I grew up around people that enjoyed life day to day and found pleasure in simple things.

I love Tennessee, but they don't have the pine trees and the sandy soil and the black water that I grew up around.

I'm a sinner just like everybody else and I have my faults and I've been through my dark times in my life to where I wasn't walking the walk and talking the talk, or I may have been talking the talk, but I wasn't walking the walk.

I remember those days right after I graduated from college. All I had to do was wake up in the morning and think about writing songs. It's not like that anymore, needless to say.

I've listened to a lot of outside stuff and just haven't really heard anything that moves me. I don't know if I'm getting old and crotchety or what.

I was trying to learn how to deal with the freedom that I had away from home for the first time. 'Long Black Train,' the song and the album, are very special to me. It was just one of those things that I felt like God gave to me for a purpose, and I've been out here promoting that purpose.

I play basketball all the time. Me and my band play every week on the road. That's something that I've never really given up since high school.