John David Kent, Burning Up the Roads in Oklahoma & Texas

‘She’s got more mud on her boots, then all of them frat boy cowboys do – and that says a lot.’ John David Kent turned some heads with ‘My Girl,’ one of the many singles from his debut album.

The video became CMT.com’s Pick Of The Week and was added to CMT’s Pure Country rotation. They have released three singles and plan to release more from the self-titled debut album and are currently touring in support of the first album.

‘We’ve been burning up the roads in Texas and Oklahoma. There are so many markets to play here [in Texas]. You can have legitimate career and build a fan-base here,’ says Kent. ‘We are also doing writing and talking to producers in Nashville for second album.’

Kent says that he loves touring. Let’s hope so, because he has been doing it for over 18 years. But he is also a family man. He credits his wife for helping him balance between his wife and their four boys.

If I didn’t have her and she wasn’t so steady and strong-willed it would be very tough. It takes a certain kind of person to live this gypsy life that we live, but I think it takes just as much of a unique person to be able to be with someone like that. Trust is the first and foremost thing that makes the relationship cohesive. My wife is full-time in the music business, she knows it, she gets it and it works for us,” says Kent.

Despite the fact that it works, he says he sometimes feels like the line ‘He’s a walking contradiction’ from the Kris Kristofferson song, ‘He’s A Pilgrim.’ “It seems like an internal war going on– when I am home I feel like I should be out on the road, when I am out on the road I feel like I need to be home,” explains Kent. “Always pulled- the line ‘walking contradiction’ rings true. It is something a lot of people, who have families at home, deal with. No one wants to be away from their kids but you want to feel like you are doing everything you can to provide for them at the same time.”

Kent started playing drums at age four and has been rocking since. “When I was 5 or 6, first song I definitely remember performing was ‘That’ll Be The Day’ by Buddy Holly on drums. My dad had a ’50s and ’60s rock n roll cover band and my uncle spent all day teaching that to me. I played it with them that night,”

His career steeps more into Rock-n-Roll. As a teenager, he formed the band Radish with Ben Kweller. The band was signed to Mercury Records when he was age 16 and started touring. Soon after came recording and touring with the Lemonheads, a national tour with My Morning Jacket and various other acts, as well as appearances on Letterman and Conan. Kent has toured Japan, opened for major bands like Kings of Leon and Incubus, shared the stage with acts like Metallica and Snoop Dogg and done a Lollapalooza tour with Korn and Tool.

The transition into playing countrified Rock n Roll was easy for Kent. “Country encompasses a wide variety of styles now. It has a lot more pop and rock than in the ’90s. It is progressive. Fifties rock n roll artists, the real pioneers were rooted in Country – Elvis, Chuck Berry, Jerry Lee Lewis, those guys were country boys, hillbillies. They had the southern drawl and attitude, they put a rebellious attitude to it and called it rock n roll. It’s all the same,” says Kent.

“When I came off the road with Ben Kweller and settled down with my family back in Texas, a lot of the songs I was writing were subconsciously coming out with a southern flavor,” says Kent. “I like taking the elements of traditional rock and country and blurring the lines. It’s a very natural evolution for me.”

For more on John David Kent, go to www.johndavidkent.com.

 

 

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