ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Wednesday, February 19, 1997 TAG: 9702190054
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: NASHVILLE
SOURCE: JIM PATTERSON ASSOCIATED PRESS
You may be missing one of the most beloved bands in Nashville.
BR5-49 is Music City's house band. Label executives tripped over themselves last year trying to sign the post-modern honky-tonkers to a contract.
Critics raved about their debut album, ``Live From Robert's,'' and its follow-up, the self-titled ``BR5-49.'' Billboard wrote the quartet ``could be the future of country music.''
Grammy voters nominated BR5-49 for best country music single for ``Cherokee B oogie,'' which wasn't even a major hit.
The band even got a fan letter from Bettie Page, the cult pinup from the 1950s, after they put out a song called ``Bettie Bettie.''
``Your hillbilly twang takes me back to my early years in Nashville when I was such a big Grand Ole Opry fan,'' she wrote BR5-49's Chuck Mead, who wrote the song.
Cracking radio has been another matter. Charlie Cook, who helps program music for about 250 stations through the Westwood One Radio Network, said he didn't play the band's first two singles.
``It's awfully difficult as a radio programmer to truly be on the cutting edge,'' Cook said. ``We like to talk about being on the cutting edge a lot. But we're a cautious lot.
``They look different, they sound different. They don't fit the mold. While many of us complain about the sameness, very few of us are willing to take the chance - myself included.''
Despite the limited radio support, Arista Records has managed to sell almost 120,000 CDs of ``BR5-49.'' The third single is the gimmicky ``Little Ramona (Gone Hillbilly Nuts).'' It shares its rock-chick-turned-country theme with ``Rock My World (Little Country Girl),'' a hit by multiplatinum labelmate Brooks & Dunn.
``I like the story line,'' said Arista executive Bobby Kraig, whose job it is to persuade radio programmers to take a chance on the record. ``I think it's a real fun record. I think it has a real good shot.''
Named for the five-digit phone number Junior Samples once used in a car salesman sketch on ``Hee Haw,'' BR5-49 was a favorite of the Nashville music industry and college students before Arista signed the group.
They played for tips at Robert's Western World, a combination boot store/honky-tonk near the Ryman Auditorium, home of the Opry from 1943 to 1974.
Bassist ``Smilin''' Jay McDowell said BR5-49 was unique in Nashville at the beginning because, unlike other groups, they weren't sniffing around for a record contract. Other members in the band include Gary Bennett, Don Herron, ``Hawk'' Shaw Wilson and Mead.
``So many people come to Nashville with that idea [getting a record contract], and that wasn't what it was about [for BR5-49],'' which is why it was so easy to turn down labels when they'd say `You've got to change the name.'''
The group members, who hail variously from the Pacific Northwest, Kansas, Missouri and Indiana, got to know each other in Nashville as aspiring musicians. They gravitated to the downtown honky-tonk scene because they found a common ground with beer and oldies by Johnny Horton.
The group's swinging, retro sound became wildly popular at Robert's, sparking a renaissance of the Lower Broadway honky-tonks. The band is a virtual encyclopedia of country music, able to count off obscure hits from the 1940s at the shout of a drunken patron.
A bidding war eventually broke out for the band - Sony, Arista, Geffen and RCA all courted BR5-49. Arista chief Tim DuBois won, mostly because he promised to try and sell the band as-is, not groom them for the marketplace.
``We didn't feel like there was pressure on us to make a record that was compatible with what was coming out from the mainstream artists,'' McDowell said.
``We feel really lucky because I know that's not always the case, that there's a lot of people that have to perform music that their heart's not really into, and I feel bad for those people.''
LENGTH: Medium: 78 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: AP. BR5-49 is a hit in every way except for the one thatby CNBsells the most CDs - on country radio. color.