Charlie Daniels Discusses New Album

This is a partial transcript from "Hannity & Colmes," July 5, 2007, that has been edited for clarity.

HANRETTY: Welcome back to "Hannity & Colmes". I'm Karen Hanretty,

filling in for Sean Hannity. Recently, Sean and Alan sat down with country

music legend Charlie Daniels, to discuss his new album, "Live from Iraq".

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

HANNITY: Our good friend, Charlie Daniels, is back with us.

Now, Charlie, this is a special program because next week, you and I

are involved in Atlanta. This is all for the Freedom Alliance Scholarship Fund our Freedom Concert. And we're going to have the sing-off. You want

to tell everybody about it?

CHARLIE DANIELS, COUNTRY MUSIC STAR: Let me — I think I got the

ground rules right on this. We're going to play it, and you're going to

sing it. And is Neal going to join you, or is it just going to be you?

HANNITY: I'm going to get Neal to join me, Clark Howard (ph) to join

me, Scott Slade (ph). They're all friends of mine.

DANIELS: So you guys, you guys are going to do it the first time.

Right?

HANNITY: We'll do it first. This is "The Devil Went Down to

Georgia".

DANIELS: Right.

HANNITY: So we're going to do it first.

DANIELS: Right.

HANNITY: Then you're going to be — you're going to be playing.

DANIELS: Then the band and myself are going to do it. Right?

HANNITY: And then you — then we do the real version so we don't

spoil it for the crowd.

DANIELS: That's going to be fun, buddy.

HANNITY: Now, I've done this twice. The first time was pretty bad,

right? You can be honest.

DANIELS: Well, I'm going to be honest. You know what? I figured out

what the problem was, Sean. We do that song a lot faster than we recorded

it. So you're used to the recorded version. We'll slow it down to the

recorded version's tempo in Atlanta, and you'll have a good fair shot. And

we'll give you a fair shot, you know.

HANNITY: Listen, Charlie, it sold out. We've got 12,500 people. I'm

going to be embarrassing myself in front of them there next Tuesday. So

I'm looking forward to it.

DANIELS: That's wonderful. I'm so glad. Such a good cause.

HANNITY: Well, you now — this is our fourth concert together. And

you have helped us, and this leads right into your CD you have our, you

just released now in the last week, "Live from Iraq".

DANIELS: Yes.

HANNITY: You've been over there many, many times to see the troops.

Your heart and soul is with these guys. And now you decided to take one of

those trips — and we're actually showing video of it right now — and put

it on CD, for everybody to — you also had a DVD portion of this, I

understand. Right?

DANIELS: Yes, well, there's two disks in the package. One is a CD.

And one is a DVD. So our DVD is kind of behind the scenes and shows, you

know, talking with some of the guys and gals. And just showing you, kind

of, a little different view.

Of course, we're not doing news. So we — you know, we just kind of

take a public interest kind of approach to it. So I'm very proud of the

package. I'm very happy to have done it. It was a great experience, and I

hope we've got it documented in the CD and DVD.

HANRETTY: How many times have you been over there with the troops?

And how many concerts did you perform for these guys?

DANIELS: We did — we went — we've been over twice. And the first

time we were there, we did seven concerts in country, I think it was. And

this last time we were supposed to do four, but our transportation got

delayed one day, and we only did three.

But we spend — when you do concerts, you're constantly going out,

because everybody can't come to the main concert area. So you go out and

hit these other places, the forward operating bases.

HANNITY: Right.

DANIELS: Or just some of the places around the bases. And you know

somebody will pop up with a guitar, and you end up doing a little mini

concert.

HANNITY: A little impromptu. When I — when I went over there — and

I know you've also been to Walter Reed and Bethesda, and you've met these

injured guys. You also do work in — in Nashville for the troops. I know

you have over the years. You're doing our Freedom Concerts.

But when you go in there, and you have the same experience I did, when

you begin to corkscrew down, quickly. And you literally go from 35,000

feet and you land in Baghdad.

DANIELS: Oh, yes.

HANNITY: You just notice from the minute you get there, just going

there for these guys is an act of courage. And then they've got to spend a

year or two there.

DANIELS: Oh, yes. And as soon as you hit the ground, everybody's

carrying guns. You're very well aware that you're in a war zone. I mean,

I'll tell you what: the more I go among the military, the more I am

convinced they're the best we've got.

HANNITY: Yes, they are.

DANIELS: The very best of America.

COLMES: Hey, Charlie, it's Alan. Getting...

DANIELS: Hello, Alan.

COLMES: How are you?

DANIELS: I'm good.

COLMES: You know, Charlie was talking about what the problem was for

the first one. You know what the problem was? He can't sing. That's what

the problem was.

HANNITY: That's part of it. That's true.

COLMES: Now I'll tell you what. How much would it take if I could

raise the money to get him not to do it?

DANIELS: Gosh, I don't know. You'd have to bargain with Sean on

that, and I'm sure he's not going to sell...

HANNITY: Wait a minute. I've got a price here, Charlie.

COLMES: You know what his price — everybody's got a price, including

Hannity.

HANRETTY: A donation to the Freedom Alliance, we'd probably hit him

with a good number here. Might be good for the cause.

COLMES: You know what? This would not only help the Freedom

Alliance. It would help people's ears.

DANIELS: I'm staying out of this. This is between Hannity and Colmes

here.

HANRETTY: How did I do in San Diego, Charlie? I did a little better

the second time.

DANIELS: You did better. You did better than you did in New Jersey

the first time, yes. I want to hear you (ph) this time.

COLMES: Charlie, a lot of your — a lot of your performing is for

causes. We just talked about your second trip to Iraq. You went to

Kuwait. It's a special — I want to pick up on what you were talking about

in terms of it being a very special moment when you are performing for

Americans who are far away from home and they see a familiar face and

familiar music like yours. It's got to be a high for you.

DANIELS: It is very much of a high for me, Alan. It's — you know,

the first thing I do, when I go in, I say, I bring you greetings from the

United States of America, and what we're trying to do is kind of, you know,

just take them away from everything for a little while.

I say, let's get down. Let's have some fun. Let's have some fun.

We're going to play some music for you. We're going to sign some

autographs with you. Want to slap backs and hug necks and shake hands and

just have a good old American time here.

And it's so gratifying. It's so wonderful to see these young people

having a good time.

COLMES: I know the CD is "Live from Iraq", and there's some new stuff

on it. There are also some of your classics on it, as well.

DANIELS: Oh, yes. There's one song called "When I Get Back from

Iraq", that I wrote the first verse the first time I went over. The second

verse, the second time I went over. If I go back over about three or four

more times, I'll have a complete song.

COLMES: You also recently had a book out called "Growing up Country".

So define it for us. What is country?

DANIELS: Well, country is kind of a state of mind. It's, of course,

a geographical location, but I don't think you have to be raised there to

have a country attitude. There are a lot of people, you know, raised in

the city that like to go out and two-step and have a big time and wear

cowboy hats and boots, and you know, just eat grits for breakfast. You eat

grits for breakfast — right.

COLMES: If you eat grits for breakfast, you're — you're country.

DANIELS: Yes, indeed.

COLMES: Tell us about the music. I mean, your influence is

bluegrass. It's country. It's blues. It's a lot of different things that

you do, when you're on stage and when you record.

DANIELS: Well, you know, when I was a kid, the radio stations weren't

formulated to one kind of music. They played some of all of it. And I got

exposed to so much — different kind of music, so many different kinds of

music, I should say, that I think when I got ready to write original music

it all just kind of popped up there.

HANNITY: Charlie, you're a great American, my friend.

DANIELS: Thank you.

HANNITY: And I'm looking forward, Freedom Concert. It's going to be

you, Lee Greenwood, Montgomery Gentry and "get 'er done," Larry the Cable Guy. And little old Sean Hannity making a fool of himself. It's all for a

great cause.

Charlie, thank you for what you do, and thanks for helping these guys

out as much as you do, my friend.

DANIELS: Thank you, guys. I appreciate it.

HANNITY: All right, buddy.

And everyone, it's Charlie Daniels, new CD, "Live from Iraq".

(END VIDEOTAPE)

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