Based out of Houston, Texas is the country band, The Powell Brothers. Their energetic and raw music has taken them far, as they put on an average of one hundred and sixty shows a year country wide. You may recognize The Powell Brothers as they sang at AT&T Stadium for the Dallas Cowboys’ home opener or hyping the crowd up for Granger Smith in which they played ten dates in six states for Smith’s, ‘Country Things’ tour.

In 2021 alone they have shared the stage with country music staples - Carly Pearce, Jon Pardi, Cody Johnson amongst others. Their current EP, “Twenty-Twenty” 17K streams on Spotify alone while their most recent single, “Hopeless” continues to jump higher on the charts.

From life on tour to how they got their start I sat down with Taylor Powell and Blake Powell to discuss it all - including going to head to head on a Christmas lyric and Country lyric Challenge.

BC: What’s your background with music?

Blake: “Early on…..Dad played music at church and it originally started as us wanting to hang out with dad more. Within six to eight months of that and us getting our first guitar and drum lessons, we both started getting hired to play for other artists and filling in for band members who couldn’t make their normal gig. By High School we both had a little bit of touring experience. (Fast forward) we were both lucky enough to study at Berkley College of Music, we both dropped out and have been basically just touring at very opportunity - whatever that looks like ever since.”

Taylor: “We have toured with a lot of different bands as backing musicians. In 2014 we started our band so we’re seven years into it! We’ve had the pleasure with meeting, opening for artists including opening for Granger Smith and his whole crew. We’re a high energy, country, rock, duo band,” Taylor laughs. “But we’re currently touring as a trio with Mike Smith on the drums.”

Blake: “We’re just three guys, trying to make as much noise as we can.”’

BC: I love that! It sounds like Music has been there for a lot of your life but was there anything else that you guys had a passion for?

Blake: “Nothing close,” Blake says, “There are other things we’re passionate about like sports and we’ve been very fortunate enough to combine both of those singing the National Anthem. I think Taylor and I wish if we were athletic - I think I would rather be the starting quarter back for twenty or thirty years for any NFL team. But, since that’s not working out,” Blake jokes, “Being the musical act before, during or after - getting to be a part of that boyhood dreams that didn’t work out.” Blake explains, “What’s so cool about music is that get to be around so many amazing people, we wouldn’t get to be around otherwise.”

Taylor: “We’re pretty passionate about food, we’re foodies.”

BC: When you first started your band, did you experiment with other genres?

Blake: “We still do, pretty much everyday. We kind of closed that gap a little bit to not be too ADD, we want people to connect and still recognize us. Taylor and I have been in every kind of band from Jazz, Heavy Metal, Hip Hop, Rock and Country groups. We have gotten to play for amazing people who were very very good at what they did - and we got to study under them. Because of that, it’s still in our shows - depending on where we’re playing if we feel like we can get away with more stuff. Like we were opening for Granger which is a country show and we played the Weeknd. We’ve done rock shows and thrown in a Ray Charles song. Everything that can be on the far side of country music we want to try and do it.”

BC: Speaking of covering, “Blinding Lights” by the Weeknd, what made you choose that song?

Blake: “I can’t remember whose idea it was. I hadn’t heard it at the time but when it was played over here by someone I loved it. With cover songs you always think, ‘how can we do this in a way that’s ours but people still enjoy it.” I think you can make a cover song unrecognizable and then you miss the point of the exercise.”

Taylor: “I was pretty skeptical the first time I heard it. I think we just decided to run it in rehearsal and it was like right off the bat, ‘this works, this is a cool thing’ We hit it, ran with it and played it at a show and we haven’t been able to take it out. It’s always a hit.”

Blake: I remember the biggest part of that, musically was taking it from being the track that everybody knows and really defining each of the sections musically and I’m super happy with how it came out.”

BC: It’s a really great cover for you guys! What’s the number one thing that you want listeners to take away from your original music?

Taylor: “To me, the common threads in our original music is high energy and optimistic. We’re very optimistic people, optimistic writers. So even if the song is a relatively sad song it’s always naturally going to be the optimistic side of a sad situation. Like this is sad, but there’s light or there’s a turn - someway to turn it into something positive.”

Blake: “We grew up around ‘murder singers’, There’s a lot of country artists that love writing songs about people dying - really sad stuff. In today’s world you are going to get negative viewpoints everywhere. So whenever we do a show we want our audience to know we’re living the same life but we want to have fun tonight and try to look on the bright side of life.”

BC: What a wonderful way to share it through your music. Since you are a country duo, what does the genre of country music mean to you?

Blake: “Growing up in the South, I learned that (country music) it was people honestly telling stories about the lives they have lived. Sometimes our stuff doesn’t seem as country even though I was feeding cattle right before this interview we don’t sing a whole lot about that. We sing about our lives on the road or things that we think are a little more relatable outside of Southern Life. So to me, it’s just been about people living their life and writing stories about it and I’ve always loved that.”

Taylor: “Growing up around country music I didn’t necessarily have that connection to country music. I grew up around the music and the culture and I always enjoyed it but I never listened to country music. It took me going to college to look back on our culture and art form and say, ‘that’s really special’. So after a few years living on the East Coast and moving back to Texas I dove hard into it - listening to all the Merle Haggards of the world and going down the rabbit hole. The deeper I got the more I understand how rich the art form is.”

BC: What was the creative process like for your EP, ‘Twenty Twenty’?

Blake: “The creative process changed because we were working on a project and then the Pandemic happened. As we all reacted to that we wanted to snapshot what happened in that year. Most of the songs on the EP are songs we had played before but it’s how those songs changed and who we were during all of that.”

Taylor: “Whenever the world stopped, whenever quarantined was announced Blake and I were living out in a barn in the middle of nowhere North of Houston. We turned our barn into half video studio, half recording studio. So right now we’re sitting in what became the control room. We recorded all of ‘twenty twenty’ here. We shot videos in the garage next door. So the EP is quote literally a snapshot of that moment in time.”

BC: Wow, that is so amazing! what was that learning experience like for you?

Taylor: “Well I feel we had been preparing for it for a long time because for the past few years we had been building up our capabilities on video with streaming. We also come from a small studio where we had built up a small collection of recording gear.”

Blake: What set us up in a really good way was as crazy as it is three to two years before, for us, was Hurricane Harvey. We had to learn to survive when we were homeless - and we didn’t tell anybody about that. Going through that and then when COVID hit, even though it was a new set of problems we had already been through a no hope situation. So, we said, ‘let’s get to work, this is going to end at some point.’ We wanted to do the best with the time we had, we can’t control stuff.”

BC: Your song, ‘Hopeless’ came out earlier this year and that was one that struck me in particular, what was the inspiration for that song?

Taylor: “I believe that was one of the first songs if not the first song that we recorded in this space. That song kinda kicked off a lot of the projects that followed. That’s one of my favorite songs, I love how the recording turned out.”

Blake: “Hopeless is kind of the short story of people giving us backhanded compliments and us keeping our heads down and kept working. To us, it’s like a love letter to other creators - you’re going to have people tell you you’re not good enough.”

Taylor: “Or you should have back up job.”

Blake: “Yeah, if you’re going to spend all your time doing it, just go for it.’”

BC: What’s your favorite thing about the music industry and your least favorite thing?

Taylor: “Honestly, I think for me it might be the same thing. Creators are in control now, with all these different formats, the decentralization of marketing. Us being able to completely control what we do - our product, who we are, our presentation is an amazing thing. On the other side of that you re in control of everything - you’re wearing a million different hats. You aren’t just the creator anymore you need to learnt o market, do all of these different things. People say, ‘Oh you do music for a living,’ and that’s 5% of what we do.”

BC: Back in November, you guys opened for Granger Smith on a couple of his, “Country Things” tour dates, how was that like for you?

Blake: “There were so many good things about that tour. We have known Granger and his crew for awhile. His drummer (Dusty Saxton) and I were doing backing gigs in Austin when I first moved there. I played guitar for Granger for a little bit as well years and years ago. By the time we were on the road with the guys it very much quickly became a family.” Blake tells me, “They are such phenomenal people on and off stage. To get to be surrounded by very talented people and very good quality it was really cool. The amount of things we learned, we’re still in the process of it. As the next year goes on and we run into a problem and go, ‘oh we watched Granger’s crew handle it this way, that’s how it’s done.’ Those shows were so much fun every night, we miss them.”
Taylor: Yeah, every night was a new venue which means every night was a different problem. Part of it was walking in to a new room with a new group of people every single night and you maintain your consistent show, your expectations and how you treat everybody from top to bottom, to Granger to his stage manager.” Taylor explains. “Most of the time you will play a show with a band and then the next night you’re somewhere else, they are somewhere else - you cross paths but to be together thirteen shows in a row, ya know. We also got to see how they handled off days, that was a whole other thing we got to witness with living on the road.”

Blake: “How do you stay healthy, how do you night in, night out give people an experience they want to remember.”

BC: What does a day off look like for you guys either on tour or at home?

Blake: “Sleep as much as possible. Recovery is the most important thing. We work pretty constantly so if we do take a day off it’s sleep, see family, feed cattle, try to go to the gym as much as possible. Being on a bus, you’re trying to eat whatever you can because of the crazy schedule. When we get home it’s try to eat as healthy as possible and maintaining health so we can get back out. Everything revolves around a show coming up or something we’re working on. It’s making sure whenever we get those opportunities we’re healthy and prepared so staying hydrating and getting my my giant lint roller to get all the great Pyrenees hair off of me before we leave.”

BC: Aside from Granger’s touring schedule, what does it look like for just you two out on the road?

Blake: “We wake up at noon or whenever check out is, get coffee and lunch, we drive to the venue and do sound check, we’ve got maybe two hours off and then do the show. After the show we chill, hang out at merch, get in our car and drive six hours to wherever the next show is and we basically do that for months on end.”

Taylor: “You forgot to throw in stopping at radio, television stations all the promotional side of what happens.” Taylor comments. “It’s pretty much non-stop. Say we’ll finish the show at midnight, drive anywhere from two to six hours. If we have a radio show that’s usually around seven, nine AM. Do that, go back to bed - sleep as much as you can. It’s battle of nutrition when you’re out there.”

Blake: “We’ve had people be like why is so and so not at the Merch booth and it’s because we have to stay healthy. It’s loud out there, we’re talking and we want to talk to people but we have to protect. We have a certain amount of time each night and if we go over that chances are we’re going to be cancelling a show three days from now. It’s all the little things.”

BC: Between the early mornings and late nights, is there anything you do to get hyped before shows?

Taylor: We have our pre-show team huddle and break but with the amount of promotion and work that goes in to doing a single show by the time we get to the stage we’re ready, the music is the pay off. Playing on stage is the reward for all the effort. We’re saving everything we got for when we walk out on stage.”

BC: For a dream headlining tour, what three opening acts would you ask to go on tour?

Blake: “Usually people say if there’s a band you could do a show with, who would it be? I could easily be like The Killers!” Blake says, “I’d be too tired to do our show because I’d be in the front row partying for their whole show so we probably shouldn’t do that.” Blake laughs.

Taylor: “It kind of seems like we’re boasting so we’ll just do like three other acts we’d like to do a show with.”

Blake: “We’ll make The Killers be one of them.”

Taylor: “The classic pairing of The Killers with Cody Johnson.” Taylor laughs.

Blake: “I think right now for the most rowdiest it’d be like Granger, Cody Johnson and The Killers.”

BC: What can your fans be looking forward to from you guys in the near future?

Taylor: “So during the quarantining, out in the barn we recorded albums.” Taylor shares, “We’re still figuring out how to properly release them but I will say we have our next single coming out in January. We’re very excited about it, it’s called, ‘Buy A Ticket’.”