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Interview with Montgomery Gentry September 20, 2002 | |
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Eddie Montgomery and Troy Gentry were part of the Rock the Rackhouse concert, sponsored by Jim Beam, held in Louisville, KY. Jolene was able to attend the concert and interview them before the show. Our thanks to Troy and Eddie for taking the time to answer our questions. Here is a transcript of that interview:
Jolene HOST: Thank you for agreeing to do this interview, we appreciate it. These are all fan-generated questions from the country music forum at About.com.
Both: No problem
Jolene HOST: When you two first started out as a duo, was there ever a time that you felt like it wasn't going where you wanted it to go and you just wanted to give up on it?
Troy: Not really. I mean actually, when we first got started, the response from the radio and the fans and everything that we got far exceeded our expectations coming out. You know our music was a little different from mainstream radio at the time and between coming out and selling as many albums as we did and then we picked up three awards that year. We were astounded at the reception and everything that we were getting from our music.
Jolene HOST: Was there a point where you said YES, I'm making it! A pivotal WOW I did it?
Eddie No, not really, we love to play music. We'd wake up in the morning and say 'hey man, we get to play music today', it's great. Astonished.
Jolene HOST: Eddie, you used to tour with your brother John Michael. Do you miss that or do you sometimes you could do that again?
Eddie Well it was a lot fun with John Boy and stuff, but I always knew that I wanted to be on the front of the stage even when I was playing drums. I don't have anything against John Boy, I just wanted to be on the front of the stage.
Jolene HOST: How was it working with Charlie Daniels on the song, "All Night Long?"
Eddie Unbelievable! I mean you grow up dreaming that one of these days you get to be on a Volunteer Jam, or something you know? Especially when he's the legend he is. He's one of your heroes. And then you get the phone call that Charlie is going to sing with you, and you are going to be on a Volunteer Jam, its like, 'oh man this is unbelievable'. I mean, well, it is like winning an award.
Troy: Especially being the new artist coming to town and having that happen on your first record. You know a lot of times acts don't get to hook up with their mentors until two or three albums deep. Until they develop the relationship with them. For Charlie to come in on our first album was really, really cool of him and a real honor for us.
Jolene HOST: Is there anyone else you'd like to work with given the opportunity?
Troy: Well, we had the opportunity to work with Waylon Jennings on his live album that he did at the Ryman, which was very cool. We've done some cool stuff out on the road with some of our heroes: Skynyrd, Merle Haggard, Hank Jr. and stuff. Hopefully, eventually, and if our career lasts long enough, we hopefully anticipate that we will be able to get some of those guys in the studio with us as well.
Jolene HOST: Great, we'll be looking forward to that. When you are traveling from city to city on the bus, what are some CD's you might pop in to listen to?
Eddie Oh man, everything. I mean, Charlie to Merle to Waylon to Ozzie to Aerosmith
Troy: Motley Crue
Eddie Motley Crue.
Troy: Skynyrd.
Eddie We'll go back and listen to some 70's music. Just everything. I guess the main thing is that we listen to creative guys, male or female either one. Just people that have got great talent and we're able to say, 'man, that is unbelievable.'
Jolene HOST: Looking through your album covers and checking out the different people that write the songs you choose to do, do you look for any particular songwriter when you are looking for new material? How do you pick your new material?
Eddie We basically always, well I know me anyway, I always listen to the song first. I don't pay attention to no names, you know, and you'll start finding out that you'll see a pattern usually going. I mean Jeffery Steele has three on this album. Umm... I think Rivers has got three on this album as well. But you basically listen to the song first I think and then you go from there.
Jolene HOST: Do you have a favorite songwriter?
Troy: Yeah, we are starting to fall into a couple. Kenny Beard has had a song on all of ours at least so far. I know he had two on the last one and at least two on this one. I think it is just cause we have the same taste and stuff. This time we fell into Jeffrey Steele's songs. He started to have a knack for the kind of stuff we're doing. I think the longer a career goes on, the more writers tend to end up getting what you are about and the style of stuff you do and they'll start writing stuff for your albums. I think that pretty much goes for everybody, I think artists get locked into the same writers that get a knack for what they are doing.
Jolene HOST: There are stories about how you like to party after a show. Is it true that you will occasionally invite several fans after a show to join you?
::Laughter::
Eddie Hell yeah!
::Laughter::
Eddie It usually happens. We have the only rolling Honky Tonk on wheels thanks to Jim Beam, and our door usually stays open 24/7 so there's no telling who'll be up on there or who will come on. But they got to be 21!
Jolene HOST: If an aspiring artist came to you for advice, what would you tell them?
Eddie Just dig warm, stay true to yourself and be who you are. I think that's the main thing of the game. And just keep digging and don't just grab the first song that comes along.
Troy: That's happened to a lot of artists in the last ten or fifteen years especially the younger artists that have come to town and have never played a honky tonk or club. You know, they come to Nashville on their ability to sing, but haven't lived long enough to know who they are or what direction they want to go with themselves. And then they get wrapped up into a record label and the record label tells them 'you're going to sing this style of stuff and you're going to dress like this and you're going to wear a cowboy hat' you know, and I think that is one of the downfalls to a lot of younger artists careers. Not knowing who they are and what they want to do when they go into it at first. And fortunately for us, Columbia/Sony music let us be who we were cause we knew who we were and what we were about and everything else.
Jolene HOST: Eddie, your trademark seems to be the long coat on the stage. How did that come about?
Eddie Golly, I don't know how it came about. I just always liked them. Once I started doing it I always liked it. I used to wear dusters and stuff at Austin City all the time, I don't know. You know you get into a thing wearing dusters. I always wanted to be a fast draw guy or something. I just kind of hung with it.
Jolene HOST: Troy, who are some artists who may have influenced your musical style?
Troy: There's a bunch of them. Playing the clubs, I had to cover a lot of music and everything. Playing and everything on the country side, like Waylon Jennings, Hank Jr. Charlie Daniels, Merle Haggard, George Jones. I listened to a lot of George Jones. My dad was a big George Jones fan growing up. In high school I listened to stuff like AC/DC, Skynyrd, Aerosmith, John Cougar - a lot of different ones.
Jolene HOST: Eddie?
Eddie Pretty much the same. Country wise, growing up, I always listened to Waylon, Willy, Charlie, Merle - I listened to a lot of Merle. I listened to a lot of Skynyrd, Allman Brothers, Ozzie, anybody that had a lot of lyrics that were everyday life lyrics that felt like it was living my life I listened to. And being from a family that had a lot of musicians in it, I have a brother that likes to play guitar very, very loud I was pretty much a guitar driven kind of guy.
Jolene HOST: When y'all have time off the road, do you two socialize with your families? Or do you go about doing your own things?
Eddie Hell No!
Troy: We are very family driven when we are at home
Eddie Most definitely
Jolene HOST: Oh - No, I meant your two families, sorry.
Troy: Well we did back in the beginning when we first got started and everything, but we both still lived in Lexington within 20 or 30 miles of each other. I moved to Nashville and everything so it's harder for us to get together.
Eddie I still live in Kentucky, and he takes care of the business a lot better than I do. It gets a little hard you know, plus we are out on the road together you know a lot of days a year
Troy: We're actually together more out here on the road than we are at home with our own families.
Eddie So when we get home we try to devote all our time to family and kids and stuff
Jolene HOST: Each of you, when you first started out, seemed to be going towards a solo career. What brought you two together to form a duo, and a very successful duo at that?
Eddie It seemed like we had bigger crowds when we played together.
::Laughter::
Troy: They always say that two heads are better than one He brought his crowd and I had my crowd
Jolene HOST: You have a chemistry, it just seems to work really well...
Eddie There it is. You just answered it yourself. That is what everyone tells us. It's like we are just together. We were together so much back home, I don't know, it just happened, one of those things.
Jolene HOST: After your career took off, did you notice any big lifestyle changes? Like you couldn't just walk into a store anymore without people recognizing you?
Troy: I don't get hit that hard that often. The worst time we get hammered is at venues and fairs and stuff when Eddie and I are walking around together. You get us apart from each other and we're not as identifiable as when we are out in the crowd together.
Eddie It's funny cause I'm in my ball cap and stuff and unless I'm in my big black hat and dress up and everything. If we're apart we can usually go anywhere we want to but when we're together people go "wow" and that is just how it is.
Jolene HOST: Was recording the last album any different than it was recording the other two?
Troy: I think it was a lot easier. I think the more you do something the more comfortable and easier it gets. Then of course we had a great studio band and a producer that came in and he worked us. He got out of us what he wanted to get out of us without us feeling like we were being overworked or we were struggling to do something. Blake (Chancey) has the knack of being able to pull something out of you without you really knowing it.
Eddie He's very, very creative.
Jolene HOST: How long does it take you to come up with new album material as a rule?
Troy: It is an album to album deal. We're looking all the time
Eddie Yeah, we're looking all the time, I mean if somebody finds us a great song... Well you heard us earlier talking about someone handing us a CD at a venue...so yeah we're always listening for songs or whatever it's like hey we never slow down
Jolene HOST: Our Guide for the site, Shelly, reviewed My Town. She was wondering if you could tell us what the next single is going to be. She really liked "Scarecrow," and was hoping that would be high on the list of choices.
Eddie Well, yeah, that one is and "Lie Before You Leave" are probably right now the top two I'd say for second release
Jolene HOST: Well, I liked "Hell Yeah" a lot, but I don't think that one is going to go on the air.
::Laughter::
Troy: Well yeah, we are talking about it being the last release off the album.
Eddie We're not skeered.
::More laughter::
Jolene HOST: Well, that is really all we came up with. Thanks again for agreeing to the interview. Is there anything you would like to add for fans reading this?
Both: Yeah, tell everyone thanks and we appreciate them going out and buying our albums.
