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 Country music legend LEE KERNAGHAN talks to LINDSEY CUTHBERTSON about his ninth album, Planet Country.
In the world of Australian country music, the big black hat of Lee Kernaghan is as symbolically synonymous as Tamworth’s gargantuan golden guitar statue. After breaking out with his acclaimed debut album, 1992’s The Outback Club, Kernaghan has gone on to win ARIA’s, Golden Guitars, an OAM and be named as 2008’s Australian of The Year. Not bad at all for a man who in 1990 nearly threw the towel in years of failing to make his mark in music.
“I’d lost hope at that point,” says Kernaghan, describing the emotions that he went through after playing a gig to nobody. “I decided to go to night school and get a real estate license; I’d stopped listening to music. It was just finished for me. It wasn’t until Garth Porter called seeing if I wanted to do some songwriting with him that things started to happen.”
The songwriting relationship between Kernaghan and Porter has grown into one of the most formidable and respected teams in country music, and their work on Kernaghan’s ninth studio album Planet Country is evidence of this. Featuring collaborations with highly respected country artists such as James Blundell and Colin Buchanan, Planet Country is an album that continues Kernaghan’s talent of finding hope and positivity in the hard times that come with living on the land.
“After those ten years of being beaten around the head and kicked up the arse, (by the music industry) when success comes along you appreciate it immensely. And what it also taught me was that you can’t do it alone – you need a great team around you,” says Kernaghan.
“You feel the pressure, particularly when you’re at the beginning of a project. This last year I’ve really been under the pump but I’ve had a great talent bank of songwriters to work with and I’m pleased with the way the songs ended up coming out.”
It was no walk in the park for Kernaghan though. Planet Country has been nearly two years in the making and was recorded in Nashville as well as Kernaghan’s own studio up in the hills near his home. Kernaghan explains that as one gets older, songwriting gets both harder and easier.
“By the time you get to nine or ten albums you’ve covered a lot of themes, so how do you find fresh ones? That’s half the battle. There are not a lot of benefits to getting older, but from a songwriting aspect there is a lot more life experience to draw on.”
And in the midst of the global financial crisis and a drought that never seems too far away, Kernaghan is using that depth of experience to try and lift the hearts and minds of his listeners.
“Because I really wanted to focus on the positives on this record,” he says. “When things are tough like they have been in rural Australia, you don’t need somebody to tell them how tough they are, because they’re living it. Love and life goes on, no matter what the weather’s doing.”
PLANET COUNTRY is out now through ABC/Universal. www.leekernaghan.com
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