[0:02] I’m Kevin and I’m Stephanie and during our marriage, we have dealt with an electrocution, a brain tumor, brain surgery, then doctors telling us that children were not

[0:11] in our future, followed by miscarriage and then Kevin’s cancer diagnosis. However, today we live a life completely healed and restored with three healthy children who doctors said were not possible. And we’re here to tell stories that inspire, give hope and brighten your day. Welcome to Tell Us a Good Story. Okay, friends, before we get to this episode, just a friendly reminder to please hit the subscribe button on YouTube and Apple Podcasts or give us a review. Five stars, please. In our world, this is super, super important because it will help with the algorithm to make it easier for people to find us. And thank you for sharing our posts across your social media. That really helps with engagement and with us getting guests. Yes. So, hey, if you want us to keep working our way up to talking to Chip and Joanna, please share us with your friends. But regardless, thank you for listening to Tell Us a Good Story. All right, Steph. We’re so excited about this. I could barely sleep last night thinking about this conversation we’re about to have. Like, holy freaking crap. Like, we’re talking to them. Isn’t this crazy? Hey, watch your language, Steph, all right? Hey, I hope you feel the same after this.

[1:23] Well, friends, our next guests are Southern rock icons. And they’ve reunited for their first Christian album titled Always Look Up, available everywhere November 22nd, which is when this drops. Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome to Tell Us Good Story, Donnie and Johnny Van Zant. Woohoo! You guys, welcome! Thank you guys for saying yes to us. We’ve been looking forward to this. Yes. And ahead of this conversation, I’m thinking of y’all and putting myself in your shoes. I can only imagine, Donnie and Johnny, how many times people yell at you to play Freebird. Or Sweet Home Alabama. Yes. Yes. Like, what’s the most random place you’ve had a fan yell at you? Because I’m sure this happens every day. Let me tell you a story. Please. He’s full of stories. I used to watch the Sonny and Cher show whenever we were young, you know. Yes. And our wives talked us into going to see Cher. Many, many years ago. And we were out in the audience. And for some reason, myself, I went… Free Bird!

[2:32] But with Skinner, I’m still hot with Skinner. You’ll hear it through our set. I mean, we’ll be in the first song, second song. Free Bird! Really? I’m always like, you know what? We can play that, but we leave right after that. So I think you might want to hear a few more. Yes, because I’m thinking like you’re at the grocery store or hopefully not like a funeral, right? And somebody’s yelling at you to play Free Bird. So I was curious. Yeah, I’ve been driving down the road and somebody next to me, free bird when I played when I was playing with 38 special they’d actually hollowed that out to 38 did they really you know hey God bless it hey it’s been an awesome song for the band yes for sure okay so speaking of your band are fans shocked when they find out you guys don’t actually live in Alabama wait no they don’t, wait how is that possible you got to sweet home Alabama, we like Alabama.

[3:29] Been good to us uh now you know what we’re from jacksonville florida and the band in the early days used to go over to muscle shoals alabama okay and record and uh fell in love with alabama our brother ronnie loved the state and uh end up writing this song called sweet home alabama about it because neil young was putting down southern people and uh he was from canada so it was a joke and boy did it hit uh you know so but no we’re feridians are you kidding okay so you’ve mentioned you know 38 special you’ve mentioned leonard skinnard how did you guys think of those names yes oh i love those stories i don’t want to take up so much time give us give us a short version then donnie our problem with 38 special we we were out at a rehearsal place out on uh north florida okay and there’s a little town called yulee florida okay and we found this abandoned golf course shack that’s what it was they kept fertilizer in it but the worst what’s wrong with it.

[4:39] But the thing about a band the hardest thing for a band especially a young band just starting is finding a place to rehearse at. Oh, I bet. Because you’re constantly always having the law called to you for disturbing the police. You’re loud. Yeah, yeah. That’s it. So we found this place and we were out there rehearsing one night and being goofballs that we were, we had the front door chained up, And none of us had a key to the padlock, you know. So the cops pulled up there thinking there was really a drug orgy going on.

[5:16] And they were hollering through the door, come out with your hands up. And we couldn’t open the door. Because it was locked. So it had an upstairs part. So we went upstairs and climbed down a drain pipe. Okay. And then before we could even get down to drain pipe, they were pulling us out, you know. And it came from that incident right there. So apparently they had 38s drawn on them. Okay. They actually had 38s and said, these 38s will do the talking for you. I said, they sure will.

[5:49] Okay. John, can you tell the story then about Leonard Skinner, how that name came about? Because that’s a story in itself, I believe. Yeah, sure. You know what? There was a coach named Leonard Skinner at Robert E. Lee High School here in Jacksonville. And he kept kicking the guys out. Donnie got kicked out by him. Did you? And for having long hair. And back then, long hair was just a little bit touching your ears. That’s right. Yeah. So he kept kicking them out. And they were playing a place called the Good Shepherd, wasn’t it? Yeah. Good Shepherd. And it was actually a Catholic school, wasn’t it? Yeah. Okay. And they were doing like a teen dance. And that night, just for the heck of it, they said, Coach Skinner kicked us all out today for having long hair. We’re going to rename the band Leonard Skinner. And it stuck. And they spelt it different. You know, the band, of course, spelt it different. But he became really famous around here after that, of course. And he ended up opening up a real estate company, bar. Oh, seriously. Wow. He did great. He was a huge fan. And he became friends with the band after that, of course. And actually, we did a thing at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame years ago, and he came out and joined the band on that. So he was a good guy. He’s passed on now. I will tell you, I always tricked him. Okay. You know, I got Vaseline hair tonic. And I would just put that on my hair. And I had a receding hairline anyway.

[7:16] So I looked bald anyway. So he felt sorry for me.

[7:22] So it was like purely a joke then it was a joke yeah yeah you know what again he was he was a good guy he just you know hey back then you know what whenever we were kids our dad he was in the navy and this guy our older brother ronnie anytime my hair would get a little long at all be like johnny’s hair’s getting long and you know we wore it they had what they call a flat top yes with the butch wax and you could set a bowl of plant whatever on top of your head with that kind of thing. And, uh, but we, he was a good guy. This episode is being presented to you by our good friend, Anthony J. Young. Anthony is a new author, speaker, and entrepreneur. And you can get his new book titled Necessary Pain, Understanding Passion on the Path to Greatness on Amazon or his website, anthonyjyoung.net. That’s right. His book came out recently and was a number one new release on Amazon when it launched. We are so proud of Anthony and his book will be a must read for the upcoming holiday season. You can go to Amazon or anthonyjyoung.net to get his new book. And thank you, Anthony, for being a proud sponsor of Tell Us a Good Story.

[8:34] So you both have toured and been in bands for over 40 years. Okay. Oh, yeah. Do you have any stories, guys, from something fun happening while you’re on stage, right? Whether it’s in the audience, in the crowd, or is something happening? Do you have any good stories from your time on stage? How bad you want to get?

[8:53] Well i want you to go bad keep it keep trying to keep it pg right for me we were playing out in san francisco at a shoreline amphitheater bill graham’s place out there and we’re playing and, they always have security you know you don’t want people up there while you’re playing you never know what they want and uh the next thing i know just it was the funniest thing because apparently this girl was a gymnast because she started from one end of the stage all the way to the other end and was doing backflips and we were all like kind of dumbfounded and the security guys were trying to get her off we were like no let her go and so she went all the way back across it was an amazing thing i mean she was i was like what who is this is she on the u.s olympic team or what and then there’s been a lot of different things one time i hit my monitor guy in the head with my mic stand because i thought it was somebody coming up in a dark arena years ago and i thought he was coming up on stage and he was just messing with my monitors where i was singing at but i just seen a figure in the dark so i went oh you ain’t coming up here and boom i hit him you know with it and uh yeah there’s multiple things we can tell you about all that Look at her. Oh, my gosh. And he still loved me after that. I don’t know how. He knew I knew. I didn’t know. He was innocent.

[10:17] How about you, Donnie? I was in Oklahoma. Okay. And this particular spot was a dry county. Okay. You know? And at that particular time, you know, I drank a little bit. It wasn’t much. You drank a lot. A lot of it. But I did have a Jack Daniels bottle up there, and I had Coke. And right at the time we were getting ready to go on the stage, our management called us up and said, y’all just got your gold record, you know, and all I was doing was just thanking, toasting the crowd for helping us get a gold record. Well, that didn’t go over very well with a policeman there. I bet. So as soon as I walked off the stage that night, they met me at the end of the steps with handcuffs. Did they? I actually got to spend the night in the gym. You did? But they made a big example of me. I mean, they put me in the little orange outfit. They put shackles on my legs. Did you look good? I thought I looked pretty good. Oh, my gosh. Thank God we got good lawyers. I got out the next week. You know what? The moral of this story is that Donnie’s had a lot of experience with police officers.

[11:32] You know what? I’m seeing a trend here, Donnie. You know what, though? I love that they at least let you finish the show for their county. Yeah, for their county. And then they took you. Yeah, then they took me. They got me right at the end of the step. I didn’t even know what was going on. Oh, my gosh. That’s awesome. Okay. so another thing then right from being in big time bands guys for decades yeah do you have any stories of fun interactions then with fans out in public oh we have we have fans every day driving by our house do you really picture yo my it’s unbelievable yeah you know what we’re very private people but you know what where we live at it’s a little town it’s called middleburg Everybody knows us. But every once in a while, maybe they may have company come in if we’re out and about, and they’d see us. They’re like, oh, good. And usually most people are like, that’s just Johnny and Donnie.

[12:30] But we love our fans. Most people are really, really polite and appreciative of what we do for a living. And God, I’m trying to think of a good one. I don’t know. That’s a good question, though. That’s a great question. What was the question? say any he’s already forgot senior moment have you ever had any interaction funny interaction with fans hey non-police people non-police people yeah i got one for you i had to go through this lawsuit years ago and i ended up winning it okay i had it took me about a year and a half to go through it and it was just miserable and about three years after that i’m at dinner and this gentleman who was the lawyer for the other person came up to me and said hey uh johnny and i was like yeah because of course he was my favorite person i’m sure i’m sure and then he says uh my nephew’s here and he’s a huge fan can you say hello to him i said i’ll say hello to him if you leave yeah.

[13:36] Wow wow he had nothing to do with the lawsuit right hey what about what’s the most odd thing you’ve been asked to sign like autograph from a fan yeah uh you know what a lot of people i’ve had i’ve signed motorcycles cars really yeah can you believe that yeah nice cars nice car.

[14:02] And the thing that gets me is that I hate to sign a beautiful guitar, you know, like something like that, you know, because you never know what’s going to happen to that in the end. And nine times out of 10, if you’re a player, the signature is going to come off anyway, you know, and but those are those are some of the things I would I can I can tell you. Hey, are you allowed to sign guitars of like a different brand or are you? You are. Okay, so you’re not tied to Gibson. As long as you own them. Yeah. Okay. You know what? We’re not tied into one company. Okay. So, yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, people bring them all the time to meet and greets. You know what? For us, we love meeting the people who love our music. It’s a great thing. Would you like to see one of our guitars? Oh, yeah. Yes. We could show you this. This is for the new Christian record we got coming out November 22nd. Check this out. No way.

[15:01] Look at that. Can you see that? Who designed that for you guys? It’s been painted. It’s really nice. It looks like the CD and album cover. What does it say at the very bottom? It says Van Zing. Always look up. Always look up. Thank you. The title of the album. Yep. Yep. Can you see that? Yes. That is fantastic. How about me now? It’s beautiful. It really is gorgeous. Okay. So speaking of your album, guys, I was sent two songs to listen to by your PR rep. Fantastic. And I was telling stuff on the way here. When I was listening to these, they’re not one of these songs where it’s like, hey, are they singing about Jesus? Or are they singing about like an ex-girlfriend? It is very clear. You’re singing about the name of Jesus and you’re not afraid to put that in there. No, not at all. So when I was reading about you guys, I saw a quote, Johnny, from you a couple of years ago where you said, hey, your best friend used to be the devil of everything you had gotten involved with. So can you both talk about this journey of faith you’ve been on where you’ve turned your life over, you’ve surrendered your lives to Christ over the past however many years? Yeah. You know what? For me and Donnie, our dad, he was a Navy guy. He had his times, I’m sure, with the D-Man. I’ll call him the D-Man. I don’t like to give him too much credit.

[16:19] But later on in life, he really started reading the Bible a lot and us as kids, even as much. He would make us sit down while he would read scripture. And you better not have to get up because you’d be in trouble.

[16:34] Real trouble. yeah real trouble yeah yeah of course we grew up and then as kids sometimes that goes to one ear and out the other and uh for me personally i tried everything from liquor to everything else that i could get into really back in i guess 93 94 i was uh drunk as a skunk in knoxville tennessee and thought i could fly like a bird like a free bird and jumped off the spire staircase hurt my back, broke my back. And, uh, I thought at that point in time, I said, boy, God sure knows how to show that you’re not 10 feet tall and bulletproof. And for me, I really got into Christ about seven years ago. My oldest daughter passed from the C word. See, I don’t give those things any credit. It’s not COVID.

[17:23] And, uh, that was a tough, tough time for me as a parent. No parent wants to be part of that club you know it’s just an abnormal thing and when you’re facing that head on you have to really lean on the cross to get through it and i just don’t see how anybody in this world can get through this life yeah things can go really good for you and you kind of forget and to be honest that’s kind of the way i was for a long long time you know you’re chasing the dreams that you have the houses the cars and you kind of put jesus on the back shelf you don’t think of him that much. But when you start thinking of him and asking him to come into your life, boy, he sure does change you. But you know what? It’s an amazing thing. Neither one of us are preachers, but we’re surely believers of Jesus Christ. And I really feel that You know, people say, oh, what’s your next step here? You’re going to go play live. You’re going to do this. You know what? It’s all in God’s hands. You know what?

[18:22] Six, seven months ago, I didn’t. Neither one of us knew we’d be speaking to you guys today. You know, so I leave it in God’s hands. And you know what? I’m having to lean on God a lot right now. I have my youngest daughter about a month ago came down with what they call a cavernoma, which is which is on her brain. So, you know what, when you try to do good in this life and you try to spread the word, you come under attack. And for me, I’ve been under attack. My family has. But you know what? We’re true believers. Faith, faith, faith and love and hope is what we believe in. And yesterday we had a great MRI on my daughter. So, you know what? It’s an amazing, amazing thing. God is good.

[19:07] Steph, did you know that Tell Us A Good Story has a YouTube channel? Wait, seriously? So apparently you don’t watch it. Absolutely not. That’s what I thought. But it’s because you know I don’t like to watch myself. That’s true. That is true. But friends, we have a YouTube channel we would love for you to check out. So if you would like to see video clips of us with prior guests. Or some entire episodes. Or videos of my wife here scaring guests with her excitement. Oh, that too. You can see all of that by going to YouTube and searching Tell Us a Good Story. And don’t forget to hit the subscribe button. Yes. But as always, you guys, thank you for listening to Tell Us a Good Story.

[19:42] So for all of our guests, I like to give a list of fun facts to let listeners know what you’ve done, what you’ve accomplished. And keep me honest here. If I’m wrong on any of these, let me know. But this should lead to some fun conversation. And Steph is not aware of any of these. Okay? So you’re going to see her genuine reaction, right, when I get through these fun facts. Okay? Yep. All right. Fun fact number one. Donnie Van Zant was a lead singer and co-founded the band 38 special like you mentioned the band has sold over 20 million albums and produced 15 record stuff since 1976 Okay, however, he was forced to retire from music in 2013 due to inner ear damage. Oh, so first off Donnie, If I were you, I would be milking this as much as I can, okay? Because every time my wife would talk, I’d be like, sorry, I can’t hear a word you’re saying. I don’t. It’s going in and out. I can’t hear a thing. You kid me. I almost got me a divorce.

[20:42] So you’ve been doing it. You know what? I fought against hearing aids for so many years, and I need them really bad, even years before I left 38. It was a joke, actually, with the band when we were staying in hotels. They go, the best way to find Donnie’s room is to put your ears to the door. If you can hear the TV really loud in the hallway, that’s his room. Hey, but isn’t that normal with musicians where their hearing is what goes, right? It’s not like carpal tunnel or anything. It’s literally their hearing that goes first. Is that right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, Johnny’s half-deaf to sell.

[21:24] I just keep going, huh? I’m impressed, though. I mean, ever since you retired, you’re still able to work, Donnie. You’re still in the studio. You’re still able to get by. I’m not yelling at you right now during this conversation. Walk us through that process, like how you came about having to retire. Well, again, mine was inner ear and nerve damage, you know? What happened was I was on the road, and I don’t want to gross you out or nothing. But I started bleeding from both ears.

[21:54] And I called up a doctor friend of mine, Dr. Michael Loper here in Jacksonville. And I told him, I said, can you come in? Can you meet me at your office? This was on a Sunday. And I went to his office. He looked for the blood first. You know, he goes, I can’t really see where it’s coming from, Donnie. But he goes i have noticed that you asked me to repeat myself about two or three times on anything i say he goes can we do a hearing test on you so i did the hearing test with him and he goes man you need to change your profession you know he goes if you worked on an aircraft carrier i’d take you off the carrier part put you in a nice quiet office you know he didn’t really want to come out and tell me yeah i need to stop you know but anyway i mean it’s it was very weird when i first came off the road i will tell you that i had the best looking yard in the neighborhood, because you’re bored out of your mind you know what it was you couldn’t hear the line is it on is it on i can’t tell yeah.

[23:07] This thing running well you know they told us about that later i mean well make sure your ears are plugged up real well why you’re cutting grass why you’re aging i said why why did you tell me that two years ago we’re both in our yards we uh we have these john deere zero turn okay We race them. Yeah, we’re pretty much racing lot mowers. That’s good stuff. Yes. All right. Fun fact number two. This is about Johnny. To mark the 10th anniversary of the chartered plane crash near Macomb, Mississippi, which happened on October 20th, 1977, that killed the brother Ronnie Van Zant, the Leonard Skinner tribute band was formed. However, for the band to perform without Ronnie, his brother Johnny here, who’s 11 years younger, took on the role as lead singer. Okay. At the time, Johnny already had a record deal of his own when the tribute band was being formed. But their father had to talk him into performing with Leonard Skinner. And Johnny’s been the front man ever since. Wow.

[24:13] So, Johnny, is that true? Because it sounds to me like they had to twist your arm, right, to do this. And you’re just like, you know what, fellas? I’m good. I’m good. But how did that actually go down? Sort of. I had quit the music business. I was driving a truck. Our dad was a truck driver. I said that earlier. I’d quit the music business. I got tired of red tape and all the stuff that came along with it. And I was like, you know what? I know how to drive a truck. I’m going to go haul freight. So I did it for about, what, a year and a half, something like that. But I kept writing songs. and uh i had a guy by the name of joe boylan and a friend of mine robert johnson that knew a fellow named ahmed urtigan that started atlantic records he signed led zeppelin bad company all these great charles and joe took my music to ahmed and said hey i think you’d like this well i got a call on a monday i’m sorry on a friday saying ahmed wanted to come into jacksonville and talked to me about my music with you know at that time i was kind of like yeah sure whatever yeah and uh until i seen a plane come down with a bugs bunny on it then i went oh my lord this is for real so anyway he ended up signing me on another friday gary rossington from skinnerd so i did have a record deal i was getting ready but it was all in one week i had a very good That’s a great week.

[25:37] Gary called me and said they were doing this tribute tour and, I said, man, yeah, I’ll come talk to you, but I want to bring my dad with me. And Donnie was on the road with 38. So whenever I went into the meeting, I didn’t know what they wanted to do, what their aspects were, what the whole plan was. But me and my dad sat at a conference table with my brother’s band members. And to be honest, I really felt sorry for him because the last thing they ever did together as Leonard Skinner was to have a plane crash. Right and i but in the back of my mind i knew that if our brother would have survived that he would have kept this band going so they asked me to be a part of it and my first initial thought was i want to get donnie to be a part of it but 38 was really exploding at that time so he couldn’t you know due to the 38 success but after that i went around and talked to my sisters my mom my and then of course my dad was involved in it so yeah kind of in a sense of a way they were like yeah you know you should do this and and it helped me make up my mind but it’s been 37 years just next year wow you know since all that went down wow and uh you know what the skinner fans are still out there strong we call them our skinner nation they’re god-fearing hard-working patriots here in america and the rest of the world they’re everywhere and it’s a pretty amazing thing It’s the best community, isn’t it? Yeah.

[27:05] It really is. You know, the thing with Skinner is that there’s been multiple tragedies, of course, and the biggest one, the plane crash. And really all the original members are passed on. But boy, their legacy still lives through younger generations. It’s multi-generations now. And somewhere, as we talk right now, some kid’s in a room, probably skipping school. And with a guitar in his hand, trying to learn to lick. Probably, yes.

[27:38] That’s so true. We did that a lot. Yeah, we did do that a lot. We skipped school a lot. To race lawnmowers, apparently. But yeah, it’s amazing, right? You talk about the legacy, just looking you guys up. How many documentaries have been made about you guys and your family, right? It’s incredible. We are getting ready to do a movie about Leonard Scunard. You’re one of the first ones to hear about it. Yeah, you really are. Yeah, I really haven’t let the cat out of the bag too much, but it’s in the works. And I think it’s going to be told by the widow, Judy, Ronnie’s widow, and Dale Rossington, Gary’s widow. And I’m sure all the family members that we can possibly get to tell the true story. That’s the most important thing about doing this thing. And it’s taken quite a while to find someone that we really trusted to put our beliefs in to make this thing.

[28:39] Well, speaking about their family and their dad stuff, next fun fact here. Their father, Lacey Van Zant, is considered to be the patriarch of Southern rock music. He passed away in 2004 at the age of 89. Mr. Van Zant didn’t perform on stage or in the recording studio, but was the biggest fan of Leonard Skinner in 38 Special. Here’s a quote from their father that I saw step on the Florida Times Union newspaper, which is in Jacksonville. Quote, the good book says it’s not what goes into a man’s belly. That’s important. It’s what comes out of his mouth that counts. So as long as my boys don’t glorify the devil and as long as they keep it clean, I’ll back them all the way. So do you have any good stories about your dad going on the road with y’all, going on tour? Like, tell us more about your dad because it was literally a family legacy. Yeah. Yeah. Go ahead. Go ahead. No, you’re talking about really our dad, our parents, you know.

[29:34] I don’t think they really cared about what we did as long as we were happy. And if we did go after something, give it 110%. I got to tell you, our mother would be like, you boys need to get a job.

[29:54] We’re selling records here and making a living. That’s not a real job. She didn’t care anything about fame or anything. But our dad, he loved it. He, uh, he loved that, that, that the music being accepted and people were loving. We were always saying about our dad, if he could play guitar and sing real well, we’d have to be his road. Yeah. You know what? The cool thing is Donnie can testify to this is that he would always, if there was something in the early days to, he went out on the road with me and drove my truck. Okay. You know, he was a truck driver. he would pitch in unload it i mean you know he was there firsthand on a lot of things and uh, the thing needed brakes all right let’s get some shoes and let’s put them on you know get some brake shoes you know so this is this is a guy that went to the sixth grade of school yeah yeah really and he was like a jack of all trades yeah there was really nothing he didn’t know something about yeah you know and he didn’t mind jumping in there and and helping out and our mother you know what if anybody you know and the band was starving okay well come over to the house we’re feeding you you You know, true Southern tradition. And if you didn’t, if you went over to our parents’ house and you didn’t eat, you insulted them.

[31:21] Oh, yes. They’d be like, I can’t believe they didn’t eat. It was just a Southern thing. We had a table in our kitchen in our home. I don’t know. How long was that table? I don’t know. It was pretty long. Probably 14 feet long. Oh, my gosh. Wow. It was huge. And she would cook breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Yeah. And if you were from our neighborhood, if you were hungry, you were welcome to come in. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And she loved it. You know what? We didn’t come from rich. We were rich in family. Yeah. That was the most important thing. But after they passed away, we sold the old home. And it’s actually a historical site here in Jacksonville. Really? Really? Yeah. Yeah. And we went over there and got everything out. We brought it out here to my place and we stored But in 2020, you know, due to COVID, we were down. So we said, well, this is a perfect time to go through all this. And we started going through, and my daughter, Kristen, found that they were old school. They never threw away a checkbook. But at any given month, they had $1,200 in their bank account. You know, so we wasn’t rich. We never went without clothes or anything. We always ate. We thought we were rich. We had clothes and food. Yeah, you don’t know.

[32:35] And, you know, the bed was clean, and we could take a shower. So we thought we were rich, you know, but looking back on that, I went, you know what? They had that. Their struggles must have been something else, especially with five kids. Right. Gosh, Steph, that is Southern hospitality. It really is. Like no matter what, you’re opening your door to your neighborhood, your community, anybody who needs anything. Definitely. We need to get back to that. I was just going to say that. We need that back. A hundred percent. Yes. Absolutely. You know what? Seriously, we never locked doors. We didn’t have air conditioning. We had fans in a window and living in Florida, it was hot. Oh, I bet. In Jacksonville with no AC. I got one for you guys. We end up somehow we got AC central AC and way later. And the gentleman told our dad, he said, Mr. Van’s aunt. I just want to tell you, you have this air conditioning. And you need to keep your door shut because every time that door opens up, it costs you about five cents. So when we went outside as a kid, we stayed outside. We didn’t go back and forth. It’s five cents every time you come in the house, boys. Y’all can come back at dark in the sleep. You’re all coming in together at the same time we opened it once. At one time, yeah.

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[34:27] All right. Final fun fact here. Donnie and Johnny form the musical duo Van Zant.

[34:32] They have written and performed rock, country, and now Christian music. Their first new album in nearly two decades will release the day this episode drops, November 22nd, and is titled Always Look Up. So, gentlemen, can you please tell us more about your new Christian album that’s coming out? Oh, wow. There’s so much to tell. Yeah. You know what? I will tell you how it started. I mean, we have a bucket list of things that we want to do as brothers. And at the top of that bucket was doing a Christian record. So that’s the reason why we jumped on this. And you know what? And God, really, a lot of these songs were started or written doing COVID. We thought, you know what? Now’s a great time to start writing this. And the good Lord jumped on us. I mean, you’re talking about the spirit of the Lord. He jumped on us. And we’re back here in our little studio and, uh, we would be out here at three in the morning, four in the morning, five in the morning, you know, and my wife would be going, are you coming up to sleep or not?

[35:33] I’ll be up there when I’m done, you know? But we were back here, and a lot of them just hit us back here. And it’s a special place for us where we’re coming to you from. The Lord’s Spirit is back here with us, believe me. And when we did this project, we probably wrote, I guess, at least 40 songs. Oh, my goodness. We got plenty of songs to do another one.

[35:55] We would love to do more of these. Yeah. It presents itself. You know, of all the stuff that we’ve done for me personally, I think this is the most gratifying to be able to spread the word of Jesus Christ is an amazing thing. We’ve always had Christ in our songs. Go back and listen to even our rock songs. We’ll say, hey, Lord, you know, whatever, you know. And when we did our country stuff, we had an album called Get Right With The Man. And our single was called Help Somebody If You Can. And so we were leaning that way some in the country market. And we had another song called I Can’t Help Myself that was on that record. That’s a very religious song. If you get a chance, check it out. Absolutely. And, you know, there’s another song I’ll mention to you. It’s called Been There, Done That. And it’s talking about taking that dance with the D-man.

[36:43] Oh, yes. We should have stuck that on there. We should have stuck that on the gospel album. We were leaning that way anyway. But, again, we go back and we’re looking at people’s comments, you know, with this new album coming out and to see the other day donny called me i guess it was about this was great 10 30 at night and said hey look at your text and he found a comment on there that uh gentleman said our worship group did speak his name this sunday on at their church church and i was like wow we made it we were like two two kids at christmas it was that exciting and the comments hey you know what i’ve always been a believer but i’ve kind of gotten away from god uh this music has made me go back to him and yeah that’s that’s great stuff and stuff we’ve only wished for yeah and at the beginning of this project me and johnny just between ourselves here we go if we could just bring one person to christ it’d be worth this whole project yeah you know so it looks like we’ve done you check the box there we’re very excited about it guys can you imagine walking into church fellas and they’re singing your songs right the lyrics you’re like i know where i was at right in this whole body of believers is singing the lyrics that we penned back during covid like that’s incredible i might hunt them down.

[38:07] Donnie will be thanking every person. Well, listeners, for more information about Van Zant, you can go to their Facebook page. It’s at the official Van Zant band. Their Instagram and YouTube is at Van Zant band. And we’ll put links in our show notes and our website. You can click on that and go right to their music. Well, gentlemen, we were looking forward to this, but you guys are even better than anticipated. Thank you so much for saying yes to Stephanie. Thank you guys. You guys are too. And good luck with your show here. Thank you. Thanks, guys. Fantastic. You’ll do great. Yeah, you will. You’re two great spirits, I can tell. Thank you. Thanks, guys. Friends, we want to encourage you to please follow us wherever you listen to this, whether it’s on the Apple Podcast app, iHeartRadio, Spotify, or one of the other platforms. You guys, it’s completely free. And while you’re there, feel free to give us a rating or a nice review. Thank you for listening to Tell Us a Good Story.