Welcome to Music Matters Podcast with Darryl Craig Harris. Talking about all things music with celebrities, artists, music business insiders and more. Travis Boat, how are you doing today? Doing good, how are you? I'm good. Obviously you're in your car for those who can't see, but you're in East Texas, right? Yeah, East Texas, born and raised. I still come back here every couple of weeks. I've got a place out here. What are you based there? Are you based there? Are you based in Nashville or? So, kind of both. So I stay about half the month at my house in East Texas and then I head up to our spot over there in Nashville on Music Row. It seems like you kind of have to be there a little bit, especially as a newer artist. You got to be in town where everything is, right? Oh, yeah. You got to be in the mix for sure. Awesome. Yeah. So you have a new album coming out, Burning Bridges. It comes out March 6th. You were just featured in People Magazine last week on January 26th where people don't want to look it up. We're going to talk about that. And you have a new single and a new video out blues at my funeral. I was checking it out and the new album. Sounds great. So for people who haven't heard you, you have such a cool voice. It's sort of like a soulful rock and country. Is that a good description? I don't know. Yeah, that's exactly what I wanted. It's got the blues mixed in there. It's got the rock and roll and it's got my country roots as well. So over some of your early influences as a young singer, songwriter? Oh, man. I mean, even as a kid, I was listening to Ray Lamontane, you know, Amy Sleeze. Jerry Jeff Wanger. You know, I was listening. I mean, obviously the prolific Texas guys, you know, rusty wear, just all of the East Texas Texas scene, you know. And then, you know, like I said, I'm mostly Ray Lamontane, a lot of the the folk writers. And then I got into bluegrass and just kind of sort of very young age. I was listening to some pretty advanced stuff. I feel like, you know, Steve Ray Vaughn, obviously. Well, I mean, it's awesome too, because Texas, I mean, many people know that Texas has such a rich musical history. Not only not only we all think of Stevie Ray, but then, but office, there's some legendary country guys, obviously, that are from Texas and different parts of Texas, because it's also very regional. When you got started, how old are you actually when you got started singing and and songwriting and talk a little bit about because one of the things you mentioned in the people magazine article article is you're struggling with Tourette's and that singing really helped you get deal with that and kind of get get over that in a way, right? Yeah, so those two things actually go pretty hand in hand. I, you know, when I was a kid, I was diagnosed with the Tourette and I can't remember how old I always forget that I thought in my head, but I was very young and I was just getting into music as well. And I was on a lot of the experimental medication for Tourette's, you know, I went through the trial things, the trial studies and, you know, the paid studies and things and some of the medications would help a little bit, but they had crazy side effects. What I found was that when I played music, I wasn't having as many ticks as what they called a little mess ups and ticks. I wouldn't have a bunch of them at all. So I think that's what drove me to play music so much as a child. You know, I was like, well, you know, this is the best medicine I got is please check his that sounds. I don't have to worry about anything. You can just play music and not to worry about it. Very young though, I would say I started writing and performing more when I was in my late teens, you know, getting out of high school. Everybody went to college. I went to Honkytonk and man, I got me as a suburban. I bought me a used suburban and just hit the road with some speakers in the market. You know, Yeah. And I mean, Texas and even still is the case. There's all these clubs around Texas that you can tour. You could actually have an entire career playing in Texas only if you want to do. Oh, there's God do it. Yeah, I've made a great career on of it. Absolutely. Yeah, that's and that's the great, you know, the story with Tourette's is it's great that you're able to inspire people. I know you're involved. You're involved in some of the causes and some of the events for that too, which we're going to get to in a little bit later. But so tell me about the story about getting to Nashville, getting your album or getting your first record deal, all that story because I mean, that we always we always hear those stories, but this is our first hand in person account because I know that's a struggle, right? Yeah, it's actually kind of funny how it went down. So I personally released a single of mine called Never Truck cocaine on the distro kid, which is, you know, it's it's one of the things you can release music on as an independent. It's cheap. I think I paid 38 bucks. I can't remember how much it was at the time. It was monthly thing. And it went viral over the course of probably four months. And I released an entire EP on there. That song just decided to be the one that went, you know, and and I had no idea it was going to be that one. So I had all these suits from Nashville, hit me up on the TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, just trying to get a hold of me to tell me all these things they could do, these wonderful things, you know, selling me a dream type stuff. And I'm not an idiot. So I just didn't want to talk to none of them, you know, it was exciting. But I was like, man, I'm out here paying my bills already. Unless you're a hand to me, multi, multi million dollar, I could care less what you do. And you know, long as my wife, I'm still on, you know, and Anthony, my manager now, he's like family, he is family at the, you know, at this point, he was one of the ones reaching out to me. And he just, he got lumped into the people I was ignoring for, for every, you know, and he was the only genuine one in there. And it's hard to know who is real. I know. And I left him, I left him on the red for like six months. And that's kind of our goat now, you know. But he, he was very persistent. And he finally messaged me one last time. I was like, man, I'd love to jump on the phone with you. I really believe in what you're doing. And that's the first person that told me that. Use that, use that terminology, you know. So I was like, man, I'm going to give this guy a call. We had about an hour and a half conversation on the phone while I was at the gym. And the next week he flew me out to Nashville so we can meet in person, which is a big deal for me. I like shaking someone's hand, talking to him. I don't know. Very old school with that. And, uh, but we've been doing business and thriving ever since, you know, we've been, we've been busting it out here. So, so I love my team, my label, gravel road. And, uh, yeah, now we're getting ready to release this album and get on the road. Yeah, it takes a team. And like you said, the maintenance, so many, it's interesting too because you're so fortunate to be able to have a hit on your own and have a lot of interest on your own. And then I put you in a great position because then you don't really necessarily need anybody. You want to make sure it's on your terms, right? Right. Yeah. I mean, that's definitely part of it too. When you're young and not well versed in the, you know, the corporate world and all that. Yeah. Like the corporate side of it, I guess is the term, you know, you, you want to be real careful. And they were very patient with me and helped me through understanding everything, you know, rich, barreners, well, uh, says is like family. Milo, my co-manager, you know, the Rinser, everybody just helped me up to this point. And we're still helping each other. So it's, it's just a great, great habitat to be in. Yeah. And that's awesome. And it definitely, like I said, it takes a village to make it happen because as you get, as you start having hits and doing that thing, it's like it's too much for one person to manage. Um, tell me about your, your songwriting because it's very storytelling. And I know you've gone through some, some challenges in the last, you know, year or two, uh, personally with divorce and some other things. But tell me about songwriting and, and how that, how important that is to you. You know, the story telling aspect of my songwriting really comes from the Texas scene, uh, like I said, growing up around the, you know, being brought up into the Jerry Jeff Walker style of, of writing the, the Billy Joe Shaffer, you know, and just all of that, it was, that's what made me want to tell a story with my songs, uh, which I think is everyone's job. It, it takes us, it's very heavily prevalent where you get drug into like you're reading a book almost and that's, I like to show emotion on my songs and that's one of my strong points is that I can really reflect an emotion on a crowd of people from what I'm singing because of the storytelling and also the performance. Uh, you know, all of my songs have something to do with something that happened to me. There's a few fun ones like six shooters like obviously. It's just a fun song. Uh, that's also what I'm most in. Yeah, it's okay. That's fun. Yeah. I mean, you know, uh, you know, and I have, I have some songs like that, but all of them come from a real place, whether I'm writing on myself or co-writing. I mean, anything that's all my album has something to do with my life. Uh, like coming home, for instance, that was about my ex wife, uh, leaving and coming back a few years later and trying to talk to me. And it was, it was very hard for that to happen. I wrote a song about it that night and put it on this record. Yeah. And it's, I mean, songwriting's cathartic. It's like therapy at a way, right? Oh, it is. Oh, absolutely. That's another reason it's a medication. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. For sure. So tell me about making burning bridges. There's a lot of great tracks on this album. And so you mentioned co-writers, but then also talked to us about recording the album, the producer. Yeah. So that was actually the funnest part, man, getting into a studio as fun. So shout out to Jason Burr, my producer, amazing guy. I love, I love hanging out with him. We met through a mutual friend of mine, Paul Kaufman, actually. And he wanted to work with me on an album. So we went with him. He, uh, we went to Dallas and I already had some songs kind of ready. And we started recording over at Modern Electric Studio in Dallas. Sorry about that. How to, how to blank. Recorded there and then me and him really started hanging out and realizing, man, we could, we could write together. So me and him actually wrote, uh, tow wrote a few of the songs that are on the album as well. And, uh, he, he introduced me to some of his people along the way. You know, we flew back and forth to California, you know, uh, West Hollywood, uh, ban knives to record some of this and write and think, well, so it was just a fun, probably seven or eight month project bouncing around the country, recording these songs and writing them. And it really reflects, you know, some of the ones we recorded in California have almost a California desert type sound to them. So it really reflects the location. It's just really neat, man. Like when, when people get to listen to this album when it drops, uh, and they hear the story about how it came about, they're really going to hear those reflections. Yeah. And it's, I mean, it's nice to get new input, right? And getting, getting some new kind of fuel for the fuel for songwriting materials. Absolutely. Yeah. And, um, who are some of the guys that played on the sound? Were they L.A. guys or the Nashville guys? We definitely had some, uh, some Texas guys and, uh, some, uh, Austin, some, uh, L.A. guys as well. Yeah. I mean, I don't have the list of everybody in front of me here, but yeah, we definitely had, uh, it was a big blend for sure. Uh, riders as well, not just musicians. Yeah. And California Country has its own thing too, right? It's all, it's, it's, it's, it does. Yeah. A lot of tellies and, and steel guitars for sure. It's very regional. It's interesting. Now you have the Bakersfield thing, the Southern California thing. Um, so what, what do you have coming up? I know you're going to be at, I think you're going to be performing at Sundance Festival, right? Is that coming up for you? Yeah. So we actually just did that. That was the Sundance Film Festival. We did an event there, uh, me and, me and the band flew in from Nashville. And that was insane because of the, the storm that, you know, the winter storm that flew across the country. It, all our flights were getting canceled. We got stuck there, had to fly to Sacramento and then to Nashville, just a mess. But we, what we nailed that show, it was one of the funner ones we've done. Uh, up next, I have got, uh, I've got to pop over to Nashville this week for a few meetings and things, just to pop around. And then I fly to Georgia for a private event. Uh, and then in March, you know, right ahead of the, uh, release, you know, I'm partnered with the National Tourette Association of America. And I will be flying to DC, actually. I've been invited to be a performer and speaker at, uh, the, the, the gala, you know, the event they're having for that with all the senators and things for funding. So, uh, I forget the physical name of what that's called, but I will be at that. And I'm going to get to speak to, uh, you know, the younger generation that has Tourette and let them know you can do anything, which is very important to me to say, because I was told as a kid by doctors and teachers, I wouldn't be able to do what I'm doing. And here we are talking on the phone. So what's, um, and speaking of that, what's some advice that you would give to younger artists, but also people dealing with Tourette's, especially children, because I obviously that's impacted your life at a pastor's songwriting. Um, yeah, talk, talk a little about that. You know, it's as easy as it is to say as opposed to doing. I would say push through because I was lucky growing up the way I was. I, uh, I let stuff kind of run off my back. I didn't even care, you know, it just, wigs, rush my shoulders off and went about it. Kids made fun of me. Teachers were hard on me. I just let it go. I was very happy, but, uh, I had a very good support system at home. I have two older sisters that would fight people. You know, if I had two, so it was what it was. Uh, but, you know, if I could go back and I've said this in a, in a previous interview, if I could go back and tell my 10 year old self what, what's happening now, I would, I would have, it would have been so much easier for me, you know, so that's what I want to do with the kids that have it, you know, I can't go back and talk to my 10 year old self, but I can talk to the younger generation now that has it and tell them, look, I'm getting to travel the world and play music and do what I love. And I've got to rent. It hasn't held me back a bit. Uh, it's, it's tough and you got to get through it, but it's not the end of the world. People are going to make funny. You go make money, prove them wrong. You know what I'm saying? And that, that's what I'm, yeah, you got to wake up every day on a mission to prove everybody wrong, right? Yeah. And, you know, you have to stay humble to that, that's the biggest thing. Uh, no matter what you're doing, you know, I've, that's, I've been taught that since I was a kid, you stay humble and, uh, you know, but you still want to tell some of those teachers that told you what and do nothing that you, you know, you might have just spent what they made in the year, you know, also. Yeah. I had that for music, my high school guidance counselor was like, you can't work. You can't be a professional musician. So like, well, I've been doing it for 45 years. Like I said, worked out, okay? Yeah. Yeah. I find going to work. I don't know. Exactly. Yeah. Like you said, prove them all wrong. Travis, tell people how they can find you and find upcoming tour dates and all that stuff. Yeah. So I'm actually at TravisBoltMusic.com and we're going to be adding all those tour dates for this year on there in the next couple of weeks, I believe, uh, getting all that geared up and ready to go for the album release, uh, all of my music and, uh, happenings and things would be on Spotify, YouTube, uh, you know, shout out to Spotify and YouTube music. Amazon iTunes, all of that. So it's on every major streaming platform, uh, when all of this drops, it'll be on everything at the same time. I think you're fixing to get very busy. Yeah. That's the goal. That's the goal. And then Instagram for sure, Facebook, you know, if any, if, you know, if you're getting on there to follow me, please do and, uh, you know, hit the follow button, subscribe to my YouTube, all of that good stuff. Every bit of that helps get the messaging out. So. And you're, I should say you mentioned Spotify because you have, I think it's over 300,000 followers or listeners a month, which is, which is a great accomplishment, especially as an independent artist, but now obviously signed. Um, and I admire what you, I admire your work ethic. I admire the fact that you pushed through and didn't let anything stop you. That's, that's really awesome. It's a great story. Well, thank you. Yeah. It's been, uh, it's been a ride for sure. And we're far from done with it. So. Yeah, you just begin to have a great day, Travis. I'll, I'll get pull all your information and also, um, I'll put the like the studio name and all that stuff in the, uh, in the podcast, uh, release. So everybody can find you and make sure they check you out, check out your new music as well. Thank you so much. Great. Thank you, Darryl. Awesome. Thank you. Have a great day. See you.
