DAVE'S DIARY - 20/2/08 - PREVIEW OF EPISODE 12 - SERIES 9

CATHERINE BRITT SWINGS DOORS FOR NU COUNTRY

Expatriate Newcastle country star Catherine Britt headlines Nu Country TV this Saturday - February 23 - on her triumphant tour of her homeland.

Britt, 23, is touring to promote third album Little Wildflowers and appears with U.S. superstars Brooks & Dunn on their Brisbane dates this week.

The singer also joins a superstar cast at the CMC Rocks The Snowy Country Music festival on March 14 and 15.

Britt's one time mentor Kasey Chambers also appears on this week's show on the eve of a headlining role at the 32nd Port Fairy Folk Festival.

And U.S. star Dierks Bentley - who shares his Nashville producer Brett Beavers with Britt - also performs his new video Free And Easy.

Another young singing actor Shooter Jennings also performs his video of Mark Knopfler song Walk Of Life.

Louisiana legend Trace Adkins also returns to Nu Country with the video of his hit I Wanna Feel Something.

And Sydney singer Jayne Denham debuts with the video of her breakthrough song Chick Ute.

Britt reaches back to her second album Too Far Gone for her video of Swingin' Doors for this week's episode hosted by Mid Pacific Bob Olson.

CLICK HERE for a Britt feature from The Diary on February 12, 2006.
CLICK HERE for another Britt feature from The Diary on October 21, 2004.
CLICK HERE for a review of Britt's new CD Little Wildflower.

KASEY CHAMBERS HEADLINES PORT FAIRY

Central Coast chanteuse Kacey Chambers returns to the Shipwreck Coast on the Great Southern Ocean for the 32nd Port Fairy folk festival.

Port Fairy is about 100 miles from where singing father Bill and mother Dianne fished for their supper during her childhood when not hunting on the Nullarbor.

Chambers, now 33 and mother of two, is performing with singer-songwriter husband Shane Nicholson and father Bill at Port Fairy.

The singer, about to release her fifth album in autumn, reaches back to previous disc Carnival for the video of her song Surrender.

Kasey and Shane wrote most of the album during her pregnancy at their home on the Central Coast of NSW.

CLICK HERE for a Kasey feature from The Diary on May 31, 2004.

SHOOTER JENNINGS - THE WOLF

Shooter Jennings and Waylon Payne have plenty in common - they won cameo roles in Johnny Cash movie Walk The Line.

And they're both sons of country music legends.

Shooter appears on Nu Country TV with the video for his version of Mark Knopfler song Walk Of Life.

He is the son of singer Jessi Colter and the late Texan outlaw star-actor Waylon Jennings who died at 64 on February 13, 2002.

Jennings played his dad as a young man and Payne was cast as Jerry Lee Lewis in the movie that also featured Shelby Lynne as Johnny Cash's mother.

Shooter and his band perform in the video in a supermarket to illustrate the Knopfler song from his third studio album The Wolf - successor to his live disc.

Shooter and actress partner Drea De Matteo - star of The Sopranos and Joey - recently became parents.

Shooter and Drea welcomed a baby girl - Alabama Gypsy Rose - on November 28 in New York.

Jennings, now 28, hosts his music show Electric Rodeo on Sirius Satellite radio in the U.S.

The singer promoted The Wolf by performing the title track live on U.S. TV variety shows David Letterman and Jay Leno on January 23.

The singer has also appeared on top rating Nine Network show CSI.

"They were looking for a scene at a country bar, and they needed a band," Shooter revealed.

"Right now, I'm looking hard to find avenues outside of country radio. I wish the radio would embrace me and a couple of other people. I wish their heads weren't so far up their own with it. I'm so in love with country music and the history, and I want to keep it alive and pumping and bring it to the kids and do good for country. But country radio thinks we're not their market, or that they need an older audience."

CLICK HERE for a Shooter Jennings CD Review from the Diary on January 22, 2008.
CLICK HERE for a new feature story on Shooter Jennings.

DIERKS BENTLEY FREE AND EASY

Prolific chart topper Dierks Bentley returns to Nu Country with the video of his 5th #1 hit Free And Easy.

The song is a highlight of Bentley's fourth album Long Trip Alone.

Bentley owns his publishing and paid for the #1 party at the downtown Nashville arena that is home to the Nashville Predators pro ice hockey team.

"I might need another No. 1 hit to pay for this thing," said Bentley, 32, who hails from Phoenix, Arizona, and writes with his producer Brett Beavers

Bentley scored four nominations for the 50th Grammies, tying with Tim McGraw as the most-nominated country artist.

The recently wed singer has since released new single Trying to Stop Your Leaving.

But that hasn't diminished his ability to wrote and record heartbreak songs.

"So, now I'm married and things are going well but it's not like I don't have firsthand knowledge of what it's like to get your heart broken," Bentley revealed.

"I can still tap into that from a writing standpoint."

Bentley took his band to Texas in January to record an episode of Austin City Limits.

When he was 31 he was the youngest member of the Grand Ole Opry.

That was longer after moving to Nashville in 1994 to pursue his music career.

But he enrolled at Vanderbilt University, studying English for three-plus years.

He later worked at the Nashville Network as a researcher, screening classic concert footage.

CLICK HERE for a Bentley feature from The Diary on September 17, 2005.

TRACE ADKINS

Former Louisiana petroleum engineer and oilfield roughneck Trace Adkins blazed a vivid trail on the charts with his roots country.

Adkins, 46 and thrice wed father of five daughters, gave up oil drilling for music in the nineties after earning a degree at Louisiana Technical College.

The burly baritone was a welcome contrast to identikit country pop acts clogging the charts.

Adkins dedicated his 1996 debut disc Dreamin' Out Loud to his brother, Scott, who was killed in a truck wreck at 21.

"He wrecked his truck and it killed him when he was 21. He was a great, great, great kid. He was my first fan," says Adkins.

This week he performs a video of his hit I Wanna Feel Something from his 9th album Dangerous Man and also on American Man - his second Greatest Hits CD.

The thrice-wed singer also released his biography A Personal Stand: Observations and Opinions of a Freethinking Roughneck.

Villard Books - an imprint of Ballantine Books - released it on October 23, 2007.

"This book has been knocking around in my head for a while now," Adkins said.

"It's not exactly a memoir, but more of a look at the state of the country as I've seen it through the lens of my admittedly colorful life."

Book topics include the environment, immigration and the war on terror, according to a press release.

Adkins was born in dry county Sarepta - population 924 - that has five churches but no liquor for sale.

He previously hit #1 on the charts in February, 2006, with Ladies Love Country Boys, written by Jamey Johnson, George Teren, and Rivers Rutherford.

Adkins has had more luck with women since marrying third wife Rhonda - a former record company publicist.

His second wife shot him in the heart and lung on the final day of their marriage in 1994.

At 6 ft 6 and a former sports star Trace was a big moving target.

CLICK HERE for an Adkins story from the Diary on August 2, 2006.

JAYNE DENHAM

Jayne Denham performs the video for her debut single Ute Chick from her album Sudden Change Of Weather on the eve of her debut at the 19th Bunyip Country Music festival tomorrow with Adam Harvey and Amber Lawrence.

Jane had inside advice when she penned Chick Ute - her husband (who co-wrote the song) drives a ute and carefully vetted the lyrics.

"He insisted on checking it to make sure it was technically correct, so I wouldn't get laughed at," Jayne said.

The song was inspired by a real ute, a pink Holden V8 with the words Miss B Haven stencilled on it.

It's featured on Jayne's single CD cover but a different ute was used for the video clip - an award winning extravaganza that picks up the Best Chick Ute category at shows all over the country.

This ute is owned by Jo Chisholm from Yass. Sixty women turned up to help Jayne film the clip, after she put the word out.

John Kane and Mark Walmsley produced the album after they heard a demo CD of her songs.

"The demo CD was put together for my dad," Denham revealed.

"He'd written a poem (which has become the beautiful song Boy From Blackhill on the album), so I got together with some songwriter friends and put music to it. It was so much fun we kept going. I grew up on country music - my parents played it all the time. But then I drifted into the rock scene, performing and doing backing vocals and jingles."

Further info - www.jaynedenham.com
www.myspace.com/jaynedenham

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