DAVE'S DIARY - 11 JUNE 2007 - PREVIEW OF EPISODE 2 - SERIES 8

SINGING ACTORS HEADLINE NU COUNTRY TV

Singing actors Tim McGraw and Dale Watson headline Nu Country TV this Saturday - June 16 - at 8 p m on C 31.

The duo feature in an episode hosted by Lost In Suburbia drummer and Warrnambool Secondary College teacher Rohan Keert at the recent 31st Port Fairy folk festival.

Keert's brother Axel filmed the hosting role that also features his camera work on the Shipwreck Coast band's live performance of Love Will Lead You Home from their indie self titled debut disc.

McGraw starred in recent movies Friday Night Lights, set in Texas, Flicka and with Jamie Foxx in The Kingdom and performs his recent hit Last Dollar (Fly Away). Friday Night Lights is based on the H.G. Bissinger book that follows the true story of the 1988 Permian High School Panthers in football-crazy Odessa, Texas. Big Kenny Alphin of Big & Rich penned Last Dollar in 2006 before his duo cut their third album Between Raising Hell & Amazing Grace. The song is from McGraw's 11th studio album Let It Go that sold 325,000 copies in its first week and has now been certified platinum for 1 million sales.

This brings total album sales to 35 million, making him the seventh best-selling artist since the inception of the BDS System in 1991, behind Garth Brooks, Mariah Carey, Celine Dion, Metallica, the Beatles and George Strait.

McGraw, now 40, re-invested his profits into Style Sonic Records, a new indie label he created with his co-producer Byron Gallimore in September of 2006.

They partnered with Mercury Records to launch the career of Halfway to Hazard, a new band with roots in eastern Kentucky, and Lori McKenna whose co-write with Darrell Scott on I'm Workin', is on McGraw's album.

McGraw and his studio band The Dancehall Doctors are touring with singing spouse Faith Hill, who duets with him on I Need You on his album, on their Soul 2 Soul 2007 tour which began on June 5 in Omaha.

Their previous tour grossed a cool $90 million after Hill appeared in the recent movie remake of The Stepford Wives.

The couple have three young daughters - Gracie, 10, Maggie, 9, and Audrey, 6 - and homes in Nashville and Beverly Hills.

CLICK HERE for a McGraw CD review from the Diary.

DALE WATSON TAKES EXIT 910

Singing Texan actor Dale Watson returns to Nu Country this week with his trucking song Exit 910. Watson, 44 and thrice wed, performed the song during marathon shows on his fifth Australian tour in February this year. Dale also showcased tunes from 14th album From The Cradle To The Grave that was released here on Hyena Records after his tour. He wrote the album in a Tennessee cabin, owned by fellow actor Johnny Knoxville, and once the retreat of the late Johnny Cash. Watson has also shot another video for Justice For All in Los Angeles with Desperate Housewives star James Denton - childhood sweetheart of country star Deanna Carter.

Watson appeared with Sandra Bullock in the 1993 movie The Thing Called Love - the last movie for the late River Phoenix.

He was also cast to star with David Carradine in Texas movie Austin Angel.

But director Zalman King decided Watson's tragic life was worthy of a documentary Crazy Again and made it first.

CLICK HERE for DALE WATSON feature from the Diary on February 21, 2007.
CLICK HERE for a DALE WATSON Concert Review from the Diary on February 28, 2007.

PAT GREEN SINGS DIXIE LULLABY

Fellow Texan Pat Green performs evocative new song Dixie Lullaby from his 10th album Cannonball (BNA) that has sold more than 140,000 copies. The San Antonio born singer now lives with Kori - his wife of seven years - and their two children in a 3,400 square-foot ranch-style home near Fort Worth (Cowtown). Green, now 35, broke with several indie albums before major label album Wave on Wave sold 544,000 copies. But Lucky Ones, a rush job released as his relationship with Republic Records was severing, sold 193,000. Cannonball has already produced radio singles Feels Just Like It Should and Dixie Lullaby.

Green wrote Finder's Keepers - cut as a duet with Sara Evans - with prolific writer Matraca Berg, singing spouse of Nitty Gritty Dirt Band co-founder Jeff Hanna.

CLICK HERE for a Pat Green CD review from the Diary on December 18, 2006.

KEITH ANDERSON

Oklahoma singer Keith Anderson is a country artist with a big difference. Anderson hails from the small town of Miami and was first in his class at Oklahoma State University in 1990 when he gained an engineering degree. One of Anderson's brothers is also a rocket scientist. When Anderson, now 39, landed in Nashville in 1996 to cut a six-song album of his own songs he worked as a landscaper, personal trainer and model.

He even formed a country duo, the Romeo Cowboys, to create and deliver singing telegrams.

In 2000, EMI Music Publishing signed Anderson to a songwriting contract.

"It was one of those deals," Anderson explains.

"Where nobody in town thought that I was really that great a writer. Then Garth Brooks and George Jones recorded my song Beer Run,'' Anderson revealed.

So it was no surprise that Anderson called his debut 2005 disc Three Chord Country and American Rock & Roll.

He co-wrote all 11 songs on the disc and Jeffrey Steele and John Rich, of Big & Rich, co-produced it.

Anderson, who also wrote The Bed for Redneck Woman Gretchen Wilson, performs a video of his single Podunk.

More info - www.keithanderson.com

GINA JEFFREYS

Golden guitar winner Gina Jeffreys, also 39, resurrected her performing career after a welcome maternal break that produced a son Jackson, now four. The former Toowomba hairdresser sings about her motherhood on sixth album Walks Of Life. She also recruited her extended family to appear in the video clip for Live It that she performs this week on Nu Country TV. "In the video clip for Live It I enjoyed having my family and friends," Gina added. "My little boy Jackson, my dad and mum and god daughter. There were no famous people.

It was more like a big family picnic with me dancing with my girlfriends and celebrating motherhood. Rod played the song to me three years ago. Kathy Mattea recorded it. We had it on hold for three years. Harley Allen wrote it."

Allen is one of the major writers for expatriate Australasian publishers Barry and Jewel Coburn who also have expat superstar Keith Urban's catalogue.

CLICK HERE for a Gina Jeffreys feature from the Diary on March 25, 2007.

LOST IN SUBURBIA

Shipwreck Coast band Lost In Suburbia was one of the unsung successes of the 31st Port Fairy folk festival in March.

The sextet performed in the famed Shebeen bar and other venues including historic 1848 vintage pub The Stump, also known as The Caledonian.

Axel Keert, brother of drummer Rohan - known for his work with the T-Bones and Slap N The Cats - headed the camera crew.

Lost In Suburbia bassist Peter Bird - our videographer for the 2005 Port Fairy fest - edited their clip for Love Will Lead You Home live footage for Nu Country.

CLICK HERE for the Lost In Suburbia web page.
http://www.swtafe.vic.edu.au/lrc/music/lostin.html

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