CREEM ONLINE: BR549 — Hillbilly Sound And Proud Of It

At a recent band meeting, BR549 discussed switching their act to Boy Band but couldn't decide who was the cute one.

(Editor's note: Yep, here at CREEM we're big fans of nepotism. First Editor BJB had his brother Mike review ZZ Top, and now his dad Jack is taking a crack at BR549.)

It was a Saturday night in the World's Biggest Little City. The casino floor at the Reno Hilton was a study in contrasts. Hundreds of high school volleyball hardbodies with bare midriffs and hip-hugger jeans mingled with an equal number of grotesque fifty-somethings adorned with every imaginable exhibit of body art and piercing. The West Coast volleyball championship meets the International Tattoo convention.

If that combination of lifestyles weren't bizarre enough, the sound of Bob Wills—or was it Buck Owens?—drifted out onto the casino floor from an eclectic showroom known as the Garage.

A standing-room crowd packed the Garage for each set of BR549's two-night stand. The group is on a cross-country tour following the release of a new album, Tangled in the Pines on Dualtone Records. The new album is unique in that each song is an original written by band members, a risky venture since the band gained a lot of its popularity playing cover tunes.

These days BR549 is a fixture on the Grand Ole Opry, the altar upon which country traditionalists worship. They have nailed some big-time tours with Faith Hill and Tim McGraw, Bob Dylan and The Black Crowes plus national TV sessions on Letterman, Conan and GMA.

This down-home bunch, once known as the Hillbilly All-Stars, got their baptism in a more humble way – Nashville's seedy Lower Broadway, playing for tips at a western wear/beer bar known as Robert's Western World. The band is credited with turning around the rundown storefront district into a trendy spot for the pure country sound.

The group's meteoric rise was sidetracked when two original members of the group left and their contract with Arista ended. As you might expect from a band with such original country roots, a reconstituted BR549 returned to its roots and returned to Lower Broadway to find itself and its sound.

One of the new members of group was singer-lead guitarist Chris Scruggs. He's the grandson of bluegrass legend Earl Scruggs, but he says he has little contact with that side of the family, describing it as "bad blood." He credits his mother (singer/songwriter/producer Gail Davies) for his musical heritage.

Young Scruggs, barely out if his teens, wears glasses with heavy black frames, bringing to mind the vision of Roy Orbison without the sideburns. A bystander referred to them as "birth control glasses." As long as you wear them you'll never get laid.

The glasses are a throwback to the '50s and so is the style of BR549. Stand-up bass player Geoff Firebaugh, takes the stage in bib overalls. Other band members dress in what some critics call "costumes," kind of campy cowboy outfits. It's a look out of the '50s, but the band insists it is not a retro band. They think they are taking traditional country into the 21st century.

"Tangled in the Pines is a modern album that honors country music by bringing it into the 21st century with its soul and spirit intact," says Chuck Mead, the group's lead singer and guitarist. "We see ourselves as a modern-sounding band that writes songs with a contemporary point of view."

Their music may be conceived in the new millennium, but the sound is traditional, no overdubs, no digital editing or re-mixing. Each song was recorded straight through, "the way records used to be played," Mead said. "You play the whole song. If you like it you keep it. If you don't you do it again."

Those following the band are amazed at the number of young people showing up at BR549 performances. Scruggs says he thinks it's because they are "a country band with a rock 'n' roll attitude."

"We all grew up the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, as well as Bob Wills and Webb Pierce, Mead observed.

"College kids get into it because it's something different and because we're not trying to bullshit anybody. We're up there to get ourselves off and if we get ourselves off then everybody has a good time."

"Sometimes we'll do a gig with a mixed audience; older folks who grew up on Hank Williams along with snot-nosed punk rockers. It makes for a nice audience gumbo," Mead said.

Several album cuts, like "That's What I Get" and "Honky Tonkin' Lifestyle" show off a distinct western swing style. Meads credits the groups fiddle player Don Herron with pushing forward that sound.

"Donnie's a real good western swing fiddler. He knows a lot of that hillbilly hoedown, barn dance kind of fiddlin'. There's nobody alive today who can stand up to Donnie playing Bob Wills. He's got the meat, man."

Scruggs says the best thing about Herron: "he's untainted by high school orchestra."

Some would say the band's sound has a lot of Buck Owens influence or even the Derailers of more recent vintage. Just listen to "She's Talkin' To Someone." But Mead shrugs off any undue influence by the Bakersfield Sound or any other style.

"On stage on Lower Broadway we played everything from Buck Owens, Hank Williams, the Ramones, Chuck Berry, Dean Martin and Elvis Costello," Mead recounted. "When you're playing for tips and what somebody with a five-dollar bill wants to hear, you'll end up playing"

A lot of Tangled in the Pines compositions deal with time-honored country themes of love gone sour, too much honky-tonkin' and down home country livin'. But the title cut is different. It's a message that's really heavy or maybe means nothing at all. Scruggs and Mead are vague about the meaning.

"It's a story, a true story," Scruggs says with a hint it may be somewhat autobiographical. "We just changed the names to protect the innocent."

As Mead put it, "We just write and play what we do." And that's the beauty of it because we did have all that experience flying by the seats of our pants on Lower Broadway. Whatever we do, it's gonna come out kinda sounding hillbilly."

"We're trying to expand what we do and not lose people along the way," Scruggs adds. "We're trying to get our point of view across without hitting people over the head, saying, 'hey look at me. I have something important to say.' Once you do that you lose your touch."

There's a sense that members of BR549 would be the last to take themselves too seriously. "At the end of the day it's just music, Mead says. "You're not going to save the world, but you might save somebody's night."

BR549's association with Dualtone Records comes after a long relationship with Arista Record and a one-album deal with Sony. Mead thinks there are major disadvantages to a major label deal.

"Unless you're ready to sell 10 million records right out of the gate, they don't bother with you. They're not into artist development. And we still get a lot of attention and respect."

Despite a revitalized career and a hot new album that reinforces their musical philosophy, the boys of BR549 still hold onto their roots on Lower Broadway. They know they have a good thing going.

Scruggs know the independence of not following the rules of the corporate music industry is a great benefit.

"We can travel around the world and not have jobs," Scruggs says. "That's pretty good."

And Mead smiles as he says, "We've worked long and hard not to work long and hard."

With that refreshing observation, BR549 walks back on stage as the six foot blonde spiker from Sausilito examines the multi-colored eagle tattoo on the bicep of a 60-year-old "artist" from Des Moines.

—Jack Bowe
June 2004

Photo by Eric England