The Bacon Brothers caught up with Billboard's Tetris Kelly at Stagecoach 2025.
Category
đ”
MusicTranscript
00:00All right, so hanging out with the Bacon Brothers at Stagecoach.
00:02Like, is this your first Stagecoach?
00:03Have you guys been before?
00:04Certainly is, yeah.
00:06First, how's it so far?
00:07Have you seen any acts, any country acts you guys would like checking out?
00:09We just got here literally 10 minutes ago.
00:12I feel like we're on Stagecoach Beach here.
00:15You guys got a great setup.
00:17Oh, my God, s'mores.
00:18Listen, we're trying to make people feel welcome.
00:20By the way, this is the biggest marshmallow I've ever seen in my life.
00:24It's massive.
00:25It's not hot yet.
00:26We're not currently making s'mores, but we can't, we can't, we can't.
00:29I got so excited, I dropped the microphone, and I thought I was going to get a s'more.
00:32Oh, well, okay.
00:33You probably don't even need to light anything.
00:35Yeah, because it's hot.
00:36Well, today feels good.
00:37Today feels good.
00:38Today's good.
00:38And, I mean, talk to me about, like, your music already kind of, like, blends rock, folk,
00:43country, all that stuff.
00:44Like, would you ever consider doing, like, a straight country project?
00:48I don't know.
00:49I mean, you know, I think for the Bacon Brothers, it's like we write these songs,
00:55and sometimes they end up feeling like country songs, and sometimes they don't.
00:58And that's just, we follow, instead of picking what the sound is going to be,
01:03we follow the song, and the song tells us what the sound will be.
01:05And what is that process like?
01:06Like, where do you start when you're creating something, since it's kind of genre-less?
01:11Well, for me, I've been sort of on both sides of the fence.
01:13I was a staff songwriter in Nashville in 1972 for 10 years, writing songs for people, meeting
01:22with my partners from 10 to 5, whereas the kind of songs Kevin and I write are more what
01:28I call confessional, where you just sort of wait around for a mood, and hopefully something
01:33that you're feeling personally that day has enough energy to become a three- or four-minute
01:39song.
01:39So I think for every four-minute song you write, you have 30 little 10-second snippets
01:46that never, just sitting there gathering dust.
01:50Man, that's incredible, but it's a lot of material to work from.
01:53Yeah.
01:53And then, I mean, talk about, like, working on the show that you're doing right now with
01:56Jennifer from Sugar Land.
01:58Like, how is it to create music for that?
02:00It was amazing.
02:00You know, we talked about the idea that I would write some songs for the show, but then
02:06Jen got cast, and she was the perfect person to play this part, and also just happened to
02:15be a great singer and a songwriter.
02:17And so, right away, we wrote a song.
02:20We wrote another one.
02:21Mike and I wrote one.
02:22I wrote one by myself.
02:24Only a few of them made it in the show, but it was a really great exercise to have to
02:30write as another character.
02:32Right.
02:32And not even a character at my age, like a character when he was a younger man, because
02:36in the show, I haven't picked up a guitar for, like, 15 years.
02:39So it was a great acting exercise on top of everything else.
02:43And then, will we ever hear any music from outside of the show that you and Jennifer could
02:47have worked on?
02:47Yeah, we cut eight songs, which is out now.
02:51Yeah, it's called Hell and Back, music inspired by the Bondsman, and it's awesome.
02:58Check it out.
02:59And then, what's it like for you, like, do you get filled differently with acting and
03:03music, like nervousness, or is it all the same to you?
03:06It's all performing?
03:07No, no, no.
03:08I think that one of the reasons I love to play live music especially, I find live music to
03:14be a lot more akin to live theater, which is really where I started out.
03:17I was really a theater actor when I first moved to New York, and I still get butterflies.
03:21You know, I'll get butterflies today for sure, you know, going out and playing stagecoach.
03:25And I think that's a really good thing for a creative person, is to have a little fear
03:29in your life.
03:30All right.
03:30Well, I do want to play a game with you guys before we get.
03:32We're doing it for social.
03:33It's just asking you guys, like, which one of you you think will do something.
03:38So let me pull this up.
03:39I'll jump into the first one.
03:42Great figure.
03:44And boldness.
03:46All right.
03:46So who is the most likely to forget a lyric?
03:51I think we're pretty even.
03:53You know, I'm a nine-year-old in the cabin.
03:55It should be me.
03:56But I have on video one place where he literally had to restart the entire song.
04:04So I'd say it's definitely Mike.
04:08And what it is, it's not that he forgets lyrics.
04:11It's just that he starts to speak in a foreign language.
04:13Oh, man.
04:14That nobody actually.
04:16Oh, OK.
04:16That's true.
04:17He just makes up his own thing.
04:17That's true.
04:18You're making up your own thing.
04:19Never mind.
04:19He's right.
04:20It's me.
04:20It's me.
04:21It's me.
04:21It's me.
04:22Who's most likely to trip and fall on stage?
04:25Probably me.
04:27I'm not good with my guitar.
04:29Kevin is doing this, at the end of one of our songs, this stage kick.
04:35OK.
04:36Spoiler alert.
04:37I got to look for the kick.
04:38Every night I go, oh, no, this is not going to end well.
04:42Who's most likely to forget which city they're in?
04:46Oh, I'd say both of us.
04:49Yeah.
04:49We're pretty even on that.
04:51And luckily, we have a band, some of which have incredible memories for every single city that we've played in.
05:00And it's usually based on the food.
05:03Oh, and that was my next question, actually.
05:06Who's most likely to rob catering?
05:10Well, I'll tell you, the catering.
05:11He's got a marshmallow in his hand, so I'm thinking it might be him.
05:14That's not free.
05:16The catering here, I got to say, is crazy.
05:19I mean, for all these people who are here, Stagecoach really does a great job with it.
05:23Yeah, there's good food out there.
05:24So we got to go eat.
05:25We got to have a good time, man.
05:26I need to get this lit, though.
05:27Yes, man.
05:28Thank you guys for hanging with us.
05:29This was really a pleasure, man.
05:30I really appreciate it.
05:31A lot of fun.
05:31Appreciate you.
05:31Of course, of course.
05:32Thank you, man.
05:33Thanks, man.
05:34Thanks, man.
05:48Thanks.
05:48You're welcome.