Cody Bolden, Greg Shaddix and Jonathan Peyton

Intro: [00:00:07] Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX Studios in Woodstock, Georgia. It’s time for Cherokee Business Radio. Now here’s your host.

Stone Payton: [00:00:23] Welcome to this very special edition of Cherokee Business RadioX Stone Payton here with you this afternoon. You guys are in for a real treat. Please join me in welcoming to the broadcast Cody Bolden and Greg Shaddix. We are down one. Though conspicuously absent with this trio is Jonathan Peyton. As I understand it, he’s probably down in the Honduras, hanging out with a Harry and or latisha down there with Alma Coffey having a great time. But we’ll get him in the studio sometime soon. Welcome. Welcome, guys.

Cody Bolden: [00:00:56] What’s going on, man?

Stone Payton: [00:00:57] I have been so looking forward to doing this. If there’s anybody out there who listens to this show that doesn’t know who Great Shot and Cody Bolden is, you’re going to know by the time we finish this conversation. But one of the things that makes it really timely to have this conversation. You guys are going to get together along with Jonathan Payton, and you’re putting on a show in Canton. I’ll start with you, Cody. Why? When? Where? Yeah, tell us about that.

Greg Shaddix: [00:01:29] So when February twenty six this year to Saturday, February 26 at seven p.m. at the historic Canton Theater in downtown Canton is the win. The Wise? Because we’re Cherokee County people. I myself live in downtown Canton and it’s such a cool theater and one that really, really cool shows can go on there. So I’ve always wanted to to do a show there and just kind of had the opportunity to do it early this year. So that’s that’s the why in the win and the cause is just because.

Stone Payton: [00:02:02] So I’m not familiar with the theater, but my wife, Holly and I are both going, so color us, they’re we’re really looking forward to it. And we were talking before we went on the air. I think we’re going to make a date night of it, right? Yeah.

Greg Shaddix: [00:02:13] Yeah, and really, that’s kind of what we we want this show to be a lot more than come see live music. It’s Cody and Jonathan and Gregg. We want it to be a come visit downtown can because we we think it’s such a cool community that has so much to offer and we’ve got support locally from some of the restaurants. So we want you to come eat dinner beforehand, hang out, go to the show and then maybe grab drinks afterwards. All right, there.

Stone Payton: [00:02:35] Yeah. So Greg, I won’t ask you why. I’ll ask you why Cody and why Jonathan?

Cody Bolden: [00:02:40] Well, because they ask me, to be honest with you. I mean, big props to both Cody and Lauren Bolden because they’re they’re really behind the scenes doing, especially Lauren. I mean, she even bribed you stone with pie from the pie bar.

Stone Payton: [00:02:57] That’s right.

Cody Bolden: [00:02:58] But I mean, I think first off, I think we’re all real similar as far as our musical styles. We’re different enough, but similar enough in what we’re doing. And I think kind of like to reiterate what Cody said. We’re all Cherokee County, folks. You know, Jonathan and I both live here in Woodstock and Cody’s in Canton. And on top of that, we’ve got this beautiful theater. So let’s let’s make some local homegrown music in it. I think it’ll be a good time.

Stone Payton: [00:03:24] I do, too. Yeah, go ahead.

Greg Shaddix: [00:03:25] Well, it’s really neat because I would say of the three of us, myself and Jonathan and Greg, I’ve got the latest start on music. But what’s what’s needed is one of the first times I ever played out loud was that like a competition event, and Greg was one of the judges at the event. That’s right. So it’s neat to me because when I, you know, when I was when we were putting this show together, the only the not the only two, but the first two that came to mind were Jonathan and Greg. So I’m excited about it. It’s going to be a great show. I’ve said it before and I’ll continue to say it if even if I wasn’t on this bill. This is a show that I would be going to.

Stone Payton: [00:04:00] So do tell us Cody first, and I’m going to come back to you, Greg, because I want to know your story as well. But tell us a little bit about the back story. How did you get into this?

Greg Shaddix: [00:04:07] Yeah. So my wife and I own a pie shop right here in downtown Woodstock. But just before we open that, I’d always I didn’t grow up in a musical household. We never had a guitar sitting around. Both my parents always loved music and they always sang to the radio. But we’ve never really been instrumentally inclined, I guess, would be the easiest way to put it into law and heard me say that enough times, my wife, that she finally bought me a guitar for Christmas. And you know, I did what I think most people do. I played it for five or 10 times and just kind of like, it’s just too much work for what I want to do. And a year went by, and the next year for Christmas, you bought me lessons, so I picked it back up. Wow. And when I picked it back up is right. When they started building my life right here in Woodstock, that shares a parking lot with us at Pye Bar. And I got to know the owners of Mad Life and just music was kind of like present, you know, not not just music, but like the idea that you can make your own music and that’s a thing. You can write your own songs, you can play your own music. And really, that’s kind of what’s always attracted me. Covers are cool and I love other music, but just the idea of like, you can make your own and not coming up in a household like that, it was never really even an idea. And the fact that not only is it not can you do it, but it’s it’s celebrated, especially kind of here in this community as well. A lot of original music is celebrated, so it just kind of stayed on the forefront of my mind and watching Mad Life be built and talking with Mike and Kerry just kind of stayed inspired, so it hadn’t really stopped since then.

Stone Payton: [00:05:42] And I do want to give a shout out to Mad Life. We had Mike in the studio. It’s been a been a little while and you can just his passion and his genuine interest in helping people in the in the entertainment industry get out there and do their thing. I mean, this guy is and he the energy he and Kerry have around. I don’t know how they do it. You run the business and everything like that. So God love them. And then of course, you know, I love the little little shrimp appetizer and I’ll be, well, you know, I’ll go out there all the time and I’ll see you picking it up, right? And I’ll tell you, it is kind of cool because in a community like this, you get to know some people, right? And it is. I got you feel like a big shot when you walk up. And when Greg’s on stage, he’ll give you a little nudge, you know, like, yeah, I know this guy, especially like if I have family or friends in town, you’re like, Oh, stone knows everybody. Yeah.

Greg Shaddix: [00:06:35] Well, after this, he might call you up by name, and

Cody Bolden: [00:06:37] You never know now that you let me on

Stone Payton: [00:06:39] Your show. That’s right. How did you get started, man?

Cody Bolden: [00:06:43] Well, you know what? I grew up and a lot of people in this area, we started in church. That’s how I started. Just like anybody else. And my dad’s a preacher and I started singing in his church. You know, he learned the old hymns and those things. And then one thing leads to another. And kind of like Cody said, one day you’re like, Wait a minute, I can do this too. I can make something rhyme and write down a story and make it rhyme. And it just never stopped. I’ve been doing it ever since, and I’ve always been infatuated with stories and story songs. My heroes are John Prine and people like that that tell stories in their songs. And yeah, it’s just kind of snowballed from there. And now everything I do to some extent is related, whether it’s my own music, actually, these days, it’s less my own music and it’s more I want to. Hey, that was a great song. Let’s do something to let other people hear your song. And yeah, so then we started the podcast and just keeps rolling.

Stone Payton: [00:07:40] Well, I’ve been stalking you on Facebook. You more recently, Cody, because everywhere I go, I hear your name. Okay, so you’re CMO Lauren. She’s doing a great job or whoever.

Greg Shaddix: [00:07:51] Yeah, that’s my manager.

Stone Payton: [00:07:52] So I’ve been stalking you more. I’ve been stalking you for since we moved. Yes, we moved here. And one of the things that I have noticed is a great deal of your effort is in kind of shining the light on other musicians.

Cody Bolden: [00:08:03] Yeah, for sure. For sure. And I mean, even with my podcast The Mockingbird Shameless Plug, but the reason it’s called the Mockingbird is because the Mockingbird, the actual bird itself, it repeats other bird songs, and I find that fascinating. And yeah, I was telling Cody as we were coming in, I was like, Yeah, I met Stone one night. We were over at the Reeves house and I sitting out there picking and he showed up and he stayed the whole time and nobody ever since.

Stone Payton: [00:08:27] I don’t even know what the event was. That’s not why that might have been why I went, but it’s not why I stayed. I stayed because I was listening to Greg.

Cody Bolden: [00:08:34] When back to your point, earlier stone is the fact this town, it is very community based. And the same goes for Canton at the Canton Theater in that area. You know, you can just walk around and stop here and hang out for a minute and then go over here and hang out for a minute. And it is very community oriented. And Cody and I and Jonathan too, even going up right down to all my coffee. I mean, it’s it’s all about this community.

Greg Shaddix: [00:08:57] Well, honestly, what has happened to me, both in Canton and in Woodstock and Woodstock, back on the Elm Street, green, right across from Reformation. I’ve played a couple of shows there with a full band and then in Canton on the street in front of Green Line. They do during first Fridays. They do this thing on the street, but more more than three or four times. I’ve been on a set break and I’d see somebody I know they said, you know, I was like four streets over and I heard that. And I, yeah, I thought that was you, you know, had to come check it out. Yeah, right, exactly. And just that, it’s the support of like, Oh, you hear somebody, you know, playing and then you go and you know, and support that. And that’s that’s kind of the big thing. I think that we’ve got here is is a supportive community.

Stone Payton: [00:09:39] Well, we really do. And I can remember having a conversation with you on a break and you know what you talked about, not you, not your you talked about Jonathan Payton. Oh, really? Which, as it turns out, I knew the guy. I just didn’t make the connection because I had seen him at a young professionals of Woodstock, which I don’t know why they let me go to that meeting. I’m definitely not young, but but I mean, that’s just your spirit. It’s clearly Cody’s spirit. But I think that’s true about a lot of people in Canton, which are Cherokee County. That’s been my experience so far.

Cody Bolden: [00:10:14] Yeah, I know for me, coming up and Cody is probably the same way, too, like especially in music. There was a time where and I. I say this a lot on my show, but the feast and famine mentality, in other words, hey, how did you get in there to get that show and nobody would tell you, right, there’s room for everybody. And I personally, my kind of my ethos or my M.O., if you will, is like, be the person you wish you would have had. Yeah, when you were, I mean, as young as 13, you know, I’ve seen kids like like an Anna Shin holster or mace and embers from the time, literally, they’re 13 to now they’re 18 and they’re out there playing their own shows. And like, I didn’t have that person when I was a kid, you know, or even tell you it was possible.

Greg Shaddix: [00:10:57] Yeah. And I will say to the more, the more that I’ve playing, the more that I’ve grown in playing in the bigger shows I’m getting in, the more I’m playing out of town. Not everywhere is like that. I mean, there are still those places where it is like, No, I worked hard to get this. Why would I give you any leg up? Because that’s going to hurt me, and I know Greg feels the same way, and so does Jonathan. And it’s not. There’s nothing live music out there for everybody, and then everything we’re doing is different. I mean, you could take my song and Greg could sing it, and you wouldn’t know it was even my song because Greg’s going to sing it the way he sings it. Same thing with Jonathan and so on and so forth. And I think that that kind of community just breeds more creativity. Absolutely. You’re not trying to be that. You’re not trying to be whatever that is, whatever selling or whatever else you’re only. It’s it’s supported that you’re being what you want to be and people are going out. So I think it only makes everyone else better in the long run.

Stone Payton: [00:11:51] So how does the whole sales and marketing thing work for a musician? You know, I’ve sold training, consulting, speaking. If I had to sell anything physical, I’d starve to death. Right. But but how does it work in your world?

Greg Shaddix: [00:12:07] I mean, I could I could kick that one off. So for me, at least, my methodology is the product has to be good, and that’s the song. So like, you should be able to me, I think you should be able to play your song with the guitar and it’d be worth singing it, you know, by yourself. And it’d be good. But it starts me with the lyrics in the song and then you kind of build off of that. But just like everything else, it’s hard work. You still have to market it. I mean, you can have a great song, but if no one ever hears it and you want that to be successful, then it doesn’t do you much good. But I think I think all too often, just like in a lot of things, the song itself gets looked past and then you start, you see past that. But I think for me, it always has to start with. The product has to be good to start with.

Cody Bolden: [00:12:52] Yeah, I mean, you’ve got to offer the listener or the consumer however they are. You’ve got to offer them something that they actually want to listen to for sure, whether it’s a story they relate to or, you know, art. It could just be a melody that’s stuck in their head. And then on top of all of that, I mean, it’s just a lot of social media like, I mean, that’s, you know, that’s kind of it today, you know, whether it’s Instagram or Facebook or Twitter or Tik Tok, I mean, you know, you just you just kind of have to dove in and see what sticks. And you know, each one is different for different reasons, and you just got to constantly put your face out there, whether you want to or not.

Greg Shaddix: [00:13:29] Yeah. Well, it’s funny you say that because for me, it is such a weird thing like self-promotion is such a it’s a weird thing. It’s something you really have to get over if you’re, you know, especially like, especially small time. You know, if you’re going, you don’t have somebody that’s promoting all your stuff. You have to promote your own stuff. You know, like if you were selling tires, you’re you’re you’re selling that tire. It’s a lot easier to sell that tire than it is like, look at me. Look what I’m doing. Look how good at I am at it. So it’s really, you know,

Cody Bolden: [00:13:57] Yeah, it does. You’re right. It takes a minute to get over. And that might be the reason why I started promoting other people more than myself. Maybe I don’t

Stone Payton: [00:14:05] Know. But isn’t it interesting or I’m extrapolating from my world? You have a show where you’re spotlighting other people. You spend a lot of your energy holding other people up, and I am willing to wager it’s already starting to come back to you tenfold. Oh, right. Oh, I’m a

Cody Bolden: [00:14:22] Huge I’m a huge believer in that. One thousand percent. Yes, you will definitely get back what you put out there into the world. I’m a huge believer of that. And yeah, yes, you’re there’s no way I can’t even add to that.

Stone Payton: [00:14:36] Yes, it’s true. Just by the way, those of you, you can’t see us. We’re in Studio Cody’s wrestling with his hat and his headphones. I have a product idea. Speaking of sales and marketing, okay, because I’m a hat guy, I have hats in the studio. I intend to, you know, if anybody gives me a hat, I’ll put it in the studio. If they give me two, I’ll put one in the studio and I’ll wear one everywhere. The hat I had on before we got started was one of my clients, Alpha and Omega Automotive. But I’ve got this idea, Cody, is to have a hat that has like this flap. Then you put the headphones and you put the flap over the headphones.

Cody Bolden: [00:15:07] It’s not a bad idea. Yeah, I came up speaking of musicians and trying to help them talking about promoting themselves. This one musician that comes to my open mic every Wednesday, he’s missing one of his legs. I won’t remember the story, but it’s his left leg. I was like, well, I got two ideas for you. Number one, his name is the name of his band is seven feet above. There’s four of them. So do the math. I think it’s a great name. Secondly, secondly, I like, man, you should start an eBay store and all you do is sell left shoes and it’s called Take a left.

Stone Payton: [00:15:43] This guy is creative.

Cody Bolden: [00:15:45] I mean, come on. You can’t tell me that there’s not a whole bunch of people out there in the world that need a left shoe in the same predicament. You know that they’re missing their right.

Greg Shaddix: [00:15:54] Not only that, not only there are, and then he even specializes because it’s got to. It’s going to be his size. So, yeah, yeah,

Cody Bolden: [00:16:01] Yeah, it’s a niche market. I sell 10 and a half

Greg Shaddix: [00:16:05] Laughs

Cody Bolden: [00:16:06] In a variety of shoes. It’s not just one make you know I got you Sunday dress you. I got your converse. You wouldn’t need a sock.

Greg Shaddix: [00:16:14] We could. We could come up with that.

Cody Bolden: [00:16:15] I guarantee

Stone Payton: [00:16:15] You. So once you do start to get some traction like you guys and Jonathan have, do you have some physical, tangible stuff that you sell or you use to promote like the do you do, like the hats and the shirts and the in the bumper stickers? Is that part of the thing?

Greg Shaddix: [00:16:31] It is, yeah. So what I’m finding now, because so like for me personally, for this show, I’m playing everywhere. But Canton leading up to this show, OK? And and just kind of to speak to the business side of it, they can’t. Theater show is a ticketed show. So if I’m out playing, you know, four nights a week for free in Woodstock and downtown Canton, why would somebody pay twenty two to thirty eight dollars to come see me? Right, right? So things like the hats, the T-shirts, the stickers when I’m playing in Anniston, Alabama, this weekend.

Stone Payton: [00:17:05] See, I knew that because I’ve been stalking. Yeah, yeah.

Greg Shaddix: [00:17:07] I’m playing in L.A. now, so I’m getting I’m getting paid for the event, but I’m not quite at the level yet where I’m getting paid enough that it’s paying for everybody. Plus our food plus our gas plus our hotel. Yeah. So the merch really kind of makes up. It’s kind of that supplemental income. So and that’s really, you know, at least from what I can tell a lot of a lot of tours in artist right now, that’s kind of where they’re making up for lack of ticket sales on like a Tuesday night in a town because attendance has been down with, you know, with COVID and everything else. So really, that’s almost a necessary supplemental thing. Yeah, I think right now

Stone Payton: [00:17:44] And it’s doing double duty, right, because now you’re you’re getting promotion for the benefit of that. Right now, you’ve got people in Anniston where and you have a band as well. I do. So we’re in Anniston, you know?

Greg Shaddix: [00:17:57] Well, they’re here. So it’s Cody Bolden on the road. Hands the road. Yeah, OK, OK. Yeah, neat thing. So I met a neat thing about the very the original road hand is Jason Hall, and he plays drums for me and I met him at Pine Bark. He came in and was looking for some extra work. I think really just to fill time, he started washing dishes for us. He already had a full time job. He was just looking for something else. I did not know that I met him at. Yeah, he came in and started washing dishes for us and the like. A few weeks after he started working for us, I played at an open mic at Mad Life Undiscovered event and told him, You know, I was like, you know, because I literally walked next door with my guitar. So he saw me with my guitar. So he came over and watched me, and at the end of he said, Hey, I used to play in a band. If you ever need a drummer, let me know. I said, Well, as a matter of fact, I just took a full band gig in two months and I need a full band so I can do the drummer. Yeah, yes. So he’s been with me ever since, and then the other guys are kind of around between Atlanta and Calhoun area, so they’re all right around here.

Cody Bolden: [00:19:00] Yeah. And then for me, I played with Dallas McGee, where the cosmic cowboys. I mean, technically, if you look us up on Facebook, it’s the cosmic cowboy metaphor company. But we just just call us the cosmic cowboys. And we got speaking of shirts, I got to get it made. I’m hoping I can get it done before the show, but our friend Buddy Finnerty designed this one, and because people always laugh at us because we’ll argue for a little while and then we’ll play a song, and it’s just the dynamic that we have. It’s friendly argument. Nothing, you know, nothing terrible. And but he made us a shirt where both rock em sock em robots with our faces on them and it just says, play a little fight a little on the bottom of it.

Stone Payton: [00:19:37] And I have that point again.

Greg Shaddix: [00:19:40] Actually, I had that

Stone Payton: [00:19:41] Toy to do,

Greg Shaddix: [00:19:44] And I’ll speak for Jonathan to Jonathan is going to be playing with Abigail, and I don’t know if you’ve seen them out live yet, but they have incredible harmonies, so I have to go with his wife. So it’s him and his wife.

Stone Payton: [00:19:54] How cool is that? We got to get him in here because we got to ask him about that dynamic, right?

Greg Shaddix: [00:19:58] Yeah, yeah, yeah. But and you’ll you’ll you’ll see it and hear it when you come to the show, but you’ll feel it too. I mean, there’s just something about them too together. So it’s going to be it’s going to be a great show. I’m looking forward to it. We’ve got support from the local community. As a matter of fact, the the first real open mic I did and I call it real because the first time I played it, my life I. I wasn’t really ready to play yet, but I had been talking with Mike and I knew I knew two songs, three songs at the time, and he was like, Hey, we’re going to be doing this thing, come out and play, and I played it. But then when we moved to downtown Canton Green Lane, Brewer had just started doing an open mic in their space and I could walk down there with my guitar and play like a 30 minute open mic of all original songs. And they’ve kind of been there with me since the start to so they’re on support for this show. They’re literally right across the street from the theater.

Stone Payton: [00:20:54] So maybe that’s for Holly and I have our date night, right? We start there and maybe we start there in in there. We’ll bookend it with Green Line. That’s right.

Cody Bolden: [00:21:00] That’s right. Well, not only that, but you got you got your face on one of their canes.

Greg Shaddix: [00:21:03] I do. Yeah, yeah. So they yeah, they came their first canned beers, Allen Brook Lager, and they they do what they call an auto series, and I think they’ll do. I think they’re continuing to do this as they release canned beer. Yeah, there’s more coming. Yeah, yeah. So it’s got my face on the back. I should have brought you on. I can definitely get you one.

Stone Payton: [00:21:23] We’ll do if you can, but I’m going to be there. I’m going to be. So I’ll just buy. Yeah, probably more than one. That’s all right. But I don’t bring the can. Don’t just pour it into glass, if you can.

Greg Shaddix: [00:21:33] Well, the other night I was there because, like I said, I can walk down there. So for me, that’s my spot to go. I just go down there and Hannah, she works at Green Line and I was I was drinking Allen Brooks and I had two or three, but she was not like collecting the cans. So I was starting this little pyramid, you know, it’s like a pyramid of of my face. So that is a weird. She’s like, I’m going to clear those out before

Cody Bolden: [00:21:59] People start going, I have an issue.

Stone Payton: [00:22:01] Yeah. Now, do you guys? I was going to say, still get nervous because that’s assuming that you ever did. But do you get a little nervous when it gets close to show time and they get in? Somebody denounces you or it’s just your turn to get up? Do you get butterflies?

Cody Bolden: [00:22:19] Yeah, sometimes there was a time, and I’m not kidding. I used to get like I would actually have to. I would get ill right before I went on. Every time, every show nowadays and this nowadays, I actually feel more comfortable up there than I do. Like I’m notorious about and I love talking to people. Don’t get me wrong, but I’m notorious after the show of not wanting to go out and talk and hang out. That’s why I have Dallas, because Dallas would talk to anybody, whether they want him to talk to him or not. He would do it. And I don’t know for me these days, it’s like, I’m actually I’d rather be. It’s almost like a security blanket in a weird way these days. Yeah.

Greg Shaddix: [00:23:04] Oddly, I’ve never really gotten I don’t really get stage fright or I haven’t gotten stage fright. And when I have, it’s in the like unusual spaces. Like it’s not for the big shows. I don’t know. Just kind of block it out in my mind. I don’t really think just, Oh my god, it’s time to do whatever this is.

Cody Bolden: [00:23:21] Well, the small shows are harder.

Greg Shaddix: [00:23:22] Well, and that’s what I was going to say. I’m not like, I don’t get nervous for the big shows where they introduce your name and all this stuff. But like not long ago, I did an open mic out on the MetLife patio. I’m just a Tuesday night. You know, there’s like sometimes eight people there, sometimes 45 people there. Yeah. And yeah, I mean, I felt my heart racing during that. But yeah, it’s an odd thing. But now, like for this year, I probably won’t get stage fright. And I think part of it is this particular band that’s playing with me. Mm hmm. They’re all way way better musicians than I am. So I know that if I get up there and I just if I broke a hand, I would be fine because they got your back. They got it.

Stone Payton: [00:24:04] Yeah. So do you have a like a pregame ritual like day of show, will you? I don’t like, eat, eat differently or not do some stuff or do some other stuff. Is there a prep ritual

Cody Bolden: [00:24:16] For something like this? For me, I have to be like real. I need like 30 minutes where it’s just don’t don’t talk to me. Not not, not not in a rude way. Like just let me kind of be for a minute, because a big part of my show is, I mean, we play songs that we wrote and I think they’re good. And I think Dallas songs are really good too. But there’s a lot of banter. We’ll talk a lot. So a lot of times I’m going through my head like figuring out what story am I’m about to tell or which story am I about to make up because you’re not going to know the difference. I can promise

Stone Payton: [00:24:50] You that I’m sure

Greg Shaddix: [00:24:53] Now. I mean, no, not necessarily. And I think that’s part of not doing anything that’s going to make me nervous as I really do anything different other than I like that. I like like that. If if it’s somewhere like this, one is going to be an odd one. This can’t theater show because I got family coming to town and they’re going to be staying at our house. So it’s oh my, you know, and we’re going to have friends in town and it’s just, I like that too. I would if I could just go to a room and sit by myself for like 30 minutes to just bring it here, you know, get it all real. In, but sometimes it’s hard to do on some of those shows, especially playing it like, I mean, I know playing it Smith’s old ball in Atlanta, sometimes with the pre-show there. So because there’s three bands play in, everybody’s kind of sharing the same green room area. It’s really just kind of like chaos. Yeah, yeah. It’s just as much of a show backstage as it is, you know, out front. But no, I mean,

Cody Bolden: [00:25:44] And sometimes shows like that to like the logistics of it. I remember I played a show that made me think of this story. I played a show, its missile bar. This is years ago, and it was I was opening for Corb Lund. Yeah, yeah. But it was just me and a guitar, and there was three bands Corp’s headline in it. And so they put a full band on and its missile bar. Upstairs, there’s a big curtain, right, that closes up the whole stage, so you can’t see the stage until the artist is out there. So they put a full band on and they get done. They did great. They didn’t raise the roof on the place and then the curtain closes and I’m standing out there all by mine.

Greg Shaddix: [00:26:20] You were saying,

Cody Bolden: [00:26:21] Wait

Stone Payton: [00:26:21] A second. I who did this? Whose idea was

Cody Bolden: [00:26:24] This? Yeah. Like, put me on first. Yeah, yeah, please. I’m sandwiched in between two bands. It went and ended up being fine. But it was it was a very supportive crowd. But that is the last time that I can remember literally sitting there like shaking my hands out. My knees are a little knocking because you can hear them out there. It’s a sold out crowd. Oh, and you can hear them out there in this curtain between me and them. Like, this is this is awful.

Greg Shaddix: [00:26:51] Well, stone, and this is for you. You know, just kind of like a kind of like key of like when you do multiple events, you usually want to build the sound. So like in that case, if the headliner was a full band, you’d want the group before them to be a full band or maybe a piece or two less. And then you open with like an acoustic gang. But but if somebody comes out there and they’re just ripping and then you got like a solo acoustic,

Cody Bolden: [00:27:16] But then a bunch of sad

Greg Shaddix: [00:27:17] Stories, you know, the crowd is up here and then we come out and we’re like, Well, you know,

Cody Bolden: [00:27:23] As my friend Roger Brainerd says, you want to hear a fast song about death and dying or a slow song about

Greg Shaddix: [00:27:28] Death and dying, right? So, so you kind of want to build that thing. So it’s kind of like, Yeah,

Cody Bolden: [00:27:33] Yeah, oh man, my

Greg Shaddix: [00:27:34] Knees were knocking. Yeah, yeah, I would have been nervous in that. It was.

Cody Bolden: [00:27:38] It was

Stone Payton: [00:27:38] Terrible. Yeah. So do you find yourselves when you are in that situation and there’s multiple acts that occasionally or maybe more than occasionally, you click with some of them and then after everything, everybody’s gone home and you guys are hanging out and do you find yourself in the back room or a nearby bar and you just like kind of just jam and just hang out? Oh yeah, that happens. Yes, that’s my vision of it. Yeah, like my glorified vision of the lifestyle, right? As we’ll go, you know, we’ll hang out at two o’clock in the morning and just, yeah, that does happen.

Cody Bolden: [00:28:07] Like sometimes to like the craziest stories happen out of those. Another night at Smith’s Bar, I opened up for Ray Wylie Hubbard, and at the time we both had acrylic nails. That’s how we played. Our guitar was our picks, and he was so it’s me and this living Texas country legend, in my opinion, sitting at a booth, eating chicken fingers, telling each other the best way to get to a acrylic nail shop on the road. It was the wildest like I wish to this day that I had that moment recorded, even if it was just for me because you tell that story and feel like, Hey, no, I don’t know if that’s true. No one hundred percent happy just sitting there talking about. They acrylic, nails and guitar, pick over chicken fingers. You know, it was just, yeah, so there are those moments that only I guess the musicians get to share that. Yeah, but almost there, sometimes unbelievable.

Stone Payton: [00:29:02] I’ll bet. Right.

Greg Shaddix: [00:29:04] You know, I was well into the other side of that. Sometimes you get I mean, it’s really nice. I think some of the the guys you think are going to be the coolest aren’t the coolest at all. Yeah. And they won’t give you the time of day, especially if you like the opening. You’re like the the local opening act and it’s a two hour night coming through that you probably have a lot of respect for and you just want to say hello to them. Yeah, that happens too. But there is, there is this and you don’t really understand it till you’re in it. There’s there’s so much downtime involved, like in between soundcheck and the actual show and especially on the road, like if you’re traveling between, that’s kind of I’ve heard people to talk about tours and you get paid to travel. You do the show for fun.

Cody Bolden: [00:29:44] Yeah, you get paid to carry your

Greg Shaddix: [00:29:45] Gear around,

Cody Bolden: [00:29:46] Right? Yeah, for sure. Well, I mean, even with the the the show on February 26 at the Canton Theater, I mean, you know, we’ll we’re going to get there way before anybody waiting

Stone Payton: [00:29:56] For me in Hollywood.

Greg Shaddix: [00:29:57] Yeah, yeah. We’re I mean, we were sound checking. So and also the way you do it in reverse order, how you soundcheck. So the headliner sound checks first. So the person that’s going to be there, the latest two also has to get there the earliest because you do it in reverse order, because that way, when everybody comes out, everything is set to that. So like, we’ll get there. We’re sound checking at three o’clock on that, on that Saturday. Yeah. So there’s just all of that.

Stone Payton: [00:30:20] So when your sound checking, the important stuff is set to the headliner, so you have to kind of adapt or there’s just a way to make sure your stuff’s going to work too without screwing up their

Cody Bolden: [00:30:30] Good Sandman good sound man will have it’ll all be preset for each of us.

Greg Shaddix: [00:30:34] Oh, OK, yeah, yeah. And we do have a good sound man for this one. His name’s Jason Jenkins, but essentially, but it’s like we’ll have. I have a full band, so they’ll have a drum kit and everything. So that drum kit can get out and set up and it stays out there while everyone else is playing. So when we, you know, when we come out, it’s already there. There’s not a whole lot of interchange time. So yeah, it’s in everyone’s best interest that way. It just, you know, sometimes there’s a lot of downtime involved.

Stone Payton: [00:31:01] So I’ll tell you what’s going to be fun for me and I don’t know if it’ll be six months from now or six years from now. But I went to a James Taylor concert last time that he was in town and people kept running him different guitars, and I’m going to really enjoy what I see you guys up there and you’re not moving. People are just bringing you different guitars. I mean, I’ll be like, I knew them when you left

Cody Bolden: [00:31:22] To buy more guitar.

Greg Shaddix: [00:31:23] Yeah, yeah. And I don’t want to break it to you, but I don’t think any of us are James Taylor yet. So we’ll all be playing the same guitar.

Cody Bolden: [00:31:29] And he does play with acrylic nails, does he? He does

Stone Payton: [00:31:32] Really well. And his what do you call it, the not the not the headliner? What do you call the other the warm up or the opener opener? Ok, who’s Jackson Browne? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But and James Taylor was such a class act, though during that set, he came during that set and played in the in the in the background. He was like a background singer for Jackson. I mean, I just thought that was a real class act. Kind of got it. Got a thing to do. All right. So what can we expect when we get to this event? So Holly and I, we didn’t go VIP, but there’s a couple of different levels of tickets. Oh yeah. So we got the early admission. So tell us what we can expect when we get there.

Greg Shaddix: [00:32:16] Yeah, so and I’ll start with, yeah, if there may be one more VIP ticket available. But the way we did it and the way this theater is set up to me, I don’t think there’s really a bad seat and I don’t. We wanted to do it and we didn’t want to like pre choose your seats. So we did three different levels of tickets. So we do a VIP admission and early admission and general admission. So VIP admission gets in the doors a little bit early, actually at five 30, because we’re doing like a little acoustic show with those. So it was something we wanted to offer something a little special for like, you know, because it’s a little it’s a little bit more money for those tickets, but essentially they get in at five 30 and they can choose whatever seats they want in the theater. And then we’re doing a little like 15, 20 minute. We’re all going to play a song, tell a little story about it and then hang out with those guys for just a little bit. And then the next tier down, which would be what I think y’all got, which is early admission that gets you in at six 15. So you only you’ll get to go in and choose whatever seats weren’t available after VIP admission or whatever you know, or whatever they didn’t choose. So you’ll still get to. You’ll still have a pretty good because we didn’t do. We only did a limited amount of VIP tickets that way. It yeah, it wasn’t overfilling. So you still got really good tickets and you’ll get to go in and choose your seats. And then general admission is doors for them or at 6:30, so they’ll come in and choose their seats. What after VIP and in general or an early admission. But honestly, there’s not. No matter what time you get in there, you’re not going to get a bad.

Stone Payton: [00:33:46] Well, that’s what I was. I haven’t seen the venue, but I mean, it’s a fairly intimate venue. Yes, absolutely. But there’s not a bad seat in the House.

Greg Shaddix: [00:33:53] Yeah, there’s one hundred and seventy seats in there. And it’s such a such a big space as far as like what the stage in all is, all the seats are, there’s not a bad spot and you’ll see it. It’s such a cool thing. I mean, it’s

Cody Bolden: [00:34:06] Beautiful, too. I mean, it’s a beautiful theater, and it hasn’t been that long ago that they just went in and completely renovated the whole place. I mean, over the last several years, it’s not been that long. And it’s I mean, it’s top notch. It’s beautiful. Yeah.

Stone Payton: [00:34:19] And so it’s a seven o’clock show.

Greg Shaddix: [00:34:21] Yeah, seven o’clock shows. So depending on what ticket you get, depending on what time the doors are at the latest, it would be 6:30. Greg and Dallas are kicking it off at seven o’clock and then Jonathan Mann will be after them and then we’ll come on after that and in between each one, there’ll be a little intermission break because we’re going to have drinks and stuff there. So Green Line is one of the sponsors because they’re also, yeah, so they’re also offering. So there’ll be beer and wine and they’ll have little snacks. There something else, too? If you wanted to come down early and eat one of the other sponsors is Kel Hospitality. He owns three restaurants in downtown Canton, so that’s Queeny Downtown Kitchen and going coastal. All are great. All the different. Yeah. So for you, you know, like for you, the doors at 6:15, I would get down there around five o’clock, maybe four forty five. Eat dinner at one of those places. Yeah, come to the show, hang out and then go to Green Line afterwards because I’m pretty sure I don’t have anything written on paper. But Green Line is going to offer some some deals if you come in with your ticket, whether it’s half off your first beer or whatever that may be.

Stone Payton: [00:35:27] Yeah, we’ll be there. Yeah, yeah. All right. So you’re bringing your partner in crime?

Cody Bolden: [00:35:32] That’s right. Dallas McGee will be there with me, OK? One hundred percent. Yeah, I’m bringing his cantankerous self.

Stone Payton: [00:35:39] That’s going to be fun. Yeah. So I mean, you’re for both of your passion, your energy for this work. I mean, it just comes through. It’s going to come through over the airways. It definitely comes through sitting in a room with you guys and you’re human. Sometimes you got to run out of gas now and again you got to you got to stall sometimes and and maybe maybe be in a situation where you need to recharge and you need to go somewhere for inspiration or or you need to go somewhere for inspiration to write that next song or to get motivated to. Where do you go for inspiration? I don’t necessarily mean a place, but how do you guys recharge? And for me, it’s I go to the woods. I like to hunt and fish. That’s my church man. That is so for me if I can just walk in the woods, but where do you go to kind of reach? And I’ll ask both Ive and I’ll start with you, Greg.

Cody Bolden: [00:36:30] You know, for the longest time, my favorite place was like chain restaurant bars. And when I say I’m talking about like a Ruby Tuesdays or an outback, especially if they’re in a small town close to an airport, and I’ll tell you why people will come in and they’ll sit next to you and they know for a fact that they’re never going to see you again. And they will tell you the deepest, darkest secrets that they ever have because they want to get it off their chest. And then I turn around, turn it into a song. But I mean, it’s happened. I can’t tell you how many times, but on the flip side of that one hundred percent, you know, I like to throw my kayak in the water and disappear for a few hours without my cell phone and go fishing and just think about things. And that’s a lot where my stuff comes from, too.

Stone Payton: [00:37:15] I am so glad I asked the question. No, that’s it. Is that coming? That’s fantastic.

Greg Shaddix: [00:37:22] Yeah. I mean, mine are situational. So sometimes I put myself in these situations and sometimes I just end up in that situation. But I like I like for a lot of the songs to root from that. But I tell you where I get a lot of like inspiration in terms of things that I wouldn’t necessarily do or things that kind of get just the my ball rolling in my mind is open mic nights because people are coming with their own original ideas and own different stylings of how they do things. And it may take something already may have a lyric, but it gives me a different idea for a melody that I wouldn’t that it wouldn’t necessarily start. And like in an open mic, you know, I think with Greg’s the one he hosts over at my life. I mean, sometimes there’s between eight and 12 different people. So there’s so many different things happen. They’re all playing two or three songs. So you’re getting like this blend of all these different stylings and types. So it kind of just it takes what I may have already had or it kicks off this new idea. So I get a lot of inspiration from open mics.

Cody Bolden: [00:38:23] Yeah. And if you just keep your ears open and just listen, people will tell you things. It may not even be something that seems significant, but the way other people say things sometimes will spark your brain to a way that you would never a turn of a phrase that you would never say. And then you’re off to the races.

Stone Payton: [00:38:43] What you’re describing reminds me of what I think I heard on. On more than one episode where the comedians and cars, where the comedians get together. Jerry Seinfeld and they I mean, they make such a science of just observing. Yeah, right? And they bring that in. That impressed me and it impressed me just how much attention that they put to the craft and how focused like a Jerry Seinfeld will be on how to to articulate the phrase, and he may try that thing on like 13 different ways. Right? Yeah.

Cody Bolden: [00:39:16] And words matter. Like, Yeah, you know, a simple turn of phrase like one word can change an entire song and it can be as simple as a word. It’s like, I don’t know. Instead of using he, there’s another way to say that, you know, I mean, it sounds simple to in some ways, but when you take a what, you basically have a whole page full of words and then you just start throwing every one of them out. That doesn’t have any importance. That’s when you end up with a song, in my opinion.

Greg Shaddix: [00:39:46] Yeah. And you know, to me, I like the idea of crafting a song, too, because once you have that song, especially if it’s a good song and you think about it, you’re probably going to play that song thousands or ten thousand times over you over the lifetime of that song so that that one word you know, it makes. You’re going to say that one word so many times it’s worth it to go ahead and like, you know, chew that down to what you can get

Cody Bolden: [00:40:10] Out of it. And songs grow, too. And I’m sure that you’ve, you know, you write a song and you play it. You may play it for ten years. And then all of a sudden you’re like, Oh, wait a minute that verse. If I said this, it would say what I’m trying to say better. And I wrote the song so I can change the song, you know, and then there’ll be people out there. Well, that’s not how it goes. Yeah, it’s my song. Like, my wife gets so mad at me sometimes because I’ll have a song that you know, I’ve had for years, and she’ll hear me play it and she’s like, I’ll play it. All of a sudden, I’ll make it a waltz. And she like, that is not the way you do that. And I’m like, What it is now or it is for tonight.

Greg Shaddix: [00:40:47] And I think that’s what’s cool about music. And at least from like a songwriter standpoint is, you know, my hope is that I haven’t written my best song yet. So it’s always that like trying to get whatever that is and the same thing, like when you play one, because the way you play a song makes the words meaning different, like the effect of what you do. And so, you know, especially like in storyteller songs like myself and Greg, you know, a hard strum is one thing, and then a palm mute is another thing in certain parts where you really, you know, you really want the the lyrics to come through opposed to the melody of the song. Or you know what you’re saying, there’s very important compared to the rest of the song. So something I’ve I’ve been working on, especially from like a full band standpoint, is song dynamic. So, you know, like everybody’s up here and down here. And I didn’t really listen to a lot of music, podcasts and from like a producer standpoint, you know, if you listen a lot of these old country songs, a lot of the stuff they’re doing is, you know, if they’re if they talk about a waterfall, if you really listen in the background, there’s probably something whether that violins making it sound like water droplets or something, you know that

Stone Payton: [00:41:52] You don’t even necessarily consciously. Yeah. All right. As a layperson, right, it’s really happening.

Greg Shaddix: [00:41:58] Yeah. Yeah, it’s really a neat thing. Yeah. You know what can be done with music?

Stone Payton: [00:42:03] So what about collaborating with with another or several others in putting a song together? I would think that could be it. At the same time, simultaneously very challenging and maybe incredibly rewarding, it might be able to create something marvelous. Have you guys had some experience collaborating on songwriting?

Cody Bolden: [00:42:21] Oh yeah. I mean, a lot of my songs that a lot of people, you know, when I say a lot of people know, but the people, the songs that people know by me that I’ve played for years, a lot of those I wrote with my really good friend Matt Burrell when I lived in Ohio for a time. I’m not from Ohio. As you can tell, by the way,

Stone Payton: [00:42:38] I talk, you’ve adapted. Well, you are.

Cody Bolden: [00:42:42] I am not from there. But yeah, I mean, a lot of those things we wrote together and a lot of things I write on my own or I don’t know about you. Like, sometimes I’ll write some stuff and like, I’ll get stuck and I’ll send it to Cody, or I’ll send it to somebody like Jonathan or just a friend of mine that writes songs and like, Hey, can you? I’m stuck. Like, What? What’s the next thing? And it could be as simple as they like, Hey, what if you went this direction? And that’s all I needed. Like, for some reason, my brain was stuck on it.

Greg Shaddix: [00:43:14] Yeah, I mean, actually up to this point, the only the only person I’ve ever co-written with is my wife, Lauren. She’s also a great writer. And I say, it’s kind of it’s definitely a hard dynamic because a lot of the times I’m coming to it already have the melody and a lot of the lyrics. So I’m already kind of like tied to a lot of that stuff, you know, right? But she also brings a different perspective to things, which I think is needed in a lot of the stuff. So I haven’t co-written many, but I need to work on it, I think. They could only build your lyric integrity like working with others and, you know, being open to changing things

Cody Bolden: [00:43:56] Because you have to have a lot of trust with that person too, because you know, a song, a song can be a very vulnerable thing, depending on what you’re talking about and you’ve got to have you’ve got to trust that person, like, Hey, I’m about to tell you something deep inside of me that I’m trying to get out or trying to handle. Or maybe it’s some kind of therapy. So that person better understand what you’re trying to say to.

Stone Payton: [00:44:21] So you were you were speaking about the I don’t even know the right words for it, but the rise and fall of the peaks and valleys managing through a song. Do you do that with a an entire concert or a set two? Do you plan that out so that you take people up and high fast and slows that that takes some planning to do?

Greg Shaddix: [00:44:40] Yeah, it does. So as a matter of fact, I just finished putting myself this together for arcane theater show. Ok? But yeah, I mean, and I think any any good show or somebody that’s trying to pay attention for the overall show itself, they’ll do that. You know, in terms of, I think different people have different ways I can tell you for me personally what I like to do and what I’ll do, probably for the theater show is as we come in pretty hot and then we work our way down a little slower towards the middle of the set and then we end it, you know, we. So it kind of does. If you’re visually looking at it, it’s here. And then, you know, and then we end out here. So you kind of do this a little bit of a wave. Some people like to do it the other way around. Some people, you know, start off hot and they want to be tear jerking by the end of it or vice versa, or start off really slow and have a gradual increase.

Stone Payton: [00:45:27] But there’s often some design behind it, whatever, for sure. Yes.

Cody Bolden: [00:45:33] And for me, the way I mean, has that been? I’ve been in a band. I was in a band for a while, but these days solo or a duo artist, most of the time and a lot of mine has to do with, Am I going to make you laugh or I’m going to make you cry right now? And like, it’s intentional. Like, Am I going to sing a song about my granddad or am I going to, you know, sing a song about, you know, knocking over a Milwaukee beer truck, you know, because there are songs about both of those things, you know? And and so and part of it for me is you read the crowd like, if they’re laughing a bunch, well, we’ll just we’ll laugh a little bit together. And after, you know, five or 10 minutes, then I’m going to like, Oh, now, so then you got your Kleenexes out and you didn’t see it coming. So like, there’s a dynamic for me personally, like a lot of it has to do, what are you all out here in the seats giving me? And then we’ll go from there. Especially, you know, if you’re kind of back to Cody’s point earlier, if you’re playing a bunch of shows for free, that’s a different thing. But this show February twenty six, like there, everyone in those seats paid money to see us, so I want to give them something that you’re not going to see. If you come see me on a patio on Sunday or somewhere else where it’s just me, I’m going to give you, I’m going to tell you the stories behind the songs. I’m going to talk to you a little bit more. And and quite frankly, you know, Jonathan and Cody may play you more songs. I may talk to you more than I play. These guys may play you 12 13 songs. I might play you six row, but

Greg Shaddix: [00:47:04] You could take that to the bank.

Cody Bolden: [00:47:05] Yeah, yeah, I mean, that’s true. You’re going to be there, Stone, Callum. Yeah, that’s just, you know, one of my heroes has always been Todd Snider, and he had this whole intro and I don’t remember the whole thing, but the last part of it, he’s like, I may go on as much as 18 minutes in between songs, and it’s it’s just part of what I do. And it may be because I’m a preacher’s kid and I’m used to seeing people standing in front of the microphone just talk for a while.

Stone Payton: [00:47:31] All right, so let’s make sure that we leave our listeners with all the information, everything from we definitely want to make sure that everybody has information on this upcoming concert. Yeah, but people are going to hear this a year from now to well beyond the concert. So I want to make sure that they have contact information. I want to make sure they know how to get to your radio show. Yeah. And so they can continue to follow. So whatever you guys think is appropriate in terms of whatever the social media stuff is, you cool kids are doing these days, the Instagram, the website, all that stuff. Let’s let’s start with you, Greg. Lay it out there. Let’s make sure we got it out.

Cody Bolden: [00:48:05] I mean, probably the easiest way to find me is to just go to searching for metaphors, and that’ll take you everywhere. It’ll take you to the all my social media. You can find the Mockingbird. podcast there. Yeah, I mean, that’s probably the easiest thing for me. Just look for searching for metaphors. Spell f0r, spell it all the way out. Not the no.

Greg Shaddix: [00:48:27] And I think Jonathan Patent does Jonathan Peden or Jonathan Patent Music. If you search Jonathan Patent on Google, you’ll find him. Yeah, minus Cody Bolden. So Cody Bolden, you can find all of the other stuff from that. But I think on Instagram, it’s Cody Bolden. I just started a tick tock. I think it’s good. Board music, but yeah, yeah, search for it and you’ll find it any of those names, you’ll kind of if you Google it, you’ll find us. And then for this show, so we’re going to be Saturday, February twenty six in downtown Canton at the historic camp theater show starts at seven o’clock. Tickets are on sale now. I don’t foresee us having tickets at the door. I mean, they’re selling well now. And that’s the hope anyway, is that we can sell out prior. So if you’re listening to this, you can get tickets at my website. Cody CNN.com it’s an Eventbrite as well, so you can like, search the Facebook event, get tickets there.

Stone Payton: [00:49:23] Well, guys, it has been an absolute delight having you in the studio this afternoon, and I’d like to make it maybe a little more of a habit of this. We already get together periodically, get caught up on what you guys are doing, get some stories from the road, get caught up on your shows and do it. So I need you to come on my show too. You got it. We talked about it a away back, too much fun and off air. I’m going to get Jonathan’s phone number because I need him to bring me back some cigars. He’s still down there. He is giving me a call. All right, this is Stone Payton for our guests today, Greg Chadwick’s and Cody Bolden and everyone here at the Business RadioX family saying, we’ll see you next time on Cherokee Business Radio.