Looking at you, Luke Bryan…
Today, the one and only Tim McGraw is the guest on Tracy Lawrence’s TL’s Road House podcast, where they talked about coming up together in Nashville in the ’90s and all of the good memories they have together.
Tracy also asked Tim about his songwriting process and how he puts albums together in terms of picking songs to record, because he’s had so many hits over the years. Tim explained that he still writes his own stuff, but he has a great group of writers who send him songs too, and those usually take priority:
“Well, I write. I mean, as you know, that’s how I started early on as a writer, I wrote all the time. And I still write for every record, and I have these ideas of the types of songs that I wanna write. Luckily, every now and then, one of mine makes it, and said does well.
But what happens is, I have these sounds and ideas of the songs that I wanna do and the things that I wanna say, and I start writing these songs. And I get six or seven songs, and I think, ‘Okay, these are really good. I think these will work. And then all a sudden, Tom Douglas sends me a song that has the same theme. Lori McKenna sends me a song that has the same theme, the Warren Brothers send me a song that has the same theme, and I’m like, ‘Yeah, that’s what I was trying to say.’
So then my songs move further and further down the line. But to me, look, there’s, you know, everybody can sing in this town. There’s great singers in this town. What it really boils down to is the song.”
Tracy pointed out how Tim has had so many great songs with a message, that tell a specific story and have a moral grounding to them, which is pretty hard to do and falls in line with many of the popular songs the late, great Kenny Rogers put out.
Of course, the first one that comes to mind like that in Tim’s catalog for me is “Live Like You Were Dying,” but Tim says he does try to throw in fun songs sometimes too, though they don’t always resonate the same way as he’s gotten older:
“I try to do fun songs every now and then, it’s hard the older you get to find a fun song and feel comfortable.”
Tracy added that they can feel shallow, or even like a silly little ditty, and Tim said that he just doesn’t want to be singing about “tailgates and bikinis when you’re 58 years old,” which equally as funny as it is true.
I think we’ve all heard enough songs on mainstream radio to know that there are still a lot of artists who sing about spring break and things of that nature who are well-past the age when that feels appropriate. I guess those types of songs still make money no matter what age you are, but I think the Tim McGraw model of aging those out at a certain point is smart, and the right way to do it… though he admits he’s not totally opposed to it if “the song is right”:
“You don’t feel like… you don’t wanna sing about tailgates and bikinis when you’re 58 years old. Occasionally you do if the song is right, but for me it’s like, what song is going to teach me a lesson? What song is gonna make me learn something about myself? And what song can I sing, that I interpret, that’s believable.
And that’s the hardest thing, because I’ve experimented with stuff. I’ve tried different things. I listen to all kinds of stuff, and I take things in that I like. Stuff that are new sounds, and then I’ll try to put my spin on it. And I’ve done stuff like ‘Looking For That Girl,’ and things like that are a little different and weird.
And I’m not always trying to experiment, but but I think I have a base sound, a sort of a base attitude about the kind of songs that I wanna do. I’ll throw fun ditty song in every now and then, I’ll throw a fun love song in every now and then, I’ll throw a fun cheating song in every now and then, but I’m always looking for a life affirmation song.”
Obviously, I think that’s the right strategy, but because so much of the country industry, and music industry in general, is about pushing music to young people, I think many artists who aren’t in their 20s and 30s anymore feel pressure to stay “hip” and “current” and put out songs they might not necessarily want to, honestly.
Everyone’s not Tim McGraw either, but this feels like a much more respectable strategy to me then being a creepy old guy who has college-aged kids singing about stuff like girls and tailgates, to use his words.
You can watch the podcast here:
