contents
cmp
April 2018
Features
JOSHUA
HEDLEY
IN THE CORNER OF MY MIND THERE’S A JUKEBOX
joshua hedley’s album is set to be one of this year’s highlights and a beacon of hope for those who like
their country on the traditional side. billed as this generation’s classic country champion, Duncan
Warwick meets the honky tonker who became known as ‘the mayor of lower broad’
10 Joshua Hedley
This generation’s classic country champion talks to Duncan Warwick.
16 Murder On Music Row
Larry Cordle on his masterpiece which resonates more than ever nearly 20 years on.
22 Are You Ready For The Country? Part One.
T
Hedley has a record deal. It might not be
with one of the few remaining majors,
no, it is way cooler than that. Hedley is
the latest artist on Jack White’s Third
Man Records, the same people that
brought you Margo Price not so long ago.
Hedley may have been singing and
playing his heart out every Monday
at Robert’s Western World but to
be on the verge of one of the most
anticipated releases of the year, let alone
a record deal at all, is not something he
anticipated. “Not at all,” he laughs.
“It all kind of happened by accident. It’s
really weird. I’m very much in this state
where every time something happens
I’m like, ‘What?’ I made an EP to sell on
an Australian tour because the tour prior
to that I had nothing in the merch booth.
I had no merch! Well, I had t-shirts before
that but everybody wanted a record. So
I just did it and I went in and I cut four
songs and I sort of was just like, ‘I’m not
going to worry about how I’m going to
pay for this. I’m just going to do it and I’ll
figure that part out later.’ I cut four songs,
sold them over there, and I had been
working with somebody and he really
wanted to produce a record on me and I
said, ‘Why don’t we start by you putting
this EP out?’ And he said, ‘Sure.’ And he
drew up a contract and he gave it to me
and I took it to a friend of mine who was
an entertainment lawyer.
“He was just sort of like, ‘I don’t think
this is what you’re looking for. Let me
send them back another offer.’ And they
didn’t respond. He said, ‘Well, do you
care if I send this to some other people?’
here’s a saying that suggests
that ‘classic never goes out
of style’ and never were that
more relevant than with
Joshua Hedley and his debut album Mr.
Jukebox which is released this month. An
accomplished fiddle player who has been
plying his wares down on Nashville’s
Lower Broadway both as a sideman
and in his own right, Hedley proves
that he indeed worthy of the claim that
he is “this generation’s classic country
champion,” as stated in his bio.
Hedley likens it to a man’s suit, “It’s
true, man. It’s like a suit. A man’s suit has
looked pretty much the same forever
with slight modifications but the general
idea has been the same since it was
invented and it’s always looked sharp no
matter wh at. It’s classic.”
Rarely can a singer’s sound have been
so perfectly summed up, and from the
retro-inspired album cover to the all
but one Joshua Hedley originals, Mr.
Jukebox screams classic at the top of
its voice. Once you get between the
grooves of Counting All My Tears, I
Never Shed A Tear, This Time, or the title
track, Mr. Jukebox you are transported
back to a time when you’d stand a good
chance of bumping into Willie or Patsy
if you stopped by Tootsies for a spot of
late-night lubrication. Joshua Hedley
has taken his cues from the golden era
and created his own classics for a new
generation.
And if all that sounds rather unlikely
in a world of loops, samples, and hick-
hop, even more surprising is that Joshua
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So I said, ‘Sure, whatever.’ You know, I
didn’t really expect anything to come out
of it but Third Man was one of the people
he sent it to.”
“Third Man was interested, and I went
in there and they wanted to put out the
EP and I was like, ‘Well, I’m writing. I
have a bunch of songs if you ever want to
do something else.’ And then they came
back with a contract for a full length
record.
“I didn’t ever really care about having
a record deal it just sort of happened
and I almost feel kind of guilty about it
sometimes.”
Hedley is not only delighted to be on
Third Man, but he is even more pleased
that they aren’t like the majors. “They are
not interested in…So much of the music
industry here in Nashville will just sign
somebody they think they can sell and
they just basically make an artist. Just a
guy or a girl who can maybe kind of sing
a little bit and they look great and they’re
young and they bring them in and they
say, ‘Okay, this person is going to produce
you, and this person is going to style
you, and these are the songs that you’re
gonna sing, and this guy is going to direct
your video,’ and all of that. That’s what
is so great about Third Man, there aren’t
any of those people.
“Third Man is not interested in that
at all. They want somebody who is their
own thing already and they basically just
gave me a contract, gave me some money,
and said, ‘Go make a record’.”
Any classic country aficionado
listening to Mr. Jukebox may well think
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Spencer Leigh looks the rise of Country rock and all those pesky definitions.
28 Country2Country Review
Adrian Peel has mixed feelings on country’s big weekend.
48 Ameripolitan Awards 2018
Chris Smith reports on the big night in Memphis.
52 Beth Nielsen Chapman
Spencer Leigh talks to the singer and songwriter.
58 Tracy Pitcox
The Heart Of Texas head honcho talks to Tony Byworth.
Reviews
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Page 10
MURDER
On Music Row
(Seems More Like A Massacre Now)
It’s nearly 20 years since Larry Cordle and Larry Shell wrote the classic song Murder On Music Row. George Strait and Alan Jackson
took it into the charts, but the song is even more relevant all these years later.
Larry Cordle speaks to Duncan Warwick about his all too prophetic seminal work.
T
songwriter and bluegrasser Larry Cordle
and Lonesome Standard Time. It didn’t
take long for the song to create a buzz
around Music City, and before long it
was covered by George Strait and Alan
Jackson who just happened to be the
most successful of the most traditional
singers of the time.
Larry Cordle had come to town at
the suggestion of his childhood pal
Ricky Skaggs, one of the instrumental
figures of the New Traditionalists, and
it was Cordle who penned his landmark
Highway 40 Blues. Cordle went on
to supply the likes of Kathy Mattea
(Lonesome Standard Time) and George
Strait (Hollywood Squares) with songs
but when he wrote Murder On Music Row
with Larry Shell it was to become his
crowning glory.
Now, almost 20 years on, its message
is more powerful than ever, and Cordle
heartily agrees, “You know what, I think
it is more relevant now than it was
before.”
Cordle recalls how he quickly came to
realise he might have something rather
special. “Well actually, I played it at a live
venue here in Nashville, at the Bluebird
Cafe. I’d been out there for years. We
always used that to…Myself and Carl
Jackson and Jerry Salley and Jim Rushing
used to play there a couple, three times
a year, and one night we were playing
here was time in the
1990s when it was going
swimmingly. The New
Traditional movement from
the tail-end of the previous
decade had given the world artists like
Dwight Yoakam, Randy Travis, Marty
Stuart, and Sweethearts of the Rodeo,
and the major labels were tripping over
one another to try and sign the next
traditional sounding singer. As the 90s
wore on however, thanks in a large part
to the success of Garth Brooks, there
were signs starting to show that maybe it
wasn’t all fiddles and steel guitars.
The bean counters in Nashville saw
that Garth was breaking sales records
left, right and centre, and able to fill
sports stadiums night after night. The
American public was mad for country
music and it became a cash cow for
every washed-up rocker and folkie. Alan
Jackson had seen the writing on the wall
as early as 1994 when he warned us that
“… a man could make him a killin’
‘Cause some of that stuff don’t sound
much different than Dylan” in his
Gone Country masterpiece and as we
approached the millennium it seems that
all that had been foretold came to pass.
Then came a song that mourned
the passing of real country music like
no other had quite done before. That
song was Murder On Music Row by
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out there with someone else and I’d
just written the song. So I decided that
I would play the song that night. I told
whoever the rest of them were that I
had a new song I was going to play and
when we got to the hook of the song the
roof came off that place. I’d seen great
reactions to things before but nothing to
compared with that. I had my eyes closed
like I do and it shocked me. I couldn’t
get over how people were just bonkers
for it. So the next time I had a gig it was
at The Station Inn and I told my regular
bluegrass band, I said, ‘Guys, I’m gonna
try to play this out here tonight.’ We ha d
a great big house full of people and the
same thing happened — just when I got
to the hook of the song the whole roof
of that place came off. And so I told the
boys, we’d already picked out the songs
for that album that became Murder On
Music Row, I said, ‘Guys, we need to
record this thing. It’s not a bluegrass
song but bluegrass fans love this thing
too. They’re just crazy for it.’ Those two
reactions that I got the first couple of
times I played it I knew it was something
that was really resonating with people.
“They started playing my record
around town real soon. I had taken it
over and left it with a local disc jockey
here, we didn’t put my name on it but
I imagine anybody that knew anything
about me would have known it was me
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Defining Moments
ARE YOU
READY
FOR THE
COUNTRY?
Spencer Leigh looks at those pesky definitions from country rock to Americana
30 Album Reviews
44 Live Review
The definition of country rock in the
Oxford English Dictionary is “music
combining elements of country and
rock”, which doesn’t get us very far
but we know that there is plenty of it
around. They cite early references of
the phrase in Billboard in 1955 and
1956, which seem unintentional, and
then nothing until 1969. This suggests
that they haven’t been looking in the
right places as I would say the phrase
followed on from folk rock and Bob
Dylan’s Bringing It All Back Home
(1965). The main contender for the
first country rock album is the Byrds’
Sweetheart Of The Rodeo (1968),
but there are soundings in Buffalo
Springfield Again (1967), made in
California and combining rock, folk,
country and psychedelia.
The term ‘Americana’ has been round
since the 1840s to denote artefacts
relating to America of some historical
significance. There was a weekly
Americana column in The Listener in
the early 60s which poked gentle fun
at American habits and customs. It is
only in recent years, really the last
twenty, that the phrase has been
attached to American roots
music.
Ideally, the term
Americana should
have been used
for this purpose many years earlier
– preferably back in the mid-60s. On
12 January 1970, Time magazine had
the Band as their cover story with the
strapline “The New Sound of Country
Rock”. No other act embodies Americana
like the Band (yes, I know four of them
were Canadian), but the Band were
to disband before the term had even
been established. Music From Big Pink
(1968) would be my contender for
the first Americana album and we are
celebrating its 50th anniversary.
If you look back in CMP, which started
in 1970, you will find that the writers
tied themselves in knots trying to define
the music. The editor Bob Powel should
have stated each month, “This is how we
define country music” and included any
updates. He would then have had more
space for his features. Experimentation
was not encouraged. In 1970 Johnny
Cash was reproached for having
trumpets in Southwind, but surely CMP
should have been discussing whether it
was a good record.
As you will see, this look into country
rock and Americana has led
me to investigate the US
country charts and the
results certainly took
me by surprise. Feel
free to comment on
anything you read.
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Regulars
4 News
8 Tour Guide
14 The David Allan Page
20 Nice to meet y’all - Jake Penrod
45 Americana Roundup
20 Nice to meet y’all - The Carolyn Sills Combo
BETH
NIELSEN
CHAPMAN
Things We Do For Love
BETH NIELSEN CHAPMAN talks to Spencer Leigh.
My week-to-a-page diary suits me fine. It suits most of us
fine, but you do see larger diaries which are a day-to-a-page.
Who buys them I wonder: whose life is so full that they need
several entries for every day? Well, now I know: Beth Nielsen
Chapman. She is a superlative singer-songwriter of course
but she is rehearsing her band for a new UK tour, promoting
her new album, encouraging new talent, looking forward to
a songwriting seminar and organising events for her family
and friends. She is immensely busy and is constantly involved
with worthwhile causes. As she says, “I’ve gotta keep all the
plates spinning in the air as I like doing it all.”
In advance of her UK tour in March, Beth came to the UK for
a few dates to promote her new album, Hearts Of Glass. Here’s
our conversation but you miss some of the fun. Beth is prone
to shoot off an impersonation or two: best of all is her rough-
voiced Waylon Jennings mumbling an Outlaw song.
Beth, I saw you in Liverpool two years ago where you
recreated a night at the Bluebird Café. It was a wonderful
evening but the venue could only hold a hundred people
and yet you normally play large theatres.
Doesn’t matter. That was a wonderful night and I love to
perform – two thousand, two hundred or just twenty people,
it doesn’t matter to me. The Bluebird Café in Nashville is
like a church, a sacred place for songwriters. I thought it
was wonderful that they were collaborating with the UK on
something similar. I love doing my own shows of course but I
love doing the Bluebird too as I love hearing new artists. I’m
on stage with other singer-songwriters and it’s wonderful
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MARCH
2018
2018
So the invite was Come To Mine, which happens to be the
opening cut of your new album and a song you wrote with
Graham Gouldman.
Yes, we had both been invited to Chris Difford’s songwriting
retreat at Pennard House. I have gone three years in a row
and I am going again this June. They are the most amazing,
inspiring weeks - Songwriter Heaven. It is like going to
Downton Abbey and being served beautiful meals, and in the
meantime you are writing songs with people like Graham
Gouldman. I’ve loved his work the years. I used to go round
singing Things We Do For Love, I’m Not In Love, For Your Love
and Bus Stop. I love I’m Not In Love as he so cleverly picked
up on irony as the singer is saying “I’m not in love” which he
obviously is.
MARCH
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DEEP IN THE
HEART
OF
TEXAS
Tony Byworth talks with Tracy Pitcox
H
Courtesy of Billboard Inc.
And you’re over here so often that you must be an
Anglophile.
Definitely. I’ll be applying for a passport someday. (Laughs)
I am meeting Brits all time in Nashville. English people are
settling here and there’s a real kinship between us. Soon
there may even be a place where you can get a decent cup of
tea. (Laughs) When Graham Gouldman came to Nashville, I
arranged a big dinner party for him and invited all the British
people I knew. (Laughs) So we gave him a great welcome. We
had Peter Collins, the great producer, Peter Frampton, Roger
Cook and Siobhan Maher-Kennedy, whom I see all the time.
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Charts
64 Americana & UK Country Charts
65 Billboard Country Charts
to discover the chemistry between us and to see what can
happen.
e might not be the most
familiar name known to
country music fans but Tracy
Pitcox is a powerful force
behind the scenes. Especially
in Texas. Like so many fellow Texans,
he not only likes his country true,
honest and traditional but also plays a
major role in creating it. He founded,
and heads up, Heart Of Texas Records,
a genre operation located in Brady, a
small township (population: 5425)
located in the actual heart of Texas,
some 125 miles north-west of Austin.
The record label will celebrate its
30th anniversary in 2019, a remarkable
achievement as the majority of
independents don’t stay the course
for any substantial period of time,
or else get swallowed up by a major
record conglomerate. Its’ strength is
in its resilience and an audience loyal
to the product, equally matched by its
founder’s love of traditional country
music and playing his part in keeping it
alive.
Tracy Pitcox is always enthused to
talk about country music as he has done
on the occasions that we’ve met at Mi
Familia, the Mexican restaurant that’s
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the nearest eating place to Brady’s
actual Heart of Texas, the town square
with imposing courthouse. But he
never brags about his achievements
and often brings along an artist, Norma
Jean or Darrell McCall, to join in the
conversation while we chomp upon an
enchilada or a fajita platter. The last
time it was Justin Trevino, an equal
powerhouse in the Heart of Texas
operation, along with his wife Elizabeth.
The record label came about via a
series of events, Tracy explains, first
bred through his family’s interest in the
music and, later, his own enjoyment as a
radio disc jockey.
Born on January 14, 1971, the
youngster’s passion for country music
was born out of his grandfather love of
such legendary entertainers as Ernest
Tubb, Bob Wills and Loretta Lynn, then
furthered by listening to late night radio
when many of the stations’ midnight
hours devoted time to the truck drivers
and playing their kind of country music.
Among the most famous of the midnight
DJ’s were Bill Mack out of Fort Worth
and Larry Scott in Shreveport. “I would
call up the stations as often as I could
and make requests” he recalls.
Then Tracy took to the airwaves
himself when, at the age of 15 after
constantly contacting KNEL, he was
hired by the local station to present
the early evening shift, though this also
involved family participation. “I was
too young to drive, so my mother used
to take me the station every evening at
7.00pm and then pick me up to take me
home at 10.00pm after I had finished
the show”.
“As the radio station had a very
open policy, a lot of older listeners
would call up to make requests. I loved
the interaction with the listeners,
that’s what make radio so personal
– something that’s lost these days on
most of stations with little conversation
and one record following straight after
another”.
It was this connection with listeners
that led to the creation of his Friday
night, “Hillbilly Hits”, a show with the
governing factor being that the artists
and songs were at least twenty-one
years old. Phone interviews were also
an essential part of the format. Besides
conversations with such as Hank Snow,
George Jones, Tammy Wynette, Porter
Wagoner while others - whenever in
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