Country music is at its best when it honors the past while blazing a trail toward the future. Few artists can bridge the genre’s most beloved traditions while carving a path of their own, but Tommy Townsend successfully inhabits that unique space.
The Georgia native actually began recording his “new” album Southern Man more than 25 years ago working with Country Music Hall of Famer Waylon Jennings and his legendary bassist Jerry Bridges. Townsend met Jennings when he was just a kid and never dreamed his idol would one day become his mentor.
“Hell’s Angels used to do security for Waylon,” Townsend says, recalling the Georgia concert where he met Jennings. “My mom and dad were telling one of the guys that I liked Waylon and he said, ‘Bring Tommy down here to the gate after the show and we’ll let him meet him.’ I remember going on the bus and talking to him for 20-30 minutes. He was asking me questions about playing music and he was as nice as he could be, made me feel right at home.”
Though he was a youngster, Townsend felt comfortable talking music because it had always been an integral part of his life. “I started playing drums when I was five years old. When I was 12, I started playing guitar. I wanted a Telecaster because that’s what Waylon played,” he smiles. “All the Townsends played a little bit. I played music with my dad and cousins. They had a band.”
By the time Townsend met Jennings a second time, he was in his teens and had recorded a demo. “I had made a little tape and gave it to him and Jerry Bridges. They liked it,” Townsend says. “Jerry took me into the studio to record when I was a senior in high school and then Waylon jumped on board and he and Jerry started producing my stuff. I guess I was too young to realize what a legend he was.”
Bridges and Jennings began gathering songs for teenaged Townsend, soliciting material from such legendary songwriters as Dean Dillon, Roger Murrah, Troy Seals, Don Schlitz and other greats now firmly ensconced in the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame. “He’d always say make sure it fits you and what you believe and what you do,” Townsend remembers Jennings’ advice. “He always told me when you are listening to songs put yourself in that song and see if it moves you.”
In addition to finding songs and producing, Jennings also sings on several tracks including “Southern Man,” “If You Can’t Stand the Heat” and “Holes in My Boots” and “A Good Love Died Tonight.” Jennings plays guitar on “The Picker” and “Southern Man.” “Each song I remember doing it, where I was and basically what I was even wearing,” Townsend says of the sessions that produced Southern Man. “I remember Roger Murrah coming by when I was singing some of his songs and Troy Seals being in the studio.”
The album was actually recorded during two separate seasons in Townsend’s life. “‘Southern Man’ was cut in 1988. I was just a kid when ‘Southern Man’ and a couple of the songs were cut then and then ‘Trouble with a Capital “T,”’ ‘Stompin’ Ground’ and two or three more were cut in the late 90s. There were sessions about 10 years apart.”
Despite Jennings’ enthusiasm, the album didn’t find a label home and remained in storage until Audium’s Chuck Rhodes was looking to sign Townsend and became aware of the project. With one listen, he couldn’t wait to share it with the world. Though it was a long time coming, Townsend feels it’s the right time for Southern Man. “It’s so cool that it’s being put out properly. Everything has it’s time and everything has a plan,” he says. “I don’t know if there’s anything such as luck as it’s all God’s timing.”
Townsend kept the original tracks, bolstering them with a few tweaks here and there, but he re-sang the songs, bringing his last three decades of experience to the studio. After all, he’s now a seasoned performer with other projects under his belt that were produced by Jennings’ son, Shooter, and The Mavericks’ frontman Raul Malo.
Townsend has also spent years on the road, performing as a solo artist and as part of Waymore’s Outlaws, a group that features longtime members of Jennings’ famed band The Waylors. “It was like going out on the road with your favorite uncles because every one of them would look after me,” he says of traveling with Bridges, drummer Richie Albright and steel guitarist Fred Newell.
All that life experience and time on the road informs his performances on the album, giving ballads such as “If You Can’t Stand the Heat” and “Could and Still Do,” a soulful warmth and poignancy while infusing “Stompin’ Ground” and “Southern Man” with confidence and swagger. “Coming out 25 years later, now I have lived every song,” he says, “I can sing them more with conviction now than I could then because at 18, 19 or 20 I hadn’t lived any of that then.”
Though he loved Waylon and became part of his inner circle, Townsend admits there was a time he was tempted to distance himself from the legend. “From the get-go everybody associated me with Waylon and at one point I wanted to get away from that,” he says of working to establish his own creative identity. “But everything that happens is always something about him, so I’m going to carry on this mission. I feel like I’m an ambassador, bridging the generations in country music so people won’t forget the pioneers who helped make it what it is today. No matter what I ever do, there will always be Waylon in what I do. I’m going to embrace it, support it and just keep his thing and the Outlaw thing going.”
Townsend’s appreciation for his mentor is obvious in the album’s intro as Jennings’ voice introduces the artist when he opened a show for him in Georgia. It immediately signals that the listener is in for something special and song after song Townsend delivers in a strong, muscular voice that has been seasoned by life and influenced by the best.
“I’ve never even had the thought of quitting because music is so much a part of who I am,” says Townsend, who has also become a successful entrepreneur over the years. “I just feel fortunate to be able to share this music and honor Waylon’s legacy . . .and there’s a lot more to come!”
Tommy Townsend