Nashville Years I

A little over a year ago, I decided I wanted to tell the story of my Nashville years, 1982-1989. Seven years, it was, although it seemed much longer than that to me. I guess I crammed a lot of living into that space of time. Either that or living on the edge of "making it" just made it seem like a long time. Anyway, I wrote the blog posts "Prelude to Nashville" and "Nashville 1980" before getting sidetracked. A recent trip to Music City, however, has me thinking about that place and those years once again. So, over the next while—I don't know how long—I'll write what I can remember.

My real Nashville experience began when I was 22 years old. The scene: Walnut, North Carolina, sometime in April of 1981. I had been a year back from my 1980 experience in Nashville, which was largely to do with attending Belmont College. I'd done a little more school at the University of North Carolina at Asheville in the fall of 1980, making it through half a semester before dropping out and going to work in a sports store operated by my good friend Mike Tweed. I was singing in churches with Mike, his wife Bobbie, my aunt Ernie and my mom. It was during this time that I wrote several Christian songs, the only one of which that still survives is "Dear Mother." For a period in late 1980 and early 1981, that's the only type of song I wrote. But that spring of '81, I started writing some secular songs again.

My best friend at the time was Karen Smith, who had been a fan of the White Water Band and loved to listen to my music. I made some tapes for her, although I couldn't tell you now what was on them. Karen had a younger sister still in high school, and this younger sister had a classmate and friend named Ronnie Weathers. Ronnie's father Ron Weathers was an entertainment booking agent who also did some entertainer/artist management.

Back to April 1981. I was sitting at home in Walnut watching—I remember—an episode of The Greatest American Hero. The telephone rang, and on the other end of the line was Ron Weathers, who said that he had heard my music on a tape his son had brought home from school. He also said that he'd like to meet with me. I was, of course, flabbergasted and quickly said I'd be glad to meet with him and play him some songs.

A few days later we met at his office near Asheville: Surefire Productions. I sat in the plush red velvet chair across from his desk and played a few of my tunes for him. He seemed pleased with them but not overly impressed. As a final song, I played him a new one called "Daisy." That floored him. Suddenly he was excited about my music and me, and talk about taking me to Nashville was on the table. Also on the table was talk about a management contract. I didn't really know what that entailed, but I had an idea—I'd heard about "managers."

If I'm not mistaken, Ron and I were off to Nashville within a couple of months of our first meeting. We were to meet some fellow there that Ron knew from New Orleans (or maybe Atlanta)—a record producer named Sonny Limbo, who had just helped put together a big hit record, "Key Largo" by Bertie Higgins. Of course, just being on the fringes of a success story like that was enough to make my young head swim with "What ifs." When we arrived in Nashville, lo and behold, Sonny Limbo was nowhere to be found. He'd gotten hung up in New Orleans (or Atlanta) and wouldn't be able to meet us. (Remember the days when we had no email and no cell phones?) At some point, Ron reached Limbo by telephone and was advised to go see Earl Richards. "Leave no stone unturned" was to be the theme of our Nashville visit, but we didn't get any further than the meeting with Earl.

I didn't know it then, didn't know it until it was much too late to recover my career, but the stone Earl was under ought to have been left unturned.