#530 - Drake White on Having a Stroke on Stage + His Encounter with God + Why He Fought Through Initial Signs and His Road to Recovery

Summary

Podcast Summary: The Bobby Bones Show Featuring Drake White

Episode Title:
#530 - Drake White on Having a Stroke on Stage + His Encounter with God + Why He Fought Through Initial Signs and His Road to Recovery

Release Date:
August 12, 2025

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Introduction to Drake White

Timestamp: [02:02] – [03:12]

In episode #530 of "The Bobby Bones Show," host Bobby Bones welcomes country artist Drake White to discuss his harrowing experience of having a stroke while performing on stage, his profound encounter with God during the crisis, and his inspiring journey to recovery.

Bobby Bones:
"If you're curious as to what Drake looks like, you can always check him out on Instagram if you don't already know. DrakeWhite Stomp has really great music, a lot of soul. He's got a song that's out now called 'Nothing but a Smile.'"

The Stroke Incident

Timestamp: [08:01] – [16:51]

Drake White recounts the day of his stroke on August 16, 2019, detailing the symptoms he experienced and the immediate aftermath. Despite feeling severe symptoms like balance issues and brain fog, Drake's determination to continue performing led him to endure the initial signs without seeking immediate medical help.

Drake White:
"...I felt like I dodged this bullet... but four shows, four embolizations in, and about 40 shows in."

Bobby Bones:
"My story isn't as severe as yours, but I had blood clotting my brain three different times where I didn't know what it was."

Drake explains that his stroke was caused by an arterial venous malformation (AVM), a rare condition he was born with, which became symptomatic due to the physical strain of touring.

Drake White:
"...the AVM is so big, Drake, that we're going to go in through your femoral artery, and we're going to do these embolizations..."

Encounter with God During the Stroke

Timestamp: [21:11] – [24:04]

During the acute phase of his stroke, Drake describes a near-death experience where he felt a profound sense of peace and an encounter with divine figures, which he interprets as angels sent to guide the medical team.

Drake White:
"...I saw four figures in the corner of the room... I was having a stroke. Keep breathing, keep doing your thing... I was locked inside my rib cage."

Bobby Bones:
"So whatever it is, it's naturally come upon you."

Drake attributes his survival and partial recovery to his wife's prayers for divine intervention, which he believes were answered through the presence of angels that aided the doctors in their swift and effective treatment.

Road to Recovery

Timestamp: [32:01] – [55:51]

After surviving the stroke, Drake faced a challenging recovery process, including extended hospitalization, physical therapy, and relearning basic functions. He emphasizes the mental toughness required to persevere without taking days off, driven by his fear of letting fans and his career down.

Drake White:
"...building that back up was extremely painful... I had a little bitty drop of hope. I could write these songs and do these things."

Drake shares how music became a pivotal part of his healing, providing him with a sense of purpose and a means to express his struggles and triumphs. Despite setbacks, including the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, Drake remained committed to his recovery and musical career.

Drake White:
"...music is healing. It is healing...ould have had detrimental thoughts... but something happens, a show happens, I hang out with my golden retriever..."

Mental and Emotional Insights

Timestamp: [56:01] – [82:04]

Drake delves into the psychological aspects of his recovery, discussing the importance of perspective gained through adversity. He highlights how his experiences have fostered empathy and a desire to help others facing similar challenges.

Drake White:
"...if you believe you're healing, you're healing. That's placebos, a real thing. But it doesn't matter. If you believe you're healing, you are healing."

He also touches on his family life, including his journey through infertility and the challenges his wife faced with her own health issues, underscoring the resilience and support systems that have been crucial in his path to recovery.

Drake White:
"...we went through seven years of infertility in the middle of all that... seeing his life and seeing him in the world has been one of the best things ever."

Embracing New Beginnings

Timestamp: [82:04] – [85:43]

Drake reflects on how his stroke and subsequent experiences have reshaped his outlook on life and music. He speaks about his new projects, including a documentary titled "Ladder to the Sky," which chronicles his healing process through activities like hunting and reconnecting with nature.

Drake White:
"...stepping into those fears and climbing that ladder one rung at a time... it's about other people and it's about giving."

He emphasizes the therapeutic benefits of engaging with nature and how these activities have not only aided his physical recovery but also provided mental solace and clarity.

Conclusion and Final Thoughts

Timestamp: [85:43] – End

In the final segments of the episode, Bobby Bones commends Drake for his vulnerability and the positive impact his story has on listeners facing their own struggles. The conversation wraps up with mutual appreciation and encouragement for Drake's ongoing projects.

Bobby Bones:
"I appreciate you being just so generous with your stories and vulnerable with your stories. And I know that a lot of people... are not feeling as alone, because you now exist in the manner that you do."

Drake White:
"...how I battle them and I know how to tell other people how I battled them... it's a roller coaster."

---

Notable Quotes

• Drake White [21:11]:
  "I was locked inside my rib cage, my body, like I feel like I'm literally locked inside and I can't."

• Bobby Bones [24:04]:
  "So whatever it is, it's naturally come upon you."

• Drake White [56:01]:
  "If you believe you're healing, you're healing."

• Drake White [82:04]:
  "Climbing that ladder one rung at a time and not understanding that the deer does not care that you've had a stroke. The red birds don't."

---

Key Takeaways

1. Resilience in the Face of Adversity:
   Drake White's unwavering determination to continue performing despite early stroke symptoms exemplifies incredible resilience. His commitment to his career and fans played a significant role in his initial recovery phase.

2. Spiritual and Emotional Strength:
   The near-death experience Drake describes underscores the role of spirituality and emotional strength in overcoming life-threatening challenges. His belief in divine intervention provided him with hope and peace during critical moments.

3. Importance of Support Systems:
   From his wife’s proactive role during his medical emergency to the support from friends and family during his extended recovery, Drake highlights how essential a robust support system is in healing and maintaining mental health.

4. Music as Healing:
   Drake's unwavering passion for music served as both a coping mechanism and a healing tool, helping him navigate the complexities of his physical and emotional recovery. His continued creation and performance music became a source of purpose and empowerment.

5. Perspective and Empathy:
   Experiencing significant health challenges has granted Drake a deeper perspective on life, fostering empathy and a desire to help others facing similar struggles. His story emphasizes the value of sharing personal experiences to inspire and support others.

6. Holistic Recovery Approach:
   Engaging with nature, hunting, and reconnecting with physical activities were pivotal in Drake's recovery journey, demonstrating the benefits of a holistic approach that includes physical, mental, and emotional healing processes.

Final Thoughts

Drake White's candid and heartfelt discussion on "The Bobby Bones Show" offers listeners an inspiring narrative of survival, faith, and the unyielding human spirit. His journey from experiencing a stroke on stage to rebuilding his life and career serves as a beacon of hope and resilience for anyone facing their own battles.

Transcript

[Bobby Bones]

This is an iHeart podcast.

[Ryan Seacrest]

Made from.

[Bobby Bones]

Plants and sizzles on a grill.

[Drake White]

Impossible.

[Bobby Bones]

Feels virtuous and tastes reckless.

[Unknown]

Impossible.

[Bobby Bones]

Easy to pick up and hard to put down.

[Drake White]

Impossible.

[Bobby Bones]

Yeah it is. Burgers, hot dogs and chicken. Everything you want from meat. Without the stuff you don't all flavor, no trade offs.

[Drake White]

It's impossible.

[Bobby Bones]

Purchase impossible products at your local grocery store store today.

[Unknown]

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[Ryan Seacrest]

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[Drake White]

I was in that church and they were asking the congregation to come down if you have anything on your heart. And I remember a voice saying, stand up, come on down. And I was like, I can't walk. And then in a split second I just thought, oh no, I just missed my opportunity to go to heaven. Like I just said, I can't. To God.

[Bobby Bones]

Welcome to episode 5:30 with Drake White. If you're curious as to what Drake looks like, you can always go check him out on Instagram if you don't already know. DrakeWhite Stomp Drake has really great music, a lot of soul. He's got a song that's out now called Nothing but a Smile. I think he sings that.

[Drake White]

Yeah.

[Bobby Bones]

Towards the end. Got it. We recorded it. It wasn't out yet.

[Drake White]

Yeah.

[Bobby Bones]

So know that. So Low Country High Road. That album came out in September. We talk about new music as well, but Drake had a stroke and it was a bad deal. I don't think I realized because I mean, I don't live with him how bad a deal it was. He talks about that in detail. It really wasn't the plan, but I said we have a very loose plan anyway, when we do this show, it wasn't that we're going to spend the whole time talking about the stroke. We don't spend the whole time talking about the stroke. But I was just very curious at what he had to go through and him bouncing back. And we talk about. Well, I'll let you guys listen to what we talk about. So, yeah, let's do this. Here he is, Drake White. This is episode 530 of the Bobbycast. We were talking about our phones and I just got a new phone as well.

[Drake White]

Do you have.

[Bobby Bones]

Change your number much, though?

[Drake White]

No, I've had the same number for a little while. I mean, it's been, I don't know, pretty standard. Three, three years or so. Four years maybe. Maybe longer.

[Bobby Bones]

I had one number for like 16 years.

[Drake White]

Yeah.

[Bobby Bones]

And, man, I was so attached to that number. Like it was a relative. Wouldn't change it. Number got written on a wall. A couple times past, I would just get random texts and finally got to the point where I had to move off. But now this new phone, it's got like a weird button on the bottom, right, which opens up your camera automatically. So at times I'm just like, recording. Or is it like the government?

[Drake White]

Could be. Could be. I think it's the government and I think it's. I think it's a lot of stuff.

[Bobby Bones]

If I use the bathroom, I take my phone. Either leave it out. I would like to have my phone to read, or tick tock, but. Or I'll just. I'll cover the. The holes on it so they don't watch me using the bathroom.

[Drake White]

Oh, yeah. So you're. You're in.

[Bobby Bones]

I'm in enough to. I don't want my wiener on the Internet. Yeah, like, that's. That's the level. What? They're not really going to find anything if they do go deep. And I feel like if they want to go deep, they will, and there's nothing I can really do about it.

[Drake White]

Yeah.

[Bobby Bones]

Like, if they want to plant stuff on someone's computer, you know, they can do that so easily.

[Drake White]

That's fair enough, man. I mean, you don't want your wiener on the Internet. That's totally fair.

[Bobby Bones]

I prefer it not be okay here. I'm humiliated enough.

[Drake White]

Yeah. Sweet. Yeah.

[Bobby Bones]

You like. Are you a big conspiracy guy or.

[Drake White]

No, I'm not above a. My manager just looked at me like, I'm not above. I'm not above a good conspiracy theory. Like, I've. I've watched this stuff pan out over, you know, grew up in the 90s. So we grow up, we're doing this thing. Like, I feel like we're the. We. We watched Facebook come into fruition. We watch the age of social media. And I think if you're not a conspiracy theorist in some regard, you're just not paying attention. So.

[Bobby Bones]

And I think some of them have been proven true to where some of them do feel a little wacky.

[Drake White]

Yeah.

[Bobby Bones]

But even with, like, the JFK dump. Yeah, I, I, that wasn't a lone gunman. We kind of know that. And forever, those people were like weirdos. If you questioned anything the government said about it being more than just one person, but now it looks like for sure there was some involvement by some group. Probably the CIA.

[Drake White]

Yeah, probably. Yeah. You know, for me, I like information. I like to look into something before I, I like to have all the information before I make a comment. It's really hard to do that now because. And I think our parents. My dad's 70, my mom. Mom's 65 or so, they are, you know, no offense to, to them. I love them. And they're super intelligent, but they, they are the ones that are vulnerable to, like, did you see what Trump said about this or this? I'm like, no, dad, that, that's not that. That's AI. You know, he said he hates pickleball. What? Are you sure he said that? Like, I don't, I don't know. So they're the vulnerable ones on, like, believing. Believe. So there's a. And we're just, I think, at the tip of the iceberg with that.

[Bobby Bones]

Well, I think, too, the older generation didn't get to grow with it.

[Drake White]

So.

[Bobby Bones]

Yeah, if you're 60, 70, 80 years old, what used to be written was the word, because the newspaper wouldn't print something if it wasn't the word true. And the word. Now, if you read something on the Internet or it's a meme, it's like it is just believed because it's made into an actual image.

[Drake White]

Yep.

[Bobby Bones]

And just like the paper, I didn't even plan to get started on that. I just thought it was interesting.

[Drake White]

No, because I would.

[Bobby Bones]

Yeah, me too. I just, I won't poop with my phone without the cameras being covered.

[Drake White]

Yeah.

[Bobby Bones]

I wanted that to be out there in case anybody's listening that wants to hack me or look at my wiener or poopole. It's covered.

[Drake White]

It's understandable.

[Bobby Bones]

What's the rule? We were talking about this, this morning. Do you have a tour bus rule about using the bathroom and the in the bus?

[Drake White]

Yeah, I think that's more of a. For the guy that's emptying the tank. You know, for me, if I've got a. If. If there's an emergency, it's always like, you know, it's there. If there's an extreme emergency. But the rule is no pooping on the bus. For sure.

[Bobby Bones]

Because it then lives with you.

[Drake White]

Yeah, it. I mean, you're.

[Bobby Bones]

You travel with it.

[Drake White]

Yeah. Unless you're Dave Matthews, you're taking it.

[Bobby Bones]

With you and then you're dumping it out on the bridge and somebody's getting hit with it.

[Drake White]

Yeah.

[Bobby Bones]

How you been, man?

[Drake White]

I'm great.

[Bobby Bones]

Dude, I haven't seen you in a little bit.

[Drake White]

I know it's been a while.

[Bobby Bones]

Yeah, I think. I mean, I don't even know. Covid kind of messed with my years, so I don't know how long it's been. Do you live in town?

[Drake White]

Yeah, I live just north of town.

[Bobby Bones]

You don't have to say where. Don't say where. Yeah, just wondered if you live somewhat close.

[Drake White]

Yeah, I got a. I got a farm that keeps me kind of sane. Farm, like a small 20 acre deal. And it's just. That's what kind of keeps me sane. Kept me sane through Covid. We played a lot of shows in my barn and, you know, got a tractor. I got a little boy now. Got a two year old golden retriever and a bronco, so it's. It's my spot.

[Bobby Bones]

I haven't spent any time with you since your stroke. What year was that?

[Drake White]

It was August 16th of 2019. So. So.

[Bobby Bones]

My story isn't as severe as yours, but I had blood clotting my brain three different times where. Where I didn't know what it was. And I would like, lose the ability to read. I couldn't identify objects. I just knew that weird banana shape, that weird yellow thing was a banana. But I couldn't find words. And I had gone back and forth a few times to doctors and it ended up being like an ischemia is what they called it.

[Drake White]

Okay.

[Bobby Bones]

But I would wake up and just think I had brain fog so bad. And there are parts of my life that I have no memory of at all. Like, there's like two month gaps prior to what ended up being the. What they would call as a small stroke. You had a real one? I had three really small ones. And now my blood thinners so my. The blood in my brain doesn't clot again. But I never really knew that that's what it was while it was happening until my wife was. At the time, she was my girlfriend and my fiance. She was like I don't think that's normal, what you're doing. Like, I couldn't read a piece of paper. And so I went in and they did a brain scan and they were looking at the different, like, gray matter, white matter. I learned so much about the brain in that period. And the doctor, like, you've had blood clots in your brain, and that's why you have these lapses in memory. And that's why there would be like three or four weeks where my balance was bad, couldn't read, and I was having to do a show and, like, lean on folks. And that was a very mild version of it. What is your version of, like, what happened? When did you know it was happening, that whole story?

[Drake White]

Well, I want to comment on, like, it's the toughness, you know, the Arkansas kind of Alabama just being a dude, you know, the toughness. It. Like, we're trying to tough it out.

[Bobby Bones]

I never stopped working because I was afraid if I did, I wouldn't be able to work. Like, they would go, oh, something's wrong with his brain. I didn't even acknowledge it. I never talked about it because I didn't want someone to go, like, he's broken. And I was like, I can. I can get through it. I never took a day off work. I should have, looking back. But you're right, it was very stubborn of me.

[Drake White]

We're going to get so far into that then, because that. That is the main. The main struggle for me mentally that happened because, you know how fast this. This city runs and, you know, we. I like to say we got to second base. It. It. We had some really good successes, had a lot of friends people loved.

[Bobby Bones]

You mean your career before then?

[Drake White]

Yeah. Right. Everything was rolling, everything was good. Had been dropped, had been picked back up, had the Zach Brown tour, had had stuff rolling. But it was just. It was a struggle. But it was a good struggle. And we were like, in that spot, so I didn't feel like that I could quit. I felt like I was building and so just tough it out, man. Walk. Go past the numbness, the little tingly stuff on the tips of your fingers. Go past the heaviness in your. In your left leg. Go past the. The. The brain fog and. And the. The spots in your vision.

[Bobby Bones]

And you were. So you were feeling these things.

[Drake White]

Yeah.

[Bobby Bones]

So you had a. Wow. You had symptoms leading up to them.

[Drake White]

Not really. Not to the point of where I was. Like, that is a symptom. It was just tough it out. Like, it wasn't. It wasn't severe enough to where that I had, like, headaches or anything like that, until it was. Until the headache triggered. And what I had was called an avm, an arterial venous malformation. Malform. Male malformation. And I was born with it. And it formed in the embryonic stage. Wow. I know that your whole life. My whole life, but one in, I'd say 150,000 people have these, and usually you find them in a ditch at 60 years old because they've hemorrhaged.

[Bobby Bones]

They didn't know. And it hit them all of a.

[Drake White]

Sudden, they didn't know. I found out because I was a singer and the intensity at which I sing and training of running. I was running a lot, trying to get in really good shape to go out on tour, and I just liked competing. And so that wore my bumpers off of this avm, which is a wad of veins and arteries about the size of a Lyme that rested right in my mobile cortex in my right side.

[Bobby Bones]

It was as big as a lime.

[Drake White]

Big as a lime. Huge. One said it was the biggest one he's ever worked on. He said he's worked on 20,000.

[Bobby Bones]

And when they say they work on them, do they cut it out or do they kind of repair the pathways?

[Drake White]

There's two different pathways to go about it. You can cut it out, which is obviously an evasive surgery, which I'm going through this mental thing of like, okay, I'm climbing. I've been dropped. I, I, I'm, I kind of. I'm playing with a chip on my shoulder. Like, I'm, I'm ready to go back at it. I don't want to tell people or do I want to tell people? So my thing was, like, I'm not going to tell anybody. I'm going to. Me and my wife are just going to go get these embolized. And my doctor's name is here in Nashville. He is amazing. He's part of. He's part of my life now. His name's real name is Dr. Miracle. Like, that's his real name.

[Bobby Bones]

Oh, that's. That's not his nickname from you.

[Drake White]

That's his real name.

[Bobby Bones]

You got kind of got to be a doctor or, like, a dancer. Those are your only two options. Dancer with Miracle. Yeah.

[Drake White]

Yeah, sorry. My brain's going like, what else for Dr. Miracle? But he said, we can. This thing is so big, Drake, that we're going to go in through your feminine artery, and we're going to do these embolizations, which entails going up through your feminine artery with a catheter into the back of your brain and squeezing it full of this stuff called onyx. Say. But we can only do a little bit at a time because the brain doesn't like drastic change, but it doesn't mind small changes incrementally. So we go in and he said, we're going to start doing these on like Monday. You can rest Tuesday and Wednesday and then Thursday. Because the first thing I wanted to know is, could I play? You know, Thursday you can be back out on the road and you can be rocking. And so we took that, got our first embolization. They did it. I felt, and mind you, I'm healthy, everything's good. Because I wasn't drinking that much. I wasn't doing really anything. I was just working out and staying. When I got that news, by the way, it came on as a headache.

[Bobby Bones]

Yeah. I was gonna ask, like, why did you even go to the doctor the.

[Drake White]

First time I got an mri? Because I couldn't. The. The headache was so bad. I'd never really had migraines, but this was like level 50 migraine. Like I couldn't see, I couldn't. I couldn't look at light. I couldn't do anything. I literally went home after the lunch and with my managers and I went to bed and that headache was. My wife came in and was like, this is not normal. I mean, I'm going to tough it out again. This is not normal. With your head hurting like this, you need to go get an mri. No, no. I fought it for a second, then couldn't. I couldn't shake it. So I went, got an MRI and it showed the Lyme size mass. So that was a two week stent. Two weeks is a long time to go not knowing what that Lyme sized mass is in the back of your brain. I don't know if it's cancer. I don't know if it's a. Who knows?

[Bobby Bones]

But you did know there was a mass.

[Drake White]

Yeah.

[Bobby Bones]

So they're like, this is this now. We'll come back in a couple weeks and tell you what it is.

[Drake White]

Yeah.

[Bobby Bones]

Holy God. That's crazy. You have to just wait because my mind would have gone every super dark place there was.

[Drake White]

That's another common thing in my life. The. The number of times that I've waited. Me and Alex, you know, we have been through so many things where we've just had to wait and everything is waiting for me, and I'm not a patient person at all. I love to. To kick the tires and light the fires. I like to keep it going. And man, it's just been hurry up and wait. My. It feels like the last five, six years. But anyway, the AVM is revealed. The. The treatment is revealed. And now I'm to the first treatment, and I come out Monday. He does the embolization. I wake up from anesthesia and I'm like, okay, everything's fine. I feel good. And he said, as we do more of these embolizations, I think it'll take seven, maybe eight, because it's so big. But your chances of them rupturing, because there was a chance of it rupturing, that that is. Could end in death. Should end in death, I guess. But that chance was like 2%, he said, and it will lessen with each embolization. So I'll take that chance. And we go out and do all these shows. And so after the first one, we go out and do the show on Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, run. Alex is with me. Everybody's looking at me, checking my blood pressure, because that was the thing. My blood pressure would get up because I'd just be screaming.

[Bobby Bones]

The intensity of the show, right?

[Drake White]

Yeah. And, man, that show went off without a hitch. 2 shows, 12 shows, 20 shows, 30 shows. We went to Bahrain to play for the troops. We went all over the place. We went to Europe, came back, did a bunch of shows with Zach Brown, came back like, everything was really rocking. I was like, man, I dodged this bullet. Well, four shows, four embolizations in, and about 40 shows in. It was August 16th, and we take the stage in Roanoke, Virginia. And my blood pressure medicine made me extremely dizzy, so I would bite it in half, you know, and just, you know, just take half of it or whatever. And for some reason, I. I'd ask. I'd either ask the doctor or ask. I'd ask the doctor. I'd said, like, is there any way I can. Like, I feel good. Is there any way I could come off this. This medicine? He's like, well, I would. I would advise you take the medicine, but I don't think if it's making you so dizzy. I mean, I'm talking about like, vertigo level dizzy. I don't know if you've ever. Yeah, you've probably performed dizzy. It's not easy. So I didn't take it that day, and it wasn't the first time I'd not taken it. I'd take it. Not taking it a lot. So it wasn't like that's what caused it. But the 1% thing happened. I took the stage in Roanoke, got into about three songs, and when I say a. It felt like a bowling ball was on my left leg about three songs in. And just like you were talking about the banana. Like, I knew it was a banana. I knew the song, I knew where I was. I just didn't know how to. I didn't know what I was doing. I was like, I think I. And. And you can see in the footage back, we're making a documentary on this. And I've been watching the footage back. You can see me, like, toughen it out. Just trying to tough out. And they keep going through it. And the miracle is that the EMTs were watching me, you know, but the sky flipped upside down like the cotton candy sky became the ground, and the ground, the crowd became the sky. And everybody sounded like the scene in old school where you get shot in the neck with a dart. Everything slowed down and everything was. And I was like, madam, I'm having a stroke. And I'd read all the jargon about that and was like, you, you. It's death, you know, that is death. So in my head, my left. My left arm and my left side was completely numb. And I kind of staggered back and they caught me, pulled me off stage. I was three minutes from a. A trauma one level hospital there in Roanoke. And they rushed me to that, that hospital and they. My wife is a type A kindergarten teacher. Like, so she had prepared a. A booklet of exactly what to do if this happened. So my tour manager handed the doctors that booklet and they administered this coagulate that stopped my brain bleeding within 18 minutes of it starting. So it saved my right side, saved my life. And so then I'm in the hospital. You know, I'm there in this very. It's a student driven hospital, very similar to Vanderbilt. So there's a lot of traffic. You've been to Vanderbilt, where there's like, maybe you have, maybe you haven't. But they, There's a lot of people, they ask a lot of opinions to try to figure out what's going on. I'm in the. The room. This is 15 minutes after, 10 minutes after the, the stroke happened. And I'm in the hospital room and they, they got my shirt. They tore my shirt off of me. And there's these, like, conversations going on of, do we put a port in? Do we not put a port in?

[Bobby Bones]

You can hear this. You remember this?

[Drake White]

I can hear it and I can remember it, but I remember screaming, don't put a port. Because I'd read About sepsis. I'd read about being brain dead. I don't know if that's the politically correct thing, but I, that, that was my biggest fear is like having to be rolled around in a, a wheelchair my whole life by my wife or, well, whoever, and just fed. And I'm screaming, don't put a port in. But I feel like I'm locked inside my rib cage, my body, like I feel like I'm literally locked inside and I can't. I could see everything kind of. And they wouldn't give me any pain medicine because they wanted to make sure that I could respond to where, where I'm at. What's your name? That. And so I just, I started praying in that moment and just remember saying, as long as you're breathing, you're alive. And as long as you just breathe in and breathe out. And upon that, you know, that breathing, I just had to concentrate so hard on breathing. I was like, well, I'm still alive. And in that little 15 minute. I know this is a long story. No, no, it's even, it's even longer.

[Bobby Bones]

No, take your time.

[Drake White]

That, that was only 15 minutes, you know, 15, 20 minute kind of a bang, bang thing of them administering that. But my wife is seven hours away. So I'm breathing in, out, in, out. And I'm concentrating. I'm hearing all these conversations go on. And I see these four figures in the corner of the room and they're like very confident and they're very peaceful and they're shaking their head. And I was like, something happened in the room to where I was not worried. It was a very peace, peaceful feeling. And I'm not going to say I floated above the bed, but like I got, I was above the bed in some regard. Like, I felt really good. I felt, I felt really free. And in that moment there was just this unbelievable peace. And I'm going to fast forward. Well, no, I'm not. I'm going to stay in this. Because I didn't ever fear. There was no fear in this part of the journey. Like, the fear was gone. I was just like, all right, I'm having a stroke. Like, keep breathing, keep doing your thing. And then all of that. I didn't have to worry about breathing. And they hadn't administered any pain medicine yet.

[Bobby Bones]

So that means your body is not reacting to the pain medicine. So whatever the feeling is this, if it's a euphoric or free feeling.

[Drake White]

Yeah.

[Bobby Bones]

Or some mixture of both, it's not because of medicine in any way.

[Drake White]

No.

[Bobby Bones]

So whatever it is, is naturally come upon you.

[Drake White]

Yeah, got it. So the next thing that I remember is me waking up in Alex's hand, in my hand. And I remember thinking, I tried to squeeze her hand and I couldn't squeeze her hand with my left hand. And I remember thinking that rock bottom had a basement. I was like, that was rock bottom. That was like, okay, I am paralyzed. I am not going to be able to do what I want to do. And then, then I pass. Like it's not consciousness, like I'm not in a coma or nothing like that. I'm just so weak from everything. Alex. Alex is explaining that I saw her there and I kind of grinned and then went back kind of under this world, this other world. But the veil that I'm talking about is just that was the near death experience of seeing the four figures. And I didn't know what they were. I thought they were security guards. I thought they were, they had security guards from the show because it was just kind of, you know, I didn't know what it was. So Alex comes in and she later tells me that she had prayed for four angels to surround the corner, put angels in the corner of the room. As she was coming to Roanoke at 100 miles an hour. She said, just put angels in each corner of the room and guide these doctors hands. And they didn't put a port in, they didn't put anything in that, that coagulant stopped the brain bleed and saved my, the rest of my body. And then these, these four angels appear and they're, they're, they're there. The next thing I remember, I remember I grew up in this church that had red carpet. Well, I grew up in a church that blue carpet. But my grandfather preached in a church that had red carpet. And we would visit at his church and we, I was in that church and they are, they were asking the congregation to come down if you have anything on your heart. And I remember a voice saying, stand up, come on down. And I was like, I can't walk. I'm not going to be able to stand up. And then in a split second I just thought, oh no, I just missed my opportunity to go to heaven. Like I just said I can't to God. You know, I just said I can't get up, I can't walk. And in that moment I realized that, I realized that. I just said no, I can't to God. And Alex said that I had not moved in like four or five days. And I jump up and I'm ripping the stuff out Trying to get out, and I'm like, I'll get up. I'll walk. And, like, now we're back into the hospital room, and she's like, I have not moved. And I sat straight up out of bed, and I'm trying to get up, and I'm trying to walk. And that was basically, in my mind, an encounter with God. Like, I didn't see his face. It was just a bright light, and it was. It was a are you ready? Type experience. And I was like, no, I'm not. I'm not ready. It wasn't very verbal, but I knew he was thinking it. Are you ready? I was like, no, I'm not ready. I'm. I'm got a lot of stuff I want to do. I've got. I want to have kids. I want another golden retriever. I want to fix my Bronco, you know, whatever it was. But that was. That was maybe seven, eight, nine days after the stroke, and Alex was sitting bedside with me, which she never left. I know that's deep. I know that's in there. But that. That veil is so thin, and life and death is so fragile in that world. But it was not scary. It was super peaceful, and it was very, very real, and those angels were very real. So I'll. We came. We got home, we made it home. And the supermoon was in the eastern sky. I know that sounds. I'm in the. You know, I. I love the moon. I love the stars. We always go outside on the farm and look at. Look at stuff that's going on in astronomy. And. And this superman was happening, and I rolled my wheelchair over there, and this cloud goes by, and the cloud looked like the archangel Michael in a painting that me and Alex are familiar with. And kind of at the same time, we both said, that looks like the archangel Michael or an angel. And Alex told me that story. She said, you know, on your way. On my way to Roanoke, I prayed that God would put angels in the corner of the room and guide the doctor's hands and help them with the decisions. Because the decision to not put a port in, the decision to not open me up, the decision to do what the booklet said, as opposed to, you know, that that was a miracle. That was a big thing for me. And she said, I prayed that they would guide. And I think that was spiritual warfare happening in that room of, like, I was being tested, I was being kind of taken and pulled. And I think that that prayer, that one prayer, sent those angels, and those angels guided the hands of those doctors. And that saved my life. Hang tight.

[Bobby Bones]

The bobbycast will be right back.

[Unknown]

You can make a difference in someone's life, including your own, with a job in home care. These jobs offer flexible schedules, health care, retirement options and free training. They also provide paid time off and opportunities for overtime. Visit oregonhomecarejobs.com to learn more and apply. That's oregonhomecarejobs.com.

[Bobby Bones]

Here'S what I love about Impossible. You don't have to pick. It tastes great. It's delicious meat made from plants so you get to eat good and still go big. I'm talking about full on protein and full on cheat day meals without the cheat day fills. It's fuel for your body and it tastes delicious. That is the most important part, right? It comes from plants. It grills like beef. It's not or it's and it's impossible. Look, I love burgers. There's nothing like the grill going nice summer afternoon, getting that perfect burger, stacking it high, the whole deal, right? Summertime burgers. But I also like knowing that I'm not wrecking my cholesterol or feeling super heavy afterwards. It's everything you love about meat without the guilt of meat. Impossible lets you have both. It's awesome. So if you're like me and you want to eat good and you want to feel good, grab some impossible meat products next time you're at the store. Red packaging. You can't miss it. It's everything you want from meat and everything you didn't expect from plants.

[Ryan Seacrest]

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[Bobby Bones]

And we're back on the Bobby Cast. How long were you in a wheelchair or unable to physically do normal able bodied things?

[Drake White]

Once I got back to Nashville. So that was August, September, October, November. We're talking about three months.

[Bobby Bones]

You're in Roanoke the whole time? All the hospital? No. But you were in the hospital in Roanoke for how long?

[Drake White]

For two weeks.

[Bobby Bones]

That's an eternity. That's not home.

[Drake White]

No.

[Bobby Bones]

Even for your I Mean for your wife too. Like, she's not able to have the home things.

[Drake White]

Yeah. Wow. And you know that it was a miracle that we couldn't fly a plane back because of the pressure to the ABM in the brain. We couldn't get a medical transfer back in an ambulance because I can't be jostled around like that in an ambulance for seven hours, you know, or nine hours. And Alex is like, what are we going to do? What are we going to. And we called a dear friend of ours, Kylie Irvin, and she sent a tour bus up there. And then they were like, I mean, and this is the hospital. They were like, we got to get him out of here. And Alex is like, what do you mean? Like, I don't, I don't know what to do. And so the bus is coming. You got to have a EMT to accompany you on the, on the bus to watch you. I mean, you are a high risk dude right now. So I come out, up out of. Alex will explain. I come out of kind of a stupor and go, call Eric Estes, call Brandon Harco. They were my buddies that had become firemen out of high school. And I hadn't talked to those dudes in a while. And she called both of them. Brandon had had something going on, but Eric was like, I'll be there in seven hours. Eric comes, we get a ride all the way back to Nashville on a tour bus in the back. It works out. So you asked the timing. That was two weeks in Roanoke and then it was the work then over at Skyline, right off Dickerson pike, which I love that hospital. Those OTs and the PTs saved my life. And they, they're the ones that made me get up, you know, And I'm, I'm sitting here, you know, rehabbing next to a 75 year old stroke patient that's farting all over herself, you know, and it's just a, it's a very dire time for me and my mental capacity because we're. We had played Fenway park, we had played these awesome places. You know, we had seen these great things. And then I'm, I'm. Somebody's got to help me use the bathroom and somebody's got to help me shower and just a very, very low time. And that took. I was, I was there 40 days and 40 nights and I don't. I know that's biblical, but that literally is how long I was there. And so once I was, I was just so ready to get back home. And I had buddies come and build, build handrails to get. To get in and at the house. And we got back home and, you know, that is. That is when the work, you know, the work. There was a lot of work of just getting off the table and a lot of pain in joints. And my left side was completely paralyzed. All the muscle mass went out of my left side and all the muscle mass went out of my leg, and nothing would work. And so building that back up was extremely painful. The shoulder was extremely painful. The hip was extremely painful. But I would just get little, little bitty drops of hope. And this one. All I wanted to do was write. I wanted to write songs. I was like, man, I have a. Have a forever muse. I have a relentless muse. Like now I can. I can write these songs and do these things. And I remember my publisher goes, well, Drake, the pandemic is set in because do the math, you know, August, September, October 2019, and then we're moving into 2020. And so it's a double whammy for me because I felt like I'd gotten my career was, you know, you work hard for that. You work hard to get to those points and those spots. And then I felt like the proverbial rug was kind of pulled out from under me. And then they say the pandemic then, you know, right when I get back to where I'm on a walker, I had a cane and I felt like I could play. They didn't want me to play, but I played a couple of private shows probably four months after the injury, four or five months after the injury. And they were very, very docile shows. But it proved, it was just a stepping stones that I could get there and do it, but all I wanted to do was write. And he said, well, nobody's writing. Nobody's coming to the publishing house. Would you be willing to write on Zoom? And I said, man, I'll write in Morse code. I don't give a shit what are you talking. So the perspective shifts. You're just like. And I wrote this song called Hurts, Hurts the Healing. And that song proved to me in that moment that. That I could. I could do it, that I could keep going. So that little raise of hope there, little raise of hope when I didn't feel like I could walk and I would go like, I would gain, like two steps forward, then I'd go five steps back as far as the, the health journey and that recovering.

[Bobby Bones]

What do they tell your ceiling was, though, whenever you went back home? Did they tell you they had visions or they Your outlook could include playing music and writing music, or was it, we don't know where this is going to end. Like, what was the. What was their version of your future to you?

[Drake White]

Yeah, I realized really quick, and you probably did, too, with brain injuries, they know less about the brain than we know about the ocean, than we know about Mars. Like, they know very little. And so they can't tell you anything. Nobody can tell you it's an acl and it's going to heal if you do this, this, this, and this. So they're. They're basically going, just keep working hard. Just keep. Keep working. And I formed what I now live by is if you believe you're healing, you're healing. That's placebos, a real thing. But it doesn't matter. Placebo or not, if you believe you're healing, you are healing. And so I just put in my mind, I set things, Bobby. Like, getting back to the stage was a big thing. Then the pandemic hit. Wednesday night therapy, you know, getting in the barn and playing these shows, these small shows that I would just gather around with, you know, two or three people and throw up my phone and put it on Instagram. You know, I would look forward to those. Hunting was a huge thing. Being outside was a big thing. Whether it be, roll my. Get Alex to roll my wheelchair out there and just take. Take my shoes off and walk around in the backyard. That might be the event for the day at some point early in the recovery process. But I did something, and I noticed that my brain, as long as I had something to look forward to and as long as I had something to, you know, music was so. Everybody says music's healing. It is healing. But, man, like, I remember preparing for a right. Like, I had so many rights that the years prior. Like, I got a right today. Who's it with? What are we going to do? You get in the right. What y' all want to do, you know? No, dude, I would prepare for these rights. I would go in and just have 17 ideas. And all because you had time. And so it just really gave me a perspective shift in gratitude of how to walk through this and how to walk through life in an appreciative way. And not that I wasn't before, but now I was just very, very adamant and very driven to prove. Not prove anybody wrong, but, like, get back out there. Because I heard rumblings of he may never walk again. I heard rumblings of he'll definitely never perform again. Like, and, man, the. The artist that would call me there's no needing saying names. But like my good friends that we all know that you know that you've had on your show, they would call me and I'd be like, all right, man, well, let's. Let's write or let's get together and write. Oh, brother. You worry about. And they didn't mean to. This is a specific one. They were only trying to do good, but they would be like, you take care of yourself. You will write when you get well.

[Bobby Bones]

Not understanding that what you need to take care of yourself was to write or to have something to do.

[Drake White]

I threw an iPhone through a Sheetrock wall one day after I got off the phone with a, with a, with a friend and a fellow artist, and, And I threw it through. Alice thought, what is going on? What, what, what's wrong? And it was by him saying he didn't mean to, but by him saying, kind of taking my, hey, let's write. And him saying, you take care of yourself. We'll write when. When, blah, blah, blah. That was like, he thinks I'm done. He thinks that. He thinks that everybody's just passing me. And I know that's not true, but that's what I thought. And so I'm, I'm angry. I have to, I have to deal with some of that now, you know, with, you know, it's an ongoing battle of like, you know, is your shot over? Is your window of opportunity over? Can you get back up and do this? You know, and I answer those questions every day. You know, I answer those questions with every show. I play these shows with a revival esque type spirit of like, I once was dead, you know, but I don't celebrate. It wasn't a near death experience to me. It was a near life experience. Meaning. I heard Deion Sanders say that the other day. I think that's why I say it.

[Bobby Bones]

Talking about his bladder, his cancer.

[Drake White]

Yeah, it was an. It was a. It was a life experience. The reason I love, I love what he said it was. It's not a near death experience. It was a life experience because, man, it made life. My sweet wife duct taped her leg to my leg and taught me to walk again. She'll be my wife forever. I mean, goodness gracious, you can't love anybody more. My son, teaching him to do stuff, my never taking a right for granted, never taking a podcast for granted, never taking an opportunity for granted. Like I said, I had a pretty good grounding of it before, but now it was like God gave me this thing, this obstacle, and I think that it gave me the authority to go and help people and. And where people be like, oh, he don't know what I'm going through, like, blah, blah, blah. Well, maybe I don't, but let me tell you this story. And they're like, whoa, if he can. If he can get through that I can get through. So now I've started speaking. You know, I've met. I've met, you know, tons of folks. I love doing it, and I never thought I'd love speaking. I thought that was a nightmare, you know, but it's about helping people for me now. And the music. The music is just. It never stole my. I think this is a great, cool thing. Like, it never stole my ability to sing or stole my ability to. To, you know, hear melody. I don't play a guitar as well now. I do a lot of opening, open tunings and stuff like that. But the music has a richness to it that, you know, I can't. I can't say it's anything but. But a miracle. And I can't say it's anything but, you know, to have this attitude and have this thing. And I have bad days. I just have people around me that pull me out of it. And, you know, therapist Griff Moore at Paradigm down south of town, meet with him still four hours a week, you know, and we go through the same motions and we grind. And I have horrible days with him of days that my leg and my foot doesn't do what I want it to do. But we've got this show, and we prepared for these shows and we prepared for these movements and we prepared for this thing, and we prepared to climb a ladder, a ladder stand, you know, to hunt. And that. That helped me. Just climbing this ladder helped me do other things, helped me learn how to change a diaper, you know, and changing a diaper. My wife laughs at me, but she said, that's great therapy. It's great therapy. Changing the diapers. Great therapy. Go change his diaper. So it's really. It's really been a crazy experience, Bobby. It's been a frustrating experience and. But ultimately, I think it's the best thing that ever happened to me, you know, I really do. Because as far as me as a human being, empathy and being more like, you know, being more like Jesus or whatever, you're aspiring to be better. I'm always trying to be better than I was yesterday, as cliche as that is. But this is. This is just always. This is one of those things that, like, now maybe somebody can look at me and go, well, if he can get through that, then I can keep going and get through this. So all this mental health stuff and you know, I think I've got, I think I've got a line I could throw you. You know, the Bobby cast.

[Bobby Bones]

We'll be right back.

[Unknown]

You can make a difference in someone's life, including your own, with a job and home care. These jobs offer flexible schedules, healthcare, retirement options and free training. They also provide paid time off and opportunities for overtime. Visit oregonhomecarejobs.com to learn more and apply. That's oregonhomecarejobs.com.

[Bobby Bones]

Here'S what I love about impossible. You don't have to pick. It tastes great. It's delicious meat made from plants so you get to eat good and and still go big. I'm talking about full on protein and full on cheat day meals without the cheat day fills. It's fuel for your body and it tastes delicious. That is the most important part, right? It comes from plants. It grills like beef. It's not or it's. And it's impossible. Look, I love burgers. There's nothing like the grill going nice summer afternoon, getting that perfect burger, stacking it high, the whole deal, right? Summertime burgers. But I also like knowing that I'm not wrecking my cholesterol or feeling super heavy afterwards. It's everything you love about meat, without the guilt of meat. Impossible lets you have both. It's awesome. So if you're like me and you want to eat good and you want to feel good, grab some impossible meat products next time you're at the store. Red packaging. You can't miss it. It's everything you want from meat and everything you didn't expect from plants.

[E]

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[Bobby Bones]

This is the bobbycast. You talk about that in a way that I talk about perspective in general, where no one wants to have to get perspective, but once you have it, it's invaluable. And you don't get perspective by something easy. Like, nothing easy ever gives you perspective. Perspective comes through something hard that you've had to get through, and what you've learned from it ends up being tools you can use for yourself or for others. I had a guy call me this morning, and he just got out of jail, and he was like, hey, while I was in jail, like, another inmate gave me your books. And he was from an area like I grew up, like, somewhat like where you grew up, but, you know, super impoverished area in the South. His. He had addicts all around him, as did I. And he was like, you came out of that to do what you're doing now. And it gave me hope that it could be done. And I think because of what I come from, I have perspective. It sucked getting sucked. I would not wish it upon anyone, but now I am so happy that I have it. And this is. I'm just hearing you tell your story, and you say people don't have your exact same story, but they have an understanding that you now understand what something very, very difficult is like. And I feel like you've gained so much perspective. Would you do it again? Probably not. However, you're so grateful for what you've learned from it that it's a. It's. It's a net gain. It feels like. I don't want to put words in your mouth, but I feel like it's a net gain for you in your life because of what you've gained from it, for sure. And then what you can help other people do as well.

[Drake White]

I think that's a. That's a very fair assessment and statement. Like, you know, the. The. The big thing that we're talking about with people isolating their selves with their problems. Like, I've been divorced three times, or I've got a drug addiction. Drug addiction is a big one. Or I've got. Know I've had. You know, I'm paralyzed on the left side or what. Whatever it is. I've had cancer. I've had this. I've had that. I kind of do this thing, and I. And I got it from a conference I went to one time. But like in. In our shows, like, I've asked people to raise their hand. Hey, if you've faced something in the last five years, say I. Everybody says I. Hey, if you. Is anybody in here ever battled cancer in one, you know, and it's kind of a church thing of show, show some hands. And at first I thought it was cheesy, but basically I go through cancer, you know, go through whatever I'm thinking of. You know, I've went through Parkinson's. I went through addiction. I went through. In the bottom, what I'm. What I was shown when the. When the first time I saw this is. Most of the time, I would trade my. Your problems for my problems. You know what I mean? I would. If you ask people, they've all got problems. Everybody's got problems. And my favorite thing is everybody's like, well, it's not like yours. You know, it's not as. You can't say that because their problems are their problems. And you're not alone. Everybody has faced your specific problem. Even if it's this little bitty minute niche thing. Like the people that I've seen raise hands on the AVM journey and the. The brain stuff are crazy. And I've been able to talk to teenagers with AVMs that have ruptured. I've been able to talk to dozens and hundreds of people with. With these AVMs. And they're supposed to be one of the rarest things, you know, out there. And, you know, it's kind of like when you get a. When you get a Bronco and you start. Or you get a Jeep, you start noticing everybody's got a G. You know, you get this AVM or whatever, you start noticing. And I think that is spiritual. I think it's spiritual because that's what he's bringing you through that stuff for. And if I can help somebody. Music definitely heals. Stories definitely heal. Separation is the opposite of healing. And to go through that pandemic right after brain injury, I just think I'm very proud that God gave me these challenges. I wish he wouldn't have sometimes. But now looking at it, if he trusts me with that and he knows that I'm going to come back and have this perspective, then that's what I'll have. And I will say this again. I fail every day. I fail. I fail every day. You know, I failed today. I got kind of heated earlier. It ebbs and flows. It's a constant working thing. Oh, man, I think I'm done. Or I think I'm this or I think I'm that. And then something happens, a show happens. I go hang out with my golden retriever, my little boy, or, you know, I see, you know, a hawk fly across the sky, or, you know, I get to come and a great friend asked me to come write, or I get a cut, or I get, you know, I get a show or we get an opportunity, you know, something happens to pull me out of it always. And I just realized it's the roller coaster, man. It is what it is. And it's. It's best just to. For me to go, man, I'm getting to live this. I'm getting to live this life. I'm getting to live through it. And how can I help people with it?

[Bobby Bones]

How old your son?

[Drake White]

Two and a half.

[Bobby Bones]

How's that been?

[Drake White]

Amazing. Amazing. Dude, you want to get a, you want to. You want to up in. In frequency, get you a two and a half year old with a two year old golden retriever and hang out with him for five minutes. I mean, it's just like an endorphin. There's so much innocence there. And we went through seven years of infertility to have him. We went throughout the IVF process. I've been open with that, on our stages. So we went through the stroke. I just told you that story. Then we're going through seven years of infertility in the middle of all that. And then Alex, my wife, becomes. Starts tingling, gets this autoimmune. She's tingling, she's tingling. We go to Steamboat with some friends to try to just get away from the pandemic or whatever. And we're hiking out there and she becomes paralyzed, long story short, becomes paralyzed from her breasts down. And now I'm just now out of a wheelchair, and she's now paralyzed from her breast down. And people ask me what I did, and I'm like, I called our moms. Our mom came and lived with us for a little while to get Alex back up on her feet. And she's faced this cidp, so chronic demyelination of her nerves, and it was from not knowing she had type 1 diabetes. So she was.

[Bobby Bones]

Wow.

[Drake White]

Diagnosed with type 1 diabetes. And, and so that happened in 2020.

[Bobby Bones]

Did she feel healthier after they diagnosed what it was that was causing that? Like, once they, they said you have type 1 diabetes and you were able to treat that specifically, did she start to feel better?

[Drake White]

Absolutely. I think, I think not knowing is half the, the, the health battle.

[Bobby Bones]

But was she, like feeling Bad before that, because I feel like undiagnosed diabetes is affecting her in a way she didn't even know before. The drastic turn just ebb.

[Drake White]

Huge ebbs and flows of energy, you know, your sugar fluctuating uncontrollably. Yes. Is. Is just, you know, the mood swing, the. The moods and the things, you know, that. That affects. Is crazy. But so she's. She battles through that, we get through that, and then we go through all this infertility stuff, end up having our son. So seeing his life and seeing him in the world has been one of the best things ever, and also one of the funniest because, like, I've realized that nobody has a clue what they're doing, you know, with parenthood, like, you just kind of do it. I mean, we do the best we can, and, man, he's. He's blondheaded and wild, and we just have a good time with him, but he is the source of joy, you know, right now. And it's like. It's just good, man.

[Bobby Bones]

What do you have out on your farm?

[Drake White]

Bees. We got a. It's a deciduous forest, which means, you know, just a bunch of hardwoods and stuff like that. I do a lot of hunting out there.

[Bobby Bones]

Are you a beekeeper?

[Drake White]

Alex is.

[Bobby Bones]

Did she put that. That thing on?

[Drake White]

Yeah, we.

[Bobby Bones]

We. We had a bunch of folks where I come from that were beekeepers. It was very common, but they would just. Just sometimes put the mask on, but they dropped the whole suit. Like, if you wore the suit, you kind of got made fun of. Yeah, but they would wear. They would wear the hat. But, yeah, we had honey everywhere because everybody in that town was beekeeper. Why does she do it? Does she like it? Is it.

[Drake White]

Yeah.

[Bobby Bones]

Is it. Does it take her away? She has to focus on that. Is that like a. I don't know what. What therapeutic does she get from that?

[Drake White]

Yeah, you know, I think she's just. She. We're both natural people. I like things that take me out of living in this. This simulation almost. You know what I mean? I like. That's why I love hunting. I love being in a. A situation where I'm thinking where. What if I was a deer or what if I was a duck? You know, how would I react here? And what would I. She likes being in that natural situation of doing something with her hands and then bringing it and putting it in a recipe. She's also a. She doesn't call it a chef. She calls it her great grandma's cook, you know, her great grandmother and grandmother Taught her how to cook, but she's a phenomenal chef and a great. She's got an event space out there on our property, and that. That's just what she likes to do. She likes to put her energy into natural things, whether it be bees or. I mean, she loves finding artifacts and Indian artifacts on her property and taking him out there and catching lightning bugs or, you know, fishing. Little stuff. But preparing food and nurturing people is. Is what she loves to do.

[Bobby Bones]

So you have game cameras out there on your property? My stepdad sent me this this morning because.

[Drake White]

Oh, you're about to start the game camera.

[Bobby Bones]

Well, it's just, you know, I'm from rural Arkansas, so this is what. These are the pictures that we send for fun.

[Drake White]

Yeah.

[Bobby Bones]

Like, there's, like a. Right behind his house. He's got game cameras.

[Drake White]

Nice. Just.

[Bobby Bones]

That's what my. My photo log is from people home. It's fish and deer.

[Drake White]

Yeah.

[Bobby Bones]

If. Or. And ducks.

[Drake White]

Yeah.

[Bobby Bones]

And so it's like. He's like, here we go again. And it's just like, one after the other.

[Drake White]

That's awesome. Yeah, that's. That's my whole reel, you know, and people. People. There's such a. A dogma, I think, that comes with hunting and fishing. And I love that saying. You know, it's. It's a newer idea to not hunt or not fish than it is to fish or. Or hunt. What that means is, like, people, they're like, oh, my gosh, you hunt? What do you mean? I mean, I've been to, you know, all over the place where. And I don't want to. You know, I understand. The closer we can get to earth and the closer we can get to our connection with our food and all that, the happier I get and the healthier I get. And it literally helped heal me through all of this stuff. To be close to bees, to be close to growing your own tomatoes, to actually harvesting the venison and eating that. That healthy food that was healing to me and that made. I could feel that in my bones. And. And so I've dedicated a lot of my life to. To. To that. To the conservation of that and that the idea of the. The outdoorsman and the. The man and woman that go out there and. And actually know how to. Can their vegetables and actually know how to harvest and sk. Prepare a wild animal and feed and provide. So coming back out of that stroke and being able to provide for my family and get back into a rhythm, into a hunting thing, into making music again, was just huge. And then the Pandemic hit. And really diving into that outdoor world was really what I, what I told you. What I had to look forward to was hunting. And I saw a giant deer, like 175 inch deer, if that makes sense to you, like on the, on a scoring system. And I've never been a big guy of like, oh, it's got to be this massive deer. But I saw this deer after my brother in law put a game camera up behind the house. And it was kind of a reluctant thing for me. I was like, I can't hunt. I'm in a wheelchair. You know, this is right in between wheelchair and cane. And he was like, whatever, I'm gonna do it. So he puts it out there and I check it 500 times a day. Well, giant, like Bambi's dad walks out behind the house, like right behind the house. And it's not normal to have a world class deer in Tennessee that big. So I go to Alex Bobby and I said, I gotta learn how to climb a ladder. And she looks at me in this wheelchair and she goes, we gotta learn how to walk. And I held that picture up to her and she goes, well, you're not going to Iowa. I said, look at the picture same. It's in our backyard. She was like, oh, my gosh, that's crazy. So then I go to my therapist and I said, I gotta learn how to climb a ladder. He looks at me in a walker and it's like, you got to learn how to walk, boss. Showing the picture, he's from Mississippi, so he got it real quick. He was like, he's like, we'll get on that versa climber and let's go. And two months later, I climbed a ladder and I never saw that deer. I saw the deer twice, but I never had the chance to harvest it. I think that deer might have been a, a God deer, might have been an angel deer. Like a fake deer. Like God just put it in my life because he knew that you can really get me with a song and a deer and a fish. You can just get me with those things. So we made a documentary. We're going to release it. It's called Ladder to the Sky. Just about how that helped heal me. And I had this idea to. I love that scene in the Revenant where the bear attack happens to DiCaprio. And I wanted to shoot it like that. Like, I love hunting videos are what they are. They're whatever how we grew up watching hunting videos. But I wanted something to encapsulate the primal Instinct of it, like what it did is flipped a switch in my brain primally. That got me back to like a provider, a, a producer, a somebody with something to do. And I went back to my, my neurologist. I'm talking three or four months after I'd seen that picture. And he's like, Drake, what have you been doing? Man, you look great. I said, well, I mean, and Alex, because I'll tell you what he's been doing, he's been hunting every day. And he said, whatever you've been doing, your scans look amazing. You know, I can't say that neuroplasticity has grown around your lesion because of this deer, but I can promise you this, whatever you're doing is healing you. And so we got the initiative, the hunts, the healing off, the song, the hurts, the healing and we just documented all that.

[Bobby Bones]

When is that coming out? Like do you have a date on it yet? Next couple months?

[Drake White]

September 1st. September we're going to do a, we're going to do a launch at rally's deal. September 1st duck line. And then we're going to do. So it's going to go out on Real Trees YouTube September 15th and then we're going to go out to Outdoor Channel around Thanksgiving.

[Bobby Bones]

Is it done?

[Drake White]

It's close. It's real close. Close.

[Bobby Bones]

Proud of it.

[Drake White]

I'm, I, I love it. Cuz it, it, it's very, maybe 10% of it's about hunting actually. Like I had to concentrate. Think about this. I mean it's 4 o' clock in the morning. I set my alarm. I don't have anything to set my alarm for. Before this set, my alarm alarm goes off, I pop up wide eyed, bushy tail, get my coffee and I get all my clothes on and I ease down to the, you know, 100 yards behind my house and I take the first step on the rung and there's a little bit of frost on the rung of the ladder and I would hear that boot kind of crunch on that frost and I would, I would be like, do you need to be doing this? Like you're going to fall out of this thing and one of the arrows is going to go through your neck or something. You know, all these fears and now I use it in my speaking stuff because it's like stepping into those fears and climbing that ladder one rung at a time and not, and understanding that the deer does not care that, that you had a stroke. The red birds don't. The. Not to get too hippie on you, but like the. They don't care that you've had a stroke. You're in nature. And that's where God is for me. That's where it all is. That's where the healing power of everything is in that scene. So I would concentrate so hard, it would take me like an hour to climb up 12 steps to 12ft in the top of this thing. But the power and the happiness and joy that I got from sitting 12ft above the ground and just watching stuff every day just took my mind off myself. It took my mind off that I wasn't. I mean, I would have detrimental thoughts, Bobby, like, are you going to be able to catch your son if he falls in the lake? He might drown. Your son's going to drown. You know, then I would make that real because what we do is make up stuff for a living. That's what I do. Can you untangle your son's fishing line? Well, he'll probably have to have some other guy taking fishing. You ever gonna be able to, you know, James Brown it up on stage again? Can you ever have the swagger you used to have and this? And now I know that those things. I know how to battle those and I know how to tell other. I know how to tell other people how I battled them. Because that's the thing about mental stuff, is everybody is different. And I can't tell anybody how to do anything. I can just tell them that, how I did it. And I understand suicide. I understand that dark hole of that abyss, and that's a good place to be. You know, just empathy for mankind and humans and being out in nature, you know, whether beekeeping or hunting or fishing, taking care of somebody else besides yourself. And I'm not the biggest nurture in the world. I'm so driven that my ambition, like I'm trying to achieve something every day. And this injury amongst the other stuff, just taught me to just enjoy. Enjoy it. Keep that ambition and keep that love, but enjoy it. But it's about other people and it's about giving.

[Bobby Bones]

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[Unknown]

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[Bobby Bones]

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[Unknown]

This is Danielle Fishel from Pod Meats World. Parents, let's talk snacks. If your mornings look anything like mine, one kid's trying to pile drive a pillow and the other is trying to zip themselves into a backpack. Meanwhile, I'm trying to sign a permission slip with an eyeliner pencil because that's all I could find. That's why Mott's no sugar added applesauce pouches are perfect to have nearby. These things are clutch and are perfect for moments of stress. Made with real apples, no sugar added. And the pouch? Genius. It's mess free and perfect for the car, the lunchbox or after school activities. This is a snack you can feel good about and a good source of vitamin C too. Just tasty applesauce your kids will actually want to eat. The other day I handed one to my son mid meltdown. He took a deep breath, squeezed the pouch and suddenly he was calm. He had a tiny apple powered moment of Zen. Trust me, your future self will thank you. MOTS. Real apples make real good applesauce. Learn [e-mail].

[Bobby Bones]

Welcome back to the Bobby Cast. We were talking about your music before you came in, so I have a couple music specific questions. So low country, high road, super rich, super soulful. Do you feel like you? Because again, it definitely feels like Drake for sure. But how do you feel? Like it's been modified since the music before this. Because I do feel sonically it's a bit different. I can't really put my finger on it, but I Don't feel like it sounds exactly like Drake White from five years ago. How is this project different?

[Drake White]

Yeah, well, I mean, I think one of the things is independence brings, you know, an independent artist brings a lot of, you know, it brings a lot of freedoms in the fact that, you know, I went and did that low country high road with Jonathan Singleton, who's responsible. Know, he does a lot of work with Luke Coms and a lot of people, and he's a dear friend of mine from Jackson, Mississippi. And we just said, hey, let's go down to. To Ryan, Mississippi, and let's. Let's get a band. And I love Nashville, don't get me wrong, but getting out of Nashville was just an idea. I had to go do another record. And so we went down there and just. And did it and that's. That's that different sonically, you know, sonic sound. So there's a lot of freedoms in all of that stuff. But the record that I released, you know, right after the stroke, it's called the Optimistic, and that was another independent record that. That I just. I've never stopped making music. Matter of fact, I made a lot more music and. And we're, you know, we're in the process of making another record, so.

[Bobby Bones]

Well, I don't want to skip over the scattered smothered covers because those three songs are definitely different than if you were to go, hey, Drake's going to cover some songs. What do you think he's going to do? And listen, I've listened to Birds of a feather 5,000 times. My wife, because she loves Billie Eilish, never really thought that'd be a song you would do. I think you either. I think it's your version of. It's awesome. I would not have envisioned that even that version existing, but I think you did it. I'll save in the word. You said a very independent way, but it was that song Ring of Fire and a Teddy Slim song. Those are why those songs?

[Drake White]

Well, individual reasons for really all of them. But the Billie Eilish song I had never really heard. Obviously, I knew who Billie Eilish was. I'd never really listened to a lot of her music that her and Phineas made. And then I listened to that song just because I think my nephew had it on at 1. He's 19. I'm listening to it and I'm like, I want you to stay until I'm in the grave. Tell them all the way. Dead and buried. You know, tell him in the casket you carry. If you go, I'm going, like, I listen to those lyrics and a lot of times, lyric will hit me. A lot of times a melody will hit me. That lyric, Bobby, like, stood out to me is like, man, this girl. That is a great. That's a great written song. If you listen to it, you don't know if it's. It's a. A eulogy or. Or a.

[Bobby Bones]

Like a love or passion or a vow. Yeah, exactly.

[Drake White]

And so I thought that was super cool how she in her emo way, like, created. You didn't know if it was a eulogy or a vow. And I was like, man, I'm going to try this. And I started messing around with it on a guitar, just kind of clicking around. And I just started singing it over and over. And then a couple of days later, you know, just kind of. Kind of happened from there. And I had some people. I mean, obviously it was not a mistake that they were extremely popular songs. Like, we wanted to. To do that in a way. We wanted to do the Teddy Swims thing because the Run's amazing. The vocal. I'm a singer, you know, I've always been a singer. That's always been something I didn't have to really work hard to do. That's kind of the. The given thing. So the Teddy Swim song was because of the. The vocal run and just the popularity of it. The Billie Eilish song was just. The lyric crushed me. And then I had had this idea on Johnny. On the Johnny Cash song or the June. June Carter Cash. She wrote that song. And I've always heard that song as a sad song, you know, because I think it would be hell to be married to Johnny Cash. And I mean, everybody's watched. Watched. When I say watched, watched. Everybody's watched.

[Bobby Bones]

You're British.

[Drake White]

Everybody's watched the Walk the Line or whatever. And I think she. I heard that song is like, I fell into hell when I fell in love with him. And so that's the way I recorded it. Just very, very sad and. And not sad, but very in that frame of mind. So I just. It's. It's fun, man. I love being in the studio. I love making music. I'm gonna do it for the rest of my life. And. And these were three things that gets us to the. You know, I want to create every day, so, you know, being independent, being in the. The nature that we're at in music, like, you can create every day and you can release a lot. Yeah. So. So that's what I'm doing.

[Bobby Bones]

What's. What's up with the new music. When does that start to trickle out?

[Drake White]

I think not.

[Bobby Bones]

Not that this isn't new. I should say the new music, that is yours.

[Drake White]

Yep. Yeah, this was, this is doing exactly what it was supposed to do. You know, the scattered smother covers, which being from Arkansas, the, the name of it, I'm probably prouder than, than the actual songs.

[Bobby Bones]

That's right. It's a great name, I tell you.

[Drake White]

Yeah. It's like, you know, you go. When I go into a Waffle House, it is my nostalgia, it is my favorite go in there. It's so comfortable. I don't know why, but coffee always tastes great in there. Black for me. And I walk in there and I walk to the jukebox and I put on, I put on something that's, that's what we do. And I love with me and my band will leave wherever we're leaving that night. And we usually try to get out of there by 1:00am 2:00am and my bus driver always stops at the first Waffle House out of town and we'll slide in there and some of those 3am Waffle House band. Like your band's the only one in there. And you go to the jukebox and you're poking it like don't let Matt run the jukebox. You know what he's going to do. And that's the kind of stuff that makes you a band. And so Scattered Smothered covers is obviously a homage to the, the hash browns and how I order my hash browns and I order them covered and, and all of that. But I, I, I get them diced and top like I get all of it.

[Bobby Bones]

That's too many words for a title of album. Yeah, dice tops matter. It's got to, we just. Yeah, you nailed it. When's the new stuff coming out? Like when does the first couple of songs coming.

[Drake White]

We have this song right now called called. It's like dancing to the sound of a Dixie band bandana holding back your hair you're tied up V neck making me sweat. Girl, I can't help but stare.

[Bobby Bones]

Give me a little melody. You got to give me a little more of the spoken poetry. Don't go hard.

[Drake White]

Dancing to the sound of a Dixie bam bandana holding back your head. You're tired of V neck making me sweat. No, I can't help but stare. Don't get me wrong I'm digging on your cut off and flip flop style. But I must confess girl, you look your best wearing nothing but a smile. Yes, ma'. Am. Damn.

[Bobby Bones]

Is that next? Yeah, August. Yeah, it's a couple weeks. That's about. It's about to hit. Okay, so let me ask you this, then. When that song comes out, do you want. Because this is going to exist. And we're on. People listen to this. And that song's coming out soon. But would you rather. Would you. That song. I can wait for that song to come out and, like, put on the national countdown. I can put it play. Or do you want us to go and do some of the Scattered Smothered cover? Oh, wait, well, Patience. Wait for that. You'll do that?

[Drake White]

I'll do Patience, man. I've learned Patience.

[Bobby Bones]

All right, True.

[Drake White]

Now that. That song for me, the Alabama Muscle Shoals kind of funk soul brother thing, that's always a. This is me doing exactly what I want to do and just creating with a. With a high frequency and just like, I'm not thinking about it too much, you know, it's like I took this adage of, like, dare to suck. You ever heard that? Like, it doesn't matter for me. Like, perfection to me. My. That's not what music is for me anymore, you know? And I think. You know, I think there's a lot of perfect stuff out there. Well, I don't. I don't think there's any great music to me, is not perfect. So it's just like, dare to suck. Just write it, put it out, and it will. It will evoke feeling and who it's supposed to, you know, so it'll find who it's supposed to. And that's kind of been my. My forte for the last four or five years and trying to put others before myself. And I don't. I fell at that all the time as well. But we're. We're happy to just be alive, man, and be making music.

[Bobby Bones]

Well, Drake White Stomp. You guys follow my Instagram, Talked about that earlier. Power of a Woman. That's a song. Is the one that. I mean, that's the thing they say. Single. Is that a single?

[Drake White]

Yeah.

[Bobby Bones]

Is that the single Power of a Woman?

[Drake White]

Yeah, it's an older song. It was a.

[Bobby Bones]

That's what I thought.

[Drake White]

Independent hit for us. You know, we. We talked about this the other day, like, mixing with whiskey and Power of a Woman since making me look good again and living the dream like those. Those songs. Power of a Woman was just a big. We had a really good campaign of. Of shining light on just independent women, women out there that were doing it, you know, and so powerful Woman was a big song for us independently. And so it as. So as make some of the whiskey.

[Bobby Bones]

I'm gonna wait till the next one. That'll be the next single in my mind. I'm waiting for the next one.

[Drake White]

Cool. Yeah.

[Bobby Bones]

Because it's like, I only got so many bullets in the chamber. I want to use it on the new stuff.

[Drake White]

Yeah, I want you to. Yeah, man.

[Bobby Bones]

You're a good snapper, too. I found myself snapping while you're talking, like, just to see if I could snap. Because you would. You weren't even trying. Like, I have little puny snaps.

[Drake White]

Yeah.

[Bobby Bones]

No, don't go. Yeah. You don't have to agree with that.

[Drake White]

So quickly, but my mom's a great snapper, and her mom was a great snapper. Snapper.

[Bobby Bones]

You're good whistler.

[Drake White]

I. I'm. I'm a. I won the Alabama State Championship in whistling. No way.

[Bobby Bones]

What do you do in the Alabama State Whistling Championship?

[Drake White]

That's a joke. But.

[Bobby Bones]

Oh, I believed it. Did you guys believe it? I did, too.

[Drake White]

My. My whistling is. Is. It. I'm from a long line of whistlers, and. And it's. And it's not. My whistling is not like, it's not like this cra. I. I'll just do that. I. I'll do, like, a. A comment. Like, I don't feel like I should go on.

[Bobby Bones]

That's pretty solid, though. That's.

[Drake White]

That was very. That was. That was your very standard. Like, I just. I just kind of pump myself up and then just hit you with a very standard thing.

[Bobby Bones]

But I whistle like I snap. And compared to yours, yours are so, like, pure and robust. And my snaps are like crackles. And my whistles like this. It's. It's so thin and so. You don't like that? You're nicer on that one. You're much nicer on that.

[Drake White]

That's my dad's whistle.

[Bobby Bones]

Because I was like, I. I snap wimpy, like. You sure do. I like it. That time you were like, I like that whistle.

[Drake White]

Yeah.

[Bobby Bones]

Drake, Good to see you, buddy.

[Drake White]

You too, brother. Yeah.

[Bobby Bones]

I appreciate you being just so generous with your stories and vulnerable with your stories. And I know that a lot of people, either here or in the places that you are talking or even performing, are not feeling as alone, because you now exist in the manner that you do. And most of the time, you're not even going to know how you're affecting people. So I can appreciate that. I do appreciate that, and I appreciate that here. And I appreciate what you're doing. And like I said, you have a lot of perspective and it sucks to have to gain it, but it is so valuable and more so for others and it's a very selfless thing to share that perspective. So thank you again. Thank you and man, can't wait to hear the new music. And yeah, you guys follow Drake. Go see him at Drake White Stomp and yeah, see you soon man. Thanks for listening to a Bobby Kast production.

[Unknown]

Hi, it's Danielle Fishel from Pod Meets World. You know that moment when you're getting dressed and it's just total chaos? Your kid can't find a shoe, the dog's barking at his reflection, and all you need is a go to outfit. Outfit you can trust. If you're tired of options that miss the mark, let me put you on to JCPenney. No, don't give me that weight. Seriously. Look. They've got stylish, dependable pieces that feel effortless. A perfect solution for busy parents. I just picked up an a a denim blouse and Liz Claiborne a line dress. Both easy wins for when I'm on the go and super affordable. And the best part? The shocked faces I get when I say, yeah, it's from JCPenney. Don't miss out. Shop [e-mail] yes JCPenney, this is Danielle Fishel from Pod Meats World. Parents, quick question. When is the last time you won snack time? The other day I handed my son a perfectly portioned Pinterest level snack and he traded it for a Mott's applesauce pouch. I'm not mad, just impressed. And that's why Mott's no Sugar added applesauce pouches are perfect to keep on hand. They're made with real apples packed in a super easy pouch, perfect for tossing in a lunchbox, keeping in the car, or grabbing as you're running out the door. Plus, they're a good source of vitamin C and kids love them. Win, win. Make sure your kid wins snack time with Mottz. Real apples make real good applesauce. Learn [e-mail].

[Drake White]

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