WEBVTT

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Hey, it's Bob Pickett. We
are on our way to the legendary Broken

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Spoken. Come on, let's get
out the truck and head inside, and

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damn you're proud of it. Come
on, it's going side, getting ready

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for another Tale from the Broken Spoke. Back once again, we got more

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tales, Bob Picket. It's Tales
from Broken Spoke, from the world famous

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historic Broken Spoke on South of mar
In Austin, Texas. Moni's grinning at

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me right now. What's going on? I'm just happy that Will's here.

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Yeah, how y'all doing. I'll
let you introduce Will and tell everybody about

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him, because I'll tell my story
about We'll after you. All right,

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Well, this is one of my
dear, dear friends, a dear brother

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in one of and I've been doing
this since I was fourteen years old,

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NonStop, only thing. It's one
of the most talented people I have ever

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known in any genre. Plays guitar
plays, steal guitar play, anything in

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front of him, and he's an
even better human being. Will Mack Willnack.

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Now, Okay, I guess both
you and Will went to daycare right

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here at the Broken Spoke exactly right. I grew up here. What's the

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first time you picked here? I
was? I was fourteen twelve, right,

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see, I'm twelve years old.
I listed. I listed on social

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media and Facebook for a while as
my high school because you neither one of

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us ever saw a high school.
Right, I was eighth grade? When

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did you quit going to school after
eighth grade? I'm like, Billy Joe

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Shaver got me in eighth grade?
Education too, good Christian raising. I

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don't know if I got that,
but I'm working on it, I said,

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Man, I graduated the shit out
of the eighth grade. Yeah,

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so I have a gd greatly educated
dude. You know I got all I

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need? And you were held back
at the broken spoke. I think it's

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okay, right, that's yay,
man, So twelve years old broken spoke,

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explain that to us now. So
and actually in this, I'll just

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get heavy and get deep right away, Get deep right away. My mother

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got drunk and set our house on
fire when I was real young eleven,

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and uh I woke up and rescued
my dad. Anyway, the house was

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burned down, so they moved us
across town to Oldworf. And when I

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was stuck in this apartment all summer, and I like to play sports.

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I like to play football well outside
with my friends, but I couldn't get

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there. They lived ten miles away
or five miles away or whatever. So

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all summer I was locked in this
apartment while he was at work, playing

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video games and guitar. And I
loved Kurt Cobain and I got into Jimmy

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Hendricks and all sorts of other stuff. Later, but we started going to

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Spoke to listen to bands. My
dad saw that, and I met Patty

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David and Michelle Murphy. Patty introduced
me to Michelle, and she introduced me

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to guitar Lynd, who taught me
a blue skill right on the floor,

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right there on her knees about yes, and told me, if you can

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learn this scale, you can play
on any song in any key. And

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so I went home and it's just
like just over and over and started playing

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with some people here, sitting in
with Patty David and Debora Peters, who

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was like an accordion player. She
did a lot of zydaco and country.

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She's great, Yeah, she's amazing. Boomer Norman was her guitar player.

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He gave me a lot of instruction
I met Johnny X through Michelle Murphy,

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who had the National Music camp that
they got me into, and Johnny started

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mentoring me, but he would also
let me sit in with his bands in

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addition to what he was doing at
the school, and so they would notice,

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like when I think this is how
to have it? I never got

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told, but you know, if
the kid played Johnny be Good behind his

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head, there's fifties and hundreds that
started getting dropped in the tip jar,

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so like maybe we should hire him
sometimes, you know. So as like

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I had this naive perspective, like
I didn't know what I was even doing,

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but I was already doing it.
And they were then teaching me more

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material. Johnny Wuld teach me venture
songs, chitt Santo and Johnny how to

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play exactly Stormy Monday, Bobby Bland
the solo note for note, and I

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played with Paul Ray and the covers
when I was like thirteen, and he

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was blown away by the Wayne Bennett
solo I did because he's it sounded wow,

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how you thirteen and you can play
Wayne Bennett? And I didn't even

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know what I was doing. Seriously, I still had no clue, but

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they were giving me these opportunities and
I just kept going, you know,

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I had nothing else, and so
yeah, broken Spoke. It really did

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start here, and I was playing
with Alvin Crow by the time I was

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fifteen. But you realize how lucky
you were at the time. You didn't

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it was just another everyday currency.
Well. But also, let me just

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say this, there's a lot of
kids that listened to Jimmy Hendrix and Kurt

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Cobain and Johnny be Good millions.
There are hundreds that can play that stuff.

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And also, you know so many
if you're not a picker. It's

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like the notes, well you can
learn the notes, you can even learn

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how to play, but you can't
learn talent. And like when I first

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started hearing about Will was that there's
like there's this kid and he's got a

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tone like Denny Freeman, and nobody
says nobody says yeah, they said,

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you know Denny Freeman, and it
was like, okay, well, how's

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that happening? Goo He plugs in
and it just sounds that way. You

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know. It's one of those things
where people like the old joke, you

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know, you're playing a guitar and
goes man, that guitar sounds good.

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So then you hand it to him
and go, well, how does it

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sound? Now? You know,
right, that's a good one. So

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and it's just like Will, It's
just uh. And and also you have

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to remember the uh, the the
Texas club tradition, you know, you

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know, back in the early fifties. I think the first little we had

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was little Dougie Song. I think
that I think he was the first little

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Then we had little Jimmy Vaughan,
the little Stevie vaugh And then you know

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in Charlie Charlie in the in the
eighties, you know. And so just

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that, and and the thing is
it's not so much the novelty of that

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kids can do it. It is
this thing that is only in Texas that

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I have found that they really don't
care your age, or if you're white

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or black or Hispanic, or if
you're just good or if there's the potential

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for you to be good. Because
I know, like when I started picking,

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my whole thing was I could.
I wasn't very proficient on the guitar,

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but I've always been able to write
songs people wanted to hear. And

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I was fourteen and doing it.
All these people that said Will had something

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going on, said, I had
something going on, even though it was

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you know, ten fifteen years apart. They just recognized here's a youngster that

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we're probably going to want to pay
attention to for a long while. And

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you know, and Will has played, you know, not in just country.

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He was how long were you with
Blue October? For five years?

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He was with Blue October multi platinum
rock band for five years. He was

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their cat, you know. And
so you don't get that on accident.

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You don't get that from being lucky. You get that from being great.

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And I've known Will a long time. He and I didn't even meet three

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music, but I heard of him
through music. But we've met through mutual

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friends. And now he's with Parker
McCollum. And of all the crew,

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you and I've had this conversation,
I think of all the acts that have

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come up in the last ten years, I think Parker is the one that's

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going to be in the Country Music
Hall of Fame. Is just amazing.

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Yeah, he's a superstar, said, I'm just grateful to be there,

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but yeah, he's he's the best
human ever. Man. I'll say that

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about the boss. Thank you,
boss. Amen. Well, we hope

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he listens to this podcast. Well, but I mean, but look,

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he's got you, you know what
I mean. He's got he's got JR.

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Producing him, John Stewart and uh
uh John Randall Stewart, and he's

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just got just a great group of
humans. You can find great pickers.

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There's the name musicians, Gune.
It's like easy to find a picker than

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it is a plumber. But it's
about finding great people that you with whom

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you want to create. Well that's
you know. When I got hired on,

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I was talking to just hey,
thank you so much. I'm a

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join it, love it man,
and uh, He's like, brother,

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there was no one else I was
going to hire. My biggest fear is

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that I get up on stage doing
this in front of ten thousand people with

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a bunch of guys from Nashville and
I don't even know and he's like,

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I can't, I can't do that. And it does his culture like seeps

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down to the crew where it's a
family man, you know, and that's

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a blessing, Like you don't get
that by someone who's not running it.

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Right. So the leadership is really
great there. Man. Let's talk about

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the relationship with you guys. Do
you guys meet when he was playing over

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at the Saxon when he was playing
there. I didn't meet him at Saxon.

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I met him before blow October.
I was playing with Wade Bowen and

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then uh Wade Boone and Randy Rogers
on the whole my Beer record, that

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first one. I cut guitar on
it and played the tour right and he

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would open shows for us, and
I remember seeing it. I was like

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ten years a little plus ten ten
or so years ago and uh, man,

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good looking kid, great voice,
good songs. He's he's got.

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So I told him up at uh
Ron Brothers my last year with Wade,

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I was like, where you want, Parker is upstream. I'm gonna be

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downstream right here, and I see
it's all coming for you, son,

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and he can't be you really catch
it all. And I'm just gonna be

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doing good, uh knowing you you're
up there? You know so uh And

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we all laughed about it, but
yeah, it was it's it's it's amazing.

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Sounds like a pretty good gig.
Now let's talk about you. Mentioned

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Alvin Crowe also now Alvin Crowe.
I wouldn't be who I am day without

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Alvin and Johnny and speaking like,
yeah, kids listening to Jimmy Hendricks and

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Kirk cob and it's easy to grab
onto pop culture right and whatever gets you

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started. But they're like, oh, you like Jimmy Hendricks, What do

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you think about Freddie King? What
do you think about Elmore James? Well,

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why don't you learn some buck Owens
legs? Why don't you learn some

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Haggard songs? How about Bob Wills? You ever heard out of? To

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play western swing? A western swing
Elden Shamblin, you know, play some

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of that rhythm. I'm not a
master of any style, but I'm just

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having to grow up and hustle for
gigs, like I have to play in

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the authentic style whatever that song is. So if it's a Latin jazz too,

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and you use a harmonic minor skin, I learned a bunch of playing

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from Ernie Durrawa to playing with a
different guest every week for ten years at

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one point, and that would be
you'd have a tehana artist and a blues

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artist, and then an R and
B artist and Latin jazz, and it

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was just like you had to go
quick every week and learn and so That's

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That's how I'm trying and keep it
as like you just have to play a

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song authentically the way the song needs
to be played, nothing more, nothing

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less, No ego licks. Used
to have ego licks, sometimes still got

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them. But you know, give
me a fuzz pedal, I'll show you

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what I'm talking about. But yeah, that's a you know, that's all

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it is, and lifting up that
song, telling the story of the song

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through the music. And I try
and think about that on stage. I

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read this Inner Game of Music book
that some of Morgan Wallin's camp introduce me

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to when we're in the gym together
on the tour we did last year,

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and uh, he as opposed to
thinking about execution, you think about what's

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the story of the song. You
can think about how it makes you feel.

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You can think about I'm just looking
at my hands, I'm just hearing

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it. All these different senses that
aren't self one talk saying hey, hit

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the tenth threat B string a note
on this solo. And you know what

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I mean, Like there are if
you're think don't mess up. If you

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think don't mess up, you're already
messing up. So it just gets you

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in a flow, stay a little
better. But uh, that's a real

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truth of it, like what the
music should be played, how the song

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is sounds and it the music should
represent the story of the song. So

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I'm really trying to get that down. I feel like I'm starting to starting

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to see it a little more,
you know, was it also It's like

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John Lee Hooker said, they ain't
but twelve notes, you know, And

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it is just what I was taught
because I was taught not by pickers but

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by songwriters. You know, that
was the culture in which I came up,

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and they said, man, this
song is the dictator. It's a

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benevolent dictator, right, but it
is a dictator, and that is the

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boss. Whether you sing it,
you pick it, what type of solo

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you play, whether you show out
a little bit, or whether you lay

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back. The song is the dictator. And so often writers forget that,

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pickers forget that. But I tell
you who never forgets it is the audience.

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The audience never forgets that the song
is the dictator. And you have

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got to always listen to what moves
them because they will never lie to you

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or and they will never get it
wrong either. You know, the collective

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of three hundred people, thirty thousand
people that you're going to ask you,

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is it almost like a runner.
It's that certain zone when you're on stage.

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Do you get in that certain zone
where oh, it's just you know

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you're there, you just can't think
about It's like what he said, if

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you think about it, it's like
a quarterback saying, don't throw an interception.

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The next pass is intercepted. You
know, you just got to flow.

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But there again, Will has the
natural you know, the day he

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was born, God gave him that
talent to where he can flow. If

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you put his guitar in my hand, you go, man, that's money

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Ward and he sold a zillion records
and you're going to wait a long time

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for that flow to start because I'm
not that type of musician. And the

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moment, whether he's picking with Alvin
Crow or Parker McCollum or Bracken Hell or

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Blue October or Wade Bowen, the
minute Will starts picking with somebody, immediately

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their music is elevated. Well,
I'll take that, man, I appreciate

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That's what that's what I intend to
do, and that's what I try to

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do. And yeah, that's that's
why I'm so hooked. It's not about

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the money. It's not about some
people think it's fame. You know,

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it's none of that. And it
is living in that where you lose sight

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of self consciousness. And it was
when after my mother died, I was

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really angry at God. Right,
had a huge bone to pick. I

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started playing guitar. I remember when
I was like sixteen at the Hole in

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the Wall playing a residency I was
doing, and we were playing a song

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and I started ripping. It's like
I went out of my body and I

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could play these things that I had
never learned and that I'll never be able

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to remember or repeat again. And
I was like, God, oh,

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that's it. And it's not every
time. You know, you practice diligently

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so you can play par musically,
the worst I can do is give you

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a good show. The best I
can do is beyond me, and that's

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not me. And that's where I'm
connected, and it's vital. I would

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play on the street if I lost
everything, I'd still be playing, right,

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that's right. Because you talk about
it's not about the money, let

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me just ask you a question.
Playing before there was money, yeah,

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yeah, and you played differently now
that there is money. Now, you

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hope not. You know, I
as a writer, but I was around

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enough successful writers to know that the
second you have a hit, do nothing

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different. The worst thing you can
do is try to write what made you

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successful, because then what you've done
is you have removed God from the equation

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and put yourself in the equation.
And I was blessed to get out of

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the God business almost nineteen years ago. That position has been filled by someone

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far more qualified. And that's what
Will and I are talking about is just

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if you can get to a place
to always let him in, that's a

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good place. Amen. Yeah.
On your days off, do you pick

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up the guitar every day or pretty
much? And there's a balance there,

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Like some days I'm real diligent,
and I'll be like, I'm clocking in

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two hours on steal today and I'm
doing an hour on guitar, and then

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some days it's twenty thirty minutes,
you know, And you have to balance

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it out because the flow, when
you overdo it, the flow is interrupted

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because you're trying to perfect it,
and it gets stale and it's not fun

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anymore, and you're so you're losing
sight of it. Right, You're going

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for perfection, which isn't achievable anyway. But yeah, finding that balance of

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like keeping the urge and it's fresh
versus being refined. So it's like it's

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a little bit each way, you
know, every time it shifts a little

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bit. But you do things when
when you're in the tour season and the

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shows are happening, Like I have
routines that I do daily out there.

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Me and Parker started picking guitars about
an hour before every show. I'll go

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warm up on my steel parts for
at least twenty thirty minutes, you know,

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stuff like that. And yeah,
and also you got to take care

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of yourself, gym running, all
that sort of stuff. You know,

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I'm sober, so I'm not putting
poison in my body. All that keeps

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me maintained. And if you play
differently before the money or whatever, it's

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it is just a little differences,
like, well, you've got this and

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I can do this. How do
I maintain this right? And that's the

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main goal. If I can maintain
this, that's the bottom line. And

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then how do I get a little
bit better? You know, that's always

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on the agenda too. But you
can't burn out, you know, I've

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been doing it a long time,
twelve to I'll be forty soon. So

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almost twenty eight years, you're forty. I'll be forty this year. I'm

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thirty nine. I'm not. Don't
sound forty, No, no, no,

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no, I'm kidding. Alternative.
I was thinking, like twenty eight,

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twenty nine. I've been doing this
a long time, brother, Yeah,

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a long time. So I might
not be as talent as money says.

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I just never quit. And you
tell a lot, but you still

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poisoning yourself almost nine years ago too, and that yeah ten, no,

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I'll tell you like almost Yeah,
life got better super quick, right,

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And really the journey started about thirteen
years ago. I had a bad breakup

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and I went off the rails for
two weeks, got back on the horse,

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and it's it's been good ever since. But uh yeah, that's how

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that goes. So it was the
breakup. Get do you know why I

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took dope because I'm a drug addict? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,

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I'll blame it on the breakup though, you know. Okay, Now,

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what would you tell any twelve year
old kid who's just picked up a

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guitar? What advice would you give? You can give advice to a younger

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you, what would you say,
First of all, listen, just listen

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to what they're telling you and what
they're playing. You know, that's the

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biggest way you learn is listening,
and that's the best way you play too.

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Is like everybody's always worried about their
tone and how they sound, then

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you're already not going to fit in
with the band. If you're listening to

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the drummer and the bass player,
you're gonna feel it and you're gonna play

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the right things, just as a
reflex. So listening is the most important

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skill that you can probably learn.
And I know some musicians read and that's

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great. I can read charts.
I can do that and that's great.

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His reference. But the other day
we were working up a song, we

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did a Toby Keith song because he
died, you know, and we're working

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up a soundcheck. My guitar tech
comes out with the chart. He's like,

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you want this. I'm like,
no, I'd rather mess it up

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without a chart than play it stale. And so I try and get you

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know, with doing that Earni gig, I got to where I could listen

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to a song about three times and
be able to and had the arrangement had

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it down, you know, then
you got to go into detail. How

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far detail you know that there's there's
different degrees of every gig that you have

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to realize they might be paid to
kind of improv, improv a little bit

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more and do my own thing over
this, or is there record licks that

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this one has to go there and
knowing how to how to do that.

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But also, I mean, if
you're trying to do an established gig,

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there's a lot of rehearsing that goes
in, and there's lighting cues and there's

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like pyro cues and all this stuff
that if you play a different part,

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it doesn't go with the cue of
the deal. And we don't play the

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tracks and we don't do none of
that. The lock Sums band's really into

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an arrangement. But I mean you've
got to you gotta have some of that.

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So different gigs require different skill sets. But if you listen, you'll

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you'll know. But also like pickers, they come to depend on your licks

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and you come to compair on their
licks, not that you're playing a record,

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but just to show them the respect
of the of the show that Okay,

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we hit a big crash here and
so you got to hit that big

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power chord that goes with the crash. And if you decide not to,

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it just it just it disrupts the
flow. But but also it's like,

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you know about reading charts, It's
like that's like reading the map. You

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know, it's like, yeah,
that will show you how to get from

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here to there, but that has
I will say this about charts, and

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I don't. I don't read shape
notes. I just read number of charts.

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Uh. I'm not great at shape
notes either. I can do it

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a little bit. I can't.
It's really stupid. Not stupid. Sheet

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music, okay, like in the
church sheet music, I have no those

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are dots. Looks like somebody dots
and lines. O'kay somebody spilled some mank.

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But I can read nationale number charts. I'm real good at that.

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But but no magic is derived from
the chart. That's only that's from God.

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And that's the pickers relationship with God. Yeah, yeah, yes,

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where do we go? And most
of the time you can pretty much prickling

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country and blues. You can smell
where it goes. Jazz sometimes you need

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to. There's a difference between the
one and the one major seventh but you

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learn to kind of smell it or
feel it if you're worth a damn,

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you know, but we'll okay,
I mean from the Broken Spoke to the

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Moody Center, that's an entirely different
style of playing. I mean, here,

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you've got the crowd Moody Center.
The last time I saw you play

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with Parker. I mean, like
I say, you've got the fireworks going

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off, you've got the lights,
you've got everything that doesn't distract you at

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all. You can't let it wait. Well, sometimes you know that's just

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what you know, that fire goes
off behind you two feet and you're like,

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oh, we flinched a little bit. I didn't miss a note.

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Okay, you know it's a it's
so yeah, some of that can,

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but it's more show business, is
what I'm saying, than here at the

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Spoke. Oh for sure. No. And then that's all part of it,

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you know, engaging fans and creating
an experience, and that's what people

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are doing. You know, they're
paying their harder and money to see something

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and feel something different. And the
more elements you can use to evoke that

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emotion of the music, than all
the better. And that's all that is

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00:20:48.160 --> 00:20:51.480
it's just enhancers. But you know, we had a show happened. It

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00:20:51.640 --> 00:20:53.400
was rainy. They couldn't do lights, they couldn't do the video walls,

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they couldn't even do our risers.
So we just set up like a band

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of a club and we played the
music and the people loved it. And

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like, if you can't do that, then all that stuff, don't don't

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00:21:02.799 --> 00:21:04.519
start there, you know, don't
go get the fancy leather jacket and the

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00:21:04.559 --> 00:21:07.240
sleeve of tattoos. Moved to La
with a Les Paul and think you're gonna

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00:21:07.240 --> 00:21:11.000
be Slash. Learn to play like
Slash first, then start dressing like him,

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you know, And that's you know, I keep itself up. I'm

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00:21:14.039 --> 00:21:15.839
a black T shirt Levi's boots kind
of guy. When I played with October,

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I where Converse or Doc Martin sometimes
because they're a little edgier, you

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00:21:18.920 --> 00:21:22.079
gotta look look the part a little
bit. Bill Ham I worked with him

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00:21:22.079 --> 00:21:23.799
when I was twenty, and that
was when I first started doing like some

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00:21:23.880 --> 00:21:27.359
arenas and bigger shows, from doing
clubs to that. And he was easy

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00:21:27.359 --> 00:21:30.920
Tops manager and producer for like almost
forty years. And he would always tell

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00:21:30.960 --> 00:21:34.240
me, like, you know,
when you go out look, be ready

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00:21:34.279 --> 00:21:37.960
to play on stage like everything.
And so to me, that's like some

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00:21:37.960 --> 00:21:40.880
guys take that over the top and
they're wearing feather bow is out and Doyle

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00:21:40.920 --> 00:21:41.960
does this thing. I love it. He only he can pull that off.

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00:21:42.079 --> 00:21:45.119
But me, it's like, what
can I dress in every day?

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00:21:45.319 --> 00:21:47.440
That's simple. I can still get
up there. I got my black teacher

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00:21:47.720 --> 00:21:51.799
jeans, right yeah. And it's
me so simplicity in that. But uh,

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you know that's something too, you
know, it's it takes everything,

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00:21:53.279 --> 00:21:56.759
Like you can't go up there unkempt, and people take you seriously, you

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00:21:56.799 --> 00:21:59.839
know, with an attitude and guitar
and like be a professional, show up,

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like brush your teeth, cut your
nails, you know, be ready,

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00:22:02.400 --> 00:22:04.119
like show them you're ready and they'll
they'll respect that. Such a great

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conversation with Will, and we'll continue
with part two for conversation with Will Neck

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on Tales from the Broken Spoke next
week. In the meantime, listen to

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00:22:11.960 --> 00:22:15.920
some past episodes are all waiting for
you right now where their free iHeartRadio app.

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00:22:17.119 --> 00:22:21.160
Tales from the Broken Spoke is recorded
live at The Broken Spoke in Austin,

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00:22:21.240 --> 00:22:26.279
Texas, hosted by Country Radio Hall
of fame broadcaster Bog Picket and Monty

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00:22:26.359 --> 00:22:29.759
Warden, recorded, mixed down and
produced by Mike rivera