DAVE'S DIARY - 21/3/2022 - PREVIEW OF EPISODE 4 - SERIES 51
KIEFER SUTHERLAND HEADLINES NU COUNTRY TV
Singing actor Kiefer Sutherland headlines Nu Country TV on Saturday March 26 at 9.30 pm.
Prolific Grammy winner Alison Krauss, Robert Plant and Sierra Hull return in a Behind Bars bluegrass double shot on the show repeated Wednesday at 11.30 pm.
Former detective chief inspector Kevin Sullivan, expat South Australian Wesley Dean and South Georgia singer-songwriter Brian Callihan appear on the program filmed and edited by our multi-talented lockdown producer-host Laith Graham.
Nu Country TV is a highlight of Channel 31 streaming list on Digital 44.
Further info - https://www.c31.org.au/
KIEFER TWO STEPS IN RETURN
 |
Golden Globe-Emmy winning actor-singer-songwriter Kiefer Sutherland returns in a smoky bar with pole dancers.
Kiefer, 55, expanded love of country music working in rodeos and followed dad Donald into movies and TV.
This week he performs Two Stepping In Time from third solo album Bloor Street.
Kiefer appeared on Nu Country with Robert Knepper (T-Bag) in TV series Prison Break in their Shirley Jean prison video from 2016 album Down In a Hole, Can't Stay Away and Not Enough Whiskey.
The British born Canadian, renowned as Jack Bauer in TV show 24, joined dad Donald in movie Forsaken and returned in TV series Designated Survivor .
His movie career included Stand by Me (1986), The Lost Boys (1987), Young Guns (1988), Flatliners (1990), A Few Good Men (1992), The Three Musketeers (1993), The Cowboy Way (1994, A Time to Kill (1996), Dark City (1998), Phone Booth (2002) and Melancholia (2011).
His country music roots are equally deep.
“I started team roping in the early '90s, maybe late '80s, and I did that for 10 years, and I did it pretty hard. I toured with my heeler who was a guy named John English,” Sutherland revealed.
“That was all we listened to in the truck, and what I fell in love with. They were listening to Johnny Cash, Waylon Jennings, Kris Kristofferson, Merle Haggard, Willie Nelson - all of those guys wrote in the first-person narrative.”
Further info - http://kiefersutherlandmusic.com/
ALISON KRAUSS AND ROBERT PLANT BLUEGRASS BOOMERANG
 |
Prolific award winners Alison Krauss and Robert Plant boomerang to Behind Bars in our bluegrass double shot.
They perform Can't Let Go from second duet album Raise The Roof that follows 2007 disc Raise The Sand that earned six Grammys including Album and Record of Year.
Alison, now 50 and 27 time Grammy winner, released more than 40 albums solo and with Union Station and the Cox Family.
Rock hall of famer Plant made his name with Led Zeppelin and other major bands.
Raise The Roof features twelve new versions of songs by Merle Haggard, Allen Toussaint, Everly Brothers, Anne Briggs, Geeshie Wiley and Bert Jansch.
Highlights include Plant-T Bone Burnett original High and Lonesome and classic Can't Let Go written by Randy Weeks and first recorded by Lucinda Williams.
“We wanted it to move,” Krauss revealed.
“We brought other people in, other personalities within the band, and coming back together again in the studio brought a new intimacy to the harmonies.”
“You hear something and you go, ‘man, listen to that song, we got to sing that song!' It's a vacation, really - the perfect place to go that you least expected to find,” Plant added.
Raise The Roof was produced by T Bone Burnett and features drummer Jay Bellerose, guitarists Marc Ribot, David Hidalgo, Bill Frisell, and Buddy Miller, bassists Dennis Crouch and Viktor Krauss and pedal steel guitarist Russ Pahl.
Alison also appeared on Nu Country with her video of Brenda Lee classic Losing You and duet with Jamey Johnson on their Willie Nelson tribute Seven Spanish Angels.
Plant and Krauss will tour together this year.
CLICK HERE for a Krauss CD review in The Diary on August 29, 2007.
SIERRA HULL LIVE AT THE BROOKLYN BOWL
 |
Tennessee bluegrass belle Sierra Hull and her band return live at Brooklyn Bowl in Nashville.
Sierra, 30, hails from Byrdstown and released debut album Angel Mountain aged 10 and was 15 when Ron Block and Alison Krauss produced second album Secrets
This week she performs Poison that follows fifth album 25 Trips.
Sierra appeared on Nu Country with Black River from fourth album Weighted Mind.
The mandolinist graduated from famed Berklee School of Music in Boston and launched third album Daybreak in 2001 .
Banjo ace Bela Fleck produced Weighted Mind with guest vocals from singing spouse Abigail Washburn, Krauss and Rhiannon Giddens.
Hull wrote or co-wrote 11 of 12 songs on Weighted Mind.
More info - http://www.sierrahull.com/
BRIAN CALLIHAN BREAK DOWN
 |
South Georgian hit writer Brian Callihan shows how he beat a car break down and ruptured romance on debut.
Brian hit the stage and bar and fell into the arms of a new belle and canine.
Callihan hails from a small south Georgian town and has written hits for peers in 10 years in Nashville.
Broke Down is title track of his new EP that follows his self-titled 2020 debut album.
Brian lived in a shed on his arrival in Nashville but graduated to a house with songwriting royalties.
He wrote all the songs on his new EP including some with Cole Swindell, Adam Sanders, Jesse Rice, and Wynn Varble.
Further info - https://www.briancallihan.com/
KEVIN SULLIVAN BIG SPENDER
 |
Retired detective inspector and forensic crime analyst Kevin Sullivan develops a new persona in his return.
Kevin frocked up and filmed at Surfers Paradise, Hope Island , Sanctuary Cove and Brisbane Airport in his satiric song video inspired by meeting grey nomads on tours with his family band.
They include wife Belinda and three children, KJ aged 11, Cha Cha aged 9 and Jet aged 6, all doing distance education with Belinda who is backstage manager.
He wrote Spend The Kids Inheritance for second album Against The Tide.
Kevin also appeared on Nu Country with Bill Chambers in High Country Snows video filmed in Mt Buller, Merrijig and Appin with Kellie Lovick from famed high-country Lovick family before the 2020 bushfires.
Sullivan was a forensic police crime scene investigator and retired in 2011 as a detective inspector after an injury.
He has been a professional musician for five years and lives on the NSW south coast at Gerringong near Kiama.
"I had a great career in the Police but music was always my first love," Kevin revealed.
"When I got out of the Police I thought it was never too late to chase your dream so I became a musician We do a bit of everything and I throw a bit of original stuff in when people aren't looking."
Queensland campervan company Sunland are major sponsors with custom-built van for Kevin and his family on the road.
Further info - https://kevinsullivanmusic.com/
WESLEY DEAN NASHVILLE MASKS
 |
Gawler born Wesley Dean proves a master of disguise in his Nu Country debut.
Dean, 39, won 2008 Australian Idol as Wes Carr and recorded as Buffalo Tales.
Wesley, his wife Charlotte and their two children moved to Nashville in 2021.
He performs his Eleven One video from his sixth album out this year.
“We all wear masks mainly out of fear and I'm not talking about the physical mask, it's the metaphorical ones that are most present in our everyday lives,” Wesley revealed.
“This is a song about covering up who we truly are, whether it's wearing a uniform clinging on to a staunch belief, an attitude, projection, judgement etc, masking the true self and sense of who we are. It's about playing roles and hiding different versions of ourselves for different reasons. We all do it sometime in our lives. To find your own truth in a world full of noise and disguise is a very difficult thing to master these days.
The album includes Never Thought of You - a song about divorce.
Further info - https://wesleydeanmusic.com/
WIN WAYLON, GEORGE JONES AND MERLE HAGGARD
Help us celebrate being Nu Country TV members and win albums by late Waylon Jennings, Merle Haggard, George Jones and Highwaymen by becoming a Nu Country member or renewing your membership.
George, Waylon, Merle and Willie Nelson were among country historian Barbara Dowling's favourite Texans.
The Waylon, Highwaymen , Merle and George discs were donated by Barbara who died at 77 in December, 2020.
She co-hosted Long In The Saddle in our Nu Country FM era and was pioneer Australian and Victorian country music awards judge.
Barbara was admired for rising above losing her sight as a young woman and her country passion with annual trips to Waylon's birthplace in Littlefield, West Texas.
Waylon died at 64 on February 13, 2002, and is survived by singing spouse Jessi, now 78, and son Shooter, 42.
WIN KEITH URBAN CDS ALSO
We have expatriate Australasian superstar Keith Urban's chart topping 12th album The Speed Of Now - Part 1.
Also BR5-49 CD Big Backyard Beat Show and Billy Ray Cyrus's historic 1992 album Some Gave All that features Achy Breaky Heart.
Join Watling & Bates as members and win their 13 track CD Small Town Tales.
We have other CDS by major artists you can win by becoming a Nu Country TV member or renewing your membership.
They include Brad Paisley, Carrie Underwood, Eric Church, Kip Moore and late larrikin legend A.P. Johnson.
CLICK HERE for our Membership Page for details.