Joe Diffie recorded 13 albums and enjoyed more than 20 Top 10 “hits”.
Considered one of the most successful singer/songwriters of the 1990s, he also wrote songs that became ”hits” for Tim McGraw, Conway Twitty and Jo Dee Messina.
Joe is best known for his songs “Home”, “If The Devil Danced (In Empty Pockets)”, “New Way (To Light Up An Old Flame) “, “Ships That Don’t Come In”, “Honky Tonk Attitude”, “Prop Me Up Beside The Jukebox”, “John Deere Green”, “Third Rock From The Sun”, “Pickup Man”, “So Help Me Girl”, “Bigger Than The Beatles”, “Texas Size Heartache”, “A Night To Remember”, “It’s Always Something” and the list goes on and on.
He was a member of the Oklahoma Music Hall of Fame and for over 25 years a member of the Grand Ole Opry.
Joe Diffie died on March 29, 2020 from complications of the coronavirus (covid-19).
I interviewed Joe Diffie on April 22nd 1994
Q - Joe, it’s got to be tough being on the road.
A - It can get that way if you let it. (Laughs).
Q - Where is tonight’s show?
A - Charleston, West Virginia.
Q - I’ll ask you the toughest question first to get it out of the way. 1986 was probably your worst year ever for obvious reasons. (Note: Joe lost his job in a foundry. He declared bankruptcy. A recording studio that he built, he had to sell and his wife divorced him and took their two children).
A - Right.
A – With what happened to you, why didn’t you put a gun to your head like Kurt Cobain did a few weeks ago? How did you handle that stress? How did you get through that year?
A - That’s a good question. You know, I think I just had a good upbringing. That helped me a lot, my parents have always had a real positive outlook on life. You just got to accept things the way they are and if you can’t change them, don’t worry about them. So, I was just there. I don’t know, I just figured out I had a lot of options available. I didn’t really see them but I knew they had to be out there somewhere. So, I think I can attribute that to my parents, their positive attitude on everything.
Q - Speaking of your parents, your father told you to do something every day to make your dream come true if you want this music thing to happen for you.
A - That’s right.
Q - What kind of things did you do every day to make sure your musical dreams would come true?
A - Well I really did take that advice to heart. I do very simple miniscule things some days, but at least in my mind I did something. A lot of days I’d sit around and play my guitar for a few minutes or I’d sing a song or two or I’d try to write a song or I’d try to go out and meet somebody in the music business. Just some tiny thing. Everything kind of come to me in small increments as far as my success I had. It didn’t just happen overnight. I think that advice applies not only to the music business but life in general if you have a dream or goal and you do something every day towards it, you’ll eventually either accomplish that goal or something else will pop up that’s another opportunity for you.
Q - That’s good advice. At on one point you were playing clubs, working in a foundry and going to school. How did you avoid dropping from exhaustion from that schedule?
A - (Laughs). I had a recording studio that I was in every weekend too, every spare minute. I don’t know. I guess the music kind of energized me. I got through the working day; I managed to get through that so I could do my other things that I really enjoy doing. I did get pretty tired there for a while, pretty exhausted, but I just enjoyed doing it. It was fun.
Q - When the foundry closed you had been there for something like nine years. That was the turning point in your life. I’m just curious, Were you offered any reemployment assistance?
A - Well, there was no reemployment assistance. We of course did draw unemployment that we had accumulated I guess. That ran out after about six months, trying to search for a job we really didn’t have much help from the employer as far as trying to help us get another job.
Q - This Travis Tritt tour you’re on, this is the breakthrough tour for you because of the number of people you can reach with it?
A - Absolutely. I think that’s a big part of it. It’s one of the reasons we decided to do it. We can opt to do our own shows and we might have 10,000 people at one show or he might have 2500. I just wanted to get something a little more consistent as far as the crowds were concerned. Of course Travis and Lee Roy help draw the people and hopefully they’ll hear my music if they haven’t paid much attention to it. It’s always different when you see somebody “live”. You can hear them on the radio but you see them live and you go, hey, I like this guy!
Q - This tour lasts how long?
A - Were doing about 80 dates with Travis. Quite a few dates.
Q - You’re used to being the headlining act. When you’re in a support position like you are in this tour, what do you have to give up, besides the length of your show?
A - Well, I preferred to look at it as I’m letting Travis close my show for me. (Laughs). I don’t know, you have to subjugate yourself to the headliner as a form of courtesy and respect for them too. I agreed to do this tour so that’s my position in this thing. I’m not giving up much. Most of the Knights it’s great for me. Usually I sing for 75,80, 90 minutes. So, this is kind of arrest on my voice actually.
Q - And it gives you more of an opportunity to talk to people like me!
A - Absolutely.
Q - You’ve said, I think you have to be a multidimensional to be an artist these days because there’s so much competition if you don’t have the whole package their somebody else out there who does. I know what you’re talking about but why don’t you tell the readers of this interview what you’re talking about.
A - Well, I just think you need to have the looks for the thing for one thing. You need to have the vocal skills and be able to talk to people to do interviews. I think you need to be able to write songs to supplement your own income for one thing. There’s something special about someone who does their own songs. That tells you exactly where they’re coming from; what’s in their heart and mind. You just have to be talented in several different ways. You have to be an actor pretty much for all the videos you’re doing. You gotta be able to do that. You just can’t come up, there and say, “Here I am”! That’s why it’s so hard to get a record deal. It’s one of the hardest things to do. If you put it in perspective, there’s only 250 people that have major-label deals out of all of the people in the world that’s a pretty small percentage.
Q - Especially with the number of people who are coming down to Nashville to try their hand at getting a record deal. I know somebody who just visited Nashville and would like to move to Nashville. He figures it takes 5 to 10 years to get something going on in Nashville. Would you say that’s true or not?
A - I think the five-year thing is pretty accurate. It depends on the talent and a little luck too. It depends on who you run into. The biggest thing you have to have is somebody that believes in you. The most difficult thing is to go to a record label and say, “Hey, look at me”. I’m great! Listen to this, it’s really good. You need to sign me. It helps if you got an intermediary there that can go in and really blow your horn for you. But, for myself it took me three years from the time I moved there to the time I had my first record out on the radio. I’ve seen them happen quicker than that and I’ve seen him take longer than that.
Q - The gentleman I’m talking about went down to Nashville with a demo tape and he wouldn’t even go inside a record company to play it for anybody because he thought it would take him one to two years before he’d feel comfortable doing that. I thought that was just a little strange. How does anyone in Nashville know how long you’ve been in the city?
A - Every record label for one thing is looking for the next Billy Ray Cyrus or Garth Brooks. And, who knows who that is? They don’t really know. But, they like to think they do I think sometimes. It’s like, this guy looks great. He moves good. Then they put him out and he can’t sing. So, they’re pretty open as long as you go through the right channels. You can’t go up to the head guy immediately. You go through the right channels, you can go through publishers, B. M. I. and ASCAP. If you’re talented, the cream will rise to the top of it. If you’re talented, there is a place for you in some capacity.
Q - So, he should have probably gone into a record company straightaway. What did he have to lose?
A - Right. Yeah, but not only that, but approach it as I’m not trying to get a deal, but what do you think of this? What do I need to do? What is your advice to me? What do I need to improve so I can get a record deal or accomplish what I’m trying to do?
Q - You say in your bio. In Nashville you hear a lot of people that are great singers with songs that are great that you figure there is no way they can’t be a hit. Yet, they don’t do anything and it surprises you. Joe, what are these people lacking? How come they don’t make it? Is it because they don’t have that intermediary?
A - I really don’t know. I think that’s part of it. Sometimes people just don’t hear it. There’s no telling. It is amazing to me. I see people, a good-looking guy for instance that has a good song and goes in and sings good and they just don’t hear it. I don’t know what it is and I don’t think anybody knows. On the other hand, you see the complete opposite. You see a guy that can’t sing a note. He gets up there and they sign him because he looks pretty good. It’s a strange business. A lot of luck involved.
Q - Is Branson, Missouri giving Nashville a run for its money these days?
A - I think it is. Of course Branson is not geared to the new stuff you’re hearing on the radio, the current crop of country singers. Branson is geared more towards the over 50, over 60 crowd that go down there. There’s nothing wrong (with that). I’m not saying it’s bad or wrong. I’m just saying that’s what it is geared towards. But Nashville I think has suffered some tourist wise. I think they’re trying to reconcile that by signing more new artists to the Opry for instance. They’ve incorporated this whole series of shows out of the Opryland all summer long with Alabama and Doug Stone and George Jones. So, that kind it draws people to Nashville. That’s the trouble most tourists had with Nashville, there’s nowhere to go see a country show except the Opry on Friday and Saturday nights. So, it’s kind of a strange thing. I think they’re trying to remedy that.
Q - Maybe Nashville should start building some theaters.
A - Well, Opryland has kind of got a lock on that stuff because they got the parking and they got all the stuff there. But, it probably wouldn’t hurt them any.
Q - Elton John said, “These days if you want to hear rock ‘n roll you have to listen to country radio”. Strange, but, true. What happened with country music? It does sound more like rock ‘n roll.
A - I think a lot of us were just influenced by it. When we were teenagers that’s what we listened to, rock ‘n roll. At the time I was a teenager in the “Urban Cowboy” stuff was going through. I wasn’t a big country fan at that time. I loved country. I listen to the older stuff I had, the George Jones, the Merle Haggard’s. I used to listen to Kiss, Aerosmith, Boston, ZZ Top, and all that stuff, The Eagles. I think you’re hearing a lot of that incorporated.
Q - You’ve met a US president. What president would that have been?
A - President Bush. It was a very brief meeting. There were probably about 30 of us artists in this room and the President and Mrs. Bush came in and we said hello briefly and he turned around and took a picture and they left and that was it.
Q - You say, “When it’s all said and done, no matter what, I truly am just a regular Joe”. You know something Joe? You aren’t because you sing for a living and you make records. That means you’re different.
A - Yeah, I guess so in that respect it does. (Laughs). A lot of times you don’t feel like it. Everything happens in small increments. The only real glamour people in my profession really experience is when you’re on stage in front of a crowd or on TV most of the time you’re like everybody else. You gotta eat, put on your britches like everybody else. That’s kind of where that statement came from.
