Page 59 - ION Indie Magazine JulyAugust 2019

JOE NICHOLS:

Never Gets Old

Granite State Music Hall • Laconia, NH • May 11, 2019
www.granitestatemusichall.com

Interview by Erika Johnson
Photography by Daniel Johnson
www.facebook.com/DagdaPhotography

In the early to mid-1990s in Arkansas, Joe Nichols was playing high school gymnasiums during the last period

of the day following a presentation by the local D.A.R.E officer. “I was playing in a cover band with some local
guys. The D.A.R.E officer would be up there, ‘don’t drink or do drugs!’ and then we’d get on to play a song
about drinkin’,” Nichols said when ION asked him about the start of his musical career.

“I was a minor at the time so I couldn’t play at any of the local clubs that sold alcohol,” Nichols explained. He
recalled a gig in Oklahoma in which another musician who was playing across town called the local ABC
officer to tip him off that Joe was underage. When Joe arrived with his band to the club that night, the officer

was parked in a cruiser out front waiting for him. “The stage was only about five feet from the side door,”
Joe said with a smile. “It was cold and rainy, so we got a space heater and plugged it in and put up a big
carpet over the door so I could try to stay dry. I played the whole two to three hours right there in the

doorway. We had to come up with something -- it was a paying gig!”

ION asked Nichols about the transition from playing under a carpet in a doorway to being signed to a label.

Nichols explained that it wasn’t as quick of a transition as people think. “The gigs certainly got easier!” Joe
said laughing. He told ION the story of being in an airport in Nashville. The single “Brokenheartsville” was
already out on the radio and “Impossible” was rising on the charts. “This guy came up to me as I was using

the ATM and said, ‘Hey! I love your music!’ I thanked him and then when I turned back to the screen it read
‘Insufficient Funds.’ The guy saw it and was like, ‘Oh hey man…uh…do you need some money?’ I said, ‘Nah
man, I’m good. Thanks.’” Nichols had plenty of friends who assumed he was in the black ready to go out and

buy a new Cadillac. “It’s not how it works. A lot of the money that I was making was going to cover overhead.”

As Joe Nichols’ career progressed, he has relied on his gut and others around him to help him stay true to

the traditional country music he loves so much. “Music for the majority of people is an escape or a way for
them to get into how they’re feeling. Country music to me has always been about living a simple life, working
a 9-5,” Nichols said. “The average working person should be able to listen to it and relate, ‘Hey, this guy has
had a broken heart too. Let’s raise a beer!’ I’ve always felt country has been cool on its own it doesn’t need
to imitate any other kind of music out there.”