When you write a hit song, and you know it when it's done, it's one of the best feelings in the world.
— Thomas Rhett
At every sound check, I try to practice on the stage that we're gonna play on that night, 'cause every stage is different. Whether it's concrete or whether it's plywood or whether it's Plexiglas, it all requires different things. You can't dance on concrete as well as you can dance on Plexiglas.
Everybody besides my piano player has been with me since the very first day. We were a four-piece band for a solid two years. It was me playing acoustic and rhythm electric guitar, a bass player, a drummer and a lead guitar player. For a couple of years, we sounded like the Foo Fighters.
You don't start out getting into the gym and bench pressing 300 pounds. You start out by doing the bar.
I rap on 'Front Porch Junkies' and 'Whatcha Got in that Cup.' I try to channel my inner Lil Wayne and Drake. It's fun to be able to freestyle over a country melody and say country words over a rap song.
I was not a very good football player. My coach hated me - I don't know why, I guess it's probably because I wasn't very talented.
I loved going on the road... I think that's something everybody ought to experience one day - not necessarily as an artist, but just to get out and see the country.
If you're a good person, that's all that really matters.
I would love to get shredded or whatever you want to call it, but at the same time, I really enjoy treating myself to a cheat meal more than once a week. I'll eat a piece of bread, or I'll drink a beer, and I'll have fun with my friends. For me, it's really more about being healthy than it is about gaining 40 lbs. of muscle.
There are people who will always want the genre, whatever it is, to stay traditional, to stay what it was like when you were 15 years old, but I just don't think music does that. Music is always changing and evolving, just like us as people.
To record an album and stick to one specific style isn't really my thing.
All my artist buddies make fun of me for being such a sensitive human being.
I'm a junior, so my dad's name is Thomas Rhett Akins as well. So literally, from the day I was born, it was Thomas Rhett. It wasn't Thomas or Rhett, it was Thomas Rhett.
I feel like I get a tweet every other day: 'Can Thomas Rhett's dancing get any more awkward?' Which is hilarious to me. But I like to move, what can I say?
'Die a Happy Man' was one of those that, when I wrote it and sent it to my label, their response was, 'This is a career record.' I was like, 'Why do you think that?' I think the stars aligned.
I played in a punk rock band in high school called the High Heel Flip Flops. I was the drummer. I played drums for, like, four years.
I'm obsessed with Bruno Mars' records. I'd give my right leg to be able to sing like that dude.
Writing songs has always been my first and foremost love, and, you know, whether I continue to have success as an artist or not, I will always write songs.
I realize that I'm not a great dancer. I've given up the hip-shaking. I don't pelvic thrust anymore. Those were the beginning days of T. R. learning how to dance. But I love it, and I've taken a few choreography lessons. But other than that, I kinda just feel it, I guess.
When I was 12 or 13, my dad taught me a couple of different chords, and once I learned chords, I never learned to read music, but I learned tablature, like a lot of kids do, and I learned songs that had the chords I knew. It took me a long time to understand the upstroke of picking and strumming, but once I did, it all fell into place.
I'm a fun song maker. I love to make people smile. I also love to see them big, burly dudes crying because their wives' song is 'Die a Happy Man.'
Thomas Rhett Akins doesn't sound like a rock star name. I didn't leave Akins out to convince people my dad wasn't my dad. I've always been called Thomas Rhett.
Dad told me that before I was born, he would put my mom's stomach up to the speaker and play Led Zeppelin.
It don't matter if you put 'The Dance' out, or any old George Strait song. Someone is going to think that it's awful. You gotta be able to just sit back and kind of laugh it off and know you're doing exactly what you wanna do, and if people don't like it, then it's not really my place to tell them they have to like it.
I hate negativity in general. We, as artists, we pour so much into our music and put out something we believe in... it sucks that people tear you down.
I haven't always been into fitness. But I noticed that when I'd be on stage playing a show, I could hardly make it through the fifth song without having to take a breather.
I'm ever-changing and always evolving, always trying new things.
Growing up, as much as country was a big influence in my life, the Rolling Stones and the Beatles and Led Zeppelin were such a close second. My first concert ever was the Rolling Stones in Denver. I snuck a camera backstage and filmed Mick Jagger during sound-check.
My position on Speedos changes depending on the country that I'm in. If you're in Europe, it's definitely acceptable.
My dad is one of my favorite human beings in the world. He's just a good person, and he could entertain a brick wall.
I realized I'm a very, very white dancer.
I played at Sony, Warner Bros., Universal, Big Machine, Capitol... after I played every one of those places, everyone offered me a record deal. I was just like, 'Who am I? Why do I even deserve this?' There are people busting their butts on Broadway doing this hardcore, playing three hours a night for tips, and I didn't even ask for it.
It is completely a God thing that I am here today because for the first 17 years of my life, I never thought I would ever do music professionally. I'd always liked what my dad did, but I never thought that I wanted to do it, just to be different.
Single Record of the Year and New Vocalist were such a blessing to see, but when I saw that I was up for Album of the Year, that's when I started to be like, 'What in the world, this is crazy!' That one really got me in a pretty different way.
Songs are like children in a way. They all need to find a home.
When you finish a song, your first thought is going to be, 'Is this song a hit?' I hate that we think that way, because it kind of takes a little bit of the meaning out of the songs that are being written, but you're definitely going to think, 'Can this song be put on the radio?'
I think, for every artist, the second album is the most terrifying one to put out because it can either boost your career, and everybody can't wait until your third album, or the second one is terrible, and 'He probably hit a plateau on his first one.'
There's no such thing as standing still and just singing a song. I love jumping into the crowd. I love to dance.
You definitely get the answer 'no' more times in this business than you do 'yes.' It's what you do with those 'nos' that makes your success either great or not.
I don't want to get too detailed and personal, but my parents got divorced when I was about nine. A lot of that had to do with my dad being on the road and that disconnect.
We're gone for 280, almost 300 days a year. So 70 to 80 days I'm home every year. Being an artist, you just gotta be ready to miss certain things, like Halloween and all these kind of things that you used to be able to be free for. Birthdays, all this kind of stuff.
I love a good piece of pizza. I love a good hamburger. If I don't let myself have those things, there's going to be a week where I just go off the deep end and eat nothing but that.
I'm a huge fan of Drake. Anything he puts out is great to work out to.
I grew up listening to so many different things, and having a dad that also sang, music was innately born into me. Going through high school and college, I'd go see anyone who came to town, it didn't matter the genre.
If a new artist wants to put out some sort of off-the-wall, crazy deep ballad about the sun or whatever, it might be hard to get traction. It's so much easier for someone established to put out a really heartfelt, deep song and get it played in radio.
I try not to put myself in a box, so I'll write with anybody who wants to. I don't put limitations on my co-writes.
People tell me I'm like the country version of Justin Timberlake. Actually, the other day someone told me I was an unathletic version of Justin Timberlake, and I was like, 'I'll take that.'
I'm kinda not one of those people that likes to put up trophies in my house, because I don't want my mom to come be like, 'Hey, you're full of yourself.'
I wanted to be a physical therapist because I had torn up my knee and thought it was interesting with the rehab and whatever. I did kinesiology, and after the first four days of class, I dropped out because I was like, 'This ain't the class for me!'
If you watch home videos, at 4 years old, I was doing nothing but being the entertainer. Singing 'Boot Scootin' Boogie' in the living room. Then, I guess, just by the grace of God I started writing songs, and somebody happened to like them.
