INTERVIEW: Tyler Hubbard and Russell Dickerson Join Thomas Rhett

I have a vivid memory of being at youth camp, church camp in like seventh grade, I believe it was. Seventh or eighth grade. And that was my first, I guess, when music had a major impact in my life. And I really realized my passion for music, how powerful music could be and how it was impacting me. and so then I began learning how to play guitar and writing songs and basically writing church songs. And then obviously all my influence is from country and rock and hip hop and all the other genres really led me to writing different types of songs and enjoying the craft of songwriting and learning through high school. But 15-year-old me was probably listening to a lot of hip hop, rock, Alter Bridge, bro. I mean, Alter Bridge. I mean, what you know about Alter Bridge? Every hip hop artist out there, just about every worship artist as well, Shane & Shane, Chris Tomlin, and I was a huge fan of. You guys all know we grew up learning how to play the worship stuff. And then all the … David Crowder. Corey’s cousin [laughs] but then also listening to country radio day in and day out.

It was just a passion. I really did not know that this would be where I was landing. And honestly, if somebody had said, “Hey, you’re going to do music for a living.” I would’ve laughed first of all, then I would’ve thought, well, surely it’s going to be in church, because that’s what I do. I lead worship for my youth group. I’m playing the worship band in my school, and this is where God’s going to use me. So yeah. Talk about really having some eye opening moments and some, I guess some moments in my life where I really had to trust that I was doing the right thing because it felt like, wow, this is so far from what I ever dreamed I’d be doing. But once I realized that there was a career called songwriting and a job where people got paid to write songs, I realized okay, that’s what I want to do.

RUSSELL DICKERSON: My foundation is country music. I was born in a small town, country music was everywhere. My first time performing in front of people as like, at school, was Garth Brooks, “Standing Outside the Fire.” Like headset mic and everything, bro.

TYLER HUBBARD: Hey and now here we are. Bringing it back in 2022.

RUSSELL DICKERSON: That’s how I started, that’s how I’ma to finish. So that foundation was always there, but then when I was 10 years old, we moved to Nashville. And bigger city vibes like in the school systems, everybody listens to everything. So on the bus dude, same thing. I was listening to Juvenile, I was listening to Blink-182, I was listening to Linkin Park. You know what I mean? And so that was like a musical detour from country. 15, 16 started playing guitar and that all started with my youth group. I learned guitar so that I could lead worship with my youth group, play Chris Tomlin and David Crowder and all those songs.

THOMAS RHETT: So you’re rocking Juvenile in the parking lot, but playing all those songs in the building.

RUSSELL DICKERSON: Right. So I had to repent, so I had to go lead some worship. But yeah, as soon as I started playing guitar, it was like worship songs and then you learn the power chord, you start playing Nirvana. So like all that kind of stuff and then I remember in fifth grade hearing Usher came out. And it was just like this different, swaggy, R&B type stuff and I just remember…

THOMAS RHETT: You decided to started liking, you started really loving girls at that point.

RUSSELL DICKERSON: Right. That was my awakening moment.

THOMAS RHETT: Thank you, Usher.

It was quite a journey. And to be honest, I wasn’t even planning on going to college. And I was just going to live in Georgia and run my little car detailing business and be an entrepreneur and work for myself. And I just was like, “I’m going to do what my dad did.” And then as all my friends were visiting colleges, and I went and did some college visits, I was like, “Oh. If I don’t go to college, I’m going to be missing out on a lot of fun stuff.” So I was like, “I think I might want to go to college.” What’s going to hold my interest long enough to make it through four more years of school while I’m interested in music? Okay. Well, moved to Nashville at 18, went to Belmont. Still, at that time, had no idea I would be a full-blown songwriter or artist or really pursuing that. But learned a ton, took it all in, realized at some point that songwriting was a profession. And that was what I really loved. Just to make a long story short. Went through three years, four years of college, didn’t really do a ton of music because everybody at Belmont was so good. And then probably my senior year, got it back out with some confidence and said, “I want to start writing songs.” That’s about the time that BK was doing the same thing. He was on the baseball team. We had known of each other, but not really hung out until our senior year. We approached each other and were both drawn to each other musically and creatively and said, “Let’s write some songs.” And one thing led to the next, man. And that was where I really felt, honestly, the pull of God just being like, “Hey, you’re supposed to do music with this guy. Believe it or not, I’m not going to have you in church. I’m going to have you at bars. And you’re not going to be singing songs about God. You’re going to be singing songs about beer.”

TYLER HUBBARD: I was honestly a little confused, and it’s all come full circle. And I really see big picture of what He [God] was doing and what He was setting up at the time. But it was definitely a transition in my life where I was not expecting it. And just going by where the spirit led me and if the doors were open and I was going. And so that’s what we did, and that’s what got us where we are. It was a heck of a journey. And I don’t know how deep you want to get into it.

THOMAS RHETT: How old are you? You’re 30-

TYLER HUBBARD: I’m 35.

THOMAS RHETT: Okay. We’re basically the same age.

TYLER HUBBARD: Yep.

THOMAS RHETT: And I remember when FGL started to pop, I was like, “What is happening right now? This is changing the game.”

I was in bands. We were just like rock bands, metal bands, and I just wanted to play music. I didn’t care what it was. But I remember seeing the CMT special. I was at MTSU at the time and I saw this CMT special with Josh Turner. He’s at Belmont, right at the foot of music row. And he’s talking about his career path and writing songs, and dude, I just start crying. Tears are streaming down my face because it struck such a deep desire of mine that I didn’t even… I mean, I knew that I wanted to play music, write music, perform was the biggest. I just want to be on stage. When we go see bands and stuff, I want to be that guy where you just hold the mic out and everybody’s screaming your songs. Seeing that special dude, it just struck a chord. And I was like, that’s it. That’s when I literally went straight downstairs, filled out my application for Belmont, had to audition for the school of music and stuff. So I did all that, got in, and I really just like… Kind of the same thing is like, there’s so many amazing artists and songwriters and singers around that you just kind of get thrown into that scene.

One of those nights was at 12th and Porter. I think it might have just been me on acoustic and afterwards, a mutual friend of me and Tyler’s was like, “Hey, I got these guys that I want you to meet.” And brought me over to Tyler and BK. And they were like, “Dude, great set, great songs, we should write,” and we did bro. That’s one of like my favorite foundational memories of my career was we didn’t have publishing deals, we didn’t have anything except just a passion to write songs, a passion to perform, to do this country music thing. I put out my first EP, pretty much wrote every song with them. That was just such a fun, innocent, unadulterated time to write songs and create.

Al Andrews, who’s a friend of ours, and has had his ministry in the prison system for a while, goes and visits every month. And I know us three are all friends with Al and had been telling him together and separately, “Hey, I want you to take us sometime. I want to do that.” And so somehow the stars aligned and all of our schedules were, we got to go do this. And I remember driving there with you guys and Al, and just being like, “Yo, what is this going to be like?” We were a little nervous, a little excited, we had our guitars, we were just going to go play some songs and kind of hopefully minister to these guys and just give them a little love and just kind of, hear their story and just hang out. And man, what a special day that was. I can’t help but keep thinking about the way we all felt. You said scared to death. We were all kind of nervous. And we were all asking Al all these questions, tell us, “What are we about to get into?” When we were driving there, riding in the truck, riding in your truck. I just remember all feeling a little anxious, a little nervous, a little excited, but I can’t help, but think about the way we felt when we left and how we were all just processing in the truck and talking about basically what had just happened and how it was making us feel, inside and outwardly. We were all kind of just taken back and surprised, but also inspired and grateful for that experience. And like we had sort of talked about before, I think we got to see firsthand kind of the power of Jesus and the power of the Lord.

All we have is these documentaries on Netflix of worst prisons in America, face tats, and stabbings and stuff. That’s why people are on death row. You know? But it’s like… But as [Al Andrews] has given us his rundown, I’m like, this doesn’t sound like that. This doesn’t feel like that. And just the gentleness that Al talked about these guys with; and sure enough, when we walk in, it’s like, smiles everywhere, hugs everywhere. And every time I talk about this song, I end up quoting every line. It’s like, “turns out they are a whole lot like I am.” They really are just like… They’ve had time to… I don’t know. It’s just like, they’re us, man. They are totally normal dudes, but they’re just stuck in a prison cell for the rest of their lives.

I can still see it vividly. I remember faces. I remember there were 30 people on the ground that got to be… Or on the bottom floor that got to be there on “good behavior.” And then there were folks up top that literally had their feet chained to the ground and I was like, “What the crap are we doing here?” You know what I’m saying? I don’t know if y’all remember this or not, but, I can’t remember if you started that set or who started it, but I remember being like, “What do y’all want to hear?” And one of the guys raised his hand and he was like, “I want to hear Christmas in the Country.” And it was a Christmas song that I’d released three weeks previous to that. You remember that? And I was like, “Well, we get to watch CMT for an hour every day.” So they knew every song that we had sang. And man, when that dude came down and sang, Amazing Grace, I just remember being like, “This is the most terrifying, most spiritual experience I’ve ever been a part of.” So thank y’all so much for being on this with me because that’s a day that I will never forget and a day that’s really hard to explain until you listen to this song.