Music In My Shoes
Come be entertained as the host talks about music, bands, and connected stories.
"It's a really great podcast" - Kevn Kinney of Drivin N Cryin
"I appreciate talking to you guys and the good questions" - Mitch Easter of Let's Active and R.E.M. producer
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Music In My Shoes
Kevn Kinney and Anna Jensen: Her Living Tribute to the Art of His Sound E105
What if a tribute didn’t wait for the final chapter? We sit down with artist-producer Anna Jensen and songwriter Kevn Kinney to unpack Let’s Go Dancing, a 100-song, multi-year celebration that reimagines Kevn’s catalog—solo and with Drivin N Cryin—while pairing each release with original artwork. Born from a lockdown birthday idea, the project became a living archive where legends, locals, and rising voices reinterpret songs and, in the process, open new doors for listeners to discover bands they might have missed.
Anna pulls back the curtain on the unglamorous work: thousands of emails, clearances, timelines, and a painting cadence that often demands a finished piece in a week or two. She explains how lyric imagery sparked four anchor albums and how curating rather than assigning songs led to better fits and braver performances. Kevn talks about hearing his work return in new shapes and why those covers have made him more flexible in the studio.
If you love discovery, backstories, and art that meets music at full speed, this one’s for you. Follow the series via Tasty Goody Records, queue up the Let’s Go Dancing playlist, and tell us the cover that surprised you most. If the conversation moves you, share it with a friend and leave a quick review—it helps others find the music and the makers behind it.
https://beacons.ai/tastygoodyrecords/music
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This is Kevin Kinney from Drive and Crying and Anna Jensen, artist and producer of the Let's Go Dancing compilation.
SPEAKER_06:And you are here listening to music in my shoes.
SPEAKER_03:As always, I'm thrilled to be here with you. Let's learn something new or remember something old. Jimmy, I'm excited because the day of the release of this episode, November 16th, 2025, happens to be my birthday. Yay! Yes, so this is kind of like my birthday episode, we'll call it. For sure. And usually I'm not into that. And I know some people celebrate, you know, birthday week, birthday month, and everything. But I'm going to make a big deal out of it because we have very special guests with us today. Yes, we do. We have with us Kevin Kinney of Driving and Crying and Anna Jensen. Yes, the artist. I know you know who I'm talking about. And we are going to talk about a project that Anna has been working on for Kevin, celebrating all of his music that he's done solo as well as what he's done with Driving and Crying. And I think it's a fantastic thing. Welcome to the show.
SPEAKER_01:Thank you. It's fantastic to be here.
SPEAKER_03:It's always nice being had. So, Anna, enough with Kevin here for a second. Let's talk about let's go dancing, how it started, and what made you take something that seems like an idea that's a good idea and hard to do and realize it's a lot harder to do, but it is so cool that you've done it.
SPEAKER_01:Well, let's see. It started as a 60th birthday uh celebration for Kevin because that happened during the like prime time COVID lockdown situation. So leading up to before we knew that the world was gonna shut down, we uh were gonna do something maybe at the Fox Theater or something really special for a 60th that would involve friends coming and performing similar to Colonel Bruce's 70th, but hopefully without the tragic, you know don't want the same ending. Yeah. But you know, people do say that he couldn't have chosen a better departure. True, you know, but it's hard to say that, you know, with it being such a loss. And Kevin and and him were very close. But something like that, you know, was obviously not going to be possible anymore. And so around that time, Kevin was invited to do a song covering uh New York dolls, I believe. Uh Sylvain Sylvain uh had recently passed, and so uh Kevin did Frenchette with Aaron Lee Tajan and uh am I rem I don't know if you're familiar with that those songs, but I I think I'm remembering that correctly. Um but yeah, they did a really cool version of the song, and I thought, what a shame it is that you know these tributes are almost always done when people have departed and they're not there to in you know in in life to see the the outpouring of love and admiration, and so it just dawned on me that this would be a great chance to do something like that for Kevin while he is, you know, around to witness it. So great, such a good idea. Yeah, and I just kind of took the ball and r you know ran with it and I joke that but it's true that on our ride home from that recording of that song that he did um in Nashville, I remember he went into a gr gas station and he left his phone and I just uh did my first little sneaking peek into his contacts and uh took some screenshots, took some shots of who I should start with first, like people like Audley Freed and uh just you know, Edwin McCain, maybe you know, some of his friends that I know that that I knew would want to do something, um and uh that would also so one thing just kind of led to another and I knew it would be a lot of work, but I didn't know I didn't really have a clue quite how much work it was gonna be. So luckily I am self-employed um as an artist, so I could tailor my schedule around this endeavor. But so first it was just a casual affair of just friends sending in recordings if they felt comfortable covering a portion or a full song of Kevin's or Driving and Crying. Um, and then some people just sent video messages. Uh but in the end, by the time it was his birthday, March twelfth, this was 2020. Yeah, it was about three hours worth of amazing covers like Darius Rucker doing Lost and Found and So let me answer this.
SPEAKER_03:So, what's it like to be like, hey Darius, this is Anna. Can you do a song? And and and all the other people, what's it like?
SPEAKER_01:Aray of the Indigo Girls, and you know, it was scary at first. It was exciting and always just so um really beautiful when it was a quick and enthusiastic yes from some of these people that are, you know, world-renowned, just you know, household names some of the time. And then um sometimes I even reached out to people that I enjoy listening to, but that I didn't know if they had any clue of of Kevin at all. And some of them, like the Great Lake swimmers, shovels and rope, you know, and people that said yes, and it just it was it has been mind-blowing, and I think I'm I haven't quite had even had the time to process just how meaningful it all is. And you know, to him, of course, but even to me, like some of these are my musical and artistic heroes, like Kat Power. She recorded her vocals and the music is being finished, and she's one of my favorite. You know, I painted 10 years listening to her music, and of course there were some people that said no or couldn't or it just could it couldn't happen, and there have been plenty of like letdowns and some sad things that couldn't be, but um overall I've tried to just trust that a lot of this is preordained, although you know, I had to do the legwork, and I probably sent thousands of emails at this point just in corresponding with all these artists and their teams, and you know, a lot of times there'll be label things we have to work out. I have a great legal counsel that has um helped us out um on this. It's Matthew Wilson, I think I can say, but he's with Arnold Golden Gregory and Yeah, thank anybody you'd like to. Yeah, I mean I've done a lot of work. I'm probably doing 20 jobs. One of my jobs is making the art for every song. So I didn't have a solid plan going into this, but that casual video led to uh people encouraging me to, you know, make it into an official compilation. And at that point we realized that artwork was gonna be necessary because you know, albums need a cover and singles need artwork, and they were like, Well, you should do it. So I just said yes. And I yeah, at first when I came up with the four record covers for the the main albums, which uh based on the Let's Go Dancing song, so each the lyrics that have a lot of imagery uh made it perfect for this. So one is uh split a mountain in two with a flake of snow, one is um stopped a freight train with a grain of sand, that'll be the next upcoming one. Um the first one was uh said the fireflight of the hurricane, and then let's see, the third one was said the falling rain to the open flame. So when I came up with those covers, I was so proud of myself and thrilled, just because usually it takes me months or even years to finish paintings because I don't ever have a plan. I just kind of let it unfold and I I uh use a fair amount of detail and stuff. So anyway, I felt like I had made this grand accomplishment just with those four, and then I realized that you know it morphed into this idea of me doing a painting for every single and to get all 100 singles out in you know, a reasonable amount of time would mean they would need to come out pretty quickly, like every week or two. And so it's been near nervous breakdown. Oh uh because I'm also having to, you know, do all the corresponding and the so there's a lot of email and and uh red tape and just uh it's pretty mind-boggling the amount of work that I've put into this.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, but the amount of work that you've put in every week, you know, on Facebook, I'm looking at the post, you know, and the watching, you know, do the art and the time lapse with it. Yeah, it's just fantastic. And I think that that's pulled me into it more than what I probably like a normal, yeah. Because it's like every week, you know, I know you got a hundred songs, you need a hundred more. I could go forever. So do a hundred more, two hundred more. I love watching it. How long does it take you to do the artwork for each one?
SPEAKER_01:I mean, often I'll only have a week or two, but if I know of something coming up ahead of time, you know, months out, I might get started on one. And um, but I definitely am cranking them out way quicker than I am comfortable. So I don't necessarily get them to a point of there where I would consider them like done, done, but at the same time, usually a week, a couple weeks after the release, I'm like, yeah, that that's fine. I don't need to worry about it anymore.
SPEAKER_04:I I'll tell you, I was looking at the artwork today, I didn't realize that you had done all of them. And I was like, the artwork for these things is amazing. It's like it that you know, you pull from the lyrics, like the like the straight to hell covers, the laundromat.
SPEAKER_01:Right.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:So I I and sometimes I include the artists, um, not always, but and the when I can, I'll use uh artwork that I completed that's already a part of my catalog. Um, that's always a great relief to just have a breath, you know, uh because a lot of them are do take more than a week or two to finish.
SPEAKER_03:So as an artist, you know, you kind of mentioned sometimes you do it a little bit quicker. So is that difficult because as an artist you work at a certain pace or a certain vision and however long it's gonna take, and now you have to I have the vision, but I gotta go quick because I know there's this behind it and this behind it. And I I guess that has to have a some sort of psychological effect on you as well.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I think I'm somehow the perfect person for this project, I feel like, because I've been through experiences in life that I think have provided me the ability to just block some things out, block unpleasantness out. Um so the pressure of knowing that, you know, in some cases millions of people are gonna see this artwork and it's representing, you know, a musical artist that I respect and admire, and that there's a certain amount of like pressure, you know, to not screw this up because Kevin's relationship with these people is on the line. And so yeah, there's a lot of stressful things that I have to just not pay attention to. But luckily, I'm enjoying a lot of it. It's kind of a neat challenge to make these quicker. The hardest part is coming up with the idea sometimes, and luckily Kevin has been helpful with that because he's a lot quicker of just like throwing out imagery um that I wouldn't have necessarily thought of. Occasionally we butt heads about some of this stuff because you know he this is his material that we're honoring, but um so he has ideas of what uh how it looks in his head, and I'm not really doing that. I'm doing my own, you know, interpretation of this so because he makes paintings as well, so it would have been nice to just use his or use anybody else's uh, but we decided that I would do the artwork, and so I've sticking with it. But yeah, it is scary. I usually get excited about the start of them, and then once it's like three days until I have to turn it in and there's like a lot of details to finish, then I s then I get like burnout kicks in, and but that's when it becomes a job.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, the artwork though is fantastic, and I think that really is a big part of it. You know, like I said, for someone like myself, every week I'm looking to see the videos and the time lapse, listen to the song, and it's just something that I really look forward to. And I just think it's a really cool concept. I think that today there are there's a million different songs that are coming out, right? And and all different, you know, bands and and artists.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, it's overwhelming.
SPEAKER_03:And you have to have something that says, hey, listen to me. Right. And I think that artwork and the whole thing, how you kind of you know put it out there that it's coming out, and it just kind of grabs you and and just like I said, each week it's something that I look forward to.
SPEAKER_01:Well, that's great to hear. Yeah, I do I do feel like this sets it apart from other compilations, um, to have it be kind of a family affair and have it be the art intertwined with the the visual art, with the musical art. Um I think for better or worse, this is stayed under the radar for the most part. I don't think that'll be the case forever, but um, and I think it has served me in some ways for it to be a little more of a secret for and you're you know, you're in one of the insiders that you look forward to it, but I think a lot of people aren't aware that this is even going on because I s I meet people and hear from some of Kevin's friends in the music industry that um are pretty plugged in and they're and it's news to them, even though it's been going on for several years at this point. But you know, I think that when people do learn about it, the art part is a part of the enjoyment and it'll be one of my life's greatest achievements, I would say, you know, just to have this body of work that's uh celebrating my favorite person. And you know, his his songs deserve to be more appreciated more widely, and um because he's also a bit of a a little inside scoop people who know of Kevin think that he is like you know, a generation a d a different generation to Bob Dylan or Neil Young or you know. Um because he is. Yeah. I mean But there's so many people that don't know about him, you know. When he toured with the Indigo Girls a couple years ago, like a lot of the audience were like, Who are you? You're like Buddha. And these are grown people that just never even heard of him, even though they're in the same circle. He's been in the same circle with the indigo girls since they all were beginning.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, I mean, I think the first time he was on, he talked about being with them in New York and their car got broken into or something if I remember.
SPEAKER_01:Their trip to New York, yeah, inspired a song. I think McDougal Blues or something.
SPEAKER_03:You know, I think you know, for me, this podcast is something that will last forever.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_03:So I can fully understand for you where it's a much bigger thing, much broader, because it's songs that Kevin wrote and artists that are doing it, that it it just must be the coolest thing in the world.
SPEAKER_01:It really is. I again I'm just not letting it sink in quite yet, but um I just I would want to say though that people like you that appreciate art and music and speak out about it are just as important as us who make this stuff. So I love art collectors and people like you, podcasters and writers and yeah.
SPEAKER_03:I can write a little bit, I'll try, I'll write something. Um you're writing with you're you know speaking, yeah.
SPEAKER_04:You're a music lover.
SPEAKER_03:No, I am a music lover. And I and you know, I mean, I love the story that I told when Kevin was first on when I first moved to Atlanta 35 years ago. And I said to people, hey, what do I do? What's Atlantin? What what what do you do? And they're like, Have you heard of driving and crying? Like that was like most people, that was the first thing. And I was like, No, I haven't. And I immediately was like, Well, I gotta listen to them because everyone's telling me I need to. And here we are, you know, 35 years later, and Kevin's on the show for the fourth time, and you know, it's just it's just crazy.
SPEAKER_01:And he said he brought Lenny Kay over here as well.
SPEAKER_03:Lenny Kay, he said, Yeah, Lenny was fantastic. Um, we were talking about that earlier about we looked out the door, and Kevin and Lenny Kay are just walking down the gravel driveway, and you know, just regular people. So let me ask you, you know, like I love the song Let Lenny Be, and you have uh Fang of Gore.
SPEAKER_01:That was a huge get, yeah.
SPEAKER_03:That it is fantastic. And also, some people have written in that I use the word fantastic too much. People are now starting to count in every episode. So that's fantastic that you do that. Just want to let you know.
SPEAKER_01:Kevin has gotten that comment about Groovy, and then we named one of our dogs Groovy Gore. Yes, they have to say it a lot now.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, well, I tried this straight away from saying awesome. So now I've gotten into Fantastic. But so, you know, Fang of Gore, you know, obviously related to Gang of Four. How did that happen? Because that's a an excellent song. They do a great job. Great job.
SPEAKER_01:Oh well, I'm a f a Gang of Four fan. Um, Kevin and I just saw their last their final tour. They, you know, they were at variety playoffs. I actually ran into you guys. Yeah, I remember that.
SPEAKER_03:I had a beard then. So you looking at me now, I don't look as good as you look more like the t-shirt. I look like the t-shirt then. Not I think I've seen you recently at the Earl as well, right? No, I saw you at the minus five baseball project.
SPEAKER_01:Maybe it was the Oh the Earl. I did see you at the Earl. Yeah, yes. We went to each other a lot when Driving and Crime was practicing their new album.
SPEAKER_03:Yes, yes. So I guess it's a two-fold. How did you get Gang of Four? But then are there bands that are part of this project that you had no connection, you had no number, that you just had to call people to try and get their information?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I've definitely um gotten good at figuring out who's managing who and you know how to it's not always possible, but you know, just through Googling and such, and Instagram has been helpful sometimes. But um, there's a a woman, a friend of Kevin's that's now a friend of mine named Shelly Colvin, who um is also a musician, and she did a song on the first record with Dylan LeBlanc. But she has a lot of friends and connections in the music industry, and she's been instrumental in this, and um some other people that have been helpful. So it's it's a it is a small world, as they say, and especially in the music business, with you know, I think in a a line of work like this where money isn't really can't always be the motivating factor because only a handful of are actually making a decent living doing music anymore. Um so it's more the the circus folk vibe of it all where we they all look out for each other and so you know and also like I've I've reached out to management. Sometimes it didn't work out where the artist was up for doing a song, but the usually the management teams were are all like we are huge driving and crying fans and we you know I'm Kevin's biggest fan, and so it's been a pleasant surprise often that that they have you know appreciators throughout the the music world, even if it the up-and-comers uh aren't necessarily hip to them, but I think this hopefully will help that. So I've definitely been trying to reach a wide audience a wide you know breadth of artists as far as age and genre and stuff like that.
SPEAKER_03:So for me, I love Scarred But Smarter from T. Hardy Morris. Yeah. And right after that came out, he played in Athens and at uh At Fest. And I went to the show specifically because I didn't really know anything about him, but I heard this song, I think fantastic. Friend of the show Canon plays um pedal steel on it.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, right, and he plays with Sisto and other people. Yeah, um that is definitely part of the hope of this is to not only celebrate Kevin, but to um shine a light on some of these artists to like different fan bases, so that you know you can learn of a new a new favorite from this that you wouldn't have ever heard of before. And that has been happening. Up def there are people that are that are following along, like you are, that are collecting each artist that has a a song on this, then they'll go back and go through that artist catalog and get a signed copy.
SPEAKER_03:And yeah, and I have been doing that. I mean, I think it's been really cool, like I said, going to see T. Hardy Morris. I mean, uh we went. I went with Jimmy to Athfest and you know, it was like he wanted to see certain bands, and I was like, I just want to see T. Hardy Morris. I don't care what else we do, but that's what I want to do. You know, he was really good too. He was fantastic.
SPEAKER_01:And he's friends with David Barbie, and David Barbie has been really helpful with this, with you know, um they're mastering every song there at Chase Park transduction. And I I didn't answer your question, but the gang of four is the the Hugo, the drummer, and one of the founding members is a buddy of Kevin's. I think Hugo might have worked in the music business in the more like the behind the scenes for a minute while while Tribe and Crime was up and coming. But so I I ran into Hugo at I think a Black Crows concert or something when Tribe and Crying was opening for them. So I somehow I don't even remember how I got in touch with them, but I knew that he loved Kevin, so um, and he said yes, and then he got his daughter to sing and um brought in Gail um from Belly and L7 to play bass. And so it's like this new super group called Fang of Gore. Um so that'll be on the next record coming up that's gonna be more harder rock. And it's so nice with with Hugo, he's an example of when someone like that who's so influential and such a badass, but he's also like just one of the sweetest people, just like Kevin and you know, people, members of REM and their team have been a big part of this, and it's just so refreshing when people that are you know that elevated actually are great, helpful, kind, sweet people. So that's been one of the the best I that has to be.
SPEAKER_03:I think you know, if you're doing a project and you expect certain people that are gonna be there and be part of it, and you know, and obviously I'm sure that there's some people that weren't, but the people that are knowing that they are sweet and that they're a part of it and doing what they can and McDougal Blues, you know, Scott Crumb. Yeah, and with Peter Buck, and you know, listen, that's just fantastic, and it's it's like you know, it's gotta take you, Kevin, back to, you know, when you originally recorded the song and Peter Buck was was part of it.
SPEAKER_06:Yeah, that was um I actually I think there's part of me on that. I think because I recorded this uh thing called McDougal Blues Revisited, where I added because I added a verse to McDougal Blues uh on that, and I I added a verse to Hey Landlord. So I I did that at Scott McCoy's basement, and then I think they might have used that as a a little bit Yeah, they credited him for playing guitar on it. Just like the Indigo Girls or Amy put me my voice message to Amy. I wrote Amy a I I recorded the song and then I put, you know, I hope I can make it through this. Sometimes it makes me cry when I go through it because it's for my dog and about dogs moving, whatever it is, you know, and and she took a snippet of that and put it on the on the on the recording. That's a real it's a real tear jerker movie. She's like, yeah, so you can hear me come in that goes, I don't know if I'll make it through this, I might start crying. Like it just but um yeah, the music is uh like I have this song called Dirty Angels, which I don't know if it has but been done yet. Not yet, no. But uh it's the first line is it's like a time machine. I can go anywhere. And that's the music is, you know, and and it's you know, it's a little why a lot of us keep going, it's a little why a lot of us quit, you know, because you know, I as I'm getting older, I'm getting tired of being the time machine a little bit sometimes, you know, knowing that I have to do 45 minutes of my show this week. And it's all flabby courageous Skyber Smarter, you know. So it's a little bit I'm really glad other and has found other people to carry the a torch and to reinvent a lot of these songs. It's really inspiring to me. Because, you know, I was we were watching this Nate Bargazzi on on the show on l yesterday, this comedian. And I love watching comedians and I love watching their specials because it's all new and people expect it to be new, and people go see a band and they don't want it to be new. People want to go back, they want like you went and saw Gang of Four, and it was great, and the crowd goes crazy when they play this song from the first record, and they played the whole first record for that tour. And it's great. But no one expects a comedian to do the same except outside of Dice Clay, to do the same joke. Like, do that do that joke about your wife being late to the airport again. It's like it's not really, you know what I mean?
SPEAKER_04:So you don't go to an art show and they just have the same painting. The same painting.
SPEAKER_06:It's like, oh, well, you know, unless you're going to Steve Van Gogh and then you want to see there's all sorts of levels to the time machine, you know. But I'm enjoying, as much as I'm sick of a lot of these songs, you know, when I hear Mike Ferris do Honeysuckle Blue, it's so great. And I hear, you know, Butch Walker sing Fly Me Courageous or David Ryan Harris do a song that I don't like, Good Day Everyday, which I think is a corny song, and now I love it.
SPEAKER_01:It's so not corny, but it's so great.
SPEAKER_06:It's a great song. I think it's a great song now.
SPEAKER_01:So now, yeah, some of these have changed his mind.
SPEAKER_06:Yeah, I've changed my mind a lot of times.
SPEAKER_01:Sometimes I'll get a song going and he's like, I don't even remember that that song existed.
SPEAKER_03:So that's a good point. So are the artists picking out songs they want to do, or do you say, hey, no one's done this song?
SPEAKER_01:I've mostly curated, I'll have ideas based on listening to the artists, and then I'll think, oh, this would be a really cool fit for them. Um I don't assign the songs, but I'll usually kind of handpick uh a small grouping for them to check out. And or, you know, sometimes I'll like suggest like I think I suggested Lost and Found for Darius Rucker, and he liked that idea and he ran with it. And then um like Mike Mills, I thought telling stories would be a good fit for him, and he agreed, and stuff like that.
SPEAKER_03:So and on that one, I think he plays every instrument.
SPEAKER_01:Yes. But some people they were they knew what they wanted to do, like Butch Walker wanted to do Fleming Courageous, and he also wanted to do Straight to Hell with Elizabeth Cook. Because usually there's not one artist doing multiple songs because he had Elizabeth on that. And Jeff Sullivan was Jeff Sullivan.
SPEAKER_06:The original drummer, so as a drummer, which was a great cause because Jeff showed up at my folk show. I was doing I did this residency at the East Nashville bowling alley. Uh, and and I was doing this residency, and uh and Jeff showed up and I was like, hey Jeff, what are you doing? He goes, Oh, I'm recording in time because Anon. Yeah, we'd be hungry. And tell me these things. Like a lot of people will call me and be like, you know, where do I send where do I send the file to? And I'm like, I have no idea what you're talking about.
SPEAKER_01:A lot of people think that Kevin is doing this.
SPEAKER_06:Yeah, I'm not doing any of that. No, I have to like. Yeah, so Jeff said, Yeah, we would just record a fly me for your record. I was like, Oh, well, that's cool. I did no idea. And it was it was, yeah, so I'm really uh honored.
SPEAKER_01:And but Kevin is sick of himself, as he likes to say. So a lot of times I have to not tell him anything just so I don't irritate him by bringing up music in the house.
SPEAKER_06:Well, I think that one of the things, the things that it makes it kind of weird is that I'm writing new songs for the driveway crime record, I'm writing new songs for my neck next solo record, so I'm going this way. And Anna's also going forward, but in a different lane where it's my stuff, and so I'm kind of like she's like, and so I'm I'm I'm I'm in it's it's really inspired this strange thing in my brain now that I'm constantly using, especially now that I'm making a new record, Drive and Crying record just got done with Sadler Vaden. Oh yeah, we just finished so it's coming out in the springtime.
SPEAKER_04:I saw you guys with Sadler a few years ago at the end.
SPEAKER_06:Amazing. So there are things though where he'll be like where Tim too was like questioning maybe like an arrangement, like maybe the arrangement could be different, and I'm a lot more open minded to it now because of the Let's Go Dance and project, because there are, like I say, good the everyday. There's a lot of good examples of of things that I hear. Um well, I'll I'll give you the prime example since we're here right here in Atlanta. I was in a limousine with the Producer Andy Johns, right? And he was going to produce Fly Me Courageous. And and uh we're I remember this very vividly. We were in the back of the limo and we're talking about doing the record, and he didn't do the record, he he had a he bowed out and he had to go to re he went to rehab and met Eddie Van Halen and then made 5150. So we I lost on that. But anyway, he was like saying, Um, I'm really excited about this record. I really love the song Let's Go Dancin'. That's the one. And I was like, oh really? So like I wasn't sure what he meant by that, but I never got to hear what he would have done with it. You know, I so I was like, it's always kind of like, and then you know, he's passed away since. So it's you know, it's inspired me to like when producers said to me, I've been so mad sometimes when Anton Fear would push me so hard, or some other people push me, like you're not there's this song could be better. It could be that it could go this way, and I'm like, no, no, that's not the way I wrote it. And then and then I and then I never really could wrap my head around it because as a songwriter, you like this is the way it is, this is the way it is. And you can't really think outside the box at that moment. And so I've shut down a lot of ideas that I wish I would have expounded on. Because when I hear David Ryan Harris do Good Day Everyday, I'm like, oh my god, that would I wonder if that's what they were asking me. Or when I hear uh Jimmy Johnson do Let's Go Dance and or or um Old Crown Medicine Show do uh Ain't It Strange, and I mean it's really inspiring to me to hear other versions of of things that I did. It's made me a better songwriter and it's made me more producible, I think, as far as producers go and things like that. You're welcome.
SPEAKER_03:Oh I think ain't it strange is a great song, but Ul Crow Medicine show, they do a great version. I mean, it's really good, yes.
SPEAKER_01:You know, I yeah, I love Kevin's version of all these songs. I've no one's trying to top them, you know. It's more just like a reimagining, is what is how we call it. But like there are some people out there, I can tell that some driving and crime fans are not open to this at all. I thought they would be really excited about it. And it bar overall, it's been like they they like the way that it's done originally, which I agree with, but you know, it's meant to celebrate and you know bring more awareness.
SPEAKER_03:Hardest part is my favorite, yeah. Yeah, I think if you you look at it, you talked before about a lot of of tributes are done when someone's gone, and thank the Lord Kevin's still here with us, and you know it's uh it's a living tribute. I think a lot of those are actually terrible. And I think that what you've done here is put people who really want to do it, because a lot of these other ones, not at it, not necessarily they really wanted to do it. Their label might have made them do it depending on who put it out, but this is something that's that's really cool. Now, I think that the Kevin Kinney or the driving and crying, whichever particular song it is, I think all those are better, but I like a lot of these songs.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_03:And I'm open to listening to them, and I do. I have a a ton on my phone that I have, you know, saved and I hit shuffle.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I'm a I'm a music snob myself, and I, you know, I I'm pretty pi particular and picky, and I love to listen to these records. Like, um, I listen to an overall.
SPEAKER_06:Well, I like the history too. I think that just about everyone, when me and Anna are gonna do a podcast when this is all done and over with, where we go back and we revisit song by song, what what how do I know this guy? Like, how do I know Hugo? How do I know Reckless Eric? How do I know little bits of things that the black crows? Why did the black crows do acceleration? It was like the first song they saw us do in in at 688. Oh and so like and they and they were and also the story of how they did it and how they weren't good they couldn't do it, and then they did it, and it was just really good at like persistent persistence. She's got a velvet glove.
SPEAKER_01:I'm here to nag you again. Right. But I haven't pressured anyone. Like if it's like if you like you said, these are people that are doing this because they want to, and because they love Kevin and they love the material, and everyone has just really risen to the occasion and nobody phoned it in. It's all like really neat, you know, fully committed, interesting versions.
SPEAKER_06:Yes, and has also included a lot of local people. And there's no stature of who who's who gets to be. This is not an elite thing. This is everyone's welcome. We you know, um, we've got some great Atlanta people, you know. Uh the Starbar folks, Anna Kramer and Brian Malone and Um and Das Kaiser and and my son's bands, uh uh Dino's Boys. Dino's Boys. That song.
SPEAKER_03:That's a great favorite song.
SPEAKER_06:I was gonna Dino's Boys. Yeah, yeah. That's my second favorite song. That's one of my favorite Atlantic.
SPEAKER_03:Black Crows is my favorite song. Dino's Boys. I got to meet your son in Chattanooga. Right. And I just think that song is absolutely fantastic. That might be, all right, I'm gonna say it here. That might be the only song that I think is better than your version.
SPEAKER_04:That might be well, that's what we want our kids to be, better than love that song.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, there's these two girls' uh sisters that are Atlanta-based as well. The Brouwer sisters band, and they're they're still in high school. Um, and they did um Leader Leader of the Follow, and I think a friend of ours said that that their version is better than Driving Crying. But again, I'm not never picking a favorite, but that's another song that I'd never play.
SPEAKER_06:I've never played it live. The guy at Geffen really wanted me to record it, so we did it, and then we never play it live, and then they play it. I'm like, oh I might start playing that one again. Yeah, but there's a lot of those tribute records by my friends, and I never I think Peter Case did one and I got on it. But like, you know, if there's a tribute to Todd Snyder, which is he's one of my oldest friends, they but they probably won't ask me uh if there's a Black Crows tribute. They probably no one will probably uh if outside the band. You know, um Jesse Malin, I didn't make the cut for that. Nobody has really asked me. They, you know, Jesse Malin did a great Jesse Malin did a great version of Hey Landlord on this. You do it. But I'm just saying, I get by I get I because my Q rating isn't high enough that I get that I also I get loffed off a lot of these things, these tribute things from my friends, you know. So it's if it's like so and I'm not hurt by that because I don't really like doing cover songs, so I'm okay with that. So I'm really I'm not very good at it. I don't I can't wrap my hand around it. But I love how Anna has included a lot of people that you know their cue rating, you don't know who they are. A lot of these people, I don't I even I don't know who they are. The girl that did um who did passing through that's one of my favorites. Oh, Aaron Ray. Aaron Ray. Yeah, it's gorgeous. I would have never found her. So thank you again, Anna.
SPEAKER_04:But you know, the only time I remember you doing covers personally was one time at the Uptown Lounge in Athens, you did a Ramon set.
SPEAKER_06:Maybe I don't remember that, but I probably tried. I saw you do the replacements gave us a lot of false hope to do half versions of mediocre songs. You know, like you just abandon it halfway through.
SPEAKER_03:It's like, all right. Yeah. But I saw you do why don't we do it in the road? You know, you've done that. I did tag of it, but I don't know the whole song. You did enough of it. I don't think I and I've told you this before, I don't think most people had any idea what the song was, who sang it. I don't think they know it was a Beatles song or or anything, but I thought it was great. I enjoyed it. Thank you.
SPEAKER_06:You're welcome. If Paul McCartney wants me to do a Beatle tribute record, I will try to fit it into my schedule, Paul. Sir Paul. That is awesome. All right, we're returning to your schedule program here.
SPEAKER_04:I'm wondering, is there anybody that just came out of the woodwork that you didn't even really know? You know, that you oh my gosh, they know my music.
SPEAKER_01:I think Kevin had no knowledge of the Great Lake swimmers, like I mentioned them earlier, their Canadian band, and they did a knockout version of Peacemaker, and then they ended up playing at Eddie's Attic not too long after that, and we attended, and so they got Kevin got to meet the singer. Um that was a really good version. Aaron Ray was new to Kevin and kind of new to me at the time. But this definitely has plunged me into the m the current music world. I definitely had some near misses, some people that are now too big to say yes, that you know were just like.
SPEAKER_06:Who is that band from Birmingham or Mobile? You almost got them?
SPEAKER_00:The red claestrays are.
SPEAKER_01:They blew up right after I learned of them. So I was late to the, you know, but there were people like MJ Linderman, who's huge now, and that, you know, their management is fans of Driving and Crying. And I think I was close to people like Brandy Carlyle or Nora Jones. And, you know, some people wanted to do it, but it's just a matter of time. You know, uh what I've learned through this is just how busy musicians stay. So it's hard to get in.
SPEAKER_06:And also sometimes I think what I'm amazed at is sometimes the bigger the act, sometimes the more generous and open they are to doing it. You know, some of the hardest people have been my friends. You know, like we should ask services. Like, I've asked, and they they don't want to do it, or they're like, they don't, they don't, they can't think of it. It's like, really? It's like, yeah, uh, but you know, I got um uh they'll be like, oh wow, okay, that's interesting. But yeah, I got uh old crow medicine show. We asked them and they did it and they sent it in. It's like, oh yeah, oh really?
SPEAKER_04:Wow, yeah, that's because like your friends, they have to face you, they have to talk to you about it.
SPEAKER_06:The other guys they send it in, they're like, This isn't a test or anything like that. It's just interesting how it's all unfolding.
SPEAKER_01:It's the people that are in charge of yeah, but it's like sometimes the labels or the managers that can sometimes be overprotective, and I understand why they are, and they have to be selective about what they get involved in. And this is definitely an an unusual situation because I'm not you know a trained producer. I've proven myself over the course of time, but I feel like you know it was helpful for people like Jason Isbull to be on board from the beginning. That definitely, you know, and Tracy Thomas, his manager, um, being supportive of it, it really helped open doors to other people. So whenever I want to invite someone that might not be uh familiar with Kevin or me, um just for them to see that Jason did that song is like a big vouch for the the project.
SPEAKER_06:And I think that in my overview of the whole thing is seeing it as uh a tribute or whatever it was, it's actually a tribute to to an underground underdog band who's been around 40 years and has made uh has had two very different careers, Kevin Kenny and Drive and Crying, both of us living in you know in the same universe. But 40 years, there's a if you go to Utah or Montana and say Drive and Crying, nobody knows who you're talking. You're talking about a very specific subgenre of this kind of secret band that has been around for 40 years. I mean, they know who we are in Atlanta, but very there's not we're not that well known outside of Atlanta and you know around the world. So we're kind of surprised at the lack of like the Rolling Stones and spin magazines and things like that. Like nobody's really kind of been shocked at this project, like, oh my god, this is amazing.
SPEAKER_01:Like I said, I think a lot of people are still not aware of it. Yeah, a lot of people aren't aware of it. I've been too busy keeping up with the artwork to like hunker down on promotional.
SPEAKER_06:But it's a cool thing, man. It's kind of groovy. I mean, I don't I don't think it's groovy things.
SPEAKER_03:There you go. It's groovy. It's a groovy scene, man. When you get a hundred songs, that's that's insane. I mean, that's a lot of people that want to be part of it. And and I think that says a lot. I think it says a lot about both of you. Yeah. And and and as well as driving and crying. I I think it says a lot about all three entities that you know you're reaching out and they're willing to do it because they like Kevin and they like driving and crying. And it just is something that I wish somebody would do half a song for me. Never mind a hundred songs. I'll do half a song for you, Jim. I'll do the other half. Oh, well, I appreciate that. But I think it says a lot about you. And you know, when I saw you at the the baseball project minus five show, you said to me, Hey, what guests do you have coming up? And one of them I mentioned was Johnny Hickman of Cracker. You said, Tell Johnny I said hello. So Johnny was on a couple episodes ago, and I said, To Johnny, you know, you remind me of Kevin Kinney a lot. Very personable, very into, you know, the music, but the fans and and everything. And, you know, I saw him, he said to tell you hello. And then Johnny's like, well, hey, you tell him hello. And then by the end of the show, Johnny's like, I want to do an episode. It's me and Kevin Kinney are on music in my shoes. And I'm like, it doesn't get better than that. You know, now people are saying who they want on with him. But I think you two are really similar, so approachable. And you know, I don't know if the word nice, but you are. You're a nice guy. I mean, I remember the first time I met you and asked you to if you would come on the show, and I'm like, how do I get you on thinking you're gonna send me to all these people? You're like, uh, call me. And I'm like, oh, okay, and how do I do that? Well, this is my phone number, and it's like so easy. And you know, I think that that has a lot to do with why there's a hundred songs. It's not just the music, it's not just the words. People like you, you know, you are light.
SPEAKER_06:Well, I think that 40 years ago, you know, even 45 years ago, when I worked for this band called the Haskells, there's a the bass player, Richard LeValier, was one of my mentors, and Jerome also. And they always took the high road, you know, always to take the high road, uh make make the music a community. Music should be a community. You know, there's not one upsmanship. Everybody shares. If the band next to you gets a record deal, that's good. You should congratulate them and be happy for them. And I've always been happy. I'm a music lover. It's the only reason I'm in this thing is because I was a reporter. I I was a kid out of high school, started underground fanzine, turned it into an underground newspaper, which is still in published in Milwaukee called Shepherd Express. Oh, cool. I started this with my friend Dave Lewison, and we had a thing called Express, and I was a music lover, and we started this thing so we could get free records. And so we said we sent our thing to Epic Records and all these other companies and said, here's our magazine, and they all sent us free records. Good news is we got tons of free records. Bad news, 1978. Hundreds of disco bad disco glow inches. So the dictators was like one of the few things I got that was listenable. Um, but um, I'm a music fan, so I I think I've if I've translated any good feeling towards other musicians, it's because I'm rooting for them constantly. We go when I go see a band and there's no one watching in the on the in the dance floor, I stand there in the front row, old school punk rock. I stand there and I'm in the middle of the dance floor and and I'm cheering them on and letting people know they should come up too, or whatever, you know. I love musicians, I love music, I love the magic of the whole situation and the roadies and all the all the things that make the circus work, you know. I still have grand delusions that of of what this can be. So I guess I'm a nice person, but I'm also a huge music fan. And so I think that most of these people will say, Kevin, listen to my record. Like I try to listen, I try to when Collective Soul has a new record out, I'll buy it. I'll hear, oh, Collective Soul has a new record out. I'll buy it, I'll listen to it, and then I'll send them a text. Listen to your record. Great. I love the third song. Darius Record made a book, you know. I read it. I was like, I loved your book, you know. As I just, you know, I've because I've sometimes when I go to cities and I play and I'm like, where are the musicians that I used to know from Birmingham and Chattanooga? I love it if they do show up, a musician shows up, but it's not very common, you know. And I think we should all be there to just support each other as we move on through this thing. So I guess that might be the illusion that I'm a nice person. He is a nice person.
SPEAKER_01:But I will say that yeah, that people Kevin is something really special too. It is he yes, he's a nice person, and he's a fan of and he's supported these all these people, but they've also a lot of these people they started their career because of uh his music in a to some degree. So it's you know, it's a combination of things, but like he is definitely deserves to be recognized way more than he is, and um that's what I'm doing my little part to try to.
SPEAKER_06:I agree. It's it's it's it is unbelievable what you've done. And I've been told that by lawyers and managers and other bandwidths, like, what is she doing?
SPEAKER_01:It's not over yet. I could totally screw it up.
SPEAKER_06:She has no idea what she's she has no idea what she's like. She will tell she will tell me who she talks to on the phone, and I'll be like, You talk to Frank Riley on the phone. Well you God, Frank, you've got to be a little bit more than that. There's been people along the way that I didn't realize how important they were.
SPEAKER_03:But Anna figures away. Anna has done her magic. So we are fortunate enough that you have brought in some vinyl. You brought in the first three of the Let's Go Dancing and a Kevin Kinney Think About It that we're gonna give away to a listener. And all you have to do is you can either reach us on Facebook, Instagram, you can hit us up at music in my shoes at gmail.com and just say that you want it. And then what we'll do is we'll take everybody's uh name and everyone that's interested, we'll throw it in a hat, we'll pick it out, and then we will, you know, we will send it to you wherever you located, whether it is the United States of America or somewhere else in the world. All right. Jimmy, I hope you have that in the budget. Of course. But I think that's really cool that you brought this in and and be able to give it out to people and let people hear some of the songs that that we've heard and and grown to like, and hopefully that you know, whenever you get something free, it's like, oh yeah, I gotta listen to this, I gotta see what it's like, and and you know, I think that will be cool for someone out there. So seriously, we're gonna do this and we'll do this for probably um today. Uh I'd say let's by December first. If we can get everything in by December 1st, this way, you know, if somebody wants to give it out as a gift this holiday season, you can do that. Or if you want to get it as a gift for yourself. So again, you can reach us at Facebook, Instagram, or music in my shoes at gmail.com. So that's pretty awesome.
SPEAKER_04:And that's the first three albums, and the fourth one is coming out when?
SPEAKER_01:Soon as possible. So I should have it into production within the next week, I hope, and then it usually takes a few months. So the goal is to have a big art show at the end, I should mention, um, here in Atlanta, at least, probably a couple other cities as well. But this place called Sun A T L S-U-N-A-T-L. It's a huge art space um run by our neighbor actually. And um you can find out everything uh for as far as the project goes at Tasty Goody Records uh on our Instagram and Facebook. Um and I have a website as well, tastygoody records.com. So that's spelled T-A-S-T-Y-G-O-O-D-Y Records.
SPEAKER_06:And you can listen to all of all the songs that are released. Every week I add them to my Let's Go Dancing playlist on Spotify. And I have almost 400 likes so far.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, you have like you have like 80 followers.
SPEAKER_04:I was listening to it today. I didn't realize that was your playlist.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I think there are a couple out there, but Kevin started one.
SPEAKER_06:There's one, yeah. I and as when it gets added, I add it to the to the list. And so they're all all whatever how many there are, all of them except for Alejandro is on there.
SPEAKER_01:Right, we weren't allowed to put that out as a single yet. But um, I know a lot of people understandably have issues with Spotify, and we're working on having an iTunes one of this playlist as well. But you can also just uh if you go to Tasty Goody Records um or on the Instagram, Tasty Goody Records, I have a link that has all the songs that have come out so far.
SPEAKER_06:Can can you buy all of these on iTunes?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, everything should be available on iTunes too, and everywhere else, like SoundCloud, Bandcamp, you know.
SPEAKER_06:And also an interesting fun part of this legally as or not legally, but whatever, is that uh we we I'll say we, but Anna, um the artists own their their recordings. So we're we don't own the rights to the recordings. So yeah, a lot of people thought that we should, but Kevin insisted that I yeah, I insisted that like if if the new Sopranos or something wants to pick up one of the songs from one of the artists, they'll go through that art. The artist will license that to them. We would yeah, the artists will benefit. The artist will benefit from licensing or doing it. If it gets on a Taco Bell commercial. Fair is nice.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, we wanted everyone it to be a win-win-win, as I've been saying. Um and then we also are donating all the proceeds from the physical sales to four really great charities, and that is also information about that is available on the Tasty Goody Records website.
SPEAKER_03:I was on that today. Tasty Goody.
SPEAKER_01:It was a a restaurant in like a fast food restaurant or something in LA that I saw 20 years ago or maybe a little less, but it was tasty goody, and I I jotted it down thinking I would name it like a dog. Maybe I'd have a dog named Tasty Goody. But now you have a dog named Groovy, so yeah. And then when I was pouring through all my ideas of record, because I had to start a record label for this thing because um compilations don't typically do great. Um, so I was having trouble finding someone to put it out. So in addition to everything else, I had to start uh um a record label, and Kevin loved the vibe of Tasty Goody. It sounded happy. And Jeffrey uh Zimmer is a a huge talk about music fans and supporters he's helped make this possible.
SPEAKER_06:Him and his wife's and they have they have put some uh some of the APartraits 45s out, and their art collectors and music fans down on mobile that have been very helpful.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, he started a more music fans.
SPEAKER_06:I love it.
SPEAKER_01:So it's been a small group effort. I've definitely not done it completely alone. So there have been a handful of people that have made this possible. Yeah. And that will all be in the thank you notes at the end of the project.
SPEAKER_03:And that's a good thing. I mean, you know, I think acknowledging the people, knowing that it's not something that you can do by yourself, and I think people appreciate knowing that they were part of something, especially something like this. Again, I think when you do something for someone when they're still alive, you know, it means everything because there's plenty of things, you know, you go through overpasses and and bridges and they're named after people, but the people are gone by the time they don't know that they were that important that the captain and her memory overpass or whatever. They, you know, they don't know. And I think for Kevin, knowing how much he's respected, how much he's loved, and and not just by you, but by so many people, that's gotta be like the coolest thing.
SPEAKER_01:I think he doesn't let it sink in too often either. Like I said, that I've been having the same issue. But um occasionally he'll come home from having driven around listening to the CDs and definitely was moved by it.
SPEAKER_06:Yes, when I allow when I dive in, it's really moving to me, you know. I mean, some of these things when I have time to really shed myself of what my expectation of it is, as knowing as as the guy who sang it for years, like uh Patron Lady Beautiful by Future Birds, you know. I never I really listened to to it. I was really moved by it. And a lot of the stuff on there is I'm just really moved by. And yeah, I'm glad that Anna, you know, I was really moved that she came up with this idea, you know. But I I I validate it. I I'm really a fan of it. And uh, you know, and it's our house is very busy. But you know, I was I just think it's really, you know, you know, I don't like I was saying to you when Lenny Kay was here, how much I don't validate things like the Rock Roll Hall of Fame or all that or the Lit Rolling Stone or uh, whatever the dinosaurs of but I mean it's just like Paul Rogers. It's like they couldn't have put Bad Company in 15 years ago. Right. Like they put it they had to put Metallica in before Bad Company. I mean, not that that they don't all belong in there, but you wait till they're the guy can't freaking get on stage. I mean, can you not, you know, I mean you know, I you know, that's a whole I'm just ranting now, but this project has got a similar thing for me, is that like Anna says, some of the Drive and Crying fans aren't embracing it as much as we all thought they might just be excited that somebody was paying attention at all, you know. But Drive and Crying has definitely is an interesting story to be written just as an article for something someday, about how this band, this alternative band wound up being labeled as something, and then can't once it got labeled as a mainstream rock band for the one record that it was, has tarnished the whole rest of our career as f as far as mainstream media goes, as far as the you know, spin and rolling stone and everybody, you know, we're not considered an who we are. You know, I don't think we get our fair share. I d I think we've been treated unfairly, you know. I think as far as the rock and roll media goes, they put us in a thing, and because we don't have a public system, we don't we don't put a bunch of money into management, whatever it is, I think that we've been kind of lost in the shuffle. And so it's validating for our fans, I guess, you know, sometimes when people are like, well, well, they you know, like if somebody mentions us on a podcast, like Bill Burr mentions us on a podcast, my phone blew up. It's like Bill Burr mentioned you on a podcast. You exist. I was like, No, I exist anyway. Yeah, I know. I was like, that's great. But you know what? I guess I don't know what I'm trying to I don't know if I'm what I'm trying to say is coming across as well. No, no, I think it makes sense. You know, this is uh they're faulted for having you know a bit one bad music video that I feel I feel bad that some of the people that are on this maybe when it's released, they don't feel this huge bump in their career. It's like, you know, well, welcome to my world. Because, you know, like you know, the people are like, well, you've got you on we put you on the vinyl on this, and then you know, they're like, Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm gonna be part of this thing, and then it's like, you know, we're not gonna make you famous, right? You know, you're part of it, and maybe it when the box that comes out, it'll be validated somehow. But you haven't read about this project hardly anywhere.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I think that it'll it'll be be coming in time, but yeah, I do you know the first singles we put out that I put out was The Violent Thems, which were huge for me in high school. I love the Violent Thems, and they have I think like three million Spotify subscribers or something, just as an example, and you know, whatever their Instagram following is. But I thought going in, I was like, when that song comes out, I'm gonna get like at least 60,000 followers. And you know, now we're in like 85 songs later after them, and with people like Jamie Johnson, who's a huge country star, and Jerry Shrucker is a household name and the Black Crows. And my following on Instagram has gone from 6,000 to like 6,100 over that entire time. Wow. And for every single post that I put out, I'm listing myself as the artist, which I didn't think to do at first, but Kevin was like, no one knows that you're doing this because you need to, you know, mention that you're involved. So anyway, I thought surely with from three million I'd get like at least a few thousand, but some weeks my numbers would go down. So I I feel like the algorithm doesn't like me or something, but it is funny that we'll I'll think this one's gonna be huge. Like the future birds, they're really on fire now, and theirs comes out and like it's just crickets sometimes. So I don't quite understand it, but I just am trusting that it's part of what's best for the project is that it's a slow burn, and that way I can focus on just getting it. Done without a meltdown, and then it'll explode.
SPEAKER_06:The boxes should be called Welcome to Our World.
SPEAKER_00:Welcome to Our World, the lackluster response after lots of hard work.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, but I I think though, and correct me if I'm wrong, you're doing it your way, you're in charge, and if someone kind of puts something out there and you're not really interested in it, you just kind of mix it and you just move on. That you know, having the control and it's coming out your way has to be a great feeling.
SPEAKER_01:And that's what having someone supporting us like uh Jeffrey Zimmer, you know, because I had I had a couple of opportunities to work with someone that would front financially, but they wanted to to make the call on like who the artist would be. And so, like Kevin was saying, with some of these more local acts or people that are up and coming that aren't a sure bet, you know, they would have said no to that. And um they didn't want it to be a hundred songs, they wanted it to be narrowed down to like one record's worth. And I just there's so much incredible material, I wasn't willing to do that. So yeah, for for better or worse, I'm glad that I did it my way. To quote one of Kevin's favorite singers. Did Frank Sancho write that? No.
SPEAKER_06:I don't think so. I think Williams wrote it maybe.
SPEAKER_04:Apparently he hated the song at first, and then it became a signature song. He's like, Yeah, I do like it.
SPEAKER_03:Was it Paul Anka? I think so. I think it was Paul Anka that that wrote. I think it was a French song that he kind of did the translation to get it. See Anna's now, oh, he is a music fan because he knows this stuff.
SPEAKER_01:So and you guys are wearing the same shoes, so oh, I'm so glad.
SPEAKER_03:I'm so glad you brought that up. So Kevin and I talk about, he brought shoes up the first time he was here, and he was telling me Kat Power, and he was telling me Peter Buck, and you know, I saw him at in Chattanooga, and the stage was raised high, and I could see Peter Buck's shoes, and I'm looking at the shoes, I'm like, oh wow, look at his shoes. That's nice style. So I went and saw Driving and Crying in Marietta, Georgia at the Strand, uh-huh, and I happen to get first row. I'm first row center, and Kevin's playing, and he doesn't see, you know, he knows I'm there. I saw him before the show, but he starts playing, and then all of a sudden he just goes to do this solo and he sees me. And it's the first time I've ever seen him see me, and he just starts smiling because he sees me, and I'm smiling because I realize he's got the same shoes on his duty. And I just thought it was funny with all the talk about the shoes. My podcasting shoes got really bad. They started to stink, uh-uh, and I had to get rid of them. I had to get some new shoes.
SPEAKER_06:Well, I'm looking forward to transitioning into my regular stage shoes eventually, someday. But I've gone from my Sokanese for my plantar freshitis to the sketchers uh when I don't have to walk the dogs slip-ons. I thought these are so cool. They look like shoes, but they're slippers. And uh and so I have I have gone on stage with them, which is something I probably would have never done in the 70s or in the 80s. But uh I I am enjoying our shoes. I've been very comfortable with that.
SPEAKER_01:The full Bob Dylan uh 1966 performance. And she was wearing these beautiful high heel shoes for two hours, and it looked so like challenging to for Kevin to imagine doing that. He's like, if she could do that, the least I could do is wear my stage shoes. So he started wearing his stage shoes for a while after that.
SPEAKER_06:But not for the Marietta show, I did not. But I was glad. Well, because I had to do but the Marietta show was a meet and greet. Uh, there it was like four shows. It was like a meet and greet, and then a short show, and then another show, and then another show. It was like four shows. So I was like, I can't do that anyway. Anna has a lot of great shoes, by the way. Do you really? Good fun shoes. She got a lot of fun shoes.
SPEAKER_03:I don't have a lot compared to lots of women, but now every time I see you, I'm gonna look at your shoes and stuff.
SPEAKER_01:Well, we're a socky family as far as like just comfort around the house and stuff. And I decided since this was not videotaped to just come in my painting attire.
SPEAKER_03:There's nothing wrong with it, it looks good.
SPEAKER_04:You don't have any paint though on your actual clothes. When I stand up, you can't.
SPEAKER_03:Absolutely. So, real quick, because as I mentioned at the beginning of the episode, it's coming out on my birthday on November 16th.
SPEAKER_06:Yay!
SPEAKER_03:Happy birthday. Well, thank you. I appreciate that. So, real quick, I wanted to mention a couple of things, just go back in time here. The week after my 14th birthday, November 1980, okay, I had coffee for the first time. Oh, wow, you remember? I do. It was a week after I worked at a uh flea market, and I thought I was like gonna be cool. I'm gonna go get this coffee and I'm gonna drink it, and I had about half a cup and I threw it on the ground, and I've never had it since. That was the last time that I had coffee, didn't like it at all. If we go to November 16th, 1985, I turned 19, I lived in New York, and you became of the legal drinking age until December 1st. No grandfather clause. So I had from November 16th until November 30th, and that was it, and then I wasn't able to drink for two years after that. I thought it was insane. And I went out that night and we we went to this bar like uh men is main event, and my friends like we knew who the bartenders were, they were brothers, and they just like bought all these bottles, like not just drinks, but just bottle after bottle. It was one of the worst nights.
SPEAKER_04:You should see the look on Jim's face right now.
SPEAKER_03:He obviously threw off. It was one of the worst nights of my life, and as a matter of fact, worse than coffee? It's very close. The podcast checker, Sue Ann. Sue Ann had to drive me home because I don't even know if I knew my name was Jim. All right. Yeah, but the podcast checker drove me home. I just wanted to kind of mention a couple of things around my birthday. It is the birthday episode here. Happy birthday, Jam. And the best gift could be having Kevin Kinney and Anna Jensen here on the show with us.
SPEAKER_01:Yay!
SPEAKER_03:Couldn't be any better than that. And I definitely appreciate it. And you know, thank you for all your time. Yeah. Do you want to do that? I'll write you a song. Oh, he's gonna write a song?
SPEAKER_06:Well, I mean, I'll write you a Diddy.
SPEAKER_03:Oh, wow.
SPEAKER_06:About your birthday. Wow. Wow. Is that guitar work over there? Is missing a string? That's okay.
unknown:That's all I'm doing.
SPEAKER_01:Well, one of the bands on our record, The Ghost of the Show. I'm missing a string. She plays a guitar that only has one string.
SPEAKER_06:Yeah. Okay, so uh, all right, here we go. Uh every year it seems like it's my birthday. Every year they congratulate me. They say happy birthday. As if I never had one before. But it seems to come around just about just about every year. So happy birthday is what they say, even though I don't even remember that day. You should call my mom, tell her happy birthday, because she was there, and she remembers what they call my birthday. Big rock ending, Prince Guitar Solo. Happy birthday.
SPEAKER_03:That was fantastic. That was awesome.
SPEAKER_06:Always call your mother on your birthday. Absolutely. That's what I try to do.
SPEAKER_04:My mom would tell me the story every birthday. She's like, I got up at 16.
SPEAKER_06:I know, right? It's like I'm sorry. And I was in labor for four days.
SPEAKER_03:You. Kevin, I really appreciate that. This is um this is the best 59th birthday I've ever had.
SPEAKER_06:59.
SPEAKER_03:I'm gonna be 59 on November 16th. Yes. I'm looking forward to it. Still in your 50s. I'm still in my 50s. That is wonderful. Well, I look much younger since I shaved my beard. You do. And I've lost some weight. I'm drinking. You don't match with your t-shirt anymore. It's fantastic. And again, let's count how many times I said fantastic. Listen, we could be here. It's a birthday drinking game. Yes, there you go. We could be here all day talking to Kevin and Anna. Unfortunately, our time is up, and I wish it wasn't. Thank you for listening, everyone. Yes, thank you. And Anna, thank you so much. I mean, it's really been cool telling us all about the project and you know how it started, and it, you know, it's something that's full of love and you know, times when things aren't so loving and everything. It's really cool that you've continued to work on this for so many years. So we definitely do appreciate everything. And that's it for episode 105. Thank you so much. Music in my shoes. Again, thank you to Kevin and Anna and Jimmy Guthrie, show producer and owner of Arcade 160 Studios, located right here in Atlanta, Georgia. Vic Thrill for our podcast music. This is Jim Boge, and I hope you learned something new or remembered something old. We'll meet again on our next episode. Until then, live life and keep the music playing a big bigger move.
