Lane1777,

Exile is pretty much the main reason I came to Nashville. I had lived a rock career for 12 years, starting early in high school, with the music of FOGHAT, KISS, and many of the Southern rock era bands like 38 SPECIAL (who I would end up being a co-writer with their main writer, Jim Peterik) Allman Brothers, Charlie Daniels, and Skynyrd. In the 80's, we morphed into a band similar to Journey, Styx, Loverboy, and rode that for a few years throughout the Southeast. Then, music started to change in rock. It went darker, first with the "HEAVY METAL BAND OF THE WEEK (RATT, Poison, etc) and later into Seattle Grunge, NIRVANA, and then into hip hop and rap, and everything was very, very dark. Too dark for me.

Then, I started listening to country music. On a Saturday afternoon, I was giving tickets to go see Lee Greenwood, who I liked, with the opening act EXILE, who had been a rock act. They hit the stage like a firestorm, with GREAT SONGS, ENORMOUS HARMONIES, and just a rocking attitude that you would see in those Southern Rock days, I was HOOKED on Country. I had always been sort of a fan, loved George Jones and those other acts like the OAKS (My Dad sang with them for a bit in their gospel days) and others.

At that time I met a group of people who were songwriters, and got a mentor, Ron Muir, who had lived in Nashville for years with some success writing wise. That's when I started thinking of moving to Nashville, writing country stuff, and ended up moving in 1988. Over the years I've performed with almost all of those people in one way or another, JP Pennington, Tony Hazelton, Sonny Lemaire, have all been writers I've performed with and gotten to know a bit. Most of the people who I watched those years ago, I have come to know and be around through my time in this town.

Most of them are still out there (although today, mostly OUT THERE AT HOME, due to Covid) but they still write, produce, perform, work with other people. It's sort of the way of things. Most people start with dreams to be hit artists, and some achieve that. Then they morph into writers, producers, etc. yet, still perform themselves. It's sort of like the Rap world where some star comes out, forms their own company, then develop other stars underneath them, while keeping their hands in. You find that in most forms of music.

But Exile is still one of my favorites. When you asked about "POGO" were you talking about "POCO?" Those guys were amazing, with astounding harmonies and musicianship, but their biggest claims to fame is they provided the two bass players for the EAGLES. Randy Miesner and Timothy B. Schmidt. Music is an odd family tree and it is cool to learn about all these influences and offshoots that people go through in a career.

Good conversation. Thanks.
MAB