Walker Hayes Explains Why His Latest Single ‘Ball Players’ is an Apology to His
Kids
Kids
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😹
FunTranscript
00:00We have Ballplayer out right now, which is amazing.
00:03Tell me a little bit about your inspiration
00:04with your music right now.
00:05It sounds like your kids and your family
00:06are a huge part of that.
00:08They are.
00:09I mean, without a doubt.
00:11You know, I, so much so that I come up with ideas
00:16and I go, ah, another kid's song, you know,
00:19or another family song.
00:20But that's where I live right now.
00:23And Ballplayer is the same.
00:26I mean, you know, when we're not on the road
00:29or prior to being on the road, I lived at the ball field.
00:32I mean, when I came home from the road,
00:35prior to my recent success,
00:37I met the family at the ball field every Sunday.
00:41You know, I came home and, you know,
00:43I'm just trying to be the best dad I can on a daily basis,
00:47which means all I'm doing is failing every day
00:51and saying, I'm sorry.
00:52That's all that means.
00:53I'm not like, I don't feel like I'm improving that much.
00:57I think my kids will be graceful and merciful
01:00and say that I am out of pity.
01:03But yeah, I'm just doing the best I can.
01:05And Ballplayer is somewhat of an apology,
01:09you know, to my kids, basically saying,
01:11hey, I know that I live vicariously through you.
01:15It's kind of hard not to do.
01:17I don't want to do it.
01:19I know it's unhealthy, but I'm, you know,
01:24I'm a broken man, you know?
01:26When you're into something, when you succeed, I feel it.
01:29When you fail, I feel it.
01:31And I want to feel it for the right reasons, you know?
01:34And so, and then also Ballplayer is a reminder,
01:38just that's not all you are, you know?
01:41And I need to hear that.
01:42You know, I need to look in the mirror every day and go,
01:45hey, you're not just a songwriter.
01:48Your worth is not whatever you write today.
01:51And you need to hear it.
01:52Your worth is not however good of an interview you do.
01:56And so, you know, this is just,
01:58this is something I think I need to say to my kids
02:01on a daily basis.
02:02And that's why me and my co-writers wrote it.
02:04It was four dads in a room, just reliving our glory days,
02:09but then also thinking, man, we could be better dads.
02:13And what do we want to say to our sons and daughters?
02:16We gotta talk about AutoTrader.
02:18Yeah.
02:19So tell me a little bit about this partnership.
02:21You're celebrating a very important day,
02:23National Dog Day with them.
02:24Tell me all about it.
02:26We're dog freaks.
02:28I mean, in my house, you know,
02:30if you follow me at all on my socials,
02:34it's either kids, my wife, or the dogs, you know?
02:38And my kids make fun of me and my wife, Lainey.
02:43They make fun of us because they say, you know,
02:45when we get older and they're out the house,
02:47we're just gonna have 20 plus dogs.
02:50We just love them so much.
02:52And oftentimes they criticize us because our concern
02:59for the dogs may supersede our concern for them,
03:02as far as our dogs' comfort, where they're sleeping.
03:06Our dogs constantly go with us.
03:08They're on tour with us.
03:10They're in the car with us.
03:11We live about an hour and a half out of Nashville.
03:14So we're always going back and forth.
03:17And so, yeah, I'm teaming up with AutoTrader
03:20to celebrate National Dog Day.
03:22That makes total sense for us and our family.
03:26And, you know, they've created an incredible playlist
03:30to keep dogs comfortable.
03:32We have a variety of dogs and they're all different.
03:36Some of them love the car and wanna bounce around too much
03:40and crawl on the dash and do things that are unsafe.
03:43And then I have some that are just very anxious and scared.
03:48And so, yeah, this is a beautiful partnership.
03:51I'm honored to be a part of it
03:53and happy to help people with AutoTrader
03:56celebrate their dogs.
03:58I love that.
03:59I have a dog myself and she was my first baby
04:01before I had my babies.
04:02And she still, you know, sleeps in the bed with us
04:05and all of that.
04:06I love this ASMR for dogs idea.
04:10I'd never heard of anything like this.
04:11So I'm excited to try it out with my own dog.
04:14What is it like taking,
04:16you're in the midst of your tour right now,
04:18which is amazing.
04:19You take your dogs, you take your six kids,
04:22you take Laney with you.
04:23Take me through that.
04:24What is this tour bus like?
04:26It is absolutely jam packed.
04:29This past weekend,
04:30we actually had the in-laws on the bus with us.
04:33Oh, wow.
04:34So it was six kids, four dogs, two bus drivers
04:38and my mother and father-in-law.
04:40I don't know how they survived,
04:41but, you know, we've got a pretty cool routine.
04:45Our life is very unique.
04:47I mean, we stay up much, much later than the average family
04:50because I really don't start work till about nine.
04:54And then we're usually eating after show dinner
04:57about 11, 30 ish.
05:01And we stay up very, very late.
05:03We play, you know, we get the dogs and the kids out
05:05in empty venues after the crowd's gone
05:08and we just run around and we get our energy out.
05:10And then we don't wake up till very late,
05:12but it's, it is complete chaos,
05:15but it really, really beats being out there alone
05:19because I've done it that way.
05:22And, you know, we couldn't afford to take everybody,
05:26you know, prior to some big songs.
05:29And so I'm going to do it like this as long as I can
05:32and then probably hang it up, you know,
05:34and do something else.
05:35I don't know.
05:36We'll see, but it's chaotic,
05:40but there's always somebody to hug, you know,
05:42and there's always a dog to pet.
05:44And there's, you know, my wife is there.
05:46Like we're always, always there together.
05:49I mean, I can literally walk God's stage
05:51between any song and give her a hug, you know,
05:54and that's just the best.