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Tavis: Pleased to welcome Toby Keith to this program. The country music superstar has sold nearly thirty million albums in his career and is up for three Academy of Country Music awards next month. His latest CD is out this week and the disc is getting wonderful reviews. It's called "White Trash with Money.' Gotta love that title. "White Trash with Money.' That title and his well-known sense of humor can only be topped by the first single because that was cute. Get this. The single, "Get Drunk and Be Somebody.' Here's some of the video for the first single.

[A film clip is shown]

Tavis: He said it, I didn't. "White Trash with Money.' Toby Keith, nice to meet you.

Toby Keith: How you doing, man?

Tavis: Nice to have you on the program.

Keith: Nice to be on here finally.

Tavis: You got some 'splaining to do (laughter).

Keith: (Laughter) Let me explain.

Tavis: Yeah, first of all, start by 'splaining that title.

Keith: Well, we live in Oklahoma and the east side -

Tavis: - You still live in Oklahoma. You were born there and still live there?

Keith: Yeah. The east side of town is like the blue collar side where all the worker people live and that's where my ranch is. The west side's all the uppity bankers and lawyers and attorneys and the mayor and all that. So the west side would be kind of the snooty side, right?

Tavis: You can't call the mayor uppity, man.

Keith: Oh, you can call the mayor uppity.

Tavis: The mayor just saw that.

Keith: Yeah, well, so what? He's uppity (laughter). Anyway, my daughter got into it with one of little debutantes over there and this little girl's mother said, "Well, just don't run with them no more because really, when it comes down to it, all they are is white trash with money anyway." My wife got infuriated by that and called this woman up and said, "You're not going to talk about my family like that." I said, "Honey, roll with it. This is a gift."

I make my living, you know, taking controversy and turning it into money. I didn't tell my wife, but I put this on the title. You see it's got duct tape and stuff on it (laughter). I really dressed it up nice and I brought it home and laid it on the kitchen counter. I said, "Here's my new album, baby" and she's still not forgiven me.

Tavis: She's still not talking to you (laughter).

Keith: No, we're not speaking (laughter).

Tavis: So what gave you the idea, other than your wonderful sense of humor that I referenced a moment ago, what gave you the idea to take that situation that your daughter encountered with this debutante and turn it into a CD title?

Keith: All my life, all my music career, I've been under all kinds of controversies. My fans expect that, so it lightens things up and tells everybody, you know what, just roll with it. If you call me that, I'm not going to go across town and beat everybody up and throw a fit. I'm just going to turn it into money. You know what I mean? The best way I can get you is hit you in the pocketbook.

When you walk in Wal-Mart on the west side or Target and you walk in there and you're getting your garden hose or something, you're a west-sider and you look up and see that and you know about this little incident, you're just going, "Dang, he did it again." (Laughter)

Tavis: (Laughter) There goes that Toby Keith again. Okay, the other bit of 'splaining you got to do is "Get Drunk and Be Somebody?'

Keith: Yeah. You know, a guy works all week long. He says all week long, I'm a real nobody. Boss, you know, just puts me on my totem pole kind of thing. It's a working man's song. He says, but on the weekend, I go to the bar where everybody loves me and it's my hangout, so I'm happy. I told them after we did my album release party at my bar in Vegas the other night, I said I was a little over-served that night. So the next morning, I woke up and said, "I'm writing the sequel to it. It's called "Get Drunk and Be Somebody Else.' (Laughter).

Tavis: (Laughter) When do you write this stuff? Like on the bus moving around?

Keith: Yeah. You know, wherever I am in the country. We do about seventy shows a year. I just finished a movie called "Broken Bridges" with Burt Reynolds and Kelly Preston and Tess Harper for Paramount. The whole time, I was the only guy that had his bus on the location, but everybody was commuting back and forth out of Atlanta to Senora. It was sixty minutes. So you got all this down time on the bus and I had my guitar there; so I write stuff whenever, you know.

Tavis: So how did you find the acting thing?

Keith: It was a stretch. You know, it was the most creative thing I've done in ten years. I really liked it and, if this thing goes well, I'm probably going to try to do one or two projects a year.

Tavis: So there might be more in the offing?

Keith: Yeah.

Tavis: That's really going to make those guys on the other side of the tracks really upset (laughter). Now he's acting.

Keith: Well, that's my job. I P.O. those guys all the time.

Tavis: Tell me what it is, in your estimation, about country music and specifically country music lyrics that make it such a special music genre. I mean, it's the lyrics that make it work.

Keith: Yeah. You know, this is really sad because I never thought I'd see this in my lifetime, but the rock and roll that we know as rock and roll, there's no format for anymore. Country is where like my friend, Sammy Hagar, calls me up and said, "I just did a roadhouse album that's a tequila kind of roadhouse thing and I don't have a market to take it to."

I can take it to classic rock and ask them if they'll play a new rock song, but country has turned into just an American classic music that's still allowed to play new cuts and be creative in a new format without being looked upon as classic. But it's always been about the lyrics. It's always been about being fearless about writing about the situation and telling it just like it is.

You know, if you join the two bridges, probably rap and country lyrics are probably the two closest formats and I've discussed this a lot with a lot of rappers and they agree. I did a photo shoot today with Ludacris. If you look at our lyrics, he comes from a different place than I came from, but we're talking dead on about, you know, our backgrounds. So if you listen in these things here, you hear that that's where I came from. It tells about that, as opposed to being just a pretty face that somebody's popped up with a bunch of songs and they're trying to commercialize it. You know what I mean? It's just real street music.

Tavis: That's a fascinating juxtaposition and I hear the point you're making about the storytelling and being real about the lyrics of country and hip-hop. I see that.

Keith: It's a take it or leave it thing, you know, sometimes.

Tavis: I see that. What I'm trying to hear is what Toby Keith and Ludacris would sound like together on a cut. I'm not sure that would work, though, Toby (laughter).

Keith: Well, it would be difficult for both of us. I mean, I can't hear him yodeling (laughter).

Tavis: Exactly. I can't quite get that.

Keith: I can hear myself yodeling, but it would be -

Tavis: - but what about Toby Keith rapping?

Keith: I think I could rap. But I don't know how - I guess he could croon. Could he sing a ballad, you think?

Tavis: I don't know if Ludacris even sings or not. I don't know. Don't try it, though. I'm not anxious to find out. How about that (laughter)?

Keith: I don't want to quit my night job to be a rapper.

Tavis: Yeah, you keep your day job and your night job. When did you know you wanted to do this and that you were talented enough to do it? Everybody I know wants to be a country music star.

Keith: My mom's mother, my grandmother on my mom's side, had one of the hottest nightclubs on the Arkansas-Oklahoma state line called Fort Smith. I mean, everybody flocked in. She had like a seven-piece band that played every night. So when I would go visit her in the summertime, I would sit back in the kitchen of her supper club. Supper clubs were old things. They don't have them anymore, but you could go in and do fine dining and then get up and dance.

I would sit and watch that band. They had three-piece horns, baby grand piano, drummer playing brushes. They'd play everything from "In The Mood" to "Bad, Bad Leroy Brown" to "Crazy" by Patsy Kline. I just sat back there and was fascinated with it. She bought me a guitar when I was about eight years old and I just started trying to write songs as a teenager. They kind of found me. I didn't find them.

Tavis: Is there a reason why you still reside in Oklahoma?

Keith: It's just the only place that's home. You know what I mean? It's centrally located, so I can pop in and out and get about anywhere in a couple of hours. Travel-wise, it's great, but it's just home. I've been everywhere. I've never lived a day in Nashville or Los Angeles or New York or nothing. I just come out of there.

Tavis: It seems weird for a country music star. You expect when you hear that they're a country music star that they live in Nashville, Tennessee. I guess you don't have to do that, obviously.

Keith: Never a day.

Tavis: Never a day. You mentioned earlier in this conversation that you don't run from controversy. You write what you write, you put it out there and let the people decide. I ain't telling you something you don't know. You got into a little hot water after 9/11 with a couple of songs you penned.

Keith: Yeah. Well, I'm a guy that's been a lifetime Democrat my whole life and I get painted with a big right-wing hard brush, but I believe in justice and I believe in security. It's pretty simple with me. If you come in and shoot a bunch of school kids up in the yard, I want the police force to track you down and get you. After 9/11, four or five days later, I was angry and I wanted our government to track down the bad guys and bring them to justice.

I'm for justice and security, but at the same time, you stand for anything, right or left in the political world, and they'll get you. If you support the troops, you're pro war. If you don't support the war, you're anti-troops. It's just such a hardcore right wing-left wing thing out there right now that I just try to take the politics out of it and say "Here's what I stand for" and live with the consequences, you know.

Tavis: Here's my country music euphemism: The only thing you find in the middle of the road is a dead armadillo. How about that?

Keith: (Laughter) I'm on that, I'm on that. I don't ride in the middle of the road, so I wouldn't know.

Tavis: (Laughter) There you go. Speaking of the troops, though, you have been - I haven't counted these performances per se, but you have to be like near the top of the list of American performers who actually perform for the troops overseas.

Keith: Well, the thing that burns me up. This last year, I've done sixty shows just in the Middle East.

Tavis: Sixty, that's what I was talking about, yeah.

Keith: But I just found out last year that it's hard to get entertainers to go perform or visit a hospital for homecoming soldiers or anything. The ones that do go over there have been getting paid for it and it just infuriates me.

Tavis: Maybe, Toby, though, that's because, while they may support the troops in their endeavor, they support them returning home safely, etc., they got a real problem with the fact that we're in this war that Bush has us in. So maybe that's what it is. Maybe it's not the troops.

Keith: If you're going to go play for the troops, then do it out of your heart. Don't do it for your pocketbook. You know what I mean? Don't go over there and get a half million dollars to do three shows and make them use their entertainment or amusement budget for you to come over there and play for them. They're over there playing for you. You know what I mean? So you go over there and you do that.

I didn't know. I mean, I didn't know you could get paid because I didn't go over there for a nickel. I asked everybody to go over there and everybody said, "Oh, we'll just let you do that." It's like I can't do it all. I got news for you. Just visit. If you're in D.C., go by the Walter Reed Hospital or wherever. Just do what you got.

Tavis: What's a guy from Oklahoma see when he steps into the Middle East these days?

Keith: Well, it's brutal in any zone you go into there. The first place I went into years ago was Kosovo and Bosnia. After you've seen Sarajevo in the Winter Olympics of 1980 and the film of that and how beautiful the city was, I stayed in one of the only buildings that was over five stories tall. The whole town was bombed into ruins, you know. Any place you go and war-torn like that is a bad place to be, but it's pretty easy just to go in for a couple of weeks and do something. That's not too much to ask of an entertainer to go in and do, whether you're a comedian or if you're, you know, a singer or whatever. But it's from your heart, you know. You got to go pick your spot and go every year.

Tavis: Speaking of professions, finally you are a great country music singer as we all know, but you could very well have been a football player. Indeed, you were a football player. Played semi-pro for a while. So in retrospect, you made the right decision? Music over football?

Keith: Absolutely, yeah. I would have been retired. I was playing golf with Brett Favre and Nicholson at Doral the other day. Brett's contemplating retirement and I'm going, "See, I'm just getting started and you're already talking about giving it up, dude."

Tavis: Well, if you're just getting started, I don't know what's going to come next because he's selling records like nobody's business. The new one, "White Trash with Money.' Toby Keith, nice to have you on the program.

Keith: All right, man. A pleasure.

Tavis: That's our show for tonight. You can catch me on the weekends on PRI, Public Radio International. Check your local listings. I'll see you back here next time, though, on PBS. Until then, good night from Los Angeles. Thanks for watching and, as always, keep the faith.