Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
As actors, we're so used to the axe falling, and then we all go our separate ways. I can tell you, the feeling amongst the cast in 'Nashville' is, we don't feel like we're done. It feels like, in some way, we're just hitting our stride.
I actually auditioned for 'Nashville' while shooting on another project located in Boston. I had a couple weeks off from shooting and decided to go back to L.A. While I was there, my manager suggested I go in for the role on 'Nashville.'
The big stadiums get totally packed, and everyone knows the words, and it's screaming young girls. I met a whole bunch of great Nashville musicians, and they accepted me in their community. Classic rock and country music go well together.
I've always been in love with the States. When I was a kid, we would take these long summer holidays in Texas, Nashville, and all over. I fell in love with the people, the food, even the smell. You don't necessarily get that in old Europe.
There was a time when I was - after my very first record from Nashville, I thought I might not be one of those who actually really makes it, and I may end up back in Canada, just playing clubs. And that might - this might have just been it.
I learned some invaluable lessons in Nashville that apply to both farming and show business: Do not corner something you know is meaner than you; keep skunks of all kinds at a distance; if you forgive your enemies, it messes up their heads.
In terms of 'American Horror Story' and 'Nashville,' what attracted me to those, and 'Friday Night Lights,' for that matter, is that they felt like something innovative and something that we hadn't seen before. As an actor, that's exciting.
I got to Nashville on Labor Day weekend in 1972. And the Grand Ole Opry is still there, the Country Music Hall of Fame is still there. And the roots of country music are still there. It's where the authenticity and the empowering force lies.
Country artists, I met a lot of them when I was five, six years old. I had an uncle who was a country and western singer and I met Lefty Frizzell when I was five or six years old in those shows that would come through Toronto from Nashville.
I was interviewed for a Grammy television show, and they asked me about Nashville, and I talked for three minutes and when I finished, I was teared up. The whole room was crying. Nashville has given me a home, where I never had a home before.
My tour manager, I met him at Boot Barn. He was selling me a pair of boots... and he said, 'I moved to Nashville to be a tour manager, and I need work right now,' and I said, 'Man, I don't even have a tour manager. So you can tour-manage me.'
I moved to Nashville to be a songwriter. I found out that was a job, that someone would pay you to sit in a room with a guitar and make up songs! It is the greatest job in the world. I wrote three or four songs a day. That's what I lived for.
Just being a singer in Nashville is hard because everyone does music here, and so many people do it really well. But then, the fact that I do this alternative kind of pop music, dreampop... It's like I'm the lone unicorn roaming around this town.
Great music can come from anywhere around the globe. And there has always been a music business. It just wasn't recorded, nor was it centered in New York, London, Los Angeles or Nashville but rather St Petersburg, Vienna, Berlin, Milan and Paris.
When I got into the Nashville scene, with the Ross Coppermans and Zach Kales and Jon Nites and Nicolle Galyons, all these people who have No. 1 hits with huge celebrities, they were able to show me creative ways and right ways of formulating songs.
A lot of people in Nashville think that the best song is the catchiest or the one that sells the most copies. They're editing songs in a way that make them seem more consumable, I guess. I'm trying to edit them in a way that makes them more honest.
I definitely think that with music my favorite thing about Nashville is that it's a music hub that accepts and allows all genres to be present, and I think there's been a kind of fusing of genres lately that for me makes me really happy and excited.
Nashville feels like a big little town to me. It's got lots of culture and lots of interesting things to do and lots of interesting people. At the same time, it feels very small and tight-knit and very close. Everyone feels like they know each other.
I definitely felt the desire to, like - I definitely knew there was an elsewhere. I definitely knew that, like, if I were going to be free, I needed to be away from, kind of, like, Nashville and kind of get out of the South and get out of the country.
I feel like Nashville has really embraced me with open arms. I was a little worried at first; you know, everybody knows about my immediate past, which is rock music. But everyone is coming to find out that I've been singing country music my whole life.
It was just like a dream. I could have ended up with an album that's not all that different from anything else coming out of Nashville. Mutt made the difference. He took these songs, my attitude, my creativity, and colored them in a way that is unique.
Man, I live in Nashville. I know how good other songwriters and singers are around here. There's a wealth of talent in this town, not to mention the people who shoot in for a week or two to try their hand on lower Broad or the other venues around town.
Nashville, I think, for me, personally, would be where I want to live and work. L.A. is a whole other world and has a whole other vibe to it, so I would like to come out here for work for a couple of months, but L.A. is just not really my scene, per se.
The only two shows I watch are 'Walking Dead' and 'Nashville,' but both just went off the air for a couple of months, so I feel like I have to be productive because I'm not sitting around waiting for the next episode of zombies or mainstream country music.
My biggest extravagances are also investments. I have several houses in California, a house in Nashville, an office complex, and I bought the old home place in Tennessee. They are different places for me to write, but I can turn right around and sell them.
It's something that Cory Morrow said to me a long time ago - "Don't ever forget why Nashville is Nashville. The Opry is there for a reason. Country music lives there. Don't be bitter. And don't ever treat Texas or Nashville like either one isn't important."
In 1985, I went to work for MTM Records, Mary Tyler Moore's Nashville record label, and stayed three years. After that, I spent two years as an independent promoter, then worked for MCA Nashville Records, DreamWorks Nashville, and Universal Music Nashville.
I would say growing up in Nashville has been a huge influence in my music. Growing up with my dad being a 2-time Grammy-winner, BMI songwriter of the year for five consecutive years in a row, and having the legacy he has is definitely a huge influence, too.
Country music was a part of my life. Now it isn't. We had a good relationship, really, but we wanted each other at arm's length. The people in Nashville didn't want to be responsible for my looks or my actions. But they sure did like the listeners I brought.
If I got dropped tomorrow or every single I released from now on tanked, I'd be devastated, but I'd also still be doing this. I'd still be writing songs. I'd still be recording them. I was doing that for four years in Nashville. This is just on a larger stage.
When you go to Nashville and start co-writing, you start doing it as a job and the more you do it the better you get. You know if you build houses for 30 years you're better than you were the day you started. You know the ins and outs, you know all the nuances.
Nashville is a lot like my hometown. You learn so quickly once someone hears something about you or sees something, everybody talks about it at dinner. They know your business, so people tend to be more private and not to throw themselves into everyone's faces.
There's this sort of model that exists in Nashville that we think we have to abide by: You put out a record, and in two years you have to put out another one and have three or four singles. There are all these rules that I've just sort of thrown out the window.
I was so bad with the food and alcohol in Nashville. If you saw me naked compared to what I looked like when I did Iron Man 2, when I was exercising every day - I'll get it back together, but I've never eaten so much fried food and white flour in my life, ever.
I have this friend who has a theory that lots of towns have energies. And, for instance, certain places in Alabama have bad ones because they were built on reservations or built on cemeteries or something. But Nashville has a really gravitational, magnetic pull.
We left our homes and moved to Nashville as teenagers, and suddenly, we were on our own. We knew all we wanted to do in the world was write and sing... and the only way that would happen would be to jump, but you still get scared or sure you've done a dumb thing.
Being on 'Nashville' and working with some incredible people like T-Bone Burnett and Buddy Miller - so many wonderful, incredible musicians that I've been blessed to play with and observe - that has continued to shape the process of arranging music, writing music.
I drove to Nashville a few times, met with some people and hung out, went to the Opry, and that kind of stuff. I made the decision - you've got to be present to win, so I packed it up and moved out here, and it's been great. It's been the best decision I ever made.
I don't know if Nashville will ever be ousted as the Music City. But I also think that here, over the last few years, Georgia has definitely kind of risen to the top as far as the crop of young artists coming out of this area that are kind of making waves, you know?
Being able to tour and experience all of the stuff that comes from touring, and then being able to come back to Nashville, it's almost like therapy to be able to get into a session and talk about all of the things that I'm going through. It's so much more real to me.
L.A.'s cool; I had a run with it to where it just pretty much wore me out. I love the weather and I have great friends there, great family, but I really cannot take a lot of the culture. Like Nashville, where everybody's a songwriter, everybody out there is an actor.
I didn't really know you could make a living in songwriting. I was just very fortunate to have the opportunity to play a few songs for a guy there named Jimmy Ritchey. Through that meeting, I met another couple guys and ended up getting a publishing deal in Nashville.
My father was in record promotion in Los Angeles. He worked for Mercury Records, Capitol Records, and RCA Records. My parents divorced when I was about 9. In 1978, my dad moved to Nashville and opened an independent record promotion company, Mike Borchetta Promotions.
I think the defining moment in my career is the day that I moved to Nashville - September 1, 2001. That's the biggest step to getting here is making that move. Anything that happens, the wonderful opportunities that happen to you, can't happen until you make that move.
Every single day I wrote a song, I was hoping somebody like Luke Bryan, Jason Aldean or whoever would record the song. It's tough to do because there are so many great songwriters in Nashville, and I was lucky enough to get some songs recorded before I got my record deal.
Only one thing is certain: every time I return to New York from Nashville, I walk down the streets with a silly grin, just smiling at everyone I see and, more often than not, receiving a suspicious glance in return... but honestly, I wouldn't have it any other way, y'all!
What I found about 'Nashville' coming in is it's about these small performances. It can be on a big stage but detailed, small, heartfelt, real performances from musicians and singers. So if you try to do something bloated or showy, the directors dial us in and let us know.
In the mid-1970s, I even decided to make my own country album. I put the idea to my record company, thinking we'd just go into the studio in the U.K. and make a novelty album. But instead, they suggested I go to Nashville. I was flabbergasted. I hadn't expected that at all.
Pilgrims travel to Jerusalem to see the Holy Land, and the foundations of their faith. People go to Washington, D.C. to see the workings of government, and the foundation of our country. And fans flock to Nashville to see the foundation of country music, the Grand Ole Opry.
I didn't want to be a solo Westlife - covers and ballads - and the reason I signed with Capitol Records was because they wanted me to write songs myself. It was pretty scary, but they put me in a studio in Nashville with some new songwriters, and the results were pretty good.