right? So it's like when I was in the car, I had one brother that listened to nothing but gangster rap music. Bizzle's sitting here is awesome, because he's met my whole family. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:18:37 We got tour manager Bizzle Gibbons is sitting here in the studio. Just throw him in the middle of our shit, because looking at him is like, he's looking over there like, yeah, I met most of them. I had one brother named Scott that's the middle older that was a straight gangster rap guy.

Starting point is 00:18:50 Like Tupac, Biggie, like gangster gang. The more gangster, the better. Was he dating white chicks still, or how gangster was he? I mean, no, he was everywhere. Oh, gang, gang. Yeah, his dick didn't discriminate. Oh, damn boy.

Starting point is 00:19:02 He was a man. Yeah, he got that vibe. Yeah, for sure. He was all about it all. And we lived in a super mixed neighborhood anyway, so it was just super common to, you know, like all my brothers had a black best friend or something. It was just so many, you know, whatever.

Starting point is 00:19:14 Yeah, same. The neighbors were black. We had a Chinese guy in the neighborhood. Oh, dang. Couple of Mexicans. Dude, we had an Iranian family down at the bottom of the street that were super savage, dude. They'd bring Iranian food up, dude, Iraqi food,

Starting point is 00:19:24 and it was fucking fire, dude. But anyways, so I'm fucking high. But we get in the car and like, all these different radio stations will play. So like, one brother be gangsta rap, my sister listen like nothing but Metallica, Stone Temple Pilots, yeah, for sure. Like fucking Nirvana when they first came out.

Starting point is 00:19:42 This was all huge. Oh, yeah. And then I had another brother listen like super hip hop shit, like Bismarck, he kind of shit, Wu Tang shit, you know what I mean? Yeah, and then dad would listen to either jazz or back then like singer-songwriter stuff, like James Taylor, Jim Croce. My mother listen to Motown,

Starting point is 00:19:59 oldies and like outlaw country music. So it's like every room I'd walk into or every fucking, everywhere I'd go, it'd be some different music playing. So when people were like, dude, you kind of do all kind of music. I'm like, I'm a fucking human jukebox, man. I grew up in a, you know, I didn't get to pick a music I liked

Starting point is 00:20:15 and get to play it because I didn't fucking, you know, everybody else had their genre of music in their world, but me, I didn't have like a place I could go listen to what I wanted to listen to. I just had to listen to whatever fucking room I walked in. Yeah, that's funny. The younger brother is kind of, you kind of that ear victim, bro. You know, it's like whatever, you kind of,

Starting point is 00:20:33 you start to get in whatever anybody else is into. That's the, I never thought about that. The older brother really gets to pick the radio and that kind of shapes the younger brother a little bit. It's like, if my brother's listening to Dr. Dre, then I'm all Dreed up. I'm buying that t-shirt with the weed leaves. 100%.

Starting point is 00:20:49 And when he switches to Nirvana, dude, I'm, you know, I'm cutting my wrist, but not with sharp silverware. Yeah, yeah, I didn't get to get in the car and be like, I really want to listen to 107.5, the river. Nobody gave a fuck what I want to listen to, you know. Like we didn't even know you could talk. I'll tell you the first cassette tape I ever got given.

Starting point is 00:21:05 I got all these gifts for Christmas and they were like, we got one last gift for me and this is from your brothers and sisters. I was like, oh, this is probably going to be the coolest gift ever. And they gave me this little big package and it was a cassette tape and it was Rex and Effect Rump Shaker.

Starting point is 00:21:20 And I was like, this is gangster. And I remember at that moment, it was something that was finally mine because mama had bought me a boom box and daddy bought me a boom box, but nobody, I didn't have none to play in it yet. So then my brother and they did the coolest thing besides that and then they handed me

Starting point is 00:21:36 the Rex and Effect tape and they handed me five blank cassette tapes. And I said, what are these for? And they were like, we're going to show you how to record songs off the radio. You remember this era? Oh, yeah. Right?

Starting point is 00:21:47 When you put the cassette tape in, listen for all of y'all that want to know how old I am, I'm that fucking old. Top 10 with that top 10. You would go to the top 10 and you'd wait and wait for the perfect moment for the song to start and then you'd hit the play and record button.

Starting point is 00:21:57 You got to get it just right. Just right because you didn't want to hear the radio or the skip, you wanted just the song and you'd stop right there and you'd play it for one more second so there was a space between the two songs and then you'd hit it again. Are you calling request a song

Starting point is 00:22:10 that wasn't popular yet and you'd have to wait for hours for them to play it. They're like, who's this donkey? And they taught me that. So I started making mixed cassette tapes and I knew I was on to something different then because I'd get in the car

Starting point is 00:22:22 and find out I got a cassette tape and they'd be like, we don't care about your cassette tape but please play it and it would go from rap to something else and the brother would be like, what the fuck is up? I'd be like, well, Shelby taught me about this song. So everybody got happy. So you really were.

Starting point is 00:22:34 You really were like a jukebox. Yeah. Oh, to this day, man, you play very few songs that I'm not like, yeah, I know that era. Do you have a body? Do you have balls? Do you have a body with balls on it?

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Starting point is 00:24:57 and get your free quote today. That's at TheZebra.com slash Theo. So what was the family life like? What was it like growing up? Were you guys like, so you had a mom and y'all had a stepdad or no stepdad? No, I had a father. Oh, you had a dad?

Starting point is 00:25:13 Best friend in the world. Sweetest dude on earth. He taught me. Oh, that's right. Buddy was your dad, right? What's your story about him? He is a fucking legend. He really is, dude.

Starting point is 00:25:22 Old school gangster just laid back. Story teller but softly spoken. Didn't talk nearly as much as me, but said a lot more. And he was an old school gangster like that. But dad and mother were together whenever I was younger. They divorced in my earlier teenage years. And... Why did they divorce, you think?

Starting point is 00:25:40 Oh, fuck dude. You know, frankly, mom. You know, God, I love her to death. Sorry if you're watching this, Berly. But she, you know, she just, she dealt with so much of her own shit, man. I just, I couldn't, I don't, who she is now and who she was in her two different people, so I'm sure she won't be offended by this. I couldn't have been with her.

Starting point is 00:25:56 Yeah. You know what I mean? Who she was back then. I mean, he was pushing the square through a circle for a long time, you know? She was really struggling. I mean, I'm talking about a woman that I didn't see not wearing a nightgown for 15 years. Oh, wow. You know what I mean?

Starting point is 00:26:09 Like, I don't have a memory of her being like a kindergarten thing or you know what I mean? Like none of that shit. Damn, so that must have left you feeling almost like, I mean, if your mom wasn't showing up for a lot of stuff, you probably left you feeling kind of unseen or something sometimes. For sure. And no judgment against your mom. Yeah, for sure. My mom struggles with a lot of that and it's just, they went through it.

Starting point is 00:26:29 So somebody did it, you know, they went through it. Yeah, and their era, you know, now that I'm old enough, I look back at her and go, man, she grew up in a house with three other sisters. She grew up with a single mother. My mother's 73 years old. So if you think about her growing up with a single mother raising four kids, she was the town whore in everybody's eyes. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:26:47 That's normal now. You see a bitch at the grocery right now with five kids and be like, shit, I'm gonna, she must be from Antioch. You know what I'm saying? It's like, you seen it back then. It was like, you fucking whore, you know what I mean? You damn whore. That's what she was looking for.

Starting point is 00:26:58 Yeah. You know, it's like totally different world. So, I mean, I kind of get where she came from and her mother, which was my granny, was just fucking mean as a fucking beaver on meth. She was just a fucking, you know what I'm saying? She was mean, dude. And I knew that about her. So, you know, I get where, you know, her issues, but yeah, they had divorced, but Pops was,

Starting point is 00:27:18 Pops ran a meat company for years. Oh, damn. What kind of meat was it? Oh, dude, we got three generations of meat salesmen. Oh, really? Dude, I can tell you more about a pig and I can tell you about Pussy. And I know a little bit about both and I'm telling you, man, there's just something, dude, he was, my grandfather was, ran a meat truck called DeFord Sausage Company and then my

Starting point is 00:27:36 father took it over and it was called DeFord Wholesale Meats. So, they changed LLCs, huh? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, you know, dad got into the wholesale business. You know, my grandfather was old enough that they actually rode around in a truck and went door to door. This is back when the closest grocery store to a neighborhood was 15, 20 minutes away and it was a by-rider or CB Smith or Pigley Wigley.

Starting point is 00:27:58 This is long before Walmart. So, you know, you probably grew up in an area where the meat trucks came to the neighborhood. Yeah. Well, we had, I remember they had a dude who was a swan's truck or something. Yeah. And this dude would roll through and this dude honestly was banging some ladies, bro. I don't know how this guy was a real Casanova, bro. You know what I'm saying?

Starting point is 00:28:16 He would, in the second he saw the kids, he'd be all pissed and stuff you could tell. But he was, yeah, they had everything in there, like frozen things, cookies and beef. He had the beef area to get in the beef area. The beef area, I remember when you opened that bitch up, it was like. Oh, yeah. You know, it was so cold in there as a child, you couldn't even look in there for long. You was afraid to even look at the beef. And then they came through with the little Chinese food portal at one point.

Starting point is 00:28:42 And that's when I think the people I was living with at the time, they cut it off, man. They said, we're not doing all of that shit. Yeah. Well, at that point, it wasn't far away from being food trucks in that area, but. Yeah. It was like an early future, but you had to cook it. Yeah, for sure. No, but you had a big view for, my grandfather would just pull up with a, and he did nothing

Starting point is 00:28:59 but pork. It was just sausage. It was a family recipe. We still have it to this day. And my father was entrepreneurial, so he was like, I want to sell more than pork. So he got into poultry and beef. Oh, damn. As well.

Starting point is 00:29:13 And he was like, instead of taking it door to door, change with the times, I'm not just going to serve as door to door in the small piggly wigglies and by rights. I'm going to start going to local barbecue pits and local restaurants that were local owned and local read. And, you know, he was a, he sold meat that way and, and, and housed his own meat. My brother now, my oldest brother, the one that was more of a hip hop head, he is still in the meat business. He's still doing meat.

Starting point is 00:29:37 Yeah. Oh, dude, it's still, you know, it tickles me pink because it's like my dad's still here. I go hang out with my brother and all his meat salesman friends. Yeah. It's funny how that business is generational that way because most of them guys, you'll meet, daddy was in the meat business. You know, a lot of businesses are. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:29:54 It's crazy. Officers, both captains, a lot of things are, it just comes down through the family line. I was the only one that had a vision outside of anything like that. My other brother ended up doing a survey. He's a land surveyor and does all that kind of stuff. Oh, damn. It's like a, like engineering and stuff, civil engineering. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:30:16 I actually got my degree in urban planning, bro. An urban planning. Yeah. I'm an urban planner. I guess. I mean, I am, I don't know. I don't know if my license is active or whatever. I don't know if I ever got a license, but I am, I guess I'm legally an urban planner.

Starting point is 00:30:34 I guess. I mean, I got the, you know, I did it. You know, I think it's mostly about, I mean, I know what it's about. It's about neighborhoods. Like if you have to have like a, say you're putting together a neighborhood and somebody needs, you need to know where the post box post office box is going or like if a mail truck is coming through, how to get it through, like the, you know, give it the best directions. Right.

Starting point is 00:30:55 Right. Yeah. He deals with the like, can you build here? Is this a flood land or, you know, shit like that. And, but yeah, I'm the only one that even took to like something artist driven or creative mind and all. So when did it start to like really take shape or something? Or what do you think kind of, did you have some pitfalls or something?

Starting point is 00:31:12 Like, what was it like in your teen years growing up? Cause I know you got into some trouble, right? Yeah. Yeah. So the other side of my father that was the side that I seen the most more than the hard working salesman was, he was a hustler. Yeah. So my father booked bets on the side most of his life.

Starting point is 00:31:30 You know, it's part of, part of a story that he didn't tell cause later in life, he went on to marry a fucking Methodist minister and totally different dudes than the dude I grew up with, you know, which I love both versions of him, but I grew up with the old gangster that booked bets. You know, I grew up on a bar stool with him, booking bets and, and what bets on anything, football game, all kinds of stuff. Well, he ran like the old school football cards. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:31:50 So he wasn't just like a gambler. He was the dude who booked them. So we dropped off football cards to like Stanley Street Bar and Larry's and Antioch and TGI Fridays and Antioch when it first opened up. And like all these local bars, he would run football cards to him and he, he, he take phone bets to parlays and, you know, I remember the card. I remember my buddy's dad worked over at like a Ford dealership, right? And he'd come home.

Starting point is 00:32:14 Some of them would give us a car. And we could, you know, we put five, six dollars on it or something. That's when five or six dollars was a lot. It was a big deal. Yeah. Especially for you just to be guessing if it's going to work. And, you know, he made a deal with all of us brothers when we were younger that, you know, he said, I'll give you a choice.

Starting point is 00:32:27 I'll either pay you per football card that you put out or I won't pay you per football card and I'll let you share in the revenue of it. So his thing was like, either you can take this risk and make more money with me or I'll just give you a flat fee for every, you know, the X amount of dollars per football card you put in the streets. So he kind of taught us that work ethic and it was fun to watch the brothers because you have some that played it safe, you know, and then you had the me's and that's when he knew something was going to be different.

Starting point is 00:32:56 You got risky. Me and another brother, we had some cousins that played it safe. Me and all the brothers went for the risky. Me and all brothers were like, no, fuck that we're going for it. You know what I'm saying? Like we're putting it all in the lab. We're trying to upsell people on bats, you know, and trying to figure it out. So I always had that hustler in me.

Starting point is 00:33:12 And then when mom and dad divorced, I stayed with mama. You know what I'm saying? Because I felt like she was the one that needed me, you know, and hindsight as a kid, I should have never, you know, I should have went with where I should have went with what I needed, not what I thought somebody else needed. But that just shows your nature as a human problem. Yeah. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:33:31 For sure. I love my mom. I thought my mama needed me. So I was like, okay, now I got to be the, and I didn't learn enough about football. You know, I was fucking 14, like 15, 16 years old, I can't go book bets. Yeah. Fuck the Jets. I thought it was most people now.

Starting point is 00:33:43 Yeah. Right. Yeah. It's like, I'll just fucking, you know, I'll go, you know, whatever. I'll just go find alternate means of money. And for that, it was, you know, drugs and drugs normally lead to robbing and, you know, just goofy shit as a kid. I just got in a lot of trouble.

Starting point is 00:33:55 I ended up in juvenile for a lot of years and the juvenile years rolled over and because I went to juvenile, you know, I think the first time when I was like 13 or 14 and just kind of went to that revolving door and now penitentiary ended up in group homes, kept running from them. What was that penitentiary like? Was it pretty, anything you miss about it? Dude, no, the fuck no, man. I tell people all the time, jail, prison, all that stuff, dude, is when people are like,

Starting point is 00:34:22 I love when dudes are like, we just, I just talked to uncle Joey about this old Joey Coco. Yeah. And we were talking about how some dudes go to prison enough that they start talking about them like they're malls, you know what I mean? I was like, yeah, that one was actually had really good food and yo, you know, that one had the prettiest guards and I'm like, this ain't a fucking mall. They all sucked.

Starting point is 00:34:39 That one had an American eagle. You know what I'm saying? Like my best memory in jail sucks compared to my worst memory at home, you know what I'm saying? Like when you're like, what was the best day you ever had in jail? It's like I came back and the whole unit threw me a birthday party. I was working in the kitchen and I came in and everybody had like put all their snacks together and they'd set up a big jelly roll birthday party because I was going home soon.

Starting point is 00:35:02 So like a going away birthday party and as much as my soul was touched for all these fucking gang bangers and criminals to celebrate me. It sucked. You know what I'm saying? It's like, you know, like the worst birthday I've ever had at home fucking swapped that one. You know what I'm saying? Google surprise party in prison.

Starting point is 00:35:21 I didn't want to get an image in my head and did they have any, uh, let's get a couple images there. Let's see. Oh, there's probably a band called it. I'm sure there is. That's the problem nowadays. You Google anything. There's some shitty band named after it.

Starting point is 00:35:38 Oh, for sure. Yeah. Yeah. We're not getting much. No. We didn't have camera phones in there. Oh, here's a cake. Right there.

Starting point is 00:35:46 Click on that cake. Yeah. Happy birthday, Jamal. Now imagine this. Yo, Jamal. Happy birthday. You know, the best part of that is if they would have made that out of honey buns, it'd be realistic.

Starting point is 00:35:56 Right. Oh, yeah. That'd be some stuff because you know, you get a canteen in there and stuff. Oh, because y'all had to make bootleg cakes, huh? Yeah. Oh, dude. But I tell you what, because of that, my fat-asking whip, boy, I can make something out of next to nothing.

Starting point is 00:36:08 Now, so you'd be in there like, what was your space in the penitentiary environment? What kind of guy were you? Were you just kind of the guy making everybody laugh or were you kind of a hard head or what kind of? No, dude. I was just, dude, I guess I probably made people laugh and entertain. We did Freestyle Fridays and I worked in the kitchen and, you know, yeah, I was just there, dude.

Starting point is 00:36:27 I was a young, juvenile years, I was more of a hard head because I was the only white guy there and I felt like I had a point to prove, so I was, you know, whatever. And did they ever let you say the N word or not? You know what's crazy is that is a word in which context, right, because there's one way in which you're never allowed to say it, no matter what. Right, yeah. Yeah, yeah, not like that. And then the other way, you know, there's certain white guys that, yeah, for sure, in

Starting point is 00:36:49 different penitentiaries and prisons and jails and stuff. Every now and then, somebody, yeah, they're like, we're cool, I got it, like, how'd you get away with it. Yeah, for sure, they'll let you get away with it. They'll let you make sure you don't have a neighbor recording you or nothing, you know. Yeah. That stuff will stick with you. You know what I'm saying?

Starting point is 00:37:01 Shout out to our boy. But I'm just joking. Yeah. But, you know, it's like, you want to make sure that, yeah, no, they don't, you know, it's different, man. And it's also different per jail. Every jail in every prison and everything has a different structure. You know, it gets way more racist in federal prison than in state prison.

Starting point is 00:37:17 And especially, like, county jails is a totally different world because you know everybody. When you go to the county jail, there's like a degree of separation between you and everybody in the county jail. Yeah. Because it's all local. It's all local. Like worst case scenario, you're from North Nashville. We're two minutes away from me dropping somebody's name in North Nashville that we both know.

Starting point is 00:37:35 Yeah. You know what I mean? The other problem of that is it's a lot of real drama in there, though. Like where guys have been like, I've been waiting to run into you because you had a problem with my cousin, you know, whatever years, you know. Oh, yeah. That's really, that's really the, uh, that's the real confluence of the local bullshit. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:37:53 In the federal scale, there's no way me and a dude in Wisconsin ever have a personal problem with each other. Right, right, right. You know, in the county jail, I had a lot of personal problems with people. And what about a lot of gays in there? Any type of activity like that? A lot of gay activity or was that, is that? When you get to like prison, prison, you start having dudes that are, you know, busting their

Starting point is 00:38:10 butt open. Yeah. But the county jail, that's not happening. I spent more time in the county jail than the big prison. So, because I was more of a revolving door kind of criminal. Go for a year or two. Come home. Go for a year or two.

Starting point is 00:38:21 Come home. Come home. I was that guy. Yeah, I was like, oh, he's back. You know what I'm saying? That was kind of nothing. Like somebody that winters in Florida like that? Kind of.

Starting point is 00:38:29 Yeah, exactly. Fucking totally right. Like a guy that goes to losers, you know, once every two weeks or winters. Oh, yeah. Well, I was a red door kind of guy, you know, it's like I was just, oh, he's back, you know. And there's a local baller. People don't know that. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:38:43 Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Sorry. Super Nashville talk, y'all. So what about, uh, so when, so when you kind of got, when music kind of got kind of took over your life, did that have an effect like, tell me kind of how you got, how did you get into the music then?

Starting point is 00:38:57 I was just, I started writing raps young just cause I didn't think I had a cool voice to sing, you know, and nobody in the family sang to teach me to sing. So I would write like raps and that was obviously like, I don't know how much of that we caught earlier, but that was the language of the community. Hip hop was the language of the neighborhood, you know, super mixed community. I grew up like you. You know what I'm saying? Like it always is a poor neighborhood, man.

Starting point is 00:39:21 It's really, cause black shit is cool usually. So it's like black shit always is the cool shit. Right. 100%. No, it's to this day, hip hop has influenced every genre of music on earth. For other people who want to admit it or not, I hear it the most in country music. I mean, I hear hip hop melodies, hip hop drums, 808s. That is just so prevalent in country music, but you know, hip hop was the language of

Starting point is 00:39:46 the community. So that was kind of what I got into first and I had freestyle at tables and in juvenile I had freestyle battle people and I tell this story, it's my favorite story to tell about my father. I was going, getting bound over as a juvenile and charged as an adult. I had made a decision as a child that they wanted me being charged as an adult and I ended up with that felony on my record for a crime I committed at 16 to this day. I can't get rid of that felony.

Starting point is 00:40:12 And when they bound me over, the only good thing that happened was I got a bond. I'm 17 years old. I'm going to the county jail. They let me call one person when I get to the county jail and who was it pops? A hundred percent of the time I'm calling my dad. I'm calling the answer. One man. That was my guy.

Starting point is 00:40:30 A dude supported me more than I can tell you buddy stories till I'm blue in the face. He was the most supportive dude of my wild shit of anybody. When I wanted to quit music, probably six year, five, six years ago, I sat down with a seven years ago and I was like, pops. I'm just, I'm not. I'm just talking about work. I was sitting at the tin roof of bar right on the memory of street that they have a plaque with his name in there.

Starting point is 00:40:49 He was a legend at the spot. Yeah. This is in Nashville. Yeah. This is a super beautiful spot right on the memory. We ever come through Swinctor and they serve everything out of plastic. Oh, it's beautiful. It was not the term I would use for it, but it is a good spot.

Starting point is 00:41:00 Yeah. For sure. The higher floors you go, it gets extremely sticky until you get, you can't even leave. I don't think the fourth floor. Oh yeah. Oh, you're talking about the Broadway one though. Oh yeah. I'm old school OG Demumbrian.

Starting point is 00:41:10 Oh, okay. Never mind. I'm still the one that's right there. That one is nice. Yeah, and everything served out of plastic, which was fucking what my dad thought was the greatest because he'd take a drink to go with him every day. You believe in stem cells? I don't know anything about them, dude.

Starting point is 00:41:25 You've been way beyond my pay grade of intelligence at this point. I want to get hair plugs. Is that close to the same thing or not? You're doing fine, I think, on the hair, man. I'm hurrying up. Listen, man, my fear in life is balding. Is it? I don't want to be fat and bald.

Starting point is 00:41:43 You know what I'm saying? Dude, listen, dog, when you're fat, you've got to pick struggles very intelligently for you. Really? Yeah, man. I don't get to be. You know, you can have a kind of a smelly day and get away with it because you're an old handsome fucker.

Starting point is 00:41:56 Not me. Damn. If I'm fat and smelly, it sticks forever. I've got to make sure I am smelly. That's true, huh? Yeah. If you wake up and forget the odor, it's like, oh, little musty. I wake up and forget the odor.

Starting point is 00:42:05 That'll log. That's a damn ecosystem, huh? Yeah, it will follow me like pig pen on Charlie Brown's side by afternoon. I can't be fat and bald, man, yeah. Damn. Yeah, because you're a bigger guy, man. What's it like being bigger? Well, you've got to make sure every chair won't hurt you or break you.

Starting point is 00:42:23 You look first, huh? That's the biggest thing. Well, you've got to give it a test. You know what I'm saying? For sure. You've got to ease into it. Yeah, man. Damn.

Starting point is 00:42:31 I don't think about that kind of stuff. And were you always a big guy since you were young? Yeah, dude. I was fat as a kid, man. We struggled with, and I think it's a part of my personal mental health struggles, right? We all have our own things and our own demons and vices. And for me, I could literally go on a three-day cocaine bender right now and wake up on the fourth day and be like, well, that was a lot of fun and not do it again for weeks or months.

Starting point is 00:42:54 But dude, you fucking set some snacks out somewhere and don't let me hover around them more in two or three minutes. I'll start filling my pockets up like I'm in jail and I'm never going to see them again. Yeah. Like for sure. Yeah. You want them snacks, yeah. Yeah, I'm all about snacks.

Starting point is 00:43:07 Do you, does it scare you your way? Does it worry you? Yeah, all the time, dude. I don't want to be this fat. I don't want people commenting on here. He's going to die. It's going to happen for sure. You know what I mean?

Starting point is 00:43:17 Oh, dang it, right? It might be me writing it, too, bro. I got a couple of ghost accounts. A couple of ghost accounts, you know? It's like, you don't want to go through that. And I'm on the, I got a nutritionist now and I've been working on working on my weight this year more than I have in a long time. But I also don't worry about as much as I should because I've been on this rollercoaster

Starting point is 00:43:36 my whole life where I'm a little more plump right now. But I can show you pictures when I was less plump and I can show you pictures when I was more plump. I just kind of, you know, it's kind of part of what I deal with just trying to get on the other side of the mountain. Do you feel like, well, two questions. Have you ever tried any of like, because I know they do a lot of those surgeries and stuff.

Starting point is 00:43:56 Have you ever done anything like that where they like get into your system or whatever? Yeah. I'm just not with that. Don't, you know, I'm not going to. I don't know, man. Don't fuck. I don't want to get cut on and all that old shit. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:44:06 Yeah. I just don't know what people do. You know what the most selfish thing I can say right now is, but it's real. I've heard when you do the surgery, it fucks with your ability to intake anything, which I would love for that to be the case with food. But like, they were like, well, you can't drink more than a half gallon of water a day on her. It'll make you sick.

Starting point is 00:44:27 What? Like, I don't want to spend my life. I'd rather die young. Get young like this. But like, you know. They didn't have to measure your water as you drank it. They didn't have to measure my water. You know what I'm saying?

Starting point is 00:44:37 Yeah. I didn't know all that. Like, yeah. When they started explaining some of the stuff to me, because I went and talked to the dude. You know what I mean? Like, there's not a fat person on earth that can afford the surgery that hasn't at least went and talked to the person about the surgery. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:44:51 You know, and when he started explaining it to me, I was just like, and he was honest enough too. He's like, look, man, I think that if you just put your mind to it, you'll lose the weight again. It's been proven that you can lose the weight. What hasn't been proven is that I can keep the weight off. So that's what we got to figure out next. That's such a struggle for so many people, man.

Starting point is 00:45:08 You know, I don't know what that's like. I know what the struggle is like, but I don't know what that struggle is like. Do you feel, though, also you're so recognizable as this, like, larger-than-life character? Do you feel like being larger, you almost have to be larger? No. It's like, I think the real side of it is it's a decision to live. And I'm just starting to make that decision. I spent most of my life-

Starting point is 00:45:35 Oh yeah, not giving a fuck if I live or not. Just not giving a fuck. I feel that, bro. You know what I mean? Like, I tell people to this day, like, when I really start to get angry, I've had to have this moment with a few grown men in my life where I'm like, dog, do I look like somebody that cares? Like, you should really assess that before you talk to me crazy.

Starting point is 00:45:53 Like, I have everything written on my body to show you I don't give a fuck about a lot. You know what I mean? Like, I'm just starting to give a fuck. Like, I'm just looking at my 14-year-old daughter, like, I used to be like, if I could just live till she's 18, I'd be okay. Now I'm starting to be like, I'd like to meet my grandkids, I think. Yeah. You know, it's like you're starting to think about shit you didn't think about before.

Starting point is 00:46:14 Isn't that kind of magical when those ideas come in your head that make you believe you care about yourself? Yes. That's insane. It's little stuff that's like, I think I do want to meet my grandchildren. So that's what made me hire a nutritionist. Before it was like a chore to be like, I just want to stay alive till she's 18 so I don't create any more unnecessary trauma in her life.

Starting point is 00:46:34 Yeah. You know what I'm saying? And then it's like, you know, it's about her. And then it's kind of like selfishly, now it's about me. It's like, I don't know, man. I kind of want to hang out with the grandkids. I kind of want to see where this thing ends up with her. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:46:46 I want to see what jelly is. Yeah. When jelly starts to kind of coagulate, I want to be there. Yeah, for sure. I want to kind of look, because like, now she's cool enough at 14 that I'm like, dude, I bet she's going to kick ass at 25. I want to see that. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:46:58 You know what I'm saying? Like, oh, dude, she's going to be a whole different human at 35. Fuck, I didn't know my ear from my asshole at 25. Wait till she's 35. I'm like, fuck, now I got to live for 30 years, not 20. You know what I mean? Like, oh, god damn. I'm going to have to fucking stay alive.

Starting point is 00:47:09 I'm going to have to do a push-off or something. You know what I'm saying? Fuck. How'd you get the child? Oh, dude, complete accident. Really? Yeah, man. For sure.

Starting point is 00:47:19 And was it like a one night stand deal or were you in love? No, no. I was on and off with the girl for a long time, man. And, well, until one of my cycles of jail, I had Bailey when I was in jail. You know what I mean? It was kind of my thing. And did you, was it your first girlfriend? Was it, was he the mother of the child?

Starting point is 00:47:37 Yeah, well, not my first girlfriend, but you know, or one of my earlier, earlier girlfriends. Believe it or not, to be a big fella, I've always fancied myself with women. Yeah. I've always, you know. Your wife is a real, your wife got them hammers on her, baby. Oh, man, I'm telling you, she got, man, dog, she is a stacked deck. And she is a fucking sweetheart of a woman. And she's a fucking pit bull when she needs to be, I married a full blown German shepherd.

Starting point is 00:48:08 She mixes the pot perfectly, but I've always, my wife tells people this is like, I love it when she gets with people wonder, like, she's a gold digger, like I was piss broke when I met Bunny. She financially supported me for years. Yeah. Yeah. And Bunny is his wife's name. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:48:24 And Bunny got them rabbits, too. I tell you that, boy. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. Mr. McGregor's garden. Sure. My fucking want to give her the carrot. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:48:32 But she, but then she'll tell people too, like, dude, I'm not the first bad bitch my husband's ever fucked. Like, she's the first person to tell people, like, I've always fancied, you know, a good conversation with a nice lady. Yeah. So that wasn't shit. So the girl I had a kid with wasn't my first one. She was just the first one that the pullout technique didn't work with.

Starting point is 00:48:51 Oh, really? Yeah. Yeah, for sure. Damn. I got a son, too. He's almost six. Oh, really? With Bunny?

Starting point is 00:48:59 No. No. Not a different relationship. They kind of co-excited there. But I just, I, this girl was pregnant. We wasn't together. And I didn't really know much about the situation with the pregnancy, like, you know, whatever. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:49:09 I knew she was pregnant. I knew it was mine, but we wasn't together at the time. She got pregnant. And me and Bunny started courting each other and it's a longer story, but yeah. It's not my favorite story to tell, but yeah, I got a son, too, and he's cool as fuck. What about that first girlfriend? You remember that one? Her first kiss.

Starting point is 00:49:24 Take me there, man. Take me on a little bit of that adventure. Oh, dude, it was the girl across the street. Who was yours? It always is that bitch. Was yours the girl across the street, too? I think it was, dude. They had this girl across the street from me.

Starting point is 00:49:35 Had that Lloyd Christmas on her brush. She was chipped out. You know what I'm saying? Oh, dude. She had that sand wedge right there. Little shit like that's kind of cute, though, right? Oh, I thought it was. I'd never seen it.

Starting point is 00:49:44 Yeah. You know, it was just damn beautiful. My tooth had that damn calyp, you know? Right. And some people locked us in a room, some adults, and perverts, really. And they were, like, watching through the door and yelling, kiss and fuck, you know? And we didn't know anything about it, man, you know? And she was the cutest girl, Chrissy, was her name, and we ended up, so we just kissed,

Starting point is 00:50:06 you know? Chrissy? I think that was my first kiss. And then there was another time, this beautiful girl, we were playing Spin the Bottle, dude. And I don't even know. I was so scared to even sit at this circle. I would say we were sitting in the circle. And for years, I remembered thinking we were sitting around a fire, and then I just remembered

Starting point is 00:50:24 that's how scared I was. I felt like there was a fire in front of me because there was a chance there could be a kiss. And this girl named Emily, man, the bottle stopped on her. And I always thought, like, somewhere like in the last chasm or whatever in my heart, she thought about me, or thought I was, you know, a trier, whatever, I don't know. And she got to pick whoever she wanted in the circle, dude, and she came over to me and fucking the fire got, you know, people were throwing logs on the fire.

Starting point is 00:50:55 I'm just so scared. And I remembered seeing on television, I think on Magnum PI, somebody would kiss somebody with their mouth open, you know? And so that's, so she comes in to kiss me, and I just remember just being like, like open my mouth up real wide, you know, and everybody laughed at me, and she still tried to kiss me kind of, but it was just fucking embarrassing, but anyway, man, what happened to you? Wasn't that cool?

Starting point is 00:51:22 It was a girl. It was a little hard, a little dude. I've seen the band, I felt bad for a second. I was a girl across the street, her name was Krista Hayes, Krista Renee Hayes. Oh, Renee, dude, I'll tell you this, every poor kid, their middle name, the girl is Renee. Fucking Renee. Is it not? No, for sure.

Starting point is 00:51:40 They're two nieces from the same mother, and both of them are Renee. No, those families have middle names, like ours is Ann, I dated two girls that had the middle name Ann, and my daughter then had the middle name Ann. So it's fucking, it's that, my grandmother's name was Margaret Elizabeth Ann, or Margaret Ann. But Renee's that poor, Renee's poor white middle name. Oh dude, for sure, yeah, it's just got a, it feels razzly-dazzly. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:52:05 Renee. Yeah. Krista Renee Hayes, especially her name was Hayes, so I thought the Ney and Hayes was good. Krista Renee Hayes. Yeah. Yeah, she was my first kiss, ma'am. She was a little blonde girl across the street, and she was cute.

Starting point is 00:52:17 She was cute as a button, dude. She was a little bitty thing, and she was awesome. That was my first kiss. My first blow job was outside of a girl's group home. Oh yeah, I could see that. Yeah, right? I could easily see that. The new group home, and the girl's group home was by each other.

Starting point is 00:52:30 Yeah. And what happened? You snuck over there or what was it? Yeah, but we used to meet outside and hang out, because we were allowed to hang out outside, and then one day we went over by the house where the air conditioning unit broke up. Yeah, right there by the air conditioning unit. Why don't air conditioning units advertise you can get blown behind here? They're the best, dude.

Starting point is 00:52:48 Dude, and it's the noise kind of keeps you feel like more cover. Yeah, and if you fuck on top of it, it kind of shakes, and it gives off a little like hot air. Oh. Like, that's what we needed. You know how the thing is up top? It gets a little like, it's like a stove thing kind of on top of it, it blows a little hot air on the fan thing.

Starting point is 00:53:05 Oh, yeah. It's a little sexy. But I got my first blow job, and I knew right then that that was fucking the greatest thing ever. Oh, you was in the blow jobs at that point? Oh, dude, listen, I mean, I knew that I was excited to get the pussy, and it was a little let down compared to what the blowy was. Oh, yeah.

Starting point is 00:53:22 You know what I'm saying? So, fucking ever since then, it's kind of, you know, the other thing's almost a chore. It's like, oh, we got to do that. But yeah, there's something interesting about somebody being willing to admit they're willing to put their face on your penis. Yeah, for absolute change. You know, the point of it spinning. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:53:37 I'm saying that whole shit is just fucking wow. Yeah, when you get pure, yeah, there's, you know, I remember this gal tried to give me a BJ, and I mean, one to well, a couple times, one time I was at a party, we were going to sneak off into the woods, and the woods, we didn't know it was Swampland, right? So we're back there, 30, 40 yards into these woods, and it's like that, remember that movie R-Tex and the Swamp of Sadness, it's just, damn, we're up to our necks and damn. I mean, leeches, I mean, who knows, I mean, there's no potential, I mean, mother nature's blowing me at this point, something's blowing me, you know what I'm saying, it's thick,

Starting point is 00:54:12 we're in some sludge. Wait, wait, you're from, it could have legit been a goddamn alligator, I guess, I'm sure. It could have been a toothless alligator, boy, you know what I'm saying, humming nub down there. A toothless alligator. But I'll tell you this, man, so we couldn't do it because of weather, you know, logistics. So then two or three weeks later, there's another party. So y'all had a rain delay, rescheduled the game, think about it, you're fitting to get

Starting point is 00:54:39 your first blow job, the game gets called off, and that had been, I mean, it was the Bear Grylls of, you know, we were out in the, you know, it was damn, it was, I was getting hungry, that's how long I was out there. So then the next time was another party, and me and her snuck outside, and she starts to give me some type of a blow job or something, and the girl whose pulse it is, the mom, comes out from behind a tree, dude, and we're right there. And she's like, what's going on? And I didn't know what to say, you know, and I felt like she kind of should have known,

Starting point is 00:55:18 you know, but I remember just saying that this girl was washing my penis. I remember saying it, and the mom looked at me like I was such an asshole for saying that. And I said it off the tip of my tongue, I thought it wasn't that bad of a thing to say. And she made us go back to the party, she's just like, you guys go back to the party. Oh, she didn't even get to enjoy it, she got rained out the first time and got fucking the flag on the plate the second time. And then some guy at school beat me up and stole her from me. No, you got your-

Starting point is 00:55:50 Because he heard she was giving blowjobs. Oh, fuck. So damn, man. Yeah, the worst feeling in the world is getting your ass kicked about a piece of pussy you didn't get. You know what I'm saying? Fuck, man. Oh, but that time was fun, man.

Starting point is 00:56:07 God, it was fun. No, I still remember my first homer, it was fucking absolutely awesome, it was a thing. I still remember her name, too, it was Anita. Oh, yeah, really? Oh, yeah. Anita is an interesting name, huh? Yeah, it was another one of those names. The Spanish lady?

Starting point is 00:56:22 No, no, she was all American purebred white trash like myself. Amen. Yeah, Anita, I could see that being, that's very much, I could see that being like also a white kind of white trash name. Blu-chu, you know it, Blu-chu, baby, then penile hitters daddy. It's a unique online service, delivers the same active ingredients as Viagra and Cialis. If you want that extra confidence when it's time for sex, when you're getting or doing sex or considering it, Blu-chu can help.

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Starting point is 00:57:21 T-H-E-O to meet up. That's right. Use promo code Theo at checkout. Just pay $5 shipping. That's blu-chu.com, promo code Theo to receive your first month for free. So then how did the music really start to pop up? When did that start to really bloom in your life, you know? When I was incarcerated the last time, all stories go back to this, sadly.

Starting point is 00:57:47 Now, were you behind bars, actually, or are you just like in a little room with a door? Well, depends. I've always wondered that. I've always wondered that. Every jail's different. They have some that are actually like barred. You prefer the bars or the door? A door.

Starting point is 00:58:00 A little more privacy. Look, you know, there's a little peep window there, you know what I mean? A little pie flap. They'll hand you food through if you're locked down or something. And do y'all have any sports groups in there? Yeah, I boxed whenever I was young and it's my love for fighting and still, like as a fight fan, a boxing fan, we had a program at one of the facilities and they had basketball courts at most of them.

Starting point is 00:58:21 But you know what I'm really good at because of Juvenile? I'm fucking forest-gumped with a ping-pong battle, Theo. Really? Dude, I could be an Olympian. It's crazy. I fucking fuck forest up. I haven't played in years. Anytime we get drunk and find a ping-pong table, I just goddamn go in there.

Starting point is 00:58:39 Pow, pow, pow, pow, pow, pow. I look like fucking the fat Serena Williams, just fucking moving, baby. Just, I can fucking play ping-pong, dude, because I wasn't good enough to get on the basketball court with all the black guys, so, you know, I just held court at the ping-pong table in Juvenile and that was my thing. But yeah, the last time I was in jail, jail, and I knew that Bailey was born while I was incarcerated. That's my daughter.

Starting point is 00:59:07 That's my oldest. You up? Yeah. I mean, it fucked with me. You know what I'm saying? It was the most first moment where I realized I couldn't be selfish, so I was like, selfish as far as like I had a reason to live outside of self, because I tell people all the time, without purpose, Jason Deford will drive him, he's a train that's destined to wreck.

Starting point is 00:59:30 Yeah. Right? It's purpose that drives me every day. It's providing for my daughter. It's making music that helps people. It's helping friends, it's building stuff bigger than myself, because I put so little value into myself, obviously, right? So at that moment, I was like, I got to do something, I can't, I don't want to be an

Starting point is 00:59:49 absent father. I had a very present father. I didn't want to be an absent father, and I was like, I need to, you know, I need to stand up and do something here, and my skill sets are still to this day utterly fucking limited. Minimum? I mean, yeah, dude, I'm not good at much. Really?

Starting point is 01:00:05 I'm good at singing songs and talking shit a little bit, and that fucking, and there it stops. You know what I'm saying? It's like, man, that is a short list. Yeah, I'm not going to win a talent show or anything like that if I had to do something other than what I do now, you know? And I was like, man, I don't, you know, music's got to be it. So I came home and started putting out mixtapes.

Starting point is 01:00:24 I tell you where I got fucking, can I ask him to pull up something, can I have a pull up something moment? Yeah. Pull up Jelly Roll 10 minute freestyle. My buddy Chad Arms recorded this, and he had a like a Sony flip camera, something I first got out, and yep, right there. And this is the second or third time we put it up, right? So this particular video was early, early to it, this was, we put this up in 16, but

Starting point is 01:00:56 I actually had it up before from in like 2000 and that's you or 90. That's me fresh out. I mean, when I say fresh out of jail, like I just got that haircut, my homeboy had just bought me that shirt. I can tell that this is very near a halfway house because that guy in the hustler shirt is always with, he's always in the background of every halfway house. Yes. No, for sure, dude.

Starting point is 01:01:21 That guy Frank or whatever his name is. I mean, I know he's not. He probably is Frank. It's my uncle T-Shirt. Is he really? I get the thing. But dude, that dude is in the background. This is like that kind of a thing for sure.

Starting point is 01:01:30 We're like, you know, I'm fresh out. The lady I was with at the time bought me a phone. This is how old this was. I referenced the phone because in the freedom of the freestyle, I'd say your baby mama loved me, been out of jail for a week and got a touchscreen. It was like a big deal to have a touchscreen phone back then, for me at least. This was like two, the first time it came out was in 2008. Let's see that shit.

Starting point is 01:01:51 Run it up. Yeah, so this is it, right? If you ever got 10 minutes to blow, it's worth watching. Dang, they like fresh out of jail with a lot to say. And we uploaded it in 2008 when I, 2000, no, my fault, 2009, when I first got home. And where does all that come from? So how do you get to this place though? I see that, you know, like your mother had issues.

Starting point is 01:02:35 She probably maybe had some type of alcoholism or something, you know, you said that she had some issues, right? Right, right. But how do you get to be this guy? You know? Hip-hop. I was just rapping everywhere I went, dude. I was in the county jail holding court, dude.

Starting point is 01:02:46 I had guards that would take me to different units to freestyle man people. Before M&M did the eight mile movie, I was living the eight mile movie, right? In jail. And dude, I had a guy named Jazz Howard shout out to Jazz Howard from Cross Tracks. He would take me to different barbershops and different projects in Nashville and bet $10,000 cash. I could outwrap any rapper in that project. So you know, the local barbershop would like send somebody to the neighborhood real quick,

Starting point is 01:03:14 shoot over there and grab such and such and such and such and such, so I'd fuck him up. I'd light his ass on fire. Grab mouse, mouse. Dude, Jazz give me a couple grand. I was like fucking yeah, like I was like in jail, back to the jail story, when I come home dad bills me out, I call dad, I say, dad, I need you to come bail me out. I said, I'm going to pay you back. They got a freestyle battle Sunday at this club.

Starting point is 01:03:38 I need to borrow $100 so I can enter it. I need you to bail me out, give me $100 and I'm going to go enter this and I'm going to win $1,000. Yeah. He didn't blink. He was like, yeah, whatever, go do it. And I had to, they had to sneak me in because I wasn't old enough to get in. It was Sunday night, Outer Limits, Eric McEnally, Joseph Herbert are running the promotional

Starting point is 01:03:55 company there. They sneak me in, I go in, win $1,000 right then, came home, showed my pops, he's like hell yeah son, I was like listen, I'm going to go back and win it again next week. They did it for 10 weeks, for nine weeks I went in there and won $1,000 every time. Two fucking story. And do you think- I lost one week out of 10. And what cost you that one week?

Starting point is 01:04:17 You know who beat me? Who was it? This is going to fuck y'all up. You ever seen my boy Cawhill on Broadway with the drums? He sits on Broadway in raps? Oh and downtown Nashville. Right downtown Nashville on Broadway, you got to go see him, he's there every weekend. He sets a drum kit up in front of merchants and he beats and he freestyles while people

Starting point is 01:04:35 are walking by, right? And he makes a living doing this. He's the dude that beat me. He's the one dude that beat me and I'm still friends with him to this day. He's on on Instagram as Broadway rapper but he's my boy and to this day he's the only one that beat me. Yeah but I went and did that. I've just always been in the rap.

Starting point is 01:04:50 So I came home from jail, uploaded this, it fucking went viral back then. We had to take it down because I have a line in there that says in my PO ask I hang dry wall. Yeah. And my PO made me take it down. She was like we're going to violate your probation, you're making a mockery of the state of Tennessee. She like scolded me and I had to take it down. So we put it up many years later but it went what they called viral back then early, early

Starting point is 01:05:13 YouTube dude when you had to go, when you could only get to YouTube from a hard computer. You know you didn't have a laptop, you could go to desktop, type in www.youtube.com. You had to get it right all the way out. Yeah all the way. They had to hit the W's on there. You know it was a thing. So what, so now you're at the spot though where you have the number five song. Yes sir.

Starting point is 01:05:33 And on the rock. Rock radio yes sir. On rock radio. Yes sir. So how do you get from where you were then to now? Like what kind of happened? Take me through some more of it. I fell in love with song writing through the process of writing raps.

Starting point is 01:05:47 I immediately, I was boxed into being a freestyle rapper and I was like I don't want to be known for that so I started writing like songs and all of my choruses were really soulful and I'd rap the verses. I had a song called, you pull up Jelly Roll Riding All Alone and I had this record called Riding All Alone and it was really slow and me and little white, first of all little white from Three Six Mafia. You probably remember, I think I had a jazz bar, Parker Sesson, Loretta, still one of my best friends to this day.

Starting point is 01:06:14 When I first came home from jail, yeah, yeah, yeah, he's Memphis as fuck too. When I first came home from jail we did a song together and Juicy J and DJ Paul ended up Three Six Mafia producing an album with me, White and the guy named Pee Peezy. But outside of the first song I put out with him I started putting out these super like soulful joints like this, maybe go to like the minute mark or something. I just want you to hear the chorus so you can kind of get a feel for where I'm coming from here. And see this was released in 2010, right, so this is, you know, fucking 12 years ago,

Starting point is 01:06:48 right? Right here. Watch this. Check this out. You can stop right there Hanson, but it's like, yeah, but it's like this, you know, 12, 13 years ago, right, because if it went to YouTube, yeah, that would be good now. That would be good now. I mean, that's good now.

Starting point is 01:07:26 Yeah. So then. I didn't realize I was singing that chorus, right? You know what I mean? Like I didn't register to me that I was singing because I wouldn't like open up and sing it. You know what I mean? Right. It's kind of like did this like talk, sing thing because I wasn't confident in my voice.

Starting point is 01:07:41 So I've kind of always knew, and this is something else I'm glad I got to show this to a platform as big as yours because the therapeutic music that I make now that's so personal has always been my approach to music. Like when you listen to that, I'm talking about doctors said, if I don't quit, quit living like this, I won't live to see 35. I just keep on smoking like fucking, I'm prepared to die. I've always wrote from that kind of dark perspective, you know? Yeah.

Starting point is 01:08:09 Because I'll listen to save me sometimes when I need to feel how sometimes I'm too busy, I notice, or too caught up to really just get my own feelings out. Right. I'll listen to save me just so somebody else can do it for me almost in a weird way. You know, a lot of times I can get them, but sometimes you can't. No, that's the beautiful thing of music, man. Yeah. Yeah.

Starting point is 01:08:32 Music is the soundtrack of the soul. And that's how I've always looked at it, just like tears are the expression of words we can't articulate. And I've looked at music as being the soundtrack to the soul. So I've always wanted to make music that would help people. That song is a great example. That song is fucking 13, 14 years old. So I always, so the transition has been very slow.

Starting point is 01:08:56 It seems like it happened quick for the unseen eye because guys are like, dude, it's crazy. You're on rock radio, which is fucking great to me, too. But the idea that like, you know, we've always leaned that way. I just didn't know I could sing five, six years ago, I started like really singing. I got drunk and went and sang, but you got to, you got to, you got to go to karaoke song. Yeah. And actually I do rockin' around the Christmas tree. I do a Christmas carol because I'm not that great of a singer and everybody likes it.

Starting point is 01:09:24 Everybody at first is like, fuck this guy, you know, queer, you know, but then like ten seconds into it, they're like, you will get a center, you know, or they're like rocking it, you know. Yeah, for sure. So it's like nobody can really super hate on a Christmas carol, so I'll play it a safe bet. Right. No, dude, it's awesome.

Starting point is 01:09:41 But what I love about that is I tell people, we all secretly have a go-to song. We sing in those moments, you know, karaoke thing. Oh, I wish mine was that smash and pumpkin song, bro. Saw you with his man, you got me lucky, want me dead. You know what, mine? No, that one's good. Mine is and has always been old-time rock and roll by Bob Singer. Just take those old records off the shit.

Starting point is 01:10:06 That ain't it, is it? Oh, that's it. That's it, for sure. Yeah. 100%. It's crazy, right? It's like the song that's stuck in every white trash human's mind forever. But you forget it's there and then it pikes its little fucking head out and you're like,

Starting point is 01:10:19 yeah, fucking, I do know that song. It'll take that long. Look, it'll help you finish cleaning the kitchen. I know that shit, bro. That will slide around in my socks. Yeah. My mom used to put on Brian Adams. She got one of those cassette tape deals where you give them $0.30 and they send you six

Starting point is 01:10:34 cassettes or whatever and then you don't pay them and they sue you, right? So we had that deal and one of them was Brian Adams, looking too much. Oh, yeah. You will see what you mean to me. There we go. Sing it to us, Steve. I can't. I can't.

Starting point is 01:10:54 But mine was old-time rock and roll. And I go out with some business guys one night that I'm working on a production deal with. It sounds like drugs. Yeah. It's fucking torturous. And we're all doing karaoke drunk. And I did Bob Seeger and somebody in the group was like, dude, you can really fucking sing. And I don't know why it's all it took for me to be like, maybe I can and I just started

Starting point is 01:11:18 singing. I started like really singing like from my ballsack then. You know, at first I was just singing from my chest and then I started singing from my ass. Yeah. That's when I was like just clenched my butt cheeks together and fucking opened my little fucking hips and just fucking, you know, to go for it. Like a hound dog.

Starting point is 01:11:35 The problem is I'm now having to learn how to sing and work backwards from there. So it's like trying to do the stable stuff. You know what I mean? Yeah. The inflections of lower stuff is like, it's so fucking hard where it's like, just take those old records off the shelf. So much fucking easier, right? Then like, I use Manzene.

Starting point is 01:11:58 Yeah. That sounds hard. Yeah. That sounds hard. I want to say this though, dude. What about the ladies? So you got married. Where'd you meet your wife at?

Starting point is 01:12:08 I don't know. Your wife has a wild story. Oh, dude, my wife is fucking the fucking best. I met her in Vegas at a show and she's be look, I'll say this beautiful lady. I've seen her a couple of times. She come in the room. She ain't looking at me. She's looking at you.

Starting point is 01:12:23 Oh, dude. You know, you can tell that wife has dialed into you. No, that's my girl, man. She, she, she's the sweetest woman on earth and I met her in Vegas and I was really down on my luck. I was living out of a van. I was fucking. Damn.

Starting point is 01:12:37 You know, literally I was living out of a conversion van. I was just like, where were you urinating it? Oh, dude, just on the side of the freeway. Same place I was shitting, you know, truck stops and, you know, we were doing 250 years. Oh, dude, flying Jays and love stay away from TAs. TAs are the fucking word. They're the trailer park of truck stops. I've been saying that, dude.

Starting point is 01:12:57 A friend of mine reached in. They had a live fishing well or something in there at one of them. Yeah. Fuck it. Only a man. Menengitis from the damn tank in there. But I will say this though, he fucking, I do remember he dropped a Laffy Taffy in that bitch and he reached in and fucking got it.

Starting point is 01:13:14 Fucking hell, fucking. Some part of that's on him, baby. You know what I'm saying, dawg? If you eating candy out of an aquarium at a truck stop, dawg, look, the Lord, he gets to do what he wants. You know? Nothing is trashier than a TA. Yeah.

Starting point is 01:13:29 If I wake up on the bus and we're at a TA, I'm just like, fuck me, man. How does this happen? Oh, yeah. I can't even open my bowels up at a damn TA, bro. But you get me over to a flying jet, you get me to a Lovs. Oh, my God. What I love about Lovs, dude, if you're using a urinal or the shitter in there, you can shit and hear somebody play buck on it right outside the door.

Starting point is 01:13:44 Oh, for sure, dude. Pilots are fucking awesome as well. Yeah, they're pretty good. The Apple Barnes or whatever they're called. I haven't been there. You get to the West Coast, they're kind of trash. But yeah, so we were like doing 200 and something shows a year. And it's like.

Starting point is 01:13:58 Wow. So you guys were on the road, man. Dude, I was opening up for everybody. I mean, I went out with the insane clown posse. The first people that ever took me in a little whiteout was a group called Twisted. They were signed to ICP at the time. Great dudes, man. Skinny puppy.

Starting point is 01:14:12 You ever go out with them? No, but I did go out with Mushroom Head, the metal band. They're fucking fire. I went out with them. Pull up a picture of them Mushroom Head. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, this is awesome.

Starting point is 01:14:22 Skinny and them. On this ICP tour one time, I was the first act of five, so I didn't have a like dressing room or nothing. And that means I went on when people were like, you know, still walking in the door and buying popcorn and stuff. Yeah, totally. That was the worst set up, worst set up ever. And this band invited me, gave me the code to their bus and they would let me use their

Starting point is 01:14:39 bus as my green room. And I'm forever grateful to Skinny and this band to this day we're friends because they were so good to me. And dude, I had a 1994 conversion band, like a Southern Comfort High Top. And this 1990 something, 95, 90, we called it Bertha. And everybody who toured with me back then has Bertha tattooed on them, shout out scary Larry and the crew. They all, Casey Stroms, they all, yeah, that's it.

Starting point is 01:15:04 That's my van. I feel like that, that white one down there with the high top. Oh no, on the left. Left, left, left. Right there. Right. The white one. Boom.

Starting point is 01:15:13 That is fucking Bertha, son. Wow. That is big Bertha to a fucking team. Did it have curtains in the windows on the inside? That might be a picture. Yes, sir, it did. Wow. That might be a picture of my van.

Starting point is 01:15:21 We hung a TV up in it, scary Larry and Casey hung up a TV. Me and Highlight would sit back there and fucking watch fucking old DVDs and stuff. That's it. That's it. Sound. Today, that'd be damn homoerotic. That's it, dude. We carried a trailer on it, so the back seat would lay down to a bed.

Starting point is 01:15:37 Kind of like a futon or something. And I lived in that motherfucker thing, yo. Like, shit, when I met my wife, I was like, I was like, come, let's smoke a blunt in the van. And she got in the van and she said, to this day, she tells Thor it gave her anxiety because it was so trashy. It, like, smelled like fucking coming cigarettes. It was like, you know, it was fucking six grand men in there.

Starting point is 01:15:54 People have been doing coming in there and doing coming in there. Coming in there, cocaine in there, fucking, I think some guys were tying their arms off. It was bad. We were struggling out there, man. It was a rough run, dude, for us. The Devil's Tug of War right there, son. Yeah, we lived in there. We called it Bertha, dude.

Starting point is 01:16:07 Everybody's got Bertha tattooed on. If you toured with me in that area, you got Bertha tattooed on you. God. Shoot, you know. Dude, that's when touring was so different. There was, before smartphones, it was just, you were just at the will of the world. Oh, dude, $50 a night is what I got paid for, like, three years straight. Like $50 a night.

Starting point is 01:16:25 We didn't have enough room to get gas and a hotel. So it was like, we just had to go fucking park at truck stops and sleep some night. You know, we were banging on merch. We were counting on hand-to-hand CDs and T-shirts and... Dude, how'd you used to do them? I'll tell you this, I used to, so I remember one day, at one point, I bought that burner, baby. Really?

Starting point is 01:16:44 I bought that three-shelf burner, bro. For the CDs. I think I was in, up near Canada and somebody run that bitch across the border, still had sweat on the outside of it. Really? You told us that CD burned at the tower, right? I bought the tower. I burned three CDs at one time.

Starting point is 01:16:56 And I burned three in there. It took about 19 minutes. I put them on a spindle. I'd hand-write on every fucking one of them. Me too. Dude. And I would sell them right off the spindle. And I'd make a title of a different title, like they were different albums or whatever.

Starting point is 01:17:07 No, for sure. We did that for fun or we'd autograph them or have the friend homie autograph some. It was just like, and we'd sell them off the spindle. Like, we wouldn't even give you a case for them, it'd just be like, right off the spindle, this is yours for $3, you know, or $5 or whatever I could... I used to do it for donations. Oh, that's a good way to do it. In hopes that somebody would give me some more money, I'd be like, look, man, I'm just

Starting point is 01:17:25 fucking... I got 40 bucks to open this show, like... Dude, I remember a lady one time in Fort Worth, Texas, came up and gave me $100. She's like, my husband just died. Really? She gave me $100. Really? For one of the CDs off the spindle?

Starting point is 01:17:37 She just gave it to me. She didn't want the album. I don't blame her. Wow. She was like, I don't really... I'm not into your art. I'm just into your hustle. I think about how many people bought the CD and never listened to it.

Starting point is 01:17:46 Oh, I think every single one. Like the guys that went ahead. I want to say thank you to everybody that bought. Sometimes I think it was a DVD, dude. I don't even know what was all that bitch, but I sold them and thank you, man. Yeah, no, for Jeff. We did it. And I was at that phase of my life when I met Bunny, and she was like, she adopted

Starting point is 01:18:04 a little pound puppy. And where'd you meet her at? Where were you guys at? We were at this bar called the Las Vegas Country Saloon on Fremont Street. There's a lot of titles in one. Yeah, it's pretty big. The Las Vegas Country Saloon and Fremont Street, and Bunny was doing high-end escort stuff.

Starting point is 01:18:21 She was a sex worker in Vegas. She was getting a lot of money. I mean, she had like a real big plush penthouse and couple cars. We had a sex worker on the podcast one time. Oh, dope. You should get Bunny on here one time. She loves to tell her story. She has a podcast.

Starting point is 01:18:34 We need to get you on her podcast, too. It's called Dumb Blonde Podcast. He just in here, Theo. I need to plug my wife. Dumb Blonde Podcast. We'll put a link, too, into it. Yeah, yeah. She's crushing, man.

Starting point is 01:18:42 And she's like, on Apple, she's always in like the top 10 on the comedy chart. She really kills. And Bunny just took me under, kind of took me under her wing and, you know, the cool. What was it about her? I think she was just, it was like a genuine thing the moment I met her. Like I just knew she was a, you could feel the genuineness from her. And she was in a very ungenuine business, right? Like, that business is slimy.

Starting point is 01:19:09 Oh, yeah. It's a lot of shucking. It's a lot of game being ran on both ends. She's running game. They're running game. It's just a lot of game happening. It's fantastic. It was just, I could just feel the authenticity in her, though.

Starting point is 01:19:21 I just like, I hate to be the cliche, like I felt that it was soulmates at sign, but I felt that for real, bubble. Like I felt that connection with her and she did, too. And how'd you convince her to do it? Because if she's living this lavish life, you know, she's living a more lavish life as a lot of those, you know, a lot of sex workers, if they get dialed in on their business and their business women as well, or business men, if they gay workers, then they get, you know, they do real well, you know?

Starting point is 01:19:49 So how'd you get her, I mean, if she stops in that van, I think, damn, this bitch smells like repossession, though. I'd be out of there, bro. Nah, dude. She was a... Damn, bro. They got ghosts of freaking people jerking off in this bitch. Damn.

Starting point is 01:20:03 If four people live in a van and I roll up in any business sense, the last thing I'm doing in that van is falling in love. The absolute last thing, I'm freaking leaving one of my legs in that bitch before I'm falling in love. I picked up a fucking stray pit bull. She said her attraction was I was clearly the saddest human she'd ever met. I swear to God, that's what she said. Hey, I'm glad another's hoped for us, because I'm the second one.

Starting point is 01:20:31 She was like, you had the saddest eyes in the room. I don't know, we just connected, man. It was like, it felt like a love story that was supposed to work. I mean, we're talking about a woman, you know, we're talking about an ex-drug dealer and an ex-prostitute get together and build what we've built together. You know, a woman who has a podcast that's crushing a big Patreon. She still does the OnlyFans thing and absolutely just fucks that and crushes that to death. And then, you know, I went on to fuck, dude, I'm sitting here talking to fucking Theo Vaughn

Starting point is 01:20:57 on a podcast that I spoke into existence two calendar years ago. Yeah. Right? I didn't know you were from the man on the moon. You just moved to Nashville, what, almost two years ago or whatever? And I was like- It has been almost a year and a half. I can't even believe you.

Starting point is 01:21:10 Yeah, it's been at least a year and a half. And I banged you immediately. I didn't know you were from the man on the moon. I was like, yo, I'm from here. Like I need to get on the cast, you know, and here I sit. It's like not just because you're hearing my story because I consider us homies. Yeah. Like you're my boy.

Starting point is 01:21:22 You know what I'm saying? Like we're just talking about some shit we talk about in the fucking green room of Zany's right now. Right? Yeah. It was funny too. It's like you can, sometimes people are like, I want to be on this and that. And sometimes it just works out how it works out.

Starting point is 01:21:34 It's like sometimes you almost just have to have a time for me anyway where you feel like oh, this person is in my life, I want to talk, you know, I saw you the other night at Brennan's show and I was like, man, I just seen you a few times where, you know, we'd seen each other in different places. And I'm like, man, every time that guy is just people want to be around that guy. You know, that guy just lights up the fucking room. I just love people, dude, man. Yeah.

Starting point is 01:21:59 And they love you. Oh, dude, I love them and I love you. They love you, man. But it's like who would have thought that me and Bunny's story would end up, you know, where it's at. And I think she did before I did. Yeah. I don't know why she took the fucking, you know, the fucking pound puppy in.

Starting point is 01:22:12 She was like, I think she had even the vision I didn't at the time, you know. Oh, yeah. You was drooling, dude. Yeah, I was like, homey-o and drooling yet, baby, you know what I'm saying, right? I'll tell people, I didn't pick Bunny. Bunny picked me. Yeah. She's the man in this situation.

Starting point is 01:22:26 Yeah. For sure. I was just like, yes, I'll go out with you. Yeah. And that's just kind of how it worked. And that's awesome. Yeah. We've been together, you know, I think six years going on, seven years now.

Starting point is 01:22:36 Wow. And do you think y'all will have a child or not? I don't think so. I don't think that's something that's in our, you know, Bunny didn't have a desire to birth a child, but she always had a desire to be around children. So I think that we kind of fed each other's needs. I got custody of my daughter right when I met Bunny. Dude, you know, when somebody's four, when they grew up four and white, when somebody

Starting point is 01:22:57 says, I have custody. Yeah. The second the word custody hits the air, bro. That's the most, that was the word that I always heard growing up, bro. Yeah. No, it was like I had custody. I don't like telling this part of it. Well, I want to tell it.

Starting point is 01:23:10 I think she appreciates it now. Her mother had a battle with a heroin addiction, Bailey's mother, my daughter. And she's sober now and back in Bailey's life, which is awesome. Oh, that's amazing. But at the time it was bad. I mean, like, you know, really, really, really true addict stuff bad. So I was getting custody of Bailey at simultaneously courting Bunny, all while some other girls like in week three of being pregnant.

Starting point is 01:23:33 So it was like a really weird moment where Bunny had every reason to run and instead, she was fucking that bitch Duggar heels in and was like, let's fucking go, throw me the fastest pitch you can, big boy, and I'm going to catch it. And we immediately, you know, took that custody of Bailey. She started raising Bailey as her own to this day. Bailey calls Bunny mama and calls her mother mom. So you know, and her mother was in the same sex relationship. She's gay.

Starting point is 01:23:58 So the other girl that raised Bailey from birth is a part of it too. So Bailey's got three moms. Damn. Yeah, dude. Just fucking. That's a limit. Yeah. It's a thing, dude.

Starting point is 01:24:08 I mean, it's a big, it's a legal limit. I think a lot. A lot of things. I'm the only test officer on in the room besides Bunny because she's a little aggressive sometimes, but it's all fucking bitches and me. But it works out great. Do you have, whether it's, tell me about one of the toughest times you guys had on the road.

Starting point is 01:24:23 Was there, you guys party pretty hard, I'm sure. Was there a night where you didn't think he was going to make it any night you end up at the hospital? Yeah. I had a, because I had a night, man. It's a few years back. This is more than a few years back now, but I was like sitting there and I was so close to going to the freaking emergency room.

Starting point is 01:24:39 My heart just, just rattling baby. Just, you know, like, so like a cheerleader was shaking that bitch. Mine was coding. So it was the opposite. Damn. It was going so slow that between breasts, I would hold my breath for a second and put my, my thumb up to my throat or behind my ear to see if I could just catch a light poop. And I was like, I thought I just drank too much cough syrup and I thought it was over.

Starting point is 01:25:06 And how much did you drink it? What was it? Dime tap? Yeah. No, no, no dude. We were doing, you know, we were getting, we were getting real active actors and, you know, we were going for, we were mixing the potions and sometimes we just get the straight pink, the codeine or, you know, just the straight, you know, what sometimes we get the purple,

Starting point is 01:25:23 but we, you know, we do, we were doing, you know, eight, 10, 12 ounces, just filling up, dropping fours and sprites every day and just getting them gone before noon. And then I'd be so low. I'd, from that fucking four ounces or six ounces or eight ounces of codeine, I would fucking do some blow to pick myself up. And then I'd take a Xanax to try to go back to sleep, you know, and that's what I tell people too. When they're like, you need to worry about your health.

Starting point is 01:25:48 I'm like, trust me, man, I'm going to live a long, longer life and y'all think I have changed my ways dramatically. When people see me out drinking a lot, they're like, you're fat and drink a lot. And I was like, I used to do eight balls of cocaine after eating codeine for breakfast and I would balance it out with Xanax. Fuck you. I was a Molotov cocktail of death. That didn't kill me.

Starting point is 01:26:06 I think a little obesity will be okay while I'm currently working to lose the weight, Karen. I'll be fucking all right. Okay. I don't need you worried about my heart. I have a cardiologist bitch. I'm fine. I'm losing weight.

Starting point is 01:26:16 You should have seen me when I was just running around like my drug of choice used to be more. You know what I'm saying? That was my drug of choice was like, what's your drug of choice? What do you got? You know what I'm saying? Fuck you. Oh, yeah. But what do you have the most of?

Starting point is 01:26:30 Dude, my favorite weed was cocaine. Yeah. That was it, dude. Yeah, for sure. They were like, damn, baby. Only person that could smell that is you. Yeah. Guess what my dad would start doing?

Starting point is 01:26:44 What's that? God rest his soul. He would get a couple drinks and then he would walk to the back of this bar and he would just be like, hey, can I just, I just need a cup and they give him a cup and they had an ice machine in the back and he'd go fill up his own cup and then get in the car and pull out his bottle from under the seat. Mix his own drink right there in the console, put his seatbelt on, drop the top on his little seat ring convertible, put his sunglasses on.

Starting point is 01:27:12 He'd have one for the road, man. He's in a damn seat ring. Yeah, dude. He had a seat ring, man. When he passed away, you know, there wasn't a lot to divvy up around the family because his wife's a cunt, but what we did end up getting- I haven't met her, but I know her. Yeah.

Starting point is 01:27:31 Right. So, but what we did get was his seed ring and I gave that, well, I wasn't like I was in charge giving shit away, but as a family, we decided to give that to Scott so his son could have it who's in college or, you know what I mean, or whatever and the seed ring still around, dude. Scott's one of my response. My two brothers are super responsible. I'm not.

Starting point is 01:27:50 Scott and Roger. Roger's the oldest. Scott's the next one. So, Scott has the seed ring and Roger's just one of the Kentucky Derby stuff because he and dad used to go bet on horses together, you know, and all the stuff related to the meat business and I took the pictures of the clowns, but yeah, dude, the seed ring is still in the fucking family. Scott tinted that bitch.

Starting point is 01:28:07 Scott tuned that motherfucker up. It's nice, man. It's running. That thing's pimping. Every time I go see him down in Georgia, we'll take the seed ring out and go get a drink. Hey, come in it, bro. Make it mean something. That's it.

Starting point is 01:28:17 I'm not a pertha. I'm sad about that. I miss my van. I think I needed to go, dude. I put four transmissions in and I put 400,000 miles on it. We beat that thing to death. On the fifth transmission, I just never went back and picked it up. Yeah, dude, I remember my friend Billy Comforto, dude, who was probably the greatest gay prize

Starting point is 01:28:37 fighter that never was in any sanctioned fights. He was homosexual, but he beat people up and nobody had ever seen it. Right. It was an obscure thing. I mean, still, you see some of it, but you never saw it like this, dude, bro. And he hired some dude and then everybody gave him like 1,100 to fix this transmission that dude fucking never fixed. We went over there to pick it up finally and we opened up the hood and everything inside

Starting point is 01:29:02 of it was gone. He beat his ass, didn't he? Yeah, he did. He did, dude. And the guy thought he could punk him because he was a gay dude, you know, and Billy fucking lit him up, bro. I know some gay people that can fight. He shifted every gear inside of that dude, bro.

Starting point is 01:29:15 I know that, dude. You know, Bailey's other mother, Cheyenne, her baby mother. Gays can fight. Okay, listen, Cheyenne fights like a dude. Yeah. Bailey's other mom fights like a fucking dude. Gay women and gay men should fight each other, meet in the middle and fight. Oh, yeah, for dude.

Starting point is 01:29:31 Listen, I got my money on Cheyenne nine out of 10 times. They used to have Foxy Boxing at a strip club in Nashville and Cheyenne would show up like a ringer and just beat the brakes off people, dude. We'd show up like a chicken fight, taking bets on the side and Cheyenne would just be in there fanning fucking people out. It wouldn't be fair because these little girls would be in there bouncing with their titties, they looking all cute and Cheyenne would just come in there just fucking thunder. Just swinging from the goddamn shoulders, all hip action, dude.

Starting point is 01:29:59 Looking like fucking a karate. Oh, yeah, putting a labia in that shit. Just fucking turning into it. Yeah, she would just... Dude, we had... I remember they used to have a group called Fag Fist Fights, right? Yes. And it was a gay men group and they came to different college towns and they put Boxing

Starting point is 01:30:14 Ring at a bar and gay men would fight, you know? And they would... You'd pay $5, whatever you get in and these dudes would fight. I'd pay $1,000 for a ringside table to one of those right now. It was crazy, man. I can't believe they used to come to Hammond, Louisiana, they'd roll through probably twice a year and we'd go over there and watch it. Did the Midget Wrestlers come through too?

Starting point is 01:30:35 I always heard about that, but I never saw that kind of shit, you know? I do. We got here at the Fairgrounds every other month. It was the best. Every other month. There was no fair even, it was just a couple of Midgets out there. No, so they had this thing at the Fairground where you ran out of this place. Little people.

Starting point is 01:30:49 Dude, these fucking Midgets, dude, we're going to be politically correct now. Fuck that. They're fucking Midgets, dude. And they call themselves Midgets, called Midget Wrestling. Different ones do the old school ones, I think we'll say it, but then a lot of new... You know, if they're fancier, they won't say it. Yeah, yeah, the fancy Midgets, that makes sense. The real trashy poor Midgets are like Midgets, right?

Starting point is 01:31:08 Yeah. These were poor Midgets then. They do, but they would do double gain or backflips off the top rope. It was some shit that... A couple of them guys should have went to the WWE. Yeah. I don't know why. Yeah, well, I don't think...

Starting point is 01:31:21 Well, WWE missed that hole. They never got into smaller folks being in there. Yeah. Ray Mysterio was like the closest thing, right? Yeah. Because he was like acrobatical. I think they left the acrobatical shit to Lucha Libre Wrestling. Oh, you go down to Mexico, you see whatever, dude.

Starting point is 01:31:37 Is that where the college is at? Lucha Libre? I believe it. Yeah, Lucha Libre. The movie. I think that's what it's called. It's called Lucha Libre, yeah. That wrestling was fucking...

Starting point is 01:31:46 People were doing backflips and shit, and I think that's what the Midget Wrestling was. I think that's what it's called. They couldn't break a table. I mean, they were so small, man. You'd have to cut the table down the middle before they even got on it. Yeah. They would cheat it off the bottom. They would kind of bring it, you know, cut, saw in 3.4, 3.4 inch.

Starting point is 01:32:00 Do you know... Was there any time y'all got hijacked or anything on the road or Rob? No, we never had to deal with nothing like that. Y'all ever get paid? We got a lot of bites. We're not paid a few times, we stole some TVs out of venues and stuff. We took pictures and art and all kind of stuff. Art.

Starting point is 01:32:16 Yeah, yeah. It's just that thing above the urinal that says when there's a car, when there's a car auction. Man, he's car auction. I stole neon signs, you know what I mean? I've done all that stuff. I broke a window at a bar before, just like... Then they were like, we got insurance.

Starting point is 01:32:33 I was like, but you won't be open tomorrow, bitch. I was like fucking... Dude, what am I, friends? Can you do YouTube comedian touches neon sign? I think it's our friend Jamie Liso did this. Oh, shit. How many do they have all this stuff now? Remember when you could find, there was a nine videos and you could find it every time?

Starting point is 01:32:59 Yeah, now it should have nothing to do with it. Jamie Liso, L-I-S-S-O-W. I think it's him. Oh, there it is, right there, a comedian electrocuted on stage. I just ate three sticks and I'm still hungry. I just ate three sticks. Does he have a bag? Oh, he got to play one more second.

Starting point is 01:33:16 It looks like he's saying he's not touching it again. I'm glad I didn't hit my foot in the glass of water last night. Oh, no. He really birthed him then if he didn't try it again. That's how I know I'm a special kind of hard hitter. I would have had to have it twice to me. Yeah. For sure, I'd have been like, no fucking way.

Starting point is 01:33:43 I'd have touched more times. One first, sure. One more time, just like, let me just see. I'd be like, that ain't real. Yeah, no, I've stolen the neon sign out of a bar, though. Did they ever not pay y'all? I'm trying to think. Yeah, but it was more like shady stuff.

Starting point is 01:33:54 Well, usually you get with the agent before you can go get into the clubs. Before that, it's just weird rooms. They had a guy who would, he used to just be bringer of shows. He had to bring eight people. Right. You know, and so you get there and you don't have anybody. How did you get picked up by an agent in your business? I think you just start doing well.

Starting point is 01:34:14 You get about 10 minutes going and some manager sees you and then the manager connects you with an agent usually. Okay. And they'll tell you, because you've got to feel like that's got to be a hard business to break. Like you just got to be crushing. Where did you cut your teeth at? I cut my teeth a little bit in New Orleans and I cut them mostly honestly in LA.

Starting point is 01:34:31 I moved out there and I hadn't really performed much and I took a comedy class even. I went to a class and people always make fun of the classes and shit. I went there and the best thing about the class was I hated the class. I was like, I'm better than everybody in here, even though I wasn't. But in my head, you know, you just like, oh, I'm cool, you know. And they had, at the end of the class, you got to get on stage and perform. That was the graduation. So you were in front of a full room and you got a three minute tape.

Starting point is 01:34:59 You got your tape and my tape was decent. So then you go around other places and then, you know, next, you know, it's five years later and you're, you know, starting to travel around and do it. And then it's 10 years later. And at that time, I think around 10 years, I thought about quitting. I moved back home for about four or five months. Really? What encouraged you to get back?

Starting point is 01:35:21 I don't know, man. I was with it. I broke up my girlfriend. I broke up. I don't know. I was at home. I was working at a Mexican restaurant bartending in a Mexican restaurant. I was not a good bartender and I broke some equipment and I fucking, I still might know

Starting point is 01:35:39 those people in the men's honestly, but I broke some damn equipment there. One of them Margarita makers, you know, that bitch. I was trying to put it back together late at night and I couldn't figure it out. And I broke that bitch and the guy, then they, you know, they were upset and I don't know at that point, I felt like there was no reason for me really to stay. I think I kind of hinged my bets on this girl kind of. So when that fell apart, I felt like I didn't know what to do and then I went back. I guess that's what happened.

Starting point is 01:36:04 Yeah. Who all did you feature for early? Oh, that's a good question, man. Uh, I featured for this one guy named Mark Lundholm and sober guy, super funny dude, but he smoked cigars, right? And we got stuck up in a Notre Dame of Michoacca, Indiana. Oh yeah, right outside of South Bend. Right outside of South Bend, man.

Starting point is 01:36:30 We even went over and saw the bar where like Rudy would sit at and sit in the seat and stuff was real cool, but we were stuck indoors. It was 30 degrees, we're stuck indoors and we're sharing a little condo or house and he smoked cigars and I was like, Hey, do you mind not smoking indoors? And he's like, I'm going to be smoking, you know, and that bitch would smoke two cigars before he'd go to sleep. I think. Yeah.

Starting point is 01:36:52 He's lighting them off each other. Yeah. Yeah. And if I'm wrong, Mark, I'm sorry, but that's just how I remembered. And, you know, then it got Tom Rhodes, who I love, who I got to have on here sometime. And when he used to smoke Marlboro Reds and he and I had to share a place in the airport one time and I remember asking him, I said, Hey, man, we might not smoke indoors.

Starting point is 01:37:09 He goes, I'm going to smoke in. I think he lit one right up there. He might have lit two up. He lit two up. I think maybe a whole one. One more question because I got asked while I got you. Yeah. Why did you probably tell it a thousand times?

Starting point is 01:37:19 What was your worst or most memorable bomb? I mean, I had one that I've told where I just kept a bomb and they didn't know that I had to come back out between each act. It was like a battle of the bands. It just moved me off in the beginning and I burned my material so fast because I hated me, but I had to keep coming back out. And it was horrible. At one point I came out with an American flag.

Starting point is 01:37:44 Like, I didn't know what to do. This has to bring unity. This land is yours. I didn't know what. I didn't have any material left. And I had to do like another probably 20 minutes, man. And the best part was towards the end, I would kind of sneak like I was going to come back out and like there's no way he's coming back out, you know?

Starting point is 01:38:04 And I would just come back out. And they would just die laughing because they couldn't believe, bro. One time I went out and sang Smooth Criminal. I didn't even fucking know the words. Half of it was Man in the Mirror. I didn't even know the fucking words. And that shit, man. Oh, but at the time, bro, in her, I felt bad even asking them to pay me.

Starting point is 01:38:36 I just wanted to leave. And it's such a dichotomy of leaving a place when you've crushed it and that feeling of bravado and I did good. Then that other feeling of leaving when you did not and still having to get to your vehicle, get to leave and you know you're going to run into people. Oh, man. And you just feel that energy. People just turned it out.

Starting point is 01:38:57 Jelly Roll Man, I appreciate the time, man. I think we covered a lot of stuff to you. You feel like we covered a lot of stuff? I love it, Dave. When you Frankenstein, I think it'll be the funniest shit ever. What is it? I don't even know. I don't know either, man.

Starting point is 01:39:15 I'm just trying to stay alive. Jamie got a damn electrocuted, bro. That sucks. That S-U-C-K-S, baby. That sucks. Dude, thank you so much. So now you're on tour. So just tell us where you're at now, you know?

Starting point is 01:39:31 Yeah, man. Here goes my shameless plug. Because you've had this on me. You've had a lot of the songs that hit. What really started to catapult you then? Let's get to that real quick. Oh, Save Me. Yeah.

Starting point is 01:39:41 Yeah, there was a lot of like, this is what I tell people, everything I did was a step on the ladder. Save Me was like skipping 10 steps on the ladder. Yeah. You know, knowing your story and hearing Save Me now, it even, it's more. Yeah, for sure. It's more understandable. Yeah, it's like I could bore you with like every little step that helped and there was

Starting point is 01:39:58 so many. Everything mattered is what I tell people. Everything you're going through right now and your career, if you're a young, up and aspiring artist, comedian or whatever, every one of those little things matter. And then there's like a small tipping point that happens, like the Malcolm Gladwell book, where shit just kind of, Save Me for Me will always be that moment of like, you know, and it's fun. I don't know how it is in your business, but it's always the shit you don't think is

Starting point is 01:40:22 going to be it. Yeah. Dude, we fucking wrote Save Me on a Sunday. We recorded Save Me on a Monday. We shot a video. No, but we wrote it Saturday, recorded it Sunday, shot the video Monday, put it out Tuesday. Wow. That's how that worked.

Starting point is 01:40:40 Didn't think twice about it. And did you know that it would be that? Did you know? Did you have an inkling? Honestly, did you have any idea? I just knew that I couldn't quit fucking with it. I just knew that it was something about it that just stirred my spirit. And I was like, I just, man, we got to go for it.

Starting point is 01:40:57 And I just, I was proud of it. I was like, to me, it was like a therapy session publicly, you know, and that was like the biggest thing for me was like just letting those emotions out in a public way was like, I don't know, some songs, I have songs, Theo, that I wrote that mean a lot to me that I'll never play anybody ever because they mean that much to me. And Save Me was one of those songs that could have been that song, but it meant even more to me. So it was like, no, this one needs to go out like, I just, I don't know, man.

Starting point is 01:41:28 I was just prepared for it to buy. I loved it so much. I didn't care what it did. If it popped or flopped, I just felt like fucking, you know, this is the last thing I'll tell you this story. People, I was talking to Travis O'Gwen from Strange Music once, we were talking about how I get thousands of emails a year of people who say or messages a year that say, your music helped me.

Starting point is 01:41:53 I overcame drug addiction. I was going to kill myself and I found your music. I was literally, I've had messages that were like, I was sitting there gun loaded listening to a playlist that was going to be the last listening of my life and found a song of yours that made me feel like, man, this is, it touched me in such a way that it changed my decision. And this is my thing. If I get 5,000 of those a year and 4,999 of them are lies, holy fuck, and you believe we saved one fucking human.

Starting point is 01:42:31 You know what I mean? Like let's just assume everybody's full of shit, but one fucking guy. Holy shit, man. You know what I mean? And to me at the end of the day, that's what saved me was about. It was like, man, what means the most to me and that's why I write the music I write is people come up to me and all, dude, such and such was fun. I love that song.

Starting point is 01:42:53 I dance to it. But when people come up to you and say, dude, we played Save Me at my cousin's funeral at Overdose and it's now his mother's favorite song and the way she copes with it. We played Smoking Section at this funeral or we played Smoking Section to commemorate this or, hey, man, this song helped me when I got out of rehab. Yeah. That shit is like fucking what this shit's about, dude. You know what I mean?

Starting point is 01:43:17 Like one of the motherfuckers like, dude, I don't just watch your podcast for humor. It was the fucking first thing I laughed at after I got out of fucking sobriety. Like that's the shit that touches the soul. You know what I mean? Yeah. A friend of mine recently told me, he said, yeah, man, if you have a story and you don't share it, it's that thing that you're afraid to share, you know, it's that scary thing, you know?

Starting point is 01:43:39 That's the connection. That's the thing that, you know, that somebody else could really be waiting to hear. You know, there's a reason why there's that magnetism of uncertainty with you, with sharing stuff sometimes. Right. And yeah, man, it's wild to have certain things can have an effect on people. I mean, there are songs I go listen to that of certain friends that passed away and I go listen to a certain song and it reminds me of them.

Starting point is 01:44:01 It reminds me of him. It reminds me of certain times in my life when I cared about certain things. It is. The power of a song is really powerful. Yeah, it'll take you back to a place in time, man. Yeah, dude, it'll take me back to that freaking, that Bon Jovi song, baby. Yes, baby. Yes, baby.

Starting point is 01:44:17 It'll take you right back to being in the front seat of that fucking car for however you felt the first time you heard it. Oh, heaven. It's also the greatest feeling on Earth is when you hear a song for the first time in the feeling you get. Yeah. I remember certain songs in my life that I heard for the first time and like it just changed everything about how I thought about things.

Starting point is 01:44:36 That's one song. Yeah. Don't Go Chasing Waterfalls by TLC, I remember. We were driving to the mall one time and that bitch came on, dude, and we fucking, we were never the same. No, for sure. I'm telling you, dude. Tim and Joey, we were never the same.

Starting point is 01:44:50 Yeah. We sang that thing. Do you have a favorite song? I got some stuff that we play on the pod sometimes by Evan Bartels. I love, he's a local singer-songwriter. I love listening to some of his stuff. Do I have a favorite song? You know what I like right now?

Starting point is 01:45:07 I listen to Dirt by Florida, Georgia line, I just really like that song. I get stuck on a song for a little while, you know? No, I like that. I've been in the country music more since I've been here, but I listen, I like, I've been listening to Juice World recently that I really like. I don't know if I have a favorite song, do you? Yeah. Well, I'm one of them weird dudes that has a top five in every category of everything.

Starting point is 01:45:27 I've got, I've got a top five comedy bit list of like what I think was the best top five comedy bits to me personally. But songwise number one, as of now, they're subject to change every now and then is Against the Wind by Bob Seeger. That song just has told my story and I feel like it's the story of who I am as a human, what I've been through as an artist and where I'm at as an artist now and I just remember the first time I heard that song and just thinking, man, this is my life and I still feel it every time I listen to it.

Starting point is 01:45:57 So you got things onto YouTube, you, and then things started to really pop from there then when Save Me came out. Yeah, man. I was just building the YouTube and you know, just building the, just putting out music. Oh yeah, with 30 something million, I mean, your spans are crazy, man. Yeah. Yeah. Save Me is at almost 100 million now.

Starting point is 01:46:13 That's insane. 97 million almost. Some of y'all want to go check it out, gang. Fuck with me and get me over the line here. Look up populations of countries right now. I want to see what country, what country is listening, what country could have entirely listened to it? Yeah, what country could have everybody wanted to know?

Starting point is 01:46:28 Let's get one down really quick. Every when I looked at it recently, it's like one-third of the American population. Yeah, that's probably about right. Let's go to, just can you go down, is there a list, is there a chart? There we go. Get that chart. Let me zoom in a little bit, daddy. Let's look at 100 million right there, 98.

Starting point is 01:46:43 There we go. Vietnam. Holy shit. Vietnam, baby. We're close to touching Egypt, dude. I need to get to the Egypt mark. You close, baby. That would be fire, dude.

Starting point is 01:46:51 And then the Philippines. They could have been over there fucking mummies and shit, banging Save Me. The Philippines, they want you, if once you hit Philippines, baby, that is magic. It's crazy that it's more than the United Kingdom. That's nuts. That's magical. Yeah, I never thought about it like that. I think about it from like football fields.

Starting point is 01:47:06 Yeah. You know what I mean? Like, that's how I just categorize things to me is, you know, how many people, how many nights could I sell out of football fields if at that rate, you know what I'm saying? It was like 30 nights or something. And now y'all are playing bigger venues, now you're touring. Yeah, I'm going to shine down later this year. Tickets actually go on sale, they're shipping on sale by the time y'all see this.

Starting point is 01:47:26 Tickets are on sale. Jelly Rolls shine down. They're fucking, they've had more number ones than any rock band in history. Wow. I can't believe I'm going out with them. It's surreal. That's amazing, bro. It's just fucking awesome.

Starting point is 01:47:36 So I'm going out with Shine Down later this year. I got a bunch of headline days, Jelly Rolls615.com, if you want to come see me, I'm sure you use the support. And we're playing a lot of festivals, dude. Amazing. That's going to be a blast, bro. People are going to love it. I got a big announcement coming for Nashville in a few weeks.

Starting point is 01:47:49 I got to figure out, but you know it, but I got to, it's... For America, for everywhere. Yeah, for sure. Not just for Nashville. No, no, no. You know, they're out now, but I'm saying we're going to announce our Nashville show. Oh, we have a big announcement about that. A big announcement about the Nashville show coming up.

Starting point is 01:48:05 It'll be, it's going to be insane. It's never thought. This ain't even something I want to say. I dreamed about this. Nope. Didn't think it'd ever happen. You know what I'm saying? It's fucking...

Starting point is 01:48:17 Didn't even dream about it, baby. I'll tell you what I dreamt. What was that song that Bon Jovi sang? One of their hits, Tim. Who's in here? We've been fighting this all day, Bezel. We can't remember the Bon Jovi. You know, I had hours to think about it even after.

Starting point is 01:48:27 And fuck, we can't remember. We both lie silently still. Is that Bon Jovi? In the data? That was poison. Okay, not them. Who was it, damn. Bad medicine?

Starting point is 01:48:35 No. Look at, look at Bon. That's my life. He... No, it was before that. He gave love a bad name? Is that a bad medicine? Let's sing a song for the...

Starting point is 01:48:43 I don't think that was it. Johnny Work. Johnny working down in the dark. Working for a man he can't afford it. Love, oh love. Oh, yes. Living on prayer? Yeah.

Starting point is 01:49:01 No, that's Aerosmith. We did. No, that's... That's living on the edge. That's living on the edge, baby. Oh, yeah. Fuck, we... No, now I'm singing.

Starting point is 01:49:09 Living on a prayer like living on the edge. Living on... No, that's living on the edge again. Living on a prayer. Shoot me. Johnny, use your work on the dark. You gotta hold on as well. You gotta hold on to what we got.

Starting point is 01:49:36 It doesn't make a difference if you make it or not. Yes, yes, yes. Got it. And then, bro, my... My babysitter. We're halfway. My babysitter played that. It was the first song I ever remember hearing.

Starting point is 01:49:47 Living on a prayer. Yes. Because I heard it with a woman. I heard it with a chick and I thought she was cute and so in my mind, that made enough glue. And so, dude, I kept on wearing her calling. Oh, you were living on a prayer by the end too, baby. Oh, bro.

Starting point is 01:50:03 I kept saying, hey, let me put your seatbelt on for you again. No, it's just, bro. We'd be driving on a seatbelt on 30 times just rubbing my hand across her chest, dude. Then hopping behind my buddy's map in the back. Y'all were sharing the maps together, dude. Oh, man. We're both headed the same direction, eh? Jelly Roll, thank you so much.

Starting point is 01:50:24 Thank you, brother. We'll put the information or people can come check you out. When does the tour start, do you know? I head out at the end of this month to do the East Coast run. I think those are all sold out, but the big shine down tour starts in the fall. I got some dates getting announced with a couple other guys that are big friends of mine. I don't know if I'm supposed to talk about it, but I will, because I don't care. I'm going out and doing some shows with Co-Wetzel, our boy.

Starting point is 01:50:42 Oh, yeah. Yeah, I'm doing some Co-Wetzel shows. Me and Co-Wetzel got a song coming out later that's really dope called Role Model, aka The Cocaine Song. Yeah, I got some shit cooking, man. It's going to be a big year for me, dude. It's surreal. We're like doing full amphitheaters all year.

Starting point is 01:50:59 It's crazy. Wow. Dude, that's amazing. Red Rocks is on sale right now. Is it really? There's only a couple thousand tickets left. We went on sale a few days ago, and there's like 1,700 tickets left. I would cry if I could hurry up and sell them just to have the piece and all I sold out,

Starting point is 01:51:14 the fucking top two most legendary venues in America. That'd be fascinating, man. Yeah, Co is unbelievable. Co is just a, I mean, he's that fuck you Texas Rock Country Southern. He's like me. You can't really label what he does anything. It's just different, you know? Yeah.

Starting point is 01:51:33 He's so real. He is, what is the word I'm looking for? It's, he's a rebel. Yeah. No, for sure, dude. It's polarizing. He's a rebel man. Yeah, he's a rebel man, dude.

Starting point is 01:51:47 He's like me. He does not give a fuck. He's one of my favorite people in music. Well, fuck him, and we'd be happy to have him in here sometime. Fuck you, but come on. No, Co, we'll have to have him in here sometime. Jelly Roll, thank you so much, man. Congratulations on all this success.

Starting point is 01:52:02 And just thanks for sharing your story, man. I can relate to certain chapters of it. And yeah, it just seems, it seems like you, what you're creating is just part of your life, man. It's cool to see. Thank you for watching, bro. Thank you for having me. I love you, man.

Starting point is 01:52:19 I mean, the world. Yeah, I love you too. Bizzle Gibbons, tour managers, thanks for stopping in. Riley Mal peaked in for you to go to, I'm sure, some type of church meetup. Yeah, for sure. And Nilo sat in today to help produce, so thank you guys so much. Dang, gang. Gang, gang.

Starting point is 01:52:32 Now I'm just floplaying on the breeze and I feel I'm falling like these leaves. I must be cornerstone. Oh, but when I reach that ground I'll share this piece of mind. I found I can feel it in my bones But it's gonna take a little time For me to set that parking brake And let myself online Shine that light on me

Starting point is 01:53:11 I'll sit and tell you my stories Shine on me And I will find a song I will sing it just for you And I've been moving way too fast On a runaway train with a heavy load of my past And these wheels that I've been riding on They want so thin that they're damn they're gone

Starting point is 01:53:48 I guess now they just weren't built to last

This Past Weekend - E385 Jelly Roll

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