DAVE'S DIARY - 11 SEPTEMBER 2002
MELINDA
SCHNEIDER FLIES WITH DIXIE CHICKS
When roots country singer Melinda Schneider's indie record label Compass
Bros sent a package of her CDS and press kit to country superstars the
Dixie Chicks she feared they might be lost.
Or ignored.
So when the singer received the call to announce she was the Australian
support on their prestige Australian tour she was shocked.
"We heard they were going to use a male pop act," Melinda told
Nu Country TV on the eve of her Victorian tour which climaxes with the
two Dixie Chicks gigs.
"It was a real thrill and a shock to be on the same bill for six
shows with The Dixie Chicks and The Thorns. It proves that major artists
and their management read their mail. I guess they really wanted an Australian
country artist on the bill."
This is good news for country fans who have long suffered mediocre pop
ponces as supports on some international country tours. But not a complete
shock.
Schneider has written with Jim Lauderdale whose songs have been recorded
by the Dixie Chicks and David Lee Murphy who has shared bills with them
in the U.S.
But it's a testament to the fighting spirit of Schneider, 32, who missed
out on their support role at the Enmore Theatre in Sydney early in the
year.
GYMPIE MUSTER
"I tried to get that support as well but it didn't happen,"
Schneider revealed after also being surprised that 70,000 fans sang along
to her songs at the recent Gympie Muster in Queensland.
"They had either bought my albums or heard them on regional, ABC
and community radio or the pay TV channel CMC. It was a big thrill for
me to hear them singing the lyrics to my songs. It was really shocking.
I had a ball on the Saturday night."
Schneider, who duets with Jimmy Little on her song Reach Out on his 30th
album Down The Road, has already written for her third album scheduled
for 2004.
"I have written some on my own and others with Michael Carr who is
touring with me through Victoria," says Schneider who also performs
at the closing day of the Royal Agricultural Show on Sunday September
28.
"I also plan to go back to Nashville to write in November and after
Tamworth in January. When you're touring a lot it's hard to get into song
writing mode. You're tired all the time and it's hard to relax. I've probably
got six songs close to definite for new album, including a couple on my
own and some with Michael Carr."
VICTORIAN TOUR AND NU COUNTRY TV
Carr, son of veteran rock and Play School pianist Warren Carr, is also
promoting his self titled Compass Bros disc when he joins Schneider, Brendon
Walmsley and Jim Haynes on Schneider's Victorian tour.
Walmsley is promoting two Compass Bros albums Never Say Never and A Little
Time and Haynes has a brace of albums, a poetry book and some new jokes.
Melinda's first two albums My Oxygen and Happy Tears won wide acclaim
and sold thousands of units despite being ignored by commercial radio.
The singer will be filmed and interviewed for Nu Country TV on Monday
September 29.
Can You Hear Me Down The Hillside, penned with Jim Lauderdale, is among
the hot videos on Nu Country TV which debuts on C 31 at 8 p m on Saturday
October 4.
The song was injected with a yodel born in the historic 'Mule Skinner
Blues.'
MUM MARY AND AUNT RITA IN A MANGO TREE
"We
came up with the chords and melody in Sydney and Jim went home,"
Melinda says, "I went over to Nashville few weeks later, we only
had an hour. He said 'I want something really innocent and child like.'
We just nutted out these lyrics in an hour. Later on I thought that was
my mum's story, she used to practise her yodelling in a mango tree in
Rockhampton. Her elder sister Rita said 'get up there and practice, you
are not coming down till you get it right.' We wanted to do it as a really
traditional yodelling song, a tribute to Mule Skinner Blues."
Also autobiographical is 'The Story Of My Life.'
"I was born in 1971/ policeman dad and a yodelling mum/ got no brother
sister ties/ I'm an only child."
So when she wrote 'Story Of My Life' she didn't have to borrow from her
clothing designer teen years to frock it up.
She grew up in public from three as the daughter of internationally known
yodelling icon Mary.
But she chose a pair of co-writers for the videogenic vignette which spawned
the first film clip from her second Compass Bros album 'Happy Tears.'
Unsung Australian duo Vanessa Corish and Paul Begaud had penned a swag
of hits including 'Now, That I've Found You' - a U S chart topper for
Canadian chanteuse Terri Clark.
"I had written the ideas in my book but I think I needed them to
finish the song as it was quite emotional," Melinda said.
"It effected all of us. We wrote it in a couple of hours, it came
together like a jigsaw puzzle."
'Story Of My Life' won Melinda the prestige Gold Guitar for best female
vocalist.
In the literate genre, marketed through TV and print media and ABC and
community radio, artists have to work extra hard to skin the me-too corporate
cats.
For artists diverse as Schneider, Felicity, Catherine Britt, Git and Audrey
Auld, the answer is to move offshore - even for short bursts - to build
on the success of Keith Urban and Kasey Chambers.
MELINDA IN NASHVILLE
Melinda
began with writing sojourns in Nashville with tunesmiths whose songs are
chart magnets.
Ms Schneider wrote 14 songs with Music City veterans on her latest foray
and four of them - with Aussie tourists David Lee Murphy and Jim Lauderdale
- survived a studio cull.
So did two penned with Bob Regan and Jimmy Melton, enabling her to be
author of nine of 13 tunes on Happy Tears.
Ironically, one of the most evocative, radio friendly songs was penned
with veteran rocker Billy Thorpe whose years in L.A. found him soaked
in country.
"I sang on 'I Got My Mojo Working' with Thorpie at the Emerald festival,"
Melinda revealed, "I got up on stage to wail, did all this bluesy
gospel stuff. He gave me his phone number and said we should write. It
was our first attempt. I got the song idea in the car on my way over.
Children leaving home is such a big thing in people's lives. The title
just came to mind in the car. He could relate as both his daughters left
home when they were living in L A. He said the house as so empty. That's
what made him move back to Australia. He used to do 'She Taught Me To
Yodel' in his set as a rock act in the sixties."
MELINDA AND CHANGES
Equally
memorable 'I Love You, You're Perfect, Now Change' - written with Regan.
"It was my idea, I was working on it for quite a while on my own,
I even tried to write it with an Australian writer," Ms Schneider
confided, "it didn't quite happen, didn't click, didn't go where
I wanted to go. I took it to Nashville. Bob has a fantastic sense of humour
- bit like mine, sick. We sat there and had a lot of laughs. It's probably
my favourite song on the album but not directed at my husband. At the
Sydney launch people were saying which one's her husband."
Schneider's husband - bassist producer Graham Thompson - may not have
changed her as a person but helped shape one of the best Australian country
discs of the new millenium.
It veers from the bluegrass on 'Can You Hear Me Down The Hillside' to
the gospel of 'God's Time,' written with Melton, and hook heavy raunch
of the Melinda-Murphy collaboration on 'Small Stuff.'
Ms Schneider wrote 'He Still Calls Her Angel' with her 'Wearing White'
duet partner Michael Carr.
"Warren had his own recordings in 60's, he also played with JOK,"
Melinda said, "so Michael had a similar upbringing to me in musical
family. I introduced him to Adam Brand and he co-wrote three songs on
his new album."
SUPERWOMAN
Schneider
also wrote two tunes 'Superwoman' and 'No Tears To Cry' with Rick Price.
Harley Allen - prolific hit writer for expatriate Australasians Barry
and Jewel Coburn - provided 'Living It Down.'
Allen, son of bluegrass legend Red Allen, also wrote 'She's Still Got
It,' with John Wiggins - son of late Ernest Tubb's singing bus driver
Johnny.
Schneider's songs are in ABC TV series 'Something In The Air' - a show
blessed with the acting talents of Nu Country TV director Peter Hosking.
Melinda is hoping to score international release for her albums in Nashville.
"I'm free to go over and look for my own deal," says the singer
whose partners on unreleased tunes are Dean Miller - son of the late Roger
- and former Boy Howdy singer and solo artist Jeffrey Steele.
Her extensive national touring, which included stints at the Melbourne
International Blues And Music Festival and Frankston Guitar Festival,
have expanded her fan base.
Schneider, Carr, Walmsley and Haynes perform Hallam Hotel on September
23, Bairnsdale on September 24, Wonthaggi - September 25, Churchill -
September 26, Colac - September 27.
The quartet also perform Sunday September 28 - final day of The Royal
Melbourne Show - with Tania Kernaghan, Jacqui Clune and Southbound.
Melinda then performs that night at the Rod Laver Arena with the Dixie
Chicks and The Thorns and again on Monday September 29.