Cody Hanson (Hinder drummer)

Episode 142 - Cody Hanson from Hinder! Cody is not only the drummer, but he also co-founded the band as well as co-wrote, and co-produced much of the music. Many people know their big hit “Lips of an Angel” but there are sooo many more good songs! Hear all about the band’s rise to fame, collaborating with Mick Mars & Richard Marx, plus a story that makes Ozzy’s ant snorting look tame. All this and much more!

00:00 - Intro
01:12 - Writing Songs
02:40 - Musical Influences & Musical Family
05:00 - Hinder Band Name 
06:07 - March Bandness
07:30 - Business Savvy Mentality  
09:15 - Far From Close EP & Leaks 
11:20 - Handing Chevelle Bass Player Demo
13:28 - Being Accessible to Fans 
15:10 - Rise to Fame & Early Days 
19:20 - Model on Extreme Behavior
20:16 - "Lips of an Angel" 
21:52 - Collaborating with Mick Mars 
26:20 - Singer of Trapt 
28:50 - American Nightmare & 80s Rock Sound
30:00 - Jeffery Steele Collaboration 
31:05 - Richard Marx Collaboration
32:20 - James Michael of Sixx AM 
33:30 - Transition of Changing Singers 
34:39 - Relationship with ex Singer Austin Winkler
36:07 - "Loser's Salute" 
38:00 - Playing Covers & "Life In the Fast Lane" 
39:32 - Fans of Australia 
40:48 - "Dangerous Hippies" Side Project 
42:50 - Marshal Dutton & Cody Hanson Solo Albums 
44:55 - Prosthetic Leg Story 
46:22 - The Darkest Days Sushi Story 
48:00 - Jay Leno, Conan O'Brien & Craig Ferguson 
50:05 - Johnny Strong of "Operator" 
52:49 - Staying Busy & Future Plans 
55:20 - Mutt Misfits 

Hinder website:
http://hindermusic.com

Mutt Misfits website:
http://muttmisfits.com

Chuck Shute website:
http://chuckshute.com

Transcript

Unknown: 0:12

Yes,

Chuck Shute: 0:13

this is what I love to do I get to tell Cody Hanson, the drummer from Hendrick get to tell the band story I get to tell his story. But I'm also learning new stuff about this band. And I think this is a good interview that fans of hinder diehard fans of hinder will enjoy. And also, if you've never heard of hinder, or you weren't a fan before, I hope after hearing this interview, Will you at least check out their music and more than just the lips of an angel song? Because they really have a great catalogue. And we're going to go through the band's history. And Cody has some great stories and opinions on things and I really appreciated his openness and honesty. Like he gave me his opinion on the trap singer. He's a really cool Nick Mar story. He tells me which talk show host was maybe not the friendliest guy and you also hear a touring story that puts Ozzy snorting dance and licking Pistorius shame. So, you're gonna want to pay attention to this one. Have fun listening. I know I did. Welcome Cody Hansen to the podcast from drummer of hinder co founder drummer and songwriter I found I didn't realize you've written a lot of these songs.

Cody Hanson: 1:21

Yeah, man. I mean, you know, since the very beginning, that's, that's just kind of been our thing. Right. So, you know, over the years, it's kind of developed into production and, you know, mixing and mastering and, and, you know, pretty much the whole deal. So, yeah,

Chuck Shute: 1:37

yeah, that's awesome. Yeah, cuz it's, it's not as cut. There's so many drummers that just literally just play the drums and they don't even know how to write music, right.

Cody Hanson: 1:46

Yeah, you know, I've never really considered myself to be like one of those, like, drummer drummer, guys, you know, what I mean? Like, you know, I don't really keep up with who's to, you know, out there and, like, have, like, you know, a favorite drummer, you know, what I mean? Like, I've always kind of taken the approach that's more like, really song based approach, I guess, like, what's best for the song, what's best for, for the band as a whole. And that's kind of always been my approach.

Chuck Shute: 2:14

So how do you write songs that you must play other instruments in the drums then?

Cody Hanson: 2:18

Right? Yeah, do I play guitar? And, you know, I can kind of get around on the piano. I wouldn't say that. I can play the piano. But you know, I like, I know how to, you know, create, create chords and, you know, good enough to record it. And and if I need to,

Chuck Shute: 2:36

yeah. Okay, so you kind of have a musical family background. Your grandfather was a bluegrass musician. Is that right? Yeah,

Cody Hanson: 2:43

yeah, he lived in South Dakota. And every time when my grandma would come down, he'd always bring, you know, an extra guitar. And of course, I didn't know how to play it back then. But we'd always, you know, sit around and write little goofy kid songs about, you know, pigs and ducks or whatever, you know, whatever it may be. And I think that's probably where I, I got interested in music. Ah, okay. And then you you have some really eclectic influences, like 70s and 80s, and 90s. Rock, but also country, and gangster rap. I mean, they're all over the place. I think that's cool. Yeah, man. Yeah, growing up, I was really into like, I was really into Buddy Holly and Jimi Hendrix and bad company. And then, you know, as you mentioned, you know, gangster rap. I had older siblings, he said that they were really into gangsta rap at the time. You know, that's where I picked that up. And yeah, man, and growing up in Oklahoma, you have to have country roots. Right, right. Yeah. So yeah, man, I mean, I'm pretty much all over the place. And and it's, it makes it interesting, you know, in the writing process, because, you know, you can always find ways to use certain influences, you know, you can you can pick one thing from, you know, from this genre, and one thing from over here and kind of, you know, put it all together and make it one cohesive thing,

Chuck Shute: 4:11

which is pretty cool. No, that's really cool. Did your parents did your parents let you listen to NWA cuz I had to hide mine and a blank tape and write new kids on the block on it.

Cody Hanson: 4:20

Yeah, man. It's really weird. Like I was my wife just, like blown away by that as well. She's always asking me that. And I don't really remember, like, ever having rules on what I could and couldn't listen to, you know, I just think I just kind of, maybe just like, Did my own thing and listen to it in my room and nobody ever really paid attention. I don't really know. But

Chuck Shute: 4:42

would you? Would you let your kids Listen, NWA? Well, I don't. There's a good reason why I don't have kids. There you go. That's a good answer. I like that. Yeah. Okay, gotcha. So you and Joe Garvey, the guitarist. You meet the original singer of hinder you guys met at a party. And I think most people may know the story of how you came up with the name hinder you guys were frustrated looking for a name. So you look it up in the dictionary hinder it's like if or thesaurus or whatever. Were there other names that you consider though before you decided on Tinder? Was there anything that someone had thrown out?

Cody Hanson: 5:21

Not that I can remember, man, we were, you know, it was really it was really frustrating, obviously, you know, we, we just like, looked and looked and looked and nothing made sense. And then, you know, I think we were just to that point where, you know, we looked up frustrated, as you said in the Saurus, who's back, he was back in the day whenever people actually still had books.

Chuck Shute: 5:44

Right?

Cody Hanson: 5:45

in their house, right. So at my parents house where we practiced and pulled it off the shelf and opened it up. And it was like, hey, that word looks looks kind of cool. Like, sure. Let's Let's go in. I like it. I love the show. And when played it, I mean, probably that weekend. It was really quick. Okay,

Chuck Shute: 6:03

and so then this is cool. I never heard of this thing. Do they still do this? The Oklahoma March band goodness. And they and you guys made it to the final four. And then you lost to this band called Falcon five. Oh, that I've never even heard of what happened in that band?

Cody Hanson: 6:18

I don't know, to be honest. You know, it was it. That was one of those deals, man. It was really, you know, it was a really big deal around Oklahoma City. It was like the the radio station that put it on is gone. But they would put it on every year. And it was one of those deals where we had in Oklahoma City, we had built a pretty massive fan base. So we ended up playing right before this this band. And our fan base was known for being really rowdy. So you know, we played and it was packed you know, people were going crazy. And then this this other band played and most of most of the people kind of cleared out and of course when they won the contest are our fans way. They were crazy. They were ready to fight everybody. It was a it was kind of a big deal at the time I guess but to be honest man that that that Falcon five Oban, they had a pretty catchy little, little pop rock song at the time. I can't remember what it was something like, dirty girl are one of those catchy little phrases or whatever. So I guess it kind of makes sense. Okay,

Chuck Shute: 7:29

well, that's cool. I think I thought this was really interesting. So you guys are a young band, you're not signed to a record label yet. And what you did is you took all the money that you made from the shows, and you put it back into the band for advertising and expenses, and you save money to record your debut EP, I think that's so smart. Because how many bands I mean, I talk to musicians all the time, I would think a lot of them probably just waste their money on drugs or booze or whatever. Like, whose idea was to like, Hey, guys, let's take this money that we make. And let's put it back into the that's a very business savvy kind of mentality.

Cody Hanson: 8:01

Well, yeah, I mean, for me, honestly, like, I was going to school for business. And, you know, I wasn't even looking to be in a band, to be honest, I, I kind of quit playing music. Oh, and so, you know, whenever we we met and just kind of started started, you know, to practice or play around, whatever. You know, I kind of immediately just just kind of approached it as, as a business, you know, like, once I, once I realized that the songs really, they were kind of cool, you know, I had

Unknown: 8:34

a

Cody Hanson: 8:35

whole new new sound force, they changed, you know, by the time that that we, you know, released their commercial release. But, you know, I thought that the, the original material had some some serious potential. So, you know, for me, I always just kind of approached it as a business and, you know, as a, I don't know, as a marketing opportunity, really, I mean, that's, you know, that was that was kind of my background as well to go to school for so I really enjoyed that. And, you know, we were like you said, I mean, I think we were pretty smart about it, you know, it paid off and here we are a million years later

Chuck Shute: 9:11

in years. Yeah, so that'd be that EP far from close. You guys recorded six songs now for made the cut but two didn't. But I always wondered about this kind of thing. The two songs that didn't make it there on YouTube. So what happens without like these demos, these these unreleased tracks, they always get leaked. Who does that? Do you guys know? Who does that? Or do you have a theory? Or is it just like a total mystery? Like how many people have copies of these demos?

Cody Hanson: 9:37

Dude, I this is the first time I'm hearing about this. Oh, really? I know the songs were online. I'm gonna have to go I don't even know what they were. I'll have to go check them out.

Chuck Shute: 9:45

That's what I heard. I didn't check myself. Yeah, cuz I don't know. But I just, I always wonder with stuff like that. Like, I'm sure you guys have other stuff, bootlegs and things that are that are online on YouTube and stuff somewhere. I didn't know if you knew, like how many people get copies of demos and stuff like that. Even when you're a major label act, how many people have access to that, I would think would be very strictly locked down.

Cody Hanson: 10:07

Yeah, yeah, I don't I don't know. You know, I remember. I remember at one point and I don't know if it was that particular little demo or EP or whatever you want to call it, but I remember you heard that being 12 stones? No. Oh, well, they had so they were best known I guess for their their singer was on that. Call Bring me the life that Evanescence track

Chuck Shute: 10:33

Oh, yeah.

Cody Hanson: 10:35

Okay, so, so Paul McCoy. They're, they're sitting here was, you know, like I said, that's kind of how, at least at least, that's how they came into the mainstream telco. I remember they came through, came through and played a show at UCLA, which is where blower, I went to college together. And I remember approaching that band. At that point, we were so excited to go and give them a demo. And, you know, thinking that and as long as we can get our, you know, our demo in the hands of this band, you know, everything will be fine. they'll, they'll take it and do whatever with it. You know, we we were stupid, of course, but you know, I remember I remember doing that. I remember taking one up to two that the band Chevelle. Yeah. So their bass player, - we went to a Chevelle show, and he was signing some stuff after, after the show. And I remember we took him our very first like, album. And I remember handing it to him, and I was like, "Hey, man, we're not expecting anything out of this. We don't want you to do anything with it. But we wanted to give you our CD. Just in case you guys get bored on the bus one night, and you want something new to listen to? We worked really hard on it. Here it is." And at first, he was like, "No, man, I can't take it. I can't accept that. I'm like, okay, man, if you want to listen to it, cool, man. It's fine. Just take it. And so I remember he took it, and we sat around for a second. And he turned around to walk off to go back to the bus or wherever. And there's a trashcan there, just right in front of us just throw in the trash can.

Chuck Shute: 12:24

oh, man, I just like break your heart or why I say this or break your heart or why like, I would be crushed. If someone did that dude

Cody Hanson: 12:33

at the time. It certainly it certainly did. And I was just thinking to myself, like, you know, even if, you know, I know bands, obviously Now I know that, you know, they get approached with with stuff like that a lot. But man, I was just thinking, you know, what, kind of what kind of asshole does something like that right in front of people, you know, like, you know, Ben is so excited and spent their money to come and see you. And you know, they were so we were so excited to give it to him. And then I felt like it was just he intentionally wanted to like, I don't know, just just degrade us. I guess right there in front of everybody.

Chuck Shute: 13:12

And this was this was the singer of Chevelle or no,

Cody Hanson: 13:15

I think it was their I think it was their bass player base. Okay, which I wish you know, I think he might have been might have fired him

Chuck Shute: 13:21

later. He might be sending you a demo soon to help you get some help. So do do so do a lot of bands. Reach out to you guys, you get that a lot where bands meet you and your demo tapes or business cards? Yeah.

Cody Hanson: 13:36

Yeah. Quite a bit. Yeah. Yeah. Well, you know, because we've always been really accessible. You know, like, after shows, you know, anytime there's, there's a bar around, you know, shows, we'll go inside and, you know, just have drinks and, you know, meet as many people as we can and just try to try to get to know people. Yeah, so that's part of the fun of doing this, you know, you know, without those people paying for, for tickets, you know, we wouldn't, we wouldn't be able to do it. So, we always we always think it's pretty cool to go out and you know, mingle and talk to people and get to know them. And

Chuck Shute: 14:09

so do you guys do the the paid meet and greet center?

Cody Hanson: 14:13

Yeah, we do those as well. I mean, yeah, a lot of people like that, you know, a lot of people that don't want to take the time to stick around after, after a show. You know, they like to have that like really like private one on one time. So and that's how we most of the time when we can we do our meet and greets we, you know, we'll have people come on the bus and we'll just sit down and you know, maybe have a beer or whatever and, you know, just kind of have a have a real conversation. We try not to do the whole thing where we just rush it through and you know, take a photo and just move along. You know, we try to take our time with it. But when we can, you know, it's not always possible if there's too many people, but we would try.

Chuck Shute: 14:56

That's cool. That's good. But then if people wait and they just go to the bar next door, you'll meet them for free. Dude, I shouldn't have said that. That's cool. That's cool. So extreme behavior, your major label debut. 2005. So how long has it been? Since when you started? To where you got the major label? How long did it take you to get there? How many years was that?

Cody Hanson: 15:22

So we started in 2001. Okay. And then I think we, I think we signed our deal. In 2004. Okay, my, wow, pretty terrible.

Chuck Shute: 15:36

No, that's so that, yeah, that's approximate. So it's like three or four years. I mean, that's pretty you move guys move pretty quick. And I think probably a lot of that's because, like you said, you're putting money back into the band, like a business and advertising and all that kind of thing. That's really smart.

Cody Hanson: 15:50

It went really fast. To be honest, you know, like, you know, we were, you know, we put our focus into, like, the female fan base at first. So I'm kind of given our way of giving away some secrets to to any local bands out there.

Chuck Shute: 16:04

How do you? How do you focus on female? Do you take shirtless pictures and stuff or

Cody Hanson: 16:09

got nobody want to see that? weed, right, write songs that were kind of geared toward females Anyway, you know, songs that that women would like to listen to. But when we, you know, we would go around to, you know, to sororities and, you know, go in and talk to them, and, and, you know, we hand out flyers to, you know, all the best looking to all females, but Well, yeah,

Chuck Shute: 16:39

cuz if you can get the females to come, the guys want to go where the females are, right? Do what, so if you can get the females to come, the guys want to be where the females are. So

Cody Hanson: 16:48

actly, right, yeah. So every time we would play, everybody would always know where we were, you know, every other Friday night, we were at the same place. And then, you know, it was just there be literally I'm not lying, there would be a line a mile long of people waiting to get in. And, you know, people couldn't get in until somebody left, you know, it was like the hot spot to be in Oklahoma City, you know, every other Friday night. And then eventually, we got to the point where we're like, okay, we don't, you know, we don't want to be known always as this, this little bar band. So, we, we stopped doing that. And we would just, we would go rent a building, you know, somewhere a big building. And we would, you know, spend money on production, big stage, big library, pa the whole deal. We would spend money on on radio ads. And we'd really make sure that the, you know, the messaging and the ads was, was geared to make us look bigger than we were. And this

Chuck Shute: 17:54

is all before you got signed. Yeah. Yeah. That's amazing.

Cody Hanson: 17:59

Yeah, it was really cool. It was really cool, man. You know, like, when you're your local bands, you know, you've never had anything on the radio, you know, and people are coming, you know, you can sell out 750 to 1000. Cap rooms. You know, that's a pretty big deal. And at the time, we were, we were doing all our own ticketing all our own everything, basically. So everything that came through the door, you know, we were getting it, we were keeping it and then we can reinvest with the next show.

Chuck Shute: 18:32

So I can do a hinder show at this point. And you or Austin or blower is taking my ticket and then doing all this stuff.

Cody Hanson: 18:39

Well, we weren't taking tickets, but you But yeah, well, it would have been somebody from you know, friends or okay. Yeah,

Chuck Shute: 18:45

people have been out.

Cody Hanson: 18:47

Yeah, we, we went as far as to have like we, you know, had our own like, credentials or, you know, backstage passes, we had our own life. We are a group of our friends with like hinder security shirts. And deal man, we did the whole thing. And it was it was really neat, man, we shall save this. We fooled a lot of people, which I think probably led to us getting our record deal.

Chuck Shute: 19:13

Well, there you go. Fake it till you make it. I've heard that it seemed to work really well. And obviously you guys are talented. So that major label debut. This is a question I had. I could not find the answer to this. I don't even know if you know the answer. But there's a rumor there was a rumor that the model on the cover is actress Katherine Heigl, but it's not it's supposed to be a cover from a sex book. And then you just change the laundry or something who is the model? People were trying? There was an article on loudwire in 2018. And they didn't know who it was and they're like trying to figure it out. Do you even know? No, I don't. It's like,

Cody Hanson: 19:48

like huge assholes. We were actually going out telling everybody that it was Katherine Heigl because we thought it was from our table actually told us that it was Katherine Heigl. So We're just going around, like, just lying to everybody, you know, like, I don't know, I thought that was pretty

Chuck Shute: 20:06

hilarious. So, like the record label, pick that picture and they must have been on the up and up and got the rights for it or whatever. And did it legit, right? Yeah, absolutely. Okay. Okay, so I can't not bring up lips of an angel. I'm not doing my job. I don't know what we can say. But obviously, the songs huge is I know if there's anything we can say about it that hasn't been said before. Is there anybody that I'm, like, really famous person or like a hero of yours that reached out and told you how much they love that song and kind of blew you away?

Cody Hanson: 20:38

You know, over the years, I've heard of people, you know, mentioning it or saying something about it, but not, you know, not really that I can that I can think of, you know, anybody in particular. But like I said, My memory is terrible. And you know, we drank a lot of years.

Chuck Shute: 20:58

Do people still bring it up a lot, like cuz I just had the singer of everclear on. And I was asking him about the song father mine, and he said, People bring that up to me every single day. So I was like, Wow, so. So what do you ask him like about lips? People still? Yeah, do do people bring that up to like, oh, that song changed my life or meant so much to me or do yeah, I

Cody Hanson: 21:19

mean, yeah, I mean, daily, pretty much, you know, especially when we're out on the road. But it's funny, man. Like, more often than not, they they mess up the title. It's always like that, you know, you know, kiss from an angel or like, really? lips Angel lips song. It's fine.

Chuck Shute: 21:44

You correct them or you just let it go? Man, I'm not anymore. It's like whatever. Yeah, thanks. Cool. So the next album tickets a little limit. You know, unless there's a problem with I think the public perception of you guys is like a lot of people just know you for the lips of an angel song but you guys have so many awesome like straight ahead rockers like us, me. And the ticket to the limit song though. I got to ask you about that you got to meet and collaborate with Mick Mars. I'm a huge Motley Crue fan. I think you guys are as well, right? Yeah, I mean, who's not really, you know? So yeah. Tell me about that experience. What's he like?

Cody Hanson: 22:23

He's like, honestly, one of the nicest dudes of all time. To be honest. It was. It was kind of interesting. You know, we went up to, to his house, you know, up in the up in the hills out in LA or whatever. And we walk into this house, you know, it's this massive house, right? And so we walk in, and you know, this, this young girl answers the door. It looks exactly like what you think Mick Mars would look like. It's like a 20 year old girl. Right? You know, God like black. Like a she looks just like him. Only she's, she's This is

Chuck Shute: 23:01

I'm assuming his daughter? No, it was his girlfriend. Oh.

Cody Hanson: 23:08

Yeah, right. So anyway, so we walk in and we're like, we look around and the house is like, totally empty. I mean, like, nothing in it at all. Is the movie or do what

Chuck Shute: 23:23

is he moving or what's going on?

Cody Hanson: 23:24

Well, so he comes out right so well in one room. I can't say it was totally empty one room there was like this, this wall of like, full Marshall stacks. And then there were some plaques like all the Motley Crue plaques like laying on the floor just like laying there in a corner. And there was like, in the kind of the dining room area of the house there was a cat one couch like an old couch just sitting over there in the corner right? And so anyway, and Oh, is that I thought this was really weird. So like, the the Bannister like the staircase, the Bannister all, like, almost every single one of the supports for the handrail. were gone. Right? It was like, there were like two in it. And like he kicked him out, or Yeah, I guess he did. I guess one night that he's like, he said, he came out and he was like, I don't really like those anymore. So he took a sledgehammer. Knock them all out. But Wow, it's so it was so bizarre man like he you know, he came out and we were like, Hey, you know, nice, nice to meet you. You know, like, are you? Are you moving? Or did you just move in? And he's like, no.

Unknown: 24:36

Okay, cool. Well,

Cody Hanson: 24:38

so, yeah, it was it was wild there. And then, you know, we went into his little he had this one little little bedroom, you know, it was downstairs that he used as a studio and, you know, he played us, you know, some of the clips that you know of him doing the solo some of the takes for the song, take it to the limit. And then after, you know, he was like, You Want to hear like the secret to my tone? So we were like, Yeah, sure. So we go in the living room and he's like, he picks up this this pedal. I don't even remember what it was now he's like, this is it, man. So he sits down, he plugs it in, and he turns on those those amps, and I swear to God, like, that was the loudest thing I've ever experienced. And he just like, wrong, you know, just just rips a cord out and it was just like, I don't know, it's like a cartoon where the air is like blowing your way

Chuck Shute: 25:28

back to the future when Marty McFly goes, does the cord and gets blown away by the speaker? Exactly. It

Cody Hanson: 25:34

was it was like that. And it was crazy, you know, and it was, you know, in the middle of the night, you know, and he had neighbors so there's, there's no way they didn't hear it. It was so loud. But I don't know, man, it was a really, really cool experience to get to meet him and, and just see how like, how down to earth he was, you know, and at that time, you know, it was before they had started touring. And, you know, so he just kind of physically wasn't, wasn't in great shape. You know, he wasn't quite as limber. You know, he wasn't moving a lot. So it was kind of it wasn't what I expected. You know, I didn't I didn't really know that at the time. So, but he was, I don't know, man. He was super cool. Super nice guy.

Chuck Shute: 26:17

That's awesome. So then you guys do this Jaeger Meister music tour with trapped and rev theory I just had well not just have a couple months ago, I had Matt McCloskey on from that band. He's so nice. What a cool guy super down to earth. Like you said, Would you ever consider doing a reunion of this tour? or How are you cool the guys in trap? Because I know the singer is rubs some people the wrong way recently with his social media stuff.

Cody Hanson: 26:41

Yeah, I think I would be willing to go out and tour with every band except Trapt. I think that guy's kind of losing it a little bit to be honest with you. And I'm sure I'm gonna get some some heat for that or whatever. But, I just personally I don't I don't really see a need to go around and putting your your political views shoving in everybody's faces, and treating people the way that he treats them. I think it's unnecessary. I don't really like it that he treats people that we're fans of, his band, the way that he treats him. I think it's kind of it's kind of disrespectful, a little bit messed up personally,

Chuck Shute: 27:28

like with the social media stuff or other stuff.

Cody Hanson: 27:31

Yeah, social media stuff. He'll post this thing or whatever. And everybody gets riled up now, right? Everybody's all on it all the time. But it's just the way he reacts to them after the fact. You know, I think I see. I don't think it's necessary, and to be honest our bands share a lot of the same fan base. So a lot of those times when he's disrespecting those people, I feel like he's disrespecting our fan base as well, I still think it's very good for our genre for him to be carrying on that way. So

Chuck Shute: 28:15

it's good point. And I think I think it was Matt or somebody I've interviewed brought up the point that, you know, it's fine for him to have those views. Or maybe now whatever, but at least post them from your personal social media. He was posting them from the bands. And and I think Matt was the one that told me that the other members of the band don't share his same political beliefs. So it really should be his own personal Facebook or Twitter or whatever it was. So

Cody Hanson: 28:39

yeah, exactly. Yeah. That Yeah, that's that's a that's a really good point, man. I do. I do feel bad for for the rest of the gals. That's that's, that's pretty shady.

Chuck Shute: 28:48

Yeah. So the other next time all American nightmare. The title track from this album is so good. It's like a straight ahead, rocker. I think a lot of your music, it's kind of like 80s rock style, but like, you take like a modern twist on it. It doesn't sound like it's from the 80s. But I like kind of hear the influences on a lot of that stuff. Would you agree with that? Yeah, absolutely.

Cody Hanson: 29:09

You know, we've always been, you know, big, big fans of the of 80s rock and the two guys that that we wrote the song with, out in Nashville, a couple a couple of country guys that were they kind of got started as rock guys. And they were, you know, they were really influenced by 80s rock as well. You know, they always loved it. And so, of course, they had had a blast writing the song and then they ended up writing the majority of that album with us, actually, because we just texted it chemistry together. But yeah, Breton, Brad Warren. They're a country project called the Warren brothers today, so you can go and check that out. But man, to be honest, there's some of the most talented songwriters that I've ever had ever written with. Incredible so Wow. And also you

Chuck Shute: 30:01

you co wrote with Jeffrey steel red tail light song tail lights. Yeah. He's like, he's written a lot of songs and collaborated with a lot of artists.

Cody Hanson: 30:11

Honestly, that sounds like that was one of the highlights, I think for me, you know, in my, in my career was getting getting the chance to go and, and write with with Jeffrey steel bed He's like, like how he wasn't the biggest thing in the world as an artist, not only as a songwriter just just blows my mind, you know, he's put out some stuff. You know, some solo a piece of songs, you know, that he's written over the years and his versions man are incredible. His voice is so amazing. And, you know, he's another one of those guys that, you know, when we went to ride with and he just, you know, welcomed us right in and you know, had his cigar in his whiskey. And, you know, he was just like, the most cool down there, dude ever. But yeah, like he said, He's written about a million hits.

Chuck Shute: 31:01

Yeah. Well, then, the next time Welcome to the freak show. Then another one of these collaborations you write with Richard Marx was like, he was a huge 80s pop guy. So that's interesting. Is that somebody that you guys reached out to? Or he reached out to you?

Cody Hanson: 31:17

Um, you know, I'm not really sure how, how that one came about, you know, he makes his rounds out out in Nashville quite a bit. And hello, and everywhere, you know, oh, you know, he's been a he's been a songwriter, you know, outside of his own career for forever, you know? And he's do I mean, it doesn't get any better than than ratioed marks. It's, it's, it was awesome to sit in the room with him and listen to him, you know, seeing parts of the song back while you're writing. I mean, he's just like, he nails every pitch, and it's the first time he's ever saying this melody, you know, and he's just kind of a man. He's incredible in the he's really, he's really funny dude, too, you know, watching social media now. And he's, he's really funny. And

Chuck Shute: 32:01

yeah, he's had some tweets go viral, I think.

Cody Hanson: 32:04

Yeah, yeah. Yeah. My wife is really excited. He retweeted one of her tweets. She's not very active on Twitter. She just reads things or whatever. But she responded to something that he put up. And he retweeted her the other day. And she was, she was pretty excited about it.

Chuck Shute: 32:18

That's cool. So you and you produce that album was not the first time I think that was the first time you produced. And then it's interesting that you had James Michael from 6am mix it? What that's how does that work? Why would you?

Cody Hanson: 32:30

Actually, we actually got we so we actually co produced martial and I got the all American nightmare record with Kevin churko. So that was, that was a huge honor that he allowed us to do that. But yeah, so we went ahead and produce the next album. And yeah, man, and we'd worked with James and he was a really good friend. And and, you know, we, we send it we sent the songs out to man, I don't even know how many different guys probably 10 different big name mixers. And he ended up blowing everybody else out of the water, to be honest with you. He was I mean, he's a he's a really talented guy, you know, as a songwriter, as a performer, obviously. Producer mixer, you know, he's, he's amazing.

Chuck Shute: 33:23

Yeah. So then, and then you when the smoke clears, that's the first one with new singer Marshall Dutton. But he had, again, like he said, he'd already helped you co write and collaborate and produce and all that stuff for you. So that was probably a pretty smooth transition, then.

Cody Hanson: 33:38

Yeah, I mean, obviously, whenever you're making that kind of transition, I mean, it's never, it's never like, smooth. But you know, you know, I think for us, you know, it was the only move that that we could have made at the time, you know, we were going through, you know, so much emotionally and mentally. You know, I just think that at that point, man, like, we just needed to, we needed to be home, you know, what I mean, we needed to be surrounded with, you know, friends and family, and we needed somebody to fill that role that cared about the band, as much as we did, you know, somebody who was going to take it seriously. And somebody that we we knew wasn't going to let us down. And, you know, Marshall was that guy and he's, he's filled that role, you know, for what going on seven years now, so it's been a long time.

Chuck Shute: 34:38

Yeah. So Austin left because there was some drug issues and some are you guys at least amicable now though, or what's the relationship like with him? Yeah, I

Cody Hanson: 34:50

We talk , exchanged text messages every now and again, but I think we hesitate to go back to opening the relationship too much, just because it was such a rough time for us emotionally... I mean, it could have completely crippled all of us financially and not just us, but our families, our crew members.... we carry a pretty big crew and support them as well. So, yeah, it was a pretty big deal for us, it was pretty difficult. So it was a lot of a lot of anxiety surrounding that. We obviously wish him well and don't ever want anything bad to happen to him, or anything like that. It's just that I think that we're not... that we want to get too close and certainly

Chuck Shute: 35:52

You're not looking to do a reunion is what you're saying,

Cody Hanson: 35:55

That's exactly it

Chuck Shute: 35:57

That was the very long winded turnout for a long time ago. No, no, I like I just gonna let you like speak your mind. So and then I think this is this your most recent album, The rain? 2017 Yeah. Okay, so that song loser salute. I just love that title that like when I saw the album, I was like, I'm going through your discography I'm looking at on with all the music. And that's that one. I love the song too. It's like a slow build and then it kicks in. It's a catchy chorus and just again such a great title who or what inspired that song? Is that a fictional or is that true story? No, I

Cody Hanson: 36:33

think you know, it's just one of those songs that that you know, Marshall, I were sitting around. And you know, we just have the concept for and we thought it was really cool and really funny. And that's actually that's actually it may be my favorite track on the album, but it's

Chuck Shute: 36:51

mine too.

Cody Hanson: 36:52

Yeah, it's one that like never really caught on you know, it was it was I think it was the last track on the yes

Chuck Shute: 36:57

make Yeah,

Cody Hanson: 36:58

so I don't know if most people have the attention span to make it that far. anymore. So yeah, like it really got overlooked. But you know, we had a really great time doing the production for that song. Either you can hear like you know, like little sound effects and things like you know, there was a time we you know, we put a bunch of beer bottles and trash on the floor just we kicked it over and you know,

Unknown: 37:25

oh really? I

Chuck Shute: 37:26

didn't even notice that. We used all these like laughs to go back Yes, it's subtle cuz I don't remember hearing those parts.

Cody Hanson: 37:35

Yeah, it's all pretty subtle. Okay, I think it's a lot of things that unless you know it's there you may not you know, you may not notice it like a lot of stuff in the background where like, you can just imagine this drunk guy stumbling through his like shitty apartment and so on the trashcan right? You're hearing like in the background? You know?

Chuck Shute: 37:58

I have to go back and listen to That's awesome. And then you guys did a cover recently you didn't do a full album we did a cover the Eagles life in the fast lane. It looks like you've done some fun covers. Do you like to play the covers live because I love when bands surprise me with the covers. And I think I saw I don't know if this is really I read this on the internet but did you guys want to do a cover of skid rose you've gone wild?

Cody Hanson: 38:20

Yeah, we did. We didn't do it very long though. back I can't remember. I think it was probably a pretty challenging some to saying live show. Yeah, we loved playing that song. That was that was a lot of fun. But yeah, the the Eagles track man, we you know, it was just one of those things. I'll sit around one day and I was I was actually learning trying to learn the riff and I had an acoustic guitar and all sudden I just started like, not really paying attention to what I was doing. But I was just playing this like, I don't know like dark minor you know version of of it of the riff. And I just had a had the idea to do it. So I took it to Marshall and we went in and tracked it and you know, the rest of the guys seem to love it. So yeah, we started playing alive. And you know, it went over really well. Man. It was like I said, it's a real it's a real like, dark take on the song I think so. A little heavier lyrics. The lyrics are really are really kind of are really kind of dark, you know, when you think about it. So, I mean, it kind of kind of lends itself to that. You know, I mean, it kind of makes sense with the with the song with the lyrics.

Chuck Shute: 39:30

No, that's really cool. I noticed that with some of your songs that you released as singles. They didn't make it as big in the US they made it bigger in Australia like the songs or is it just me and making it hard? Do you guys have like a like a pretty big fan base on Australia. You know, it's funny, I

Cody Hanson: 39:48

mean, I guess we do, but we can't seem to ever make it back over there really been twice and you know, for whatever reason, you know, we really want to go back but we Can't seem to can't seem to do it. But a funny story is I actually had Marshall and I we co wrote a country song with some of the guys from from Jason Albion's band called you got to me. And that ended up being a number one country song in Australia.

Chuck Shute: 40:18

Oh, really? Yes. Which guy's from his bank? I had rich Redmond on isn't he? Isn't he the drummer for digit? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, it was. It was it was rich. I love him. He's so nice.

Cody Hanson: 40:29

He did. He's awesome. Yeah, he's a he's a good friend. So yeah, they came to the house here in Oklahoma City, when they were playing playing around town. And yeah, we wrote wrote two or three songs on that trip while while they were here, and that was one of them. So yeah, pretty cool. Dude,

Chuck Shute: 40:45

that's really cool. So then yeah, tell me about or tell people about the dangerous hippies band. Because you guys were approached to write a commercial. But you didn't know it didn't want to use the hinder brand, because they wanted more like a black keys kind of sound. And now you kind of did you've done all sorts of stuff with different 1982 was that was this I think the song that sounds kind of black keys, but the other song contagious, contagious, dangerous, that's really Poppy and catchy. And there's, it's kind of like, you have no rules with this band. Right? You can do whatever you want. Yeah, man. Yeah, that's

Cody Hanson: 41:16

kind of what it's been, you know, up to this point, you know, and we have so many songs for it, that we haven't we haven't put out, you know, the concept is going to be we were going to, you know, put it out song by song, you know, whatever, we kind of felt like it. But yeah, we have, you know, more than an albums worth of material already recorded. Just kind of, kind of sitting on the hard drive. Wow. So

Chuck Shute: 41:41

which commercial? Is that song in? Or did it?

Cody Hanson: 41:44

I, you know, I don't I don't think that I've ever actually made it. You know, I just remember writing it and sending it around to to our like publishing team. And everybody was like, Man, this is this is really cool. You know, we really liked this. And now we have something that we knocked out pretty quick. And so we had a lot of fun doing it. So we decided, you know, let's let's just keep, let's just keep doing this. Why not? You know, so, you know, over time, you know that the sound changed, because I guess there's really not a particular sound to that, that project. It's really just kind of all over the place. Yeah. You know, some of its rock some of its pop, some of its bulky some of its, I mean, you know, it's just like, you know, that that's one of those essences, like I was saying earlier, you know, it's really fun as a songwriter that, you know, you can pull, you know, from different influences and kind of put them into one pot and stirred up, right. So we've had, we've had a lot of fun doing now. And we've kind of recently you know, kind of taken a break from from from doing it. You know, Marshall been working on some. He's doing like a guitar album kind of thing right now. It's like, kind of like Joe Satriani kind of, because I don't know if most people know this about Marshall. But he's like, he was originally a guitar player, the guitar player in a band called faction. That's how we met him. But he's like, I mean, he's amazing.

Chuck Shute: 43:12

He's a Satriani type of guitar player. He could do that stuff.

Cody Hanson: 43:15

Yeah. Yeah. He's like, he's and he's on that level. Like, he's, he's literally that good. He's amazing.

Chuck Shute: 43:22

Well, I look forward to that. I love that kind of stuff.

Cody Hanson: 43:25

Yeah. And then so while he was doing, you know, he's been working on that doing that thing. And, you know, I actually started for some weird reason. I don't know why, but I just, I started writing like this, this, like, rock EDP. So I guess I'm going to I wrote, like, you know, six songs, and then did a cover for it. So I think I'm probably going to put that out. Maybe here in the next I don't know, maybe next few weeks.

Chuck Shute: 43:52

Is this like a solo record? or What is this? What? Is this a solo record? or What is this? Yeah, do you think?

Cody Hanson: 43:59

I've never I've never really done it before. You know, I've never I've never done anything like as you know, seeing anything, you know, I've never even attempted it. You know, I've never had never had the the need beyond just writing songs. And you know, just sitting down in my, you know, my studio by myself, you know, I just kind of started started doing it. And, you know, some of the tracks started turning out, you know, I thought they were really cool, you know, and seem to like it and so, you know, I thought I thought I'd just put it out there for fun for people you know, that are that have followed, followed hinder might might kind of enjoy it, you know, so

Chuck Shute: 44:38

yeah, definitely check that out. Cody Hansen, solo EP coming soon. Awesome. That's really neat. So you got to tell me these two you have two that I could find two legendary, amazing road stories that I heard you talk about. The first one is the prosthetic leg story. Tell me tell our listeners. This one. This is classic.

Cody Hanson: 44:59

Yeah, I think until about a million times, but yeah, we were, we were playing this. It was like this festival up in this it was like a ski ski festival or something it was, you know, like up in the mountains. So it was like, you know, snowing outside, obviously. So we're in this big, this big heated tent, like massive tent. And you know, it was packed in there, you know, like, I mean, totally packed and people are all sweaty and gross. And you know, sometimes people just like, throw their random things up on stage for whatever reason, you know, I don't, I don't know. But anyway, so this guy throws his his prosthetic leg up on the stage. And, you know, one of the other guys picks it up, and they're like hitting blower with it because he was always like the prankster guy, right? He was the joke the life of the party all the time. And so he so he was, he's getting kind of pissed. So he, he snags it, and he walks over back to the drum riser. We had his drinks and stuff and he took his vodka and he poured it in there and like, swirl that around real good to get all this skin and stuff.

Chuck Shute: 46:07

Oh, pounds. He just drinks right away. So he's got like, pieces of the guys like, yeah, it's not clean. unhygenic right. No, that's disgusting. Okay, so people think that's disgusting. They better turn this episode off, because now it's about to get really discussed. I don't even know if the story's true. This is almost like, were you like that? I don't I don't believe this story. So you're out on tour with my darkest days. They're opening for you their keyboard player. He's always trying to like outdo everybody. And you guys go out for sushi. Yeah, I'll let you take the rest of the story.

Cody Hanson: 46:44

I don't even know if I remember it. Exactly. But I remember I remember he was like he was Reid the keyboard player. He was he was always the he was pretty much the only one that was always trying to outdo Blower but I can't remember which one of them like one of them felt(ill) Yeah, it was the sushi was disgusting. Okay, we were walking back and one of them got sick and threw up in the spiel. But I mean, a pretty big massive pile of vomit. I can't remember which one did if it was Blower or if it was Reid but one of them walked over and grabbed a handful and ate it.

Chuck Shute: 47:23

Yeah, that's just and that's that puts Ozzie snorting ants and looking pissed to shame. I think that's way worse. To eat a handful. And did he like finish it? Or did he

Cody Hanson: 47:33

die at that point? I don't even know. Like, I wasn't gonna sit around and watch like that, for whatever reason grossed me out.

Chuck Shute: 47:42

For whatever reason, because you're human. Yeah, that's crazy. I'm gonna have to get I think it was you said in the original interview I heard you talking about I think you said it was read that did it. So I'll have to I'll have to get him on here and tell that story. But okay, a couple more questions. I'll let you go. But I know you guys did. You've done some talk shows like he did Craig Ferguson and Conan and Lenin. And I looked it up and I was like, Okay, one of the episodes Samuel Jackson was on the same night. And then I think another time David Spade. Did you have any interactions with those two when you were there? Apparently not. Because I don't I don't remember that. Is it pretty rare to have interactions with those other the other guests on the show? Or? Um,

Cody Hanson: 48:26

maybe I don't, I don't really know. Like, you know, I remember when we did Leno, he was like, the nicest dude ever. He came in and talked to us for a while. He had some ties o Oklahoma. So we had something n common. So we talked to him f r quite a while he was real y awesome. The other dudes n t quite so much. I remember w en we were on Conan, I remember im like, we could hear him SCR AMING at somebody through t e walls... Somebody had pisse him off royally, so he was sc eaming at somebody...

Chuck Shute: 49:06

Conan. Yeah, I was shocking, cuz I cannot picture him being I've never even I can't picture him being mad. Unless it's like he's being funny and pretending to be mad.

Cody Hanson: 49:16

Right? Yeah, that's kind of what I thought too. And maybe somebody had really done something wrong. I have no idea but sure. That was just kind of caught me off guard because like I said it was looks like the nicest dude ever. And maybe he is I don't know. Sure. Sure.

Chuck Shute: 49:29

Well, everybody has a bad day happens.

Cody Hanson: 49:32

That's crazy. Yeah. And actually, I saw one of our crew guys that told me they bumped into Craig Ferguson and he was a total big

Chuck Shute: 49:45

man, do you have those? Besides the Chevelle bass player, whatever. Have you had those kind of interactions where you met people that you thought were really cool, and they just were total dick to you and there must happen.

Cody Hanson: 49:56

No, yeah, I mean, it definitely definitely happens. For the most part, I mean most most of the people are pretty cool. I remember there was this one band though, that that we toured with. We're doing this this tour called the Mad Packers tour. We're going around playing these these colleges, this business sponsored, so it was called, but anyway, this band called like, I think they were called operator. And they were signed to Atlantic. And they were opening the shows and the singer was like this like UFC guy, you know, and so he's always walking around with a shirt off and like, thinking he was like, the coolest thing ever. Right? And we would always catch him like, he was the biggest prick, but we'd always catch him like, you know, the bottoms of tour buses. They're their mirror, right? So he can you can, you know, you can see the reflection, we always catch him out, like in front of our bus like

Unknown: 51:00

looking at him looking at himself.

Chuck Shute: 51:04

Oh, I love your impersonation. That was great. Yeah.

Cody Hanson: 51:14

He, he ended up like, he would go on stage and like, talk shit on us and bashes and stuff. Yeah, it was great. Actually, I think I think the rep there you guys might have been out on that, too. But anyway, um, and he ended up like, he like through, he took like something from the stage and like, threw it down into the crowd and broke some little girl's arm and, like, he was like, out of control, just like, he wasn't, he wasn't like drunk or anything. He's like a big meathead guy, right? But like,

Chuck Shute: 51:44

oh, maybe roids, maybe they were maybe he was on roids.

Cody Hanson: 51:49

He maybe maybe set a winner we ended up having to call him in. And I think we ended up picking them off the tour. I'm not from not mistaken. I was like, that's like, really the only, I mean, really bad blood that we've ever, ever had anybody we pretty much get along with, or we try to, you know, be with everybody. We're pretty pretty laid back.

Chuck Shute: 52:09

Well, and also, like, aren't some of those people that are kind of more, you know, kind of dickheads they kind of just keep to themselves anyways, right? They're not going to come in to your dressing room and stuff, because they don't want to they're just maybe more introverted or whatever.

Cody Hanson: 52:23

Yeah, most of the time, you know, yeah, most of the time, we actually like, we tend to get more offended when people don't come and hang out with us, you know, if people don't want to come on our bus and you know, just walk on and then act like it's their house, too. You know, we, we really like to, for people to be social and, you know, have drinks with us or whatever. So, well, that's awesome. It's about man building relationships.

Chuck Shute: 52:47

That's very cool. I know what you get. We'll wrap this up here because I know you're very busy man. I was like, listing all the things you're doing you got a production business, you're flipping houses, you know, you want to travel you got to hinder you got your frickin solo record, and you spend a lot of time working on music from morning to late at night. How do you find all the time to do all this stuff? Like are you just super busy all the time?

Cody Hanson: 53:09

I try to stay stay busy. Yeah, man. I mean, obviously, like lately, you know, with, you know, the whole pandemic thing, you know, we weren't doing a lot. So, you know, for me, I just kind of got in a schedule. And I think that's how the whole like EP thing came about really is, like, I'm just gonna schedule or I wake up, like, for whatever reason, I wake up at like, 730 to let my dogs out. So I just got to, you know, like, make my way down to the studio and just kind of just kind of start messing with stuff, you know, and, you know, some days I'll get an idea and that's, you know, that's the start of a of a song you know, or some days you know, I'll get far into a song and then I'll just go you know, what, I kind of I kind of think this sucks, you know, and so I'll just throw it away and move on. But yeah, just try to try to make it a schedule. This is like a scheduled as possible. I guess

Chuck Shute: 54:02

that's smart. And then so do you guys have any future plans? I think I only saw like five tour dates for hinders or is there more going on the horizon? or? Yeah, no, we

Cody Hanson: 54:11

just we just just announced we have two dates coming up in June at the end of this month. And then we have like five weeks in July and August. So I think we start there start on the 20 last the first year, but we started with 26 in and that is in I don't remember but we started 26th of July and we ended I think on the 26th of August is that

Chuck Shute: 54:42

is that on the website? I missed that I thought I was looking at the website on tour dates and I was like I'm not seeing a lot and maybe they're just not on the website yet.

Cody Hanson: 54:49

Yeah, they may not be on the website yet. Okay, I need to fix so but yeah, yeah, they're they're up on our on our socials. You can you can find the admin at school. Okay.

Chuck Shute: 54:59

Are you coming to Do you know if you're coming to Phoenix? I don't believe we are dammit. Okay, well, if you're close and maybe I'll drive to drive to Vegas or California or something like that. Oh, man, that'd be awesome.

Cody Hanson: 55:11

Okay, just hit me up and let me know. And I'll you know, I'll make sure you you don't have any tickets or whatever you need.

Chuck Shute: 55:17

Okay, thanks, man. That's awesome. And then I like to end each episode with a charity. I don't know, if there's one you want to just give a quick shout out to or something that's near and dear to your heart.

Cody Hanson: 55:26

Yeah, man. So, you know, my wife and I are really big into. We love animals. You know, that's our thing. So there's, there's this, there are several around Oklahoma City to do really great things. But one in particular that we really like is called Mutt misfits. Okay. They kind of they take in, I mean, they take in a lot. But, you know, I think that how they started is they take they were taking in animals that, you know, had, like deformities or you know, things that would people might not, you know, that might make them undesirable to people for whatever reason, or what a

Chuck Shute: 56:07

great cause I

Cody Hanson: 56:08

love this. Yeah, man. I think it's, I think it's one lady that does it. And they do such amazing work. So she's, she's got a huge chart. So okay.

Chuck Shute: 56:19

I will put their website in the show notes along with the hinder website, and people can check it out for tour dates and follow you on social media. Awesome, man. All right. Yeah. Thanks for doing this. A lot of fun. Yeah. All right. Talk to you later. All right. Well, I really enjoyed this episode. Cody is a class act and a super cool guy. So do yourself a favor. And if you haven't listened to hinders music, just go check out some of their other thought songs on Spotify or YouTube. And tell me it's not great stuff like, not just the lips of an angel song, the other stuff and I also love his side project. Dangerous hippies. Check that out as well. And we'll have to keep a lookout for his solo project. It sounds intriguing for sure. So their websites in the show notes along with the tour dates and social media links, everything you need. My website is in there as well along with my social media links, if you want to support the show, your likes, comments and shares all help out and I appreciate it. I had a lot of people reach out to me recently and tell me they enjoy the show. And I'm extremely grateful for all those messages. And I hope I never never become one of those guys that turns into a dick to people. So I appreciate you all hope you have a great rest of your day. And remember, shoot for the moon.