We talked about the internet and how they feel about it in terms of connecting with the fans and helping their career. Both artists are very internet savvy and had great things to say. They feel that it is a great thing to have the ability to be so accessible to their fans as well as having their fans accessible to them. It has been a very instrumental part of their success this far. They even documented their whole tour over the summer with video journals and posted them online for their fans. The results over the internet are immediate rather than waiting for an album or DVD to be released, or for them to physically come to your town on tour. Through the internet you can reach people far sooner and make it a personal experience for them.
We talked about trying to juggle time with family along with the demands of a growing career. They said that they think of it as a big pie and each aspect of their life is a slice of it. At this point of their career they are sacrificing their time and energy to grow their career and expose themselves as much as possible to get their name out there. Right now they are missing things like just sitting down to play guitar for the sake of playing, or going to watch a friend play ball, or going to a Titans game. But they are committed to doing what it takes to become successful in their career and will do what it takes to make it work.
When they get some rare time off they enjoy sports like skiing and snowboarding. Chad enjoys off road ATV and Motorcyle riding and David is a fishing and outdoor enthusiast. But the biggest priority for them is spending time with their families. Chad has a four year old son and a 5 month old daughter and David and his wife welcomed their second child, a daughter, who joins an older brother.
I asked them what influenced their unique music style. They grew up listening to traditional country music on the radio, and both had older sisters who introduced them to rock music. They grew up during the days of heavy metal and had some gospel background thrown in as well. So all of those styles come together while they write their music. The bottom line for them is that they like good music no matter what genre it may be.
As we came to the close of the interview I asked them if there was anything fun or interesting about themselves that fans may not know. This was a fun question for them because they said that everything is already pretty much out there because of the internet access they have. As they joked around, they came up with maybe they are more sensitive than people may think since they are both parents of young children. Don't be surprised to see a tear when watching a Disney movie. They also half joked that regardless of how they may act, they are very intelligent. In any case, they had a lot of fun with the question and coming up with an answer.
They are also currently putting together a video for "Countrified" that is a compiled video of live footage onstage and backstage from their tour with Tim McGraw and Faith Hill, and this will follow up their debut video for "Daisy." On the other side of that, their radio single will be "The Devil and the Cross." They feel that this strategy will allow people to get a good spectrum of the talents of Halfway to Hazard.
In parting, they had this to say to their fans:
"You guys are amazing, and you never cease to amaze us. We'll play shows, we're a new artist and a new act, not a lot of people know who we are, but it always amazes us to see how music can touch people and people are so passionate about music. And it's great because we are passionate about the music we create and it is an amazing thing when that gets reciprocated and turned back to us. We played a show in Wisconsin this week and people sang the words to "Daisy," every word, and this always amazes us. Or we'll be at a show somewhere and people will come up and say, 'I drove 4 hours to see this or I drove 6 hours to be here' and those types of things we don't take for granted and we really appreciate all those fans out there that support country music and support what we do, and we'll continue doing what we do if they continue doing what they do and we really appreciate them."
