Shaky Knees 2025 and IBMA's World of Bluegrass in Chattanooga couldn't be more different, but this week on The What Podcast we were at both. From Atlanta's Piedmont Park with Devo, Johnny Marr, 4 Non Blondes, Weird Al, and more, to the Red Carpet in Chattanooga with Steve Martin, Alison Brown, and the bluegrass world's biggest stars...we've got you covered.
PLUS: we sit down for an exclusive interview with Johnny Franck of Bilmuri (not Bill Murray), where he talks about festival life, Bonnaroo 2025's cancellation, rocking jorts on stage, and how his genre-bending sound fits across rock, pop, country, and metal festivals.
Listen to this episode here or watch it on YouTube. As always, subscribe to The What Podcast wherever you get podcasts for weekly updates on Bonnaroo and festival news!
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Shaky Knees 2025 vs. IBMA Chattanooga: Live from the Red Carpet + Bilmuri Interview
While it was a shaky knees event, and it was a very cool event, all of these people are
more Bonnarooo related.
And for me, this whole weekend, I feel like was a redemption from Bonnarooo because, you
know, we hardly saw any music at Bonnarooo.
This time, I saw a lot of music.
When you woke up this morning, Monday morning after three days of music, what was the song
in your head?
Welcome back to the What Podcast.
I'm Barry.
That's Russ.
We are a podcast that is primarily focused on what's right there on Russ's shirt.
Bonnarooo.
Bonnarooo.
Bonnarooo.
However, we also like to cover all kinds of different things.
And I think we're going to prove that today.
Yeah.
It's been a whirlwind of events that are not Bonnarooo this past week or so.
I have never had a week quite like this.
We joke later in the show, you'll see we interview Bill Murray.
And I joke because I think you actually made the joke originally.
We had Steve Martin with us on Thursday, not technically with us, but kind of sort of.
But we had Bill Murray, not that Bill Murray, on Saturday, which was awesome.
And we kind of made the joke that maybe, you know, who's next?
Is it going to be Chevy Chase or Jane Curtin?
I don't know.
Anyway, point of all that is the What Podcast or various conglomerations of whether you,
me, and or Brian, we were at the IBM As in Chattanooga this week.
And then you were in Atlanta Friday through Sunday for Shaky Knees.
I was there Saturday and Sunday for Shaky Knees.
I had a blast.
Do you have a good time?
I had a great time.
This has always been one of my favorites.
The lineup is always really good.
This is the first year I'm used to it being in Central Park.
They moved it to Piedmont Park.
What do you think?
It seemed like it worked out layout wise.
I thought the layout was great.
It's huge.
We heard a lot of comments from people comparing.
I heard people say they preferred, what's the other one?
Central Park?
Central Park.
Yeah, they liked it was more intimate.
This one seemed a little more commercial.
But then I heard from some actual like crew and whatnot.
They liked this one better because it was easier in and out.
I have no complaints.
I was really, really impressed with how clean it was.
And I know that's always a weird thing to talk about.
I mean, there were people walking around with garbage bags.
And I mean, I saw so many people finish like a can of beer,
or water, or whatever, and look for a guy with a bag,
and walk 20, 30, 40, 50 feet to throw something away.
That's a big deal, man.
It is.
Yeah.
It makes a difference.
It was so clean.
I loved the two-stage, the dueling sort of stages.
One show ends, and within seconds, the other one starts.
Yeah, the two main stages were kind of in one area together.
But they weren't too close because you didn't
get a lot of sound bleed.
And then the two smaller stages, Ponce and Criminal Records,
you had to kind of go up the hill.
But they were in a good spot, I think.
I think it all worked out.
Yeah.
No lines for food, drinks.
No, it was, you know, I don't think they sold out.
But I think they got real close.
And it was packed out.
But nothing was too crowded.
I mean, yeah, bathroom lines, food lines, even getting in
was a breeze.
I mean, things were expensive.
You know, a beer, 24 ounce, was $15.
I didn't buy food.
So I mean, you were going to spend some money.
But that's just reality.
When it got crowded, it was a little hard
to get up and down that hill.
Thankfully, people left a couple of aisles open.
You know, again, those are minor.
Did get dusty.
I know you just before we got on air said you felt like you
breathed in the playground.
Oh, yeah, I know.
My whole nose and throat is just stuffed up with dust.
I've been coughing up dirt ever since I got back.
It's awful.
For me, it was so cool because we ran into so many people.
And I tried to jot down some names.
Nathan, who is a listener to the show, Xander, Zach, Daniel.
Daniel actually was back in media with us.
He's a photographer.
I'm pretty sure.
I hope I have that name right, Daniel.
If I'm wrong, please forgive me.
But all these people came up and said hi.
And you had thankfully brought some stickers.
And we were able to share those.
Plus also, and this is kind of one of those weird things
to mention, but the vendors were super nice.
Right?
I mean, didn't you notice that?
They were like extremely engaging and friendly
and happy to be there.
And that makes such a difference.
Just a hello, right?
Just a hello, good morning.
How's your day going?
Have a great festival.
Makes such a difference.
But of course, then we also saw, got
to run into the villains, Tara and Kai.
Just my favorite people.
M. Jeezy, also my favorite people.
And her husband, I ran into them all the time.
And it was always hugs.
It was one of those, you turn around, like, oh, hey,
there you are in a crowd of 30,000 people.
Even Sunday, I kept running into her.
So that was cool.
And then I didn't see them, but you saw Shayna and Maddie.
And we never did see Bosco.
Yeah, no.
One guy that he said, oh, we'll look for you there,
never saw Bosco.
I'm sure he was there.
So we'll catch him next time.
But I was also overjoyed.
I got a text on Sunday morning, probably 10,
from Mitchell saying, hey, man, 12 hour shift selling popsicles
in front of the Piedmont stage.
Come see me.
And so we got to hug and howdy.
And we got to share a dirty joke or two.
He was selling popsicles and telling jokes.
Yeah, yeah, like he always does.
I ran into him and got a popsicle Sunday.
I think you had already left.
But yeah, he was working hard.
I mean, yeah, like you said, he was doing 12 hour shifts
and really didn't get a lot of time off.
So I did get to stick around and talk too long with him.
But yeah, shout out to Mitchell.
Yeah.
And I'm not going to give numbers away.
But I'll just say that the popsicle business
did well this weekend.
Yes, yes, it did.
Individually and as a business, they did very, very well.
So and I mentioned those folks, not just to give a shout out,
but I'm so thankful they all came up and said hi
and recognized and were like, don't you
do the what podcast type of?
Yeah, plus everyone else who we ran into
that we talked to for a minute and don't
remember names or anything.
But yeah, we appreciate everybody
that comes up and says hi.
I can't even begin to tell you how much that means to me.
It's like, are you kidding?
Yeah.
Yeah, you were at a couple of people like, oh, yeah,
what the wife was like, oh, my husband listens to you guys.
That's crazy.
But the main thing, and I thought about this
before we started recording this morning,
is while it was a shaky knees event
and it was a very cool event, all of these people
are more Bonnarooo related, right?
Yeah.
You know what I'm saying?
They know us because of Bonnarooo.
And when we talked, we talked about Bonnarooo.
And it's just so wild, that connection.
Yeah, and for me, this whole weekend,
I feel like was a redemption from Bonnarooo
because we hardly saw any music at Bonnarooo.
This time, I saw a lot of music.
I don't know about you, but I saw a lot of the stuff
that I wanted to see at Bonnarooo.
And it really fulfilled what we were missing from June.
When you woke up this morning, Monday morning,
after three days of music, what was the song in your head?
Well, there was one for me, and that's why.
It was Panic, which is the name of the song.
But it's The Smiths.
The refrain is hang the DJ, hang the DJ.
That Johnny Maher show, man, was awesome.
That was the first one that came to mind, was Johnny Maher.
Yeah.
There it is.
That's why I asked.
Yeah, that was probably the surprise show of the week.
That's why I brought it.
I knew it was going to be good, but it really stood out.
Absolutely.
He played so much of The Smiths, more than I expected.
Absolutely.
He crushed.
And I was just like, I went to bed singing that song,
and I woke up singing that song.
And that is, like you said, I missed him,
what, at least once, maybe twice for various reasons.
He was going to be at a couple of things.
And so I was so glad to see that.
My Don't Miss show was Devo.
And I've taken Monday off, and that's
the music that's been playing upstairs about as loud
as I can turn it up and not bring the cops.
It was so fun.
Yeah, it was so cool.
What else stood out?
For me, the big one was Four Non Blondes.
Oh, yeah, yeah.
So I was going to ask.
I was going to ask.
For those of you who've listened to the show for a long, long
time, you know that Lord Taco has several skills.
He's exceptionally good at rating PBR.
He's also really good at identifying babies.
So now I have a new identifying talent.
Were they, in fact, non-blondes?
And were there four non-blondes?
Yeah.
OK, see?
Well, there you go.
It's confirmed.
Yeah.
That was your way on your list, right?
Yeah, just because I love Linda Perry.
If you don't know the story or the song,
Four Non Blondes put out an album early 90s.
What's Up?
It's one of the most sung anthems as far as just people
like to belt it out.
And it was their big number one hit.
Linda Perry famously hated the album, didn't like the band.
They were on their way propelled into star wars.
It was a big success, right?
I know.
They were wanting more and more.
And she was like, I don't want to do this.
I don't want to be a pop star.
And she quit the band and didn't leave the industry.
But she focused more on songwriting, producing.
And throughout the 2000s, she worked with everybody.
Everybody, it seemed like, had a song that was either written
or produced by Linda Perry.
But she said on stage, she didn't really
like any of the Four Non Blondes songs that they did.
They're writing new music.
They've got a new album that they're working on.
So they played a lot of new stuff.
And they did some covers and did some old stuff.
But it was maybe not what she expected.
They did do What's Up, of course,
and the whole crowd sung.
But she's just got such a powerful voice.
When did they do it?
When in the?
They did it towards the end.
Yeah, OK.
Devo did Whip It, what, about fourth, fifth?
About the middle, yeah.
It's always interesting.
I know, right?
That was a great set.
And then Weird Al, I don't know if he stayed for Weird Al.
I saw a little bit.
And then I needed to get out of town, literally.
Was it good?
Was it what you wanted?
It was great.
Yes.
I've seen him before.
But yeah, it's always such a good show.
And of course, he's done a ton of parodies.
He's parodied Coolio and Michael Jackson and Devo.
Not really straight parody, but he's got a Devo-like song
where they all come out in jumpsuits,
kind of the same thing.
And so it was a lot of costume changes.
It was a lot of performance.
And he brought out Puddles, the clown.
Oh, nice.
He was an Atlanta legend, right?
Mm-hmm, yeah.
Yeah, and they've toured together before.
It's a good fit.
So it was a really fun show.
That's funny.
We saw a friend of the show, David Champion.
Yeah, you were there.
We saw David.
David had sent me a note on Saturday night
about the Public Enemy show.
I've seen Public Enemy.
Man, I go back to the early days,
87, 88 with those guys.
Saw them with U2 and PIL, I think I told you, in Birmingham.
So I've seen Public Enemy.
That's a great show.
That was another fun song.
Fantastic, yeah.
Saw Flavor Flav, he had the clock.
Chuck D. Yeah, they put on a great show.
Flavor Flav.
It was fun.
I mean, I have nothing bad to say.
And the weather was great.
Like I said, it was hot.
But you get a breeze every now and then.
Yeah, and there was shady areas to stay in.
Yeah, ran into a couple of people from Canada
and California, and they were talking
about how muggy and humid it was.
I was like, please.
You don't know muggy and humid.
I'm like, please.
Please.
This is pleasant.
I mean, it's hot, but this is not muggy.
Kind of going back, so what, on this show,
you're going to get our interview.
We haven't even talked about.
We got to sit down with Johnny Frank, Bill Murray.
That was a blast.
Yeah, we should clarify.
When we say Bill Murray, it's B-I-L-M-U-R-I, not the Bill
Murray, because we told several people.
He might dispute that.
He might.
But we told several people, oh, we're interviewing Bill Murray.
And they're like, holy crap, wow, really?
And it was like, well, yes, but let me explain.
He was cool.
We get into that.
He was super cool.
He's one of my favorite bands, too.
I mean, I saw them play that night, Saturday night.
And yeah, the interview was fantastic.
He was such a nice guy.
He was terrific.
Speaking of, so I mean, I was backstage in media
waiting for you in our time with Bill.
I mean, I don't mean it like that.
You got bad directions.
So I'm sitting backstage waiting to do the interview,
and Harlow and Tyler from Hey Nothing literally come
walking through the fence right next to me.
And I'm like, oh, hey, I know you people.
And we kind of hugged and howdyed.
And I did the unprofessional thing later,
because I didn't care.
I got out and did a selfie with them.
They were there to do an interview, loved those guys,
then went out and saw their set, which I thought was great.
They had a huge crowd.
They're another Atlanta group.
Yeah, I wanted to mention, yeah, they're an Atlanta group.
I wanted to mention their set too,
because I think they had a great crowd.
They had a great show, and it was really good to see.
So that Saturday, we got to see a couple of friends
of the show, right?
We saw them, and then we saw Michigander, who also was great.
Yeah, our boy Michigander.
Yeah.
You guys can go back and listen to those interviews.
But it was funny to kind of compare Bill Murray's summer
with Hey Nothing, and the fact that we just,
like within 10 minutes of each other,
we're sitting there talking about it.
The fact that you go from doing a bar to all of a sudden
you're on a summer festival stage, that was really cool.
He described it as like the hockey stick.
You're lying, just straight up.
I haven't heard it that way, that's right.
Yeah, the 10 year overnight sensation.
That's right.
But he was great.
So yeah, the whole festival was cool.
Everything just sort of, it always does, man.
It seems like things just fall into place, right?
Every time.
Yeah, just a cool event.
Back at the beginning of the year,
it was announced that the IBMA,
the International Bluegrass Music Association,
World of Bluegrass was gonna come to Chattanooga.
You know, we live in Chattanooga, we know people,
so we kind of reached out and thought
we ought to talk about that on the What Podcast.
And so we did, and we had Ken White and Randy Steele on.
Little did we know, I don't know if you thought we would,
Russ, we would get like full access like we got,
but we got access to the red carpet event.
And we did a little conversation.
Ryan Stone and I sat at a table
and had a conversation about what it was like.
Russ was on the camera there,
and we had the red carpet behind us.
We're gonna show that here in just a second,
but it was pretty cool, wasn't it, Russ?
Yeah, it was pretty amazing.
All right.
Well, let's go ahead and show that,
and then we'll come back real quick,
and we'll talk about it,
and then we'll talk about the Shaky Knees,
and we'll do our recap on our visit,
and then, you and I went down to Atlanta.
Brian kind of stayed home.
I think he might've done some...
Yeah, where was Brian?
I think he was doing IBM-A,
but he might've been watching football
and listening to Pearl Jam.
I don't know, who knows what Brian does.
Anyway, here's our visit to the IBM-A.
Here we go.
Here's our visit to the IBM-A.
Here we go.
Here we go.
Here we go.
Ryan, you ever done a red carpet event before?
No, I'm almost starstruck.
It's pretty cool, isn't it?
I mean, there are stars here, too.
Yeah, yes, there are.
I haven't seen one of them that I would consider a star.
What I consider a star and what many of you around here
would be different just because I'm ignorant to a lot of it.
But wow, how cool is this, right?
Yeah, let's set the stage real quick.
We are in the basement of the Memorial Soldiers and Sailors
Memorial Auditorium in Chattanooga, Tennessee.
It's the day three, is it?
Tuesday, Wednesday, we're on Thursday.
Now we go into the weekend.
First time we've had this event here in the city of Chattanooga.
And sorry, Glenn, I was just going to say,
the world of bluegrass is the official name.
It's the IBM-A International Bluegrass Music Association.
Already we've met Russ and I, who's on the camera.
We've met somebody from Monterey who's a promoter.
He's here looking to book some bands.
We've met Josh from Indiana, who is a performer.
I didn't know what to expect, but I didn't expect this.
I didn't either, but I want a little credit for my sedate.
Look at this guy.
Look at this guy.
I got this for a wedding like 10 years ago.
I found it in a closet.
So I feel in the sport coat would look good.
He is a pro.
You know, Barry, when this thing was announced,
we've talked about a lot of our time viewers
and listening for now, we've lost our festivals
in this town.
And we were pretty bummed about that.
And when this was first announced,
not necessarily as a replacement,
but the opportunity was there to bring this to town
from Lollywood for about 12 years.
I was looking for every reason to say,
yeah, nice try guys.
Right, like nice try.
I know what you're trying to do.
I get it, but I don't think so.
Well, of course I was wrong as per usual.
It has been such an exciting week here.
It's nonstop wall to wall bluegrass, no secret.
We're not big bluegrass guys.
That doesn't mean you can't really recognize excellence
and recognize the celebration that it is.
I mean, we're only halfway through.
By the time this hits the air, as we would once say,
this thing will be long done.
We got the award show tonight.
So we'll get into that in a minute.
A quick recap to sort of,
if you're really, really interested,
we did a show, what, two months ago?
I think you said it back in the spring.
Back in the spring with Ken White,
who is the president of the IBMA,
and Randy Steele, who is a local musician,
friend of ours, good friend of ours,
who's the guy who had the stupid idea, if you will,
I think he would agree, the crazy idea,
went to the Chattanooga Tourism and said,
why can't we have that here?
And boy, they jumped right on it.
And we spent, what, a year and a half,
two years made it happen.
Spent a while, I mean, my guess is in the end, money talks.
And we probably won the bid that way,
not to minimize the work,
but into it from the grassroots efforts of it,
because that certainly is where it started.
We'll have it for the next two years after this,
the F-26 and 27.
For sure, and if we, you can keep it going
with what they're looking for,
which so far it feels like as just a patron,
they're getting what they wanted.
I don't know, I don't have a balance sheet
or anything like that.
Right, so along those lines,
and I'm gonna ask you to go through it a little bit,
tonight, as you said, is the awards thing.
We're gonna be upstairs in the auditorium.
To give you an idea of the level of stardom,
we're not just making this up.
This isn't, you know, this isn't Ryan and Barry
playing with our next door neighbors.
The co-hosts for tonight are Steve Martin
and Allison Brown.
Performing, we expect, or is he gonna give an award?
I do even know, but Billy Strings.
I don't know, what I do know is standing right behind Russ,
turn around Russ and put the camera on that guy
right behind you.
That's Brian Sutton right there.
And he was with Billy Strings on Tuesday, oh nice.
And it was Brian Sutton and Billy Strings,
and then one other as a trio.
It wasn't a traditional Billy Strings show
on Tuesday here in Chattanooga.
And I got a last minute miracle at the show,
and I didn't know the first thing about Brian Sutton.
Basically, from everybody I could tell
from my big Billy Strings fans,
before there was Billy Strings,
as far as the virtuoso nature of his playing,
the level of singular talent he was,
Brian Sutton was the guy.
Nice.
He was the guy mopping up on everyone.
And of course, as you know, I print Wikipedia.
So, 2000 to 2016, guitarist of the year,
that's Brian Sutton.
Wow. Every year.
So he's probably used to a guy turning around
and putting a camera in his mouth.
I hope so.
He didn't punch you.
So the two of them were playing,
and I didn't know what I was looking at.
I was like, who are these guys with Billy?
And why is Billy not the center of attention?
Right.
Well, he wasn't the center of attention
because it was a divided attention show.
I just didn't know what I was like,
who is this guy?
That's funny.
Would you shut up already, man?
This guy is, he's a legend, Nicker.
That's funny, because one of the great shows
that I saw in this building was Prince,
who was with Larry Graham.
Everyone was saying, who is that?
Why do they, Prince keep wetting Larry Graham,
take the stage?
And I'm like, if you know, you know,
he's a pretty good bass player.
God, I've invented that thing.
So in that setting, I did not know.
I did not know, but I, yes.
You knew tonight.
I got my second Billy Strings show on Tuesday this week.
I missed the good one though.
The full band, the full band,
real Billy Strings experience.
Well, I mean, what I would consider,
or better, I'll say.
I miss that one, but boy, I was just as tickled
and it was such a treat to be able to,
be at such an exclusive event.
Well, let's do something I don't normally do
and let's stay on theme here for a minute.
Okay.
Tell us who were some of the nominees for tonight,
and then I wanna talk about some other stuff
that's happening this week.
Yeah, so when I was going through the list earlier,
I was just trying to find how many times
Billy Strings was on it,
because this is kind of like in the 90s,
into the 2000s, Barry Bonds in baseball,
Michael Jordan in basketball,
Wayne Gretzky in hockey.
The most valuable player are those three people
every single year.
There shouldn't even be a discussion,
but they don't do it that way.
Tonight, entertainer of the year is Billy Strings,
Alison Krauss.
Just to name a few as I'll go through,
the album of the year, Krauss has one there as well.
Billy Strings, Highway Prayers,
which is the only one I know of these,
and it's excellent,
but I would guess he's gonna win a lot of these,
not all of them.
Instrumental of the year, Billy Strings,
Eastgrass Nash,
who we in Eastnash,
Scrooge, excuse me.
I like that, Steve Martin,
the co-host of the show,
has his song, Five Days Out,
with Alison Brown.
That is up for music video of the year
and song of the year.
And it just kind of goes on and on from there.
I could bore everybody with every single one of them.
That's a little bit of star power, no doubt.
The point is,
if you're any good at bluegrass,
or you want to be,
this is a good place to be right now this week.
And if you're a fan,
and if you're a fan,
this is where you,
and this is where they are.
I mean, our downtown is,
I've talked to people with hotels,
venues, those kinds of things,
packs sold out everywhere.
I mean, so.
And it's interesting because
when I was telling some people that we were doing,
we were coming to this thing,
and we're guilty of it too.
Everyone thinks it's a festival,
that it's gonna be a big stage,
or two big stages,
and 30, 40,000 people.
But this week is about way more than that.
We met, as I said,
we met somebody from Monterey, California earlier.
He's a promoter that does a festival there,
and he's here to find bands.
What did he tell us, Russ?
He's found two that he hopes,
two maybes,
and two that he hopes don't ask.
Yeah.
Don't call us, we'll call David.
Don't make me say no.
But the point is,
is this is a place to be seen,
and to see,
and to discuss.
Think of it on a much lesser scale.
Don't, no, I'm not going nuts here.
But think of a little bit of
Austin City Limits kind of thing.
The way it's a symposium of sorts,
it's a conference of sorts,
it's meetings, it's gatherings,
it's brainstorming,
it's talent buying,
just like you were talking about.
It's a lot of stuff I've never been involved with before.
So I didn't really know what it was like either.
I started the week early on
just kind of hanging around our convention center,
and it's workshops.
It's exhausting,
the amount of things.
And I still don't know what almost any of them are.
But it's very clear very quickly
how important this event is to everybody involved.
Lots of people walking around with mandolins
and cases over their shoulders,
guitars, banjos, all over town.
It's an interesting kind of genre of music too,
because you could be the most top,
I'll make something up, top 10 in your field,
and no one is gonna recognize.
Outside of the very, very, very top.
And so that's just an interesting dynamic,
and I'll have a greater point,
other than that's probably pretty nice actually.
Well, one of the things that Billy,
in addition to performing, did
was go to keynote speaks the other day,
and in it he talked about how he was not really accepted
right away in the bluegrass arena,
because he'd show up, as he said,
with his long hair, tie-dyed t-shirt, smelling like weed.
He said, I knew I was good enough to play with him,
but I wasn't always accepted.
That was the biggest, the most wild dynamics of all this is.
And we've talked about on the show before
as with my kind of obsession
of trying to understand the Billy strings,
is that I didn't hear that,
I've heard him say versions of that,
I didn't hear his keynote on Tuesday,
but he's having trouble, or he did maybe, maybe not now,
but yeah, he's having a little bit of a pull
being accepted into the community initially,
but the jambang community cobbled him up
like it was nothing.
And that's just wild, because he is every bit
of everything that exemplifies bluegrass.
But he's a hippie-dippie jambang guy,
and that's probably maybe where
that little bit of trepidation started.
Right now, both scenes want him.
Right now, both scenes want to celebrate the guy,
and they do.
We don't get a lot of the shakedown street lot
kind of thing you would see at a big jam show.
And for the last two nights,
I've been hanging out with the Crunchy Kids
in the jam lots, and those are my people.
So it's been a thrill for me this week.
I knew I'd like it, I've had a blast.
I won't ask you to turn around,
because we'll take pictures and you can drop them in,
but this room is packed.
I thought we would be good to get 30, 40 people tonight.
What a spread over there.
They take on food.
I guess it's about 12, a band of about 12 people
up on a stage over behind us playing.
Folks keep coming in on the red carpet.
It's really, really good.
We're hoping for a Steve Martin show in here.
I don't think that that's unrealistic at all
to expect to see him any moment.
I don't know, we'll be rolling at the time that it happens,
but I certainly would enjoy that.
One thing I wanted to just quickly mention is that,
I know this, this is from the big program,
the exhaustive program from the event.
Music City Roots, who are our buddy, Todd Baio,
was involved with producing and coordinating early on.
I didn't know they had been away,
they've been dormant for a few years
and they're making their comeback.
I don't have all the details,
but I pulled the sheet out of the thing.
I was like, huh, I didn't even know
Music City Roots wasn't a thing for a little while
and it's making a comeback.
I think COVID might've did it in.
In a quick glance of summary, it appears that is true.
Tough.
But November 26th, Music City Roots is back.
So if you're interested, you can check that out.
All right, so what I think we're gonna do
is kind of hang out.
This is supposed to last another hour, I guess,
or half, 40 minutes.
Already gotten some names and phone numbers.
Maybe we can get some more.
I don't know how much we wanna follow up with this.
I'm mostly interested in talking about the sausage making,
like talking to the promoter
and maybe following up with the musician
to see how it went.
One of the things he said to us is that
he hasn't been to every single year,
but he's ever been to every single venue
about these things.
So it'd be kind of neat to get a follow up with him
to see how Chattanooga compared.
But also, I'm sorry, I was just gonna say
the only other thing is Russ and I,
Russ is leaving tomorrow.
This is Thursday night.
Russ is heading down to Atlanta for Shakenese.
I'm heading down there Saturday.
I'm gonna be there for two days.
You're probably getting out of here.
Boy, I don't know if I'm making it to Shakenese or not,
but this is a hell of a warmup band for a big time week.
And the only thing, we were talking about it last week,
but it didn't come together.
The news that came out of this festival,
not gonna make a big deal,
but Sierra Pharrell, right?
Sierra Pharrell is a pharaoh.
It's pharaoh, Sierra Pharrell.
Two days before the festival dropped out.
Now, most people don't agree with me.
I did not like this.
She's going on to play at Willie Nelson's
Bar Maid 40th anniversary this weekend.
And it's a star-studded event.
Neil Young, Bob Dylan, old event.
A lot of great artists.
She was supposed to be the headliner here.
Gonna blow it off for a cooler party?
Rubbed me the wrong way.
That's all I'm gonna say on it.
Most people said, get over yourself, dude.
It's like, well, I get over myself.
I'm talking about this is for the event, man.
I don't disagree with that.
But from my point of view,
we're getting David Rollins and Gillian Welch instead.
That's a great substitution.
But she's the top of the bill, man.
Two days, two.
A lot of people paid money to come see her.
I get it, things happen, but I don't know.
I guess something neater came along.
Oh, that's all.
Well, it was really kind of, I guess.
All right, anyway, anything else?
I think we're good for now.
We'll just hang loose if something else comes our way.
Jump back on.
But thanks for watching live.
This is live from the IVMA World of Bluegrass
in Chattanooga, Tennessee.
Carpet event, man.
Look at all that.
And it is, look at me, Bob.
It is no joke.
Yeah, so there you go.
That was cool.
I mean, I think I've done a red carpet maybe years ago
at one of the junket things,
but if I did, I was way, way in the back,
not even paying attention.
But I didn't know what to expect, but this was awesome.
I definitely have never covered a red carpet event.
And I don't think Bryan Stone has either
since he had to pull out his jacket from a 10 years
and sitting in his closet.
His jacket.
And sitting in his closet.
His jacket and his tie-dye shirt and his ball cap,
which I respect, at least he wore a jacket.
I thought it was great.
That was amazing, right?
I mean, that room was full and it was full.
If you are a Bluegrass fan, that was a place to be, right?
Yeah. Absolutely.
It was pretty cool.
A lot of names you might recognize,
the Doyle Awesons, the Steve Martins, of course,
the Allison Browns, Michael Cleveland.
You've seen Michael Cleveland on probably every YouTube clip,
whether you know it or not.
He was there.
Billy Strings was not at that event, the red carpet,
but he was there.
No, but he was all over Chattanooga and Bryan Stone
got a ticket to go see him play, what, Tuesday night,
I think.
Yeah.
One of the nights that he was here.
I ran into, I told you when I was checking in,
I was getting my credentials at Shakin' Ease
on Saturday morning, a girl who was running the Will Call
had on a Billy Strings, Chattanooga, IBMA t-shirt.
And I said, were you there?
And she said, I bartended both nights.
So, you know, pretty cool.
Small little world again, right?
It is kind of weird to have them both on the same weekend.
I mean, I know it's obviously two different separate events
run by two different people in two different locations.
Two different worlds, let's be real.
Two different worlds, yeah.
But for us, covering both, it was a little hectic.
But they announced dates for the Bluegrass Festival,
actually for the next two years,
because they've got a three year deal with Chattanooga.
And I suspect if things go well,
it'll stay in Chattanooga for as long as it works out.
But at least for the next two more years,
it's gonna be held in October, did you see that?
No, I didn't, that's nice.
So it'll be what, after Three Sisters, I guess?
Yeah, I think it'll be after Three Sisters,
which is another Bluegrass Festival here in Chattanooga
that's actually coming up this weekend.
And again, to differentiate,
Three Sisters is what I would consider a festival.
It's a big stage.
More of your traditional.
Stand in the field, and it's free, watch music.
The IBMA world of Bluegrass is all kinds of things.
It's hard to explain to people
because they're like us, they think festival,
and they think that's what it is.
So, yeah.
And then also dates-wise,
Shakin' Ease was on a weird date.
It's normally in May.
They moved the date and the location this year
into September, and from Central Park to Piedmont Park.
I think maybe Central Park
was doing construction this year.
Maybe they were redoing it.
That might have been the reason.
I don't know if you-
I did, I asked my buddy.
Wyatt moved, and he said they swap them back and forth.
For several reasons.
One, to literally let the grass grow back,
and also, they shut down the neighborhood.
I mean, there is no parking in that area.
Oh yeah, that's true.
All along the street.
Yeah, so it's in the Virginia Highlands area,
if you're familiar at all with Atlanta.
And so, that's pretty stressful on the neighbors.
You know, so they complain,
so they move it back and forth.
Okay, that makes sense.
Yeah, I think we-
Well, but date-wise,
I don't know if maybe the location wasn't available in May.
I don't know otherwise why they would have moved it
to a completely different time of the year.
Yeah, that I don't know.
I don't think that ever came up,
that I heard this weekend.
So, we'll see.
I guess they'll announce sometime
what their plan is for next year,
if it's gonna be at Piedmont Park in September, in May.
Who knows?
Yeah, and again, I was lucky.
I got to stay with my buddy.
You had a hotel.
I got a hotel.
It was convenient, right? A few miles away.
Was it too bad?
No, it was great.
In fact, when we checked into the hotel,
we ran into this lady and her son.
They were there for the festival.
You can kind of look and tell who's here for Shaky Knees.
And we were both checking in at the same time.
And then she said, well, how about we split an Uber?
We're both going to the same place.
I said, great.
So, we checked in, got ready, came downstairs.
She was like, hey, I just got an Uber.
It was only like five bucks.
Oh, sweet.
And it's gonna be here in like 10 minutes.
And we're like, okay, well, let's go sit in the bar
and wait, I'll buy you a beer since you got the Uber.
Nice.
And then, yeah, so that worked out pretty well.
Shout out to them.
They were from Jacksonville, Florida, I believe.
Wow, that's cool.
Everyone was super nice.
The whole vibe was great.
Yeah, people, hello, good morning.
It was cool.
And then like you, I've got a buddy that lives in Atlanta
and I hit him up and we had breakfast Saturday morning.
He came by the hotel and picked us up, went to breakfast.
And then we were pretty close to the park.
So he was like, I'll just drop you off right here.
Nice, yeah.
That's what my buddy did for me.
Yeah, so we did Uber a few times,
but it was, we got some rides and stuff
and got to hang out with people.
So it was worth it.
Went to the Hard Rock Cafe Sunday morning.
I think I sent you that picture there.
Went in there and got a burger and looked around
and all kinds of memorabilia.
There was Leonard Skinner's drum kit up on the wall,
mounted up there, and a letter that Buddy Holly
had written to his dad, it looked like,
that was framed on the wall.
That was kind of interesting.
It was cool, yeah.
Virginia Highlands was very walkable.
Jeff and I, my buddy, we went to,
like I think I mentioned later, an Irish pub
and had a Guinness and then walked another block
to I think Sir Hands, Thai food, which was terrific.
Yeah, just everything was cool.
No complaints.
Walked a bunch, walked everywhere.
Got in the car twice.
Looked at my steps, yeah.
But it's a different vibe from Bonnarooo,
which is a camping festival.
Once you go into Bonnarooo, you're pretty much all sealed in.
But here, the festival closes at the end of the night,
so you can go out into Atlanta and do a lot more stuff
in the city that you normally wouldn't get to do at Bonnarooo.
So there's pros and cons to both, right?
Yeah, 100%.
And I think I mentioned that later when we talk about
the Shaky Knees and the whole thing,
we ran into a lot of Bonnarooo people
and Bonnarooo came up a lot.
But the Shaky Knees vibe is completely different.
You're there just to see the show and then move on,
go do something else, which is cool.
When you're at Bonnarooo, it is cool.
I think they're both cool.
When you're at Bonnarooo though, you're not gonna step out
and go have a Guinness and Thai food though.
No, you go back to camp and you do more Bonnarooo.
Yeah.
Yeah, so just different.
But I had a blast, so glad I did it.
A lot of things happened behind the scenes for us
that I'm very excited about that won't mean anything
to you guys until something maybe manifests from it.
But just a great trip all the way around.
Super glad we did it.
Busy week between bluegrass and Shaky Knees,
completely different animals in every way.
Doing both of these in one week was a lot.
All right, so we are gonna talk a little bit more
about our trip down to Atlanta.
And then we're gonna bring in Bill Murray,
B-I-L-M-U-R-I, Bill Murray,
who we sat down with on Saturday.
So again, it was a busy week.
A great week for the What Podcast.
Yeah, and we get to find out why he chose the name
Bill Murray for his band.
He tells that story.
And I don't know, I had to bring it up.
I can't think of any other artist currently
that can rock a pair of jorts.
Johnny Frank.
Intentionally.
He was a lot of fun, he was a good dude.
Well, let's run the clip with Bill Murray
and we'll come back after that.
All right, the other night on Thursday,
Rush, you and I were with none other than Steve Martin.
Tonight we're with Bill Murray.
That's right.
I think next maybe who, Chevy Chase?
Yeah, why not, dude?
What would it be, right?
Yeah.
Man, thank you so much for doing this with us.
Oh, happy to be here, man.
Thank you so much for having me.
How is your, how's the summer been?
How's the tour been for you?
Oh, dude, it's been,
has anyone ever answered that it was horrible?
Well, Boundary was canceled,
so you could throw that in.
Well, it's been great.
It's been awesome, I was just curious
if anyone's ever been like, it sucks, dude.
Yeah, yeah.
No, no, it's been awesome.
We've been like, I've been getting really spoiled
because we've been selling out our shows in like a day.
And when a show takes like a week to sell out,
I have to like check myself and be like,
you would fucking have killed for this two years ago.
Stop bitching and like be super grateful.
And most of the time, luckily,
I am grateful for all the stuff that's been going on
and grateful that our tour is sold out.
So it's been cool.
I'm gonna let you do the Bonnarooo discussion real quick.
Well, of course, you were supposed to play which day?
Don't know.
It's kind of a blur now.
Yeah, that's right.
I know they've said some artists next year,
they're gonna get a redo,
some are being asked to come back.
Would you be open to coming back next year if they asked?
I've heard it's a great festival.
It is a great festival.
I don't know, I'm kind of in the dark about all that stuff.
Okay.
So yeah, I was just like, you know, we'll see.
But I was so bummed.
Luckily, I'd just gotten to Nashville
to shoot a music video.
So it wasn't like I went there for nothing.
Not a waste of trip.
Yeah, exactly.
So, you know, that was good.
But I think I had been on the road
for a really long time too.
So when it canceled, there was a part of me that was like,
get to go home and see my wife, which is sick.
And you know.
I was gonna ask that question
because sometimes when you're at work,
you pray for a rain out.
I was gonna ask what you did.
Normally, would you go golfing?
Would you go sleep in a hotel?
On an off day?
Yeah, or something like that.
A surprise off day.
I mean, I flew home as quick as I possibly could.
I hadn't seen my wife in like.
And where's home?
Columbus, Ohio.
So I hadn't seen her in like a couple months
or a month and a half.
So I was just like, you know, happy to do the festival.
But also if I got home a couple extra days early,
I'm like really happy about that as well.
So when I'm home and just walking the dogs
and just being a normal ass first going.
I've got a diner right across the street from my house.
So I always wake up at like seven in the morning
and go over there and hang out with all the hometown folks
and kick it, yeah.
I wanna talk about the music here in just a minute.
But you mentioned what an awesome summer it's been.
And coincidentally, you didn't get to see them.
But the guys from Hey Nothing were sitting
in this very spot 20 minutes ago.
They are the one act that we did get to see
and interview at Bonnarooo.
And they're so sweet.
But you talk about going from zero to 4,000 miles an hour
in a summer, they did it.
That's awesome.
And so, so have you.
And so, I mean, we joked, you joked about,
does anybody ever say it sucked?
But I gotta ask, what is that like?
And I mean, you know, you work so hard.
It's the, what, the 15 year overnight sensation?
Yeah, the hockey stick moment is what we call it.
It's like little, little, little.
It's been awesome, dude.
So I, when I was in high school,
my band kinda had a similar moment.
And I was so young at the time that I didn't really feel
like I got to appreciate it or do it right.
Because it was just like, you're building a building
and, you know, two months, it's gonna be shitty.
And like, I was really,
so I left that band, you know,
and it was kind of just like, all right,
well, that was cool, I guess.
And I'll never get to do it again.
So the ability to be able to experience another rise
has been awesome, like a gift from God.
And I'm genuinely like really appreciating it this time,
especially now that I'm older.
And it's like, these things are not just given to you.
These things are special.
And like, I'm very happy.
I keep a journal of like just mundane shit
that happens every day, just so that I can go back
and remember it and like, yeah, I did eat XYZ that day.
And, you know, I'm trying to really appreciate this rise
a lot more than the last one.
It is different when you've done it.
Again, the, hey, nothing, they're 20.
You know, we're talking to them and it's like,
you know, this isn't normal.
It's like going to the Superbowl your first year, right?
I think they know what a big deal it is for them.
Sure, yeah.
Yeah, I mean, everyone processes it differently for sure.
But I was just such a moron when I was in high school
that I was like, I guess this is just what happens, dude.
And, you know.
Yeah, we're gonna do this next time.
Dear diary, today I'm gonna be a star.
Yeah, exactly.
So, you know, I didn't even really like process
or think about it and never thought it would happen again.
So I'm just happy that it is.
And just riding the wave is what I call it.
And yeah.
Musically, how is that evolution?
Talk about your evolution a little bit.
Are you, and I always ask this question
because it fascinates me with songwriting.
Are you playing the music today that you heard in your head
maybe 10, 15 years ago?
Oh, definitely not.
Yeah.
No, I've very much, Bill Murray is a,
like it's a layered cake.
And every record, I feel like I add a new layer
to that thing that I'm like,
something will kind of like show up in my head of like,
all right, there's a sound that I'm hearing that's cool,
but it's all stacked on what's come before it.
So it's never like,
oh, we're gonna do something so wildly different,
at least in my head, it's not wildly different.
It's like, oh, there's a new layer
I wanna add to this, you know, cake.
And it's very much been a sound that's been built
for about a decade at this point.
So like that's, yeah, it wasn't like some moment
that just came to me in my head randomly.
It's just very like slow and steady, you know?
And then you look back and you're like,
wow, it's like just doing a little bit of improvement
over 10 years or a little bit of change
or adding onto things,
you start to really see the difference 10 years ago.
So 10 years ago, you weren't thinking,
I need to mix metal, country, pop,
and some Christian elements.
Yeah, no, no.
If we look at your journal, it's not in there.
No, no, it was like, yeah, I try to just keep my eyes
on what makes me happy and you know,
what I enjoy and what's interesting to me.
And if other people find that interesting,
we probably have quite a bit in common anyways.
So I really feel like the fans have latched on
to just what I think is interesting.
And that makes a really cool, deep relationship
between them and I.
I'm hogging the mic right now, you guys.
Well, let's just talk about the name.
Yeah.
Because I talked to a few people and I said,
oh, we're interviewing Bill Murray later.
And what, no way.
And I said,
My daughter, you could just hear her breath catch.
Yeah, I said, well, it's actually not that Bill Murray.
Hate to disappoint you,
but it's some random guy from Ohio.
Yeah.
So is that a name, was that a nickname that you had
or was it just a funny?
I remember we were just sitting in this campfire
and I had made the decision to start a band
and I was just kind of like, well, what do we name it?
And I said that, I just threw that out
and everyone kind of chuckled and I was like,
well, it's nice when you first hear a band name
to have a good interaction with it.
Yes, a good first impression.
Because most of the time you're like, what?
What's the name of it?
Yeah.
And you're like, oh, cool, I guess.
Like whatever.
Yeah, no, I love the name too.
I just wanted to create like a genuinely interesting
reaction the first time you hear it.
And then, you know, maybe have it make you want to ask
a couple of questions and go from there.
You've got it.
Yeah, you've definitely sparked a lot of interest, I think.
Yeah, that's good.
Well, and he's such a beloved guy too.
So it's, when you see it on the lineup, you just smile.
Yeah, you're like, now I'm interested.
Yeah, it's gotta be a happy thing.
That's right.
So that's also, he's got kind of that special quality
to him as well.
Yeah.
Talk about the songwriting.
You mentioned you hope other people, when they hear it,
and, you know, connect to it.
Do, who are you writing for when you write?
I feel like I've got a good grasp on what Bill Murray fans
want and a good grasp on what I want.
And I try to like find the middle ground
in between those two things.
Because it's like, at the end of the day,
like I really do make music for other people
as well as myself.
I do find the most success when I can really toe that line.
You know, and it's not like I'm,
I'm not trying to make some insane artistic statement.
I just really like want to play music and like, yeah.
I mean, like make music that people like and people enjoy
and kind of shut their brain off for an hour, you know,
and not think about whatever's going on.
Well, nothing wrong with that.
I mean, not everything has to be a deep poignant thought.
Yeah, I'm not hot enough to be an artist.
I feel like I make music that's just like,
oh, thank you, appreciate it.
I mean, anybody that can rock jorts.
That's right, yeah.
Come on now.
I feel like I've earned that one.
Come on now.
Through the Iron Palace,
I've earned the right to wear jorts.
But like, yeah, I mean, I genuinely try to,
I view music as like a self-giving thing
as much as a self-receiving thing.
And both of those are important.
And if you nail it, then you got something really special.
Yeah.
It's one of those things where I was reading,
obviously in preparation,
and it's like some people are like country and heavy metal.
And I'm like, well, it makes perfect sense.
Yeah, I mean.
Why it been done?
I know Kid Rock probably would be the closest.
Yeah, a little hip hop there too.
Yeah.
I think like, for me, it was like,
there's an artist named Hardy,
who's like a good friend of mine, just a great guy.
And he had this just one part in one song called Boots.
And it's like this country breakdown.
And I was like, well, I just wanna make a whole album
of that one part, you know, that's cool to me.
And you can tell that like, I was like,
oh, this dude's listening to metal.
Like, you can just tell, like, you know,
he's got a foot in that world.
And I just thought that was so cool.
So I was like, let's just make an album of that.
I like that sound.
I think he stumbled on a really cool sound
that I wanna explore more, so.
I mean, I'm gonna stereotype
and generalize something awful here.
But I bet if we went out in the parking lot
and found any truck, there's a Metallica CD
and there's a, you know, pick a country.
Totally.
Florida, Georgia, whatever.
Well, like what's been really interesting for me
as well as like, you know, obviously when I was real young
and we would do Warped Tour,
it's like we're playing Jackson, Mississippi.
And there's a bunch of like high school kids
who are going out and listening to heavy metal music
all day long at Warped Tour, because it's sold out.
And so I'm like, there is absolutely a group of people
who grew up listening to country
and then maybe discovered heavy music in high school
and stuff like that.
And I'm like, well, if I marry those two things,
I'm sure that those people will come out of the woodwork
and be like, oh, finally, like my two favorite things
have been added to one.
So, you know, that was also kind of something
in the back of my mind as I was working
on the record as well.
Rap, I appreciate your time again,
but I just got a couple more.
Talk a little bit about the festival,
kind of going back to, has that been a different,
is it a different audience, a different animal for you
than maybe a honky tonk or a bar or a parking lot
or whatever?
Yeah, I mean, it's wildly different.
And it's also really interesting
because every festival is different.
So it's like, you know, I'm learning,
this year is a big learning experience for me
so we never really played festivals up until this point.
So like realizing that if we're gonna go play
like a lull of blues,
and maybe we skew the set a little more pop,
or if we go and play, you know, incarceration,
which is like out of prison in Ohio
and it's all heavy metal bands,
it's like, well, we can skew it a little bit more that way.
And like, that's really what we're trying to do.
And my goal next year is I wanna play a country festival,
pop festival and a rock festival and have it not be weird.
So, you know, that's just a challenge.
Weird for who?
Yeah, well, dude, if we come out
and play a bunch of heavy metal to a country festival,
you know, people will feel uncomfortable
when I don't want that.
So like, you know, that's a goal I have in my head
and I'm like, it would be interesting
to try and take on that challenge and see,
but like every festival is wildly different.
So it's, you know, I feel like every festival
that we play is a relationship that's beginning.
And like, I learn more about that festival
and what it's like and how to like slightly adjust
what we're doing to make it better for people.
Yeah, that's one of the things we've heard.
I mean, we've done this since 2018
and festivals are a chance for a band
to get in front of a whole new audience.
You know, cause they're, they might be here
to see somebody else, but they're like, oh, hey,
you know, I'm not doing anything.
Bill Murray is a play and let's go check that out.
And, but it's interesting to hear you say
you kind of tailor a little bit to the event
cause we've asked, Bonnarooo used to get more of that.
We kind of felt like, but then we were hearing
like the bands, we've worked all year
to put our set together and it's not as easy
as just, you know, blowing it up, you know,
but you have that desire and freedom.
I'm learning.
I mean, and also too, sometimes you just don't have the time
to be able to do it.
So we're in the middle of like record mode.
So it's like, you know, I put press pause on the record
and now I'm here.
So it's like been interesting to learn how to switch gears
and do that as well.
Yeah. Cool. Yeah.
What are folks going to see tonight?
What's a shaky knees crowd going to get?
I mean, like we're, we're playing last on our stage.
So we've got an hour.
So we're just going to rip our headline set
that we're doing this summer.
And yeah, so it'll be sick though.
It's we try to, we try to like,
I don't like playing over an hour.
I know we will eventually have to, but like, I'm like, okay,
instead of doing an hour 15,
let's take the 15 most boring minutes out of the set
and just have it be an hour.
And that's really my, been my goal for the last like two,
three years is to make like the most entertaining possible
hour we possibly can.
And, you know, not add songs, but take away the weaker ones
and just keep refining it, refining it.
Just boil it down.
That's right. Yeah. Yeah.
We might have to consider that for the show.
Yeah. Why do we have our shows run that long?
We should cut our stones.
We can take the bad parts out.
Who are you?
Are you going to see somebody here?
I'm hoping to see my chemical romance.
I've been a fan of them for my whole life.
I mean, there are a lot of the reason I got into, you know,
rock music and stuff like that.
So I'm excited to see them in like the festival format.
Like, you know, I think,
I think they'll probably thrive in that format.
So yeah, it'll be sweet.
I'm very excited.
All right. Awesome.
You got any others?
That was it.
I was going to ask who you were excited to see the results
on the lineup, but yeah, my chemical romance.
Good choice.
Yeah. Yeah.
Well, I thought Russ at the beginning,
he was going to say you were at the top of all of three.
You usually have three of us.
And when we were looking at the Bonnarooo lineup, you know,
who you want to see, you were up there.
And I'm not saying that cause you're sitting here.
So when we saw you were here, it was like,
maybe we can get him to talk to us.
Yeah. Well, I'm happy to be here and excited to play.
I'm glad it's not going to get rained out.
So thank you. Yeah.
I've been dreading.
I was like, I hope there's no hurricanes.
I hope there's no storms, but yeah,
it looks like we're getting away with a perfect weekend.
That's right. So, yeah.
I'm tired of festivals getting rained out and canceled.
Yep. Absolutely.
Johnny man. Thank you so much for your time.
I appreciate you guys.
This was great. Absolutely.
Can't wait to see you tonight.
Oh, appreciate it.
It's going to be awesome.
Yeah. Thank you.
All right. So there you go with Johnny Frank.
Wasn't that fun?
Yeah. It was really cool.
I'm glad we got that one interview from Shakin' Ease.
That was really cool.
Yeah. He was a good dude.
He was very patient.
Kudos to the folks running C3, running.
I thought the event was great.
It was neat having the media tent back there.
One thing I would ask for is maybe a fan,
maybe something to move that air a little bit,
but that's been picky.
They did have snacks.
They had a snack table and obviously a lot of ice water.
That's where we're being spoiled.
Yeah. They didn't have hors d'oeuvres
like we had at the IBMA, but you know.
That's true.
I think we can get it.
That's true. That's right.
What was the prosciutto or whatever?
Yeah. The sliders.
Yeah. If we're going to compare the two.
Yeah. The bag of Doritos didn't quite compare
to the sliders and the, but anyway, it was really nice.
Like I said, I thought it was just a great event.
I loved the layout.
It was easy to get around.
It was all fantastic.
Yeah. Yeah.
Lineup was good.
Love the transition.
I really can't say that enough.
It was great to be able to just turn around
and walk from one to the next
and not have to sit around and wait.
Or miss.
I mean, there were still conflicts.
Like I missed a wet lag because of conflicts.
And I would have liked to have seen Four Non Blondes
because they were on the same time.
There's still more stuff that I wanted to see,
but when you've got such a smaller venue,
there's going to be conflicts.
You can only have, there's only so many hours
to pack all this in.
So there had to be some tough choices made.
Yeah.
I really wanted to see wet lag,
but I think Weird Al was higher on my list.
Four Non Blondes were up against somebody
that I wanted to see.
But I still saw a lot.
We saw the beaches.
Frans, that's right.
I missed Frans.
Yeah, it was great.
That was a good show.
I saw that one.
Yeah.
And that's another one that I missed.
Oh yeah, the beaches.
I forgot about that.
That was a great show.
Yeah, Bryan Stone's favorite.
Yeah.
I got to see them back in,
they were being interviewed and photographed and all that.
So anyway, it was big time event, big time fun,
whole weekend was a blast.
Got to see, like I said, my buddy,
got to run into a lot of people.
Thank you all so much for coming up and saying hello.
Thank you so much.
Mjeezy especially, I kept running into her.
She's awesome.
That was a blast.
She's super cool.
All right, well, you and I need to catch up
on our sleep, we got our steps in.
Yeah, I'm very exhausted, very sore and yeah,
ready to sleep.
So coming up, I don't know,
we might take another week off or what?
Depends on what we get, right?
We got some other stuff lined up.
Yeah.
All right guys, thanks for listening.
As always, I can't not,
I am sincere when I say to everybody
who came up and said hello, thank you.
That means the world.
It's amazing.
Yes, thank you so much.
And if you ever see any of us at a festival or concert,
please don't feel bad.
Just come up and say, hey, we love talking to everybody.
And yeah.
It's awesome.
Yeah, we'll usually have stickers to give out
or something, so.
Yeah, you gave out, oh, I meant to say that.
So when we went to the vending,
they had a take one, leave one little box.
Oh yeah.
And Savannah left a trinket
and you left a sticker of your face
and I left a sticker of the what.
And when I went back the next day,
your face was still there.
Like I kind of felt bad.
That's okay.
My face has been left a lot of places.
I don't know if it's good or bad.
Yeah.
Just teasing.
All right guys.
Bye.
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