DAVE'S DIARY - 30/4/2018 - PREVIEW OF EPISODE 21 - SERIES 34
KIRSTY LEE AKERS HEADLINES NU COUNTRY TV
Hunter Valley singer-songwriter Kirsty Lee Akers leads a punch posse of female peers when she headlines Nu Country TV on Saturday May 5 at 9 pm on Channel 31/Digital 44.
Canadian Lindi Ortega who calls herself the Comeback Kid and toured here last year also returns to the show repeated on Monday at 3 pm.
Another Canadian Whitney Rose also appears on the program filmed and edited by Laith Graham.
New Mexico refugee and latter day Texan Bri Bagwell suffers beer pressure in her debut on the program with fellow Texans Wade Bowen and Ruston Kelly - singing spouse of Kacey Musgraves.
Nu Country TV is a highlight of C 31 streaming list on Digital 44.
Further info - https://www.c31.org.au/
KIRSTY LEE - A CROC ESCAPEE
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Hunter Valley singer songwriter Kirsty Lee Akers spends much of her time writing and performing in the U.S.
She visited Santa Monica Pier and famed Nashville music venues The Factory and Layla's in her new video for Drive Till The Wheels Fall Off - seventh single from her fourth album Burn, Baby Burn.
Kirsty Lee, now 30, also avoided a crocodile in her trip to our top end where she was more at home singing, swimming and flying.
Akers aged dramatically, with the aid of make-up, in her previous video for Take Me Back.
She returned to the 2017 Americana festival in Nashville and continues her Nashville to the Top End tour until June 2018.
Kirsty toured Victoria in 2012 with Texan troubadour Hayes Carll.
CLICK HERE for a Kirsty Lee feature in the Diary on June 4, 2016.
LINDI ORTEGA – THE COMEBACK KID
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Toronto troubadour Lindi Ortega moved to Nashville about six years ago and toured here for Brian Taranto's Love Police last year.
Lindi, 37, is blessed with Mexican and Irish ancestry and performs The Comeback Kid from her seventh album Liberty , released in March.
Ortega last appeared on Nu Country with Some Day Soon from her sixth album Faded Gloryville.
She credited singing actor Jeff Bridges as a mentor after his role as Bad Blake in the Crazy Heart movie.
Lindi played the Seaworks , Williamstown, Meeniyan Town Hall, Northcote Social Club and Toff In Town in the Melbourne CBD on her previous Australian tours.
The singer was born in Toronto, moved to Nashville for five years and recently returned to Canada.
CLICK HERE for our feature on Lindi album Faded Gloryville in The Diary on September 14, 2015.
WHITNEY ROSE CAN'T STOP SHAKING
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Whitney Rose was born on Prince Edward Island off the coast of Novia Scotia and turns 32 on Tuesday in her new home town Austin, Texas. She returns to Nu Country with her video for Can't Stop Shaking on her third album Rule 62 . It was produced by Mavericks singer Raul Malo who discovered her in Canada and also produced her second album Heartbreaker of The Year in just four days in Toronto. Mavericks drummer Paul Deakin guests on the album recorded in Nashville. Rose, just 31, recently appeared on Nu Country with South Dakota born Sam Outlaw for their live rendition of Kind To Me at the B.B. Gun boutique leather store in Vancouver. Whitney later moved south to Texas and recorded her recent South Texas Suite EP at Dale Watson's studio in Austin. Rose also appeared on Nu Country with her live version of Chivalry Is Dead at the Grand Ole Cameron House from her 2012 debut album. |
Further info - http://whitneyrosemusic.com/
BRI BAGWELL BEER PRESSURE
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New Mexico born Bri Bagwell showed how to deal with Beer Pressure with a vast cast.
Bri, now 31, moved to Texas from Las Cruces - the city of crosses - in New Mexico about 10 years ago.
Beer Pressure is on the Austin singer's second album When A Heart Breaks.
The four-time Texas Female Vocalist of the Year spent six years with her band The Banned .
Bagwell began performing with her two brothers as a teenager before moving to Austin at 18 and graduating with a marketing degree from the University of Texas.
She released her debut album Banned from Santa Fe in 2011 after a top 10 finish on CMT's Next Superstar reality TV show.
In 2013 she released an EP of demos recorded as a hired songwriter at Sony ATV in Nashville, followed by When a Heart Breaks in 2015.
Further info - http://www.coloredlion.com/BB/
RUSTON KELLY 1,000 GRAVES
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Texan Ruston Kelly explores post-traumatic stress of soldiers and survivors - especially after losing a friend or lover in battle.
Kelly explores the subject in 1,000 Graves on his new album Halloween, released in April 2017.
The video depicts heartbreak of a young female soldier who loses a loved one in battle and returns home to face the demons of PTSD and loneliness.
1000 Graves isn't specifically directed at soldiers who may have post-traumatic stress disorder but is filled with the angst of someone struggling with inner demons.
The soldier appears to reluctantly return to her home and family following her deployment to an undisclosed location.
Although she is warmly and lovingly welcomed back home it unfolds that while overseas she fell in love with a fellow soldier.
The young woman withdraws from her family, endures sleepless nights riddled with bad dreams and night terrors, and spends time in bars or in her military sweats running and painfully remembering her troop, her love and the war.
It depicts the source of her PTSD is very complex because the brave young woman suffered the terror of war and also lost the soldier she loved - she returned home from the battlefield but he did not.
The soldier's run takes her into a military cemetery similar to Arlington where she knows her beloved soldier rests.
It flashes between images of her holding the dying man and staring at his final marker.
Kelly recently released new single A-Hole that he wrote in jail after being arrested in January this year.
"Though my full length will be released soon, I'm constantly writing from my experiences. I wrote this in a jail cell a month ago,” revealed Kelly who was born in East Texas and lived in Belgium before returning home at 17.
He moved to Nashville with his older sister and formed popular band Elmwood and toured from 2008 until 2011 before his first publishing deal with BMG in Nashville.
Kelly, now 29, wed fellow Texan singer Kacey Musgraves in 2017.
Kelly and Musgraves recorded To June This Morning from a poem the late Johnny Cash wrote to his wife June Carter Cash for new album Man in Black. Johnny Cash: Forever Words features recordings of Cash's unreleased lyrics, poetry and letters.
His song Black Magic was played in the Season 2 finale of the CBS series Scorpion and wrote Face the Sun that Charles Esten sang on a February 2018 episode of Nashville .
Singing actor Tim McGraw recorded Kelly tune Nashville Without You and fellow Texan Josh Abbott Band covered another Front Row Seat.
“The first sound I remember hearing was a steel guitar,” recalled Kelly who learned guitar at 13.
“My dad was in some East Texas folk bands back in the day, and he would play steel guitar every night before I went to bed. When he wanted to sneak cigarettes, he'd take me on midnight drives around the neighborhood and play Jackson Browne records. I was fascinated. It seemed like a magical thing to recreate a song you'd heard before.”
As the family shuffled from Alabama, Cincinnati and Texas to Brussels he immersed himself in classic country and roots.
“Subconsciously, I think I wanted to reconnect with the homeland,” Kelly revealed.
“It started with The Carter Family , then Woody Guthrie, Bill Monroe, Hank Williams, Leadbelly, and Johnny Cash. All of that influences what I do. I was raised with good old Southern kindness, but I was also taught to keep an open mind about things. There are so many different types of cultures and people out there. That's definitely a theme for me.”
Further info - https://www.rustonkelly.com/
WADE BOWEN SPICES UP DAY OF THE DEAD
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Fellow Texan Wade Bowen heads north to perform a song about the south live in New York City. Bowen spiced his music with a mariachi feel in Day of The Dead on his 11th album Solid Ground. Keith Gattis produced it with fellow Texans Jon Randall and Miranda Lambert as guests. |
Wade hails from Waco - Texan city hometown of bluegrass author, comedian and banjo ace Steve Martin -and latter day digs of sharp shooter Billy Joe Shaver.
The Texas Tech University graduate also appeared on Nu Country with Say Anything, When I Woke Up Today and a duet with Randy Rogers for Standards on their joint album Hold My Beer, Volume 1.
Further info - http://wadebowen.com
HOW TO KEEP NU COUNTRY ON AIR
We need your support as we celebrate Nu Country TV's 34th series with Australian record companies and artists teaming to ensure our survival.
You can win Kip Moore's third album Slowheart , thanks to EMI promotions chief Dave Parker, and Blake Shelton's 12th CD If I'm Honest from Karen Black and Tony Midolo at Warner Music .
We also have other CDS by major artists you can win by becoming a Nu Country TV member or renewing membership.
They include Brad Paisley, Carrie Underwood, Gary Allan, Dierks Bentley, Eric Church and late larrikin legend A.P. Johnson.
CLICK HERE for our Membership Page for full details.