Yeah

... moments that, like, it's almost, I don't know if I'd...

This, it's like Hemingway where you hear one side of the conversation.

And I don't know.

That album is ridiculous.

It's like, I...

And I, I kinda do love, like, a guy doesn't get the girl in the end story.

Do you ever feel though like if you write something so unconventional, you just wasted four hours where you could've been writing something that was a bit more conventional that you could've actually made money to pay the bills with?

That's okay.

Uh, Lonely Tonight with Blake Shelton and Ashley Monroe.

I'm gonna say that one.

Even though I don't know, I'm gonna say that one.

See-

But that was a, but that was a two-way.

Some of these other ones are three or four ways, like, with writers.

That was a two-way, me and Brent Anderson, so I didn't have to split the money as much.

Yeah

... moments that, like, it's almost, I don't know if I'd...

This, it's like Hemingway where you hear one side of the conversation and, I don't know.

Well, that album is ridiculous.

It's like, I... and I, I kinda do love, like, a guy doesn't get the girl in the end story.

I don't...

That is, that whole thing just sucked me in.

Do you ever feel, though, like, if you write something so unconventional, you just wasted four hours where you could've been writing something that was a bit more conventional that you could've actually made money to pay the bills with?

Uh, but just to, before I get into maybe their particular questions and objections, can you give a little bit of an explanation of auctoritas and kind of the role that played?

Yeah.

So auctoritas, uh, is the Latin version of our English authority.

It means lots of different things, and it functions in a lot of places in theology.

A lot of Catholic versus Protestant dialogue, uh, today concentrates on issue of the authority of Holy Scripture versus, say, the authority of the Pope.

Uh, in scholastic theology, typically we speak of auctoritas in a, in a fairly significantly different way, and it has to do with what we might call today belief formation or what brings you to assent to a certain proposition.

And there's a lot of overlap between those two, uh, spheres.

And I, I wanted to kinda kick it over to you to see what you thought of that idea and how you would respond to it.

dreamer?

There's a couple things here.

And yeah, you were.

I mean, and so one of the things you have to know about lucidity is that it tends to happen when the mind is waking up anyway.

There's more metacognition happening.

The brain is essentially warming up.

And basically, some evolutionary psychologists theorize that REM sleep in general, it's so close to waking up.

Huge,

Why is it called Midwest Rock and Roll? Because

I just, it is what it is.

I loved, I wrote that title.

You know how this works.

We write titles in our phones all the time.

I wish we still, I used to write on legal pads.

But I wrote that title in my phone.

And so to take him and not only go to a game, but to take him on the field, like that's the really the coolest part.

that's like the like the coolest thing thinking about that it's one of my favorite parts of success not me throwing the first pitch but I got to take my stepdad he was with me he'd never even got to go he'd never been to Wrigley and so to take him and not only go to a game but to take him on the field like that's Really the coolest part.

Can I tell you about my dad at Wrigley the next day when I got to do it? So I know all the people at the Cubs because of Brian O'Connell.

I was on the Florida Georgia Line tour, and I was booked for the whole tour.

I was first of four, so I got to play, I think it was 20 minutes maybe.

But it was fun.

It was worth it.

It was great.

yeah

Yeah.

And, um, it's been (laughs) very hard fought and a long, um, 18 months for sure as far as just my personal life and what I thought music would look like, and then what it does look like for me.

Um, but I have an incredible team now and, uh, just a lot, just an inc- a very cool culture I think is, is the word I've been saying the last two weeks when I realized that's what it was.

So-

Yeah.

...

I just...

I'm really blessed to have made this album and had a label like Big Machine just be like, "Oh, okay, we'll figure it out." And it ended up, like, yeah, it's expensive and, yeah, it's a, a bit much.