My dad is one of my favorite human beings in the world. He's just a good person, and he could entertain a brick wall.
Thomas Rhett
I'm ever-changing and always evolving, always trying new things.
Growing up, as much as country was a big influence in my life, the Rolling Stones and the Beatles and Led Zeppelin were such a close second. My first concert ever was the Rolling Stones in Denver. I snuck a camera backstage and filmed Mick Jagger during sound-check.
I'm a normal, horrible, screwed up human being like everyone else. I mean, I'm not horrible person, but I'm just as screwed up as anybody.
Everybody besides my piano player has been with me since the very first day. We were a four-piece band for a solid two years. It was me playing acoustic and rhythm electric guitar, a bass player, a drummer and a lead guitar player. For a couple of years, we sounded like the Foo Fighters.
To record an album and stick to one specific style isn't really my thing.
I was not a very good football player. My coach hated me - I don't know why, I guess it's probably because I wasn't very talented.
I hate negativity in general. We, as artists, we pour so much into our music and put out something we believe in... it sucks that people tear you down.
My position on Speedos changes depending on the country that I'm in. If you're in Europe, it's definitely acceptable.
People tell me I'm like the country version of Justin Timberlake. Actually, the other day someone told me I was an unathletic version of Justin Timberlake, and I was like, 'I'll take that.'
It don't matter if you put 'The Dance' out, or any old George Strait song. Someone is going to think that it's awful. You gotta be able to just sit back and kind of laugh it off and know you're doing exactly what you wanna do, and if people don't like it, then it's not really my place to tell them they have to like it.
I think, for every artist, the second album is the most terrifying one to put out because it can either boost your career, and everybody can't wait until your third album, or the second one is terrible, and 'He probably hit a plateau on his first one.'
'Die a Happy Man' was one of those that, when I wrote it and sent it to my label, their response was, 'This is a career record.' I was like, 'Why do you think that?' I think the stars aligned.
There are people who will always want the genre, whatever it is, to stay traditional, to stay what it was like when you were 15 years old, but I just don't think music does that. Music is always changing and evolving, just like us as people.
If a new artist wants to put out some sort of off-the-wall, crazy deep ballad about the sun or whatever, it might be hard to get traction. It's so much easier for someone established to put out a really heartfelt, deep song and get it played in radio.
Dad told me that before I was born, he would put my mom's stomach up to the speaker and play Led Zeppelin.
Thomas Rhett Akins doesn't sound like a rock star name. I didn't leave Akins out to convince people my dad wasn't my dad. I've always been called Thomas Rhett.
I grew up listening to so many different things, and having a dad that also sang, music was innately born into me. Going through high school and college, I'd go see anyone who came to town, it didn't matter the genre.
I'm kinda not one of those people that likes to put up trophies in my house, because I don't want my mom to come be like, 'Hey, you're full of yourself.'
I rap on 'Front Porch Junkies' and 'Whatcha Got in that Cup.' I try to channel my inner Lil Wayne and Drake. It's fun to be able to freestyle over a country melody and say country words over a rap song.
I haven't always been into fitness. But I noticed that when I'd be on stage playing a show, I could hardly make it through the fifth song without having to take a breather.
I love that my fans are cool with me being lovey-dovey about my wife rather than pretending that I'm single and trying to act all sexy onstage.
I realize that I'm not a great dancer. I've given up the hip-shaking. I don't pelvic thrust anymore. Those were the beginning days of T. R. learning how to dance. But I love it, and I've taken a few choreography lessons. But other than that, I kinda just feel it, I guess.
I would love to get shredded or whatever you want to call it, but at the same time, I really enjoy treating myself to a cheat meal more than once a week. I'll eat a piece of bread, or I'll drink a beer, and I'll have fun with my friends. For me, it's really more about being healthy than it is about gaining 40 lbs. of muscle.
If you're a good person, that's all that really matters.
I'm a fun song maker. I love to make people smile. I also love to see them big, burly dudes crying because their wives' song is 'Die a Happy Man.'
We're gone for 280, almost 300 days a year. So 70 to 80 days I'm home every year. Being an artist, you just gotta be ready to miss certain things, like Halloween and all these kind of things that you used to be able to be free for. Birthdays, all this kind of stuff.
Writing songs has always been my first and foremost love, and, you know, whether I continue to have success as an artist or not, I will always write songs.
I grew up with, maybe not the best hip-hop in the world, but a lot of hip-hop. Will Smith was, like, my jam when I was, like, 9 or 10 years old.
I played in a punk rock band in high school called the High Heel Flip Flops. I was the drummer. I played drums for, like, four years.
I'm not just trying to be good at one thing and then call it a day. I want to be like Bruno Mars.
When you write a hit song, and you know it when it's done, it's one of the best feelings in the world.
When I was 12 or 13, my dad taught me a couple of different chords, and once I learned chords, I never learned to read music, but I learned tablature, like a lot of kids do, and I learned songs that had the chords I knew. It took me a long time to understand the upstroke of picking and strumming, but once I did, it all fell into place.
I played at Sony, Warner Bros., Universal, Big Machine, Capitol... after I played every one of those places, everyone offered me a record deal. I was just like, 'Who am I? Why do I even deserve this?' There are people busting their butts on Broadway doing this hardcore, playing three hours a night for tips, and I didn't even ask for it.
I'm obsessed with Bruno Mars' records. I'd give my right leg to be able to sing like that dude.
You just have to live today. And I think one of my New Year's resolutions is definitely trying to stop and live in the moment and cherish it.
I would say that all the singles that I have put out are collectively just a small piece of the artist that Thomas Rhett wants to be.
As a kid, I dreamed of being nominated for a Grammy.
I love being the dude that does what no else is doing in the genre. It's exciting and terrifying at the same time.
'Crash' is the hardest song I've ever sang in my whole life. It's the lowest in my vocal register and the highest in my register, all within 15 seconds.
I wanted to be so many different things in the beginning - I wanted to be a rocker, I wanted to be a great songwriter, I wanted to be a great melodic singer.
Any time you're nominated for anything, it's a true blessing and something you should be really excited about, but it's sort of time to not be considered new anymore because I don't really feel like I'm new. I'm just glad people still see me as fresh. I wish there was a 'fresh country artist category' rather than 'new.'
Single Record of the Year and New Vocalist were such a blessing to see, but when I saw that I was up for Album of the Year, that's when I started to be like, 'What in the world, this is crazy!' That one really got me in a pretty different way.
If you watch home videos, at 4 years old, I was doing nothing but being the entertainer. Singing 'Boot Scootin' Boogie' in the living room. Then, I guess, just by the grace of God I started writing songs, and somebody happened to like them.
It is completely a God thing that I am here today because for the first 17 years of my life, I never thought I would ever do music professionally. I'd always liked what my dad did, but I never thought that I wanted to do it, just to be different.
I wanted to be a physical therapist because I had torn up my knee and thought it was interesting with the rehab and whatever. I did kinesiology, and after the first four days of class, I dropped out because I was like, 'This ain't the class for me!'
I realized I'm a very, very white dancer.
I feel like I get a tweet every other day: 'Can Thomas Rhett's dancing get any more awkward?' Which is hilarious to me. But I like to move, what can I say?
I'm a junior, so my dad's name is Thomas Rhett Akins as well. So literally, from the day I was born, it was Thomas Rhett. It wasn't Thomas or Rhett, it was Thomas Rhett.
I try not to put myself in a box, so I'll write with anybody who wants to. I don't put limitations on my co-writes.
