Pryor & Lee Discuss How Their Love for Dogs Inspired Their Latest Single

Throughout the past year, it hasn’t been easy to be close to the people we love. Luckily, many have gotten through the tough times with the help of their pets that have so much love to give. For country duo Pryor & Lee, dogs are pretty much an essential part of life. Growing up, the duo’s Pryor Baird and Kaleb Lee always had dogs around the house, and currently, they have three dogs between them.

These Nashville artists recognize the value in these four-legged family members so much so that they decided to record a song about it. They have released two new singles, “Good Ol’ Dogs and God” and “Carry on.” Both of these songs are relevant in the current state of the world, but they will also prove to remain applicable in the years to come.

Pryor & Lee recently caught up with Country Now to discuss their new music and what’s to come this year.

Read on to find out more about Pryor & Lee’s latest tracks, “Good Ol’ Dogs and God” and “Carry On” in this exclusive Q&A below.

How has the past year been for both of you in terms of being able to write and perform?

Pryor: The writing part of it… it’s been nice for that; it sucks that everything’s over zoom though. We get to write every day, which is nice, and build up a catalog, but not being out on the road and not being able to play is really tough, it’s really hard.

Lee: That’s what we’re designed to do as artists, to go out and play music and it’s great to write and it’s great to plan and record and all that stuff, we love it just the same, but there’s nothing like being on that stage.

What was your first reaction to hearing “Good Ol’ Dogs and God” when it was first pitched to you?

Lee: That’s on the list of great songs we didn’t write, but a good friend of ours, Doug Johnson and producer wrote that with a handful of other guys. We were in a song meeting, just listening to a bunch of songs that were pitched our way, and this was one that wasn’t on the list, it was thrown at us near the end of the meeting just as a “hey, check this new song out that I wrote,” and it was something we fell in love with.

In your own words, what is “Good Ol’ Dogs and God” all about?

Pryor: It’s just the personal relationship between you and your dog, you and God and it’s the unconditional love between God, your dog and yourself. It’s a beautiful thing, it gets you through anything and it’s something that needs to be talked about, something that needs to be celebrated and sung about.

How have fans reacted to this song?

Pryor: The teasers and stuff that you’re seeing, those are all videos that were sent in to us, so people are excited. Everybody has dogs, everybody loves their dog and when somebody hears this, they immediately gravitate towards it… so I think everybody’s excited.

Did you own dogs growing up too?

Pryor: Yeah, I’ve always had a dog growing up, for sure.

Lee: For as long as I can remember, we’ve had dogs. My granddad used to raise beagles and other bird dogs and we had the little ones, the big ones, the medium-sized ones, all the above. 

Were those your dogs in the lyric video?

Pryor: Those are all our dogs.

Lee: Those are our puppies. The footage, obviously, with us running around the field with our dogs… that’s who we are. We absolutely love our four-legged friends. They’ve got us through a lot of hard times, and you know, as Pryor said, that’s unconditional love. Other than God and dogs, I don’t know another thing that loves us that way. No matter what we’re going through, what we’ve done, good day, bad day, okay day, it doesn’t matter. They’re right there and they’re ready to play and to make you feel better.

Is there a plan to release a full music video for “Good Ol’ Dogs and God”?

Lee: We’ve got plans to do a lot around this song so we’re excited to kinda continue that route because it’s one of those songs that I think so many people can relate to and connect with. We’ve got lots of creative ideas to help make sure this song has legs for years to come.

What does your other latest release, “Carry On,” mean to you?

Lee: It’s a special song. It’s a fun, live tune that we can’t wait to get out on the road to play, it’s a sing-along song. We refer to these two songs specifically as kind of a package because “Good Ol’ Dogs and God” is the message that just kind of got us through this year and so many others that have been home and not really in the way of normal life. Their dogs have been there for ‘em and with ‘em. Then “Carry On” is really the message that we’re moving on with. I think everyone can relate that it’s time to carry on and it’s time to move past this rough patch that we’ve all been in. I hope people can rally around that, sing along with us and look for good things in the future to come.

Pryor: And “Carry on,” that message is just relevant to all periods of time. It wasn’t even written during covid, it was written years ago or whenever it was written, it doesn’t matter. It’s gonna be relevant to today, tomorrow, 20 years from now.

How did it work for you in terms of recording songs this year? Has that whole process been done virtually?

Pryor: It’s different. It’s a different time in the recording industry. You know, it’s like everybody has home recording studios now so you can record a piece here, send it to somebody else to cut it there, send it to someone else to cut it here, it’s really weird, but it’s what everybody’s doing. There are some people that are in the studio that are just coming back and it’s very small, but that’s the way everything’s had to be done.

Lee: It’s just been interesting having to deal with the different ways that music has been made and how it’s being made now. Luckily, “Good Ol’ Dogs and God” is so stripped down and just mostly us anyways so that wasn’t too abnormal.

 What’re you hoping 2021 will look like?

 Pryor: Right now, hopefully, we can just go in the parking lot, play the guitar and about 20 people would show up, that would be cool I mean we could all just hang out, have a beer, and give each other a hug. I’m looking forward to that.

Lee: To his point, we can’t wait to get back on stage, be on the road and do what we love. I mean we love the recording; we love the writing and all of that other stuff, but that’s not what we got into it for. We got into it to entertain and to have a good time and to make people feel something and I’m ready for that again.

Beginning the first week of August, Pryor & Lee will head back on the road. Fans can keep up with the duo on Instagram.