Never let other people decide what you can and can’t do. In this episode, Marty Ray, actor, composer, and director, joins Rich Redmond and Jim McCarthy as they talk about Marty’s journey of making music on his own terms. From losing his hearing on his right ear to posting his first video online, get an overview of Marty’s entertainment career and how he persevered to find his voice and achieve his dream. They also talk about the power of social media to reach out and share your voice and content. Tune in as they celebrate Marty’s unique talents and making a living with creativity.

Listen to the podcast here:

Marty Ray :: Making Music On His Own Terms

People are moving here to Music City, USA. Recording studios are being knocked down. Condos are being built. The state bird is the crane and its progress. To my left Jim McCarthy of JimMcCarthyVoiceovers.com. Thanks always for being here. I love you being my Robin. I mean Batman and Robin with your utility belt and stuff.

I would rather be Robin Quivers in this scenario.

Let’s get to this because we have a talented new friend, my friend Marty Ray. What’s up?

How are you all doing?

How are you doing? Thanks for being here.

Thank you for having me on the show and teaching me some things about the RØDECaster.

You’ve got the same board.

The same one. I have a podcast.

Tell everyone about that.

It’s called The Marty Ray Project: Chats. We had Vanilla Ice. We talked about one of the songs I did which if anybody knows me that’s listening they’re going to definitely know that I did a cover of Ice Ice Baby.

The Marty Ray Project is your page on YouTube.

That’s everywhere. That’s my band. It’s Marty Ray Project anywhere you want to find me. TikTok, Snapchat, and Instagram.

Jim is trying to get active on TikTok. I’ve got an account and I don’t know what to do with it.

I’ll tell you about the beauty of TikTok. I was talking about it with my little brother. I got on there. It was first called Musical.ly. Some fans of mine would send me Musical.ly whatever they called them then they called TikTok, I don’t know what to recall but these videos of them lip-synching to my songs. They said, “You need to get on Musical.ly.” I was like, “I don’t understand why I would get on there if that’s a lip-synching app because I’m a singer. Am I going to lip-sync to my own songs?” That doesn’t sound like something I would do so I didn’t give it much respect.

When TikTok started and bought it out or did whatever they did, it’s become this whole other thing. I still didn’t embrace it because it was still people doing lip-synching. It was maybe in 2019 that I started seeing people sending me things that were different. There were people using my songs and doing some skits and stuff like that. All my friends are bearded, which is a parody idea and they were taking that and they were doing skits. I was like, “Maybe I should get on here.” A few months ago, I ended up getting on there. The beauty of TikTok is it’s not like Facebook. They’re not making you pay to get views, advertising and all that. You should embrace it while you can. If you look at those trending tags, you find one that’s at 20 million or 30 million but climbing, and you get on that wave, you can get views easily and quickly.

We had a friend yesterday who has a great online drumming education program and he’s got tons of views. One video has a million views. For a drummer, this is a big deal but what he did was he figured out the back end game of the algorithms, keywords, timing, the length, and the thumbnails. I’m assuming you’re knowledgeable on all that.

I am but I don’t think anybody could know it unless that’s all they do to keep up with the ever-changing algorithms.

When was the first YouTube video you posted? Has it been years?

Years ago. It wasn’t YouTube though. My life started like this, basically. When I was five years old, I lost hearing in my right ear because of what they called cholesteatoma. It stayed in there and the doctors kept giving me ear drops. The doctor in Blytheville kept giving the ear drops to my parents, and it wasn’t helping at all. One night, the whole side of my face goes paralyzed. My dad then rushed me to the hospital and apparently there had been a cholesteatoma. There is some form of a tumor. I don’t know 100% what it is, but it ate up the bones that allow you to be able to hear and my eardrum inside my ear. I couldn’t hear out of my ear this basically my whole life since I was five. I don’t know the difference, to be honest.

You’ve got to crank up that other side.

Even now when I mix my own music, it’s mixed with one ear so it’s always mono. Professionals, they pan. I don’t pan at all. It’s all down the middle with me. For years, I would mimic artists like Jason Aldean or somebody like that. Garth Brooks, Al Green, and Shirley Caesar. You probably don’t know Shirley Caesar.

As an exercise to know to develop your ear.

Not an exercise. It was something that I enjoyed doing. As a boy, I would do that. Boyz II Men was a big thing for me. I would mimic those people but never could sing my own. I didn’t know how I sounded but I thought I sounded pretty good and sounded like them. I had some people tell me that I wasn’t that good at singing so throughout my life and my dad was always a realist so he was like, “This thing is music. That’s fun to have a dream.”

“That’s not a viable path, son.”

That’s fun but go get a job go work.

What state is that?

Arkansas. I was born in Memphis raised in Arkansas.

We had a lot of guests from Memphis. Something’s in the water there.

Isn’t it? Something’s in the water is making a move over here. I like that. I’ve got to start using those more often.

You can be like Jim and use them nonstop.

We put our own in.

I’ll put my own intro in.

Don’t use the toilet one.

We can use the, there we go.

That one’s good.

Which one did you say not to use? I want to hear that one.

Toilet one where it’s a guy’s having a real problem.

That one?

That’s beautiful. I’ll have to get some of your sounds.

That’s a good one.

That’s like a day after I eat cheese. I’m lactose intolerant.

That’s me after Taco Bell every time.

I haven’t had Taco Bell in so long.

You probably eat healthily, don’t you?

I try.

You look like you’re closer to me.

I try, whenever I’m around Rich.

I’m not saying you’re fat.

I’m heavy, for sure. I’m big-boned.

When he’s around me he diets because I say, “No, Jim put that down.”

What is your daily diet?

I had two eggs and a green juice. You get all your vitamins and stuffed from the green juice and eggs are like the perfect food. For lunch, usually, I’ll bring lunch for Jim and we try to go something more paleo. No rice, no white flour, but occasionally we’ll cheat and we’ll go to Jimmy John’s because they have the best bread. If you can try to eat your bread earlier in the day, it helps. For dinner, some salad with a protein on it or something like that.

We’re doing PF Chang’s.

I’m going to get Chang Spicy which is their version of the General Tso Chicken and try not to eat too much of the brown rice.

You were talking on your podcast about The Fast Five.

We open every episode with the Fast Five. We ask our guests five fast questions to break the ice and get things that don’t matter too much. Don’t think and just say but they need to be the truth.

Look at Jim. What questions are you going to ask Jim?

We would say something like, “Favorite snack food.”

I’ve got to think about that. Candy bars.

Like a Snickers?

No. Doritos or Goldfish. Revised.

One answer. Please, sir. You lost already. What’s your favorite snack food?

Twix.

You’ve had time to think about it.

You’ve got to do it fast.

It’s tough though when you give somebody, “Give me. Quick.”

I like the green M&Ms.

“I’ve got to think about this. I don’t know.”

It takes more muscles to frown than to smile. Click To Tweet

Everything is my favorite snack food. Who is your favorite actor?

I would say, Brad Pitt.

Mark Ruffalo.

That’s the first one that came to mind.

I like Mark Ruffalo. He’s going to play me.

I like Brad Pitt.

Robert Downey, Jr.

Don’t change it now. Brad Pitt is your answer. Brad Pitt in Fight Club. I love that guy. That came right out the gate with Brad Pitt. Brad Pitt is a great actor though. I watched Fury. It’s a great movie. Fight Club is a great movie. We would go, “Who would play a movie about you?”

Mark Ruffalo.

Clooney.

I’ve got that picked out. I’d give him some drum lessons and he would play me.

I believe that that would work because I can see that happening but you look like a guy that would play yourself.

I would love to play myself. I’m working on it.

How about you?

Howard Stern.

Howard Stern will play him?

Howard Stern played himself in his movie.

He did and did great. Who would play you? Vin Diesel?

Probably Bruce Willis.

He’s like Brad Pritt. We would go for something like a favorite movie.

Gladiator and Marvel movies are all in the top ten.

I’ll say, Gladiator.

Alien with Ridley Scott 1978.

The First Alien, that’s your favorite? You’ve watched it how many times?

If it’s on, it’s getting watched the entire time. I’ve watched the director cuts, extended cuts, with and without commentary. I’ve done it in a theater, home theaters, and on my device. It makes you uncomfortable. He did such a great job of making the actors uncomfortable and it’s so gloomy and dark.

It began to you.

It’s a work of art.

You’re into horror movies.

I love horror movies.

I could tell when I’m walking through your house.

There are some posters down there. Day the Earth Stood Still, The Creature from the Black Lagoon.

There was a dead body down there too. He is into these things. Was that five?

That was three.

The next one could be anything but favorites are easy to do. Dream vacation if you haven’t been there already.

Italy.

Have you been there or is that where you want to go?

I’d like to go there.

Rome would be nice because I’ve been all over Italy but not Rome.

You’ve been everywhere. Cats, dogs, or others?

Dogs.

Cats. They’re easy to take care of. I would kill a dog. It would die from hunger.

Thank you for clarifying that.

I kill cats. I’m gone so much that I kill cats. Everyone’s like, “Rich, you should get a kitten.” I love pugs. I’d like to have one black pug and a white pug. They’re brother and sister and or they’re two brothers and they’ll get into mischief. I have my track pants on and Kara and I take the dogs for a walk. It sounds romantic.

Track pants but not shorts.

It’s not going to happen.

It sounds like a Brad Pitt movie. It’s like that Burn Notice or something.

It’s like a Brad Pitt Mark Ruffalo movie.

That’s right. That’s who will play both of you. The last one would be something like, “The best advice you’ve given to someone in your life.” It doesn’t have to be in music but it’s any advice ever.

Learn how to sell.

That’s good. That’s broad but a lot of lead them in the right direction. I like that.

I tell people to smile more often. It’s because you don’t have to speak the same language. It helps everyone because you release serotonin and it’s a beautiful thing.

That’s good. That’s good advice. They always said this and I don’t know if this is true, but they always said it takes more muscles to frown than to smile. When you’re sleeping, you’re not smiling so you’re at your most resting place.

RBF.

I don’t believe that it takes more muscles to frown than the smile, maybe to do, but this is the face of least resistance for your muscles.

When Rich plays, he has that Robert De Niro frown.

What is that?

There’s a lot going on. People are like, “Why does that guy look like he’s going to take a massive dump on the drum set?” The Muse is there with me and you go into your special place to create this thing. It’s a physical reaction to making music. I’m not doing it on purpose. I get a lot of crap for it though.

He’s possessed is what he’s saying.

You’re not worried about what you look like when you’re singing. You’re emoting.

I look horrible when I sing. In Ice Ice Baby and I was saying this on another show. That’s me and him singing it at Boca Raton.

Is there a more produced video?

There’s an actual produced song but that’s after the first video if you type in Marty Ray Project Ice Ice Baby, it’ll pop up.

You’re going to pull it up on me.

Look at that. We’ve got it right here.

Ice Ice Baby Acoustic.

I produced. All that is a USB mic in the middle of my studio.

Five million views almost six million views.

On YouTube. It has 100 million-plus on Facebook collectively. That song is a legendary song and it has its own life.

You reggaenized it.

In that video, you see I’m smiling. That’s forced because I had done other videos. That wasn’t my first viral video, but I was like, “I should smile more.” I’m supposed to be happy but when I’m saying I tend to be frowning. I don’t know. If I’m singing anything and it could be happy or it could be, “Don’t worry about a thing because every little thing is going to be alright.” It could be anything or a happy song like that.

You could say anything acapella. You sound great.

Thank you. What else do you want to hear? We’ll do a whole show of acapella.

I can grab the hand drum right there and jam with you.

Let’s do one before the show is over. You play your drum and we’ll see how that goes. It would be fun.

That would be uncharted territory.

It would.

Acapella with a hand drum.

Maybe we should write a song where it’s drums and voice.

Remember Don’t Worry Be Happy? That was Bobby McFerrin doing all the voices back in the day and there was minimal production.

What I was saying was Bob Marley, Three Little Birds. You’re talking about Don’t Worry Be Happy.

All human voices.

Where did Bobby McFerrin go?

He’s doing speaking.

That makes sense.

How are you knowledgeable about everything?

I know stupid stuff.

That’s not stupid. That was pretty perfect.

I don’t know bonafide that’s what he’s doing but I know he’s done speeches, TED Talks and stuff.

What does he talk about?

Music. He talks about pentatonic chords and stuff. There’s a video of him leading an audience in guessing what the next note will be and how he’s singing something.

Bobby McFerrin demonstrates the power of the pentatonic scale. It’s a TED Talk with 8.9 million views.

Don’t worry, be happy.

Making Music: There’s no market for you to sound just like somebody else, even if you’re dead on.

That’s good for him. For anybody that’s accomplished something, you’re already at that point in your life, where as an actor and somebody who has so many fans, you could be speaking and you command a room. When I met you, we’re new friends. We only met in early 2020.

It was love at first sight. We fell in love. We were looking at each other’s eyes.

There were four speakers.

They were supposed to be doing a panel on me and Rich were like, “Hi.” They’re like, “What are these guys doing?”

There are four speakers and two are relatively shy and you were like, “This is how it is,” and you command the room.

I wasn’t trying to do that. That can happen and I feel that happening when I’m at panels and stuff. I was like, “I’m not trying to be the guy that is talking the most or something.”

This is what you heard when you first saw each other.

Sailing.

“Hi. I see you. You see me.”

Are there some wind chimes?

We have.

Have you seen the naked clay guy that does this and he’s like, “It’s okay, you can look at my butt?” Have you ever seen that? I got to see that. It’s weird.

What is that shirt you’re wearing, the guy? That’s Ed Bassmaster. We had Daughtry’s bass player on here, Josh Paul and he’s like, “We know that guy.”

You must tag Ed when you post this. If you take this clip and post it to your Instagram or wherever tag Ed because you’ll get a kick out of it.

He is wearing a Freddy Krueger shirt there.

It’s a gaudy ‘80s sweater.

What was it called? Coogi?

Psh Guy.

No, with the sweater he was wearing.

That’s a Cosby sweater.

What was the brand? It was called a Coogi or something

Kangle?

Maybe. It starts with a C. Nonetheless, you haven’t seen this yet but you will have to. After this podcast, you will have to see Chip Diamond. I don’t even know the name of the character goes, “Would you look at that, just look at it.” That’s how he blew up from that.

What were we talking about?

I have no clue, but I love talking about Ed.

We were talking about you growing up with your dad, music as a career and you losing your hearing?

We were talking about that.

Where’s the singing and the acting?

Here’s how it happened. I would mimic people and I thought I was good and some of the people I looked up to in my family, as musicians and singers would say, “You might want to play the drums or something if you want to get into music.” I was like, “I don’t feel I’m supposed to. I’m called to play the drums but I feel like I’m a singer.” There would be arguments or not, but I would believe them still.

That’s funny that they wanted you to play the loudest instrument.

At one Christmas, we went to the church because we always did that as a family. Sometimes we would go and jam out. We went to church and I was singing. I had my moment and I wanted to impress him. I would be singing and they would be like, “When’s he going to finish?” When I finished, I was like, “Huh?” They’ll be like, “Do you want to hit and see if you can play the drums?” I’m like, “Sure.”

They’re like, “There’s your calling.” I’m like, “Really? No, this is what I want to do,” which is fine. I like playing the drums. Anytime you get to pop it out, I wish I could play you. You’re all amazing. I left there. You leave you those situations where you think, “I want to impress them this time.” I don’t have a good hearing. I said, “Maybe I’m one of those people that think they can sing.” There’s a lot of people that, apparently to them, hear themselves singing great.

They sound like Pavarotti.

They sound horrible. My brother’s one of them. God bless you. He’s bad.

What does he do?

He has a business and Jonesborough doing something. I don’t know if he still has the towing service or not but I don’t know what he does.

You still got your mom and dad around?

They’re still here.

Do they go, “We get it now?”

My dad even to this day, I’ll tell him, “Daddy, someday soon I’m all I’m going to be rich enough to take care of you completely. I want you working anymore.” He goes, “We’ll see. I’ll be dead before that happens.” I said, “Daddy, you said you’d be dead before I got to where I could do music full-time and live and have my own house and things like that.” He said, “You got lucky.” God bless him too. He was a realist and he worked hard for everything that he got and you could tell. He’s not in the best of health because he worked and worked.

We were blessed growing up. I was never poor. I wasn’t rich but I was never poor. My dad always worked his butt off but for our vacations, we would go everywhere but it had to be in on a weekend. You had to get there on a weekend to get back because he had to get to work because he owned his own business. He owned a record service, in a mechanic shop, a gas station, bails bondsman, and bounty hunter. He hunted down his own bounties. He would bail out these dangerous people. If they didn’t come, he’d go away to Florida and drag them back to Arkansas like a madman. He did all that so he could wake up on a Saturday morning and be like, “Do you know what I want to do? I want to go to Six Flags.” Let’s go. Do you know what Six Flags is?

Yes. Texas.

We went to St. Louis. He said, “I want to go to Six Flags.” We’d all jump in the car, go to Six Flags, stay overnight and come back home. We would get into the flow of the vacation and it is time to go already. I told myself that when I grow up when I go on vacation I’m going to go for a week.

Seven days at Six Flags?

Not Six Flags. I don’t even want to go to a music park anymore but I do because of my children. I’m more into dinner shows like the Dixie Stampede and where you eat and you watch a show.

It’s like Chaffin’s Barn.

I don’t know if you could tell but I like to eat.

You’ve got a wife cooking for you?

Yeah, she definitely cooks.

How long have you guys been together? You’ve got kids. You made human beings.

We’ve got children. We’ve made human beings.

Are they into music?

They love music, especially mine. They’re my biggest fans for sure.

Does it start with them?

It does. My youngest daughter, everything that I do she wants to do. I’m an actor, so she wants to be an actress. I’m a singer, so she wants to be one. She’s good. My other daughter is that way but she’s more of a writer. She’s written two books already. That’s my oldest. My youngest is two years younger than her. My wife and I have been married for several years and it’ll be forever. There isn’t anything stopping us.

That’s great.

I would imagine you as a young man.

You guys got married at twenty?

22 or 23. I don’t regret a bit of it.

I tell you what, what it makes me think of it? It makes me think of The School of Rock because we have some parents out there that are sponsors of our show. The School of Rock is our sponsor. If there are parents out there that want to get their kids involved, off the video games, get them some exercise, learning some musical instruments working in a team, we learned so much from playing music in a group. It’s a team sport.

My friends Angie and Kelly McCreight have two locations here in Nashville. They have School of Rock Franklin and School of Rock Nashville. We’ve got email addresses for you folks out there and Angie and Kelly said that they’re getting a lot of referrals from us. It’s Nashville@SchoolOfRock.com and Franklin@SchoolOfRock.com. Tell them that Jim and Rich sent you and that School of Rock music education rocks. You’re supporting your kids in whatever venture they want to creatively.

I need to get my daughters over there. That’s cool.

Bring them over there. Singing, playing bass.

School of Rock, they got it from the movie.

The movie came from this thing that existed already.

It already existed.

If you are going to make it in music, you have to figure out how to find your own voice. Click To Tweet

It’s been around for good twenty-something years.

I didn’t know that. I figured they used the School of Rock movie.

There are 250 locations. They got one in São Paulo so it’s a great thing where you learn by doing. They play concerts to teach music. It’s an incredible thing. It’s hands-on. What is it Jim, when you go to become a mechanic?

Trade school.

That’s learning by doing.

You get your hands dirty with music.

You’re saying that you’re making your living full time from music from the comfort of your home.

Also, as entertainment.

You create videos and you put them right here. I’m looking at your YouTube channel. It says, “New video every Friday at 3:00 PM.”

That’s old. I release them on a weekend now. Saturday or Sunday. I need to change that. I’m glad you brought that up. I wasn’t prepared.

That’s good. What would interest me is that I always saw myself as a complete entertainer not only a drummer so I’ve been studying acting in the last few years. I’ve got my SAG card. I study here in Nashville and I’ll study in Los Angeles. I’m going to take TV hosting classes for six weeks out there. What was your story with acting? When did it start? Who did you study with? Where should we look for you like indie films or big blockbusters or television shows?

I’ve been on some big-time TV shows, but first, I should finish my music story.

Finish that sure.

Let me wrap that.

I’m so sorry.

No, it’s not your fault. This is the way it goes in my show too. Fast forward. I’ll make it quick. In 2005, I got a MacBook. When I opened that up, it had GarageBand on it. I said, “I can record myself without paying somebody to do it.” I started messing around with it, with the speaker and the microphone on the computer. I was like, “I don’t know. I sound pretty good to me. I still like the way I sound,” but I’d never heard my own voice. That year, that Christmas, I wanted to get my uncle and my cousin together and go record Hallelujah because that was a song that I knew I could get them to sing with me.

The Leonard Cohen?

The Jeff Buckley one.

It’s one of my favorites of all time.

Did you talk about that?

It’s the thing that comes up and I even do a speech called Happiness Rocks and I encourage people to put a playlist of their favorite music together to put them in a positive frame of mind and that’s top of the list.

That’s the one. I did that not too long ago. Years later, we never finished that one but that beauty of that moment was like a godly divine type moment because I was mimicking everybody else so there’s no market for you to sound somebody else. Even if you’re dead on, what’s the market for? Unless you’re doing a Vegas comedic type show. I knew that if I was ever going to make it in music, I had to figure out how to find my own voice and how I sounded. My uncle ended up leaving early so we didn’t get to finish that Hallelujah song. When he left, I told my cousin, I said, “I want to finish some song completely so I can mess around with the editing so I can learn.” He said, “What do you want to do?” I said, “I don’t know. Let me find a hymn book.” I went through it and said, “Here. I’ve never heard anybody saying this one.” It was Great Speckled Bird. Have you heard that?

Yes.

I said, “I haven’t heard anybody sing this. Play it. I’m going to sing to follow you.” He started playing it. There’s no reference in here now for me to sing the song so I was like, “What a beautiful thought I’ve been thinking.” I was like, “Woah.” The first time I’d ever sing and got chills was right at that moment.

It’s because you weren’t mimicking anyone.

This is me singing now. I finally know what I sound like. I went out and showed it to him. I was like, “Do you hear that?” He goes, “It’s alright.” I go, “This son of a gun.” I took it out and I left. I took it to my uncle and said, “What do you think about this?” He knows that my cousin had been editing music for a while and he goes, “James Rodney edited that. That’s not you.” I said, “There’s been nothing done to this yet. That’s me singing.” He was like, “Okay.” I said, “I’m going to make a video.”

I made a simple video with me and that song to see, Is this my calling or not? I said, “God if this is my calling, I’m putting this out there. You let me know.” I put it out there and it got 30,000 views on my personal Facebook page and I said, “I’m a famous man now with 30,000 views.” People were calling my dad’s shop where I worked and they were like, “That moved me to tears.” They were saying, “When are you coming out with an album?” I was like, “I hadn’t thought about that but I do need to come out with an album.” It was years later. I wasn’t immediately. It was years after that separated from that. Years later, I took $3,000 or $4,000 from the bank because it was all I had. I came to Nashville because I had a buddy here, CJ Wilder. Do you know CJ?

He’s a drummer. He lost his house, didn’t he?

He’s not a drummer. He’s a bass player.

That CJ Wilder.

He did lose his house, unfortunately.

That’s horrible

Making Music: When you start breaking a million views, the thousands don’t seem as much. It’s a shame.

You know another Wilder.

There’s a drummer with a Wilder

We were talking about him. He used to do a jam session at Fiddle & Steel on Tuesdays. He said, “Come out and play.” I went out and said, “I’m going to do it.” I went out there and sang two songs with them and acted like, “I’ve got to go for an act like I’ve done this many times.” I don’t know how I did, but they all seem to like it but I was up there terrified because I’m in Nashville now. I’m on the stage and there are people watching. I had no clue but it was a learning experience for me all the way from there so because of him, he knew the studios and all that so we ended up doing an EP and whatnot. We released that a long time ago. I had to take it down for some reason. After that started, I said, “I want to sell this music.” I started making videos and trying to be consistent. The first actual viral video I had was called All About Dat Beard. Have you heard that one?

No.

It’s a parody of All About that Bass. I was learning video production. I said, “I’ve got to make a video to learn to do video.”

How long ago was this?

This was years ago. It was posted on my personal Facebook first because I didn’t originally post things to YouTube because I had no YouTube following. I had a small following on Facebook, it’s not even on my Facebook page. You’ve got it pulled up?

Yes.

Do you hear that scratching in the beard? That’s me scratching my beard on the microphone.

That’s awesome.

You’ve got to go and check this out. The visuals are hilarious.

How does that work with licensing in a parody?

It’s supposed to be covered under the law because 2 Live Crew and somebody I forgot what, but they won a court case years ago that said, “If it’s a parody, they can use it because they’re parodying the music.” It doesn’t mean it always works. I did a song called Bad and Beastie. It’s a parody of Bad and Boujee. Have you ever heard that song?

Bad and Beastie? No.

No. Have you heard Bad and Boujee?

I’m sure I have.

You don’t listen to any rap, do you?

No, I do. I try to keep up with it.

It was a song a while back that goes, “My girl’s so bad and bougie.”

Lil Uzi Vert?

That’s Migos.

I like Migos.

Lil Uzi is in there.

I don’t know the titles but I know some of the jams.

I don’t see anything on YouTube.

You did a parody of that?

Yes, and I posted it on Facebook, this was a while back, and the Universal Music guy took it down.

This one?

That’s it but that’s the end of it. Lil Uzi is at the end. What did you find? A clip of his?

Yeah. It’s a verse lyric.

Did you put Bad and Boujee?

It’s a lyric video for a rap song. That is funny.

You need it in that song. I had to watch it over and over to get it. I wasn’t a fan of the song but it was the number one song at that time. I was with a partner with a beard product company and they paid me monthly to produce content.

Are you with Manscaping?

No. They paid me to do something for them too. Did you see that?

They reached out to me about doing an influencer thing.

That’s what they do to me.

I can’t imagine me telling the little drummers that follow me, “Make sure you shave your balls.” I don’t think it’s a good fit.

Listen, kids, everybody shave your balls.

Girls love shaved balls.

Five songs that will get you laid. Five beats.

Be sure to tell mom and dad that you want a Manscaper for Christmas.

We had a guy on and we’re talking about how to title your videos to get more attention.

It’s a lot of how-tos.

That’s what he talked about.

Manscaping the balls. I don’t get it.

You have The Money Beats.

That’s one of my teaching philosophies for the last few years. The Money Beats are five beats that you better learn how to play if you want to make a living playing popular music. Our guest goes, “Title your videos Want to Get Laid or Five Beats to Get You Laid.”

If I would, that would be clickable 100%. What were we talking about?

We were talking about a man’s hairy balls.

We were telling kids to shave their balls.

Because you have that beautiful luscious beard doesn’t mean you get to shave your balls.

I can shave my balls when I can see them.

How long have you had the beard?

I’ve been growing it for what I thought was a few years. When I was on Facebook, do you know how they give you those memories? They showed me one taken years ago when I had a beard. I was like, “I’ve been growing this for years.” I’m horrible with time. My timelines are horrible. I don’t know if everybody’s like that. Not everybody’s like that. I know but I don’t know if you’re that. I’m definitely like that. When I went and performed with Vanilla Ice. Somebody said, “How long ago was that?” I said, “That was ten years ago, it seems.” They’re like, “It was five years ago.” I was like, “Okay.”

I think about the time in relation to who I was playing with, recording with, dating, and who I was married to. It’s a good way to know, “I was married to her so probably it was that year. I was touring with such and such and we were playing in such and such place so that’s probably 2006.”

How long were you married?

Anybody that takes their own mind and creativity and makes a living out of that is just beautiful. Click To Tweet

Eight years.

That’s pretty good.

I was on the road full-time.

It’s a tough life.

I’ve got a great new girl now so everything happens for a reason because I am a big believer and in the big G, the guy upstairs. He wants the best for us.

He does. That’s true. My story, to wrap it up. I don’t know how long you all do these.

We can go as long as you want.

Is he a steel guitar player?

Yeah. Bruce Bouton. He played on all the Garth Brooks records.

My buddy who I do my podcasts with is Jim Vest. He played in all of Johnny Paycheck’s and produced Tracy Lawrence. He was the one that produced and wrote a Stick and Stones with Tracy Lawrence. He’s got all these golden platinum records on his walls. He also worked with Vern Gosdin. He’s the one that did the detuning of the steel guitar on Set ‘em Up Joe.

We probably have crossed paths because Jason’s first hero is Tracy Lawrence.

He probably knows Jim Vest. Ask him if he knows him. I did that All About That Beard because that’s what I wanted to do. I wanted to make parody music. When I found out how hard it was to get the license, I said, “I also need to do my own music and stuff like that.” I made that video learning and you could tell I’m learning in that video because it looks crap but was funny still. That’s all it mattered and that’s all that matters on YouTube, unfortunately, fortunately.

People want to laugh.

It doesn’t matter about the quality as long as it’s funny.

It does. You can pour your heart and soul into something and it can be this masterpiece and beautiful project. Somebody comes along and does it on their phone and goes further than yours and it crushes you. It crushes your spirit but you can’t let it. That got two million views in one day, my little brother, Brad and I, were headed to an audition in Nashville, coincidentally.

Acting?

Yes, we were starting. We’ll get into that after this. I posted it in the morning at 7:00. We were driving to Nashville and didn’t even think about it because if you don’t get a whole lot of love anyway, why am I going to be checking it? Halfway from Memphis to Nashville, he was getting texts. People were like, “I saw that video. It’s funny.” He’s like, “I appreciate it.” They were some friends. “My guess is they saw it because you tagged me.” He kept on getting texts and he’s like, “What the heck?” Nobody was texting me. I was like, “Nobody’s texting me.” What the heck is on my page? I said, “Pull it up.”

He pulled it up and sure enough, at that time was 700,000. He was like, “This thing is at 700,000 views.” I said, “What? Let me see that.” At the time, I thought 30,000 was special. It’s still special. I’m happy for every view. When you start breaking millions, the thousands don’t seem as much. It’s a shame when that happens. When you’re small, if you get to 10,000, you’re like, “I did something.” If you get 10,000, again, it doesn’t mean as much. If you get into 100,000, 50,000 doesn’t mean as much. You get 500,000 and 100,000 doesn’t mean as much. It keeps going up.

I have almost 70 million views on YouTube collectively. If I get a video that doesn’t get a million, I feel like a failure. On my Facebook page, I used to be able to post a video and it would automatically get a million views. Organically, it would get a million. When they change the algorithm and they want you to start paying, that all changed. They want you to pay. There’s an occasion where I can still post a video and it does well but it’s a pig in a poke now.

We’re driving and by the time we got to Nashville, it was at a million views by the time we got back to Memphis that night it was two million views. It was right at two million. That was on my personal. I stopped posting because I didn’t even know that people were migrating from my personal page to my Facebook page. I abandoned my Facebook page because it was too hard to get people over there and because of that, people started naturally going on to the Marty Ray Project Facebook page. Have you ever heard of Lad Bible?

Yeah.

They did a whole article on that song and called me or emailed me and said, “We want to do an interview with you about this song.” I was like, “Where are you all out again?” They said, “We’re in the UK.” I was like, “This is something crazy with this video.” They interviewed me over there. For the video, I was hoping that Meghan Trainor would see it. I thought this was going to happen. She’s going to see it and we’re going to collaborate. It never happened. It still hasn’t happened.

Did she ever respond to it?

No. I don’t think she’s ever seen it. I’d highly doubt she has. If she has, she probably hates it. I still love you, Megan Trainor. You’re amazing. Fast forward through that, I was trying to stay consistent and because I hadn’t posted a video in a while at 3:00 AM, I posted the Ice Ice Baby cover the way that I was doing it, acoustically. On my personal Facebook page, I changed it now but on the original description, I placed, “I know it’s 3:00 AM but I want to be consistent. I haven’t posted a video in a while. I don’t know if you like this or not but here’s how I’ve been messing around with Ice Ice Baby.” It’s a set it and forget it type thing like an old infomercial. I forgot all about it until I checked Facebook again and that thing blew up and went bananas.

Twenty-nine million views.

That’s one post. The thing about that video is it’s been posted even on my page. They’re reposts. There’s one that’s 30 million views, 29 million, 7 million and 10 million. Also, other people posted it. World Star Hip Hop posted and they put it on their website and their Facebook page. Bam Margera posted it. All these people were taking it and posting that video. They couldn’t believe that somebody took Ice Ice baby and made it feel that intimate. There are people who are saying this, and they still say to this day, “I tear up listening to that.”

You could take the lyrics from something that’s more of a party song and the way you presented it inspired another emotion. Incredible.

They did the same thing with Gangsta’s Paradise. Have you seen that one?

No.

Making Music: If you want to go fight for your country, do that but don’t do it because it’s your last resort.

Pull that up quickly. Those are the two rap songs from my day that I was always playing and listening to.

That’s supposed to be that way. When you hear his lyrics and that’s what I thought about. His lyrics are heart-wrenching what he’s saying in there and they even know it’s a rap song.

These comments, all of them are positive, “Am I the only one wondering why he’s not famous?” “Easily the most unique and best cover the song I’ve ever heard?” “I don’t know what’s better, your voice with that beard.” “There’s something amazing about hearing a song done in a completely different style.” Do you respond personally to a lot of people?

That’s what I was going to say. When I started getting all the comments, that’s what helped my brand grow. I wasn’t doing it for that reason, but I was so honored because I came from a place where people said, “You better play the drums if you want to get into music,” to where I have all these people that I don’t even know that love me. They say, “You saved me with your music. Your song kept me from committing suicide.” They’re crazy things. It moved me so much I was like, “I’ve got to let these people know what I think.” I would answer every comment, I still do, that I can and get to. It’s impossible to answer every one because some of those I don’t get notifications for that video anymore. The comments that come in on that video, Ice Ice Baby and One Day, I would have to go and look at all of them.

When I first posted these things, I’m answering every comment and message I answered myself. I still to this day. I answered them all back and I want all these people to know that I appreciate them and I love them because that’s the truth. Years later after I found out that in the algorithm of Facebook, it helps you. You are considered a conversation starter so it keeps boosting your video or your post. I didn’t even know that at the time but I would still do it even if that wasn’t the case.

At the bare minimum, I’ll hit the like.

You should hit the love.

The love? Is there a love button?

On Facebook.

There’s a love button? If somebody leaves you a comment, usually if I’m super busy, I try to respond to everybody but sometimes I’ll like it.

Hold down and hit love because that’s how Facebook is. Facebook when they release something different or new, their algorithm judges if you hit like. It’s not as important to Facebook’s algorithm as if you hold down and hit an actual reaction. Love, tears, sad, wow, or anger.

I didn’t know they had those. I’m a creature of habit.

That’s what most people do but what I’m saying is I used to study that stuff but religiously. I had to quit because I can’t keep up anymore. At this point, it’s always been in God’s hands. That’s what the project is. It’s a project to see how far I can go without signing a record deal. How far can you go with only his fans and God?

Pretty far. You can monetize YouTube from the views and now that you have this audience, you can sell t-shirts and coffee mugs. Are you there? Are you doing that?

I’m partnering with Stitch Kings who makes this shirt. We are now going to start making them. I’ve had merchandise for a long time, but I’ve never pushed it because I don’t stock all this stuff and go mail it all the time.

It’s horrible. Somebody has to do the distribution for you.

I partnered with them and they will drop ship. That’s what I’ve always wanted.

What’s it called?

Stitch Kings.

Write it down.

We need somebody to do our T-shirts and coffee mugs.

Please call them and tell them I sent you.

Are they here in Nashville?

No, they’re in Pittsburgh. That’s where Ed’s at. That’s how Howard discovered them.

What’s up, Ed?

What’s up, Ed Bassmaster? Psh. Unreal.

Does he ever get down here?

I’m trying to get him down here. He and I are talking about doing something together.

Comedy music.

I don’t know. I want to work with him. He’s a genius in everything. Even in selling shirts, he’s a genius. He’ll get on there and he’ll have a shirt or something. He’ll go, “I have a new shirt up. I don’t care if you bought it or not. Whatever,” It’s unreal, “I don’t give a crap” and people will buy it. He sells the crap out of it and he doesn’t have to leave his house. He sells that much merch. Anybody that takes their own mind and their creativity and makes a living out of that I have mad respect for.

It’s beautiful. This platform exists for us to do it. It’s incredible. Any thoughts about going out and playing live?

I do that. I played in Franklin at Kimbro’s. That was the first show I’ve done here. I don’t do public shows a lot. In all reality, I’ve done probably a handful of public live shows because in the beginning, I was trying to do public shows and it’s hard to get people to show up.

You can do those living room concerts where the fat cats bring in, the high rollers.

The private events? I do those.

Living room concerts. What do they call them? Home concerts?

I don’t know what they call them but I call them private events. I do those a lot. People bring me to Canada and they pay well. CJ and I went to Canada and Florida in 2019. We’ve got a fan named Tony that brings me to Florida to his vacation house. Tony the fan. Tony Rouse. Thank you. I love you. We do private shows but I want to start doing more public shows because everybody can’t afford them.

I’ll play some drums.

That’d be nice. That’d be sick. He’s at our price range though.

We’ll come. We’ll be fine.

If he’s too expensive I can play with you.

Jim wants to get back into public.

I’ll take Brad Pitt.

Bruce Willis.

The music thing is killing and what’s the little bit story with the acting bug. How long was that going?

The way acting came about was when my little brother, who graduated high school at eighteen years old. He was working at Zaxby’s in Blytheville. I lived in Memphis.

That’s good chicken.

It is good. They charge too much for the extra sauce. Do you get the extra sauce?

They extra surcharge the extra sauce?

Yeah, $0.25 a pop.

For crying out loud.

You know what I’m talking about. You feel me, Bruce. He’s all depressed and I dropped him off at Zaxby’s because he was going to work and he spent the night with me in Memphis. I took him to work and took him back home. He was getting out of the truck and he was depressed and down. I asked, “What’s wrong with you?” He’s like, “Nothing.” I was like, “No. What’s wrong with you? Something’s wrong with you? You’re going to tell me. I’m not an idiot.”

He said, “I’m out of high school now.” He’s depressed since high school was over and now, he’s got to figure out what he has to do with his life. He was like, “I feel like my only option is to go join the army.” I was like, “That’s honorable if you want to go join the army but that’s not the reason to do it.” You don’t join it as a last resort. If you want to go fight for your country, do that but don’t do it because it’s your last resort which is not your last resort. You’re a bright kid. Why would you think that?

I said, “What’s your dream? Did you ever have a dream? What is it?” He didn’t talk about dreams much. He said, “My dreams are unrealistic.” He’s trying to walk away and I’m like, “You’re not walking away. What is your dream that’s so unrealistic?” In my mind, I’m thinking, “I hope you don’t say president,” because he’s right that’s unrealistic. That’s not going to happen. He said, “Actor.” I said, “An actor. There are millions of actors.” I said, “Move to Memphis. We’ll find a place. We’ll find an acting studio, class, or whatever it is and you will be an actor.”

He moved to Memphis. I found a place called Indie Acting Studio in Memphis. Forrest Pruett is a good friend of mine now. A shout out. What’s up? I know you’re not watching this, but maybe you will be. We started going to that. I was taking him. I wasn’t participating. I was hanging out and letting him do his thing. Forrest kept coming back and taught the teacher. He kept coming back and talking to me and asking me about certain things. He started to get a feel for who I was and one night he said, “Marty, come on up here.” I said, “No. I’m a singer. I’m not an actor.” He said, “We’re all something else. Get up here. Let’s have fun.” I said, “Alright.” I got up there and immediately fell in love with it because that’s something I’ve always done anyway, playing make me believe. It’s a fun thing. We’ve all, but as an actor. We all do it. As a child, we’re all actors. We were all actors and we’re all dreamers. We all believe that we could be anything we wanted to be when we were young. You said, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” “I’m going to be a superhero.”

Spider Man.

You believed it?

Life kicks in the balls and people give up on all that.

It’s not alive so much as humans “adults” say, “You’ve got to think about real life.” You get trained to not dream. You get trained to believe this is what happens in life. Don’t think that you can do that. That’s foolish. That’s a childish thing. You shouldn’t be that way. I’m not doing that with my children. I say, “Anything you dream about now, never lose that dream. Keep on dreaming that and keep going forward.” I don’t care if you have to end up working McDonald’s or something and I pray you don’t but if you do, you do, but you never lose sight of the end game. Even if you die trying, you’ve died trying.

My parents were not like that. My whole family, none of them are like that because they were all from poor families and that’s how it works. When you’re from a poor family and you work hard and get some there’s nothing against you. There’s nothing wrong with working hard. We work hard with our minds and with our skills. My dad doesn’t see it that way. He doesn’t see what I do is working hard. He sees that you can only work hard with your hands. He did that and he still does that.

We started doing the acting thing and that got me into the acting bug. An agent showed up at his acting class one night to check out things and we were all working scenes. She loved what I did and she said, “I want to talk to you after class.” She signed me and started sending me auditions for TV shows where I’m co-starring roles and stuff. The first thing I booked was an indie movie called Bad Bad Men, which is on Amazon. I got paid $100 but it was beautiful because I got paid to play. This is make-believe. This was fun.

The next thing was the show on TBS called the Detour and it got canceled, but this was five seasons ago. It was the first episode where I was in and that was $1,000 a day. As soon as I got that, they paid me to come out there. It was in Wilmington, North Carolina. They paid me to come out there. I’ve got the hotel and a small trailer but it was still a trailer.

Anything you dream about now, never lose that dream. Keep on dreaming that. Click To Tweet

I’m sitting there and taking pictures. I’m a movie star. You can’t get past the treatment. Once they treat you as a co-star and they treat like you’re the actual star. It’s amazing. When you’re in between scenes, there are people that come up and they’re patting your head and you’re like, “Thanks.” Other people are so used to it that they seem rude. I was always cutting up with the people. I was like, “Can you get my butt next?” They would laugh and they weren’t used to that. You could tell the people weren’t used to the actors and I still do that when I go. It doesn’t matter.

Being kind.

It’s stupid to be all pretentious.

It could dry up at any second and they can never get the work again. I had that little trailer on the streets of Queens because I was in that show Happy on the SyFy Channel with Christopher Maloney. I got to work stunts and had lines. I was all dressed up as a cop and you go and get fitted for your outfits and you’re at craft service and they’re like, “Places people,” and it’s rolling. It’s like a drug. It was amazing. I can’t wait to do it. I’m waiting for my next opportunity.

It’d be amazing if my next opportunity was your next opportunity and we would be there together working.

It’ll happen.

It would be incredible. They’re going to be doing a film. Who is the blind piano player?

Ray Charles?

No.

Stevie Wonder?

No.

Ronnie Milsap. He’s going to be on my show.

We almost played some music at Bridgestone Arena one year and something happened. His bus was delayed or he got sick or something and it didn’t happen. They’re making a biofilm on him.

Jim said that because him and Jim are close.

There’s going to be some parts for us. We’ve got to find out what’s going on.

We’ve got to get those parts. I’ve got to talk to Jim and get us both into that movie somehow.

Let’s do it. They’re going to need a drummer.

You got a guaranteed in. You might have to change your hair.

If you’re too expensive they can talk to me.

If they need a Brad Pitt look alike?

That’s right. Brad Pitt or Bruce Willis.

One-arm pushups.

It’s that time of the show. We talked about the Fast Five questions. Let’s do Fast Five random questions. We have the random question of the show. I’m going to copy your template and your format and pay homage to you.

I like that.

Is it omage or homage?

Great guest. Not everybody has the gift of storytelling and being an articulate conversationalist. You could tell a story, which means, I have no worries that one day you are also going to be a big corporate speaker.

I was getting to that. Before you start because I remember that now. When he didn’t when he said that it triggered my brain. I was in prayer when one morning and I said, “Lord, I want to be pliable. I want to be usable. Mold me into what you want me to be.” It’s like he placed this thought and I said, “I’m doing everything and entertainment. What else is there?” He told me internally, “You haven’t spoken in front of anybody as a speaker.”

Did he tell you that?

Internally. I heard this in my head. I’m not saying God said, “You haven’t spoken to anyone.” Internally, you hear this small voice. I didn’t think of that. I never thought about that, “I’m going to be a speaker.” I never thought about saying, “I’m going to do a TED Talk someday.” I never thought about that until that morning. Lo and behold, this was crazy, my buddy Derek Eurales, who has done that for a while and a business coach and things like that, texts me. This was literally the same day. He says, “I want to get you to come to Clarksville next month and speak in front of the citation group.” I said, “What’s your citation group?” He said, “It’s a club we have and we have speakers come in.” I said, “Are you serious? Alright, I’m there.” This is something that is outside of my comfort zone because I don’t know how to do that. I’m good at answering questions. I don’t know if I’m good at getting up and saying, “Here’s a topic. I’m going to talk about it and you’re going to be interested in it.”

You get a coach to put your little presentation together. As far as you executing your presentation is going to be no problem for you. Look at how comfortable you were answering those questions with the people four feet away at Kyle’s party.

I can answer questions all day.

If you can do a podcast, you can speak freely in front of people.

I like it. You all are boosting my confidence.

We do the same thing. We do music, acting and I speak. That’s your next thing.

Do you speak?

I speak to Fortune 100 companies.

What’s your next speaking engagement?

There’s nothing here in Nashville. My next one is at the Venetian in Vegas for Oracle.

Do you have a video of it that I can watch?

I’ll send it to you.

Maybe you can coach me?

I’m also doing emcee work. You could do that all day long and you look different. A guy shows up that has a long beard, you put your sports coat on with your jeans or whatever, and you’re still going to look completely different from the average businessman that’s attending this four-day conference.

I would think that’s going to throw them off.

No, they want something unique. When I show up, I’ve got crazy spiky hair, my rip jeans, and boots, but then I put a sports coat on. It dresses the whole thing up. After the first song, the sports coat comes off. As the emcee, you’re doing to keep the energy moving and keep people engaged.

You’re the in-between guy like a Grammy host.

Or like Ryan Seacrest or Mario Lopez. You could do that all day long.

Or Brad Pitt and by the end of the show, he’s in his underwear.

Underneath the desk, I’m in my underwear already.

I’m going to get cinematic here and throw some music beds in here. Random questions. Fast five. Would you rather your only mode of transportation be a donkey or a giraffe?

Donkey.

Would you rather be every shirt you ever wear be itchy or only be able to use one-ply toilet paper?

Itchy.

Would you rather have edible spaghetti hair that regrows every night or sweat, not sweet maple syrup?

Regrows every night.

Would you rather have to read aloud every word you read or sing everything you say out loud?

Sing everything, I say.

Would you rather wear a wedding dress/tuxedo to every single day or wear a bathing suit every single day?

Wear a wedding dress.

Finally, would you rather have all dogs try to attack you when they see you or all birds try to attack you when they see you?

All birds.

Hitchcock. I heard that they were going to remake the birds and it was going to be a Michael Bay film. Can you imagine? These things would have been monstrous birds, transformer birds.

The birds flying to you in the way they hurt you is they explode when they hit you.

You can’t discern what’s going on the screen because that’s how movies are.

That’s an easy question though. The dogs attack you or the birds. I can slap a bird around. I’m not scared of a bird. I do not want to get bit by a dog.

People are like, “They’re so sweet” for Pit Bulls. They don’t seem sweet.

Some of them are sweet.

When you challenge them on that, people get upset.

Pitbull owners.

You know what makes me nervous? It’s when an infant or a child is around a Pit Bull. Not a good idea.

One of my best friends who’s more like my brother he used to raise and breed Pit Bulls. His son was young and we’re talking about massive headed Pit Bulls. His son would be pulling the ear. I’m like, “Randal, don’t you worry?” I’m like this with any dog. It can be a Pit bull, a German shepherd or my own little Schnauzer that I have. I don’t want no dog biting my children. I don’t care so I teach my dog. I’ve had Great Danes. I love Great Danes but they knew 100% that my babies were untouchable. When my babies would come around, the Great Danes would be looking down and my babies would be petting them. They would be hurting them but they’d be petting them.

How do you train them to do that?

With a stern voice.

Alpha male.

They’ve got to know. If you have a big dog or a dog that’s dangerous, they better know who the boss is in that house. There’s no problem with that with many of my animals even my little dogs know that I am the boss.

“You hear that goldfish.”

“What are you looking at?”

Look at his goldfish over there. They’re all obeying him.

“You looking at me?” Tony Soprano.

What’s the best place for people to find you?

@MartyRayProject anywhere on social media and MartyRayProject.com is my website. Everybody should join the mailing list and the podcast is The Marty Ray Project: Chats and you’re going to be on it.

I can’t wait.

I can’t wait to get you on there and talk to you.

Where are you out of? Franklin?

Hendersonville. I wanted to move to Franklin but it’s too expensive.

Go north. You’re right up there. There’s a lake and all that.

I love it. It’s a blessing to be there. I am happy to be in Hendersonville because my buddy Jim lives there and I’m already friends with him. It worked out the way it should.

Taylor lives there or one of her houses.

Taylor Swift? She’s got big joints everywhere.

She’s got a place downtown.

She’s got a place in LA, Paris.

I thought she moved to New York. She has a song, “Welcome to New York, to New York.”

She basically disavowed Nashville and country music. She was screwed.

She has won every award you could possibly win.

She looks genuinely amazed when she does.

Have you ever seen that video Taylor Swift is Always Surprised?

“I won again?”

“I’m surprised.”

Before we go, do you do the acapella thing? What do you want to do?

You start singing and I’ll start playing.

He’s going to give us random songs and I’m going to sing them and you flip it up in the middle. Have you ever heard of the five beats of death or five fingers of death on Sway in the morning?

Five Finger Death Punch?

No, but it sounds like that. On Sway in the morning, he does this thing where he gives these beats and these people freestyle with the rapping and they change the beat in the middle of everyone. They go through five levels.

Can you do Africa by Toto?

I don’t know the words.

You pick the song. Something you’re comfortable with. You were doing one acapella before. It’s gorgeous.

Nice.

I like to try and test myself and see if I can make a song up on the fly.

That was great. We went through some stuff. Isn’t it great? I wish I had pipes like that where you can burst into song and people won’t run away.

Do you sing?

I didn’t get that gift. I was a music educator and stood in front of concert bands and stuff so you could say French horns and you could sing the line to them but as far as someone showing up in public to hear me sing, you’ve got to jump in the shower with me.

He’s trying to get you in the shower. Is that what you do after every show?

We’ve got to get cleaned up somehow.

It’s awkward.

He saves on water that way.

It’s efficient.

Jim, what did you learn?

I learned that it’s proof positive that when you get around the right people and you break outside your lobster show of discomfort, you can put your mind to anything and achieve great things. You are living proof that you can do it on your own without any middleman or gatekeeper telling you what you should and shouldn’t do. Kudos to you for making a go at it and a viable career in the music business without signing a record deal.

It’s incredible.

He should read audible books.

I tried that. It’s not my thing. I like doing radio commercials and imaging.

I read my own book. If you guys want to buy it’s on Audible.

I’ve got to get it.

Do you know what I learned, Jim?

What did you learn?

First of all, I love the idea that you had naysayers in your life. You had some negative Nellies that didn’t mean any harm by it. It was parental units and friends and they were like, “You should do something a little bit more realistic with a safety net.” You’re like, “I have a strong feeling that this is my calling,” and you follow that gut instinct of yours and all these years later, you’ve followed that path and you’ve been able to be successful. You’re blazing a new path for other people that want to try to do things in the music business using existing technologies that don’t need record deals. It’s an incredible thing so it reinforced the idea that when you have that gumption, and also, the fact that you talk to God on a regular basis.

I have too. I would be a mess. Sometimes I say, “If I didn’t know that Jesus was looking after my children and my wife every day, I would have to be there with them at all times wherever they were at.”

I would think that I’d be a wreck of a parent. I’d be like, “I’m going to chain you up.”

I’ve got a room for you that I locked.

“Do you have some electrical outlets that I can lick?” That’s what they do in the first couple of years of their life.

They stick a fork into the sockets.

They spend the first five years of their life looking for death.

That’s hilarious but it’s true. This was such a fun conversation. I appreciate you coming by.

I appreciate you all having me. It was fun.

It’s a great show. Jim, thanks for everything you bring to the table. I love that the production value keeps growing and growing and I hope you guys are noticing that out there. We, of course, love you guys out there. Give us a five-star rating. Leave us a comment, subscribe, share, rate, and review. Be sure to check out my friend’s podcast. What was it one more time?

The Marty Ray Project: Chats.

I love it. We appreciate you. Thanks to The School of Rock for sponsoring the show. Keep coming back for the good stuff. We’ll be here. We’ll see you next time.

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