Maybe the best hasn’t happened yet.
Being an opener is all about warming up the audience for the main band. That is always fun, pretty easy; there isn't a lot of pressure.
You kind of gotta step back from your dreams and your passions once in a while, and kind of do something else for a minute so that you can come back to it with a fresh outlook, and be real inspired by something else, so you can give something back to your dreams and your passions.
I love myspace and sites like that, cause its allowed me to stay connected to my fans. The personal connection remains the same, but as I've grown, it never gets to be too overwhelming. It allows the artist to be as involved as they want to be.
I toured for about 2 1/2 years on twentythree and then I took about a year off. I really just spent some good quality time by myself at my house, cooking, watching movies, hanging with my friends, and family. I just really needed a chance to get away from the music for a minute and decompress.
For me I want to know everything that goes on with my business but at the end of the day I just want to live, experience, be inspired and create music.
I think it's important to make sure you learn and understand the business that you are in, but it's also important to not let that get in the way of your main focus.
I am pretty involved with everything that goes on, and overtime have learned a lot about the business side of things. I have an amazing manager, who understands the business really well, so he is a great teacher.
I love being home, reading the paper in the morning and having a cup of coffee, doing laundry, going grocery shopping and running daily errands. For me, it's important to have that balance in my life.
Me and my friends get together all the time for girls night, or watch rock of love on the couch. I end up going out to a lot of shows, and surfing with my folks is always high on the priority list.
I'm pretty down to earth, I always have been and though I am on a much different path than most 25 year olds, I feel like I have a bit of a double life. We will go on tour for weeks at a time, but when I come home, I feel like I am picking up where I left off.
We're always supposed to be happy and positive. There's something about letting yourself slip into that vulnerable space because you can really feel things there. It helps you grow as a person. I tend to enjoy being in a vulnerable space, in a weird way.
Where I grew up, surfing was a way for people to celebrate their love and respect for the ocean.
There's a much bigger picture beyond surfing, its part of an ocean culture. Everything comes back to Mother Nature. Surfing is a way of connecting, and saying thanks.
I think humans in general, make associations and feel the need to group things together to have a better understanding of them. Though I would say my music is more country in a lot of ways, than it is surfy.
For me surfing is just something that I love to do. I grew up surfing, is sort of like a family requirement. I can't imagine my life without it. But I am not defined by it, nor is my music. They are very separate.
I think people in general that don't surf, have a fascination with it. Its definitely much more than a sport or activity, its a way of life. There is a culture that surrounds it and I think people are intrigued by that.
I can't wait to be a mom and a wife, and explore that phase of life. And also see how it affects and influences my song writing and creativity.
I've always been someone who likes to share and talk. When something happens to me I [don't] run away from it. I want to dive right into and explore it. Try to figure out why it's happening and try to figure out something good that's going to come out of it.
Honestly I think that the internet is one of the most amazing promotional tools out there. And I think it promotes music getting heard in a grass roots way, where people aren't being force fed to listen to something.
When you have fans telling you their stories it makes you feel like you're not alone.
If you want perfection or close to it...listen to the record.
Music was sort of an accident for me. I love to do it. I can't imagine doing anything else.
I'm just as normal as anybody else. I'm just probably in the same place as many people in their mid to late twenties are.
Writing music obviously comes from being inspired by things, and big changes in your life, and relationships and growing older and being more independent.