"I love playing music. And that's what it's all about."
"That's kind of fuse for the show - those first 10-15 seconds you're onstage. The curtain drops and you see the crowd for the first time and they see you for the first time. The response and the energy that's going on right there - to me, that sets the tone for the rest of the night."
"But for me, I thought you made a record, you got on a bus, went out and played your shows and made a lot of money. That was the way it was supposed to go down. But there's a lot more to it than that. There are a lot of early mornings, late nights, a lot of traveling, a lot of being away from home, being away from your family."
"As a new artist, you come out, and there are so many other new artists. It seems like there's a whole wave of new artists that come along every year. In '05, I was part of the crop. It was a lot harder trying to set myself apart from the rest of the pack."
"The worst gig story I have is from a club in Alabama that I think is still up and running, so I won't name the name of the club. We got hired in there to play, and the owner was pretty annoying. He kept coming up to me during the show and asking me to play 'Purple Rain.'"
"I would say, 'Go ask any couple that's been married for 30, 40, 50 years... It hasn't always been roses.'"
"I know I'm not gonna please everybody when I make a record. I don't let that affect any of my decisions."
"There are people out there who are into traditional country music and for those people you have artists like Brad Paisley and Josh Turner and Alan Jackson. Then you have artists with a progressive style of country music, like myself and Eric Church and Luke Bryan and Miranda Lambert."
"I'm a country boy. I'm from Georgia."
"You're not going to hear me singing songs about Wall Street because I don't know anything about that."
"I grew up listening to all kinds of music, everything from country to rock, pop, R&B and even rap, so for me, music is music and a great song is a great song."
"To me, a critic is someone who gets paid for their opinion, and they're entitled to that opinion but I don't really put a lot of stock into their opinion. I'm going to cut the kind of records and the kind of songs that I like, and the kind of things that I enjoy doing. If critics dig it, that's fine, if they don't, that's fine."
"My producer, Michael Knox, he's kind of my eyes and ears on Music Row. While I'm out on the road, he's looking for songs, and then he and I will get together and go over songs."
"Macon has such a rich musical history - and the state of Georgia, as well."
"It feels good when your hometown supports you, and Macon's always done that with us. Every time we come here, it's an event - which is nice."
"I had no idea 'Big Green Tractor' was going to be as big a hit as it was. You just can't predict those things."
"My mom was a single mom, and she had enough on her plate. I knew when I was doing something I wasn't supposed to, and I tried to keep her from finding out about it. I did a pretty good job of that."
"I had a friend, Melissa, who was 28 years old. She was my best friend's wife, and she was my wife's best friend. She died of breast cancer. When she passed away back in 2004 was the last time I cried."
"When I was a kid, we went to St. Augustine, Fla., and I was lying on the couch one night with a Q-tip, cleaning my ear out after I'd taken a shower. I hit my arm on something, jabbed the Q-tip through my ear drum, busted my ear drum and couldn't get back in the water the rest of the time we were there."
"I'm trying to get an acting gig on 'CSI' or something like that, so we'll see how that works out. I'm a singer, definitely not an actor, so I just follow directions."
"I don't think I really have any wisdom. Stay out of trouble. Good luck. Stay away from women because they will burn you, haha."
"You don't want to get too ahead of yourself and go out thinking you can play stadiums every night, and they end up being about half-full."
"You have record companies that sign acts that they think are great, and then they never do anything. Acts that they don't think are really going to do much end up having a career. I don't think anyone really knows what it is that drives somebody to get on their computer and want to download a song."
"We call them impact songs, and people buy impact songs. But you just never know what those songs are going to be. One of those songs that really went through the roof for us was 'Big Green Tractor,' which I thought was kind of a fun little ditty song that I never in a million years thought would be as big as it was. But it was."
"I think from an artist standpoint, you have to put out music that you feel like represents you and things you feel like your crowd wants to hear. And if that drives them to go and download the album or the single, that's what we want."
