DAVE'S DIARY - 9/03/14 - PREVIEW OF EPISODE 2 - SERIES 22
ADELAIDE HILLS EXPORT IMPORTS TOPANGA CANYON RUNAWAY GIRL
Adelaide
Hills born singer-songwriter Liam Gerner features a mystical maiden he
found in Topanga Canyon when he debuts on Nu Country TV on Thursday at
10.30 pm on Channel 31.
Gerner highlighted the brunette he discovered in California where he wrote,
recorded and filmed Mother Nature's Runaway Girl in an overseas
odyssey.
Georgian superstar Alan Jackson and Missouri young gun Tyler Farr perform
a double shot of redneck video clips on the show repeated Mondays at 5.30
am and 2.30 pm.
Bluegrass veterans Del McCoury and Peter Rowan also revive historic songs
in Behind Bars.
And Texan Aaron Watson also honours war veterans on the program hosted
by Mid Pacific Bob Olson and filmed and edited by Laith Graham.
Nu Country TV has been added to the C 31 streaming list.
Just follow this link on your computer or mobile phone - http://www.c31.org.au/program/view/program/nu-country-tv
LIAM GERNER TRACES RACHEL'S TATTOOS IN SONG
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Liam
Gerner sowed the seeds of Mother Nature's Runaway Girl in Topanga
Canyon in California on his new album Land Of No Roads. Liam, 30, wrote it with his producer Eric Lynn while living in Topanga Canyon after starting his overseas odyssey in London. The video was directed by Lily Baldwin and Jefferson T Jones. "Jefferson is a brilliant cinema photographer from Topanga (his home garden features in the clip)," Gerner revealed. "After Jefferson heard this song he showed me a book of the photography of Anne Brigman." |
"Lily, Jefferson and I came up with the story of the film clip and we filmed it in Topanga Canyon in one day. A fitting location as Topanga is where the song was written.
"Lily
Baldwin is a wonderful dancer and film director. I first saw her dance
in David Byrne's band in London and just loved it. She was in LA for a
few days and we hatched this plan to make this film clip. Alex Lee Moyer
edited the film clip, and what a great job she did."
It was a fitting companion to the song embryo.
"I wrote Mother Nature's Runaway Girl when I was wandering
around the State Park trails of Topanga Canyon," Gerner explained.
"I met some girls out on a trail one day, and what was a lonely mountain
man to do but to chat with them? I noticed one of the girls had a giant
rose tattoo covering her chest, and for some reason I pictured a bee flying
onto it. They walked off and I wrote the song. I actually have her email
somewhere so I shall send her the clip. I never saw them again. But thanks
for the song girls. Eric Lynn helped me kick this song into shape too.
"This is I guess one of those "It's me, not her" songs.
It's about my wanting to get back to nature. Topanga Canyon does have
somewhat of a wildness to it, with the wild coyotes, deer, mountain lions,
rattlesnakes, owls, and hummingbirds, but as its so close to all things
Los Angeles. There are always people wanting to get up there and out into
nature for a day hike and that makes Topanga a very unique place to witness
the wonderful sites of modern humans feeling at a loss of how to survive
or even at a loss of how to interact with the wilderness and nature, myself
included. Weirdly enough just after I recorded this song, I met in Topanga
a very special person called Rachel. And the song has become very much
about her too."
The singer shares South Australian geographical roots with expats Kym
Warner from The Greencards and prolific guitarist for hire and songwriter
Jedd Hughes who was born in Quorn, Beccy Cole and Kristy Cox.
Liam has a Thursday night March residency at the Labour In Vain Hotel
in Fitzroy.
CLICK
HERE for a Gerner CD review in the Diary on March 5.
ALAN JACKSON DEFENDS REDNECKS
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Georgian
superstar Alan Jackson goes back to school in his classic video
to prove It's Alright To Be A Redneck - fourth single from
his 2000 album When Somebody Loves You. The song was written by Bill Kenner and Pat McLaughlin. |
Just a few weeks after its release it was pulled so Jackson's newly penned single, Where Were You When the World Stopped Turning, could be released.
Alan, son
of a motor mechanic Eugene whom he honoured in song Drive (for Daddy
Gene) has toured Australia twice and released two gospel albums and
bluegrass disc that topped the U.S. bluegrass charts this year.
Now 55 and father of three daughters Jackson has released 16 albums in
a career kick started when managed by expatriate Australasian Barry Coburn.
Jackson was born in Newnan - same hometown as revered singer-songwriter
Steve Young who has also frequently toured here since the eighties.
CLICK
HERE for an exclusive Jackson interview in the Diary on October 24, 2010.
TYLER FARR REDNECK CRAZY
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Missouri
minstrel Tyler Farr, 30, debuts on Nu Country with the video for the
title track of his debut album Redneck Crazy. Tyler's character parked his Silverado on his belle's lawn with the headlights on her boudoir. His jealousy sent him Redneck Crazy with help from fellow artists Colt Ford, Lee Brice and Willie Robertson from Duck Dynasty TV show as his characters in rhyme. Darius Rucker snagged a few of the Duck Dynasty stars for his video of Wagon Wheel - the song penned by Bob Dylan and updated by Old Crow Medicine Show when they recorded it. Throwing beer cans and toilet paper rolls is not torn from the southern etiquette book so Tyler's Redneck Crazy video was accompanied by some mock shock in the U.S. media. |
It's not clear if Farr's character won back the blonde bombshell who shattered his ego when she cheated on him.
Farr also
co-wrote songs Hey Y'all for Colt Ford and She's Just Like That
for Joe Nichols.
In early 2012, Farr released debut single Hot Mess that
he co-wrote with Rhett Akins.
Following the merger of his original label, BNA Records, Farr moved to
Columbia Nashville to release second single, Hello Goodbye.
Third single, Redneck Crazy was his first Top 10 hit in 2013 -
it was followed by Whiskey in My Water that peaked at #28.
Further info - http://www.tylerfarr.com/home
DEL MCCOURY MINES CALIFORNIA GOLD
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As leader
of Del McCoury Band, he plays guitar and sings lead vocals along with
his two sons, Ronnie and Rob who play mandolin and banjo.
In June 2010, he received a National Heritage Fellowship lifetime achievement
award from the National Endowment for the Arts and in 2011 he was elected
into the International Bluegrass Music Hall of Fame.
Originally from North Carolina, he joined Bill Monroe's Bluegrass Boys
as lead singer and guitarist in 1963 (although he was originally hired
to play banjo).
He left the following year to join the Golden State Boys in California.
Subsequently he went back East and worked in logging and construction
for a number of years while continuing to play music on the side.
In recent years, the band have become extremely popular at non-bluegrass
festivals and has worked extensively with groups such as Phish.
Del has also performed with The String Cheese Incident, Steve Martin &
The Steep Canyon Rangers and Donna the Buffalo, and recorded with Earle.
McCoury has covered songs by artists as diverse as The Lovin' Spoonful,
Tom Petty, and Richard Thompson.
Del has a very enthusiastic fan base - the Del-Heads.
Further info - http://delmccouryband.com
PETER ROWAN RETURNS
 Photo by Carol Taylor |
Peter Rowan,
who soared to fame with the Rowan Brothers, returns to Nu Country with
his tribute video to a much maligned Oklahoma tumbleweed at the Old Settlers
Festival in Austin, Texas.
Rowan won an avid Australian following at the 36th Port Fairy folk festival
in 2012 and other gigs including the famed Caravan Club in Oakleigh.
When Peter Rowan ambled onstage with his quartet it was a trip through
his bluegrass archives.
Not only did Rowan, now 71, reach back to his embryonic era with late
Bill Monroe he also pioneered bluegrass psychedelia with Jerry Garcia
of Grateful Dead fame.
It was during that trail blazing and genre-blending epoch that Rowan also
created Old And In The Way in 1973 that morphed into Old And
In The Grey.
But on his second sojourn here in two years it was his bluegrass custodians
- Michael Witcher on dobro, double bassist Paul Knight and Mike Munford
on banjo.
They kicked off their first set with the riveting Dust Bowl Children
- title track of his 1990 Sugar Hill album - that segued into harmonica
fuelled Ruby Ridge.
"I bring out a CD every four or five years so every copy you buy
is brand new," the Massachusetts born minstrel joked as he previewed
The Family Demon from his 2010 CD Legacy on which he wrote
all but three songs.
The quartet preceded "an old Ralph Stanley tune (an instrumental)
with Father Mother - a new song he and brother Chris wrote after
burying their father on a snowy Easter morning.
Equally evocative was another new song - Hey Jailer.
Rowan then recalled his era with Monroe's Bluegrass Boys and a trip on
the icon's bus Bluegrass Breakdown where the vehicle emulated its title
after they drove interstate to the Bean Blossom festival in Indiana after
appearing on the Grand Ole Opry.
"I happened to be driving the bus when it broke down," Rowan
recalled of writing The Walls Of Time.
"It was a beautiful spring morning and Bill and I wrote this song
about it.
The quartet stretched out on The Land Of The Navajo and injected
Bill Monroe's Brakeman's Blues, a train song, replete with yodels
honouring The Singing Brakeman Jimmy Rogers.
Rowan's combo covered geographical extremities in Sitting On Top of
The World - a Garcia-Rowan gem with "bluesgrass refrain"
- and Dallas and El Paso locales.
They also headed further south in the Lone Star state to San Antone for
Moonlight Midnight and When The Train Left The Station.
The singer became satiric in Occupy The Tea Party with a Panama
Red reference and extolled the virtues of the civil rights movement in
Selma Montgomery in Freedom Ride.
It was a rich and warm performance with credit to Compass label-mates
The Waifs and East Adelaide added to the lyrics of another song.
Further info - www.peter-rowan.com
AARON WATSON WARRIOR TRIBUTE
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Texan Aaron
Watson performs the video for Raise The Bottle - a tribute to unsung
war heroes including his late grandfather.
He returned from World War 2 in a wheel chair and walked with a cane.
Raise The Bottle is on Amarillo born Watson's 11th album Real
Good Time.
Watson has used it to raise money and awareness for the Boot Campaign
- a foundation that supports American troops upon their return home.
Asleep At The Wheel icon Ray Benson produced Watson's 2004 album The
Honky Tonk Kid featuring guest cameo by Shotgun Willie Nelson.
Watson played junior college baseball in New Mexico and performed around
Texas before releasing debut album, A Texas Café.
Aaron, now living in Abilene, and his band Orphans of the Brazos appear
on his 2005 album, Live at the Texas Hall of Fame.
In 2006 his San Angelo release hit No 60 on Billboard country charts.
Later that year Watson, 37 and father of four, released a collection of
gospel songs - Barbed Wire Halo - including readings by latter
day veteran Waco singer-songwriter Billy Joe Shaver.
On April 1, 2008, Watson's eighth album Angels & Outlaws peaked
at 28 and hit the Billboard Top 200 all genre chart.
He has since released The Road And The Rodeo in 2010 and Real
Good Time in 2012.
Further info - www.aaronwatson.com
HOW TO KEEP NU COUNTRY ON AIR
We need your
support as we celebrate our 22nd series of Nu Country TV.
Australian record companies and artists have joined forces to ensure our
survival.
We have new CDS by major artists you can win by becoming a Nu Country
TV member or renewing your membership.
They include singing actors Willie Nelson and Tim McGraw, Voice judge
Blake Shelton, Ashley Monroe, Brad Paisley, Gary Allan, Toby Keith, Dierks
Bentley, Eric Church, Carrie Underwood, Chris Young, Charley Pride, Slim
Dusty, Eli Young Band, Rosanne Cash and more.
We also have the latest John Denver all-star tribute album and DVDS by
Lady Antebellum.
CLICK HERE for our Membership Page for
full details.