(strums guitar) - All right.

I ain't done this one yet.

So if this is the room, this is where it happens.

- [Chris] We're here for the Wild West Songwriters Festival.

What makes this event so special is the songwriters rounds, where we get to sit down with a room full of people that care, not only about hearing the song, but they care about hearing the story behind it.

The silence is heavy.

- [Tiffany] I remember when I was little, I was like, there's no way these people were legit, like, they wouldn't come to South Dakota.

And then, I remember the year that Caylee Hammack came, and I saw her sing Small Town Hypocrite, and the next, like the year after that, she was like huge and on the radio everywhere and opening for Chris Stapleton and people like that.

And so then I was like, this is legit.

- And I love playing writer's rounds and it's, I don't get to do it a lot anymore.

You know, I'm so much in the studio and writing, still working, so, for me, it's fun.

- [Danny] Here's the way it developed.

Years ago in seventies and eighties, it used to be that you would find frequently, like in backyards all over Nashville, what they call guitar pools.

And what that basically is, is kind of like Laurel canyon in the sixties and seventies, where songwriters and artists would be hanging out in the backyard, and somebody gets out a guitar, and somebody plays a new song they wrote a couple of days ago, and they just hand the guitar to the next person.

And he or she plays a song they wrote last week, and blah, blah, blah, blah.

So this lady named Amy Kurland, started the Bluebird Cafe in Nashville, built around doing these kind of shows.

So the Bluebird Cafe is about the size of this living room.

It's not very big.

And so what she ended up doing is putting the chairs, facing each other, four chairs facing each other.

And the songwriters would play that way.

And all the crowd is around us.

So we were playing in the round, and you take turns just like in the guitar pool.

- Sometimes I think we just, you know, we go through life and we change and we evolve and we forget some things that really make us who we are.

Especially when you're on the road every day and you're chasing a dream and you know, you kind of, it's good to slow down and anyway, I was grateful for the pandemic, 'cause it made me slow down, and I started listening through my old songs and I read this poem by Paulo Coelho, that was called "The Lesson of the Butterfly" in it.

And it talks about how this butterfly, that's flying through cocoon.

This guy's like walking through a forest, and he sees this cocoon hanging, and he's watching this butterfly struggle, and he feels really bad for it.

And so he gets a pair of scissors and he's like, "Oh, if I cut open the hole, maybe the butterfly will just fly out free, and he can stop struggling."

And unfortunately, he does that, and the butterfly falls to the ground with underdeveloped wings and it's never able to fly.

And, that kind of hit home for me in a weird way, cause I was like, "Wow, maybe this struggle is the most important part to getting your new wings."

And I think we forget that sometimes.

So kind of channeled that into a song and ended up with this one, (guitar riff) All right, it goes like this.

(upbeat guitar music) ♪ Whoo ♪ ♪ Whoo ♪ ♪ Whoo ♪ - You kind of get to hear a chance to really be an audience and listen to them as they perform and show you their art.

A lot of times when you're just gigging, you're the background noise.

So this is a huge draws just to get to really know the artists and get to know their songs and why they wrote 'em.

- [Tim] We're constantly learning as songwriters.

I actually grew up as a guitar player, a session guitarist.

So I played, you know, session guitar in a little bit different records.

And then that sort of led me to writing my own songs.

And I think when you play cover gigs, it teaches you a lot about what people want to hear and you know, people wanna enjoy themselves as well.

And you know, music's, it's supposed to make people happy, just as much as it's supposed to evoke an emotion, or a sadness or you know, some form of hurt, but being a cover artist has taught me a lot about how to present myself to people, you know.

- There's something I think far more genuine when you strip everything down to just the artists and their guitar.

You know, this is how the song came to life.

When it first started was just us with a guitar and you get to kind of hear that before it becomes full grown, you know.

And you get to pull it back.

And a lot of people really like that.

- When you can really hone in on finding that space with you and that acoustic guitar or you and a piano, whatever it is that you end up playing, I think there's something to be said for that intimacy that you can't get with the other thing, That thing's loud and attractive and fun.

But I think the best route that I have found for myself that I love, love, love, is being able to exchange it with that little bit of sound and those words clearly being heard, and the reaction, kind of being face to face, right there in front of you.

So I love that still, but I have a new love for being able just to sit down on the stage with an acoustic guitar and be able to translate that communication in music.

- [Kevin] It's an insight into their minds.

And it's an insight into what constitutes a song that you might know and love, or one you've never heard, but to actually hear the backstory behind it, I think is so interesting and so cool.

And to have it with the backdrop of Deadwood, you're not gonna beat that.

- [Ben] You know, the gold hunting, the hunting for gold is something that we do on a daily.

You know, whether it's an idea or a chord or a melody or a lyric, we're doing the same thing.

We're hunting for gold.

- This town is an amazing venue with all the casinos and restaurants and the hotels.

We got everything that say Austin does, but just in the little package.

And I think that's what makes it even more attractive.

That it's a small intimate setting.

- It's one of those little magical towns in our country that I was aware of it.

I'd seen the HBO show and I'm a fan of like, you know, old Western culture.

But you just don't know till you get out here and the people are really magical.

I love being near the Black Hills and the native American culture.

It's really incredible place.

- I think that there are certain towns that are meant for music and Deadwood's one of 'em, - [Bridgette] There's something to say about this country music coming to this place, marrying that with the wild west.

So I could talk about Deadwood till I'm blue in the face.

It's one of the most special places that I have been.

Deadwood, South Dakota has some open arms for some real country music to land here and be played.

They're are ghosts walking these streets and I feel like they come in every now and then, check us out.

(Bridgette laughs maniacally) - [Heath] It rings when you play it here, especially.

It's interesting 'cause I moved here from Omaha in 2008, and Omaha has got a pretty good artsy, music scene.

Back then they did and it's only grown.

And I keep thinking about, had I not moved up here, what would be different?

And I don't think I would've been doing any of this.

South Dakota really for me became like the ground that I was able to get creative.

I feel confident enough to put my own stuff out there.

- [Chris] Oftentimes it feels like kind of an Oasis.

I think it's so valuable to be able to improve yourself here because then yeah, you can take it to other places, and people will be blown away, and they'll ask, you know, "Geez, where did you come from?

South Dakota?

Oh, there's people there?

You know."

Yeah, there's people here and they're good at what they do.

- [Heath] We've got some hidden gems in South Dakota for sure.

The first thing people do when they want to develop their creativity, is they think they need to move, you know and, I have the exact opposite mindset.

I think South Dakota is a perfect place to get opportunities where you're not a small fish in a big pond, you know.

You can really shine and highlight, and develop far easier than I think you can anywhere else.

There's less competition.

And the competition we have up here, we're all supportive of each other, you know.

So we're not really competing, you know.

We're just helping everyone get better.

- I think the steps you take to become who you're gonna be, is what makes you who you are, and be proud of that.

Be proud of the steps you gotta take to get there and the grind you gotta do.

'Cause I'm proud of my grind and they can't deny the grind.

- You know, I think, it's always been an interesting thing with songwriters because you know, we are the, I don't wanna say it like the talent behind the artist, 'cause obviously, those artists are incredibly talented.

But the initial creation sort of comes from us and we're used to being like, you know, behind the scenes people.

And so number one, I love the way that doing these songwriter festivals lets us spotlight ourselves a little bit as artists.

At the same time, from a marketing perspective, it's really tough to market because you know, everybody who loves Jason Aldean knows the song, "She's country," but they don't know that Danny Myrick wrote it.

So if you were saying, Jason Aldean is playing down here, you would have a pile of people waiting, right?

But you announce that I'm playing and they have no idea, but it gives us an opportunity to kind of have the stage and have a little spotlight on us for a minute.

- You know, the difference between, before I got songs to people and I didn't is I came to town and I started writing songs that I thought other people wanted.

And then it was just like, dead in the water, nothing was happening.

And then I started writing songs for myself, but obviously trying to make 'em as good as I could, and put 'em with a hook and make sure there was a twist and that's when they started cutting them.

When I wrote 'em for myself, that's when they wanted 'em, you know, they want what you got, not what I think they want.

- I mean, as far as starting as a songwriter, I guess I had a really a weird experience on a school bus.

I heard this song called "Don't take the Girl", by Tim McGraw, when I was a young kid on a school bus, and I was able to like copy and paste my life into that life, that was being portrayed in the song.

And it seemed like, I don't know, it seemed like, time stopped for about three and a half minutes.

And about three and a half minutes later, I was a disaster.

And I was just trying to figure out what happened to me.

So when I write songs, I'm trying to create that experience at least for me.

It's like recreate that moment that I had for the listeners, because that was such a profound moment for me.

So when I write songs, I go into it with that mentality a lot of times, like what can I write that someone else can put themselves into and become the star of that song.

- I started writing songs when I was five years old.

Like I remember writing my first song at five.

And I don't really know what it was, I think I was always drawn to music and creating music and I got my first guitar at 10 and then from there it was just nonstop.

- [Chris] Songwriting for me is, every song is woven with threads from experience in life.

You know, that's what makes up the fabric of the song for me.

I don't know how to write about things that I don't have experience with.

(background chatter) I try to remain as honest as I can' and I put everything into that.

And sometimes I write songs that I really love and other people don't care about.

And sometimes song that I think is a throw away song is something that people hold really close to them.

If I can, I'd like to write both at the same time, because then you can, (plays mouth organ) you use the words as a vehicle for the sound and the rhythm and the lyrics become an instrument in themselves.

- [Tiffany] My best songs are usually written, I would say, like when I'm in the heat of the moment or something.

But I usually start with chords and I just feel, I try to convey with the music what I'm feeling, and then I'll write lyrics on top of that.

And I find a lot of my best lyrics just come when I'm not even thinking about what I'm saying and I'm just letting the feelings kind of, take the steering wheel on that.

(guitar riffs) It's a songwriters round and that's just the honest story.

So there you go.

- [Lacy] People relate to that.

People can grab onto that.

When you hear a line in the song that you're just like, "Oh, I felt that.

I'm not the only one who's felt that."

That's what makes you wanna come back to that song.

That's what changes your paradigm.

It changes your whole view on what's going on, if you hear that one line in the song.

I just try to write 'em true.

I try to write 'em true to who I am.

If I'm not writing, 'em true, they don't sound right.

I put a lot of time into making sure that each word has its place, it fits together like a puzzle.

And I can feel it if it's right or if it's wrong.

It's a lot of just my instincts.

So if I- It's just like making any decision in life.

If your instincts say, maybe not, but you do it anyways, it's gonna be a wreck.

But if you listen to your instincts and go this way instead of that way, or put this word here instead of that word, it just creates a piece of art.

I'm an artist also.

I paint.

And so every color, every brush stroke, every anything that I put on that painting is for a purpose.

And in my songwriting, I try to do the same thing.

I don't wanna put words in there that are just fillers, that are just to get me to the chorus or to get me to the bridge or whatever I want.

I want each word to have its place and to be important, 'cause there's only so many words that you can fit in a song in three and a half minutes, there's only so many things that you can say.

So if you're gonna say, you might as well say 'em right.

- It's that weird phase when you get outta college, you don't know what to do.

You're just kind of like wandering around.

You don't know if you should get a job right away or you should move away.

And I struggled with that for a little bit.

And I started to write this song here and it sounds like I'm talking to somebody else when I started writing it.

And it wasn't until later I realized, "Oh, I was talking to myself here when I wrote this one."

So, I'm recording my very first album now.

And this song is going on there.

(audience cheering) Thank you.

This is called, "Dream it Away."

♪ Get together darling ♪ ♪ When your world is falling through ♪ ♪ Whoo ♪ Like if I'm going through something, I have to get it out.

It's like therapy to me.

So I feel like, yeah, I'm typically writing if I'm going through something, but then again, it's like if you're going through something and you hear a song that's oddly specific, there's nothing better than that.

- [Alyssa] Truth is, it really just, sometimes I'll just get an idea and I can't stop singing.

It's almost like, it's like a ghost, that's like bugging you, you know, like, "Write me, write me."

And so those are the songs that I think that are probably the most fun to write because they kind of come out really easily.

And then there's always, you know, if I go through something I have to write about it, you know, it's something that moves me in a good way or a bad way.

I think that that's where my songs come from.

But it's always been therapy for me to be honest, you know, free therapy, (laughs) writing songs.

- [Stephen] Writing very quickly, and a lot of times in the middle of the night, I get woken up by songs a lot.

So if I don't write it then, it's like a visitation of sorts.

And the visit only lasts so long, so, you gotta try to get as much out of it as you can, before it's over.

It's like walking the train track, walking the rail of it, you know.

If you fall, it's not like it's gonna be the end of the world, but you just don't wanna fall.

I love playing songs that people don't know, honestly.

That's how I cut my teeth in songwriting.

Everybody really.

You eventually gotta play a song that nobody knows.

And that's how every song starts.

Every song starts, I don't know.

You just kind of conjured something out of thin air.

Music is the closest thing to real magic that I've actually seen.

♪ I wanna be whole ♪ - And I feel like a lot of songwriters will tell you this, there's this weird, like just inner, like spark, that just keeps you going even on the hard days and I'll be like, "Dang, like I wanna quit songwriting."

And then I'll write one of the best songs I've ever written, like the next day.

And I'm like, "Oh, maybe I am supposed to be doing this."

- I mean, when I was younger, I didn't know that people didn't write their own songs.

So for me, songwriting as a career, was just, I didn't even know that it existed.

Sort of feel very lucky that it does because I was not successful as a recording artist.

- [Bridgette] I try to come in with ideas that I know are gonna have life, like it already has a heartbeat and it's kinda like, let's grow this baby.

Let's see what this thing is gonna look like.

They all don't grow up and stand as tall as some of the other ones.

But I think when you get to the end of it, I think you can almost, for me, you can hear that artist doing it.

You can hear that voice on it.

It gives you the song is there.

I always say the song is right there.

You can't tell a song what to do.

It will tell you what to do.

So I think that's all the way until it even gets to the person that's supposed to be with.

Don't write it for me.

I'll write it for the song.

The song is gonna always, when you're in a room and you get a title, let's say you just bring in a title, whatever, Cowboys around here, 'cause of where we are, Deadwood, South Dakota.

You bring that title in.

We don't know what that song wants to say yet.

So I think it's really important to give it that space.

So when I'm writing it, I'm writing it for whatever that song wants to say.

I'm fighting in that room for that song.

I'm not bringing any ego in the door.

I'm not actually trying to bring any of me in the door, other than just being a channel or a vessel to let that come out for whoever's ears that's supposed to land on.

- It's almost like I can't control it.

It's like a subconscious thing that just happens.

I can't help it.

A lot of the songs that I write are like, it'll be like a little bug in my ear.

Like, I'll hear some words that that'll just stick with me, that'll stick with me.

And then I can either hold onto that and let it run around in my head and then put it down on paper or I can think about it and like, "Oh yeah, I should do that later," and then it'll be gone.

- And sometimes I have got no ideas and I have to wait months until I write another song.

But that just means I have to experience a little bit more life.

- It's a miracle to like do music for a living and so there's some divine intervention that must have happened for me to get to Nashville, for me to meet these people and get these songs there.

There's definitely days where we're very intentional, where it's like, "Hey, we want like, here's the title I have in mind, and I think it's a dark vibe or I think it's valid or I think it's kind of a sad, I think it's got minor chords or or fast beat and it's fun, you know."

So, there's definitely days where it's intentional.

- I feel like when I'm sad, I can write a song.

When I'm happy, it's like, I've forgotten how to do everything I know how to do.

So if I'm writing a lot of songs, I'm not doing okay.

(Lacy chuckles lightly) - [Alyssa] It's like you're a sponge and you start to really understand how the chord works, but I actually am really bad at math and I can't read any music and so I play all by ear.

♪ I let the past be the past ♪ So, none of music to me is a math equation.

If you are able to be free in the moment and listen, it's all about listening, it really is.

You really have to open your ears and your heart and your mind when you're hearing someone else play, to then want to add something to it.

If somebody's got a hit song and you can remember it by the first verse and first chorus, then that's a good sign.

(laughs) - You can sing the same lyrics and there's five people in the audience and five people heard different meanings behind it, you know, and that's the beauty of it.

- That's really just how it worked, you know, and once I realized that, I stopped writing for other people and just writing what I thought was cool.

And then things started moving.

- And man, I'm competing like, when I look at my friends that suddenly have two or three songs on the charts and I will cheer for them.

That's awesome.

But my next thought is, "Okay, I gotta get there now."

Like, you know, I want to have one too.

So that keeps me hungry and young and fresh and just the fact that it's ever evolving.

It's not like music suddenly stopped and this is what it is, like, we're always going, what is the next trend?

And every day I sit down in a writing session, my favorite thing about it is that, you know, what we do today could end up being three and a half minutes from changing culture for the next six months.

You never know when your song is gonna be the one that you walk around in the mall at Christmas and everybody's singing it.

- [Ben] I think hearing great songs that other people wrote is what keeps me hungry, you know.

Songs I wish I would've written.

And that's really what keeps me going plus trying to write classics that are around for a hundred years, you know, that's what drives me, something that isn't just a flash in the pan, but something that sticks around forever.

- [Kevin] It's really hard to be a songwriter.

Not the job, I mean, the job can be hard too.

But we're not making license plates or building houses, you know, but it's hard to get paid.

We don't go home on Friday with a paycheck.

It's just the reality of it.

So we're all about the back end and it's buying lottery tickets and you know, you're not gonna hit the jackpot every time, but you might win $10 and you might win a hundred dollars, like, and not to simplify it, but I feel like if people realized how hard it was to make a living as a songwriter, they might value music more.

- Music is hard, but if it's in you, if it's how you breathe, it'll carry you wherever you need to go.

- Music is bigger than the person that I think sings it.

And we forget about that sometimes when you get into the business side of it, because it's very complex and it's very wrong in so many ways.

I think that success changes throughout your life as you understand it, you know.

I was in a band for five years and we were on the road with some really high profile people and you get to see kind of how they live and you know, and what that's like, when you're really a big superstar, you know.

And I watch my parents have it and lose it.

And they're some of the happiest people, my mom and dad, and I think it has to do with your outlook on life.

And, you know, you have to really ground yourself in a lot of this because I'm just, you know, a human being that got given a gift of music and if that song touches somebody, then that's really my job on this earth, you know.

I really believe we all have destinies and I think when you're given the gift of music, your destiny is to move someone else with your song.

And it's really not about all the other stuff.

All the other stuff is like secondary to what it's really about and we can get caught up in that sometimes.

- [Ben] It it's an honor to play with these gigs that haven't had a cut or they want to do it, because, you know, I'm not special, I'm just me.

And, you know, there's no reason that they can't do what I've done.

And, but no two stories are alike, you know.

So they can't compare themselves to me and my story because my story, everybody's story is different.

And you gotta remember that and take the wins when you get 'em and take the losses when you get 'em and own 'em, because that's what makes you who you are and that's what gives you a story.

- [Danny] One of the things I loved about getting into the focusing on country music was writing about the pain and just the journey and the joys and everything of it.

And then, man, I was this really, really innocent preacher's kid from Mississippi and I just really had not lived a lot.

And the truth is, you know, the better songs come from experiences that you've actually lived and you feel the pain and- The good news about that is that everyone experiences those same things.

And one of the reasons those songs really work is people identify something like that in their life.

- I just can't, I didn't do anything else.

Truly, like when I was a little girl, I knew music was something I always wanted to do.

- The best thing that you can do for yourself is just do it and do it and believe in it and be honest with it.

- It's just something you wake up with and go to sleep with and, you know, you never clock out, it's just there.

So, I don't know what else I would do.

- I think it's so hard to predict, who's gonna be successful and who's not because there is a great degree of luck and timing and divine intervention.

So, to say that somebody should stop.

No, I don't think that's ever anybody else's place to say.

- I heard a guy say one time, that the best way to maintain your youth as you grow older is to always stay curious.

And I think the most dangerous thing that you could do as you have success in whatever field you're in, or really even in life, is to decide that you've arrived, that you figured it out, right?

And there are some experiential things that come with some things, there's a lot more that I know now than I, you know, I did in 20 years ago.

But there's an energy and an excitement and a blank slate, that up and coming writers and artists, like they don't know about, like the rules or, you know, the confines that we have to live within.

You know, if you live on music row in Nashville, and you're trying to get cuts on the country record.

And so there's this nice mix of, this sort of marriage of, I want to get some of that wildness back, some of that newness back, 'cause we can really get into a little bit of an assembly line kind of thing, when you're writing professionally as a career.

And sort of lose the original thing that you felt when you first moved to Nashville or LA or wherever.

So, I love the meeting of those two things.

I love hearing the inexperience and the newness of what they're doing.

And hopefully it works for them that we have a little interaction that can pick our brains and you know, hopefully help them avoid a few of the bump.

- Whiskey glasses, we didn't know what it was when we wrote it and when it was released, we didn't know what it was.

But when it got to the top and it got the ear lugs on it, we really said, "Wow, you know, this is something."

That's been a dream come true and Morgan Wallen has changed my life with that song and you know, I'm hoping that that song will be forever on juke boxes around the world and people will play it forever.

From going from a cover band artist to being a songwriter that cover band's cover is really full circle and it's a dream come true.

- [Kevin] Having a song like all about that base is, it's foreign, even for me.

You know, most songwriters never have that experience.

So, certainly nothing that you can plan for, or you can take credit for even, like you can say, "Yeah, I wrote that song.

That's awesome."

But as far as making a song that big on a global level, I mean, you're naive to think that you had anything to do with it beyond actually writing the song.

There's teams of people.

There's millions of dollars spent.

And then you have to see if the public actually likes it.

So, you can't predict or control any of that.

But yes, I mean, there are probably people in this world who have heard a song I wrote and a lot of people would have no clue who I was.

- There's just a lot of unique words, a lot of unique stories, a lot of unique things that people need to say that a lot of the rest of the world doesn't get to hear.

- [Bridgette] Staying relevant is not an easy task, but it's part of the job.

- [Lacy] A lot of these songs, you'll never hear on the radio, but when you hear them, you'll wanna hear 'em again.

- It's always gonna be about getting the music to the people.

Like I always say, the space between the speakers and those people, that's our gift that we get to have.

- There's something about the west and places like Deadwood, that people, they crave, they want, they want that freedom, they want that authenticity, the whole cowboy lifestyle that's so romanticized.

- You're hunting for gold, but it's people and it's songs and it's ideas and I think that's where I relate to this town.

- You know, everybody needs a venue, like this to start, to get in front of people, you know, and you never know who's gonna be downstairs.

- And that's how music is discovered.

It's just getting to be able to play on stage somewhere.

- So South Dakota forever, man, I love this town.

- Thank you Deadwood, I guess you would say my artist career came to life in Deadwood, South Dakota.

(somber guitar music fades out)