Favorite 5 Artists
1- Willie Nelson
2- Bruce Springsteen
3- The Allman Brothers
4- Johnny Cash
5- Alabama

Favorite Places or Cities...
Atlanta is my favorite city to live in, I love the mix of the Southern hospitality with the big city atmosphere. There are plenty of soul food restaurants, which is the food I was raised on, and the bars stay open super late. I have a lot of my childhood and school friends in town as well, so being able to hang out with my old-school friends is very important to me. Also, there is a lot of music history coming not only from Atlanta, but from all of Georgia. The Allman Brothers, Ray Charles, Alan Jackson, James Brown, REM, Otis Redding, The Black Crowes...there are so many great acts from Georgia.

Here are the other places that I like:
Nashville is my favorite place to write songs. Albany, GA is my favorite place to relax and go fishing. Texas is my favorite state besides Georgia, because I love to float the rivers, and the people are really laid back and open to new music.

Favorite Activity Outside of Music...
My favorite activity outside of music is writing and working on video footage shot from shows and on tour. I would someday like to make my own films. In my free time I like to watch football games, fish, hang out with my friends, hit my favorite bars in town, and play poker.

How do you write songs?
I basically get hit with songs. I usually don't just sit down and say, "OK, today I'm going to write a song." My songs mostly come when something moves me, whether it is something I experience or just observe. Then melodies and words and chord structures will jump in my head, and if I don't sit down to write it out then it will stay in my head until I do.

Where do you get inspiration?
I get moved by one of two things...something that happens directly to me that affects the way I feel, or an act that I observe happening to someone else that I know has really affected that person.

For instance, The Battery is a very personal song that was inspired by 3 events.
1) having to leave a girl in Charleston,
2) being picked up on the road in the middle of nowhere when my truck ran out of gas by someone who randomly knew a good friend of mine, and
3) Having to spend 3 days in a Sullivan County (Bristol) Jail. So each of those experiences pretty much inspired me to write the song, and they are from direct personal experiences.

Do you have any heroes who inspire you to perform a certain way live?
Yes, Bruce Springsteen, because he leaves it all out on the stage. I've always thought that Willie Nelson does a great job connecting with his audience as well, and it makes you feel as if he is singing straight to you. Also, Alabama and Hank Jr. both put on kickass shows, I saw Hank when I was a kid in Albany, GA, and he blew me away.

What do you think people leave with after an LT performance?
I think that our main goal in playing live is to take people out of their everyday life and put them in a place where they feel. Whether that is happy or sad, or pumped up or pissed, the main thing to me is that people feel emotion. I love it when people come up to me after a show, and they are smiling and sweaty, and they say that they had an amazing time. As musicians, I think our main job is put people on a different level for a few hours, give them a really good time, and leave them with music that makes them feel.

How did you come up with the name the "Lost Trailers"?
When Ryder and I were first starting a band, pre-Lost Trailers, we had a trailer full of musical equipment (about 20 K worth) stolen from us. We had parked the trailer in my apartment complex, which was only about 20 spots, but Ryder kept on driving circles around the same 20 spots, so I asked him what he was doing, and he said, "I think I lost the trailer." Well, it was obviously stolen, but I always thought that phrase was funny. So, when we started this band, we decided to use the name The Lost Trailers. Then we had another trailer stolen again in Boston (November 2001), as well as Atlanta in 2004.

Has there been a dramatic event in your life that has impacted your life?
The dramatic event of my life happened when I got to sit down and talk with the only person besides my folks that I've looked to as a hero. I was only a kid when I got to sit down and talk with Willie Nelson, but I knew that I wanted to play music as my life, that it was the one thing that I could do pretty well, and that if a chance was given, then these songs that I'd been writing could connect with folks - so I asked him how you make it in music.

And he said, "If you build a house of quality in the woods, then the world will beat a path to your door."

That single moment, when he told me that, set in motion what has become my life.

The idea being, whether you are doing music or anything else in life, if you have a vision or great idea that you know can contribute to the world, then you don't wait around for other people to help you realize it, but you go ahead and go after it yourself, and you make your mark on the world by fulfilling your own dream, and then if it is worth a damn, and you've made sure that you've done your best, then other people will find their way to you. The key is that it has to be good, and it has to be done for real, cause people can tell if you're a put on, especially in music.

Is there a political or social agenda to your music?
I wouldn't say that there is an agenda to Lost Trailer music, but I would say that there are certain themes that run through most of the work. Most of what I write about is ordinary people going through extraordinary situations. It is about love and struggle, and the fact that most people have to struggle to do what they love, or have to struggle with who they love and how to show it. More than anything, it is about hope, and that no matter how tough things get, that if you do things the right way things will end up all right. Those types of themes lend themselves to political or social agendas, but it is up to the listener to find out where that fits in to their beliefs.

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