For more than twenty years, Pat Green has been in the music business, and he has grown and adapted to the changing times as well as the changing maturity of his own music. Before a show at the House of Blues in Boston, Green was kind enough to sit down with New England Country Music and share how his music and attitude has evolved over the years, his thoughts about the country music sound currently, and his plans to continue doing what he loves to do.
Green, one of ten kids in his family, grew up watching his father perform. He remembers his father performing as the lead actor in the plays, The Music Man and Cyrano. Green can recall how much fun it was watching his father on stage and how he had such control of the audience. It was this experience of watching his father, that influenced Pat Green to become a musician and an entertainer.
Green started his career in 1995. Born in Texas, Pat is considered a musical legend there. First, performing in small honky- tonks and bars, his main crowd was the college set. Green has since expanded his audience and has since recorded and released twelve studio albums. Probably his most well-known song came from his 2003 album ‘Wave on Wave,’ and the title track from the album reached number three on the US Country Airplay charts. Other Pat Green songs that reached the charts were, ‘Baby Doll,’ from the 2004 album ‘Lucky Ones.’ as well as ‘Feels Just Like it Should,’ and ‘Let Me.’ Green will soon be releasing a new album independently, titled ‘Home,’ and will include duets with Lyle Lovett and Sheryl Crow. The song with Lyle Lovett, called ‘Girls From Texas,’ was the first single released from new the album.
You can purchase ‘Girls From Texas,’ on iTunes here.
Green writes or co-writes most of his songs and over the years, Green’s music, has been influenced by such artists as Bruce Springsteen, singer and song writer Jerry Jeff Walker, who is best known for writing the song ‘Mr. Bojangles,’ Texas based country folk singer/songwriter, Robert Earl Keen, and “if you are doing what I’m doing,” George Strait, Waylon Jennings and Dave Matthews. When writing a song Green allows the music to come before the lyrics. With the theme of his songs usually about love, his wife of almost fifteen years is always mentioned in some way in the song. Green has even written a song with Brad Paisley titled ‘College.’ Pat enjoyed writing with Brad and says that Brad is “The most naturally funny guy you have ever met in your life.” Brad Paisley is not the only artist with a sense of humor, when Green was asked how his sound has evolved and changed over the years his reply was, “It’s gotten older like everything else on me. The sound, I’m just not in a hurry as much as I used to be. I used to be just loud and drunk. Now I’m just loud and not as drunk.”
Green has had the opportunity to tour with big names like Keith Urban, Kenny Chesney and Dave Matthews, but he could not decide which tour he enjoyed more because the experience was different with all of them. Green is a fan of the artists he has toured with and he also expressed his admiration for artist, Blake Shelton and the Eli Young band because “they make great music.” Eric Church is another artist Green feels makes really great music and Church is currently Pat’s favorite artist on the radio today.
Like so many artists of the ‘old country’ sound, Green has his opinion on the new sound of today’s country. He does not think it is the same as it was, and it is a natural transition because it is not supposed to be the same. The artists are different, and the audience is different. Green compares it to when he listened to the Eagles as a teenager. Their music was not considered country at all but was labeled as rock-n-roll, and today, they would be considered old school country. Green’s advice to these new country artists of today would be to, “Look around. I wish I would have looked around more. Instead being so worried about the buzz or the partying. I wish I had taken more pictures. I wish I had lived more responsibly.”
Green is very grateful for the career he has had and he wants to just “keep going. It’s what anybody in our business wants to continue to do. It’s just very rare to have a career in this business that lasts 20 years.”
New England Country Music would like to thank Pat Green for sharing the story of his music career with us and we wish him, at least, another twenty years of writing and performing great music.
Interview conducted by Lorraine Frigoletto, contributing writer for New England Country Music. You can follow me on Twitter.