Picture this: a teenage George Burge strumming his guitar and belting out original songs in the lively bars of Austin, Texas, with his high school buddies' parents as the audience. Now fast-forward to the present, where that same passion and energy have propelled him into the spotlight with his hit "Mind on You." Our latest chat with George isn't just about his journey; it's about the heartbeat of Austin's music scene that fueled his fire and the serendipitous events that transformed his career from band member to a solo sensation. He spills the details on the song originally meant for country icon Jason Aldean and the twists of fate that led to his own chart-topping success.
Picture this: a teenage George Burge strumming his guitar and belting out original songs in the lively bars of Austin, Texas, with his high school buddies' parents as the audience. Now fast-forward to the present, where that same passion and energy have propelled him into the spotlight with his hit "Mind on You." Our latest chat with George isn't just about his journey; it's about the heartbeat of Austin's music scene that fueled his fire and the serendipitous events that transformed his career from band member to a solo sensation. He spills the details on the song originally meant for country icon Jason Aldean and the twists of fate that led to his own chart-topping success.
Speaker 1:
the show. After the show Today we are talking to an up and coming artist, somebody who we only just really got to know.
Speaker 2:
And there's this prevailing story about a song that he recorded that has become a giant hit, a mega hit, and even though he's probably talked about this many times, we want to get the story straight from the horse's mouth. So, with no further ado, let's talk to George and the other two. Let's talk to George Burge about his big, giant hit. Mind on you. You popped on and my alarm went off saying you were about to pop off.
Speaker 3:
Surprise. I like to cause a little bit of chaos when I jump in. Yeah, 100% cause a little bit of chaos.
Speaker 2:
How are you?
Speaker 3:
I'm doing fantastic guys. How are y'all?
Speaker 2:
We're doing great, never better.
Speaker 3:
Happy holidays. Thank you so much. Happy holidays to you guys too. I hope y'all are getting to relax a little bit.
Speaker 1:
Are you in Austin or Nashville?
Speaker 3:
I'm in Nashville for the first half and I'm going to sneak down to Austin for a week. Well, just all across Texas. My wife is from Texas too, but she's from West Texas. We have family up in Houston too. Like I didn't travel enough this year, we're going to go do a tour across Texas and see family too.
Speaker 1:
Austin's on my bucket list for South by Southwest. It's been on my bucket list for like 10 years.
Speaker 3:
You will not regret it. It is such a fun city. I was so lucky to grow up there and still have a bunch of family and friends there. I'm biased, but Austin, texas, is a great town.
Speaker 1:
I got to see a show at Austin City Limits in 2014 and I just fell in love with the city.
Speaker 3:
Oh yeah, that's where I cut my teeth. I grew up playing bars in Austin when I was 14 years old with X's on my hand. There's not a lot of towns you can do that. We're downtown 6th Street, a high school band, and have our friends, parents dropping them off and watching us play original songs at a bar downtown. I didn't realize how special that was until I realized that not every city was like that. It was a pretty cool place to grow up.
Speaker 2:
That's kind of amazing if you really think about it. 14 years old, I'm trying to think 14. My mom was dropping me off at the roller rink. I was playing with Star Wars toys. You were jamming out in a bar band. That's the best I know. You probably belabored this story, but since we've told it a few times ourselves, let's hear it from the horse's mouth. You wrote Mind on you for someone else. Jason Eldine, Is that right?
Speaker 3:
Insane story. I was formerly in a band and I had been chasing it for a while and, for whatever reason, I had just gotten to this point where I wasn't happy with the music I was making. I didn't feel like I was being authentic to myself. I looked at the guys in the band with me and I was like, hey, guys, I gotta hang it up. They were amazingly supportive. We're all still friends. But there was an 8 month period there where I thought that I was never going to do the artist thing again and that I was just going to be a songwriter. And so I started writing songs.
Speaker 3:
I got lucky. I had a bunch of big artists in Nashville start believing in me and recording my songs and I wrote Mind on you and I ended up sending it to Jason Eldine. 24 hours later, I get an e-mail bag saying don't play this song for anybody. Jason wants it for his new record, which, at the time, was the biggest thing to happen to me. He's fresh off an entertainer of the year. I idolized him. He was one of my biggest influences growing up with music and so I felt like this was the biggest thing to ever happen to me.
Speaker 3:
Well, fast forward about six months I started to put some of my own music on social media and had people start to react to it and all of a sudden it blew up and I've got a record deal and I've got a chance to start working on my first album, and the head of the label calls me and he's like hey, man, we're so excited to work with you, but that song that you were going to give to Jason Eldine, that's a mistake. You need to call and ask for it back, because it's going to be your first single. Wow, it's pretty insane.
Speaker 2:
And ask for it back.
Speaker 3:
Well, after I didn't sleep for three nights and had two or three panic attacks, I did yeah. I ended up calling him no. He was such a great guy. He and his team were excited for me. They were excited for my opportunity. I can't thank them enough for believing in me and giving me the chance, because it's not the first time something like this has happened in this town, and more often than not, people will tell you that you can't have your song back, and so he was a complete class act to give me my song back, and it ended up changing my life.
Speaker 3:
I put it out with my own name on it and it's the most added song in America at Country Radio. It has flown up the charts. It's put people in seats for me. I'm starting to sell tickets and show up and see these crowds that I could have never dreamed of. I'm seeing people sing every word of it back at concerts. It's been nothing short of a life changer for me, and now they're dancing to it in the clubs with the remix. So it's all it's everywhere.
Speaker 3:
How crazy is that.
Speaker 2:
I really wish we had longer with George.
Speaker 1:
I know here's what you mean. I know a lot of times when we interview artists we only have six minutes with them and that goes by so quickly. So we're going to try to set up a little bit longer interview because he's really interesting. We weren't sure, going into it, how it would be, but, Ash, we fall in love with these artists so quickly.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, one of the things that I found really interesting too is and I mentioned to him about the remix of his song. So he has this whole hip hop remix thing with a guy that's rapping along with him and it's just a dance version of the song. And I've mixed emotions about those things because sometimes I'm like you can't have our good country music. But then I'm like, hey, good music is good music and everybody should get to enjoy it and you like to see the popularity for the artist because it's really good for their career.
Speaker 1:
Exactly. We want these artists to do as well as they can. I was just reminded of the first time we talked to Jelly Roll. We knew so little about him. And within 60 seconds, we were both in love with him.
Speaker 2:
Please stay all day. Yeah, he was such a good guy, mr Jelly.
Speaker 1:
And kind of the same with George. Just such a cool guy. I can't wait to talk to him again.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, I hope it happens very soon. Of course, you'll be the first to know. So thank you so much. Give us a couple, not a couple.
Speaker 1:
Give us all the stars if you can, all the stars.
Speaker 2:
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