Little Rebellion Music

At the end of last year, after some label drama, duo LoCash Cowboys came home to Average Joes Entertainment. I thought it was a good career move then, and having heard the new music, I think it was the perfect move. They are now working hard to get their album ready for release in June. Over the last few weeks, we’ve chatted about the new songs, mainly at CRS 2013 where most of this conversation was recorded. Their career has had more peaks and valleys than your average-sized mountain range, and watching them stay focused and enthusiastic through it all has been really inspiring. Along with learning music industry lessons from the duo’s Preston Brust and Chris Lucas, I also became increasingly impressed with their songs.

The new single, ‘Chase a Little Love,’ is at radio now and you’ll be hearing more about the new album soon. In the meantime, you can find out a little more about what’s been going on from this interview.

UCN: So…this is weird. We’ve had so many conversations that to now record it feels weird. [smiles] Preston Brust: Yeah, I know right! [laughs] Chris Lucas: And people don’t even want to know what we didn’t record… [smiles]

UCN: What do you want to talk about first today?
CL: We can say how we truly believe in our new record label Average Joes.
PB: We should talk about how the album is almost finished.

UCN: Yes, that’s very cool!
PB: We are really excited about it. We signed with Average Joes in December, we started recording around January 10. So, it really captured who we are right now, musically, and as songwriters.
CL: Yes, and the stuff we’ve been through. I mean, you got every different type of LoCash emotion on there. It shows a side of us that people haven’t seen.
PB: We really went for some fresh sounds, some big drums, but some things that you don’t hear on every single record that’s coming out of this town right now. We wanted a record that sounds aggressive and different, yet kind of ahead of the curve.
CL: Even on the ballads, we have ballads that are very drum heavy, and you know, go back to 1980s rock a little bit. It has a little bit of that Mutt Lange feel to it.

UCN: Yeah, there’s one of them that has this part somewhere where it felt like a Def Leppard sound.
CL: That was probably ‘Hey Hey Hey.’ [editor’s note: actually, it’s current single, ‘Chase a Little Love.’] PB: And it’s been fun, just listening to the music come together because this is really fresh for us too; it kind of turns a corner for us. In the end, we tried to really pick great songs and all the way down to songs like ‘Little Miss Crazyhot,’ it’s got some fun little lines in there but it’s very creative, the way it’s written and the way it’s formatted. That line you mentioned before ‘you’re the ‘hey girl’ in the ‘hey girl what’s up’,’ I mean, it’s just heartfelt little fun things like that.
CL: We actually wrote that with two of the best songwriters in town.
PB: Yes! We wrote that with Steve Dean and Wil Nance.

UCN: Oh cool!
PB: Yeah, isn’t that great? Chris sent the song to Steve Dean and I sent it to Wil Nance. They’re excited and feel like this is a monster hit. We’re excited too. It’s cool to have these guys we’ve been writing with for years on our album.

UCN: And then to have them be excited too, because they’ve been around for a long time.
CL: Absolutely.

UCN: You know with ‘Crazyhot,’ do you know what I was thinking the very first time I heard it?
PB: What’s that? [smiles]

UCN: I was like, where’s my truck? I need to go roll around blasting that song. [smiles] CL: Great! [smiles] PB: That’s what it’s about! We didn’t try to change the world when we wrote ‘Little Miss Crazyhot.’
CL: Same thing when we wrote ‘Truck Yeah,’ we weren’t trying to change the world. There is no thinking about it, it just came out and it’s fun.

UCN: Yeah, Chris [Janson] told me that, that it was just fun to write. Nobody sat there thinking “let’s write a big hit,” but that it was just “let’s have some fun.”
PB: Yes, it was. When we started the write, Danny Myrick was just playing around on his guitar and he already had that riff going. He said that he was being told that he shouldn’t write any more songs about trucks or dirt roads or being in the country because nobody wanted them and nobody was cutting them anymore. And he said “So…let’s write one!”  Janson immediately went “Fuck yeah!” but I said “No, no, truck yeah!” I said it and we all looked at each other and we knew. I don’t even remember thinking it, it just came out. Really, all we do is sit down and write songs that we feel come from our hearts and come from our attitude, and just have a good time doing it. And if anybody likes it or doesn’t like it, I mean, we hope everybody likes it but we can’t please everyone. We feel like the record we’ve put together is well-rounded and feels really solid.
CL: We’re very excited about the music, and it’s hard for me to say something like that because I’m so critical of the stuff that we write. Well, you know that Liv, over the years it’s been like that. I’m just so excited with the songs we have now, and the team we’re working with, with Jeffrey Steele, Noah Gordon, and Shan Houchins, and then us having a say in it too. It’s fresh and it’s really exciting what’s coming out.

UCN: Has it become easier to be critical of your own stuff?
CL: Yeah, and I think it has, you know. When we go over the songs, me and Preston, when it comes down to it, we’re bringing the songs to Average Joes to let them listen to it, so we have to pick the songs. What do we want them to listen to for them to pick from? We went through repertoire stuff that we wrote seven years ago and then the stuff we’ve written in the past three years. And there is a huge difference. Huge!

UCN: Yes, I know. That’s what I keep telling you. [smiles]
CL: For a lot of the songs we’re now “that’s a keeper!” There’s been a few that were on hold with other artists but we were like, you know what, this is us. Like ‘Best Seat in the House,’ I go through that emotionally literally every day of my life.

UCN: Yes, exactly, that’s real life. How hard is it fighting the misconceptions people have of who you are or who you may be? Or do you even care?
CL: Like Preston says, you can’t really please everybody. But you know, I was talking to somebody at CRS, a radio person, and she was saying “I can’t wait for people to hear this new stuff.” And she was talking to somebody else who was like, “they’ve probably got a party song coming out.” But we’ve got some songs that have some meat and potatoes to it, you know what I mean?
PB: Meat and potatoes sounds good right now…
CL: Yeah, it does, doesn’t it.
PB: I didn’t realize I was hungry until you said it… [smiles] CL: I’m excited for everybody to hear the new music, and find out that there is a lot more to LoCash than what people have seen already from some of the singles we have. But if you really look back, yeah, we had ‘Here Comes Summer,’ but right behind it we had ‘Keep in Mind.’

UCN: Yes, exactly.
CL: It really hasn’t changed that much.

UCN: As you already know, I really like some of the new songs.
PB: Some of them…? [smiles]

UCN: Well, I don’t know if you remember this from the first time we met, but the very first question you ever asked me, before the interview, you asked if I had your music and if I liked it, and I said “Yes, I got it, and no, not really.”
PB: Yeah! l[laughs]

UCN: So we’ve made progress. [smiles] What has the reaction been to the new material from other people?
PB: It’s been so cool! There are a lot of people loving it.
CL: I haven’t heard anything negative yet.
PB: Nate Deaton got the music, and he is an MD for KRTY on the West Coast. We obviously want the MDs and PDs to love the music. We worked hard on it and we want it to be on the radio.
CL: And the PDs are very honest too.

UCN: Yes, and they have to be.
PB: And Nate Deaton is one of those guys, he’ll tell you straight up. He has had the music for about a week before CRS and he was in the lobby when we got there one morning at 9 am. We were hearing about all the new tours, who just went platinum, and stuff like that. But then there was Nate on the phone doing a live spot for his radio station, and he goes “you guys have a freaking smash record!” He had so much energy at 9 am and he didn’t care who got the latest tour, or who got the latest big record, all he wanted was to tell me how amazing he thought the new music was. I was like, that just set the tone for my day, that’s what I needed.
CL: That’s true, that’s exactly right.
PB: We can’t control all that other stuff, all we control is what we do. And we try our best. And he was telling everybody how much he loved our new music. When we saw him later, he was grabbing PDs saying “have you heard this record yet, this is the stuff!”
CL: I mean we’ve been friends with these guys for a while and I think they really want to see us succeed. We are at a new level in our career now, thanks to Tim McGraw and Keith Urban and all the writers who write with us. We’ve done the bars and the clubs and toured like crazy. And we don’t stop, we still do. We’ve definitely paid our dues. I think some of these people are just saying “you know what, I really want to help these guys.”

UCN: I still get it now, from people who don’t really know you, when I say that they should go to a live show, they’ll say “I can’t believe you like these guys.” And it’s true I don’t like everything, and you know that.
CL: Well, they’re probably going off one of the older songs they heard…

UCN: Oh yes, and that’s why they don’t get it. I will tell them that I don’t love every song, but I love the live show, and these are two of the people I respect the most in this town.
PB: That means a lot. Thank you.

UCN: So yes, it is that thing where I want this record to succeed and I think you are now with
a great label. I have seen how they handle their artists, in a careful way but not a contrived way. Artists are allowed to be whoever they are, and then you find your own audience.
PB: And that’s what works.
CL: Average Joes is 100% behind us. We want to be successful, they want to be successful, and it’s that thing where you both say “this is the perfect fit at the perfect time.”
PB: I am so glad you saw through some of that stuff early on and saw the guys we really are.

UCN: Me too. [smiles] Honestly, when the first interview was offered I did think, do I even want to talk to these guys? But it was straightaway, and I don’t know why, that I just felt that there was more to you. And then it took just two minutes into the interview to see how smart you are.
PB: Thank you.

UCN: And that’s necessary because I do still see a lot of young musicians be told what to do and who to be.
CL: Yes, too many.

UCN: But it’s tough. If you’re 22 and some label tells you what you’ll need to do to succeed…
CL: Yeah, then you don’t know. We probably didn’t listen as much as we should but at the same time, I’m 100% behind who we are.
PB: We have had to scrape and claw for everything and anything we ever had. And so, at the end of the day, we have to be who we are and we have to be proud of that, because we’ve created a lot of buzz on our own without anybody, without anything, without a label, without an album. We’ve never had an album! [smiles] I mean, how do you get here at this point in your career without an album? [laughs] But thanks to Average Joes we put an end to all that and we feel we have a bright future.

UCN: I know! It’s so strange to think of this as a “debut” album.
PB: We were walking around at CRS and people were telling us “hey, you guys are blowing up!” And I’m like, what have you been hearing? [smiles] CL: That’s why we’re excited coming into this album, you really get the find out who LoCash are. I mean, you obviously do Liv, but the fans and especially other people in Nashville are hopefully going to be blown away.

UCN: I agree, and in this new material, I see you, I see my friends.
CL: I think we’re better songwriters now too, which is a good thing. The door is wide open for country music right now. It’s wide-open mainly because of the internet and YouTube. It’s like you ask someone “do you like country music?”, and they’ll go “I just like music.” You can go from Taylor Swift and Justin Bieber to Blink 182.
PB: And that’s the way it should be!
CL: Let the people out there decided what they want to hear.

UCN: But I’ve seen the opposite to what you said, Preston, where industry people are talking to you and telling you, “we love you guys, you’re great,” but then when you walk away…
PB: Yeah, we know…and we know who they are. [smiles] CL: Unfortunately that’s how it goes.

UCN: But it drives me crazy. After a show here someone told me that they didn’t really like it. I didn’t agree, but I said if that’s how they felt maybe next time they interview you, they should let you know, because maybe there was this element to the show they didn’t like.
PB: I would encourage anybody to do that.

UCN: But then they go, “Oh, come on Liv, you wouldn’t tell them if you didn’t like something.” So I just laughed and said “would you like to go back there and ask them what I think of ‘Here Comes Summer’?”
CL: Right, exactly. [laughs]

UCN: There is no point in not being honest. I think for me it just comes back to respect. I have an enormous amount of respect for you, and therefore I believe I owe you honesty, because there is nothing more disrespectful than not being honest.
PB: Exactly, and that’s why I love talking to you so much!
CL: And talking behind someone’s back, that’s the worst.

UCN: To bring it back to the new record, I think some of these songs might change those people’s minds though, they might think twice. And hopefully even if they say they still don’t like all of it, they’ll respect what you’re doing and they’ll understand it a little bit more.
PB: And that’s been the number one thing that we keep having conversations about. How can we make the best record we can and still turn some people’s opinions around a little bit, because this is our shot to change what people think about some of this stuff. That’s where our heads have been, you know, in picking the songs, it’s hard…and you know we’re critical.
CL: Yes, it has been hard, it really has.

UCN: Well, if you ever want to play me more new stuff and talk about some of these things you’re bringing up, just let me know.
CL: I love to do that.
PB: I would love that, because you know this; you look at it from the outside.
CL: And you also get it. I mean, you might not like a song, but you know the audience that is going to love that song. You know that, but a lot of people don’t open their mind to that.

UCN: I talked about that with Chris Janson once. I said people have to understand how the industry works and have to not be judgmental. He said that he had to kind of get over it himself where he was trying to be the cool guy writing the edgy songs. But then it’s, no, let’s just write ‘Truck Yeah,’ and have a blast. That’s not a bad thing, it’s okay to do that.
PB: There is nothing wrong with writing like that.

UCN: I had to get over that point of view too. I spend a good amount of time in the Americana and roots community, and many there really look down on Music Row. But they are missing so much great music by dismissing all of it!
PB: Yeah, but we get calls from a lot of people wanting the next ‘Truck Yeah.’

UCN: I’ve had conversations like that about ‘Red Solo Cup,’ a song I despise with a fiery passion. [smiles] Songwriters will tell me ‘oh, I hate that song…but I wish they had called me to co-write it.’
CL: When we were in Germany last year for the first time, we were playing in this little honky-tonk and we were getting ready, telling the crowd ‘okay, we’re going to play you some songs.’ And people started going ‘Red Solo Cup!’ And we were like…

UCN: Yeah… No. [smiles] CL: Yeah, really! [smiles] PB: Yeah, we sang it, and we turned the place upside down with that song; it’s a worldwide hit!
Well…hopefully somewhere we talked about our new album too. [smiles]

UCN: Yeah, I know… [smiles] I have been sitting here thinking ‘how am I going to write this up?’
PB: I’m glad that’s your job and not mine. [laughs] CL: But you get us. You’re awesome.

UCN: You know…yeah, I am pretty cool. [laughs] PB: [laughs] Right!

UCN: Thanks for your time today. We will definitely talk more nearer album release time!
CL: Yes, thank you!

To make sure you get the latest updates, check out locashcowboys.com and follow via Twitter, @locashcowboys.

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Liv Carter

Liv is a career coach for creatives, and the people who work with them.
She holds several certificates from Berklee College of Music, and a certificate in Positive Psychology from UC Berkeley.
Her main influences are coffee, cats, and Alexander Hamilton.

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