FALL EURO TOUR

FEATURED ARTIST ON AIRPLAY DIRECT

TREE O RECORDS

Vince Gill

FALLON, NV

BEALE AIR FORCE BASE, CA

TUESDAYS AT BENTLEY'S IN BELMONT, NC

All the best,

Chris

Nominations Are In

The Charlotte Music Awards will hold its inaugural Awards Ceremony on Thursday, Sept. 6, 2007 at Ovens Auditorium, starting at 7 p.m. This event will honor local musical talent across a wide range of genres. Chris Cook has been nominated for Best Overall Artist and for Best Songwriter. The Awards Ceremony will feature live performances from local award recipients. In addition, Lifetime Achievement Awards will be presented to Carolinians with a history of dedication to music. This year’s recipients are Arthur Smith, Reflection Sound Studios and the Marshall Tucker Band.

It's no rumor...

Chris has been recording a record at Danny White's Sixteen Ton Recording Studios. The studio is  located at 1008 Sixteenth Avenue South. That's on Nashville's Music Row! This is a very special recording environment which features vintage equipment and the like. Chris has always held a very high regard for the music of days gone by, so this was a very exciting time. There were some pretty interesting players who joined in on the making of this CD. Bob Babbitt (Funk Brothers - Motown) and Ed Greene (known for his work with Steely Dan, Michael Jackson, Hall & Oates). How awesome that must have been. And if that wasn't cool enough for ya, Chris reported he sang the new songs through a mic Fleetwood Mac once used! The record is scheduled to come out early 2008 and is sure to be a good one.

Audlem Music Festival Buzz
 Musician helps lift Festival to new heights

Every live music fan knows when it’s happened – that moment when musicians hit such sublime heights that everyone there will remember and be proud to say: “I was there.” It happened last night as Heavy Weather, with guest American vocalist/guitarist Chris Cook, played to a packed Shroppie Fly. The ‘moment’ was an awesome rendition of George Harrison’s While My Guitar Gently Weeps, with Chris and Jim Kirkpatrick’s soaring guitars playing off each other to perfection, driven on by superb bass, drums and keyboards.


At the end of a memorable evening’s music, a visitor was heard to say to his friends: “I’ve heard great pub bands, I’ve heard crap ones. But that was the best ever!”

Chris Cook was heading from home in North Carolina to play a series of gigs in Denmark - but just wanted to play the Audlem Festival on the way. He’d met Jim Kirkpatrick when they played together at Key West’s famous Hogs Breath a year or so ago. Chris plays the Florida venue regularly and returns there straight after his Danish tour. His latest album, Small Town Gone is a beauty and well worth searching out or buying from Chris – he’ll be playing again on Monday night at the Shroppie.

Great World of Sound

Craig Zobel chose to film the movie Great World of Sound (Sundance 2007) in Charlotte and the Visulite Theatre had a local premiere. It’s a tale of young aspiring musicians and singers who get lured in by scammers who promise stardom (for enough money). The crooks take the money and run. Two of Chris Cook’s original songs were used in the making of the movie, “Go Back to Sleep” and “The One That Got Away” (Fatfried Music 2004). Hopefully, this movie will stop short the wishful thinkers – there's no short road to fame.

Imagine this – 25-cent wings, $2-draft beers and the chance to see and hear Chris Cook live. I really don’t think that life can get much better than that! The last Friday night of June my daughter and I enjoyed this treat when Chris entertained at Little Dooey’s Blues and Barbeque which is located across the street from Concord Mills. As we walked over to the restaurant, we ran into Kathy first. We talked a while and then headed in to find a seat. The hostesses told us that the only table available was the one right in front of Chris’s performance area. Laughing, we told them that was the exact table we wanted! After we were seated we got the great news about the cheap wings and beer…..and since we knew we would be there for the whole show we put in our order and waited for Chris to begin his show.

I had planned to provide the set list but some of the songs on my list will show my relative ignorance of musical history (and my inability to read my own handwriting!) I kept up pretty well in the beginning, so here goes. Chris’s first song of the night was “You Gonna’ Need Somebody” which I think is an old Blind Willie Johnson song. Chris was getting into the music, but not interacting with the audience yet. Next we heard Jackson Browne’s “These Days”. Chris has a wonderful ability to cover a song and allow you to hear the essence of the original artist’s performance while making it his own. In plain English, he sounded like Jackson Browne when he sang this song. I have heard him do this with Al Green songs too. Next up was “Lucky Me, Lucky You”, “Water Like Wine” and “Looking for a Miracle”. I really didn’t know any of these songs, but I loved hearing Chris perform them. He was getting into the music, interacting with the audience and enjoying himself and that is something that an artist just can’t fake. I was hoping he might start doing some of his own material and was pleasantly surprised when he sang “Three Chord Joe” for us. Next Chris wowed us with his guitar skills when he played a great rendition of “Statesboro Blues” and then his own “Don’t Go In There”. I think Chris writes some really fine lyrics and “Don’t Go In There” contains some of the best! We got the full Chris next – he played his guitar, stomped one foot and played the tambourine with the other, blew his harp and sang “Old Suede Coat”. This was followed by a great version of Marvin Gaye’s “What’s Going On?”. Chris mentioned that this was one of his all-time favorite songs. That got a giggle from the audience when he admitted that it was released the year before he was born! To round out the set he played two more of his songs: “Growing Up” and “Life is Good”.

Break time! Chris took the time to talk to everyone (and sample fried pickles, wings, and cake). One of the things I love about Chris is that he is willing to interact with the audience, both onstage and off. He really is a nice guy (with a huge talent).

The second set started with Chris’s “Old Guitar” and a little bit of info about the new guitar from Denmark that he was playing that night. It is a beautiful instrument with an appealing sound. The audience started making requests and I think that the next song was “Behind Blue Eyes” and then “Walking in Memphis”. Next we were treated to Chris’s “Home” and then a great version of James Taylor’s “Steamroller Blues”. (As a note, did you know that Elvis did this song too?) I got into the request mode and asked for “I’ll Be Alright” and Chris played an amazing intro into this song. Next, he played a song that he said he’d written a long, long time ago called “Ten Times the Blues” (which was pretty good) but he said the message was really pathetic. Remember that the audience was making requests? Chris thought he heard a request for some Tom Petty so he played “Breakdown” but I believe the actual words were “it’s not pathetic” – but how cool is it that Chris has such a vast knowledge of music that he responded the way he did? The next song was Jeff Black’s “King of the World” and then my notes get weird. The whole night was great, especially since Chris did so many of his own songs.

Remember the title mentioned “a half”? I learned during Chris’s break that he would be playing in Ballantyne ( I refuse to call it Charlotte) the next night with a band, instead of as a solo act. The bass player happened to be a mutual friend, so my daughter and I decided to make the trip to see them at Under the Grape. It was a totally different experience, with the majority of the music being covers. There was a bigger crowd than the night before and they really enjoyed Chris’s singing and choice of songs. Chris had fun teasing a guy up front that was requesting beach music or Buffett (but didn’t get either!) The beach music request got answered with “Sittin’ On the Dock of the Bay” which I really liked a lot. Oh, and they played “My Girl” which had me grinning from ear-to-ear!…..I used to sing it to my daughter when she was a little girl. The dancing guy was satisfied after Chris played “HandyMan”. The guys sounded great together – they jammed on a few songs including Chris’s “Old Suede Coat” which was the last song of the first set. Considering the fact that our seats were at the bar in a high traffic area, my daughter didn’t meet the age limit to even be there and it was 10:30 pm, we decided to leave. I’m sure the rest of the night was great – I don’t think it could have been anything less!

We really enjoyed getting to hear Chris play two nights in a row and play two totally different shows. Live music is my passion (well, listening to it is!). I can’t imagine anything better than attending a Chris Cook show – I can’t wait to do it all again!

Jakob Reitz
by Reece Bennett