Parmalee stopped by The Bobby Bones Show to share stories about their multiple number 1 songs over their 25-year career, as well as open up about some snubbed moment at award shows and the scary moment on their tour bus that inspired their current single.
The band consists of a mostly family dynamic, two brothers, a cousin, and a friend. Band member Josh isn’t related to the other three, he was actaully an only child. So he’s become an honorary brother with the guys, even though he said he’s not been invited to the family reunions yet. Noting if he did get invited, he wouldn’t go. Parmalee is having the biggest year of their career right now, and they hope it continues.
Bobby Bones asked the guys to share a story from each of their number 1 songs. On their first number 1 “Carolina,” everyone’s parents came out to see them and they got to witness all of the guys getting their number 1 plaques for this song. It was a special moment for everyone involved. For “Just The Way,” Matt and Scott recalled being out in California. Scott went out with some friends and Matt decided to go write and came back with this song. They didn’t have Blanco Brown on it, but they knew it was going to be a big song for them. Putting out “Close Your Eyes” as a single was not a move the band wanted to make originally. Their label head John Loba sent them the song and when he heard they all thought the song sounded familiar, Loba told them that’s exactly why they needed to cut it. The song shot up the charts and into the top 5 quickly.
Barry recalled playing “Take My Name” for some radio people down in Florida. He thought they should be more excited about the song than they were so he went back to his hotel room and chopped up the song to make it not as long. This particularly song, they all agreed, was their sleeper song. It was the project they didn’t expect anything to happen, but it went on up anyways. Talking about “Girl In Mine,” they all recalled shooting the music video for this one in a high rise building. Matt is terrified of heights, but they had him right on the edge of the top of the building complete with drones. He was not a fan of the whole experience and was happy when they wrapped. Despite some number 1 success, the guys admitted they have swung and missed several times on songs that they thought would be great hits. However, Scott has always been right as far as choosing songs for the band. He’s currently 4/4 on songs he knew would be a hit and they did just that.
“Take My Name” is the song that resonates the most with their audiences on tour currently, so much so that they now end their sets with this song rather than “Carolina.” They’ve also had an insane uptick in proposals happening at their shows with this song. Beyond performing, the band hopes to perform at award shows one day. When Bones mentioned he’s really annoyed for them because the band is often getting robbed and snubbed by award shows not only in the performing category, but in awards as well. They did add that iHeartRadio has been great to them and they have been nominated for many awards through their events.
The guys currently have a song out called “Gonna Love You,” that was actually inspired by a really difficult thing that happened for their band back in 2010. Before the guys had a record deal, they were playing a club on a Monday night and there were roughly 20 people there. Matt and Scott were in the RV packing up when they got a knock at the door, thinking it was their bandmates, they opened the door to find two guys with guns and masks pushing their way onto the bus. Matt hollered for Scott who has his conceal and carry license and that’s when gunfire broke out. One of the strangers tried to fire shots at both of them, but then Scott fired back. Scott was able to hit both of them, one died and the other one is in prison. Scott also got shot 3 times during the exchange and was bleeding out on the bus. Thankfully cops were next door and able to get to the guys quickly. The tragic situation put Scott in a coma for 10 days after he lost a lot of blood and was airlifted to the hospital. He spent 40 days in the hospital and had to have 3 lifesaving surgeries. The first thing Scott said out of his coma to his bandmates was “we’re not playing anymore of those shitty clubs.”
Crazy enough, the guys were actually about to move to Nashville to get signed to a record deal when this tragic incident happened. And shortly after that, COVID hit and everything shut down. Despite such a horrible sitaution, the music community showed up for Parmalee, there were local bands and people who organized auctions to help them during that time. Once Scott was back on his feet, they made their way down to Nashville and signed the record deal that was waiting for them and met Bones shortly after.
