Creative on Purpose Live!

confirm that we are where we're supposed to be. And boom, just like that, we did it, folks. Ladies and gentlemen, one more time, we have landed on Facebook, LinkedIn, and the YouTube channel. Welcome to Creative on Purpose Live, conversations with inspiring guests about living your legacy and experiencing better living while making a bigger difference. I'm your host, Scott Perry, Chief Difference Maker at Creative on Purpose. If you're ready to fly higher in the difference only you can make, visit creativeonpurpose.com and sign up for our newsletter. Get insight and inspiration delivered to your inbox 3 times a week and a free copy of Trust Yourself: A Simple 3-Step Decision-Making Process to Power Past Imposter Syndrome and Your Inner Perfectionist. I'm super excited about today's show. Let's meet today's guest, Drew Smith. Welcome to the broadcast. Please tell our viewers who you are, what you're up to these days, and where can people go to learn more about you and the difference you're making?

Scott Perry, thank you for having me, man. I am a singer-songwriter, uh, mixing engineer and producer, and the creator of the Before You Record course in Nashville, Tennessee. And you can find more about all of, uh, those semi-interesting things at DrewSmithLive.com. Thank you again for having me, man. I'm so excited about our chat.

Yeah, I am too. So, uh, I made a living as a musician for about 30 years before I pivoted and changed to doing some writing and some broadcasting and some coaching and consulting. And, uh, I love what you were saying. If, uh, if that sounds interesting, because in my experience, um, to the, uh, to the, to the person that's not a musician and not a, certainly a working musician, it sounds really glamorous in my experience. Um, not so much all the time.

It, uh, it does sound really good, doesn't it?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, and I love that you're also a teacher, um, and so I would love to unpack a little bit about, uh, your course. But before we go there, just, uh, give us a quick sketch of your origin story, the, the arc, you know. How did Drew Smith get to where he is as an artist right now?

So I have been writing songs for a living for about 12 years now. It'll be 12 years, I guess, uh, next next month, um, which is crazy to think that, that it's been that long of a run. It's wild how fast it goes. But I have been successful as a songwriter for, for many years now, and honestly, I got real comfortable with that, Scott. And I, you know, when someone respects you for, for one facet of, of your life, it's really easy to stick with that, uh, and I found that that's, that's what I was doing. Oh well, you know, people know me as a songwriter, they respect me as a writer. I don't know that they're going to love me as artist though, so I, I should probably just keep that to myself. And so I did that for a long time, and just recently, uh, a few months ago, uh, just put out a new song that has done exceptionally well. Uh, it's been very well, uh, uh, accepted, and the, uh, all of the reviews and all that have just been so excellent, uh, and I'm so happy that I am out of that fear-based box that I was in. But I just get tired of being afraid of it. And so, so I've always been an artist at heart. I've always performed for years. I've done that for a very long time. But it just kind of got to the point where I went, you know what, there's so much of this that I'm not doing. And I'm just kind of hanging out locally here and in little pubs and stuff like that, playing on the weekends and that sort of thing. And I'm just, I'm ready. I'm ready to be an artist, um, that I'm ready to be the artist that I, I was meant to be.

I love it. Um, before we go any further, tell, tell us what the name of the single is.

It's called The Truth, and, uh, and, and it's, it's autobiographical. I've written thousands of songs, uh, in my lifetime, man, and, and so, so much of, of what I do, so much of my job is to write songs for other people, for for other artists that, uh, have way more success as an artist than, than what I have. Um, but this one, this one is really, really special to me. It's very autobiographical and, uh, it's the most honest song that I've ever written. And I'm more proud of this song than any of the songs that I've ever written that have gotten me gold records or any other kind of recognition.

That's fantastic. Well, we will track it down on the interwebs if there's a link somewhere and post it in the comments so people can tune in and check it out. I love what you were You know, one of the things that comes up over and over and over again on this broadcast and on these conversations, especially when people kind of share the arc of their journey and where they are now and maybe even projecting where they are wanting to be in the near future, you know, this, these identity stories come up and I totally hear you that it can get really comfortable to, to stick with the story. That everybody already understands and that feels comfortable. So being a songwriter, I'm a person that writes songs for other people, sounds like a lot of fun. And it also sounds like, you know, you had this kind of wee small voice nagging at you in the background saying, hey, maybe you could be the one that's on the stage instead of the person feeding the songs to the person on the stage. And so I love that you, you reached a, you know, you sat with that tension long enough to lean into and through it and, and push yourself forward. You mentioned, you know, being an artist. And one of the things that we talk a lot about at Creative on Purpose is what does it mean to be an artist? How is that maybe perhaps different than being a creative? I just floating that out there. And you can refuse the bait if you, if you like, but I mean, do you see it? Does it feel any different to you to be the person that was creating the, the material that artists sang, uh, as opposed to creating something that you as an artist present to the world?

Absolutely. Yeah, yeah, because I've, I've written tons and tons and tons of songs that I wouldn't necessarily get up and sing, not because, uh, not because I don't like the song or because I'm not proud of the song, but just because it— I felt like it, it doesn't represent me as, as a person and as an artist. And, and that's the difference, is I've really been going through my catalog and finding things that, um, trying to pick out the things that I think represent me as a person and as an artist. So it is— it's two very different entities for sure. Yeah.

Well, and the other thing that comes up For me is, that's interesting about, about that juxtaposition is, you know, one of the roles that I'm just, one of the transitions I'm making is for the past several years, I've been the head coach in Seth Godin's Creatives Workshop, which talks a lot about the things that we're talking about right here. And one of the things that we talk a lot about there is not only what does it mean to be a creative and be in practice and developing craft, but how do you find your voice? And what's interesting about what you, you've been sharing is, you know, you, you were a songwriter for other people, which sounds to me like you had to write in other people's voice. And now you are a songwriter for yourself and you're writing in your own voice and telling, you know, your stories. And so I'm just curious, I mean, that sounds, it sounds extremely challenging to write in other people's voices. So. As a songwriter for others, I'm just curious if you could tease apart if there's any distinctions about how you approach that craft as opposed to the craft of writing a song for yourself.

I, I'm very blessed in that getting up and writing every day and going to writing appointments with, with co-writers and things like that, it— I'm, I'm not I'm not in a position where I'm stuck to only writing for myself. Some people are. You look at a lot of indie artists, that, that's what they get up and deal with every day, is that they try to— they're trying to write songs solely for them. For me, when I go to work and I have these co-writes, even if I go in with the intention of writing something for someone else or for myself, if it's something that I'm that I'm just not feeling for me as an artist, it's real easy to let that go because I just pivot and just say, yeah, but man, that sounds like a Blake Shelton song or a George Strait song or whatever. And we push it more in that direction. So I'm probably not the person to talk to about that because I am blessed in that regard where I can easily pivot and it works the opposite way as well. I've I might start with an idea that I think that is really great for other artists. And then I go, I don't know, man, I think I want to keep this one. I think, I think that I might get selfish about this one. So I'm really in a great position for that.

Yeah, well, it sounds to me like, I mean, the thing that comes up in the workshop is just the importance of empathy. And so, you know, if you define empathy as just the capacity, the human capacity to see, hear, feel and understand what someone else is going through, what their situation is, what their, you know, what their frame of reference, point of view, perspective is. It seems, you know, I think as someone that's written some songs, not very good ones, myself, you know, there is that idea of um, you know, putting myself in the protagonist shoes of whatever song it is and, and singing from that point of— or writing from that point of view, in that perspective. Um, and I definitely feel you on, um, you know, writing sometimes and thinking, oh, that— like, I wrote a song once I thought, um, John Cougar would, would be perfect for John Cougar, and I was really thinking about pitching it to him because he used to actually come to a, a gig I did in Hilton Head, South Carolina. I was like, you know what, I really actually like this song too much for myself. I think, you know, he's fine, he'll be okay.

You know what's funny about that, Scott, is I had one that, uh, it was a song that I, at least up into that point, I, I, I brought this idea into a co-writer and, uh, I was really, really excited about it. And, and it just, the thing got before the end of the day, the thing got just flipped on its head and was just the complete opposite of what I had set out to write that day. And I was so disappointed. And I thought, man, nobody's ever going to cut this. I like— I hate this song.

I don't—

and I think that's okay. I think that's probably healthy too. I shouldn't love every song that I write, but I really hated this one. And I thought, nobody will cut this. Nobody will cut this. And my publishing company, called me one day and said, hey, you know, this guy's publisher wants to demo the song and pitch it to other artists. I was like, why? Why would we spend the money to do that? Nobody's going to record it. The song is awful. This is not what I set out to write. And I said, well, you know, they're pretty adamant about it. I said, tell them to do whatever they want. And then I was, I was sitting at a, at a bar restaurant here, just, I mean, I'm talking about like maybe a couple of months later. And I got a call from this guy's publisher and he said, hey man, uh, just needed to get a little bit of information from you. Um, John Cougar just, just got this song. What, are you kidding me?

That's awesome.

So you should have pitched it, Scott. You should have, you should have slipped him a CD.

Yeah, I mean, I might not be sitting here talking to you if that were the case. Who knows? What was that? So did that song get released?

No, he shelved it. And I, and I think, I think that's kind of, um, so from my understanding, he's got a studio, I think, in New York. At least at the time he did. This has been a few years ago, and I think that, that that's a pretty common thing for him, is to— if, if he gets pitched something that he really loves, he'll just go record it and, and he'll shelf it. And if he decides to pull it out later, he'll, he'll pull it out. And if not, then he doesn't.

Well, you know, I'm sure it'll be in the Basement Tapes box set when, uh, when, when he's gone.

Hey, that'd be great, man.

Yeah, I'll, I'll keep keep my, my ears peeled, assuming that he's— I'm going to outlast him, which I would not say is guaranteed in any way. I love, um, there's this other thing that's— you've been weaving in that I'd like to touch upon, and that's, um, it sounds like you do a lot of collaboration. So I mean, I think writing for someone else is a collaboration, but it sounds like you also write with other writers, and I would just love to hear a little bit of insight into, you know, how that how that unpacks and how that impacts your creative process.

Oh man, that's, that's such a great question. I don't think anyone has ever asked me in that way before, and I love that you ask how that impacts the process. I think that's super important. There's so many songwriters, so many great songwriters in this town, and, and that's, that's one thing I love about Nashville is just crawling with great songwriters and artists as well, of course. But You know, it's, it's my job to basically— my, my publisher, um, will set up, uh, writing appointments with other publishers, with their writers, and they try to pair us, you know, in a way that they think will work. Uh, they find, you know, similar interests or similar styles, and they say, I think these two guys will work well together, or these three guys, um, or gals, and they put us in a room together and just kind of see what happens. And if it goes well, then you continue to, to to book writing appointments with them. But it totally is.

It's—

it does impact your process because we all have— and you're a musician yourself, so you get it— we're all kind of crazy. So, um, uh, we're very eccentric people and we all have a very different process. And I love watching other people's processes, uh, because it does sometimes shape my process. Uh, some guys come in, tons of energy, and they're, they're ready to go and they're excited about anything that you want to write about that day. And then other guys, you know, you'll— sometimes it takes a couple of hours just to find something to land on, something that you both want to write about that day. So it's, it's really interesting. It's different every day. Um, it— and for, you know, anyone that works in an office or a situation like that, that's hard to explain. I mean, imagine if, if you went to work every day, if you went to the office and your coworkers were different people every day. That's what it's like. But that, man, that makes it so much fun. And it does make it exciting because you just, you really never know what's going to happen that day.

Yeah. Well, the other piece for me that I know, having written some songs in collaboration, is you learn real quick to check your ego at the door and make it about the song. Yeah, so one of the things that I would, um, always kind of open up with is, okay, you know, we're here to serve the song, not, not ourselves. And, uh, you know, it was just a way of setting the table, like, hey, let's let go of the status games and the, um, you know, the one-upmanship, uh, or upwomanship, depending on who the collaborator was. And, uh, let's, let's just, let's have some fun. Let's write a song. Let's, let's just do that.

Man, that's such a great point. And, and that's something that it is easy to get wrapped up in, in ego. And it's like you said, if, if you can just— if you can have just a moment where you allow yourself to let that go and just let the song be the song and let it do what it wants to do, then you're, you're likely going to have a really good day.

Yeah. Well, and, and this was coming up for me and something that you were talking about earlier when you were talking about the song that you thought was really terrible that John Cougar Mellencamp eventually picked up and, um, recorded for, for future use. Um, and that is, you know, we have, as artists, we have to set an intention. We have to put a point out there on the horizon that we're aiming for. Um, and at least in my experience, especially, you know, with something like writing, you start writing, whether it's a song or a blog post or a book, and it often turns— it often ends up somewhere a little bit different than you expected. Some— if you put the blinders on and just grind your way towards the preconceived notion that you had. Number one, in my experience, it's really exhausting. Number two, it's not that good. But if you can kind of hold the intention loosely enough to let the song go where it wants to go, or the book or the blog post, you know, whatever it is that you're writing, that's— then you suffer less. It's less exhausting. And sometimes for me at least, that element of surprise, like, holy cow, who would've thought that I could've ended up there? Um, is just part of it. So I'm just wondering, what's your process when you're, you know, you're sitting down, we're gonna write a song, it's gonna be about, and then it turns into something else. What's, what, what's your process for holding it loosely? And, and at the same time, maybe sometimes it needs to go in the direction it's supposed to go because someone wants that song.

I mean, I think you very much nailed it. It is, it is a balancing act. It is holding it loosely. Um, there are writers in town, man, that when, when they show up to a writing appointment, whatever idea that they had, they're very, they're very much set on that. In the example that I gave with the John Cougar song, um, I was really fixated on that idea because it was, uh it was more of a personal kind of story to me. And I felt like the idea could really just only— it was, it was one of those smaller ideas that it just, it needed to be a very certain way. And, and I was also very in love with the title and I felt like we just didn't do the title any justice. And that's what I was upset about. But that did teach me a good lesson because it I realize that I don't really know what I'm doing. Um, but I'm— but what I do know is that I am showing up every day, uh, to, to do a very specific job, and that job is to write the best song that I can. But it is, man, it's such a balancing act. And I've also— when you start co-writing, I think that most anyone that, that is doing this full-time or even semi-full-time, we all start out writing songs by ourselves. That's how it starts, is usually, you know, angry teenagers writing stuff down in notebooks in your bedroom. And, and so, and that's exactly how it started with me. And so you get used to writing this stuff by yourself for so long, and then you end up in a situation or in a town like Nashville where collaborating is very much a normal thing. That's just kind of how it works here. You do a lot of collaboration in a lot of different things, and that's terrifying at first because it's kind of like going through each other's underwear drawers, is what I've always said, you know, because you're sitting down in a room with a lot of times a complete stranger, somebody that you've never met in your life, and and you're getting really intimate, you know, and very vulnerable sometimes to get these songs out. And so that's a— that's an odd thing. But what you learn from that eventually, hopefully you learn, is that you have to trust your co-writer. They're there for a reason. And so even if you're really hell-bent on an idea, on a specific idea, you still have to have a degree of openness, uh, to, to what your co-writer is saying because they are there for a reason. Uh, they, they've earned their right to be there and you're collaborating with them for a reason. So there's a good chance that there's something that they're seeing in it that you're not because you are so just stoved in on this particular idea or this particular path that you think this, this idea needs to go down. Mm-hmm.

Yeah. Well, I love that you wove in that theme of vulnerability because some, you know, we live in a culture that doesn't seem to reward that very often. We prefer to reward people that are super certain and overconfident about themselves and their opinions, and especially in areas where there's absolutely no certainty to be had and where confidence is actually quite foolish. And it takes a lot of you know, it takes a really healthy amount of courage and to embrace, you know, to, to allow yourself to be vulnerable, to be, to accept that you don't know everything, that there's more uncertainty than there is certainty. And I love that you wove in the theme of trust, because one of the themes that we talk about here at Creative on Purpose quite a bit is you know, we want to trust, you know, creatives trust the process and creatives trust their collaborators, but it all, if you can't trust yourself, then how can you fully trust the process or the other person? Right. So it's trust from the inside out. Love that. I wanted to, we're coming close to the end of our time here. And I did stick a pin in this theme of teaching that you mentioned. And I, um, as someone that's, you know, been a guitar teacher and, and actually began my career as a schoolteacher. I just love that, that you're bringing that element into what you do as well. So tell us just a little bit about the course that you're teaching around what you need to know to be a songwriter in Nashville.

Well, I want to make it real clear that I am in no shape, form or fashion a teacher. I am. I am only someone that can— that can say, here's all the really dumb things that I've done. So don't do these.

Uh, I'm just gonna push the pause button there, Drew, and say those are the people that make the best teachers. But if you want to call— if you don't want to buy into that identity, I'm fine with that. We'll call you whatever you want to be called. I'm calling you a teacher. Go.

All right, uh, you call it teacher, I call it a screw-up. It's, you know, man. Um, so I started producing other artists years ago, uh, just really kind of by accident, Scott. And I'd been working with some great producers, so I'd had some really great experiences in the studio and was really learning a lot of things. And I had started recording things just for myself, just little work tapes of song— new songs that I'd written. So I'd get out of a writing appointment one day and instead of just having a bad phone recording of what we had written, I'd go down into my little spot in the basement at this publishing house and, and I'd fire up my recording rig and I'd put down a very clean, you know, guitar, vocal, demo just for memory to turn into my publisher. And then I started having, you know, friends and co-writers come over and they'd say, you know, man, I've been needing to record a couple of things. Would you think I could do that here? Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then I started having buddies that was like, you know, man, I've been wanting to make a record. You think we could do that here? And I'd go, I mean, we got one microphone and two sets of headphones. Yeah, we can do that, you know. And so I started recording these projects on, on, on friends and collaborators and, and it just kind of, as far as being a producer and engineer, it just kind of grew from there and it kind of exploded and got out of hand really quickly. And then the barrage of, of crazy recording gear and all that happened. But with working with a lot of these people, I, I was working with, with new artists that had never recorded a project before. And so I was basically just giving them all of the experience that I had had up to that point and, and, and guiding them through the process that way. And so eventually what I figured out was I— it's really the same process every time. It doesn't really matter who you're working with. It is very much all the preparation has to be the same. And then the recording process itself is, is the same. At least technically. And I, I knew the mistakes that I had made over the years. I'd seen a lot of mistakes that other people had made that cost a lot of time, that cost a lot of energy and a lot of effort, and in a lot of cases, lots of money. And so I decided to put together this course called the Before You Record course, that it's great for songwriters that are wanting to record demos, it's great for independent artists or bands that are, that are wanting to go into the studio, and it's just literally everything that you need to know before you even book a studio, before you set the dates. Everything from lyric sheets to, you know, how— I mean, there's so much information in there, how the union works and how to navigate that. All of that is in there, and it gives you every single tool that you need to have in your tool belt to be prepared to go into the studio. So that you don't get in there and make some mistakes because you've— you're, you're unprepared or you don't— you lack that experience. And it's going to save somebody a ton of money.

So, well, I love that. And I mean, so often, um, you know, my experience in just becoming a guitar teacher was I'm gonna, I'm gonna teach you how to I'm going to teach you everything you actually need to know, and I'm not going to teach you any of the crap that you don't need to know that I had to go through, had to wade through. Um, you know, so a lot of times what we're teaching is actually teaching people how to do something more efficiently, effectively, and with maybe greater joy and success than what we did because we spent all that time in the wilderness, you know, navigating, uh, by ourselves. So I love that. And so the course is available at Drew Smith live.com.

You can link to it, uh, from there. Yes, sir. Or it's, uh, uh, beforeyourecord.com. Fantastic. And got all the info there, man. And, and, uh, it'll, it'll, it's sure to keep you from going into the studio and falling flat on your face. I, I do guarantee that.

Awesome. Well, we're coming to the end of our time. I always have one final question to ask, uh, my guests, and that is, you know, you've already shared a lot of wisdom around the creative process and helping, helping us understand how you go about making the difference that you make in the world. If there was just one final, you know, if it's a quote, if it's a piece of advice, if it's a tip, or just a quick story that would help someone fly a little bit higher and the difference only they could make, what would you share with them?

I think it would just to be be bold. Just wake up and be bold. And don't be, don't be afraid of, um, don't be afraid of losing little things that don't matter. Don't be afraid of letting go of little things that in the grand scheme of it don't matter. Um, get up and be bold as much as possible. Some days are harder than others, but just be bold.

I love it. That's great advice. What a fantastic way to close. Well, we want to thank everyone for tuning in. Drew and I really appreciate you lending us some of your valuable time and attention. We hope today's broadcast motivates you to take a bolder step into possibility, living your legacy. You can learn more about Drew and the difference he's making at DrewSmithLive.com. And of course, it's always great to see you at CreativeOnPurpose.com. Now, take the insight and inspiration from this conversation and go fly a little bit higher in the difference only you can make. Drew Smith, thank you so much for sharing some of your wisdom and experience and learning with us.

Scott Perry, thank you, man. I've really enjoyed it. Thank you for, for having me here.

Appreciate it.