Walker Hayes Explains Why His Latest Single ‘Ball Players’ is an Apology to His Kids
Walker Hayes Explains Why His Latest Single ‘Ball Players’ is an Apology to His
Kids
Kids
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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.