Mike McGuire SONGWRITER

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How does a rambunctious young man from a small town in North Alabama go from kicking field goals and digging graves to playing drums and writing songs for one of the most successful bands in the history of country music? “I guess this is just where the Lord wanted me to be,” laughs the energetic drummer and co-founder of the award winning super group Shenandoah. “Never in my wildest dreams did I ever think that thumping on Momma’s Tupperware bowls when I was five years old while watching the Partridge Family would lead to a career right smack dab in the music business.”
Though born in nearby Haleyville, Mike was raised in the cozy little town of Hamilton, Alabama and claims it as his home town. Hamilton proudly claims him right back. Mike developed a deep appreciation and interest in music early on and would set up his mother’s Tupperware bowls as a drum set using kitchen knives as sticks while playing along with his sister’s records and the radio and, like many other young boys, day dreamed of playing drums in a band. He taught himself how to play the guitar and began what would be a long term love affair with writing songs.
But an even bigger dream eclipsed any dreams of a music career. Like every boy growing up in Alabama, his real dream was to play football for the legendary Paul “Bear” Bryant at the University of Alabama. “I never really pursued music as a career, my big dream was to play football for the Tide but I hurt my foot in high school and went to kicking field goals,” he smiles. “I figured that would be my in to the team.”
One thing you learn quickly about Mike, when he sets his eyes on a goal he is tenacious in his pursuit. To him, obstacles are just learning experiences that put you closer to what you want. After a brief stint as a field goal kicker at Itawamba Junior College he finally realized his dream and got the chance to work under Coach Bryant, not as a field goal kicker ... but as a manager of his beloved Crimson Tide football team. “It was the greatest experience of my life,” he says proudly.
After college he came home to Hamilton and worked a brief stint for his uncle’s burial vault company ... using a back-hoe to dig graves. From there he moved on to the Farmer’s Home Administration and began to settle into life in a small town. It was then he began making periodic trips to the small recording town of Muscle Shoals, just 60 miles away. “My older brother Bud was writing songs for Fame and I was just going along for the ride and hanging out at the studio,” he explains. “I had been writing songs all through college and at my brother’s urging I started playing them for the publishing company.” That publishing company and Fame studios was owned and operated by the legendary producer Rick Hall. Mike landed a publishing deal with Fame and began commuting to Muscle Shoals, writing songs and becoming a fixture at the popular Alabama recording studio, sitting in on recording sessions, and working on his song writing craft.
Though his dream of playing drums in a band had long been put on the back burner, he welcomed a job offer from old friend Eddie Moore to play drums for the house band at the biggest club in Muscle Shoals, the MGM club. This was the move that would change Mike’s life forever. “I really took that job so I could move from Hamilton to the Shoals and concentrate on my writing, I had never even played in a band before and I never expected it to last.” He smiles and shakes his head. “Jim was playing guitar in the band and had just signed with Fame as a writer also ... this was in ‘84. The band members changed a bunch but Jim and I stayed with it and by ‘85 the MGM band became our band.”
Mike and future Shenandoah guitarist Jim Seales focused on their song writing careers and kept the MGM band going for extra income and for the fun of it. By late ‘85 the band was the hottest draw in North Alabama and the guys had the personnel in place that would become Shenandoah. “We weren’t even thinking about a record deal,” he says. “When we were approached about cutting songs for a possible album deal with Columbia we really weren’t that interested. We knew we had a good band and we definitely were “song” guys, so we thought, ‘what the heck’, we’d go in the studio and cut a couple of our songs, make a little money and that would be the end of it.”
He laughs now as he thinks about it. “That first album was released in ‘86 I think, none of us were really paying any attention to it. The first couple of singles made the charts but didn’t really do anything and Jim and I were still looking at writing songs as our main job, I’d even had a couple of cuts on other artists when our third single came out, ‘She Doesn’t Cry Anymore’. That song made the top ten and we were shocked when CBS asked for another album. I think that’s when we finally realized we could maybe make a career out of this Shenandoah thing.”
‘This Shenandoah thing’ quickly became the main focus in Mike’s life. He began to write songs specifically with Shenandoah in mind and the band hit the road in a van and trailer coming home only to go into the studio to work on a new album that would again change his life and have a huge impact on the direction of country music. ‘The Road Not Taken’.
“When that album came out in the late ‘80’s and ‘Church on Cumberland Road’ hit 1 and stayed there for a couple of weeks it changed the path of my life forever. That album yielded six hit singles and made Shenandoah a defining force in the country music industry. We were so busy, playing dates, writing and cutting songs, doing interviews and such,” he pauses to reflect. “Well it just seems like one day we were playing little bitty clubs and struggling to get by and all of a sudden we were on tour with Randy Travis when he was so incredibly big. I remember that first night ... they introduced us, the stage lights came on, the crowd roared ... and there I was ... playing drums with a great band with a hit record, in front of thousands of cheering fans. It really was a dream come true. It was so exciting, so scary really, it almost took my breath away. I couldn’t help but think about Momma’s Tupperware bowls,” he laughs.
From that defining moment Mike’s professional and personal life has orbited around Shenandoah, through the good and bad. The van burning, 11 1 singles, lawsuits over the band name, TNN awards, label changes, marriage, band member changes, 1 videos, a near blinding eye injury, ACM awards, more band member changes, Grammy Awards, the band breaking up, authoring hit songs, divorce, and finally, the band reforming and recording and producing a critically acclaimed new album in 2000. Through it all he has been a cohesive force in all things Shenandoah. His vision, and most of all his tenacity and determination, have carried him to places most people only dream about. He is a shining example of, ‘you can make anything happen if you just refuse to give up, dreams CAN become reality’.
“The past ten years have surely been an adventure, some good and some painful but all beneficial. I’ve changed so much and grown up with Shenandoah and I look forward to the next ten years.” He adds with a smile and a wink, “I’ve got a couple more dreams I’m trying to make come true.”