Voices In My Head (The Rick Lee James Podcast) Episode 429 - Weston Skaggs: Rick Man

Welcome to Voices in My Head, the official podcast of me, Rick Lee James. I'm a recording artist, a singer, a songwriter, an author, a worship leader, and an ordained minister in the Church of the Nazarene. The Voices in My Head podcast is where I discuss music, movies, books, pop culture, theology, and more with friends, colleagues, and sometimes just by myself. Now make sure to let me know what you think of today's episode by leaving me a review on iTunes or by tweeting at me @RickLeeJames on Twitter. And please join my mailing list at RickLeeJames.com where you can receive an email every time a new episode is released. By the way, in case you're interested in a daily dose of kindness and encouragement beyond this podcast, I also run the Twitter account @MrRogersSay where I post daily quotes from Fred Rogers, one of the voices in my head. Well, I guess that's it for the intro, so sit back, relax, and listen to the latest episode of Voices in My Head.

Hey friends, welcome back to Voices in My Head. I'm back from hiatus and this is gonna be a very special episode. With my friend and very special guest artist Weston Skaggs. Gonna get to that interview in just a few minutes here. He has a great new single out. But before I do, I want to remind you all that at the time of recording this, that this coming Friday, the 23rd of July, I have a brand new single, Shine a Light in the Darkness, coming out streaming everywhere. So you can get it on Bandcamp, which actually, if you are a subscriber on Bandcamp or if you follow me on Bandcamp, I've already released it on surprise. So if you want to go on and pay a dollar, you can actually go ahead and download the song and get it there. That's just a surprise for those of you that follow OneBandCamp. But for the rest of you, if you listen on Apple Music or if you listen on Spotify or Amazon Music or all those different places, on Friday you can start streaming the song Shine a Light in the Darkness. There's a new music video for it which we had a whole lot of fun filming. I hope you enjoy it. We really had a lot of fun making this song, and I hope you enjoy the press release that's going to be coming out soon about it. Hope we're going to be getting a lot of coverage for it. I'm so glad to see that a lot of radio stations are picking up on it. We already have charted on a couple of radio charts, and I just couldn't be happier with seeing all of the great feedback the song is getting even leading up to its release from the radio markets. So, uh, yeah, great way to come back from this hiatus from the Voices in My Head podcast. Got some great guests coming up on the show, but today here on Voices in My Head, we have Weston Skaggs, and he has a great new single himself that just came out this past Friday. It's called Rich Man. You're going to hear all about it, and at the end of the show, we're going to actually play the single for you. I hope all of you will go and add it to your streaming platforms, whether it be Spotify or iTunes or Amazon or any of those places that I've mentioned before. You know where you listen to music. Go and find it, listen to it. It's a great song. Weston Skaggs is a great artist, and he really deserves a follow from you. He's really got a great heart, a great message, and makes some great music. So without any further hesitation, here's my conversation with Weston Skaggs. Welcome back to Voices in My Head. As always, I'm your host, Rick Lee James. I'm back from my short hiatus, and I'm so glad that all of you are here with us again today for what I know is going to be another excellent conversation today with my old friend Weston Skaggs. Weston has a great new single out. It's called Rich Man. It's on Old Bear Records, and it just released on July 16th. It's a brand new song. It's profound, and I'm looking forward to not only sharing with you today on the show, but also getting to go a little bit more in depth in the song and catching up with Weston. It's been a while since we had a chance to sit down and talk, so we're going to do that today on the show. So thank you for listening to Voices in My Head, and we're going to go right into our conversation today. Weston Skaggs, welcome back to Voices in My Head.

Rick, thank you for having me. It's good to see you.

It's good to see you too. And listeners, in case you're wondering, we are actually seeing each other even though you're only hearing the audio today. I'm trying out Zoom today. You wouldn't know this if you listen, but I've been recording over Skype for a long time, and we're trying it over Zoom today. I'm catching up with the rest of the world and recording over Zoom, so we actually get to see each other as guests today. So whether that's good or not, I don't know. I'm sorry maybe that you have to see me, but, uh, you know, uh, it's nice to see your smiling face anyway. The last time that we did this, I think, as an actual podcast, we really did do this face-to-face in person, and we were at the Getty Music Conference, and I think that was in 2000— was it '18 or '19? I can't even remember. Uh, it must have been—

I think it was '19, because I think— yeah, because I think that was the last time that— because they canceled last year. I think—

yeah, yeah, that was the last time they did it because the pandemic hit and none of us got to go. So that would have been it for sure.

Yeah.

Um, and so you and I then, we actually— I, I remember that day very well because we were sitting in kind of a press room where we got to talk and share together, but we also had the unique opportunity— I remember Joni Eareckson Tada was in the room with us, and before you and I actually did our conversation, we got to kind of eavesdrop on a conversation with her. And that was just a really special day for me because she's an amazing lady, a pretty powerful speaker anyway. And I think both of us probably remember that moment and probably will for the rest of our lives, just some of the really unique things that she had to say. So we kind of, uh, we were kind of stowaways in that conversation that day, but it was a neat time for sure.

Yeah, that was a special few days. It was good to, good to spend time with you in person after being connected for, uh, online, and that's just always valuable to, to be in person and break bread with, uh, with people in that way. And then yeah, we had some of those moments where That was really special to hear her testimony kind of firsthand there right in the room with us.

Yeah, that was really, really cool. Well, I want to get into your new single right away. As I said at the beginning of our time together today, it just released on July 16th. It's through Old Bear Records and it's a song called Rich Man. So if you're listening right now, I am going to play it as we close out the show today if you're wondering what it sounds like. But But that shouldn't stop anyone listening today from going to all of the streaming outlets that you listen to and hitting that little heart or whatever it is on the function that you use and listening to it, saving it and playing it because you're gonna wanna hear it again and again. There's a lot of meat to this song and I think you have to listen to it a couple times through. It's really based off of, really I think Jesus's teaching in Luke 6:24 about, you know, woe to you who are rich. And honestly, when I listen to it, I think, uh-oh, he's preaching at me in some ways. Because I think all of us, whether we like to admit it or not, just where we live, this part of the world, those of us who are, I guess, maybe fortunate enough to live in the United States of America, just by virtue of being where we are, we are kind of considered rich to the rest of the world on some level. You know, I was talking about this with a friend the other day that works with compassionate ministries around the world. And not rich by any means when it comes to the standards of what we would consider rich in our nations. Not Bill Gates and not— I've forgotten the guy that— Bezos, you know, who runs Amazon. Not anything even like that. As a matter of fact, even by the standards of American neighborhoods, they live very modestly. But when his kids ask him, you know, are we rich? He says, Yeah, we are, because he's used to going to Ethiopia and he's used to going to, you know, neighborhoods around the world where there's refugees and people in crisis. And I think that's maybe a difficult thing for us sometimes, especially in like the white evangelical church sometimes in America, to just look and go, wow, maybe Jesus is speaking to us right now, you know, in this parable when we talk about the rich man and some of these things. So I'm going to be quiet for a minute and let you talk about your own song. But I'm here to say it's It's gotten me thinking as I have been listening to it, and I think that's the mark of a good song for sure. But I want you to talk to us a bit about your song today. Tell us about Rich Man and some of the roots, some of the behind the music about this song and where it comes from.

Thanks for saying that. This song I started writing, I think it was 2018. And at the time, uh, I think I had the first two verses of it, kind of came out pretty straightforward. I was thinking about maybe a lack of, uh, the term prophetic gets thrown around a lot with modern Christian music, and it's usually in relation to like worship music, usually as a form of like blessing, like prophetic blessing music, but when we actually look at prophecy in the Bible, the writings of the prophets and Jesus' pronunciations that he makes, it's often a little bleak for those receiving the warning. It's often a warning, if anything, and so I thought— I started thinking about writing a song with that in mind as a warning. And I think in the tradition of folk music, that's very common. Warnings are common in protest songs, you know, by Dylan and Joan Baez and Woody Guthrie and others, you know. But it definitely doesn't lend itself to pop music, I don't think, because it's not the most feel-good type of thing. And so it's kind of definitely faded out of Christian music. I think rock and roll is still willing to protest things at times. But so anyway, kind of protest and warning as a form of song I thought was interesting. And so I started writing about, uh, "Woe to You Rich Man." and woe to the Pharisees. And really, that came out of a— just a— the, uh, it almost felt like I was being strangled by the tension in our country over the last 5 years and just the heavy, uh, tone of, of meanness that can come out from, uh, even good Christian people, you know, quote unquote good Christian people. And in thinking about how Jesus would tell parables or talk to, uh, the Pharisees, none of them knew that they were the bad guys in those stories, right? You know, and quite often the parable will be a story that has a turn in it where, you know, say like with Nathan's parable to David about his sin, he's like, you know, tells this story of, uh, of a rich man who takes a poor man's only sheep, you know. And well, who wouldn't be upset about that, you know, because when you see it in somebody else, you naturally— your righteous indignation rises up, you And then by the end of the story, he realizes it's him. And a lot of Jesus' parables do that same thing where they start you on their side. You know, the religious people are loving the fact that the prodigal has just ruined his life. They love that. They're like, yeah, that's what happens when you walk away. And what crushes the religious people is realizing that they're the older brother Yeah, who doesn't want to see him come back, right? And so in a way, the song turned itself on me in that way, because I think it's very easy for us to have a righteous energy, righteous indignation against who we perceive to be rich without considering that it's us, you know. And it's very easy for us to have a righteous indignation about people we think are more more legalistic than us, more Pharisaical than us, and not realize that maybe I'm doing that with other people. But as I initially wrote those verses, it was more of protest than of looking at myself, and then I wrote the third verse, which is, uh, "Woe to you, church blue and red," which really, uh, was my heart, like, it's just so rent by everything that's gone on in our country the last 5 years, and just the fracturing and the factions of Christians who are defined by things other than Jesus, you know, and it can be liberal Christians or conservative Christians who are identifying themselves by something other than the person of Jesus because I think Jesus doesn't fit in either of those boxes particularly, and it's not that Jesus fits in a moderate box either because he's not. He's radically radical grace and mercy, and he's radical holiness too, so yeah, so I wrote that verse, "Woe to you blue and red," church blue and red, and at that point I was like, I don't know, this song is maybe too heavy-handed, you know. Um, I don't know if I'll ever put this out. And then I wrote the last verse because then I thought of the other use of the word woe, uh, or one of the others was Isaiah when he realized the holiness of God and he said, woe to me. Yeah, I'm a sinner, you know. And I think that's the key to, um The key to real— for those of us that have all this energy wanting to change the world, wanting to impact the world and see change, is that the only thing that we can, that we are promised that we can affect, is change in ourselves through the grace of the Spirit, you know. And that has to be done through humility. So in a way, the song kind of became a Trojan horse. Yeah, you know, because there may be people who, who hear the first few verses and are like, yeah, get them, get them, you know. Um, but if you don't, if you don't decry something without also self-purification, uh, it's empty. And that's one of, uh, Martin Luther King Jr.'s, uh, tenets of peaceful protests was that one of their first things they would do is they would engage in corporate self-purification and examination, you know, on the individual and corporate level.

Yeah.

To see, even though this horrible injustice is going on, is there any way in which we are a part of this, play into this? And, uh, so it's— it would have been easy to just leave it as a protest song that decries something, but without self-examination, I think that's really where the gospel, um, comes into it more than just decrying the wrongs.

Yeah, yeah. No, that's so good. And, you know, if I may, I'm gonna, I'm gonna piggyback on your song just a little bit because at the time of recording this, next Friday I have a new song coming out too. And it's, it's very similar in that, that it's, it's almost a finger-pointing song. It started out that way and then it turned into like, oh no, this is a song aimed at me just as much as anybody. Because, because the song starts out with the one that I have releasing, it's called Shine a Light in the Darkness, and it could very easily be construed. Uh, my lyrics start with, you know, you've been ignoring the truth, you know, been a pretender for way too long, you got to be what you claim to be, are you a child of hell or are you a son of hell or a child of the king, is, is how it goes. But if you, if you listen to my lyrics, and I'm not going to make this all about my song, but I'm, I'm relating it, I'm relating it to yours because I started getting convicted as I was writing it. This actually is a song from Jesus to me and the church. It's not a song from me pointing to other people. And one of my favorite Rich Mullins lyrics actually says, you know, there's no point in pointing— there's no point in pointing fingers unless you're pointing to the truth, uh, is, is one of my very favorite Rich Mullins lyrics. And, uh, and I, I think I think that comes out very clearly because I struggled in that same way. It can be so easy for us to sit down and go, man, I hope they're hearing that. And how many times have we been in church and felt that same way at a sermon where we go, boy, I hope that person on row 3 is hearing this today because they really need to be repenting. And what we need to maybe be hearing is that might be true. Person in row 3, you know, they may very well need to hear it. But the fact is, uh, the person who's thinking those thoughts about that person in row 3, um, I also need to be hearing that word. I'm not escaping that same prophetic message that's coming my way today. And the person behind the pulpit, um, you're exactly right with what you said. I'm so glad the way you've said it. The prophets who delivered the message, uh, to Israel, they were not exempt from the message they were bringing. They never were. It was always to them, and they were always included in that message. And so, um, I'm so glad you pointed out your lyrics. You know, verse 3 of your song: Woe to you, church blue and red, is your religion about what Jesus said or does it fit your party mind? But then on the outro: Woe to me, God, I am lost. My fate is certain, my lot's been tossed. I'm hungry before the King. Woe to me, I am undone. Oh, That's just so good. It's so rich, and it makes us stop and pause. And instead of going, 'Get him, Jesus,' it makes us stop and go, 'Wait, why are you getting me, Jesus?' You know, I thought I was— I thought I was here to point the finger at them. And I think it's so important right now because you talked about the way your heart has been broken over the division over the past 5 years or so, which it's been going on much longer than that, but it's, it's been, it's been so clear over the last 5 years. And I felt that same, uh, I felt that same way myself. I still feel it, you know, whether it be over vaccines or whatever, and all the false information that people just continue to spread, and, and it continues to go and just breaks my heart. And I want to go, are you guys, you know, are are you guys even in the same religion? You know, sometimes like, I know you say you're Christians, but I hear very little Christ. It sounds like to me all you are is against the other side much more than you are about serving Jesus, you know. And it doesn't even sound like the gospel in any way. Um, there's very little good news in the news that's being proclaimed. So, um, yeah, all that is to say, this is, this is a beautiful way that you have sort of taken the the folk tradition of protest song and weaved it into a message for those of us, I think outside the church too, but especially those of us in the church who need to hear this message and be reminded of who we are and to where we need to return. So yeah, I'm a big fan of the song. I really appreciate it. And thank you so much for kind of going in depth. There was— it was kind of like a Behind the Music slash Song Exploder episode, you know, here today. Um, and, and speaking of which, I do want to talk a little bit about, um, some of the, the technical side when I, when I mentioned Song Exploder, because that's, that's such a great show too, and just the way they come.

Oh yeah, that's cool.

Behind the scenes. You've done a great job of laying out the message to us today And it's a powerful message that we all need to hear. Uh, once again, Chris Hoisington has produced this, and I know from working with Chris too, he's, he's, um, does a great job, he and Anthony both. Um, but tell us a little bit about some of the unique sound of this, because Old Bear Records, you guys always have what, what is labeled the, uh, the upstream sound, as they call it. But there is kind of a feel, I think, regardless of who the artist is, that I think you can always kind of tell like, oh yeah, that's a, that's an Old Bear, you know, product. What went into the making and sort of sonically, um, what went into making the sound of this particular track? What were some of the tricks that you can, can tell us behind the scenes that went into making this?

It is maybe one of the maybe the most sonically complicated song that we've released. Honestly, the way it, uh, even in post-production, uh, continued to, uh, transform with just the kind of magical flourishes by Chris and, and our, uh, mix and master engineer, uh, Evan Sealing, is that, uh, we started off, um, with this one, I think One of the things was we recorded a scratch track, and for this group of songs that is coming out as a batch of singles, you know, being released over time— it was initially intended to be an EP, but with COVID and everything slowing things down, they're kind of coming out one at a time. But, uh, the group of songs that came out as an EP in January 2020, uh, was more of a stark folk sound to it. That Till I See You Again album, there's a lot of sonic stuff happening, but it's definitely more stark. In this, we wanted to go with a lot more of a lush soundscape, a lot more band-oriented as well. With Till I See You Again, a lot of it was just, uh, just a patchwork, just a quilt of sounds that came in and out, and there wasn't like traditional band building blocks in there. But with this album, uh, let us say, um, Sun Won't Shine, this song, and some others that are coming out, there's definitely— you've got drums, bass, guitars, right? Which is, uh, a little more traditional. But I think the first thing we tracked was, um, we took a kick and a snare that, uh, Brennan Blowers played. And Chris Hoisington, the producer, hopped on the board, and he doesn't do too much of the engineering, but he took it, and with filters and tons of crazy effects, he made the filters into like kind of loop sound. And so it didn't even sound like drums anymore, and that kind of gave it the groove a little bit. Then we recorded drums and bass. Jeremy Thompson played, um, played guitars. Anthony Hoisington and Eric Anderson played, uh, keys. Um, Eric played that like Rhodesy kind of sound, that, uh, wordlitzer, uh, keyboard that's kind of so, uh, ominous at the beginning. And, uh, yeah, it just kind of evolved over time., into what it was with a ton of, um, crazy sound effects that occur, like radio frequency, kind of like phasing, swirling things that happen to, to communicate the tension, you know, uh, and conflict that's happening in the song. Uh, and then over, we had a big instrumental section at the end that we were like, should this be a solo 'Or what should we do?' And instead of like a big soloing instrument, um, we just made it just the big wall of tension and sound. And I said, 'It seems like we should have like a radio preacher like just shouting over this like section,' you know. And I went out into the big room and they turned on one of the room mics and They were like, okay, just go. And I sang a couple like big choir-like harmonies, but then I just found the verse that I ended up quoting was, you know, if— now it's left me in this moment, but if my people who are called by my name will humble themselves and pray, then I will heal their land. And, uh, and so I just kind of shouted that like a radio preacher over that, uh, over that solo part. And, uh, and it, it kind of— I think it worked in that way. So that's some of the sonic stuff that went behind it. I can nerd out for too long.

I'm probably asleep at this point, but no, that's good. Yeah, I was going to ask you who that radio preacher was that was preaching all fire and brimstone on there, so that's good to find out it was you. So all along it, 'cause it really does, it sounds like you've taken somebody from the media or I, like, I didn't know if it was, 'cause it's so late in there in the background of the music. I wasn't sure if it was some politician screaming at a rally or if it was a, you know, like it was, it's kind of hard to tell just in the midst of all the noises mixed in, but it sounds cool. It's got a really good feel. And with all of the way that the instruments are colliding together and it fits like sort of the, um, the way that the— like you said, the instrumental solo would sometimes work, and it fits really well. And I think it plays very nicely in with the rest of the song, so that's great. Well, you know what, we're almost at the end of our time together in our conversation, and I'm going to actually play the song Rich Man here on the podcast. And I'm going to make sure that in the show notes of Voices in My Head on both our Substack page, which you can find At— you can find it both at rickleejames.substack.com and, uh, and you can find it through voicesinmyheadpodcast.com, uh, and even rickleejames.com. There's so many places to find the podcast anymore, or you can just look up Voices in My Head. In the show notes today, I will make sure and have links to everywhere that this song can be found, uh, so you guys can go on and just with a simple click go and listen to it yourself. But I do want people to be able to hear it on the show today and be able to find that. But just before we, we hear the song today and finish our conversation out, I just wanted to do a quick kind of life check on you because, you know, this has been a tough year and a half or so since the pandemic hit, and most of us haven't been traveling a whole lot. I know for me, I'm just finally starting to get to do some traveling again and some concerts and things. And so, you know, life has just been different and weird. And so I just wanted to kind of check up on you. Things hopefully going well. And I know you're— are you still, uh, I know that you are unique in that you're not only on the label with Old Bear, but you also serve with your church, you also serve your community with your job at the hospital. And I think you're— I think you're still doing all of those things together at the same time. So you're really serving in all these different areas. So, um, I mean I mean, how are you? I mean, just right now, I know any one of those things can be stressful. So I just wanted to kind of do kind of a life checkup. How are you?

So it's wild, you know, last year threw us all into disarray in so many ways. And so as a musician, everything stopped. And honestly, I walked through a time of addressing some struggles of depression that I had been fighting with poor tools for a while. And during the pandemic, I was able to hone in on it a little more. And, uh, and talk to somebody about it. And it really helped, uh, really helped a lot, uh, for me. So I, I had a lot of, uh, personal growth in, in addressing, uh, some issues of anxiety and depression that I'd, uh, been, uh, not succeeding at, uh, at staving off. And, uh, the So music went on hold. I had all the songs that are being released this year were already in the can, just not mixed and mastered. And it's interesting how, like, I feel more confident now in the message of Rich Man in 2021 than I even did in 2018 when I wasn't sure if I was going to release it. And so actually, just the conflict of the last year, even more so, was like, oh man, I need to That's definitely something, something to say.

Yeah.

Um, but working at the hospital, I work in the Respiratory Institute of the Cleveland Clinic. And so we were, um, at the number 2, uh, hospital in the US, uh, during the— in the Respiratory Institute during the height of a respiratory pandemic. And, uh, so there was a lot of, um, a lot of stress related to working at the hospital in that time and saw a lot of sad things, but the Lord provided for us and protected us through it. Our family did get sick in January, but we were largely protected from long-term effects of that. My wife Amy and my 3 kids are doing well. Paisley is 6 and Beau is 5 and Amar is turning 3 next week. They're doing great and loving life. So yeah, in church, you know, church is— was another wild front to be on in the past year, trying to figure out streaming and all sorts of Yeah, uh, conversations to have about how church should go forward. So, um, I'm appreciating settling into a little bit of a groove now starting this summer, for sure.

Yeah, same, same here. Well, Weston, I appreciate you. I'm so thankful that we're getting some new music from you as the year begins to, to get back to some normalcy again. I'm glad that you're doing well. I'm grateful for this new song song, and we're gonna play it right now. It's called Rich Man. It was just released on July 16th, and you can find it everywhere that music is streaming right now. As I say to my guests every week, Weston Skaggs, thank you for being one of the Voices in My Head this week.

Thank you, Rick.

Comforted, ignore the struggle of other citizens. Woe to you, rich man! It would be easier for you to pass through a needle's eye than for you to enter into paradise. Widows and orphans you've forgotten in your quest for power. Be sure your sin will find you out. Be sure your sin will find you out. Be careful where you tread. Where you make your bed, be sure your sin will bite you out. Woe to you, church blue and red. Is your religion 'bout what Jesus said? Or does that fit your party line? Woe to you, church blue and red. Have you like sheep been led to accept a lesser dream than what your Savior died to redeem? Be sure your sin will find you out. Be sure your sin will find you out. I'm evil deep inside. How could I enter into paradise?

Thank you for joining me here this week on Voices in My Head. I hope you'll visit me on my website at rickleejames.com where you can find out more about me Get my music on vinyl and CD, follow my blog, and even schedule me for a concert or speaking engagement. Better yet, even a book signing in your neighborhood. You can find all that and more at RickLeeJames.com. Also, it would mean a great deal to me if you could write a review of this podcast on iTunes. The more positive reviews that we receive, the more visible this podcast will be online. And now for the benediction: May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope. God bless you, and thank you for listening to Voices in My Head.