Pictured (L-R): Beverly Keel, Ann Powers, Tracy Gershon, Leslie Fram
First Tennessee Bank sponsored Change the Conversation’s August program at Nashville’s BMI on Aug. 29, featuring reporter and author Ann Powers.
Powers’ latest book Good Booty: Love and Sex, Black and White, Body and Soul in American Music was the feature of the program, which was led by the organization’s co-founder Beverly Keel.
“I’ve always been compelled towards music because it gave me pleasure; it made me feel free,” Powers told Keel. “I wanted to think hard about what that meant—how music helps us feel more connected to each other and how that experience of music has helped shape conversations about our bodies and things related to our bodies, like sexuality, eroticism, romance and love.
“I wanted to get beyond easy assumptions, that Rock & Roll is about sex. I wanted to know: What does that mean? How did that work in gospel music in the 1930s? How did it work in the 1980s when America was dealing with HIV/AIDS?
“I also wanted to highlight the stories of LGBTQ people, of women and people of color because that is the heart and soul of our American music heritage. Often times those stories are shunned to the side or hidden in plain sight.”
Powers has long spoken to those unsung legacies that have had a tendency to become lost or forgotten.
“When Evelyn McDonnell and I edited Rock She Wrote, we made it a point to include material from teen magazines and fashion magazines,” continued Powers. “That is music writing too and may have been forgotten. Just ask Merry Clayton in 20 feet from Stardom. When you listen to music from that era, it’s Merry Clayton you remember as much as Mic Jagger. So why isn’t she considered a co-author? Why is it that interpreting a song is not a form of authorship? It’s usually women who are interpretive singers. There’s lots of ways the woman’s position is undervalued and it’s important to celebrate the position where it’s thrived.”
Change the Conversation was formed by Tracy Gershon, Keel and Leslie Fram in 2014 to help create an even playing field for women in country music. The organization funds research and presents a platform where music business leaders address the opportunities and challenges in their segments of the industry. Other music leaders who have spoken to Change the Conversation include Reba McEntire, Wanda Jackson and Sara Evans.
Keel continued the conversation with Powers, some of which is highlighted below.
Keel: How did the title come about?
Powers: For a long time the book had a different title: Rock Me With A Steady Roll, from a 1920s blues song, “My Daddy Rocks Me With A Steady Roll.” My editor thought that title may be too long, or people may not know the reference and asked me to think of a different title. I was sitting at my home office and I looked around my office and my eyes went right to Little Richard’s biography, and I thought, “Little Richard, Good Booty,” because those were the original lyrics to “Tooti Frutti.” The title just came to me straight from Little Richard.
What was the research process like?
I started in 2011, wanting to write about music and sexuality for years. I gave a talk that year at the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame called Rock & Roll Started With The Shimmy. One important thing I wanted to do with this book is to show how dancing is as important to music in this country as anything else. A woman dancing is as important as a man playing a guitar solo.
I really did this based on archival research at libraries, including MTSUs Center for Popular Music, Fisk, Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, the Lincoln Center Library in New York, the Schaumburg Library and the Tulane Jazz Archives.
Talk about sex in country music.
Historically, country has told incredible stories about love and sex and domestic life: marriage. Every country song about the fire going out is about sex, not about your stove. Country music is attached to a bigger world where certain values have historically included feminine modesty and decorum. But then on the other hand we have Dolly [Parton]. She’s our ray of light who has always presented herself as a sexual woman who is a badass in every single way.
How are the changing demographics influencing the music that is being made and becoming successful?
I lived in Alabama for six years. When I first heard Sam Hunt I thought, that’s like every undergraduate at the University of Alabama. Truly, that is what people want to hear in Southern college towns: country and hip hop. From early 90th century New Orleans, it’s always about music coming together.
There’s always the dilemma of celebrating the female artist or executive, but there’s almost always an asterisk with them perhaps perceived as different, or less than. I know sometimes as a female journalist, you’re tasked with writing about the female artist. Talk about celebrating female artists.
We face a paradox as women. We want to own ourselves as women, and we also feel forced into that slot of women in music. But in general, I believe in the accomplishments of women and strive to put them at the forefront.
As long as the structural inequities exist in the music industry—in our culture—under patriarchy, we have to address it and work to change them. So we do have to acknowledge the categories of gender. It’s a corrective act of intervention. How many times is it assumed that when you say musician, you mean man. I want that world to change. I dream of a world where gender binaries are erased.
All through history I see in your book women have been marginalized. Do you see that improving? Where are we now?
In certain scenes it’s really improved, indie rock for example. All the same conversations we’re having now, we had in the ’90s. I always call the ’90s the decade of the year of women in rock. It’s impossible to not notice how many publications would do one article a year on the year of women in rock. But who gets that writing assignment? It’s always this woman or that, but never both or not one could write on Metallica or something. The women were going to write about other women. I love to write about other women and collaborate, but there have been times where I said “I’m only going to write about men” but it didn’t last long. But I also want to say say writers of color have it much harder as men or women. That is, on the web, is changing so much.
I think one of the most important things that have changed is technology for artists. You can make your own music in your own houses and put it on Soundcloud. That in itself breaks down hierarchies and with social media you can reach fans directly.
The conversation that [Change The Conversation] is aiming to change with this organization is why are women not played on country radio? Or urban radio? Or often not invited on a tour? This is reality.
Why is it important to have journalists who are women or people of color?
I guess so we can tell our own stories. But I can identify with a dude as well as I can identify with a woman. I try not to be an essentialist. I don’t think any of us are born with an innate set of traits that are male or female. But I do think we are raised as our gender and therefore we have different experiences. So to understand those experiences, I think it helps to have those experiences.
Gatlin Brothers Ink Deals With The Holland Group, Huskins-Harris
/by Haley CrowPictured (L-R): Steve Gatlin, Becky Harris (Huskins-Harris), Billy Holland (THG), Larry Gatlin, Jason MacDowall (THG), Cathy Nakos (THG), Donna Huskins (Huskins-Harris), Rudy Gatlin, Michael D’Ancona (THG), Kelly Charest (THG), and Don Murry Grubbs (Absolute Publicity). Photo: Christian Bottorff/CMA
Country music trio Larry Gatlin & The Gatlin Brothers has signed on with The Holland Group (THG) for artist management.
“Personally, I am a lifelong fan of the Gatlin Brothers and love these guys!” says The Holland Group’s Billy Holland. “Larry, Steve and Rudy are true living legends and it is quite an honor to work together as we embark on new, exciting projects to help preserve their deserving place in music history!”
Additionally, Larry Gatlin has signed on with Huskins-Harris for daily business management responsibilities.
On signing Larry Gatlin for business management, Huskins-Harris principal Becky Harris notes, “We are excited to work for Larry who is a living legend. His music is timeless, and on top of all the fantastic music and awards he has won, he is a wonderfully sweet Christian man.”
Larry adds, “Believe it or not, I don’t know everything. Billy does…and Becky knows even more than Billy and he agrees.”
Erin Enderlin Traces Pain, Loss On Concept Album ‘Whiskeytown Crier,’ Out Friday
/by Jessica NicholsonAs a writer on some of the most gorgeous, forlorn tracks recorded by Lee Ann Womack (“Last Call”) and Alan Jackson (“Monday Morning Church”), singer-songwriter Erin Enderlin has become a go-to for those seeking intelligent, sturdy storytelling framed in traditional country instrumentation.
On her new album, Whiskeytown Crier, out Friday (Sept. 1), she brings her own voice to the broken marriages, waning love, and various betrayals of the characters she’s created in the fictional community of Whiskeytown, all of whom eventually become a headline in the Whiskeytown Crier, she tells MusicRow.
Enderlin, who worked with Jamey Johnson and Jim “Moose” Brown on the album, which is a follow-up to 2013’s I Let Her Talk, credits Johnson with the idea to approach the record as a concept album.
“He was joking that the album sounded too sad and he thought the album needed context for that. He was like, ‘Well, what if it was this one town and it was like a newspaper? The Whiskeytown Crier that knits all these sad souls together.’”
From the opening citation from John Scott Sherill, the album contains a double shot of family drama and murder on “Caroline” and “Baby Sister,” before combing through the trials of various characters, all drowned with copious amounts of alcohol and clever turns of phrases on tracks like “Whole Nother Bottle Of Wine” and “The Coldest In Town.”
Enderlin’s lone solo write on the album, “Broken,” is also one of Whiskeytown Crier’s most remarkable tracks, as it traces two young lovers from rough home lives, and the heart-wrenching decision a young mother makes to make sure certain those coping mechanisms aren’t passed on to her son.
“When I was in high school I was part of a peer mentoring group for at-risk kids who were just a bit younger than us,” Enderlin says. “It really opened my eyes about a lot of things that young adults struggle with. Hearing their story and the stories of their parents really stuck with me. I think there was a lot of all of that in my own life that got poured into that character.”
Chris Stapleton, who at one time lived in an apartment downstairs from Enderlin in Nashville’s Green Hills area, lends his vocals to “Caroline” and “His Memory Walks On Water,” which finds a daughter willing herself to overlook her late father’s addiction.
“Chris lived in a bachelor apartment downstairs that shared a kitchen and living room and I rented the room upstairs,” Enderlin recalls. “I could hear him sing through the air conditioning vents at night and I was like, ‘People are not going to believe [he] is real life.’ I already thought he was superstar back then. He was already getting cuts and things and he was kind enough to come in and sing some harmonies on the album.”
Enderlin duets with Randy Houser, whom she calls one of the greatest country singers we have out there right now, on “Coldest In Town.” “He knows how to put the hurt on something,” Enderlin says.
Though Whiskeytown Crier releases Friday, the album originates in 2010, when Enderlin took money she earned from co-writing Womack’s “Last Call,” with Shane McAnally, and invested it in making an album.
“That has been my dream since moving here,” Enderlin says. “I got a little carried away and cut enough songs for two albums. I was out on the Willie Nelson Country Throwdown Tour, and I needed something to sell so I ended up needing to do an EP off of what I cut. After that, things kind of got put on hold for a while but it’s really special to me so I wanted to have it come out and I think this is really good timing.”
Enderlin credits Johnson and Brown with the courage to sample from the catalogs of Tammy Wynette and Gram Parsons. She covers Wynette’s classic “’Til I Can Make It On My Own,” and Gram Parsons’ 1968 signature “Hickory Wind.”
“Gram Parsons wrote and recorded that himself, but Emmylou Harris is one of my favorite artists and I love her version of that song (from Harris’ 1979 album Blue Kentucky Girl),” Enderlin says. “I thought it was really cool because Emmylou cuts a lot of songs from other artists she loves, so it made me feel like she would be cool with that.
“When Jamey asked me to start naming songs that I loved, “’Til I Can Make It On My Own” was one of the first. But I was like, ‘I would never cut that because Tammy recorded it. You can’t beat her.’ Jamey said, ‘…so, that’s gonna be the one you do.’”
Whether Enderlin is singing an original or newly interpreting a classic, perhaps the characters and stories in Whiskeytown come across so well because Enderlin herself is a student of classic American raconteurs such as William Faulkner.
“I remember the first time I read As I Lay Dying, when I realized he kept changing the characters,” Enderlin says. “The same person was writing the story, but he changed the words and somehow gave voice to a whole different person. Or it’s like when actors—especially for an intense part—will write out a whole biography for their character to draw from. That’s what I try to do. I have this whole story in my head and I hope that in that three minutes, the story makes sense and people get what I’m saying.”
Stephanie Quayle Releases Album A Week Early For Fans
/by Lorie Hollabaugh“I am so grateful for the outpouring of support from my amazing fan family as we played these new songs across this country. The reaction has been overwhelming,” shares Quayle. “I started to think, ‘How can I show just how thankful I really am?’ It had to be all about the music. So, we decided to get the music to the Flock of Quayle ASAP and release Love The Way You See Me a week early!”
Quayle co-wrote six out of the 11 tracks on the album, which was produced by Matt McClure.
Hillsong Worship, Matt Redman, Steven Malcolm, Tasha Cobbs Leonard To Perform On Dove Awards
/by Lorie HollabaughHillsong Worship, Matt Redman, Steven Malcolm and Tasha Cobbs Leonard have been announced as the latest performers who will take the stage at the 48th Annual GMA Dove Awards slated for Oct. 17 in Nashville.
The four join previously announced performers Reba McEntire, MercyMe, CeCe Winans and Zach Williams on the awards show, which will be held live at Lipscomb University’s Allen Arena and broadcast exclusively on Trinity Broadcasting Network (TBN) on Sunday, Oct. 22 at 8 p.m. CST.
Additional performers will be announced in the coming weeks. Tickets for the show are on sale now at the Allen Arena box office or online here.
The Cadillac Three Play For Fans At Grimey’s
/by Lorie HollabaughPhoto Credit: Big Machine Label Group
The Cadillac Three performed some fan favorites and new tunes from their latest album Legacy for some fans Tuesday night (Aug. 29) at an intimate show at local Nashville indie store Grimey’s. The Nashville natives included “Cadillacin,” “Take Me to the Bottom,” “Tennessee,” “American Slang,” “Legacy,” “Dang If We Didn’t,”and “Tennessee Mojo” in the mini-set, which served as a preview to the pinnacle event Thursday evening (Aug. 31) when the crew hits the Ryman Auditorium stage for their first sold-out headlining date at the Mother Church.
TC3 is gearing up for a return to Europe this fall for their headline LONG HAIR DON’T CARE TOUR with Brothers Osborne and Broken Witt Rebels opening.
Save The Date: ASCAP Country Music Awards Set For November 6
/by Haley CrowThe evening will feature live performances of some of the top five most-performed songs by the award-winning songwriters and/or the artists who recorded them.
Billy Reed And Michael Fierro Join Flood, Bumstead, McCready & McCarthy Staff
/by Lorie HollabaughFlood, Bumstead, McCready & McCarthy has hired Billy Reed and Michael Fierro as account assistants.
Reed comes to FBMM with nine years of experience as a tour manager for acts like Grace Potter, Cam and St. Paul & the Broken Bones. Pairing his road experience with a bachelor’s degree in communication media from North Carolina State University, Reed managed the business and financial challenges facing artists on domestic and international tours. A native of Goldsboro, N.C., he is currently pursuing a Master of Accounting degree from the University of North Carolina.
Fierro joins the team at FBMM after a 20-year career in the U.S. Army as an air traffic controller. A native of Fredericksburg, Va., Fierro graduated from Touro University International in Cypress, Calif., with a bachelor’s degree in business administration and minor in accounting. Prior to joining FBMM, Fierro was the weekend office manager at Psychiatric Group at Hilldale in Clarksville and served as an instructor in the Army’s air traffic controller school.
“Billy and Michael bring a lot of experience to our team, and we are eager to see the fresh perspectives they will bring to our clients’ financial opportunities and challenges,” said FBMM Sr. Vice President Julie Boos. “I have no doubt these two will contribute to the culture of excellence we’ve created for our clients.”
Charlie Monk To Be Featured As Part Of Music Row Storytellers
/by Jessica NicholsonThe second annual Music Row Storytellers will feature anecdotes and memories from Charlie Monk.
The event, which raises funds for Music Health Alliance, will be held Monday, Oct. 9 at the Wellspire Center, located at 907 Gleaves Street in Nashville.
Charlie Monk entered the world of entertainment as a radio DJ in the 1950s. He worked at various stations in Alabama before moving to Music City in 1968. Within a couple of years, he transitioned to a role as ASCAP, followed by a move into publishing (at CBS Songs), eventually under his own banner, Monk Family Publishing. It was there that he signed an unknown Randy Travis…nurtured the career of an aspiring Kenny Chesney…and developed the talents of Nashville’s biggest songwriters. After a brief tenure at Acuff-Rose, Monk began serving as an executive and member on the boards of such organizations as NARAS, Nashville Songwriters Association International (NSAI), the Gospel Music Association and the CMA. Also known for his role as a founder of the Country Radio Seminar, his more than three-decades as the host of its flagship event, the New Faces Show, allowed his wit, humor and storytelling to shine their brightest…as they continue to do every time he opens the mic six days a week on SiriusXM’s Channel 59 (Willie’s Roadhouse).
Valet parking will be provided for the event, and a 6 p.m. cocktail reception will be followed by a 6:30 p.m. program. Tickets to the event are $75 and can be purchased at eventbrite.com.
Music Row Storytellers was launched last year, with journalist Hazel Smith, who coined the phrase “Outlaw Country” in the 1970s and who has worked as a writer for Country Music magazine, as a radio reporter, and as a regular columnist for cmt.com.
Thomas Rhett Announces Los Angeles Pop Up Shop
/by Alex ParryThomas Rhett announced Wednesday (Aug. 30) that he will be offering fans yet another reason to be in Los Angeles in September. In addition to his first-ever and sold-out show at The Greek Theatre on Sept. 22, the ACM Male Vocalist of the Year will bring a unique fashion experience to the city with his LA Pop Up Store.
“I know this won’t come as any surprise to my fans, but I love anything fashion related,” Thomas Rhett said. “To actually get to have a hand in creating this stuff with such incredible designers was a blast, and I hope it’s just the start of some cool things down the road.”
The pop up will feature limited and custom merchandise co-designed by the Grammy-nominee and his fellow designing friends. The lines feature styles for men and women from the new collection Daniel Patrick X Thomas Rhett, four varieties of New Era baseball caps featuring Thomas Rhett’s Home Team custom logo, limited t-shirts custom designed and hand made by MadeWorn as well as a limited supply of custom crafted denim jackets by stylist Kemal Harris. In addition, Thomas Rhett will also be selling merchandise from his HomeTeam merch line.
The Pop Up Store will be located at 501 North Fairfax Los Angeles, CA 90048 where fans will not only have the ability to shop the collections from 11AM-9:00PM daily but they will also have the chance to meet Thomas Rhett Friday, Sept. 22 from 11-1 p.m. For more information, visit www.ThomasRhett.com.
Writer Ann Powers Discusses New Book ‘Good Booty’ At Change The Conversation Event
/by Eric T. ParkerPictured (L-R): Beverly Keel, Ann Powers, Tracy Gershon, Leslie Fram
First Tennessee Bank sponsored Change the Conversation’s August program at Nashville’s BMI on Aug. 29, featuring reporter and author Ann Powers.
Powers’ latest book Good Booty: Love and Sex, Black and White, Body and Soul in American Music was the feature of the program, which was led by the organization’s co-founder Beverly Keel.
“I’ve always been compelled towards music because it gave me pleasure; it made me feel free,” Powers told Keel. “I wanted to think hard about what that meant—how music helps us feel more connected to each other and how that experience of music has helped shape conversations about our bodies and things related to our bodies, like sexuality, eroticism, romance and love.
“I wanted to get beyond easy assumptions, that Rock & Roll is about sex. I wanted to know: What does that mean? How did that work in gospel music in the 1930s? How did it work in the 1980s when America was dealing with HIV/AIDS?
“I also wanted to highlight the stories of LGBTQ people, of women and people of color because that is the heart and soul of our American music heritage. Often times those stories are shunned to the side or hidden in plain sight.”
Powers has long spoken to those unsung legacies that have had a tendency to become lost or forgotten.
“When Evelyn McDonnell and I edited Rock She Wrote, we made it a point to include material from teen magazines and fashion magazines,” continued Powers. “That is music writing too and may have been forgotten. Just ask Merry Clayton in 20 feet from Stardom. When you listen to music from that era, it’s Merry Clayton you remember as much as Mic Jagger. So why isn’t she considered a co-author? Why is it that interpreting a song is not a form of authorship? It’s usually women who are interpretive singers. There’s lots of ways the woman’s position is undervalued and it’s important to celebrate the position where it’s thrived.”
Change the Conversation was formed by Tracy Gershon, Keel and Leslie Fram in 2014 to help create an even playing field for women in country music. The organization funds research and presents a platform where music business leaders address the opportunities and challenges in their segments of the industry. Other music leaders who have spoken to Change the Conversation include Reba McEntire, Wanda Jackson and Sara Evans.
Keel continued the conversation with Powers, some of which is highlighted below.
Powers: For a long time the book had a different title: Rock Me With A Steady Roll, from a 1920s blues song, “My Daddy Rocks Me With A Steady Roll.” My editor thought that title may be too long, or people may not know the reference and asked me to think of a different title. I was sitting at my home office and I looked around my office and my eyes went right to Little Richard’s biography, and I thought, “Little Richard, Good Booty,” because those were the original lyrics to “Tooti Frutti.” The title just came to me straight from Little Richard.
What was the research process like?
I started in 2011, wanting to write about music and sexuality for years. I gave a talk that year at the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame called Rock & Roll Started With The Shimmy. One important thing I wanted to do with this book is to show how dancing is as important to music in this country as anything else. A woman dancing is as important as a man playing a guitar solo.
I really did this based on archival research at libraries, including MTSUs Center for Popular Music, Fisk, Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, the Lincoln Center Library in New York, the Schaumburg Library and the Tulane Jazz Archives.
Talk about sex in country music.
Historically, country has told incredible stories about love and sex and domestic life: marriage. Every country song about the fire going out is about sex, not about your stove. Country music is attached to a bigger world where certain values have historically included feminine modesty and decorum. But then on the other hand we have Dolly [Parton]. She’s our ray of light who has always presented herself as a sexual woman who is a badass in every single way.
How are the changing demographics influencing the music that is being made and becoming successful?
I lived in Alabama for six years. When I first heard Sam Hunt I thought, that’s like every undergraduate at the University of Alabama. Truly, that is what people want to hear in Southern college towns: country and hip hop. From early 90th century New Orleans, it’s always about music coming together.
There’s always the dilemma of celebrating the female artist or executive, but there’s almost always an asterisk with them perhaps perceived as different, or less than. I know sometimes as a female journalist, you’re tasked with writing about the female artist. Talk about celebrating female artists.
We face a paradox as women. We want to own ourselves as women, and we also feel forced into that slot of women in music. But in general, I believe in the accomplishments of women and strive to put them at the forefront.
As long as the structural inequities exist in the music industry—in our culture—under patriarchy, we have to address it and work to change them. So we do have to acknowledge the categories of gender. It’s a corrective act of intervention. How many times is it assumed that when you say musician, you mean man. I want that world to change. I dream of a world where gender binaries are erased.
All through history I see in your book women have been marginalized. Do you see that improving? Where are we now?
In certain scenes it’s really improved, indie rock for example. All the same conversations we’re having now, we had in the ’90s. I always call the ’90s the decade of the year of women in rock. It’s impossible to not notice how many publications would do one article a year on the year of women in rock. But who gets that writing assignment? It’s always this woman or that, but never both or not one could write on Metallica or something. The women were going to write about other women. I love to write about other women and collaborate, but there have been times where I said “I’m only going to write about men” but it didn’t last long. But I also want to say say writers of color have it much harder as men or women. That is, on the web, is changing so much.
I think one of the most important things that have changed is technology for artists. You can make your own music in your own houses and put it on Soundcloud. That in itself breaks down hierarchies and with social media you can reach fans directly.
The conversation that [Change The Conversation] is aiming to change with this organization is why are women not played on country radio? Or urban radio? Or often not invited on a tour? This is reality.
Why is it important to have journalists who are women or people of color?
I guess so we can tell our own stories. But I can identify with a dude as well as I can identify with a woman. I try not to be an essentialist. I don’t think any of us are born with an innate set of traits that are male or female. But I do think we are raised as our gender and therefore we have different experiences. So to understand those experiences, I think it helps to have those experiences.