Thursday Night Entertainment
Jamey Johnson to
Perform at Tri-State Rodeo
In
keeping with last year’s success, the Tri-State Rodeo will
headline a national music act after the Rodeo performance on Thursday
night, September 10th. This year Jamey Johnson, acclaimed Country
singer/songwriter will take the stage.
Jamey
Johnson’s critically acclaimed album, That
Lonesome Song,
has been certified gold by the RIAA commemorating 500,000 in sales.
The record has spent 20 weeks inside the top ten on Billboard’s
Top Country Albums chart.
Jamey
is the co-writer of the CMA and ACM 2007 Song of the Year “Give
It Away,”
recorded by George Strait. Trace Adkins, George Jones and Joe Nichols
have also recorded his songs. But instead of sitting at home counting
his royalty checks, Jamey Johnson recorded more than 40 songs during
the past year.
Making
music comes as naturally to Jamey Johnson as breathing. He was raised
outside Montgomery, Alabama in a family that was poor but highly
musical. Like so many country musicians, Jamey first performed gospel
music in churches with his father.
Jamey
is a study in contrasts. He was raised in a devout household, yet he
spent part of his youth drinking beer and playing country songs at
night on the Montgomery tombstone of Hank Williams. He has a
backwoods upbringing, but is a formally trained musician who knew
music theory as early as junior high school. He is deadly serious
about his music, yet has an outrageous sense of humor. With his
piercing pale-blue eyes and biker beard, he looks like a hell raiser,
but he has the heart of a poet.
He
seems like a rebel, but Jamey spent eight years as a member of the
highly disciplined U.S. Marine Corps Reserves. The week he was
discharged, the rest of his unit was ordered to Iraq.
By
then, Jamey Johnson was in Nashville trying to launch a country
career. He arrived on Jan. 1, 2000, spending every dime he had to
make the move. He took a job as a salesman for a sign company, then
worked for an industrial pumping company. In 2001-2004 he ran his own
successful construction firm, restoring buildings devastated by
fires, hurricanes or tornados.
Performing
in Nashville nightspots led to work singing songwriters’ “demo”
tapes on Music Row. Producer Buddy Cannon was impressed with Jamey’s
soulful singing, as well as the direct honesty of his songwriting.
Song publisher Gary Overton signed Jamey to EMI Music and joined
Buddy in the effort to land him a recording contract. Those efforts
paid off with a label deal and Jamey’s hit single “The
Dollar”
in 2005. He hit the road – and the honky-tonks – with
relish.
Following
a deep period of isolation and introspection, Jamey Johnson entered
the recording studio in April 2007. Within months, Jamey emerged with
That
Lonesome Song,
a collection of extraordinary compositions that is equally noteworthy
for its lyrical craftsmanship and its strikingly original sound.
At
the heart of That
Lonesome Song
is a trio of great story songs. The frank lyric of “High
Cost of Living”
paints a dramatic portrait of a man who hits bottom and winds up in
prison. “Mary
Go Round”
is the cautionary tale of a woman who goes through a divorce and
loses her moral compass. “In
Color,”
the collection’s first single, is the moving depiction of a man
looking back at his life in black-and-white photographs.
“It’s
been a work of love. We just had such a good time pulling it all
together.”
In
2009, Johnson has performed for sold-out crowds of music fans to whom
he says he owes this great achievement. “A gold record is one
of the only awards that truly comes from your fans,” says
Johnson. “They just made our album relevant to country music.”
That
Lonesome Song
was released on Mercury Records on August 5, 2008. The music
industry, fans, country radio and journalists from all over the
country were drawn to the authenticity of Johnson’s music and
he immediately garnered rave album reviews. That
Lonesome Song
made “Best Albums of 2008” lists (all genres) by Rolling
Stone, USA Today, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, The
Washington Post, Houston Chronicle, The Dallas Morning News,
Billboard, PASTE
and many more. iTunes named Johnson’s That
Lonesome Song
the Best Country Album of 2008 and his debut single, “In
Color,” Best Country Song of 2008.
Members
of The Recording Academy validated the impact of Johnson’s
album by nominating him for three Grammy’s with one in the
prestigious Best Country Album category alongside veteran artists
George Strait, Randy Travis, Patty Loveless and Trisha Yearwood.
Recently,
Johnson took home the ACM Song of the Year award for his hit single
“In Color.” This was Johnson’s second win in the
ACM Song of the Year category. He previously won in 2006 for “Give
It Away,” which was recorded by George Strait. Johnson will
perform that song as a duet with Lee Ann Womack on George Strait’s
Artist of the Decade special which will air on May 27 at 8:00PM ET/PT
on the CBS Television Network.
CMT
just announced their first round finalists for the “2009 CMT
Music Awards” and Johnson received two nominations for “In
Color” - one for Male Video of the Year and the other in the
USA Weekend Breakthrough Video of the Year category.
For ticket
information, contact the Tri-State Rodeo Ticket office at
319-372-2550 or 1-800-369-3211.
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