Exclusive: Bri Bagwell Talks About Texas Red Dirt Country

Bri Bagwell is a remarkable artist in the Texas Country Music scene. She has been recognized as the Texas Female Artist of the Decade . Her journey in the music industry has been quite impressive, starting from her first full-length release, “Banned from Santa Fe” in 2011, to her latest release in “Corazón y Cabeza (Heart and Head).

Bri’s performances are known for their energy and fun, and she has successfully created a loyal and passionate fan base over her career. She has shared the stage with some of the best artists, including Willie Nelson, Miranda Lambert, Gary Alan, Dwight Yoakum, Randy Rogers, Robert Ear Keen, and Wade Bowan. Her talent has also started to garner national attention, being praised alongside country music truth tellers such as Ashley McBryde and Morgan Wade.

With ten #1 songs in Texas and multiple Female Vocalist of the Year awards to her credit, it’s clear that she has made a significant impact on the music scene.

Men's Journal Country Music had the opportunity to sit down for an exclusive interview.  Enjoy.

MJ : How are you and what are you currently up to?

Bagwell : Well, I am only home a couple of days this month, so getting ready to leave and get in the studio with my producer tomorrow to start on my new record coming out probably sometime next year. We have shows this weekend then after that we are going on a cruise, where I will be performing a couple of days. So pretty much just going and going through the summer and then going and going until forever.

MJ : You started playing gigs your Senior Year at UT Austin, you played in a band with your older brother before that, but what really got you started in music?

Bagwell : I was in a daycare when I was really young where we performed musical types of plays. So, I started singing on stage when I was 3. I was terrified. My Mom had to bribe me with a doll just to get me to finish the performance. She doesn’t do that anymore, what the heck Mom? (laughs) Seriously though, my whole family is musical. My uncle had a band growing up, my mom and dad played various instruments, everyone just kind of sang and played so it was just natural. Then my brothers, there’s two of them, they’re identical twins, they started a band when I was 14 and we started playing in Honky Tonks. Then I was hooked!

MJ : So Country Music was what you started in?

Bagwell : Yes, my uncle’s band was a really popular country band in Southern New Mexico. One of my cousins played steel guitar for Kenny Chesney for nine years and a bunch of other people. So Country Music is just in our blood. I always tell people that Johnny Cash and my grandmother were second cousins, so it runs deep.

MJ : Speaking of genres of music, can you tell us in your own words what Texas Music and Red Dirt Music is, compared to the rest?

Bagwell : Yes, I mean it’s really crazy how much Nashville has embraced Texas Music recently. Like Cody Johnson is considered both now, but he’s still making Texas music. I think that Texas Red Dirt Music is such a wide genre. You have everything from really country sounding stuff to kind of rock n roll like Whiskey Myers to Courtney Patton. It is a really wide range. What I define as Texas Red Dirt is somebody that’s making music that is authentic to them without any boundaries. You know, no one really telling you what you can and can’t write and can and can’t record. For me on my last record I know that if I wanted to release songs with some Spanish lyrics, it was like cool. Like a real Southwestern Country Music genre sound and that’s exciting. I don’t ever have to worry about if what I’m doing is going to fit the mold, I guess.

Texas Red Dirt music is spreading. For example, I played in North and South Carolina, I had never played there before, and the people loved it! I mean for Red Dirt music there’s fan clubs springing up across the country with Red Dirt fans. I think people are really latching on to it more than they ever have. It’s not just a Texas thing anymore. I think it’s the phase that Nashville went through with their music. There’s good and bad in both. I mean I love Miranda, Ashley McBride, and Chris Stapleton. Nashville went through the phase of everything sounding the same and sounding too “poppy” and there was a little bit of push back.

MJ : Do you get validation from all the awards you’ve won? What do the awards really mean to you?

Bagwell : I think it differs through the years. My first one I was really excited, and not that I’m not excited now, I mean I cried because it was really validation of, okay, I made the leap from my day job to going into music full time. It absolutely was validation, like you said. Through the years it always feels good to win. I think I’m about to recuse myself from the votes because a girl said to me, “I don’t even tell people to vote and why bother because you are in the category”. That kind of broke my heart. It was so sad. I told her, what I do now is so much easier, I mean it’s still hard, but it is so much easier than what she’s doing. She is still driving to the gigs, setting up her own PA system, playing for hours, taking it down and driving back home. I did that for years and years before I had a team and a band, a tour manager and all that. So, I wish everyone could win, and I appreciate it, but I think I’ve had my fair share.

MJ : Well, that was sad to hear, but you’ve got to put in the work to get the reward, right?

Bagwell : Yes, and we are still working super hard. But this year at the T3R Kylie Frey was there Jordan Rainer and they both just had really, huge years on TV shows and stuff. I definitely wasn’t expecting to win. It does feel good! I care less about the award than the award show, because it’s such a fun day where you get to see all your friends and just have a great time. I mean, I was sitting between Wade (Bowan) and Randy (Rogers) and just laughing, and that’s way more fun for me.

MJ : You have had a slew of number one hits and great songs on the charts, but what was having your first song, My Boots, reach number one?

Bagwell : Oh yes, I remember that. We were playing in East Texas outside in April. Then this random cold front just came through, it was so crazy and just froze everybody out and we were playing to nobody. I was shaking and freezing, but I was like, hey, at least I have my first number one! Oh, the ups and downs of the music business.

MJ : So, you found out at that show?

Bagwell : No, but that was the first show I played after finding out.

MJ : When you first found out what did you do?

Bagwell : It was awesome! I pulled over and I called my mom. When I first started all I wanted to do was be a Texas Music Country Singer. My brothers loved Texas Country Music. They are seven years older than me, and they used to go to El Paso and watch Jason Boland, Cory Morrow, and bring back signed CDs for me. So, I’ve always wanted to do this!

When I was starting, back then managers in the business said I shouldn’t do it and I should just go to Nashville. They’d say, “just trust us there aren’t any girls that have been successful here” (in Texas Red Dirt Music). I’ve kind of spent my whole life just trying to prove them wrong. I still don’t think there is much of like a female Pat Green or Randy Rogers, but I feel like we’re getting closer, but we are still trying to break that mold. So, my first number one was the like the first step in doing that. I think at that time I was the only girl on the Red Dirt chart. Now there’s like so many. I remember loving Sunny Sweeney, but she went to Nashville and had a breakout hit. I just never knew if it was even possible to have success.

MJ : Well, you are definitely a trailblazer for women in the Texas Red Dirt scene.

Bagwell : I don’t know what it is. I have men close to me in my life that love female artists. So, it’s very weird when I hear that guys don’t like female artists. My boyfriend loves Alison Krauss and the other amazing female singer/songwriters. He gives them equal credit. It’s just hard to understand. I definitely have seen things changing. You know, I used to get from bar owners when I was trying to book shows, that they wouldn’t book me because I was a female, and female artists don’t sell beer. But now I haven’t heard that in years. So, I take that as maybe a positive change.

MJ : Good for you letting it fuel your fire and not discouraging you.

Bagwell : I’ve always thought that if I work as hard as I can and make the best music that I can. I have run into things that are specifically female related problems and issues, but I try not to make it like that, and just prove everybody wrong. Like you said let it add fuel to my fire and not let it discourage me, because there are ways around it.

MJ : I had the pleasure of meeting your sweet, rescue dog, Whiskey. What inspired you to do a fundraiser with the song, which just hit number one on the Texas charts, The Rescue?

Bagwell : To date I have mailed over five thousand dollars to those charities which is really exciting. We did a live stream where people donated. I had set a goal for five thousand and we exceeded it. It was so awesome! The shelters were so thankful. I went to the shelter here in New Braunfels and visited and met all the dogs. They are so happy and precious. But I found my dog Whiskey in the middle of the road five years ago. She had heart worms; fleas and she was cold. I chased her down and she just stopped. Since then, at that moment, she has been my dog. I am her person, and she is my person, and we love each other so much. She rocks the cowboy hat; she has clothes and even little earphones for when we are performing, and it gets too loud. She goes on stage with me and everything. I am super lucky.

MJ : So, you’ve made five albums now? How have you or your music changed, if at all, with each one?

Bagwell : I think it’s important to let an artist change and evolve. I’m at the point in my career where people tell me my song writing has gotten better, and we love your new record, the production is amazing. Then I have people who tell me they miss the old Bri. We have to change though. I had my days of, okay I want to be a Texas artist, so I have to have a beer song, a boot song, a whiskey song or whatever. I kind of did things almost like a check list. I still loved it. I loved what I was doing, but I’m just at a different place in my life right now where I’m older. Like my last record I wanted to create a concept around my life and with some Spanish feel and Spanish lyrics influence in it. I definitely think that each record tells you where I am in my life. My “When A Hear Breaks” record was about heartache. My last one was about me wanting to exhibit my love for the Southwest and my next one is going to have another theme I haven’t quite figured out yet. I know my producer, Rachel Loy, (who is awesome) whenever I was going to make the first record with her, she said these songs are good, but they just sound like songs you co-wrote with great writers. Which I did, I had amazing writers. But she said it didn’t really have a message. So, I said, well she’s right, she’s always right. So, I took about six months off of making the record and I wrote all new songs and that was for “In My Defense”. That was really a good thing. It was less about just picking songs and she wanted to know what it was I wanted to say. That was so cool that she did that, and I am so thankful for it.

MJ : Did you start writing or singing first?

Bagwell : I guess singing, but I did start writing songs at 13. My Mom always jokes saying you would think she is this tortured or abused child with what I was writing. I was writing really dark and sad songs, and I loved just listening to that kind of music. So, I started writing at 13 and playing the piano, but I didn’t pick up a guitar until I was 18, when I went to college. A guitar was much more portable than a piano.

I’ve always written poetry, but song writing is still daunting to me sometimes. I have to make myself do it. I make myself write a song every two weeks as a part of this songwriting group, so that helps with accountability. My producer had me in her group which was writing one song a week with a word or a phrase, like a prompt. I did that for years. So now the new record, we are starting with five songs, and I’ve put seventeen that I like in a folder. I chose those seventeen from hundreds, I just have so many songs. It is owed to that song writing group and making myself be disciplined to write. I mean you write a bunch of bad ones, but it gets those out of the way for the good ones to come through.

MJ : Who was your first big artist to open for and how did that come about?

Bagwell : Oh, that’s interesting. I would consider opening for Jason Boland was a big deal for me, while I was still in high school. I was so excited. I remember his steel guitar player telling me he thought that I was good, and I was just so excited. But then actually early on, the first year I started my band, I got to open for Miranda (Lambert) in maybe 2011. I know it was my fourth full band show I ever did. It was awesome and terrifying, but I didn’t know any better. It was exciting and I remember I sold every bit of the T-shirts that I had. That was really early on in my career to have that kind of love. I met Miranda’s Mom, and her mom really helped me out.

MJ : You have played and are playing all over, what is, or do you have a favorite venue type to play?

Bagwell : Yes! I love listening rooms. I love like a Dosey Doe in the Woodlands. I don’t know, any sort of listening room is great. Then also Gruene Hall, there’s just something magical about that too. I think my favorite is smaller, storytelling ones and also big stages with big lights with big energy or a lot of history. That doesn’t really narrow it down.

MJ : I’ve been dying to ask you, what gave you the idea of starting your Podcast “Only Vans”?

Bagwell : Well, my tour managers and I at the end of every night we would drive home and talk in the Van on the way. I would sit in the front seat, and we would just chat. So, when podcasts started coming out, we would say, we should be recording these, and it would make a great podcast. Of course, I thought that I had come up with the name, “Only Vans”, because it’s a great idea, but actually my tour manager at the time, Jeff, it was actually his idea. My tour manager after Jeff, Kyle, already had a podcast called Texas Toast. Kyle told me he would do the editing and all that stuff if I would just record and get the guests. It was great. I would just text my friends like Wade and say hey, do you want to come record? It’s been fun and we are actually about to announce that we are possibly signing with a big network and I’m really excited. It has definitely been a learning curve. We shoot video too and we recently added a camera for Whiskey, so we have a Whiskey cam that’s just on Whiskey the whole time. She’s already more famous than me by a long shot.

MJ : Speaking of friends in the industry, is there anyone you would like to collaborate with in the future?

Bagwell : Oh my gosh! That’s really tough. Well I actually just signed with New Frontier touring, which is a big deal for me and they have Reckless Kelly. So Reckless Kelly put me on their whitewater show June 15 ^th with them on their farewell tour. I just love Reckless Kelly and Mickey and the Motorcars. I just wrote a song called Idaho and sent it to them. I really want to collaborate with those guys because they’ve been so awesome to me, and I just think they are the most amazing people in the whole world. They’ve been so helpful for me in my career. They eloquently summarize the female musician thing. They really are cheer leaders for female artists, and not just say that they are. Of course there is Willie Nelson. I think he has the most duets with anyone. I opened for him one time and he was amazing.

There are so many good people in this industry. So many have been so good to me and that’s why I’ve been able to keep going for so long. It is a big family.

MJ : What’s something about you that most folks don’t know that you would want them to know?

Bagwell : Oh, that I would want people to know. Interesting. Um, I mean I do a lot of volunteer work with a place called Marbridge in South Austin. It’s for adults with mental disabilities of all kinds. I have a mentee there that I am her mentor, and we get together once a month. I play shows there sometimes. I don’t want to say that like it’s a toot your own horn moment, that’s NOT why I do it. I truly believe it brings me the most joy and it’s really good, like we were talking about, for the soul. To give back in a way, bringing joy to other people, and to myself. Even though I am on my way out of town, I’ll go there and take her out for ice cream. I go in and everyone pets my dog. I feel like if I can be involved in something like that then everyone should try to do it. Everyone needs more volunteers, the humane societies need volunteers, so many do. It’s all just brought me so much joy. You know I don’t post it on social media, but I do want people to know how much joy it does bring me.

MJ : Not that you have any, as you are also building a house, but what do you like to do in your downtime?

Bagwell : Oh yeah, the house is taking every spare penny and minute of time right now, but it’s been really fun building it. I like to cook. I think I like to do more home things, you know, because I am gone so much. That may sound stupid, but when you are never home it’s awesome. I like to just go browse HEB, run errands with my dog, wash the rugs and stuff like that. I also like to read books. Just normal things. Even if I don’t buy anything I like a TJ Maxx or Trader Joe’s browse moment.

You know I told you I’m in this writing class with Bonnie Bishop and part of this class is you have to make yourself go do something childlike or just fun for yourself for an hour each week. So, like today I’m going to go get a pedicure, which I haven’t had in a really embarrassingly long time. We really need to pamper ourselves, especially as an artist because there are so many ups and downs. Then when you get home you tell yourself I have to unpack, repack, do the house stuff, get the Van tuned and stuff. You forget to take that time for yourself, so I am trying to make that more of a priority. One of the best things I’ve learned in the class is you just need time for yourself, it doesn’t even have to cost money, it’s just good for your soul.

MJ : Where do you see yourself 5 and 10 years from now?

Bagwell : Well, with this new agent we’ve been really filling out the calendar. I am going to twenty new states that I’ve never been to this year. So, we are laying the groundwork for expanding outside of Texas. I love Texas with my whole heart, but I want to take my music to anywhere I can including back overseas now that COVID is behind us. So, in five years I really want to be headlining my own theater type shows all across the country and overseas when I can. Maybe have a couple more records out. I’m trying to write a book slowly and have that published. I’ve written a children’s book and I’d love to get that published as well. I have a lot of irons in the fire right now, but I just want to hit the road really really hard this year and really lay that foundation for myself and with my band. I’m seeing Texas Music take off so much and it’s so fun seeing different cities all across the country embrace it. I’ve been pretty much in the Southwest for over ten years now, but I’m ready to expand my reach!

To find out more about Bri and see her tour schedule, go to: Country Music | Bri Bagwell