Tyler Hayes is an up and coming country singer/songwriter
hailing from Mobile, Alabama. He plays different venues all over
South Alabama and will soon move to Nashville
to pursue music full time. Aside from all of this, he is also my cousin. During
our family Christmas, I sat down with him to ask some questions about his music
and everything it entails. Without further ado, here is my interview with Tyler
Hayes.
1. - How did you first get into music?
My dad has always been in music. He's done it ever since he
was a boy, since he was about 14 years old. I got involved when I was about
eight years old when I got my first guitar. I kinda got out of it for a little
while. I started playing baseball and then I got back into it. [My dad] He
never stopped, but it's just always something I've been exposed to. Whenever I
was about 18 years old, I decided I would pick it back up. I started really
enjoying it, working at it, and that's kinda where it sprouted from was just my
dad's passion for music. My mom, she's passionate about music too. My dad is
old school country and my mom likes southern rock and she loves pretty much all
kinds of music and that gives me a huge, wide, variety. I went through a phase
my four years of high school into the beginning of my freshman year of college
where I was nothing but rock. I wouldn't even listen to country music. No
Country. It was all rock and heavy metal. I got invited to a country concert
and I did not want to go. I did not want to be there, but I guess it was just a
phase. I still love rock music and that is kinda how I like play my country
music, with a rock side to it.
2. - What instruments do you play? If you play more than one, do you
have a favorite?
I only play the acoustic guitar and I wish I was better at
it. I've gotten better over the years, definitely, but it's something that time
and a lot of practice is going to help. Really, that's all I've ever done is
played guitar. I've always loved to sing, even when I wasn't performing, I
loved to sing all the time. So, I picked up the guitar so I would have an
instrument to accompany me while I sang. It's something I did that would allow
me to play in public.
3. - Do you have a favorite guitar?
YES! [answers very enthusiastically with a huge smile on his
face]. It's out there in the truck right now. I just got it two days ago. It's
a Gibson Hummingbird Custom and her name is Ruby. She is beautiful and she
sounds beautiful. I love it. I had a Takamine and it was a little bit more in
my price range whenever I got it. But, just playing this new Gibson is so much
more pleasurable. It's so much easier to play. It makes the whole experience so
much better.
4. - Do you have any original material?
I do. I have probably eight completed songs and probably
fifteen other pieces of songs. The thing about it is I'm my worst enemy and my
worst critic whenever it comes to writing music. I write something and I am the
hardest person around me. I'm hardest on myself because I'm kinda a
perfectionist. Maybe not in all aspects of my life, but in certain areas I'm a
perfectionist and I'm really hard on myself when it comes to music. A lot of
people around me really enjoy the music that I write. Whenever I do get to
record an EP, there will be some of those songs that I have written already that
will be on there, as well as some that intend to write in the near future.
5. - What process do you have when you write?
It always varies. My best songs I've actually written on the
road. My best song I've written was when I was coming home from Louisiana. I had a line
pop in my head, one line: "Time Well Wasted." When it popped in my
head I was like "Wait a minute, I can work around that." In a matter
of ten or fifteen minutes, I had a chorus and by the time I got home, I had the
whole song. I whipped out my phone, turned the recorder on, and recorded the
melody and the words that I had on there. It's kinda a process like that.
Sometimes it's just a random line will pop in my head. I'll see a word on a
billboard or something will inspire me to write about it. Very rarely do I say
" Alright, I'm going to write a song about this" and then sit down
and write a song about that. It just kinda happens for me. I do have a couple
of songs that I've written that I said "Hey, I want to write a song about
this topic" and then, it happened. The only time that's happened is when I
had to writing partner and that helps a lot.
6. - We're going to back track here for a little bit. Last year, you
won your college, The University
of South Alabama's, Jag
Idol, which is like American Idol. Can you elaborate on that and what you
gained from it?
It was really fun. It was the first time that I really got
to perform in front of a bunch of people. I had always performed in front of
the family and friends and stuff like that. But, I've never been able to
perform in front of people I didn't really know. It helped me to grow as a
performer and it helped me to broaden my music that I knew. I did know a lot of
songs already because I was getting to the point where I wanted to play
different venues and wanting to do shows. I had to have a little bit of a song
list. I knew a few more songs, which was an advantage in that competition.
Overall, being able to perform every week and be in front of a crowd, that
really help me to grow as an artist, and it really made me a better performer.
7. - How do you choose which songs you cover?
Oh, man. I don't know. Sometimes, I'll get on a kick and
just really like playing a song. I'll enjoy a song that I've learned recently.
Sometimes, I'll sit down and I'll just be playing a classic and be like
"Hey, I'll throw that one on there!" I try to think about the
listeners and what they want to hear and what turns them on as listeners.
Recently, I did an Adele cover. I love Adele. She is one of my favorite artist
of all time. She's got one of the greatest voices I've ever heard. I figured it
would be a cool, little perspective to have, not only a guy singing it, because
guys have covered it, but I'm a country, out in the woods guy, that's covering
Adele, which is a whole lot different than anything else I've seen. So I
figured, just try and make things different and shake things up sometimes. It's
very rare that I cover a real mainstream song that's popular right then.
Whenever a Luke Bryan song gets real big, I love the song, but I don't just run
out and cover it because it's really big. I kinda like to play songs that are
on the album that nobody has ever heard before and that'll give people the
opportunity to hear it and then they're like "Well, let me see what this
is all about!" and they go back and listen to it, and heck, it might become
one of their favorite songs. You never know. That's kinda the process I go
through.
8. - Even though Country is your main genre, obviously, you've tried
other types of music, but what other types of music have you tried?
I love rock music. Actually, my freshman year of college, I
was in a rock band. We were called Heroes Highway.
We were up in Hanceville, Alabama. We called ourselves Heroes Highway
because I-65 in Alabama
is called Heroes Highway.
Since I was from the southern most part of Alabama and they were from the northern most
part, it kinda made sense. It was the link between us. My drummer had this
little studio and he was really good at what he did. We recorded some music. We
had a really good time and I really enjoyed that. I've dabbled in rock music
and I still cover rock music. My voice is better suited for country because of
my accent, that I can't help. But I love rock music. One of my dreams would be
to do a 12 song album: six of them be normal country songs and six of them be
rock. I'm not really sure what style I would go for. Whenever I was in high
school, me and my cousin, Dalton,
and my sister [Karly], we really got on the Three Days Grace, Breaking Benjamin
kick. If I could do half of an album to sound like a mixture between Breaking
Benjamin/Three Days Grace/ maybe a Shinedown type thing, it would be pretty
awesome. I think it would be a cool mix-up. There is such a crowd that you
could draw. These days you'll see artists that play on [97.5] WABD and 95 KSJ.
But, rarely do you see someone played on TK [101.5] and KSJ. It's very rare to
see that. That would be an accomplishment for me.
9. - Have you ever thought about auditioning for any national singing
competitions like American Idol, The Voice, etc.?
I have. I'm actually signed up to try out for The Voice on
February 1st in Nashville.
I've thought about it before but I'm trying to get through school and if were
to do anything with it, I'd hate to, I WON'T stop school. I'm too close: I've
got to get through it. I'm almost 100 percent positive that I am going to try
that and see what happens.
10. - What do you want people to learn about you through your music?
Numerous things. I want them to be able to get a feeling for
who I am whenever I sing my music: the music that I write, who I am as a
person, where I come from. I want them to have more of a broad perspective of
me and know that I'm not a one dimensional person: that I can spread out, do
anything and be a little bit more of a broad artist that can have a rock song
on TK101. I'd love to be that guy. I want people to feel exactly how I feel
whenever I write a song. If I write a sad song, I want people to know and feel
that it's a sad song. I really want to get my point across as to what I'm
feeling and what I'm thinking. It's my biggest goal as a song writer.
11. Who are some of your influences and who are some of your favorites
right now?
As far as life influences, obviously my parents. My father,
he did his thing in country music for awhile. He's always influenced me and
he's always drive me to work harder in the business. So I really admire him. I
really admire a lot of the music that he's done. So, as an artist, I also look
up to him, not only as a parent, somebody who has provided for me and helped me
through my life, but I also look up to him as an artist. He'll take an old
country song and put his own spin on it and I think it's a hundred thousand
times better. I just love the way he goes about approaching music and how he
can make it his own. It's hard not to be inspired by the Waylon Jennings and
the Johnny Cashes, the people that just go out there and don't care. I really
don't care what anybody has to think about me. If they don't like me, so be it
and you can tell me to my face. It's not going to upset me. Somebody out there
is going to like me. I don't care if nobody likes me. I wake up in the morning
and I play music and I write the music that I like and I say what I want to say
and if you don't like it, that's tough. That's the way that I was raised. So I
really look up to people who put their foot down like that. Kinda like, in more
recent years, Eric Church. He may not have blown up like Jason Aldean, but he's
getting there. This day in age, people are really starting to respect not
giving a crap what somebody thinks about you. He's really starting to catch up
to the Luke Bryans and Jason Aldeans. But he's also on his own little turf
because he really just does what he wants to do and believes in what he
believes and doesn't let anyone falter his beliefs, he's sound in what he
believes. I really enjoy that. As far as inspirations musically, I do look up
to Eric Church and Jason Aldean and even Luke Bryan. I love Luke Bryan. I think
he's been very versatile. Some people get mad at him because he doesn't stick
to country roots, or whatever, but he's versatile. He's country as anybody
else. I just think he knows what it takes. He works hard at it and it's
impossible not to respect someone like that.
12. - You are playing Soul Kitchen next week with Charlie Muncaster and
Gary Stanton. How did this opportunity come about?
I've met Charlie once. I actually met him for the first time
last weekend. But, I've talked to him a bunch. All of us artists talk to each
other through Facebook or call each other up on the phone and chit chat, talk
about what's going on. it's really kind of a little tight knit community around Mobile. Charlie is from Mobile.
He's been up in Auburn
and we've just talked and hung out a bit. He gave me a shout a month or so ago
and he said "Hey, we're having a show. You wanna come play with us?" and
I was like "Yeah. I heard Soul Kitchen's got some great sound and I'd love
to play there." So, it's going to be a fun time. I'm excited about it.
13. - What does the future hold for you, aside from what you've already
mentioned?
In the future, in my perfect mind, I'll finish up school in
May with my mechanical engineering degree.
[Laughs] Engineering? Engineering is your fall back?
That's
the plan anyways. As soon as I am done with that, if I get a job, I have to get
a job in Nashville, but as soon as I get a job, I intend to move to Nashville,
have a day job, maybe part time, use my degree, so I can get up there, have a
job, be able to support myself, put a roof over my head, play my music at night,
and really be able to chase my dream without having to worry day in and day out
where my next meal is going to come from or go up there and be a starving
musician that's living out of the back of my truck. There's a lot of people
that do it, and I think that's great, but there is nothing wrong with preparing
myself and having that fallback plan of an engineer and just getting a job and
supporting myself and allowing myself to support my career as a musician. I'm
excited about getting up to Nashville
to look around, and play a little bit and see what happens. Record an EP and
let things go!
Check out his Facebook by clicking here.
Don't
forget to catch him at Soul Kitchen Saturday, December 28th!
(Video made by me. Perks of him being my cousin, I can hear him play anytime) :)
Tyler playing his song Set Me Free
