Some people are just born communicators and Lucas Hoge has that gift. Whether he’s writing a song for a hit TV show, performing for troops overseas or sharing his love for the great outdoors with fellow sportsmen at a
Cabela’s gathering, Hoge has that rare ability to find common ground with just about anyone and draw them into his world.
Lucas performed at Cavendish Beach Music Festival last year on the Cavendish Kitchen Farm Stage and Sirius XM Emerging Artist Stage, this year He hit the main stage and it was no wonder why. He came out on fire, the energy and passion he has for music and his fans made his set perfect. We look forward to seeing him again in the future. James had a chance to sit down and speak with Lucas, and here is what they chatted about.
Lucas: I grew up in a small little rural country town of 44 people in Hubbell, Nebraska. I fell in love with music and country music back then. I have two older sisters and an older brother, every time they played the radio I didn’t like a single thing they played. Finally my dad started bringing me some country music and I fell in love with it as a really really young kid. I started picking up different instruments, I started playing drums first, went to piano then guitar after that, a few little side instruments too.
James: You spent the month of May travelling to bases performing for the troops. Tell us about that experience.
Lucas: For the last 9 years, I’ve dedicated the month of May to Military May. That’s all I do is focus on giving back to the Military, doing shows for them. We started in New York playing for the Paralyzed Veterans of America then flew straight to Mildenhall, did a show for our air men over there at the airbase and flew back to the United States for about 5 days and flew back to Amman, Jordan and Kosovo. I was there about a week and a half to two weeks.
James: Your new single “Dirty South”, What’s the story behind it?
Lucas: My buddy Jack Williams and Troy Johnson, good friends of mine. Jack used to be a staff writer for The Who back in the day. He’s a wealth of knowledge, great guy to hang out with, talk to, full of stories, he remembers when He was on tour with those guys and they were throwing mattresses on fire out the windows. He has an organic farm across the street from the Loveless Cafe in Nashville now, he has a little writing room upstairs. I walk in and my buddy Troy is there with his sunglasses on picking this cool little tune, I’m like “dude have you written that yet?”, he said no i wanted to try and write that today. I said that’s dirty and sexy and southern at the same time, so we sat down and Dirty South fell out probably an hour and half later. We just finished the music video, which comes out July 20th, 2017.
James: Your new album “Dirty South” is set to be released July 28th, tell us about that?
Lucas: It’s been a long time, a long progress, two labels in and we finally releasing it. It’s one of those stories, you listen to the album front to back and each song kind of has a story that involves into the next one that shows my journey. We wanted to have songs that people can really sink their teeth into, full imagery. You can relate at least to one or two songs but we try to get everyone to relate to all of them. There is something for everyone on it for sure.
James: Did you write/co write any of the songs?
Lucas: I co-wrote 90% of the songs. I think there is only 3 on there I did not write.
James: Can you tell us about the ones you wrote.
Lucas: Absolutely. The first one is “Shoo fly pie”, I never heard of Shoo fly pie, I grew up on pecan pie, apple pie stuff like that. My dad always told me there was only 3 kinds of pie in the world anyway hot, cold and more. My buddy and I were sitting at Black River record label writing , my buddy Tim Gates walks in and he got this pie that I kid you not, as big as my guitar. I’m like “Dude, what kind of pie is that”, He said my grandma just sent me this, it’s a shoo fly pie. I never heard of shoo fly pie in my life. I said we have to write a song about it. There are ton of songs on there like that. There’s another one called “Mad dog memories”, when we were not quite of drinking age in high school, we would steal a bottle of Mad Dog and have a party and that’s what it turned into.
James: Do you have a favorite track off the album?
Lucas: I do, it’s probably a track that won’t get a ton of exposure. Its the very final track called “Who’s going to be there”. It’s a tribute to a buddy I lost in high school. Growing up in a small town like that 44 people, 300 people, there’s only 80 kids from grade primary to 12. When you lose a friend like that, it’s like losing your brother. Everyone is family.
James: What are your plans after the release?
Lucas: We will be on tour when it releases. We will be in New York, so we have a show there, I think with Old Dominion. From there we are all across the U.S and back, down in Mexico we are going to do some shows. Then we are doing a lot of grand openings of Cabela’s. They are one of my sponsors, I do alot of parties for them.
James: How did your partnership with Cabela’s come about?
Lucas: I was doing a duck dinner, just me and my guitar in front of about 2000 men. I played my set, then sat down with everyone to have some duck and this older gentlemen sitting next to me said “man that was really good music, where you from”. I said originally I’m from Nebraska, He said I’m from Sydney. I said Oh the home of Cabela’s, he was like Yeah I run it. We just hit it off , kept in touch over the next few years and about 3 years later He starts sending stuff to the record label asking for information on Lucas, we started the partnership up and it’s been great ever since.
At the end of the interview, Lucas mentioned how much he loves it up here in Canada, and hopes to be back soon. Everyone watch for the release of his new album “Dirty South” available July 28th, 2017. His music video for “Dirty South” is out July 20th, 2017.
You can find Lucas on all social media, along with his website. All listed below.
http://www.lucashoge.com/
Facebook: /lucashoge
Instagram: /lucashoge
Twitter: /lucashoge
You can also find him on Youtube and Spotify.
