I wrote 'Happy Man' with a couple of boys of mine. I have been writing in Nashville for a long time. Of course I was writing songs back in Oklahoma when I was a kid.
And to me, I had come out of Texas, and during that time was when I realized that a lot of people in Nashville, their idea of what country music was was not the same as mine.
After Nashville sushi and a long debate on Bob Dylan, we went into Woodland Studios at 10 pm that night for a look around, and jammed for 5 hours solid.
My first place in Nashville was like 'Animal House.' The whole band lived under one roof, and most nights the jam sessions ended close to sunrise.
My dad is in the music business in Nashville. I was the third child born in my family, and there are three notes in a chord, so that's how they came up with my name.
The reason I moved to Nashville was because I was reading biographies of a lot of my country music heroes, and I thought it would be better to actually go where the history was, as opposed to just reading about it.
When I went to Memphis and Mississippi and Nashville, I learnt the blues is a whole way of life. I don't really have the blues, but I can appreciate the honesty and the simplicity of it.
Nashville is wicked. It's like a proper music community, but it's also quintessentially American. You bump into people there with cowboy hats that spit in jars and call you 'boy.' I just love that.
I think it took me a while to convince Nashville that what I do is genuine and my heart's in the right place, and I love country music.
I went to L.A. to be Brad Pitt; now I just want to be Gene Hackman. I came to Nashville to be Kenny Chesney. I'd be very fortunate to be George Strait.
Nashville is only a couple of hours from New York, and people just move at a slower pace there - and they don't care who you are or what you do.
Nashville has a formula, and it works a lot of the time, but it wasn't right for me. They're afraid to step outside the box - even though, with me, my success came because I was outside of the box to begin with.
The people I used to have around me from Nashville was showing love to the Cash Money clique on the strength of Buck trying to make it; making sure Buck gets to where he gots to go.
Music leaves such a big impression. I always wondered, 'Man, if I grew up in Nashville, would I be making Country records now?' I honestly feel like Chicago had such a big impact on me.
When I first came to Nashville, people hardly gave country music any respect. We lived in old cars and dirty hotels, and we ate when we could.
The best compliment I ever had is, one day I was in Nashville, some disc jockey said, Hey, that sounds like a Tom T. Hall song. Up until then there hadn't been any such thing.
We have been so pleased with the response to our unique schools in the Nashville area, and we are confident that other areas will embrace our concept, as well.
I have no regrets. I feel very grateful for the life that I had - you know, family I live with; and I've been doing work that I love, ever since I came to Nashville.
I love chocolate, and I love to shop - just give me a good boutique. I like mall scenarios, too, because there's more right there at hand. I think Nashville could use some better shopping!
I've been writing songs all along, and since moving to Nashville in the late-'80s, I'd begun writing something like 15-20 songs a year, instead of the typical three or four in previous years.
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.
