THE WAGONEERS

by Rob Patterson

When The Wagoneers first came together in late 1986, little did they know how fitting the name they chose would become over time. Back then they were just four young Texas musicians barely into their twenties who wanted to write, play and sing real country music. Now reunited a quarter century later, The Wagoneers are heralded as
pioneers and trailblazers, and rightly so. The group broke and seeded the ground for Americana and alternative country plus presaged the rise of young country that is in full bloom today in Nashville as well as a thriving revival of roots and progressive country in their hometown of Austin, Texas. They did it through the power of their songs and a potent unity as a genuine band. And their best is yet to come.

Hailed in Rolling Stone by veteran journalist and country music expert Chet Flippo as “the best honky-tonk band I’ve ever seen,” Monte Warden (lead vocals and rhythm guitar), Brent Wilson (lead guitar and backing vocals), Tom Lewis (drums) and Craig Pettigrew (bass and backing vocals) made a “contribution to the never-ending search for real country music that places them in the history books,” says All Music Guide. Raul Malo and Jeff Tweedy have both credited The Wagoneers for paving the way for their own respective bands, The Mavericks and Uncle Tupelo. In the two decades since the group broke up, The Wagoneers’ legend has continued to grow. “Now people can actually hear us,” enthuses Warden.

The magic of the music they made in their first run also returns on Essential Wagoneers, a 25-track compilation of the band’s two A&M Records albums plus three unreleased original gospel numbers they tracked in 1988. It’s a delightful introduction or flashback, depending on your perspective, to the band’s adept mix of old school country roots with the pop twang of Buddy Holly and the Everly Brothers and a bracing youthful energy. Sounding as fresh today as it did when the songs were recorded in the late 1980s, it’s timeless music that could only have come from The Lone Star State.

At the dawn of 2011, little did the four Wagoneers realize that they would soon again be playing music together. But then they were asked to perform at the annual Austin Music Awards show on the capstone Saturday night of South By Southwest in March. As soon as they gathered to work up a 20 minute set it was almost as if they had never parted ways some two decades earlier. And it soon was apparent to all of them that it was time for The Wagoneers to roll once more and not just reclaim their proud legacy but burnish and build on it further.

“We started playing and within 10 seconds we were The Wagoneers,” Warden happily recalls. “I had printed out lyric sheets and written down the keys that the songs were in and all this stuff. We began to play and I knew all the words and all the keys and how they went.” The circle was indeed unbroken.

Then once they worked up a new song, it was obvious that something more than a reunion was in the offing. “That was when, I think, we all realized that we weren’t done,” says Warden.

It’s no surprise that The Wagoneers were like a band that never broke up as soon as they reunited. Their very first show in early 1987 was preceded by some three months of rehearsals nearly every day of the week, and in one 12-month span during 1988 and ’89 the foursome played more than 270 shows. Being as tight a unit as possible and consistently striving to become better as musicians and a band was their ethos throughout their first run. As Warden explains, “We were always aware that we wanted to be the best band in the world.” In 1983 Warden won Best New Band at the Austin Music Awards at the age of 15 with his band Whoa, Trigger! Around the same time Houstonites Wilson and Lewis were making waves around Texas in the rockabilly combo Six Gun, and later toured with Sleepy LaBeef. As they all crossed paths a mutual admiration society was born.

When Lewis heard the songs Warden was writing following the break-up of Whoa, Trigger!, he immediately called Wilson back in from the road with LaBeef and recruited his Houston high school friend Pettigew to switch from guitar to bass. They all knew they’d found a rare musical union.

“We were all shocked at how good it was,” remembers Pettigrew.

Warden seconds the notion. “Right away, it sounded great. Something happens when the four of us are playing music together,” he notes.

One of their earliest shows was at the first South By Southwest Music Festival in March 1987. Both Nashville country labels and mainstream record companies immediately started wooing the band and making bids to sign them. After playing the CMJ Music Festival that summer, A&M jumped in with a generous offer and inked The Wagoneers to a deal. “The Wagoneers are about to revolutionize country music,” predicted The Houston Chronicle.

Their debut, Stout & High, was produced by Emory Gordy Jr. and released in early 1988. “An exceptional debut,” raves All Music Guide. “There really isn’t a weak cut here.” The album reached #43 on the country albums chart, eventually sold 100,000 copies, and yielded three singles that reached the middle of the country Top 100.

The band immediately launched into more than two years of near non-stop touring that found them sharing stages with country legends like Waylon Jennings, Willie Nelson and Emmylou Harris and stars like Vince Gill and The Judds as well as fellow country innovators such as Lyle Lovett and k.d. lang plus rockers like The Ramones, The Replacements and Soul Aslyum. “We came along and people just kinda went, what the hell was that?” recalls Warden. “We weren’t kitschy, we weren’t cool. We were just four young guys trying to play country music.”

They performed on the Grand Ole Opry, appeared on Austin City Limits, scored #1 videos on CMT, toured Japan with Bill Monroe, and played a number of European club tours that were eventually standing room only. A second album in 1989, Good For t une, landed another single at #53.

Reviews of their records and shows were universally positive and the band was consistently poised on the edge of a breakthrough. But as Warden observes, the time wasn’t quite right. “You have to put it in its context I think. We were 10 years after the ‘Outlaws’ and 10 years before Americana. In 1988, a young country act was someone in their thirties. And there was certainly no Texas music scene or anything like that yet,” he notes.

Then one night in 1989, after a club show in Detroit, The Wagoneers broke up. “It just ended suddenly,” recalls Warden. “Just like any band break up. We probably should have taken five and caught our breath. But that wouldn’t have been the passion that was The Wagoneers.”

Adds Lewis, “I think we broke up before the peak of our popularity. We were just getting started. Everywhere I’ve gone since I will talk to somebody who remembers us.”

Warden went on to make two albums for the Austin indie label Watermelon Records and another for Asylum Records in the 1990s, all of which garnered excellent reviews. He wrote a #2 hit for George Strait, “Desperately,” with his pal Bruce Robison, and has had his songs covered by such country stars as Travis Tritt, George Jones and Patty Loveless, friends and fellow Texans Kelly Willis, Jack Ingram and Bruce and Charlie Robison (individually and together), Austin musical heroine Toni Price and The Knitters. In recent years he has forged a career as a producer for acts like Edison Chair, who he got signed to Interscope Records, and classic pop crooner Kevin Ahart.

Wilson continued to work and write songs with Warden. He played on Warden’s debut solo album, which he helped arrange and demo at his home studio. He also played shows with his former bandmate as well as with Kelly Willis, and produced an album for his wife Janet Lynn. In 1998 he moved to Nashville where he toured, recorded and performed on the Grand Ole Opry with David Ball and such classic country artists that inspired him as a youth like Charlie Louvin, Vern Gosdin, Stonewall Jackson and Jan Howard. Wilson moved back to Austin in 2009, and was recently honored to play with James Burton, one of his biggest guitar heroes and influences.

Lewis has since played drums for Raul Malo, Junior Brown, Jim Lauderdale, Hank Thompson, Wanda Jackson and others, and did a three-year stint living in Nashville. He produced the debut album for now hit country artist Sunny Sweeney that helped her win her major label deal. He currently is a member of the bands Heybale! and Flat Top Jones and plays with Amber Digby.

Pettigrew did a stint with Lewis after The Wagoneers in The Millionaire Playboys with Charlie Robison in the early years of his career, and has since played with Dale Watson, Jim Lauderdale, Jesse Dayton and Mary Cutrufello. With a wife and four daughters to support, he then set the bass aside to drive a bus for Capital Metro in Austin.

Over the intervening years, The Wagoneers only reunited once to cut a song for the Austin Country Nights compilation in 1995. As for now and the future, “We’re 20 years older and better,” observes Warden.

“We appreciate what we have now,” notes Lewis. “We started as kids, and up ended back together as men.”

“We accomplished some incredible things at a very early age,” adds Wilson.

And The Wagoneers are as much of a true band as they were when they the first time around, maybe more so. “I didn’t know how special that was to have four guys who were so different and so alike and just perfect parts,” says Warden. “Now 20 years later something special happens when the four of us make music together.” And less than a month after their first show in 20 years, the band already has more than enough new songs to cut another album.

“It was unfinished,” Lewis observes. “I think we had a lot more to do. Maybe back then wasn’t the time. Now it is.”

“It feels real natural,” adds Pettigrew. “We’re like the same dudes only more mature. And it’s even more fun this time.”

“This is a once in a lifetime opportunity,” concludes Warden. “We are all very committed to take it wherever it leads us. We have a legacy to protect and make sure the music is as special as the reasons we got back together again. We have a responsibility to The Wagoneers to keep it special. It just feels good and right.”