I asked artists Allie Colleen and Drew Ryder Smith to rendezvous at Sam Ash Music just outside of Nashville, TN to talk about music and more! Plus we play Truth or Truth and a new card deck is revealed – Country Wisdom!
Sue Bonzell 0:40
I’m here at Sam Ash music just outside of Nashville, Tennessee, and we’re going to check in with a couple of new country artists.
Well, Ali, Colleen is here, girl, how are you doing? I’m good. How are you? I’m good. Okay, new song out tattoos. Let’s tell me about the song.
Allie Colleen 1:23
I love tattoos. For years, I’ve been pitched like tattoo songs, you know what I mean. And they’re always very similar to tattoos on this town. You know, it’s something that we’ve kind of done before, or we’ve heard, especially in the country world. So I was super stoked to finally have like my tattoo song that also represents like me very well, we’ve been really excited for this one, we’ve had this one for a very long time, and weren’t really sure how to do it. And this is my first release, kind of also shoving the blame off on somebody else. So I have a really talented friend named Dom, who’s a producer in kind of the pop world, and just a big fan of a lot of the artists that he works with. And so I got with Dom and I said, What do you tackle tattoos with me? So it sounds different than anything else we’ve ever done? Yes. And we’re super, super proud of it. I wanted to tattoo songs that just made somebody feel really sexy, and really seen and just kind of had that moment for girls to just kind of cat call a guy. You know what I mean? And be like, fine. I got to have that little e next to a song of mine on the streaming stuff. A little explicit song. Oh, cool.
Sue Bonzell 2:20
I know, I heard it the first time I went.
Allie Colleen 2:23
It was more rad because as soon as it as soon as it came out, there was a couple platforms that the II wasn’t on. And I was like, we want to be cool. But we don’t want to be that cool. I said, we don’t want to land on stuff that doesn’t want explicit and it surprises somebody you know, I’ve been jamming to the song in my car for months and months and months and months. And it was very funny to get a lot of the on the day of release. A lot of the comments were man expected to loop after that 15 seconds because a lot of these women have been listening to the same 15 second loop, you know, like on Instagram being teased for months.
Those tattoos, the horses have been maybe about an hour, two hours from me all this time. So we ride them when we can and when we can. It’s like the greatest thing on the planet, but they’re about to be home. And I’m so excited. But I have Jack and Einstein, the quarter horses and just good boys. They’re just good boys. There anyone can ride them. Oh my gosh, coolest people on the planet. We’ve tried so hard to get halos and horns in the rodeo. We’re all the song of ours that we have. Because I think that’s one of the coolest group of athletes that I don’t really think it’s seen as athletes all the time including the horses, okay, no one’s no one’s saying it’s not the horse doing it, the horse is doing it and you got to stay on that thing. That’s amazing.
Sue Bonzell 3:36
Starting out, as you know, like a new country I was I don’t like to use the term New because you’re not new. Or you’ve been you’ve been a musician for many years. But tell me about some of like the struggles or some of the things and obstacles maybe you’ve hit where you’re kind of like man was expecting that and how you overcame it.
Allie Colleen 3:52
You’re not wrong and how you ask it though, because there’s new to performing which right we would both agree not new to that done it forever. Love it. But with that said, you always have new things that you learn right as your venue’s get bigger, hopefully, right, and all that kind of stuff. So we’ve learned a lot that way. But when you talk about like the industry and like really coming in, and being a part of this places of business, like we feel very new, very new, and especially in a business that’s changing every single day. But it is very cool and reassuring to know that like none of us are doing the same thing. You know, so it really is just how hard you want to work and where you want to put your eggs and really fun. It’s been really, really fun. I get to travel with some of the people that mean the absolute most to me, we’ve learned a lot about like each other, which has been very fun. We just learned that my drummer is terrified of snakes. I got to learn that so we got some ammo in our back pocket. And then we’ve got some little new freshly young kids that are way more talented than I am and it’s super awesome to get to see them do what they do and I’m excited to figure out what they’re terrified of.
Sue Bonzell 4:48
Okay, are we are we doing any pranking on the road possibly.
Allie Colleen 4:52
I don’t even like to do pranking. I just like people to know that I know what to do. If you know you just keep it in our back pocket. Hopefully never have to use it. But I’m gonna give me a snake. That’s truth
Sue Bonzell 5:02
or truth. Okay, well as you know, on my show we always play truth or truth. You played this before I have you like this game? I don’t know. Well, I haven’t handpicked any questions. This is a this is a full bag. This is like the full deck right here. You get to pick brand new folder.
Allie Colleen 5:23
What gross smell do you actually enjoy? like matchsticks? It’s kind of the same thing. Yeah, but yeah, like the soul sticks. Yeah. Sulfur of the strike. Yeah. But it’s not like eggy but yeah, whatever that is. Yeah. I like that. And then like when you open up beef jerky or potato chips, like that first mill, everyone hates it, but like, you know, you’re about to get beef jerky or potato chips.
Sue Bonzell 5:41
All right, added bonus. It’s a suprise new product. This is pretty exciting. The new deck of cards is cowboy wisdom right here. With you’re gonna like it. I already do. I think you’re gonna like the entire deck. I already do. So you’re going to pick one it’s going to have some, some common wisdom, wisdom and a special number for you.
Allie Colleen 6:00
So we’re all just full of good people. If you can’t find one be one your desire
Sue Bonzell 6:04
to change must be greater than your desire to stay and say
Allie Colleen 6:09
I like so there you go. I hate that. But I like so someone goes through there and they go there and they will order me a pizza. I was like I did not know that was included in the things are you joking? Like now from now on? I don’t want you to look anything in this room. I want to go order me a pizza right now on your dime.
Sue Bonzell 6:23
Awesome. Well, I want to thank you ally Colleen, thanks so much. Look for her news.
Allie Colleen 6:27
Always enjoy. Thank you so much.
Sue Bonzell 6:29
Look for her new song tattoos.
Well, I’m catching up with Drew Ryder Smith Drew. How’s it going? Great. How’s it going with you? Oh, fantastic. You have a new EP coming out. This is the debut. Right? This is it? Okay, I need to hear all about it.
Drew Ryder Smith 6:52
Oh, it’s a lot of hurt and dirt. Like that. And a lot of in between two. I’m really excited about this. This is my first EP that I’ve put out it’s I don’t feel like it’s one of those 30 year projects, like a lot of people say that it feels like when they put out their their first real piece of work, partly because I’ve been writing songs for so long. And I’ve been doing it for a living for so long. So I have tons of songs. But there’s a lot of new stuff on there. So I’m excited about getting it out there. I feel good about it.
Sue Bonzell 7:22
Now you got some pretty significant songwriters on this project.
Drew Ryder Smith 7:25
No, you know, it’s all guys that I’ve known for quite a while Rob Schneider is one of them knew him before he even got his first publishing deal. And now he’s got all these Luke combs here. It’s and he’s just he’s absolutely killing it. And he’s become such a good friend of mine. And we wrote x’s, which is on the EP and the guy that I’ve been producing it with Russell Jackson, he’s amazing as well. Really incredible musician. He’s one of those guys that he plays a little bit of everything really well. And, and I hate him for it. I feel the same way about my co writers. They’re they’re all so talented that we have a very love hate relationship. Oh guitar all the time. I love playing a lot of different things. I enjoy drums, but I’m terrible at drums. I love playing bass guitar. I’m terrible at it. So for me, I always just grab the guitar. But when I’m by myself, I like to noodle around with other things mandolin and stuff like that I’ve been I’ve been doing, you know, recording engineering for years now. Which is it works out great for for my stuff. Because I can you know, I can either have a room full of people or I can just be by myself and I don’t have to worry about, you know, what does this button do? And Oh man, I’ve already got, you know all that down. So that’s really helped a lot in the process of recording this and save a little bit of money too.
So you also have a course
I do. Yeah, yeah, there before we record for us. So what I’ve done is I’ve taken just the vocal and isolated it, and I’ve run it out into this old Vox amp. And then if miked it up, I can adjust it and get it to sound how I want it to and then record it back in. That’ll give me the effect that I’m looking for.
Speaker 3 9:11
Gamma battery down alone would come to beans and Madico. It just,
Drew Ryder Smith 9:21
you know, I can manipulate that even more and get it to sound really grungy by like turning up the game. Data
it’s such a nerve wracking experience going into the studio, the first, not even just the first time but the first, you know, five or six times that you’re in there because things are happening so fast. There’s so much lingo and there’s so many technical terms that you’re not familiar with. And our chances are that you’re not familiar with this
Unknown Speaker 9:58
movie I
Drew Ryder Smith 10:00
think the song is a good example of how important it is to match like the groove and the melody with what you’re trying to say in the song, it’s real, like, it’s Slinky. But it’s, you know, it’s behind the beat, like super pocketed. And it just makes it kind of sexy. Like, you can listen to the intro of the bottom of it without knowing any of the words. And just the intro is super flirty, you’re getting there, and it’s all happening really quickly. And the next thing you know, like the session is over, you’re going to the studio the whole day, and all this stuff is recorded, and you don’t know what happened. And so it’s such a blur that it’s hard to even prepare for the next time. So this course just kind of helps you get through all the growing pains of Dan, let’s talk about dogs. Oh, okay. Oh, I’ll give you
Sue Bonzell 10:53
see now I heard that you were a dog lover. Yeah. Do you have dogs?
Drew Ryder Smith 10:57
I do. Yeah, we have a little having these. And we got a big guy named. He’s a blue Weimer, Reiner. And he’s, but he’s a really good boy. And we love him to death. He’s been a lot of fun to raise. She runs everything. Oh, I got off the Weimer Reiner he’s he’s only one year old and he stands about this tall. Oh my goodness. A big boy. He’s got that rule if I fit since if he were here now he would be right in the middle.
Sue Bonzell 11:27
I would love that. Okay, next time. We’re gonna have to bring him bring him. Yeah. Dogs for sure. Getting out doing any kind of outdoor activities, kind of things we like to
Drew Ryder Smith 11:34
Well, as you can tell, I’m a picture of hell. And so no, Sue, I don’t do anything. No, it’s it’s pretty much writing rooms and studios and then off to bed and that’s it do some frisbee with a dog. I’d even get into a game of Madden. If somebody asked me.
Sue Bonzell 11:55
Okay, well, there you go.
Drew Ryder Smith 11:57
Yeah. Merle Haggard is at the top of my list.
Sue Bonzell 12:03
That’s a good topic. I
Drew Ryder Smith 12:05
thought about retiring after that. Randy Houser, Chris Colston, who is a newer artist, but he’s been he’s been out there just killing it. He was out with Hardy last year. And, of course, heart is really knocking it down. John Schneider was another one. That was a cool one. I mean, when Bo do records one of your songs, I mean, yes. That’s a cool thing. And what what people don’t understand is he is Bo Duke off camera as well. Yes. He’s very much. He’s very much. That’s that same character. That same guy, that same level of goals. everything you love about Bo, do you love about John’s? Love? That’s truth or truth? I got the real cards this time. What do you mean? The last ones were real. They were
Sue Bonzell 12:50
filled with fake cards. Yes, card is a real
Drew Ryder Smith 12:56
deal. Excellent. Do you know how many people have told about it? Really? Yeah.
Sue Bonzell 13:00
Are you ready to play truth or truths? already? You love this game? You played it? Before? Yes. A couple of months ago. And you and you won. You won the game.
Are there winners? Yes. Absolutely.
Yes. You’re winning. Okay. percent winning. Playing the game. Okay. Thank You card, any card.
Drew Ryder Smith 13:18
I’m gonna go with this guy. Okay. Oh, man. My dad is a preacher suit. Have you ever had a run in with a law? Oh. There’s been a few one time, the weekend of my father and the law one time. The Sheriff’s Department was nice enough to let him drive me to the sheriff’s department instead of them thinking I thought he would kill me on the way but But it worked out. All right. But yeah, so I say all that to say I’ve had
Sue Bonzell 13:48
more than a few. Okay. And you and you live to tell about it. You’re still here and
Drew Ryder Smith 13:53
yeah, probation is going great. I told my parole officer that I was here with you today and he was okay with that. So everything’s going really well. What is what is this CEU
Sue Bonzell 14:06
this time the cowboy wisdom cards. So we’re gonna get we’re gonna get fancy since the last time I saw it. I know. I can’t say enough. So you get to pick card it’s gonna have some lucky numbers on it. And a little quote for you look, cowboy wisdom.
Drew Ryder Smith 14:22
Friendship isn’t about who you’ve known the longest. It’s about who walked into your life and said I’m here for you. And then proved it.
Sue Bonzell 14:34
There you go. Do you have any friends like that
Drew Ryder Smith 14:35
wisdom? Not a single one.
Sue Bonzell 14:39
We can pay some people maybe I don’t know. Yeah. People in the wild without
Drew Ryder Smith 14:42
an ad or so. I have great friends. Yeah, I have I have more than a few that that would would do that and have done that. Honest to God I’m not telling you this. Here with You. You can ask anybody. I’ve told you about it. That was you were my favorite at CRS. We had so much fun.
Sue Bonzell 15:01
That was fun. Oh, that makes me feel so good.
Drew Ryder Smith 15:04
Sue broke out the cards at the bar randomly.
Sue Bonzell 15:08
I did. What everybody loves it though, because I ended up posting
Drew Ryder Smith 15:12
it and everybody loved it. I got always get the I’m gonna have to go, you know? No because they nearly get me in trouble. The last one we did was about skinny dipping though. Oops. And so I always always pick the good ones
Sue Bonzell 15:28
you do fit the good See ya never know what’s gonna get in that day.
Drew Ryder Smith 15:32
I think they’re all loaded. Sue. I really do.
Sue Bonzell 15:35
Some of them are are very deep. Very deep.
Drew Ryder Smith 15:38
Oh yeah, go into jail Pretty. Pretty deep. I mean, depending, depending on where you grew up
Sue Bonzell 15:47
in the hall, are you gonna buy anything today?
Drew Ryder Smith 15:54
No, no, I’m gonna I’m gonna exit immediately. Because I really want that. So this weekend, he and I were talking to tars and he’s like, do you see the new Elvis stuff? I saw. I haven’t seen it in person. He’s like I played it. Really? Come on, man. Thank you, sir. That’s for me. Okay. We’re gonna reference. How many are they gonna make these? Yep.
Sue Bonzell 16:18
It is really pretty. Okay, well, we got it. We got to talk about this. So this is the what’s the Elvis dove? Yeah,
Drew Ryder Smith 16:25
this is a Gibson Elvis. Have the low low
Sue Bonzell 16:29
price of 4699. But you can get it for 196 a month.
Drew Ryder Smith 16:34
Yeah, for two years. You know? About a car payment. Exactly. Or if you drink a lot of coffee.
Sue Bonzell 16:41
Oh, yeah. That actually yeah, that would kind of add up. Ah,
Drew Ryder Smith 16:45
yeah. So we’re just 30 cups of coffee a month. You can have one of these.
That’s once a day. Yes. Once a day. That’s
the trail. Okay. Oh. Because I love you too much baby.
I can’t see
what you do enemy. Winnie Jolie though
we can go this suspicious man.
We cannot do luxury. All suspicious by
Sue Bonzell 17:46
that is awesome. Yeah,
Drew Ryder Smith 17:48
I’m glad I remembered half the work.
That’s a beautiful guitar. Yeah. And it’s Elvis. So I mean, why would you not buy it? Exactly. Okay, well, there you go. We’re gonna shove it near a girl’s face.
Sue Bonzell 18:03
Well drew Ryder Smith thank you so much. Congratulations on the new EP you guys can all get it online all your socials right and streaming?
Drew Ryder Smith 18:11
Yeah, it’s everywhere. Every the guy with the tambourine he he’s even almost social. So you shouldn’t be too. Thank you, Sue. I always have a blast. So thank you. Yeah,
Sue Bonzell 18:24
we get the Tamborine
Drew Ryder Smith 18:28
See, these are the these are the type of things that are cool to see. Go ahead. Has anyone ever accidentally seen you naked? You have a gift Drew. I apparently have a gift for pulling. I really think these cards are loaded. I think they’re marked or something.
Sue Bonzell 18:45
This is the drew deck.
Drew Ryder Smith 18:47
Have you ever broken the law? So yeah, I mean,
Sue Bonzell 18:51
I don’t know. Maybe it’s your energy. It’s I
Drew Ryder Smith 18:53
don’t think that’s it. I think he got loaded cards. I’m a changed man. I don’t have that energy anymore. I don’t have the energy to
Sue Bonzell 19:02
break the law. Yeah, right. Exactly. Exactly.
Drew Ryder Smith 19:06
Maybe you should start serving donuts. You start off and that’s you get all the publicist in town.
Sue Bonzell 19:11
I think maybe you might have to be my my PR person. I
Drew Ryder Smith 19:14
think I could do that. Yeah, you can do that. Yeah.
Sue Bonzell 19:17
What kind of doughnuts should we get? Well, you
Drew Ryder Smith 19:19
get the variety variety pack. Okay,
Sue Bonzell 19:21
but should it be Krispy Kreme or the Dunkin cream? Yeah. They are the best.
Drew Ryder Smith 19:25
They are the best. I do love some Dunkin. No,
Sue Bonzell 19:28
they’re pretty good. Well, they’re donuts. They have frosting.
Drew Ryder Smith 19:30
Their doughnuts never turned down. Lacking donut you couldn’t tell
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
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