I'm a '90s kid, so I loved 'NSync and the Spice Girls.
With streaming services, the walls have come down a bit on genres. So I never really set out to make a country record or a pop record. I just wanted to make it mine.
I thought there was a glitch when they told me that in two or three weeks 'My Church' hit a million streams.
The art of songwriting is just stumbling your way to something really special, and you don't know what you're going to write until you are writing it. There is no formula. And, sometimes, you really have to work at it and hunker down.
I drive to clear my mind, like many people do. It's like, once you get in the car, whatever song you put on, it's so symbiotic. Your mood could change in a second.
I love dry British humor. I love to sketch in my off time. I love tequila.
I love all types of music, and I think the genre lines are starting to get thinner every year.
There's no real high like finishing a new song, playing it a thousand times in your car, and freaking out with your co-writers.
'My Church' - that was really the tipping point of me going from songwriter to artist.
Sheryl Crow. I loved her 'Tuesday Night Music Club.' She expressed her own point of view, and she wasn't trying to be like anyone else, and I loved that. That's been the thinking of all my favorite artists.
I always go back to old vinyl albums I loved, and that's sort of the aim I had with 'Hero' - just to make it look classic and feel like me, but also timeless in a way.
I did choir, soccer, some theater. The only weird thing about my life was that I was playing honky-tonks on the weekends.
I've always had an ear for melodies, and they veer pop. My lyrics are more country - what I love is the storytelling and the structure, how tight the rhymes can be. But pop melodies have always been intrinsically linked to my writing style.
My lyrics are more country - what I love is the storytelling and the structure, how tight the rhymes can be. But pop melodies have always been intrinsically linked to my writing style.
