BILL BLOG
Thursday, August 13, 2026
Bring on Thursday. 96 warm degrees today in Nashville. With the heat index at 109!
YESTERDAY
I spent time out at my friend Wil Nance’s little writing cabin, a little mini-farm he owns, complete with his own bridge over a danged pond.
Andrea Pearson joined us, and the three of us knocked out a country song with a little groove to it that’s pretty infectious. It’s always fun creating something new with these two.
LAST NIGHT
My friend Angus Gill and I spent the night at a club called 3rd & Lindsley listening to and cheering on our friends in this great collection of musical friends that includes Jimmy Fortune and the French Family Band. The night was billed as the “French Connection,” because the “French Family Band” added some talented friends for this show that features them singing “cover” songs, or hit songs from other artists, and not their original songs.
So I heard these kinds of songs: “My Life” from Billy Joel, “If” by Bread, “Wildfire” by Michael Martin Murphy, “Liza Jane” from Vince Gill, and on and on.
And just when you think it couldn’t get any better, Tommy Emmanuel gets up and plays on a couple of numbers. The French Family Band is from Australia, so is Tommy. So there’s that “Connection” thing I was talking about.
And in case you’ve never heard of Tommy, do yourself a favor and click the link above to check out his amazing talent.
I was very blessed to have Tommy play on the Kristy Cox song “Finger Pickin’ Good” for Kristy Cox that won the Australian “Golden Guitar” Award a few years back for “Best Bluegrass Song of the Year.”
It was good to see him and everyone else on that stage last night. Magical.
VIDEO
Check out this little VIDEO CLIP of the group from last night. The song you’ll hear is “TX to TN,” which I wrote with Stuie French. This song is on the new French Family Band album.
SONG OF THE DAY
Becky Denton, my Missouri buddy, just released this official VIDEO of her new song “Barefootin’ that we wrote together, a great summer song. Her husband Will did a great job producing and playing on this song. Good enough reason to make this song choice for today. Catchy!
Make sure you watch all of this, including the outtakes at the end of the video.
HEALTH NOTES
Scientists say that cancer warning signs may appear in DNA years before blood tests detect any trouble.
Whole Foods has recalled items containing jalapeños due to potential Salmonella contamination.
And nearly 30,000 pounds of raw beef from South America has been recalled due to a missed inspection.
HERE’S YOUR SIGN
I don’t want to know what they did, do you?
ECLIPSE
I did not notice the eclipse yesterday. It didn’t get dark where I was. The good news is, I didn’t have to get prepared for it as this guy in Spain did.
Or this guy.
And certainly not like this guy who got out his welder’s mask.
And here’s a piece of trivia for you. I was a pretty good spot welder in my FFA class in High School. Since then, I’ve never been asked to “spot” weld a danged thing.
POWERBALL
Somebody in Illinois won 1.04 BILLION dollars yesterday with their winning Powerball ticket. Congrats to whomever. And with that, here’s my favorite comedy bit ever about winning the lottery from the late comedian James Gregory. Watch THIS.
SPEAKING OF MONEY
Yesterday morning at my local gas pump, the price per gallon was $.3.34. By the time I got home last night from the “French Connection” concert I attended, it was $3.64. How did that happen?
Pretty sure I’m going to be doing my “Dipstick” song at the show in Mountain City, Tennessee next weekend with Linda Davis and Lang Scott.
ONE CHORD SONGS
I read a music article about one-chord songs. Yes, there are songs out there that use just one chord. Learn just one chord, and you can play along.
“Run Through The Jungle” by Credence Clearwater…one chord.
“Chain of Fools” by Aretha…one chord.
“Tomorrow Never Knows” by the Beatles…one chord only.
AND
My buddy Steve Dean wrote a one-chord song titled “Everything’s a Thing” that was recorded by both Joe Nichols and Craig Morgan. Here’s a VIDEO of Steve singing that song.
It’s a song we perform a lot in our “Hits & Grins” shows. And that reminds me of the time our trio was invited to spend some time with a High School guitar class at Port St. Joe High School in Florida while we were down there playing a festival a few years ago.
There were maybe 30 kids in the class, all holding their guitars. The highlight was when Steve invited them to play that one-chord song with him, in the key of E. You should have heard that wall of noise!
QUOTE OF THE DAY
From Josh Billings:
“Be like a postage stamp. Stick to one thing until you get there.”
TODAY
Believe it or not, I’m going to jump into a limousine with Jenny Tolman and Dave Brainard, and another songwriter or two, driving around Nashville and listening to Jenny’s new album about to be released.
Every songwriter who has a song on the project will do the same over a couple of trips planned today. What a cool way to thank the writers by letting us hear the album before it’s released. I have one song on it that we wrote about Jenny’s mom Kathy, titled “California Girl.”
So I’m looking forward to the ride today.
Have a great Thursday!
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