Story and pix by Mary Jane Farmer, videos courtesy of ShedStock Sherman

On a good day…

 

 

 

Zane Williams seems to be having lots of good days nowadays. He’s got a new CD coming out, had a song hit the Billboard Chart , aka THE CHART, has a son who brings him and his wife more pride every day, and through it all, he just keeps on writing.

The new CD, Zane thought, was to have been ready for his Friday night show at Love & War last week, but he’s been assured it will be ready come Texas Music Revolution. Zane is one of the stars of this year’s TMR, and he’s bringing his full band to the stage with him.

The new CD, “Ride With Me,” is completely Zane Williams made, written, produced, and with his own band.

“If nothing goes wrong, and a lot of things can go wrong, I have learned that, but it should be here,” Zane said.

This CD’s cover, like the others, is as personal to Williams as the songs on it. He has taken some pride in having cross-stitched the cover of his first project, then came up with the idea of a hand-tooled leather square to grace No. 2 CD cover. He still carries that square with him on his gigs.

This one cover was no different. “I have ideas and opinions about that stuff, (artwork), which makes it hard to hire somebody else. So, I have done a one-line drawing of a Chevy truck as the cover artwork.”

The songs he talked about too, the ones depicted in this newest project, “Ride With Me.”

Some are older ones, and there’s a lot of newer ones. I’ve been playing them a lot at my shows for the past six months and so they won’t be all that unfamiliar to some people.”

Musicians on this CD are the same ones who play with Zane at full-band gigs. There’s Shayne Green, lead guitar; James Driscoll, bass; Jerry Mallory, drums; Mike Horne, fiddle; and Kylie Rae Harris on vocals.

Zane also talked about a recent gig in Nashville, where he continues to go about once a month to keep working with his co-writing partners, meet with his publishing company, and keep his name and face out there amongst all the competition.

This gig was shared  by Austin songwriter Walt Wilkins, who Zane quoted as having said, “Man, it’s a weird thing about playing for Nashville. You feel like you are always auditioning for something.” And Zane said Walt verbalized exactly what he feels, and explains that is the reason he loves playing for the Texas audiences.

Williams says he’s not as prolific as some people are whens it comes to song-writing. “If I just wait for inspiration to clobber over me on the head, it could happen about five or 10 times a year. The songs that pop unbidden into my head, those tend to be the best ones. But I’ve found that if I sit down with a guitar — it’s like going fishing. I sit there and fiddle around and try to come up with an idea. If I do that, sometimes inspiration strikes, and if I can spend more time like that, I can push my output up to 20 or 25 songs a year.

“What I liken it to is the fishing thing. You can’t go to the lake and say ‘I’m going to catch 2 fish today.’ It’s out of your control. But the more time you spend with your hook in the water, the more likely you will catch a fish.”

Video:  What You Do With What You Got

Click here:   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G00AzAUDu-Q

Video:  Pablo & Maria

Click here:   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1sDtDBBd6Bw