[ WM ] Do you miss playing to live audiences ?
[ Gordon ] Of course . Absolutely . It ' s like the greatest adventure . It ' s hard to describe . When we do “ The River ,” I stand in one spot to play the song because I have to have my foot anchored to this volume pedal to swell everything I play in that song . The first night and every night since that we ' ve done that in the stadium tour , everybody in the stadium puts their phone lights on . Did you ever go see the movie Gravity ?
[ WM ] Yes . bass , and Lonnie Wilson , who ' s a hit machine for writing and playing . I ' ve done sessions with all of these guys , and for someone to go to little clubs , and play that catalog . I just want that moment .
[ WM ] What is one of your favorite stories from playing the Bluebird Café ?
[ Gordon ] “ Chuck Wagon & the Wheels .” That ' s me and my two brothers before it was a Bluebird in-the-round writer ’ s thing , they had a stage up against the wall . Me and my brothers had this thing that we did that was
pure comedy . “ Chuck Wagon & the Wheels ” had an impact on Garth and his live show I ' m told , and he ' ll admit it .
He would come and see us when we played block parties down on Music Row and somebody said , he ' d be gut laughing , holding his belly rolling around in the grass . We were the “ Champions of Country and Wrestling Music ,” and we would do parodies of songs .
We were booked to play there on a Friday night . We asked songwriter Glenn Sutton who wrote the hit song “ Almost Persuaded ,” married to
[ Gordon ] I feel like I ' m in a scene in the movie , and like I ' m doing a spacewalk , and I ' m in outer space . It ' s the wildest looking thing you ' ve ever seen . [ WM ] Are Garth ’ s stage moves choreographed ?
[ Gordon ] There ' s no choreography other than the start of the show , where it ' s ‘ places everyone ’, and then we start the show and then there are things that you do that are muscle memory . He ' s getting ready to throw this solo to somebody , so they ' re expecting it , and maybe it would be good if I ' m standing here . But he ' s never in the same place two nights in a row , and he also loses his set list from time to time . That means I ' ve just tuned the E string down to D , and then we start a song where I got to tune it right back up , because it ' s something else on the set list . But it ’ s just fun . I never would have dreamed that I would be getting to do something like this . It ' s crazy .
[ WM ] How did your Tom Petty cover band the “ Petty Junkies ” come together ?
[ Gordon ] Jerry McPherson and I would look at each other in the studio over the years , never failed to say , “ I wish we were in a band together . We ’ ve got to do something together someday ," And here we are , a bunch of guys doing this incredible catalog , and Brady Seals is killing it at the lead vocals , Blair Masters who ' s also in the Garth thing with me on keys . Mark Hill on
Gordon playing with the Petty Junkies ( a Tom Petty cover band )