Inside the mind of a true storyteller.

Joe Stamm, the frontman of the Joe Stamm Band, takes you on an unforgettable journey behind his latest solo album, Memoirs.

Stripped down and raw, Joe’s music captures something rare—a fearless authenticity that resonates deeply.

We won’t give it all away, but you’ll hear how this Midwestern artist embraces vulnerability, confronts the challenges of baring his soul through song, and navigates the pressures of a fiercely competitive music scene.

From the roots of "Black Dirt" to unexpected glimpses of his quirky personal life, Joe’s reflections are as rich and real as the music he creates.

What's it like to craft a song that feels like a window into your soul?

And how does a simple idea transform into something that connects with people on a universal level?

Stay tuned—you won’t want to miss this!

Learn more about Joe Stamm here: https://www.joestammband.com/

AND follow Americana Curious on Instagram for the latest interviews and the behind-the-scenes with your favorite artists! https://www.instagram.com/americanacurious

It's all she wrote some 30 years ago.

Cursive in blue ink.

On the inpat, it said, I'm sorry, Joe, but I really gotta go.

This world keeps spinning and it's driving me.

It's been very rewarding to get that kind of positive feedback.

Now, we didn't do any pre publicity.

We didn't even tell anybody we were releasing it until the day we released it.

If I'm honest with you myself, it was more just kind of an insecurity about it being a totally stripped down record where I couldn't hide behind guitar solos and production at all.

I didn't want to make a big deal out of it and then people not like it.

I just kind of wanted to quietly drop it into the world.

And if nobody noticed, that's okay.

It's just me sitting in a studio.

I would do like four or five takes and then we would just pick the best take and we wouldn't edit it, we wouldn't splice it, we wouldn't auto tune it.

I wanted people to feel like they were in the room with me, which is why we kind of left a little bit of that room noise before and after.

The songs just help people feel like if you're listening to it in your living room, that I'm sitting over there in the chair playing it for you.

Americana music transforms the world and unfortunately, too many are unaware of its profound impact.

Americana musicians are the unsung heroes and here you'll join us in exploring these passionate artists and how they offer inspiration and hope for the future.

This show makes it happen in a fun and entertaining way.

You'll discover new music that you'll love, Hard earned lessons from the road, the story behind favorite songs, a big dose of inspiration for you and your friends, and a good laugh along the way.

I'm Ben Fanink and my co host Zach Schultz.

It's time to get Americana curious.

Hey there, everybody.

Welcome back to Americana Curious.

We have got a doozy coming your way.

We've been working so hard to bring you today's guest and trust us when you say that he's on fire right now.

We are thrilled to be joined by the one and only Joe Stam, Singer, songwriter and the powerhouse front man behind the Joe Stam band.

It's a sound that draws from their midwestern roots and takes inspiration from the red dirt music scene.

A Style that's resonated with fans all across the country.

He shared the stages.

He shared the stage with the likes of Shane Smith and the Saints, Tyler Childers, Whiskey Myers and Charles Wesley Godwin, just to name a few.

In this episode today with Joe, we're diving into his musical journey, his inspirations, his music, and what it takes to make it in today's fiercely competitive music scene.

And whether you're a long term fan of Joe or just discovering his music, you're going to walk away with a deeper appreciation for this man, the band, and the stories that fuel his sound.

So buckle up for today's episode and we're going to leave you fired up and ready to press play on Joe's music, including his powerful new solo album, memoirs.

Let's dive in.

Zach, what you got?

What do I got?

Oh, I got too much here, Ben.

Joe, this is.

If I could step in here, If I could step in here for just a moment before we go ahead, I feel like I need some basketball warmups on and jog through my.

That introduction, man.

Yeah, can you, when you, when you do that, can you play the Bulls old introduction scene in the background that int.

Yeah.

For you.

Yes.

Only for the Joe.

Yes.

I like that.

Powerhouse front man.

Can I quote you on that?

Come on, take me, take me on tour.

All right.

I will just jump on stage for like a minute and introduce you.

If you're solo, no problem.

If you're with your band, no problem.

When did you decide that you were going to go into music rather than maybe the NFL?

What sparked your love?

I was a.

I was a shoulder injury away from.

From stepping on the field at niu.

Let Al developing into an NFL caliber quarterback, which was probably never going to happen anyways since it was never an option.

I can say, oh yeah, I was definitely on track to be an NFL quarterback, more for the injuries, but I actually had to take an art course to graduate.

And so my last semester of college, I took an art course and I chose intro to guitar.

And at the time I had really been getting into music from a more active listening standpoint.

I was listening to a lot of guys that are great lyricists like Chris Knight and Kris Kristofferson and storytellers like that.

And so it didn't take Long.

Once I could put a couple chords together to start writing my own songs, and it just kind of.

Just kind of built from there.

So it's kind of a late starter when it comes to music.

Yeah.

So how does it.

How did you develop this sound that you have?

Man, I don't.

I don't know if anybody intentionally develops a certain sound, at least.

I'm not intelligent enough to do any.

To do any.

Anything that I do on purpose.

I think it's.

I think it just kind of tends to be a confluence of your influences.

Sound sounds fine to say it that way, but I think you're just kind of a product of.

Of what you put a recipe is going to taste like the ingredients that you put into it.

And I.

For better or worse, at the end of the day, you sound the way you're going to sound.

And when you're producing your own records, you keep the things that you like and you take out the stuff that you don't and kind of what adds up is what you might call someone sound.

So I can't say there's a whole lot of intentionality to it.

Yeah.

In the research and you talk about your music is Black Dirt and Red Dirt.

Right.

I grew up in Alabama and I know all about the red Dirt, the Red Mud and the music.

And Zach, of course, is from the Minneapolis area.

All right.

So I guess that qualifies as black dirt country.

So we're kind of unifying on this.

Your music resonates with both of us.

Was there a moment or a story behind, hey, my music has that black Dirt, red dirt vibe?

Or what was it that helped make you sort of identify that connection in your music?

Yeah, well, I was.

I was listening to a lot of Red Dirt music when I was getting started and still doing always, but I was really into Reckless Kelly and Randy Rogers Band and Pat Green and a lot of those guys.

Chris Knight, who is my prima biggest influence, he's from Kentucky.

He fit into those same.

If you're throwing a music festival in Oklahoma or Texas, Chris Knight fits in pretty well.

So I just resonated with that music, but I'm not from there.

So I was.

To me, I was trying to be sensitive to the fact that I'm not a Red Dirt artist.

I'm not from Red Dirt region, so.

But I'm from an area and consider myself very Midwestern.

Identify strongly as a Midwesterner.

And we have Black Dirt here in Illinois and in the main places that I.

I tend to haunt.

So I just started calling it Black Dirt as a way to kind of give a nod to the red dirt music that influenced me as well as not be a poser and identify with the places that I identify with now.

It's the type always considers that way.

I recently saw a couple people react online to that, and I saw some comments, not towards me, but about me, where there was these guys from red dirt states who were offended and acting like by saying I was black dirt, I was trying to posture as a red dirt artist, which is the exact same opposite of what I was trying to do.

But you never know how people are going to take.

Dirt would be that sensitive.

But it's.

But people are so proud of the red Dirt music scene, and they're very.

And there's certain folks who are very protective of.

And that's.

These folks were.

Well, how would you describe the ethos for someone saying, like, maybe they're listening to this and they're living in Taiwan right now, and they're like, what are those Americana people talking about?

Red dirt, black dirt.

Right.

Because at the end of the day.

Yeah, because at the end of the day.

And this is.

This is a larger.

This is a larger discussion just about genre.

And to begin with, at the end of the day, it doesn't matter.

Right.

What you call it.

It is.

What it is is.

It's.

It's all we're talking about.

Again, we're talking about semantics, but it's just.

Who cares what you call it?

Do you like the music or not?

And that's.

That's.

It doesn't boil down to a whole lot when.

At the end of the day.

Yeah.

Well, your.

Your stories seem to be rooted in.

With Midwestern themes.

Yeah, but who cares if it's black dirt, red dirt, Appalachia?

I mean, it doesn't.

As long as it's not, bro.

Country Joe.

All right.

Yeah.

All right.

Yeah.

And.

And it's certain.

Most of it.

Yeah.

Is certainly predominated by a lot of Midwestern themes.

I think I'd like to just consider it rooted in stories and people's stories, no matter where they're from.

I've written in the context of the Florida Keys.

I've written in the context of Kentucky.

I've written in the context of domestic abuse.

I've written in the context of murder and drugs and all kinds of things that I don't necessarily have personal experience with.

But at the end of the day, it's stories.

Some of it's.

And that's what.

That's what it kind of boils down to.

I guess.

Yeah, I wanted to.

I'm glad you brought that.

That point up, because Memoirs is probably my favorite album of the year.

Thank you.

With one.

And we can get into more detail of it.

One of the songs on there is absolutely my favorite song of the year, and it just wrecks me every time, so.

But I want to know, where do these stories develop?

I mean, how.

I mean, they're incredibly descriptive.

You.

You get lost in these words.

All she wrote 30 years ago, cursive in bl.

Pink on a yellow pad.

I'm sorry, Joe, but I really gotta go.

I mean, you are in that position when you're listening to that song.

So where did.

Where's the inspiration?

Or.

You know, I read a lot about writing.

One of my favorite songs on Writing is Stephen King's book.

I think it's called On Writing.

Yeah, I think it's called On Writing.

Yes, on Writing.

And.

Yeah.

And he.

Sometimes it's nice when you read things and it kind of affirms to you what you've been doing.

Right.

I don't know if there's right or wrongs to it, but he talks about just sitting down and writing and following the story where there's writers.

That.

Of novels, for example, that and of songs.

I've done this for songs before where I've written out an outline for how I expect the story to go.

And then I fill in the.

Okay, this verse is about.

That course is going to be about this, this versus about that and that.

More or less, though it works in such a way that you're just kind of writing and you're following the story where it goes.

And sometimes you might know how you think it's.

It.

It's going to end up, and sometimes you don't.

When I wrote when the Lilacs Bloom, I wrote it on my wife's birthday and I got up early and was writing and I came in.

She came in and I played her the song that I had written to that point to the right up until the last verse or bridge or whatever you want to call it.

And she just.

She just did it.

She asked, what are you going to.

What are you going to do to him?

It's like, what.

How is.

How.

Yes, because in your memoirs, there's quite a few people that die in that record.

I think I lost count, including one marriage, I believe, But I don't know.

I recently asked Facebook posts or social media posts, how many people died in memoirs, because somebody asked me and I genuinely didn't know.

So I wanted Other people to do the work and somebody did.

I can't remember what the final number was, but it was in double digits for sure.

Yes, it's a lot.

When we were, when we were emailing before getting this interview, said you, you did say that.

I, I was praising you for Memoirs because, I mean, I just love it.

But you was an anxious release for you, kind of.

You, in a sense, you were nervous how it would be perceived.

So now that it's out, what's the other side of that now?

It's been very.

What have people been saying?

Yeah, it's been very rewarding to get that kind of positive feedback because what you've said, I've heard a lot from folks now.

I always.

There's always a caveat with that, that for every time you hear somebody praise something you've done, there's.

There's a host of people behind them that aren't telling you what their opinions are.

They don't like it.

I feel like there's always that.

And maybe that's just an artist insecurity coming out when I, when I say that.

But the, the response has been overwhelmingly positive and as a result, it's been probably one of the more rewarding releases that I've had.

Now, we didn't do any pre publicity.

We didn't even tell anybody we were releasing it until the day we released it.

And I think that was just.

I saw, I mean, I was.

That night, I was scrolling through something and I think it just popped in and I was like, oh, damn.

So, yes, people were excited though, for the surprise.

They were.

And I think, I think the reason I did that, I told myself and I told my.

The guy that does my publicity and stuff.

I said it was just.

I didn't want to go through all the trappings of promotion and pre promotion.

I think for me though, if I'm honest with myself, it was more just kind of an insecurity about it being a totally stripped down record where I could.

Couldn't hide behind guitar solos and production at all and post production.

And so I didn't want to make a big deal out of it.

And then people not like it, if that makes sense.

I just wanted.

I just kind of wanted to quietly drop it into the, into the world.

And if nobody noticed, that's okay, but at least I wouldn't have kind of scrunched up their nose.

Yeah.

The world.

This is, this is what you've built up to me.

So.

So that was kind of explains, I think answers your question in terms of Why?

I was a little nervous about it because it's just.

For those of you listeners that don't know, it's just me sitting in a studio.

I was playing full takes of the songs.

I would do like four or five takes and then we would just pick the best take and we wouldn't edit it, we wouldn't splice it, we wouldn't auto tune it.

We wouldn't take out mistakes and try to punch in better performances.

It was just me in a studio.

So.

No, and I mean, you can hear.

You can hear you at one point wrestling around, talking like off mic a little bit.

And I, I love that.

That shows how real and raw it is.

So then the emotions for me, that.

That brings it out more.

But yeah, just well done.

I wanted people to feel like they were in the room with me, which is why we kind of left a little bit of that room noise before and after the songs just so could kind of help.

Just help people feel like if you're listening to it in your living room, that I'm sitting over there in the.

In the, in the chair playing it for you.

Yeah, it really conveys that.

And all she wrote.

You can hear you getting choked up in the song.

And it just.

A lot of.

I feel like, unfortunately, a lot of times people want to smooth that out.

They don't want that in there.

They want it to be something that can be like reproduced on stage.

Exactly.

And you're really.

You really feel like you're interpreting these songs right there in the live take.

That's great too, because you never know too.

Mistakes can go one way or the other.

They can be charming.

And even sometimes when they are, you might.

Something might be charming the first time you listen through, but then once you've listened to it 20 times, you're like, oh, I gotta listen to that mistake again.

So it's hard to know where those at.

Now.

There's a.

There's a.

I don't know if there's a song called Undone.

I believe it's a Robert or Keen song or a.

Can't remember, but Chris Knight does a cover of it and it's.

It's.

It's one of my favorite Chris Knight performances.

And there's a.

There's a verse in there where he starts with the wrong line and then he just goes.

Yeah.

And then goes back and sings the correct line.

And then the wrong line is like a couple lines and it's like, I love that for some reason.

Like, I just.

I just love that performance.

And I'm sure he hates it, but Dylan ask.

Yeah, it was just.

Those things are fun.

I mean, they're charming when they're charming.

Sometimes they're not.

So it's kind of.

You got to navigate that too, when.

You put out an album called Memoirs.

Because automatically people are going to assume that these are all your personal stories on these songs.

Right, Right.

They're not, but okay, the.

I've said this a hundred times.

Songwriting is on a spectrum of experience and imagination, and some songs fall closer to one polarity or the other.

So there's certainly a lot of me in those songs.

Even none of them are necessarily, quote, unquote, true stories.

Well, that's actually good to hear because I don't think you'd be that happy of a guy.

I'm not a massive sad album person, and I don't feel like this is a sad album.

It feels like an album.

It's inspiring.

It feels like.

It seems very earthly, worldly.

Like, hey, I've had some experiences and this is what life is like when you get.

When you're not 22 anymore.

Well, yeah, like, the Cliff is a very inspirational song.

I feel of kind of a father telling the son it's not always easy.

Here it is.

But I'm a fan boy, Joe, so sorry, man.

Fill up my reserve My reservoir of self esteem you never know what I'm gonna need.

Oh, the beauty, what a cliff there's more to the road than the lines that keep you moving straight ahead there's more to the song than the crescendo to the bridge and it's easy to forget to live your life before you're dead so look around there's more to the cliff than the.

So you're reading.

You mentioned that turning point in your music career was opening for Jamie Johnson in Iowa.

It was a high point.

I don't know if it was a turning point.

It was a high point.

High point.

Well, but you've talked about specifically this moment, right.

Of walking out and like, you connected with the crowd in a certain way that had not happened previously.

Yeah.

Walk us through that night and what happened and how meaningful it ended up being for you.

I think it's pretty simple.

We walked out to 10,000 people and felt like we played a good show and felt like people cared and enjoyed it.

And so when you multiply that feeling across 10,000 people, it feels pretty good.

And that wasn't an experience we had had to that point and haven't had that experience many times since, to be honest.

But we've found ways to manufacture that in small rooms into smaller audiences and when we get the chance at the festivals and things to bigger audiences.

So I don't know.

I think that's kind of.

Oh, that's the.

That's the drug you get hooked on that keeps you grinding through many nights that are not nearly as rewarding in between.

Yeah, Yeah.

I mean, it's.

So you play all sides of the venues at the 10,000.

When you.

When you hit the stage with 10,000, your music has a real personality connection.

You said times 10,000.

Well, how in the heck do you Prepare for a 10,000 show with your style of.

Like, you're digging deep, you're laying on the line.

How does that play to 10,000 versus the dive bar?

Well, it's probably a different set.

It's probably a different show.

It's a different show when I'm playing a listening room to 50 people or 100 people, it's just me on a stool than it is when we're playing to hundreds of people or thousands of people.

And it's my full band.

And some of that is.

Is in the.

Not the way you're playing the songs and the way the production value of the song is or the production elements, but.

But also the songs you put in the set list.

So I like to think that we're.

We have a catalog that's big enough by now that.

That I can.

I can write different set lists for different rooms.

Was there a musician or somebody that gave you any advice that along the way that maybe resonated?

I try to pick up.

I try to pick up when I.

What I can.

And little.

I'm not from a commute.

A music hub of sorts.

I can't say I've had a lot of mentorship.

There's a guy named Ron Voles.

He's from Metamor, which is my hometown as an older guy and had some hits back in the 60s.

And he was a mentor for me, certainly in a steadying presence for me, when I was just putting a band together and thought we were great.

And he was kind of a steadying voice for me.

That was encouraging, but yet reminded me that I had a lot of room to grow.

And I think that's probably been the most valuable for me because any art.

Yeah.

Try to.

If I see a young artist playing, you try to withhold judgment and certainly not communicate that judgment, because, man.

But fortunately I didn't have too many situations where people really discouraged me.

And you need to give it up because you do not have a future in this, which is probably what was really.

If anybody with any know how had seen me play, that's probably what they would have thought to themselves.

It's a situation where you kind of unfold your ignorance as you.

As you grow up and improve and, and.

And start to look back and see.

Yeah, that that song is probably not as strong of a song as I thought.

I had a lot of work to do when it came vocal strength and ability.

And I'm still a terrible guitar player.

So there's, there's just.

And you kind.

You unfold your ignorance over time and it keeps you going versus.

Versus.

If you were suddenly aware of what your limitations really were, you might have given it up.

So I think it's people like Ron who encouraged me along the way or didn't discourage might be the better.

That's a better expression that have been important for the reason I'm still sitting here talking to you guys and recording music.

When you mentioned the beer patio, we talked about Jamie Johnson.

There's been a lot of gigs in between.

Yeah.

What's been one or two of your more memorable road stories?

There's, there's, there's.

There's too many.

I'm trying, Trying to pull one out of the air because I know we've had them even recently.

God, I've had some really.

We call them the indignities of the road.

That's some, Some real.

I'm having trouble coming up with a specific one in mind right now.

But you get, you get these situations.

You might have been booked into a room for a guarantee that you had no business making.

And then you find yourself at the end of the night negotiating with the owner or the manager what.

What might be fair for both of.

You when you didn't guarantee, meaning you're going to play this, and this is going to be what.

We're going to get paid for this.

The end of the night.

He's like, no, we're not doing that well.

It's just kind of.

I'm very sensitive to that as well.

Very sensitive to wanting the venues to win as well.

I don't.

I don't want to go in there and stick it up anybody's ass, so to speak.

I want everybody to feel like they had a good, good night.

So if we were guaranteed X amount of money and.

And only 15 people walked through the door.

I'm not great at math, but I can.

I can do that rough math pretty quick.

And you end up in situations where.

And I don't have it.

I don't have a manager or TM with us on the road.

Who's.

Who's got to be the bad guy?

I'm typically not very good at being the bad guy in that situation.

So there's just.

There's.

Yeah, there's one time we were playing down in Jacksonville, Illinois, and we're playing this big, long room, and there are two people there.

There's an old lady on crutches, and there's a dude in an iron mask, and they're out there.

He's out there, like, pretending to slap her ass.

When I'm trying, I'm trying.

I'm trying from the stage to basically knock it off.

And that's one from the archives.

Man, that was a long time ago.

That just popped into mind.

But you get in those.

We've been in those situations from time to time.

This is our first ever question from a fan of the podcast that's a huge fan of yours that messaged me on Instagram.

Her name's Lauren.

She's from Arkansas.

Okay.

Yeah.

She said that she wanted to know.

She recently saw you at Peacemaker Fest.

Yeah.

Yep.

And she.

Her friend that she was with wanted to come up and introduce you, but Lauren said you looked busy.

She didn't want to get in.

They ended up coming up and saying hello, but she was sheep, as she said.

And she just wants to know the etiquette that.

What's good etiquette in that situation.

Honestly, I'm just thrilled that a fan had the presence of mind to ask that question.

To be honest, it's hard to say.

I mean, at the end of the day, I think most of us, especially at my level, just appreciate that people care.

If I'm not engaged, if I'm not eating, if I'm already in a conversation with somebody else and I'm in a space that's accessible to you, then you have no reason to not approach me and say hello.

I'm always happy to talk, talk with people in that.

In that arena.

If you've snuck into an area you're not supposed to be at, or I'm in the middle of talking to somebody else, or if I am eating, then those are.

Those are areas where I'm trying to focus on other things.

But if I'm in an area where I'm accessible to you and I'm busy doing something else, then you can approach me.

She also wanted me to add, you do a thing called feed the band, so you have been invited over to her house the next time you're in Arkansas, which she said, I think is a couple weeks.

So I'll tell her to reach out to you.

All right, sounds good.

Sounds good.

We do a host the band thing that just kind of helps with travel expenses.

And it's a.

It's a way that people.

You can do it on our website or you can do it live at a show with a QR code, but it's people.

It's a place.

People can venmo us money for a hotel, I think is 110 or a tank of gas at 75 or buy us a meal for 20 bucks and then that goes into our band pool for the week.

And then we distribute that evenly to everybody just to help offset some of those road expenses.

Yeah.

What a great way to engage.

So fans.

Doesn't mean you're going to accept it, but you could accept a dinner offer if they're planning in your town.

People give us those.

And it almost never works.

It almost never works with our schedule to do so.

But that's why we have it set up where you can send us 20 bucks.

And that money will go towards somebody's.

It'll go towards our meals or towards our hotel rooms or stuff.

It's just a.

It's kind of a topic, a specific way to tip.

Yeah, basically.

And.

And it's.

It.

And.

And what?

And then if they're like, for instance, on the website, you can fill out a form if you want to shout out or if you want to dedicate it to somebody, and then I'll post a thank you that, that.

That weekend for that specific show that you.

And so it's just a kind of a way for people to help us out who want to.

Yeah, yeah.

I love that.

And I think that's important because fans want to be able to support their artists other than just buying a ticket, of course.

Buy the ticket.

There's so many other cool ways to do that and engage.

On a related note.

Sorry, go ahead.

Go Jeff.

Yeah, and buy the ticket, of course.

Come to the show.

Buy the merch.

It's a way.

Some of these.

When you're first getting into a new market, you might be lucky to sell 25 tickets.

It takes a few cycles to build those audiences up.

So it's one of those things where if we might have only sold 20 tickets and we didn't make much money on the show, we still had to buy hotel rooms and gas to get there.

If there's a group of people there that went out of their way to pay for a hotel room, to pay for a tank of gas, then you add that to what you made in tickets, and it's like, all right, maybe we can go back there versus a place.

It's like, man, nobody.

We couldn't sell any tickets there.

So we might not put that spot on back on the schedule as quick.

So it's also a way for fans to let us know, hey, people in this area want to hear you.

We want you here.

We want you to build an audience.

I do not think that messaging is out there enough.

Right.

And I'm glad that we're sharing that on our show.

Certainly Zach and I want to support you guys and our audience does too.

So that's really helpful.

So, yeah, just a.

It's a way people can try to get us back in their area.

Now, now, when people come to the show, what do you wish they would start doing when they're at the show?

And what would you wish they would stop doing other than slapping a ladies behind?

Yeah, yeah.

Mask on.

On crutches.

Right?

That's a.

Stop doing immediately all.

Yes, I'm doing that immediately.

I'm.

I'm fortunate enough that I don't have a ton of don't do's.

Don't throw anything at the stage.

Don't, don't, don't.

Don't do like a Boy's brothers, like with the chicken wires up in front.

Yeah, that almost.

That almost never happens.

Just if it's a.

Here, here's the thing.

If it's an acoustic show and there are people in the audience that want clearly want to sit and listen to the music, don't be the people carrying on a conversation.

I feel like it's.

I feel like a lot of us know that some people don't and.

And that's there.

A while back, I stopped doing free shows.

There's places even locally here around that get a hold of me and they want play an acoustic show.

And it's like I'm not doing it unless it's ticketed.

Because what started happening is there was folks that showed up for the shows for me, and then there was folks that showed up because they knew people were going to show up and therefore it'd be a party and then they ruin it for the folks that wanted to be there.

That might have traveled a couple hours to be there.

So we've tried to address that by only doing ticketed shows now, which shouldn't come as a surprise at this point, but for that reason.

And shut up.

Yeah, buy merch.

That's like I said, I mean, that's the way to get us back to it.

Even if we're not making a ton of money at the door or whatever.

If it's a huge.

A place where we sold a bunch of merch, I'm going to go back.

That keeps the wheels on the bus, so to speak.

Well, well, we'll go on the, go on the merch train for a minute.

Like, is it a.

How do you think about creating merch?

Designing it, Bring it around.

Like, what, what much I'm fortunate.

I tell, I tell other artists or younger artists or artists that are trying to carve something out as a, as a career that the best thing you can do as a young artist or developing artist is to marry a graphic designer, which I've been.

There you go.

Yeah.

So my wife, she does, she, she designs all of our merch.

She orders it, she, she ships it, she stocks the merch tubs, she sets everything up, manages the web store and all that stuff.

So.

And it, that's really just a collaboration as far as specific designs.

I'll generally get ideas and send them to her and she'll come up with something and then we'll work through them and figure it out.

But the hero of that question is really my wife, and she's done a great job because merch is a big deal for us.

We've got a lot of different options, a lot of different products that shows you usually got five or six different T shirt designs and stuff.

And it's, it's an important part of this business.

And honestly, if it weren't for the merch, I couldn't, I mean, we just couldn't do what we do.

Yeah.

Wow.

It's that important to the bottom.

It's a huge piece of the pie when it comes to my income and my ability to travel.

Abandon them.

It pays for the vehicle, it pays for the trailer, it pays for the gear, it pays for the maintenance of all that stuff.

It pays to replace all that stuff when it goes down.

So.

A pretty big part of it.

Yeah.

Well, I gotta ask this before we get out of here.

We're not done yet, Joe.

But we, we have yet to have a episode go by without mentioning somebody.

And you have a song that you came on my radar because of the Song Goodbye John.

Yeah.

And it's just a beautiful tribute song to John Pryn.

So Ben, I got that one in again.

I got a John Pry reference back in.

Yeah.

You're gonna be like episode 28, 29.

And it's been.

Tell me what John meant to you.

Because the lyrics that obviously was written kind of the COVID time and released during that time and we were all feeling just pain.

Yeah.

Other than just a legendary voice in this business, especially in our specific genre or perpendicular to our genre.

You know, that song is so much just a time capsule for me because it was.

It was bittersweet in the sense that we were playing some real dives at that point in my career.

And it was tough.

My wife was traveling with us everywhere selling merch.

The merch table.

We were gone every weekend playing a lot of COVID songs, playing three or four hour sets and we got kind of a forced vacation out of it for a couple months.

And so it was bittersweet.

And then me and my wife just got to be here on my two acre.

On our two acres of property out in the middle of nowhere and.

And just kind of relax a bit bit and.

And enjoy life a little bit despite all the other stuff that was going on.

But certainly when.

When John passed away, I believe it was April 7th or something like that.

I was in the room that's right on the other side of that wall and that was.

It was a writing room.

Now it's a nursery that.

And I started messing with that.

That song and that melody and that line.

And my wife was in this room where we're sitting in our office and she just said, yeah, yeah, keep going with that.

Just said keep doing it.

So I think it was as much of it was a tribute to a legend in our profession.

It was a bittersweet time capsule about the fear and yet the relief and the kind of the opportunity to decompress our schedule and our free time time for.

For the moment and make the most of it.

And I feel like we really.

We really did make the most of it.

And I don't say that to be insensitive to the people that.

That really time through that period.

It was.

We talk about songs on the spectrum of imagination to experience and that was really heavy on the experience side for me.

So that's really the kind of the story for where that song came from, what it means to me.

Grab the dog and the smoke and a couple bus lights can't stop nowhere they got the whole world closed but they ain't shut down these country roads so let's rock and roll let's ride high Looking for mood on a radio D It's a crazy world It's a crazy time Waiting on the radio to play John prime in my own little way I want to say goodbye I.

Was going to say if there's something that we'd be surprised to know about you.

You want to tell us what we were talking about before?

Do you have any.

Do you collect anything, Joe?

Yeah, got my he man boys in here and Joe, I just.

I just staged them around the house.

Like there's a.

There's a.

There's a stink or figure which was like the big skunk guy.

The skunk, yes.

And he sits.

He sits in a plant next next to the toilet.

And so he's like.

So like what do I call him?

He's the.

The.

The warlord of homebowl.

So and, and I've got like moss man extending into a.

Next to one of my.

My wife's plan put them around the house in random, random spots.

And my wife is just kind of.

She suffers them and has become very gracious in suffering them throughout the different.

Different spots.

Do you have Buzz off?

Oh yeah, man.

I got my favorite growing up there.

He's one of the turrets of Castle Grayskull looking down upon us.

We do this interview right now.

Why he man, Joe?

Why he.

I when I was a kid, I wasn't one of those.

I didn't.

Wasn't one of those kids who got.

Got a toy every time they went to a Walmart or a Ben Franklin store or whatever.

And so I would get basically the hand me downs from my mom's friends.

Like she'd go to her friend's garage sales and bring a Skeletor that didn't have any.

And, and I.

But I've always been like a compulsive collector when I was a baseball cards, football cards, stuff like that.

But I could never collect full.

I could never do the.

The scene on the.

The.

On the GI Joe commercials or JCPenney ads that had the full diorama of figures and buildings and vehicles and all that stuff.

And so as I got older and could afford it and they started re releasing these he mans.

This is what I worked so hard for.

Yeah, a full he man diorama.

Exactly.

So I teach, I joke kind of to my wife.

When we get a bigger place someday and we can afford it, I'm going to have a whole he man room kind of like those old train set rooms that people used to have the whole mountains and the tunnels and the people and the towns and all that stuff.

It's just going to be a big.

A big he man room like that.

So.

Yeah.

Well, everybody, when you see Joe, bring your he man collection to the show.

Show.

That's right.

Yeah.

Just.

And he will talk to you, but only he man figures we'll talk.

He man man.

Yes.

The whole thing.

He's got a skeletor right now on some sort of.

Yeah.

Road town.

It's a vehicle, a road time.

Those things are.

Yeah.

But he acts as my paperweight.

There's a paperweight right.

There's paper right there.

And he's.

He's my paperweight.

So I just find places around the house to put them.

This is awesome.

I'm just.

Imagine you're.

You got a couple of inspirations.

Your songwriting.

Yeah.

Why you got books, you got your child, and you've got he man figures.

Yeah, there's a lot of inspire.

The battle between good and evil.

Yeah, that's right.

And there's just in this room.

This is my office.

So what you're looking at is behind me is just my shows.

There's like mementos from when I was a kid, old football helmets.

There's a muskrat skin there.

There's.

There's.

There's a bunch of books and lots of inspiration.

Lots of action figures.

Yeah.

So I saw you do this thing on Instagram.

I'm just curious, what flag is flying outside your house right now?

Steelers right now, man.

Okay.

I didn't.

I didn't know who had the better record.

Well, for.

For the first five to seven weeks or something, it was the Vikings.

So.

Tell our listeners what that's about.

Yeah, we have a flagpole in the backyard.

That's an old.

I cut down this big.

I cut down a tree and stick it in the yard and the wrestled up, finagled some flagpole hardware.

Anyway, so that's beside the point.

But me and my wife agreed at the beginning of the year that whoever had the better record, the Vikings or the Steelers, gets the flagpole for that week.

And the Vikings weren't supposed to be that good.

No.

I gave her the first week thinking, all right, after a week or two, I'll be able to.

Not that the Steelers are supposed to be as good as they are either, but I figured.

Figured they would be able to get some ground back and.

And then she had it for like the first five or six weeks.

And for a while there, I was nervous that the whole season might go By.

And then might not get to wave the Steelers flag, but a couple weeks ago we got it.

And.

Yeah.

And had they had the Steelers lost on Sunday, I would have had to give it back.

But right now The Steelers are 7 and 2 and they're first in the division, so.

And if the.

If the Vikings end up winning the super bowl, you might have some purple and gold merch coming out soon.

Because she's in charge.

She's going to p.

Yeah.

I have gotten more sympathetic to the Vikings.

They're getting in.

They're in the.

They're in the nfc.

So I can reach things as long as we can.

We could meet in the Super Bowl.

Hey, that'd be great, man.

That'd be a party in my house, dude.

You'd have to come down for it.

It sounds like you have a fun life, Joe.

You got a lot of joy, a lot of fun stuff going on.

It is good.

And I think that's what boils down like the.

The.

The he man stuff for me is it's something that's simple and gives me a very shallow happiness that is just.

It makes me smile and.

Yeah.

So good.

And it's bright and it's colorful and.

And.

But yeah, there's a lot of.

There's a lot of stuff in my life that.

That is at a greater depth, gives a lot of joy.

My daughter, my wife, a lot of.

A lot of good friends in the music community that.

That are encouraging.

And we do a lot of fun stuff.

We go a lot of fun places.

So I'm fortunate.

Joe, looking back at your career one day, what do you hope the Joe Stam legacy is going to look like?

And just.

I just hope that there's a catalog of music there that.

That people will still find value in.

People will consider me a guy that could tell a story and tell it.

Tell it well and that.

And that I was able to put together a good enough career to let that music support me.

That's.

I just.

That that's.

I think what any.

That would be good enough for me when it comes to legacy.

What.

Great answer.

Now this has been real fun.

Yeah, I'm glad.

How much more time do you have, Joe?

Glad we worked it out, Zach.

And I apologize making you guys.

No, no, it's all good.

You wanted to do a podcast at 8am and man, we've had a few people.

We throw that out and we've had quite a few, but they.

Some of them have been very groggy.

Takes a while to get to like me and Ben.

Yeah.

That's so good.

Joe, what's your.

What's your parting thought for Americana Curious Nation today?

Americana curious Nation.

I don't know if I have one.

Just try.

Just give the.

Give the songs a try.

Try.

If you don't like them, great.

If you do, wonderful.

I was in a living room with friends of mine down the road, and we were watching a Jason Isol performance of.

Oh, crap.

The.

The pan one.

Anyways, doesn't matter.

Cast iron skillet.

Yeah.

And he walked in and he just started bagging the performance, and me and my buddy were.

And the song, and it's just like.

Yeah.

I'm like, you, Zach.

Like, what the f are you talking about, man?

We still friends with this guy?

No, I'm just kidding.

Gotta be neighborly.

Yeah.

The point is that is that it's not gonna be for everybody, but that just give it a chance, and if you love it, great.

If you don't, then that's okay too.

There are a lot of other artists out there that are doing great work, but anybody that takes the time to pull up my Spotify profile, either.

Joe Stammer, Joe Stan Ban.

And listen to a few of the songs and figure out whether they want to save them and listen to them again.

I appreciate it, and I thank you for that time.

Thanks for joining Zach and I for.

This episode of Americana Curious.

Subscribe where you listen to your podcast so you are notified when a new episode is released.

I'm Ben Fanning, and it's been great sharing these artists and music with you.

Until next time, stay Americana Curious.