About JOHN D. HALE BAND:
In today’s world of over produced country music that is made for the masses, it’s not always a bad thing to be a little left of center or to do things your own way and not have 25 people looking over your shoulder telling you what to be, what to wear, how to sing and which songs to sing. That road that is a little left of center is the exact road that the members of the John D. Hale Band intend on taking. Be it wrong or be it right, the JDHB is dead set on making country music their own way - without exceptions.
In 1989, when John’s brother Jimmy and Smooth Roose (Lead Guitar, Mandolin, Banjo) gave a 10 year old John D. Hale a worn out cassette tape of “No Kinda Dancer†by Robert Earl Keen, Jr., no one would have guessed it would change their lives. Too young to actually grasp the deep songwriting of the album, John still recognized that it was something different from the big country stars of that time and was something that was real and hell his big brother Jimmy and buddy Smooth loved it, so it had to be cool, right? Fifteen years later marked the beginning of the John D. Hale Band. John along with Smooth Roose, John’s nephew Cody Phillips (Bass), Jay Cagle (Drums), and recent addition of Chris Brotherton (Guitar, Drums), set out to do things their own way and play and record music the way that it’s supposed to be done - real and honest .
The release of the JDHB’s debut album “One Of A Kind†in March of ‘06 grabbed the attention of people worldwide getting radio airplay all over Europe, Australia, Canada, and the U.S. That along with the growing popularity of satellite radio has taken this little Missouri band a long way. “One Of A Kind†ended the year being the 17 album out of the top 50 albums of 2006 on XM Radio’s Channel 12 X-Country. Seeing your name on the same chart as your heroes that you grew up listening to is great. The JDHB takes the most pride in putting on one of the best live shows you’ll ever see. They have had the opportunity to share stages with some of the best touring acts around including Texas icon turned country music superstar Jack Ingram, outlaw legend David Allan Coe, Texas country rockers Reckless Kelly, Red Dirt mavericks Jason Boland and the Stragglers and many more. Trying to pigeonhole the sound of a live JDHB show is next to impossible - its everything from straight forward bluegrass to straight up rock ‘n roll and everything in between. Be on the lookout for the early spring release of “Live at the Snorty Horse Saloonâ€, the bands first live album, which is guaranteed to make anybody feel at home in a smoky ‘ol bar.
Take an 8 state banjo champion (Smooth); an ex-radio DJ turned singer/songwriter and all around great musician (Chris); a drummer who grew up around a Dad who played for Marty Robbins and a Grandfather who played with Bob Wills (Jay); a 19 year kid who can cowboy with the best of ‘em and learned how to play the bass in a week to get us out of pinch (Cody); and a songwriter that grew up on an exotic animal ranch who tries his damnedest to write songs that are real and songs that are honest as the day is long (John); and you have the cast of “misfits†that make up the John D. Hale Band. Not the prettiest group of guys in the world, not the most talented, but a group that puts more heart and soul into music than anyone else. It is a given that the John D. Hale Band will be around for a long time preaching their brand of country music to anyone who will listen.
