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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Jan. 29, 1981)
-Mddm £>Ii-f J. Nunn brings his music to Cell By Cathy Saathoff Battalion Staff Country singer Gary P. Nunn wants to take his music and that of his friends to the people. Nunn and the Sons of the Bunk- house Band will appear with the Shake Russell-Dana Cooper Band at Cell Block Five in College Station on February 13 to promote their albums and. music. Large record companies, Nunn said, spend money to promote new releases, but a lot of the money goes to middlemen, and the artist doesn't get a fair deal. To combat this, Nunn has formed his own publishing com pany, Nunn Publishing, and has released an album on his own label, Tumrow Records, with the Sons of the Bunkhouse Band. The album, "Nobody But Me," con tains one Nunn original, and 11 written by friends who write for Nunn Publishing. But the one song Nunn is most known for is nowhere to be found on the album. Nunn is alternately known as the guy who wrote "London Homesick Blues," the classic story of a lonely Texan stuck in London who wants to go "home with the armadillo." Nunn immor talized the song by leading a sing- along at the end of Jerry Jeff Wal ker's "Viva Terlingua" album. Nunn is pleased with the suc cess of that one song, but he has written others. "You only need one song," Nunn said. "But I'd be pleased if everybody paid as much attention to the rest of my songs at they do to that one." Last year, Roseanne Cash re corded another of Nunn's songs, "Couldn't Do Nothin' Right," which went to number 10 on the country charts. Nunn's songs are inspired by "heartache," he said. "You take little slices of life, and you set them down, sort of pinpoint them in time," he said. "I save some, let others go." Nunn said he has taken time off from writing lately, but hopes to find time to compose more songs sometime soon. The music on "Nobody But Me" is "basic Texas country music, good two-step music," Nunn said. "If you want country, I'll give you country," he said. "We put out quite a lot of music for a four- piece band." Nunn has been with the Sons of the Bunkhouse for about a year. Before that, he worked his way around the progressive country music circuit, headquartering in Austin. "I've been playing music since I was a kid," Nunn said. He went to Austin in 1967 and played with dif ferent bands, including Michael Murphey, until 1972, when he joined Jerry Jeff Walker's Lost Gonzo Band. The Gonzos broke off from Walker in 1977, Nunn said, and after two years the band broke up completely. Not long after that, Nunn started the Sons of the Bunkhouse Band and went on the road, "in a pickup truck and a horse trailer," touring the Southwest, including Grin's in College Station. The band consists of Michael Hardwick, of Mesa, Ariz., playing pedal steel, Paul Goad of Fort Worth playing bass, and Billy Sink of Fisher, Texas playing drums. Nunn plays 20 different instru ments. In July of last year, Nunn said, "things were sort of bogging down." The band was tired of making the rounds at small bars, and wanted to do an album. The result was "Nobody But Me," which was recorded live in a studio in New Mexico. Nunn has moved from Austin to a horse ranch in Oklahoma. He is working on his new project, an alternative method for publicizing records which are produced on small labels. Nunn's idea works on GaryP. Nunn Block "sheer human energy," without capital, he said. The show at Cell Block Five will help with this promotion. B.J. Cowgill, one of the partners in Solid Pops! Productions, which is co-sponsoring the show with Texas A&M University Class of '82, said the company is "trying to bring some of the best talent in Texas to Bryan." Shake Russell and Gary P. Nunn are two of the best, she said. "Hopefully, it'll be a lot of fun," Cowgill said. "It'll be the biggest party we've ever thrown." The show will help promote the artists involved, and will be in a "relaxed, comfortable atmosphere for the audience and the artist," Cowgill said. Randy Vandervoort, the other half of Solid Pops!, said, "I think this town needs it. It's ready for it." Solid Pops! productions was formed to "snare the music" with the people, Vandervoort said.