Warrior Magazine December 2018

EC goes to Nashville

Alums making their mark on The Music City

T here is no shortage of East Central Commu nity College alumni making their mark in the music world that is Nash ville, Tenn. Country music fans would probably recog nize the names Billy Dean and Randy Houser who have performed for audi ences across the country. But there are also those like Michael Hardy, a native of Philadelphia, and Alicia Jordan Pruitt, who grew up in Sebastopol, who are making a difference behind the scenes in the songwrit ing and music publishing industries. Michael Hardy Michael Hardy has spent most of the last decade as a Nashville songwriter and said he might never have ventured to Music City if it weren’t for attending East Central Community College. “To be honest, if I hadn’t gone to EC, I might have never had the courage to move to Nashville. When I moved to Decatur, I had written one song. It was called ‘Caroline.’ I played it one night for a group of friends and I was as nervous as I’ve ever been to actu ally play something I wrote myself. But they loved it and I bet I played it 500 times that year because somebody always wanted to hear it. That was all I needed.” He’s been in Nashville for more than eight years now but has been writing songs since he was a senior in high school. He said his move north was on a whim when he only had two songs under his belt. “My sister, Madison, had already moved to Nashville a couple years before me and basically told me, ‘You could make a career out of songwrit

ing.’ At the time, I had no idea it was an entire industry. So after that, I decided to try to make it a career simply be cause I loved it and I have very sup portive parents who allowed me to go chase that dream.” Hardy says he writes both music and lyrics, but the method of songwriting is something he says has changed over the years. He says producers and song writers have streamlined the process so that it’s more “efficient and effective” when it comes to getting an artist to record one’s song. “These days you have a producer in the room who plays two or three songs he or she has already recorded but has no lyrics or melody yet and the song writers, as well as the producer, work together on the idea, lyrics and melody until it’s done. “You used to just walk into a room with other songwriters with an acoustic guitar and make the music yourself but the process of getting the songs re corded and mixed and demoed to pitch to artists takes way longer that way.” The songwriting process, Hardy says, is a lot like any other job. Many times it begins with coffee and conversation before the songwriting ever begins. “You walk in, drink a cup of coffee and shoot the breeze for a bit then sit down and go to work. It always starts with the writers throwing out different ideas and you just write the best idea in the room that day. “I write every weekday, and a lot of weekends I’ll go on the road with an artist and write as well. I don’t write at the same place every time though. There are studios and publishing houses all around music row that I write at. Sad to say, but usually I don’t even bring a guitar to a write anymore because producers have so many in their studio that it’s fun to just pick one up and start playing sometimes.” His songs have been recorded by Chris Lane, Tyler Farr, Morgan Wallen, Jake Owen, Justin Moore, and others. He said sometimes songs get pitched to the artist by the publisher and some times writers develop a relationship with the artist themselves and send them songs whenever they want to. “That’s how I got Florida Georgia

Line cuts. They had me out on the road to write with them about two years ago and we hit it off, so they had me out to write the rest of the tour and we ended up writing a lot of songs for their next record, including ‘Simple.’” ‘Simple’ was the lead song on Florida Georgia Line’s fourth studio album and was co-written by band members Tyler Hubbard and Brian Kelley along with Hardy and Mark Holman. The song debuted at No. 24 on the Country Airplay chart on its release on June 1, 2018, and peaked at No. 1 on Country Airplay in October 2018. Hardy is signed with music publisher Relative Music, which is run by Jesse and Dennis Matkosky. His most popular song to date is “Up Down” performed by Morgan Wallen featuring Florida Georgia Line. It went No. 1 on country radio recently and was also certified platinum, which means it has sold over a million copies. Hardy said it would be really hard to pick his favorite song, but if he had to choose it would be a song he wrote by himself called “Dog Years.” He explained, “It’s written from the perspective of a dog that’s being put down and it’s ‘speaking’ to its owner and thanking him/her for being so good to it. The song got me my first publishing deal which may have never happened if I would have never written it, so it means a lot.” When asked about his musical influences, Hardy said, “I have a ton of influences. Lyrically, I love John Prine. He’s an awesome lyricist and has a very left footed way of saying things and I really respect that and try to do the same. Musically, I love rock and roll so I usually tend to lean more towards the rock side of country. Led Zeppelin is one of my favorite bands. I also love a lot of 90s rock: Soundgarden, Stone Temple Pilots, and Alice In Chains. I didn’t listen to country music growing up at all, ironically, but I grew up living a country lifestyle as most people do in Mississippi so I can definitely speak the language.” Hardy is showing no signs of slowing down and has recently signed a record deal with Big Loud and will be going on tour this fall and into next year.

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