Garth Brooks has been a primary force in the rise of Nashville songwriter Stephanie Davis since he recorded her chilling song about life’s defenseless innocents, “Wolves.”
That gave Davis her start as a recorded songwriter and now, three years later, she’s opening Brooks’ shows. In fact, she is scheduled to open for him Thursday through Saturday at the Rosemont Horizon.
“When he asked me,” Davis recalls, “I almost fell over dead. This was before I even had a record deal.”
Brooks asked Davis if she wanted him to help her get a deal and she said “No, thank you.”
“She said, `I want to get a deal knowing it’s me’ ” that’s getting it, he says, adding that Davis, the 6-foot-1 daughter of a Montana sheep rancher, is nothing if not gutsy.
The first night of his current tour, he says, she went out onstage in front of 23,000; the biggest crowd she had performed for before was 51.
“I was shocked at how well the people received her,” he says, “but she came offstage dejected. I said, `What is wrong with you?’ She said, `It just didn’t work.’
“The next night she’s doing a new number to close and the place is on its feet screaming along with her. She’s going, `Come on!’ and they’re screaming `Come on!’ She comes off the stage and I say, `Wow, where’d you find that (song)?’ And she said, `Well, last night I wrote it and taught it to the band this morning and played it tonight.’
“That’s when I knew this gal was sharper than sharp.”
Davis is also uninhibited by anybody in the practice of her craft. Brooks remembers going into the studio to record a song with her for her recently released album and finding it no picnic.
“Without intending to offend anybody,” he says, “in the studio we call her `Little Hitler.’ I didn’t think I was ever going to get out of there. I thought she might let it slide just because of who I was, but `No, that part’s not right,’ she’d say. I thought, `This girl’s tough.’ “
– Speaking of Brooks, he is helping Steve Wariner, for whom he once opened shows. He interviews Wariner in a one-hour radio special shipped to stations in the United States and Canada by Arista Records to promote Wariner’s current album, “Drive.”
– In a similar vein, Ronnie Dunn of Brooks & Dunn does a guest vocal on the Hank Williams classic “Take These Chains From My Heart” on Lee Roy Parnell’s new album, “On the Road.”
– Ricky Skaggs is working on a bluegrass album for release in ’94.
– Song Title of the Week: “We Must Be Loving Right” by Roger Brown and Clay Baker.
– Michelle Wright, who is still working on American superstardom, now basically owns her native Canada.
On the recent Canadian Country Music Awards, Wright took home four biggies-entertainer, female vocalist (her fourth consecutive), single (her third consecutive), and video of the year.
Her single and video awards were for “He Would Be Sixteen,” which concerns a 30-something mother remembering the son her parents took away from her and put up for adoption.
Wright opened the Canadian show with the sizzling “Guitar Talk.”
– Clint Black has a part in the Mel Gibson-Jodie Foster-James Garner film “Maverick,” but it isn’t interfering with the October portion of his Black & Wy Tour with Wynonna.
After doing two days of shooting for the movie in Oregon, he will return for more scenes later in the fall. He plays a gambler on a Mississippi riverboat.
