Music memories keep the dream alive
“When I was in Austin, there was this country radio station right across the freeway from where I lived. I would call in and get through a lot, and I got to know the afternoon DJ. One time he said, ‘You want me to come pick you up in the Hot 93 van, and we’ll go to a club and pass out some CDs? You can be my helper.’ I said, ‘Hell, yeah, dude. That sounds awesome.’ After that, he told me about an open mic Friday at the station, where you bring in your acoustic guitar and sing a song that you’ve written. So I left the tape deck ready to record my performance, and then ran across the freeway with my 12-string. On the air I said to my friend back at our place, ‘Start taping, Kevin.’ The morning crew, Lisa and Ernie, got a chuckle out of that. When they asked if I was ready to sing, I got a little nervous because they said there were thousands of people listening. But I sang my song, and it went pretty well. It was called ‘On the Run.’ It’s an Old West kind of thing. It’s about a guy who says he was framed for shooting somebody, and he’s on the run. It’s based on a true story, an experience I had years ago.
“There was another time where one of my songs won an award on KILT in Houston. It was the Lone Star Band Search Contest. It was a song called ‘Bubba.’ The chorus goes, ‘Bubba was an everyday, red-blooded redneck, beer-drinking, wishful-thinking, All-American man.’ It’s a real fast boogie-woogie song. They called me a couple weeks later and said I won. I got a $1,000 gig playing at Traders Village. I paid myself $500 and split $500 with the other guys in the band. That was around the time Garth Brooks, Brooks and Dunn, and all of them started coming out, and country music changed. It wasn’t crying in your beer with a lot of pedal steel. It was more guitar, and it was rocking. I saw that style was getting popular. So I thought, I don’t care, I’ll sell out. I want to become famous. I’ve got to play ball with the record companies and do whatever the hell they want. I’d watched other guys try to get signed. But they wouldn’t play ball, and guess what? They’re probably as poor as I am right now.
“I never did realize that big dream. It’s been like 10 or 15 years since the band was active. We were supposed to do a reunion gig recently, but I couldn’t make it because I had to work. I’ve got to do something to pay the bills.”
— Holt Maggard
(Note: Holt Maggard died as the result of a traffic accident on June 18, 2021.)
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