With the success of The Road Hammers, Emerson Drive, Doc Walker, and Jason Blaine, Nashville has started to look somewhat like Canada’s 11th province. Joining those ranks has been Saskatoon-based act Wyatt, who sees that city as a gateway to gaining more acclaim and notoriety in Canada.
While ironic, the four-piece country-rock group, also sees their time in the musical home of country music as necessary in breaking to the next level of an industry that recently named them the top group and having the top single in Saskatchewan in 2008.
Being on the radio has definitely helped," explains Wyatt drummer Bray Hudson, “as has the constant touring around Western Canada.”
After releasing Snowed In, a Christmas album, in 2005, Wyatt — Hudson, Scott Patrick (guitar, vocals), Danny Fortier (guitar, vocals), and Cam Ewart (bass) — released its debut album, Hard Road, in 2007.
We didn’t release any singles off that because we didn’t feel it was quite there yet," explains Hudson, who grew up in Australia and moved to Canada in 1998. "Luckily, we got a lot of great advice from a lot of respected people in Nashville that got behind us and told us what was right to do.
We sat down and decided we had to produce an album that was ‘industry-standard’ which is the album coming out. We’re hopeful for an April release, but that’s still to be determined. We’re putting the finishing touches on things and hoping to firm up the last few songs that will go on it."
In June, Wyatt won The Next Big Thing, a talent contest sponsored by Big Dog 92.7 and produced by SaskMusic. By winning the event Wyatt collected a prize package valued at $20,000. Included in the package was $5,000 cash, along with the options of having a professional single released to radio, showcasing for music industry professionals, hands-on career guidance and an all-expenses paid trip to the 2009 Canadian Country Music Association awards in Vancouver.
While the new album doesn’t have a confirmed release date, their single “Ride On” has already started to garner attention. It debuted at No. 48 on the Billboard charts, which Hudson refers to as “the mother of all charts,” as well as charting No. 1 in Saskatoon, and fairly high on Big Dog 92.7.
Although the band only returned home from Nashville on Sunday after 10 days of recording the last three songs in Tennessee, they’re playing tonight through Saturday at the Pump Roadhouse.
Hudson admits that they are striving for national, and possibly international, recognition with the upcoming release, though he’s adamant that Canada is their first priority, with plans to continue to reside in Saskatchewan despite perceptions that it will make their career more difficult.
You’ve got to look after Canada first because that’s where you’re from. We’re concentrating on Canada — we have some ties obviously in the States but that’s a hard market to crack. It really is. That crossover (to the States) is very hard, so we want to focus on Canada first, as there are lots of country fans here that haven’t heard of us yet. A lot of people keep telling us that they were never really into country until they listened to us, and that’s coming from punk rockers, pop fans, and people into rock. It’s really fun that we can open that door by having that rock-country edge."
For all that’s going on with Wyatt, Hudson states that they’re excited to be coming back to Regina to see some old friends and make some new ones this weekend.
Describing what country music lovers can look forward to for the next three days, the drummer was very concise with his answer.
Two words — high energy," he say with a laugh. “We have a lot of fun on stage and we do a lot of the original songs that people love, and a selection of great covers we love to do. People are going to come down and they’re going to leave with a big smile on their face. There’s a lot of energy on stage and we love whipping the crowd into a frenzy.”
© Copyright © The Regina Leader-Post
