A Deeper Shade of Blue

Rip It Up, Issue 116, 1 March 1987, Page 6

A Deeper Shade of Blue

Al Hunter Sings Counby

Huntly, late 50s — An eight-year-old boy, suffering from chicken pox, lies in bed listening to the radio. One song he hears never leaves him — ‘White Lightning,’ by George Jones.

Auckland, early 80s — A singer dedicated to country music wakes up in the middle of the night. He’s just had a dream, about the neon cowboy above Kean’s shop in Queen Street, who’d fallen in love with the neon sign across the road. A song begins to take shape.

On one wall hangs a picture of Lowell George, in flight with Little Feat on an Auckland stage. On the television, the Everly Brothers reunite once more in a favourite video. On the floor are about 50 records, ranging from Bob Wills and his Texas Playboys, through Merle Haggard to Steve Earle and Dwight Yoakam. Dolly Parton and Kenny Rogers are about to take the stage a couple of miles away, but Al Hunter is going in the opposite direction with his records. He’s got Hillman Hunter’s Honky Tonk Heaven to present on Campus Radio.

This month Al Hunter’s first album comes out. Called Neon Cowboy, it’s named after the song that came to him in the middle of the night. He’s been singing around Auckland since the early 70s, in bands such as Cruise Lane, Chapeau, and Hillman Hunter and the Rootes Group. Hunter grew up in Pukemiro, a mining village near Huntly, where his father, who died when his son was eight months old, was a miner by day, farmer in the evenings, and well-known as a keyboardist who could “make the piano talk.” When young Al heard Gene Pitney singing Tm Gonna Be Strong,’ he was hooked on music too. “As a kid of about four or five, I’d get up at the mining club socials, or football dos, and sing things like ‘Don’t Be Cruel’ and the Frankie Lymon song, ‘Why Do Fools Fall in Love’. ”

Listening, like everybody else, to the Beatles and Rolling Stones, Hunter was then unaware of the strong country influence on those groups. On the radio was Jim Reeves and Patti Page doing schlocky versions of Hank Williams tunes, but across the road was a neighbour with the real thing on 78s. “He was the guy with the feeling, with pain,” says Hunter. “I’ve always been affected musically by the emotion in music. That’s what’s driven me really, whether in blues or country, the heart-felt emotion of it.

“I used to cry as a kid at things like ‘Old Shep.’ Butthat's a thing I don’t like now about country music, those things that play on your emotions. Songs like ‘Biff the Purple Bear’ or about a cripple kid who talks into his CB. That’s sick, I hate that sort of stuff. But I cried when I heard John Mayall sing ‘Tribute to J B Lenoir’ on one of his first albums. He’s not a great singer, but that had so much feeling to me, I couldn’t help it. It’s

the emotion that’s the most important thing. That’s why I was never into art rock, because basically there’s no emotion, no passion. The American music had the feel, the soul — that’s what it’s all about.” Cruisin’ & Driftin’

So, after singing in teenage bands in Huntly, when Hunter came to Auckland he took the Leon Russell, Delaney and Bonnie, and Joe Cocker route rather than Genesis or ELR "Cruise Lane were very in-

fluenced by Delaney and Bonnie, the Leon Russell gospel type of thing. It was quite a big band. After seeing Mad Dogs and Englishmen we got really inspired and went from an ordinary five-piece to having a space choir!” The country rock of the Burrito Brothers hadn’t taken hold here yet, so it wasn’t until Hunter’s next band that he began singing country. “Chapeau were very influenced by J J Cale, and we started listening to Dobie Gray after ‘Drift Away.’ I loved

all those players — Reggie Young, Kenny Malone — they were soul players on country albums, and they were hot.”

Leon Russell's album of country favourites, Hank's Back reintroduced Hunter to George Jones. “I distinctly remember hearing ‘White Lightning' while in bed with chicken pox. That’s never left me, the feeling I got from that song.” Soon, Chapeau were doing songs like ‘Truck Driving Man’ in the Crypt nightclub. "That was unheard of, no one did country songs in a nightclub.” Before their demise, the band won supports for Leon Russell and Faces concerts at Western Springs. After a short sojourn in Australia with pedal steel ace Red McKelvie, Hunter was back in Auckland, emulating the Amazing Rhythm Aces. “They were a combination hotch-potch of R&B and country. I'd always wanted to have a band like the Rhythm Aces or Little Feat, who could play an R&B song or a straight kick-ass country song.” One night in Jilly’s nightclub, supported by guitarists Dave Mabee and Mike Farrell, Hunter was joined on stage by the Aces themselves. “That was incredible,” he says. "Five years earlier, being on the same bill as Leon Russell, and now having a blow on Delbert McLinton songs

with the Amazing Rhythm Aces. They said, ‘Keep playing that good music,’ because they had a ball too.”

Comes a Time

“I’ve been playing for how many years? 18,19? And this is the first record that I've ever made. Basically because I never had anything to offer before — I was just a singer. Now, I’ve got something else. I think I’m writing strong songs. And... it’s time."

Neon Cowboy was made in Sydney, at the small studio recently established by Stuart Pearce (ex-Street Talk and Coconut Rough keyboardist) and Dave Marrett (who has produced the Dance Exponents and Coconut Rough). “I was worried about doing it over there, because I wasn't going to have any control,” says Hunter. “But they persuaded me that was the best way to do it, because being their own studio, we could have unlimited time.” Also, Pearce was sympathetic to Hunter’s requirements; as a 17-year-old straight out of school, he’d passed an audition to join his first band — Chapeau.

Hunter took a week’s holiday from his work in an Auckland record store, flew to Sydney and laid down the vocals in the studio (which was just completed in time). Then Pearce set to work, laying down key-

board and rhythm tracks and recording local musicians. “Ken Francis is a respected guitarist in Sydney, on steel we had Kenny Kitchen, who’s won many awards in

Australia,” says Hunter. “Wayne Goodwin, the fiddle and mandolin player, came out here with Emmylou Harris’s Hot Band; I'd met him when they came up to the Country Gentleman after their Auckland show.” In the tradition of country songwriting, Hunter tries to write songs from experiences he, or other people, have had. “You don’t get flashes of inspiration like 'Neon Cowboy’ much,” he says. “That dream was so vivid and strong I had to get out of bed and write what it was about. I turned my bed around to face that way again, but I still haven’t had that same flash!” Several of the songs were written when Hunter was truck driving a couple of years ago. ‘Country Music’ ("is what I want to play”) sounds like a statement of purpose. “I wrote that in the sleeper of a semi driving across Auckland,” says Hunter, laughing at how corny it sounds. "It was an easy one to write — All day long standing on my feet, doin’ my job, I get home beat / The only thing that gets me through the day is knowing I’m going out to play.” That’s what playing is all about, why I do it.”

Blue Eyes “That song ‘A Deeper Shade of Blue’ I wrote while I was an offsider in a truck delivering pet food between Hamilton and Auckland. I walked into a dairy in Huntly, and there was a girl I went to school with, I was infatuated with her when l-was 13; she had incredible eyes. She now owned the dairy, and she told me what she’d been doing — she’d had a few kids, split up with her husband, and now had a boyfriend who was driving longdistance and called in if he passed by. I got into the truck, got out a pen and thought, ‘Your eyes have turned a deeper shade of blue... the lines behind the laughter gave the clue ...’ The song just flowed, it came out in about 50 miles.”

Hunter sees his songwriting is developing, he’s learnt to tell a story and write hooklines. “Any song that’s been successful has got a hookline, a line that sinks in, that people identify with.” Some of his songs were written with other singers in mind — ‘You’ve Still Got (that Look in Your Eyes)’ for John Anderson, ‘Evening Sun’ for Eric Clapton, ‘Gypsy Woman' for Don Williams. There are three covers on the album, one of the most affecting being a country version of John Lennon’s ‘Jealous Guy.’ “That’s always been one of my favourites,” says Hunter, “and I thought, it’s such a great song, I can do it a different way, with a country feel.” ‘Honky Tonk Song’ is an upbeat Webb Pierce tune Hunter found among some old jukebox 45s he was given. “I’ve done that since Hillman Hunter days. Then when Dwight Yoakam came out with ‘Honky Tonk Man,’ I thought, Shit! Who is this guy? Usurper!" Merle Kilgour’s ‘When You Get on the Whisky (Let Someone Else Drive)’ is a rocky number originally done by John Anderson. Hopefully it will be made into a video, and come out as the B-side of the first single, ‘Highway Song.’ Both tracks feature Dave Dobbyn on backing vocals and guitar. Now, Al Hunter’s getting another band together to support the album, a “few nights here and there, trying to get where the country music fans are. I don’t know where that is, but I think it’s towards the south and north of Auckland. We may even get to Gore!”. It will be a big band, six or seven piece, “probably uneconomical,” with pedal steel, fiddle, and piano. The two keys to success are airplay and reaching the urban crowd. “I think the country audience will take care of itself, though the country music club people don’t often get out to support stuff they’re not involved in. Today at the Dolly Parton thing there'll be heaps of them, though.” In New Zealand, as in the United States, it's the schlocky end of country that wins mainstream support. “Maybe it’s time for a change in New Zealand — I think we can just make people more aware that there's a relationship between country and rock and roll. But I think I’d go down well in Gore. I’m pretty adaptable, and have played at some major shows in front of a couple of thousand diehard country fans. The hardest part is to bring the music to

the people in the city." Hunter’s Monday night residency at Auckland’s Shakespeare tavern (augmented by Red McKelvie on steel and Oath Newhooke on fiddle) attract a small but loyal crowd.

Honky Tonk Heroes

Four days before Dolly and Kenny visited town, the year’s Grammy awards highlighted the country “schlock versus rock” problem. After dynamite performances from the year’s country discoveries — Steve Earle, Randy Travis, Dwight Yoakam — the Judds just about choked when they opened the envelope for best country act. Old ham Ronnie Milsap had beat out the new traditionalists, with a syrupy rock and roll revival song. “Yeah, having those three guys on that show was a big kick in the arse for country music in the States,” says Hunter. “Three pure young players decicated to bringing some soul back into the music. Dwight Yoakam stood on lots of peoples’ toes when he first started talking about Nashville. He didn’t make any friends down there,” says Hunter. “Dwight’s a bit of a revivalist, taking it back to the pure honky tonk sound which came out of the Bakersfield thing of Buck Owens, Merle Haggard, and Johnny Horton. Pure country with a rock feel. Rock and roll and country have always been so close; there’s no difference between Jerry Lee Lewis playing a rockabilly song or a country song.”

While Jim Reeves was once thrashed on New Zealand radio, and more recently, Willie Nelson, Merle Haggard and George Jones,“the two finest singers in country music," have been ignored. “Then again," reasons Hunter, “a lot of people don’t like the sound of George Jones’ voice. He’s what they call a singer’s singer — anyone who’s ever sung a song who hears George Jones sing has to be knocked out. The same with Merle Haggard. "Nobody knows there was a Willie Nelson before Stardust now; unfortunately that was when he did his best material. When he first recorded, in 1962, they didn’t like him, they thought he was weird because he sang differently from everyone else.”

Lost in the schmaltz — and being revived by people like Ricky Scaggs — is the tradition of great instrumentalists in Country music. “Listen to any of the classic country instumentals, bluegrass, the western swing players, they’re as good as any players in any form of music, they’re just masters of their instrument, like Charlie Parker in jazz.”

Hunter’s been sharing his view of country music on Campus Radio for 18 months now (Honky Tonk Heaven airs each Sunday from 4pm till 6pm). "I love it. It gives me the chance to get it out to people who wouldn’t normally hear it. It’s the stuff we’ve been talking about — not the shmaltz, but the hard core stuff which has got poetry to it, it’s lyrical, with well constructed songs and great playing. It’s all there, it’s soul music, white soul music.

"I’ve had people ring me up or come into the shop and say, ‘Hell, I don’t even like country music, but this stuff is great'.' ”

Chris Bourke