Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, November 29, 1994                   TAG: 9411300007
SECTION: EXTRA                    PAGE: 6   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

HE'S JUST AN OL' GUITAR PLAYER WHO LIKES PEOPLE

The crew and band members sitting at nearby tables chuckle. They know their boss is having a little fun at the expense of his laid-back manner.

Yes, the man who by consensus is the nicest guy in country music might also be the most relaxed.

He's definitely one of the hottest. Since his first big hit, 1990's Grammy-winning "When I Call Your Name," he's been a fixture at the top of the country charts - most recently with "Whenever You Come Around" and "What the Cowgirls Do," the first two singles from his current album "When Love Finds You." He's picked up another four Grammys, and last year was named the Country Music Association's entertainer of the year.

As a singer, songwriter and lead guitarist, Gill represents a rare combination of versatility and virtuosity, earning critical respect to go with the commercial success. His fellow musicians are certainly clued in: Mark Knopfler, for instance, invited him to join Dire Straits in 1989, just before Gill's solo career kicked into high gear.

None of this seems to have gone to his head. Indeed, Gill has been spending the hours preceding the show shuffling sleepily through the business of sound check and pasta dinner.

Ask him about his pre-concert routine - for many artists a neurotic ritual of isolation, vocal exercises, wardrobe decisions, etc. - and he just laughs.

"A lot of Nintendo," he finally offers.

The Oklahoma native is sitting in his dressing room, wearing a T-shirt, rumpled jeans and thongs - an outfit he'll upgrade only slightly for the show with a change of shirts and the addition of shoes and a jacket. Talk about a regular-guy image.

"I certainly don't go out of my way to sell that to people," he says. "I think sometimes people take their success and their career and their whole deal way too serious. I really don't. I'm still just a guitar player, in my mind.

"I think that just comes from me being secure about myself. I wasn't any different 10 years ago or 20 years ago. I just try to be normal. I like people. I'm approachable. It's not a conscious effort to be a certain way. I just am."

Not everything in Gill's life has been as sunny as his demeanor would suggest. His older brother Bob died of a heart attack early last year, ending what Gill calls "a rough life." And in a golf course robbery, Gill found himself facing a sawed-off shotgun.

"I had nightmares about it for a long time - but in the nightmares I got shot," he says. "I still get jumpy if somebody runs up on stage during a show."

And despite his substantial charity work, including AIDS-related projects, Gill has come under fire for not wearing a red ribbon in support of the issue.

"My response to that is I think everybody's deserving," says Gill, who would obviously prefer to be talking about music than touchy controversies. "There needs to be a green ribbon, a brown ribbon, a yellow ribbon, a pink ribbon, for farmers, ecology - there's an awful lot of problems besides just one."

And he admits there are sides of him the public doesn't see.

"I have drive and ambition," he says. "There are things that I'm intense about. I get on the guys if they're not playing as good as they can and should. I want things to be the best. I'm a perfectionist. I want everyone else to be equally committed. I have a temper that shows up once in a while."

That doesn't seem to bother his musicians.

"I'll tell you what kind of guy he is," says drummer Martin Parker, a Gill band member for three years. "I had rotator cuff surgery earlier this year, and he told me don't worry about it, take as long as you need, your job's here. ... Anybody else in this business would have fired me.''

Gill's steely tenor was forged in the propulsive drive of bluegrass, but it's pliant enough to negotiate the supple ballads that have become his musical signature.

His music ranges from rootsy Western swing to pop-country hybrids to hard-core country tear-jerkers, but his trademarks are soaring expressions of affirmation and devotion such as "Look at Us" and "I Still Believe in You" - classic records that are closer to Smokey Robinson than "Smokey and the Bandit."

"I found something that works, and that's pretty comforting," Gill says. "But I'm always tinkering. I always want to do something a little different."