Logan Ryan

all right welcome back to another episode of out on the road podcast i'm your host it's a long way to return here we are today's episode brought to you as always by slickman slickman welding apparel uh nate's been on the move here lately i'm gonna grab a pair of gloves to show y'all these are the pair he sent me been wearing them but they're in good gloves also got the new hoodie but believe it or not in minnesota it's not cold enough for the new hoodie yet but as soon as it gets cold enough i'm gonna start wearing it also you brought you by wobro american steel and sex appeal why don't you say that in a while it feels good to say it chris coming out with new shirts all the time uh you know he's got his new line that's not fr wobros.us also brought to you by tnn welding supply taos and mary any kind of welding stuff you need on the planet they got anything got it taos will get it get a drop ship to you you find them in big springs um i don't have his phone number like on top of my head but all right pearl snap pins johnny's always coming out with new shirts he got his hat on look those ladies that's got a shirt on this so today notice yeah oh rod shield bernardo been covering a lot of ground deadly come out new products i still use the rod cans in the bed of my truck right now we have the man the myth the legend mr logan ryan what's up man good to be here we've been wanting to do this podcast for a while you've been busy so we uh i guess i've been busy hadn't feel like recording really so here we are but it's better that that you're retired doing this than uh than work and doing it i feel like you know because it's a positive in your life of why you're not welding no more we'll cover that here in a minute so let's let's start with the welding business part of it before we get to music and all that let's let's deal with the with the welding part of it what got you into welding well yeah i started taking welding i guess in middle school and then it was about high school and i heard about all these people making boot coos and bucks out there pipelining and so i stuck in the welding shop all throughout high school me and three best friends went up to corpus christi and went to welding school for about two years and uh it's nice to have best friends with you starting your career because it kind of really pushes you to be better and do better we all broke out together with repcon and the refineries in corpus so that's pretty cool it does help when you you know when you're especially when you're younger and you get out into a new a new way of life you know having people around that you know helps a lot when i went to the pipeline i didn't i didn't have well i did have some buddies around but like it was mostly i was boom or bust when i went to the pipeline i didn't have a choice but to get it i didn't i didn't really have time to be homesick which you know a lot of people know i'm from alabama that i moved to texas and i you know i've been in texas ever since so i don't really get homesick all right so you was at corpus christi a couple years there so when did you pick up a guitar during this time because i feel like this all got to run together so really guitar has always been there like ever since i was a kid i played shows when i was in high school like little bar bar shows uh my dad was a karaoke dj so i'll go play guitar before his karaoke show and stuff like that but yeah it's always been there it's just always been on the back side i guess and welding was always first to the back burner but using your using your welding part of it you know how how many years did you did you travel welding let's say traveling probably about eight years because you just got over your uh how many months now since you've been officially quit welding retires from welding four months maybe been the best four months of your life it's been nice and can't really complain but i feel like you've been you're scared i feel like i talked to you less now that you're playing music full-time than i did when you was just welding you know i felt like i could get you on the phone periodically when you was well now it's like you know give i call you or text you and i might it's like a day or two for a new film yeah but it's busy that's just who i am as a person i feel like you're kind of a person who can set his phone down which is great you know i don't you know if i set my phone down people think i'll i'll pretty much died you know if i don't respond back then there's times i don't feel like talking on the phone here lately i've spent predominantly a lot of time on the phone i'll let the messages pile up for a day or two and then i'll reply to them all at once and try to take care of business but and then leave it for a day or two a question i always like to ask everybody which i'm what is a lesson that you learned early in your welding career that would be good for younger people to i think learning how to fit is a big thing because there's a lot of there's a lot of welders out there they think they can just weld and they don't ever have to fit they'll always have a fitter but i mean learn how to fit that makes yourself that much more valuable and you're not gonna be the first one to get laid off learning math no i hated math when i was in high school i hated math for a long time until it actually became useful to me but yeah learn how to do your takeoff learn how to do your rolling offsets learn how to pull measurements learn how to draw isos and you can you can do all that early on the thing that i've realized the past couple years one thing that kind of you know i was gonna quit pop on in last year one thing that kind of killed me about it is everybody wants to fast track it it seems like no i'm not saying that all of them that way i've seen a lot of guys here lately just feel like they're the best and they ain't putting the time to be the i'm not saying because there was a time where i was that i felt that way too but i but the difference was when i felt that way i knew how to do takeoffs i knew how to do rolling offsets thanks to justin the guys you know there there was a lot of stuff i knew that you know and i had you know a fairly decent right arm but i feel like everybody wants to fast track to be the best and there's you know the process to it but there wasn't no respect for the well you know for the welding part of it you know i quit it i quit it all just what just about when done something different part of the big picture uh there's so many other things other than pipeline you know you got to build compressor stations you gotta there's so much more welding jobs out there than people you know there's so realize remember uh i seen a picture one time you was in a uh i don't know if it was a snapchat or maybe something you posted but she was in like a tube that little tube i don't know what they call it but all the tubes puller there we go that's that's what it's called buller yeah i mean uh oil makers they're all you're a welder and a fitter you do it you're a lot whole lot more than that too that requires some mirror welding yeah that's a that's fun stuff what would you say the best welding job you was ever on where was it at the best yeah your favorite job of all time where's your favorite job welding job of all time you went to i would say it was when uh i was building compressor stations you could go home every night i mean it was all in my ears like shiner gonzalez all that area so i could be home every night you got paid shit ton of money you got to basically you didn't really have to answer to nobody you just do your job that's my favorite thing that's my favorite thing about being a popliner in general is you know just do your job signed up to weld weld going about your business you know it's i don't i don't like answering the people i think uh a lot of people that know me i don't do very well with being from what you're doing working on it work on it trying to listen to the lord here like some things you know all right so the middle part of your career what do you think the lesson is you learned the middle part of your welding career middle part uh let's see you got some hard questions i don't really think about this yeah i like to put people on the spot because then you get honest that's a real good lesson i would say it would be you know i don't know no old man ever told you something that just stuck in your mind no because i knew it all from the start i probably just have to go back to making yourself valuable but yes i feel like that's something i didn't learn until the middle of i mean my career is not done but like say the last nine years i would say that's something that i kind of learned in the middle part of it you know making yourself valuable the more you know the more money you're worth that's a fact yeah i mean i would i did a whole lot of work and i did a whole bunch of different kind of welding jobs so i like started off the refineries and i went to a shop i did barn dominiums for a while then i did compressor stations and then the latter part of my career was ammonia like the last four years of my career was ammonia steam chill water easy stuff but paid good yeah i guess the middle part would be find a way out yeah yeah find a way to see your family okay so now we're probably we're probably getting into where the middle part of music started becoming a real a real uh goal so to speak yeah so like the the past pretty much the whole time i was at brandt i was playing music every almost every weekend but like it really hasn't snowballed until what to what it was now to the past year i guess i don't want to say nothing but you know having me at the welding competition kind of seemed like it blew up after that no that's not the truth tyler nask he blew up way more but uh i talked to tyler maybe every other week still you know um kind of like you know periodically we might go a month or two you know i might send him a send him a text or snap you know that guy he'll put some people on blast on snap pretty quick he's he's a different animal you know pretty exciting to watch yeah gavin adcock thinks he's something he ain't never seen one of tyler nance uh snapchat's about 3 30 in the morning i'm a big fan of that guy yeah he's a gomer well that was a whole debacle this weekend but when did you write the winona song But, you know, love Wynonna. Oh, yeah. I wrote that in 2020, 2021? 2021. How about Tecova's? Because that's personally my favorite song. I wrote that one about also 2021. I go through these dry spells of no writing, no songs. All of a sudden, I'll write a couple songs. I'll be back to a dry spell, can't write nothing. It just comes in waves for me, I guess. I thought it was kind of crazy how fast that it kind of snowballed as you put it. You know, like I felt like you started to gain a lot of traction on TikTok there. You know, before the welding competition and stuff, I feel like you was already gaining traction in a lot of groups and stuff, which I was very fortunate to have you and Tyler there when I got to have you all there. You know, and y'all was kind of – Tyler was kind of picking up. You was kind of picking up. You know, he's a little bit different genre than what you put out. You know, you're a little bit more our music, Texas country, and kind of, you know, it's kind of – Not saying – I'm not putting him in Nashville stuff, but, you know, he's in that area over there. I know he spends a lot of time in Nashville. He spends a lot of time in Missouri, too. That's his home, but I don't know. Y'all both kind of was rolling. By the time I talked to y'all, I think I spoke to both y'all in July, I got y'all locked in. By October, I mean, I felt like y'all was – or November, y'all was already – freaking it was a huge deal. Like the whole first half of my career, I grew a little bit, but I was pretty stagnant because I refused. I didn't want to just post on TikTok. I didn't want to – I thought that was stupid and thought that was gay. I was like, lip-syncing, dude? Fuck that. But then I started posting on there, and, you know, I kept at it. I was like, all right, I guess you got to do this because, I mean, I saw everybody else blow up. Like you'd see Hudson Westbrook, Gavin Adcock, all them guys just blow up like crazy overnight. I was like, all right, I guess I got to. I don't know. So then I started. I started posting. I started really taking social media serious. You didn't want to give the side – the side mouth like Gavin Adcock does? I can't even talk like that normally, but I know it's always kind of, you know, you'd be scrolling through TikTok, and then all of a sudden it's this bug with the – Yeah. With the side mouth. A little thing on there. I put my welding rig in the shop about six months ago, and I still ain't got it back yet. I mean, do you plan on putting it to work or what? No, but I want to at least have it to drive around. Yeah. I don't reminisce. All I did was replace the transmission, and then they sent it to a dealership, and I don't know what the hell they're doing to it. Kind of trying to program something they couldn't do. Or maybe they're, you know, selling tickets out the back door to sit in Logan Ryan's truck. You never know. You don't raffle it off. Sold it. So you've been touring. You know, I know you spent time in Wyoming and up that way, Montana and stuff. Obviously, I got you on Snapchat, so I kind of see the inside parts of it. It's different when you go there and you're doing a nighttime job, like playing music, than going there to work, you know? I feel like you get to adventure a lot more, so to speak. Yeah, for sure. As long as you have some days off, because, like, going there to do a nighttime job, you still got to get there, like, you got to get there early, like 1 o'clock. Not super early, but, like, 1 in the afternoon, and you got to sound check. The rest of the time is just waiting until 8 o'clock or 9 o'clock or whatever time you play. How long is your sets normally that you play? Like, when you're doing the full band thing at a. at a show? Oh, usually 90 minutes. We'll have an opener due about an hour, and then we'll do the 90 minutes, and then we'll start partying. Well, let's give a. Let's, uh. Who opened for you your last little run here? Oh, we had a couple people. We had Braxton Hamblin. He sings a lot of cowboy poetry songs. Really good. Hayden Redwine. He's from Colorado City. He's not going to like me saying this, but he sounds like Ryan Beam a lot. But he's got really good songwriting. And we played a couple festivals, and we were the openers on the festivals. And then our. Our last. We had. Or we had two shows at Mr. Mason Mark. The Drifters opened up. He was our tour manager for that whole run. He's been a good friend of mine for a while. He's got his band, Mason Mark and the Drifters. When I was putting together the welding competition last year, you know, I wanted. It just kind of fell on my lap. Nate had said something about it. You know, I know you're a big fan of Nate. Nate had. Nate had kind of said, you know, it'd be cool if you could get. You know, if you could talk to Logan Ryan and he'd come in. When he was like, well, it'd be cool if you could talk to Tyler, you know, it kind of fell in my lap there. But it's cool that you get to use your guy that, you know, that you've known forever, your manager there, you know, helping you, you know, he helps you with what you got going on and you can help him progress his career. It's important to me as I continue forward with the welding competition and stuff, you know, second annual's coming October 24th. October 23rd, we'd love to have everybody out for like a little meet and greet, Q&A kind of deal. Just to drop a little punch there. But, you know, I wanted to keep it predominantly welders, you know, with the music, with this and that. And I was fortunate enough to get to do that. And so this year is kind of a little bit different. I think we're going to have an X-ray guy play a little bit of music. But still, it's welding field, you know. Not every day you're going to have, you know, Logan Ryan or Tyler Nance fall into your lap. Sure, we'll be down for it as long as it works out logistically. Yeah. Yeah, same place. I don't know how it's going to go in the years to come because of my affiliations with the 798 and with what they have in store to build welders in-house there too. But I hope it's something that I get to continue doing for a long time. But I obviously can't make very many guarantees on that. Well, I think it would be a cool thing, like not necessarily just an annual thing, but like you could travel around and bring it to other schools and stuff. And stuff too, you know, I want to do some stuff in Texas too, you know, just hadn't had the opportunity or the right person to talk to you. Travis Fielder's guy, you know him? No, I don't know. I don't know him. That was a badass welder. He did a lot of stuff with the, he had a lot of videos and he did stuff with WeldTube and he did stuff with Weld.com and all kinds of people. But he was, he's pretty much one of those guys that could weld anything and everything, titanium, stainless. Aluminum, pipe, anything, and he could weld it. Yeah, these days, strictly a pipeline. Downhill, uphill, in service, that sort of thing is, you know, I think, I think once I get done up here this winter, I'm going to do, once everything settles down for the year, I'm going to go to Tulsa and brush back up on my stainless steel, uh, TIG welding. Here we are. I really enjoyed Sancerre Stainless. That was, that was a good job too. That's just so nice, you know, it's so nice and clean and no grinding. It's just, that's a really good job too. Sancerre Stainless, it's real good. I was on a, I was on a union and we would get paid double time every Sunday, time and a half, you know, after 40 and we'd get paid pretty good money. Like, I mean, not as much as a rig welder, but we'd get paid 40 an hour and 80 an hour double time, you know. Plus benefits, like 10 or 15 an hour if you count them, but I never used them. One thing that a lot of people don't understand, all right, so, um, where I'm at right now, they pay for my arm, right? So they pay 22 for the truck, they pay 165 for them, seven days a week. But if you go back to the very beginning of the week, my benefit package is like $36 an hour, insurance, retirement, 401k on my pension, my insurance, my 401k. When people get confused about pension and, and my 401k, they're one in the same. They're not the same thing. It's, it's a big step for as far as long as I was in my career to pretty much start over fresh again. But Hey, here we are enjoying it. I like the guys that I've been around so far. It's my second seven on eight job. It's been good. Back to talking about, let's get back to your business because I can talk all day about myself from, uh, whatever they call it. So, so you've been about four months where you haven't welded. Was it a little bit sad though? The first time that somebody called you and wanted you to come weld and you didn't go weld for them because the music was, was doing the same. Was it sad? I wouldn't say it was sad. I said, it's pretty cool, but I don't have this thing. Like one of the guys that was working with us, he went off and did another venture for another ammonia company. He was, he was hiring rig welders. And he was like, we was hired part-time rig welders. So I was like, so I could just, when I'm sitting at the house doing nothing, not playing music, I could go over there and weld. I thought maybe that'd be cool. I figured I'd get bored sitting around the house during the week. I still kind of want to do something like that or ranch, ranch construction or just something just to, just to not be lazy and sit around the house all day. But yeah. That's why you want the welding truck back. The, um, so when was your like moment that you're like, um, a little bit surreal when it comes to music, like, was it hearing it on 95, nine or like, what was that moment you're like, this is kind of caught fire the very first time. It was, uh, I was on a roof. I was actually working in San Juan, Texas. I was on the roof doing an ammonia system and I got on my phone. I saw Parker McCollum tagged me in a post or something, or tag me in a story. And he was playing my song cigarettes and alcohol while he was like cooking some dinner or something. I was like, what the hell? Parker McCollum knows my song. And he's actually using it in a video. I think it was like a day or two after he, his tour manager lane posted a video. video of him dancing on the tour bus. to cigarettes and alcohol and i was like okay and at that point i was kind of like all right i guess music might not be my thing because it wasn't really i think i was sitting around like 10 or 15 000 monthly listeners on spotify around that time and then parker mccullum started sharing that song and it kind of put a new new fire in me to chase the music dream again you know he tweeted about it too and everything and it kind of blew us up like another 20 000 monthly listeners i started sharing it on tiktok and then started posting on tiktok a lot more and just getting my music out there a lot more and i mean we've we've grown 20 times since then the the steps that it's kind of transpired you know with with parker mccullum and stuff when he wrote limestone field right that that's kind of that same music then you know he kind of went to his like real westerny kind of george straight bid there for but you have like my dear and um that's more of like a rocker song you know like you i like that one thing that i like that you don't set yourself to one category so far yeah like this new album right not a single song sounds the same i like that i think there's something for everybody and everybody will like everything hopefully but i don't like to just put myself in a narrow tiny box i like playing music that i like and if i write a song and it needs some rock music and it needs some rock music you know if it needs some fiddle then it needs some fiddle it's good to not put yourself in a box you know and to tie it back into welding i feel like people put themselves in boxes sometimes like i'm just a pop on it while i'm just this i don't touch yeah i don't touch t i don't i don't weld aluminum i don't weld stainless that's a i guess that would be another good lesson for welding is uh i wouldn't necessarily say focus on meager flux core unless i'm going to be a shop welder but focus on tig and stick and focus on learning at least stainless and carbon at the least i mean it's hard to learn monel or incanel if you're not on the job that has that i mean if you know how to weld stainless and you know how to weld carbon you're pretty good to go so when do you have a date when the album's coming out no i don't have an official date uh the plan is probably a release at least a single or two this year i wanted to get the whole album out this year but it's not looking like it's going to be too late but at least a single or two this year and then the full album maybe january next year okay so let me touch on this too because i'm from alabama what was your inspiration to rock mobile out of all the places you've been to oh yeah okay so that was uh i wrote that song about the same girl i wrote cigarettes and alcohol about and after our we took a i guess he said we took a break or i didn't know we were taking a break then she went on to a trip to mobile to see another guy and that's where the whole see you were driving down basically she went down there to cheat on me you know yeah i got you so what do you got coming up let's talk about that real quick what do you got coming up here as far as new music well i mean where are you going to be at yeah we got uh we're going to spring texas we're going to louisiana got some dates in oklahoma we're going to vegas for the nfr yeah a lot of our out-of-state stuff is done right now but uh yeah louisiana oklahoma el paso that's texas but i i want maybe i'll be back in louisiana by the time y'all get down there uh airplane and tree port yeah i was right there in uh lake charles we went to baton rouge down new orleans i don't know that i'll go back to new orleans but uh i didn't mind baton rouge i didn't mind baton rouge i didn't mind baton rouge wasn't too bad uh love shreveport anytime i've ever been there i mean i've lost money there gambling but it's not been bad yeah i'm a big gambler a little gambler yeah yeah i mean any welder any welder is just about a gamble i mean you got to be somewhat of a gambler because you're going you're gonna drive a thousand miles to take the weld test yeah you're taking that last you know that last nugget and the savings account you know after a hard year and you drive you know 500 000 you're betting on yourself you're betting on yourself betting on yourself that's that's a good lesson for a lot of people to learn is betting on yourself when everybody bouts it if you put the money on yourself most time it's gonna pan out as long as you put the work in as long as you put the work in you gotta have the work to go with it i do not like that like i like that i'm in my truck and recording stuff but with the with the lights on i can see all the dust across there and that's wearing me out like i'm just like trying to wipe stuff down as we're talking the balance of home life now do you like right now you're chilling at home you know it's got it's got to it's it's had to have improved from being on the road you know per se yeah well where you're gone for months at a time the last job i had we were we would just travel out of town basically for the for the week with somewhere in texas like i'll go to corpus or i'll go to lubbock i would be there for the week and we'd have the weekends off i would go there for whatever how long we were there i'd have to go be on the road during the weekend so there was stints for like three or four weeks where i wouldn't even see my family or and something just had to give you know i was waiting for music to kind of triple my welding income before i decided to call it quits i wanted to make sure i had a good little safety net there i think jumping from something that you've done for so long welding wise which is pretty consistent to kind of take the leap into the unknown you know betting on yourself to go through the world to go play music and make a make a living at it you know it's it's almost like um i won't say it's cowboys are crazy that's a whole different breed you know of being a cowboy but they don't make no it's a pretty big yeah yeah i don't make no money i became a welder yeah but it's a pretty big i mean it's a pretty big jump i feel like like it's intimidating to me and i'm not a get intimidated kind of person you know i've drove i've drove from texas to florida to take you know but i feel like um it's a deep dive into have enough faith in yourself to be like i can do this and do it well you know yeah it's a it's a whole different thing than like i mean ever since you were ever since you started working you know it's always been like a consistent thing you know you work a couple hours you get a paycheck you never had the music's like different it's just different kind of work different kind of thing different kind of people environments these days you have to surround i feel like you're not you're not you're not you're not you're not like i'm i mean i don't let's be honest i don't have any any god-given music ability but i feel like you have to surround yourself with the right people to have the right ideas you know it's like if you wanted to go be a bus driver you know that that falls on yourself being a welder falls on yourself you know you only got to weld what you what you bring to the table the effort you put into it but going out here playing music i feel like you have to have some good people around you i feel like you have to rely a lot on other people yeah it helps to have a well you've been a welder you're used to relying on yourself to do the job you know to get paid yeah like yeah because uh i mean we have a booking agent you got to rely on your booking agent to book you book you good shows and then you got to rely on your band you know to play good and it's hard that's the hard part of being a musician is finding a good band i don't know that was my experience anyways that was the hardest thing was finding a good lead player good guitar player bass player good good bass good drummer you step on a stage every night and you're relying on them to do their best and they're relying on you to do your best it's kind of more of a team effort you know i mean it's a massive team effort you know if like people ain't gonna pay for tickets if it's not a good show you know i don't know like thinking about i don't know that i've ever been to a bad concert i'm sure i have i've been to a bunch of them i used to live in lovey texas so i've been to plenty of concerts but i was probably uh i don't know i don't know i don't know i don't know too under the influence to really notice if they're in a venue that's did the upload save the part of welding you rely on yourself and playing in a music band traveling all that stuff you have to rely on so many more people i feel like that that's a way bigger gamble than gambling on yourselves i mean you're still gambling on yourself but you know what i mean like yeah as far as live shows go you're gambling on other people but i mean when when it comes to when it comes to recording and releasing music you know that's if you're a single solo artist that writes their own stuff you know you're relying on yourself which i mean there's a lot of people in nashville that they have like six songwriters a song and shit but i write all my own music band that you've assembled now is that like the guys that's going to be with you from here on out or do they like got normal jobs and they're going to come and go sort of i mean in the ideal world yeah they'll be the guys that are with me for the drummer he's i've known him for for 10 years you know i've known him since since the old bar scenes when i was a young kid and he was His dad was a drummer. So I've known him for a long time. Garrett, the lead player, I've known him for a long time, probably about six years. He's always been around the San Antonio music scene playing guitar for everybody. Always been this wonder kid. And the newest guy we got is maybe two years, maybe a little more than two years with us. He's a great bass player, great guy. And, you know, they're all good to hang out with on the road. That's a big part, too. People you can get along with on the road. Oh, yeah. Because y'all are just like renting a van or whatever to travel in. You know, like from Texas to Montana or Wyoming, northern Wyoming, that's a long time to be in a vehicle with four or five other dudes. Yeah. And, you know, if it's somebody you didn't get along with, you know, it wouldn't work out. You are. I mean, you're from Texas, obviously. But have you ever heard the Ray Wiley Hubbard song, Easy Money Down in Texas? It's one of my favorite songs of all time. Yeah, I don't know why. I think it's just the beat to it and stuff. But I also think about, like, moving from Alabama to Texas to be a rig welder. Also think about that, or to be a welder in general. I also think about that same thing, Easy Money Down in Texas. But, you know, he's talking about playing music. Yeah, nice. Transpires in the welding world, too. I wrote a song a long time ago about moving to Alaska to weld. It was just because we heard, like, we heard a rumor about them Alaskan welders getting paid a shitload of money. I wrote a song, moving to Alaska. Worked my ass off all day. That was an old song I wrote when I was in fucking high school, but never did nothing with it. You was dreaming a long time about it. Being a welder, you know what I mean? Yeah, I mean, since high school, for sure. Yeah. Yeah. The, um, to kind of pull this together here, um, at the end of your welding career, like, I know, I know the part about, you know, finding ways out. Um, I mean, I've got plenty of buddies that's found ways out in different means, you know, I mean, some of them still do welding, some of them sell insurance, some of them sell equipment. Like, obviously you play music. Um. Some of them become sectors. Yeah. The, um, the end of that, the end of your welding career, like, what it, okay, let me do this this way. What is something that you've taken from welding into your music? That I've taken from welding into my music? Yeah. That you feel like that's, that's went both ways for you. And don't just say hard work, because we know that's, that's an easy one. It's gotta be harder than that. Yeah, I would say, uh, I guess, you know, attention. The detail, you know, you always. I don't like that. Attention to detail. You could, uh, you know, you don't want, you don't want to feel the x-ray. You always gotta make sure you're, you're particular. And I would say that it translates to songwriting. As in, you don't want to write a bad song. You gotta, you gotta look over it. You gotta double check. What is the, uh, like, we know the process to weld, like, to go take a test. What is your, what is your. What is your process when it comes to writing music? Like, what, what do you, what do you kind of go, like, as far as like the formula I use? I mean, there'll be, I'll be sitting in my vehicle and just freestyling until I come along the lyric that I like. And then I'm like, Ooh, I like that. And then I'll try to write something off of that. Or I'll be playing guitar until I come across a lick I like, and I'll be like, Ooh, I gotta write something with that lick. And it's just kind of, uh, one of those two things is usually what my experience is, what I, what I used to write a song and, and it, it's not like, uh, I got to sit down and write it and I can finish it in an hour, but sometimes it takes a couple of days. Sometimes it takes a couple of weeks. Depends on the song. I got a song set up, started a year ago. Yeah. That's what I was about to say. I said, I guarantee you there's stuff sitting around that you've had for a year. You know, eight, nine, 10 months, just sitting there, you know, like Weldon's Weldon is one thing because you're only getting judged by a couple of people, right? Music you're getting judged by, you know, your audit. I mean, if you've got a small audience or you've got a massive audience, it could be the whole world could be a thousand people could be a hundred people could be the DFW on a Wednesday night, you know, but it, um, some people are going to like it. Some people are going to hate it. Some inspectors are going to like you, some aren't going to like you. Some other welders are going to like it, some aren't going to like it, you know what I mean? If they don't like it, they're wrong. You know, that's, that's the way it is. That's not the way it is. That's the way the world is trying to be pushed right now. That if you don't like it, you can never, you know, it's, I don't, I mean, I'm pretty sure everybody knows my political beliefs, but they, uh, the way that that all business is going, uh, is not looking very promising. Uh, yeah, not looking very promising at all. Then in the, um, go ahead. So yeah, it's kind of been a sad place. It's past few days, but actually a lot of good rise from it. I guess a lot of people go to church, a lot of people rising up and taking a stand. I've seen 57,000 new chapters of the turning point. I've happened in the past week, which is amazing. You know, the, the thing about all that is, is I don't care if you're left. Right, gay, straight, whatever, Christian, non-Christian, nobody should ever be in that situation. And that's, that's the bottom line. Uh, you know, people talk about the, I don't want to get in all the politics because it's super sad. It's super sad. That's the way that that stuff is treated is, is super sad. Um, I wish that it wasn't that way. I wish that we could all be united in one thing, that America has a standard. It's above everybody else. That's what I, that's what I personally care about that. We, uh, it's kind of like when you're a pipeline welder, right? Our specialty welder, you're supposed to carry yourself and have the quality of work better than everybody else. Well, it's the same thing when we're as Americans, we should have our quality of life in the way that we treat each other better than anybody else. I feel like, uh, because that being said, uh, you know, all the people that are in the United States, you know, that's coming over the border, whatever, that's chasing the American dream, really not American dream, if we don't have that separation from other countries. Well, yeah, I mean, then you gotta think about infrastructure. We can't let 30 million people in here when we've normally only been letting in less than a million. You got to think about houses, you got to think about roads, you got to think about food, you got to think about everything. You just can't, you don't have the facilities to do it. You gotta think about food, you gotta think about everything. You just can't, you don't have the facilities to accommodate that many people coming in every single year. Crazy to me that every kingdom from 01 to 2025 has had walls around it, except the United States. Yeah, because that's racist for the United States to have walls. All right. To wrap this whole thing up, I know it's probably getting close to bedtime and stuff on your end. I just had to plug my phone in, I didn't want my phone to die. If there's a thing that people should know about Logan Ryan, what is it? Like an inside scoop about Logan Ryan. I'm never going to sell myself to Nashville, you're never going to hear trapbeats on my songs, long live Charlie Kirk. And we got a killer mustache. And I got a killer mustache and, you know, the, the projectory of your career is bright. And I hope that, I hope that it continues the path that it's on, you know. I hope that people get out there and like, when you're, they spend money on tickets, you know, to go see real genuine music. That's, that's another thing that I kind of like watched the rise of in Lubbock, but I also kind of watched the fall in Lubbock was the, the crowds that went and watched real music. You know, I used to go to Steamboat back in the day and man, it was, it was awesome. And then you got all these younger crowd in there and stuff, and it wasn't about the music. It was about, I'm at Steamboat, you know, it kind of changed a lot of things. You know, I was like, okay, I'm going to go to Steamboat. I'm going to go to Steamboat. I'm going to get a ticket up there. I'm about to go there for the first time ever. This, this next January. Damn, I may have to redo my tickets because I still hold a spot up there. Like a buddy of mine has the tickets now, but like we could, I could still get there, you know. I'm not, I'm not playing there like officially, but like, uh, there's some people at my show and they're like, Hey man, you gotta come up to Steamboat. We'll pay your way. I was like, all right, can I bring, can I bring my wife? Can I bring my kids? Yeah. And they're like, hell yeah. So we're just going to go up there and they're paying us to come up there and I'm not playing any official shows, but we get to see the experience for the first time, I guess. I seen Shane Smith and his fiddle player play on the side of the mountain before they was Shane Smith and the Saints. Like they played at the little pizza shop. I can't remember the name of it. It's been a couple of years, but you know, I've seen one twice here in Texas. because there were always somebody in Texas. Yeah, well, you know what I'm saying, though. Like, I know them from Texas, but that was still like a step in their start. Before the whole world knew them. Yes, before everybody else knew them. That's what I meant. But, you know, moving from Alabama, the only people I knew back in the day was Charlie Robinson, God rest his soul, Pat Green. Isn't it Cora Smith over there? Or is he a Georgia guy? Cora Smith. I don't know Cora Smith. Yeah, I know Cora Smith. That's a Georgia guy. Casey Donahue and Robert Earl King was kind of like what I considered to be Texas country back in the day. And then I moved here, and I remember I will never forget the first song in 2011. I was driving across Dallas, Texas, and my radio hit 95.9, and William Clark Green was singing Tonight. And it was. It was the acoustic version. It was at Mount Vernon. It was the Mount Vernon version of Tonight. And I was like, I don't know the blankety-blank this guy is, but I've got to see him in concert. And so on my Facebook, if you scroll way back to 2011, like two weeks later, I went to a concert out in Woodrow, out South Lubbock, Woodrow, Texas, and William Clark Green was playing there. And I had to like, I V-lined to get a picture with him. And I went to go off stage. There's just so much cooler, too, in the halls, like Green Hall and stuff, too. Yeah. Rather than a stadium. Oh, 1,000%. Like the Blue Lot, you know, that's a. It's always way cooler. It's always the kind of deer. Green Hall is, you know, it's different. Up there, you know, it's in Steamboat, to tie it back to Steamboat. They got the. You know, they got the. I remember one time I was coming off the top of the mountain, skiing down, and it was snowing, like sideways wind snowing. And Cody Johnson was playing on stage, and I thought it was one of the coolest. I don't even like. I like Cody Johnson, but I'm not a Cody Johnson, like, music lover. And I thought it was so crazy, because the way the snow was coming across and stuff, and he was playing. I don't even know what he was playing, but it was badass. Hell yeah. Well, I'm happy for you in that endeavor. I think it's another good stone in. Or another good step in the ladder for you. Even, you know, even if you're not doing the whole playing. I think you'll be around enough people up there that love music that it's only going to help develop and suckle more. All right, to tie everything in together, what is one lesson outside of. Because we talked about betting on ourselves and all that stuff. One lesson that you can tie welding to music that every. For the younger generation should know. You know, because there's. You know, there's. There's a lot of guys. There's a lot of guys out there like that. Now, we may not know about right now, but they know that Logan Ryan was a welder, and they're welding some plant, setting in some trailer, a hotel room or not, you know, they're trying to write music, trying to do the shield arcing thing, you know? Mm-hmm. What is one thing, one message you would give to them kids? I would say get that real-life experience, because a songwriter that writes from experience is always going to be better than somebody that's faking it. So, live that life and write about that life and sing about that life. Can't fake it. I mean, you got to fake it till you make it in any of it, you know? It's one of my favorite sayings, fake it till you make it. The, uh. Well, I think we're. I hate that it took us a whole year to get to this point and do this. I appreciate you, Dom. Yeah. I'm hoping to kind of circle back. Like, I ain't talked to Nate. It's damn near been three years since I've had Nate on the podcast. Look, Nate came out to one of our Blue Light shows. That was pretty cool. Oh, yeah, dude. You can't beat that guy with a stick. It's kind of like Andrew from Southern Leatherworks. I don't know if when you was up there last year at Arkansas Reed, if you got to talk to Andrew a lot. Yeah, my welding home is from him. He just wants to be involved. Well, hey, I mean, that's a big part of Welding 2's network. Yes. Getting to know people. That's a really big part that people don't, And, like, he won't, he don't ever ask for anything. Like, me and him has talked about some stuff, you know. Like, they had me on their podcast, Iron Sights, him and Brian. Like, I can, I, like, I asked Andrew, I was like, oh, are you coming back to Arkansas Elite this year? He's like, oh, yeah, yeah, I'll be there. Like, he just wants to, like, if we need more people that want to be in this lifestyle, that have that charisma to frickin' help do the things to make it better, you know. Mm-hmm. You know, like, you know, like you did, you know, like, last year. I mean, compared to this year, you know, like, it's, um, Yeah, man, we'll have a better sound system if we play there again, but. I guarantee, I guarantee. But I never, I never, I've never had a, had a band or musicians come to do something for me. I didn't know what to have, like. I mean, it wasn't on me. Thank God for, um, what was it called? Guitar Center, you know? I mean, I wouldn't even say thank God, because they gave me so much of terrible equipment. But it's better than nothing, I guess. Better than nothing. It's better than nothing. It's better than, uh, you know, putting a bucket over your head and singing. I don't know how we get the music out there, but it still was great, you know. Could have hooked up to a turtle box, probably. Could have hooked up to a turtle box, you know. Carry one in the back seat. But it's about experiences, you know. You can always look back and say, you know, one day, I mean, I can always say, well, you know, one time, I had Logan Ryan play a welding competition for me. It goes back to, uh, only the senior gets a check, you know. The senior gets a check every welding competition. Yeah, that's a fact. I appreciate your time, Logan. You know, it's, I'm glad to see your career continue to, you know, to step forward. You know, it's, it's, it's good. You're still so down to earth. You know, like, the first time I talked to you, you're kind of like that reserve guy, you know, like, man of few words, you know. But it's, it's good to see, like, you're still in that same mind frame, you know. Like, you know, fuck Nashville and all that stuff. But I don't plan on changing nobody, you know. I don't imagine you jump very far unless, uh, old mom tells you to jump. Yeah. Yeah. But, um. We will be talking, uh, you know, October 23rd, um, I gotta, I gotta give this spill real quick. If I don't, I'm gonna get murdered. You can find, uh, I have the website. It's up and running. Runs pretty good. Uh, if it says sold out, obviously I don't have it. If it doesn't say it's sold out, then I have it on the website. I don't have any 2T hats right now because my dog chewed mine up. But y'all know I normally wear a 2T hat. Logan gave his away. I gotta give him another one. I gave it away. Yep. Uh, but the, uh, uh, it's out on the road.com. Um, the, uh, link to the welding competition, uh, October 23rd is for anybody and everybody that wants to come out. We got some stuff happening there at the school. We're going to do a demonstration. We got the Q and a, um, all that stuff. Then, uh, you know, of course, October 24th, seven 30, we're going to go ahead and get registration started on the welding competition. Um, the links in my, if you go to my Tik TOK, Instagram and it's period. So the link to get signed up for it, um, on my website, links there. Um, oh yeah, I got a raffle coming up. I will have it out. I don't, I don't know what day of the week it is. I don't know what date it is, but the 25th of this month, it will be out. Everything will be solidified and it will be out. Deal about the raffle is I'm going to sell it. I'm going to sell $50 chances, 200 of them. That's going to give me $10,000. That's a hell of a scholarship to a kid that wants a career change. That's 18 plus. They wanted to be a welder. If he comes, if he practices, member acts and whatever, and he wants to compete in a welding competition, this will give him a little nest egg to, uh, to get going in that career. This is what I want to give back to the world ministry. I hope everybody supports it. It's not for me to get rich. I'm a pop on her also well for the seven 98. I don't really need their money. I don't need your money. I don't need anybody's money. I I'm, I'm doing just fine. The is strictly for the competition. If you buy a chance or buy a raffle, whatever you want to call it for the raffle strictly for that has nothing to do with me, I'm going to wind up paying taxes on the money, so it is what it is, but it's strictly for a scholarship for the kids. All right, Logan, I appreciate you not appreciate you hanging out, but, uh, I'm going to get this thing out is just about as fast as I can get it out. I appreciate your time, brother. Yes, sir. No problem. All right. Take care. I'll take care.