I had no idea 'Big Green Tractor' was going to be as big a hit as it was. You just can't predict those things.
Jason Aldean
Now one thing I think is really lame, is if you're an artist and you go to a karaoke bar and sing your own song. I like to get up there and sing stuff that I would never sing on stage anywhere else. Like Neil Diamond.
I got a hat deal with Resistol, where I have my own line of cowboy hats.
I'm a country boy. I'm from Georgia.
I've been wearing Wrangler jeans for more than a decade now, all the way back to when I first started playing clubs in my teens in Georgia.
There's nothing cooler than a good fitting, worn-in pair of Wrangler jeans, so it's great that with the new Retro line, my fans can go out and rock the same styles that I love.
If you say, 'I'm going to cut this song because I know the teenagers are going to love it,' well, then you're going to alienate everybody else. When I cut my record, I'm just going to cut the things that I like, and whoever likes it, likes it. That's too much work to try to figure out the demographic. That's too much like a business.
It's the only time that I'm ever nervous on stage, is when we're doing live TV. Especially an awards show, because I know you can't fix it.
When I was a kid, we went to St. Augustine, Fla., and I was lying on the couch one night with a Q-tip, cleaning my ear out after I'd taken a shower. I hit my arm on something, jabbed the Q-tip through my ear drum, busted my ear drum and couldn't get back in the water the rest of the time we were there.
The 'Night Train' has already been a crazy ride for me. We flew around making TV appearances and stadium announcements all over the country, fueled by little more than coffee and adrenaline... so many fans jumped on board with us, and I couldn't be more thankful.
My main lucky number is 9. That was my baseball number in high school. My other lucky number is 3, because that's the one I wore before I got to high school and had to pick a different one.
I don't know if Nashville will ever be ousted as the Music City. But I also think that here, over the last few years, Georgia has definitely kind of risen to the top as far as the crop of young artists coming out of this area that are kind of making waves, you know?
I'm very particular about the kind of music that I record and sing, and it would be the same way about the kind of movies that I would do.
I had a friend, Melissa, who was 28 years old. She was my best friend's wife, and she was my wife's best friend. She died of breast cancer. When she passed away back in 2004 was the last time I cried.
It'll be my luck that the worst candidate will pick up 'Fly Over States' as his election song. Then I'll be forever linked to that guy, whoever he is!
I grew up listening to all kinds of music, everything from country to rock, pop, R&B and even rap, so for me, music is music and a great song is a great song.
In the music business, especially the country music business, every 10 years or so you're going to have this changing of the guard, this wave of new artists that comes in.
I don't think I really have any wisdom. Stay out of trouble. Good luck. Stay away from women because they will burn you, haha.
We call them impact songs, and people buy impact songs. But you just never know what those songs are going to be. One of those songs that really went through the roof for us was 'Big Green Tractor,' which I thought was kind of a fun little ditty song that I never in a million years thought would be as big as it was. But it was.
I would say, 'Go ask any couple that's been married for 30, 40, 50 years... It hasn't always been roses.'
I grew up listening to everything. And rock and roll has always been a big, big part of it - as big a part of what I do as any other type of music.
'Tattoos' reminds me of where I'm from, and some of the stuff I did when I was growing up. That was one of the things that was appealing about the song when I heard it the first time.
I think every artist wants to have that 'Grammy award winner' tag in front of their name.
There are people out there who are into traditional country music and for those people you have artists like Brad Paisley and Josh Turner and Alan Jackson. Then you have artists with a progressive style of country music, like myself and Eric Church and Luke Bryan and Miranda Lambert.
I love fried okra. The fact that it's okra makes me feel like it's good for you - I forget the fact that it's fried.
People see you onstage and the glamorous side, but they don't see you traveling 600 miles a night, eating truck stop food and spending by yourself staring at walls.
Country music in the mid-'90s was a big influence on my career, and I played all the songs that are referenced in '94' back in my club days. Joe Diffie was rocking a sick mullet, and he was hotter than ever... just putting out monster hit after monster hit. It totally takes me back to those days, and it makes me smile every time I hear it.
Alabama - they were the masters of that. They could come out with 'Mountain Music' or 'Tennessee River' and then turn around and come out with 'Feels So Right.' Go out and have fun and be those guys that like to party, then turn around and make every woman in America want Randy Owen.
The worst gig story I have is from a club in Alabama that I think is still up and running, so I won't name the name of the club. We got hired in there to play, and the owner was pretty annoying. He kept coming up to me during the show and asking me to play 'Purple Rain.'
It's one of those things where if I do a movie, I don't even know if I'm any good. So, I may do one and it sucks and I'm a horrible actor, and I'll never do another one.
I love playing music. And that's what it's all about.
That's kind of fuse for the show - those first 10-15 seconds you're onstage. The curtain drops and you see the crowd for the first time and they see you for the first time. The response and the energy that's going on right there - to me, that sets the tone for the rest of the night.
But for me, I thought you made a record, you got on a bus, went out and played your shows and made a lot of money. That was the way it was supposed to go down. But there's a lot more to it than that. There are a lot of early mornings, late nights, a lot of traveling, a lot of being away from home, being away from your family.
As a new artist, you come out, and there are so many other new artists. It seems like there's a whole wave of new artists that come along every year. In '05, I was part of the crop. It was a lot harder trying to set myself apart from the rest of the pack.
I know I'm not gonna please everybody when I make a record. I don't let that affect any of my decisions.
You're not going to hear me singing songs about Wall Street because I don't know anything about that.
To me, a critic is someone who gets paid for their opinion, and they're entitled to that opinion but I don't really put a lot of stock into their opinion. I'm going to cut the kind of records and the kind of songs that I like, and the kind of things that I enjoy doing. If critics dig it, that's fine, if they don't, that's fine.
My producer, Michael Knox, he's kind of my eyes and ears on Music Row. While I'm out on the road, he's looking for songs, and then he and I will get together and go over songs.
Macon has such a rich musical history - and the state of Georgia, as well.
It feels good when your hometown supports you, and Macon's always done that with us. Every time we come here, it's an event - which is nice.
My mom was a single mom, and she had enough on her plate. I knew when I was doing something I wasn't supposed to, and I tried to keep her from finding out about it. I did a pretty good job of that.
I'm trying to get an acting gig on 'CSI' or something like that, so we'll see how that works out. I'm a singer, definitely not an actor, so I just follow directions.
You don't want to get too ahead of yourself and go out thinking you can play stadiums every night, and they end up being about half-full.
You have record companies that sign acts that they think are great, and then they never do anything. Acts that they don't think are really going to do much end up having a career. I don't think anyone really knows what it is that drives somebody to get on their computer and want to download a song.
I think from an artist standpoint, you have to put out music that you feel like represents you and things you feel like your crowd wants to hear. And if that drives them to go and download the album or the single, that's what we want.
'She's Country' obviously changed a lot of things for us and pretty much, I think, doubled our crowd size in just a few months time.
I haven't figured out why people like what they like. I don't know. I wish I did. I could sell that to everybody, man, and be a millionaire.
My golf score is really bad. I don't know. I'm definitely not a good golfer. Off the tee box, I can drive it about 275, and I'm in the fairway about 99% of the time. It's my next shot that needs work.
For every album, I look at where I'm at in my career and think of a title that kind of represents that. And for me, 'Night Train' was kind of a metaphor for where things have gone, from being on one bus with 12 other guys, pulling a trailer my first few years on the road, to now. We're out here with six or seven buses and eight or nine semis.
Records are one thing, and obviously, without hit songs, you don't have the opportunity to do your shows. But my live show has always been my selling tool.
