Rob Black

'Regular Guy'

Rob's father used to pick guitar to help him face a day's work in the mines. As he played, his son watched, and soon it was Rob who was picking out tunes. And growing up in the Central Queensland town of Middlemount meant that Rob had little to do but hone his talents on the guitar. He taught himself complicated Chet Atkins solos one note at a time using the pause button on a cassette player. It may not have been an orthodox approach, but it worked. Rob was accepted into the Queensland Conservatorium of Music at the age of 17.

Rob arrived at the Con to do a Diploma of Music in classical guitar - but he almost came without a guitar.
"I was riding in on my pushbike, my $180 classical guitar - in its classy vinyl case - in my right hand," Rob remembers. "I turned a corner and the end of the guitar caught in the spokes, snapping the headstock as I went over the handlebars. Luckily it was a low speed accident, and with a little D.I.Y fix-it job, I was able to get through those first few months."

After the Con, Rob's began his career as a performer, and once again, gaffer tape had a part to play.
"I had set up my guitar as a bit of a stunt guitar so I could throw it around my head," Rob says. "But there was this time at the Tamworth Country Music Festival when I failed to do my routine maintenance check. I threw the guitar and it just kept going, ending up in a tangled mess of wires at the bass player's feet."
Rob played on after taking a short break to tape up his guitar but had to spend the next day - a memorable birthday - searching Tamworth for guitar parts.

But while the years on the road may have been hard on his guitars, Rob also had some big nights, like playing to a packed house in the Crow Bar as part of the Gympie Muster.

"It's the memory of those gigs that help you survive the ones that are... a little less than average, to put it politely," he says. "I recently showed up for one gig to help promote my upcoming album release. The audience turned out to be two sound guys, a roadie, and a small group of 13-year-old girls who left when they realised I wasn't going to cover any Avril Lavigne songs."

Rob's big break came earlier this year when he entered the Toyota Star Maker competition.

"I decided to have a go because it had helped other artists, including Keith Urban," he says. "I didn't win but Graham Thompson, the head of Compass Bros, was one of the judges and he was impressed enough to phone two days later to talk about a deal. It was one of those phone calls that every unsigned artist dreams about. It seemed that all those nights of reading Anthony Robbins motivational bed time stories had finally paid off!"
What a year 2007 turned out to be! Rob came home from the Tamworth Festival and began meeting with the Compass Team to create the direction for his album. “My first single ‘Regular Guy’ was actually a track that Graham had up his sleeve from one of his Nashville trips, and was searching for the right artist to record it. It’s as though the song was written for me…..I’m about as regular as a guy gets. This provided the tone for the album, so we now had to find another 11 songs to work in.”

It was at this point that the bulk of Rob’s writing hit the cutting room floor!!! “My 80’s inspired rock ballads weren’t quite in the same vein as the ‘Regular Guy’”. The label wanted to get a single to radio ASAP to start building momentum and settled on four tracks for the first recording session: ‘Regular Guy’ and three songs Rob had co-written…‘You’re The Reason’, ‘We Have Kids’ and ‘She’s The Devil’. “I wrote ‘She’s The Devil’ with a good mate of mine down in Sydney and ironically two years after we wrote it, it became life imitating art…..for him. ‘We Have Kids’ was originally written by Mike Carr, Jim Haynes and Emily Tahini, but was re-worked to fit the style of the album by Graham and myself.” This became life imitating art for Rob, who became a father on the 3rd of April to a beautiful baby girl Abbey Joy. “I can’t wait to have the paintings on the fridge and a backyard full of toys”.

Rob started traveling back and forth to Sydney, where the first trip consisted of a day of pre-production and the full band tracks.

“Pre-production involved arranging the songs lyrically and musically and writing out charts for the band. The band tracks (what a band!) included Terepai Richmond on drums (Missy Higgins, Delta Goodrem, The Whitlams), Clayton Doley on keys (The Whitlam’s, Jimmy Barnes), Glenn Hannah on acoustic guitar (Kasey Chambers, Adam Brand) and James Gillard on bass (Lee Kernaghan, Mondo Rock) and were recorded at Garth Porter’s Rancom Street Studios. In the engine room was Ted Howard (Engineer Extraordinaire) and at the helm was Graham Thompson (Producer), who called all the shots and ensured we ended up with a great result. It wasn’t until closer to the end of the album that I realised just what an exhausting job that would be.”

The next trip had Rob recording overdubs at the Compass Bros Studio in Lilyfield, where he put down his guitar and vocal tracks.

This whole process was repeated a couple of months later in a second session when the final eight songs were recorded, this time with Chris Haig and Ian Lees sharing Bass duties.

One of the tracks recorded during the second session was a version of the Masters Apprentices classic, ‘Turn Up Your Radio’. The original version, written by Jim Keays and Doug Ford from the Masters and recorded in 1972, celebrated the glory days of rock and roll, which were then only fifteen years earlier. “Graham had the idea of updating the song to celebrate fifty years of those days and wrote a new verse that made the point that Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis and Johnny Cash were not only pioneers of rock and roll but also country music icons. The new version suggests that the best music from the 50’s may not have been topped since then. Of course there are many exceptions but hey, it’s a three minute song! I guess it’s really about how influential those artists were, and still are, today. It also reflects on how different genres of music weren’t pigeonholed back then…country and rock and roll sat next to each other on the pop charts.”

Other tracks recorded at this time were two tracks Rob co-wrote, ‘You’re The Reason’ and ‘Puzzle’. Both these tracks were re-worked in the studio lyrically. “I’d go back to my motel at night and try to re-write verses to record the next morning. It really forced me to come up with the goods, as I usually only write when I get some kind of inspiration. Graham and I worked together with these songs and I’m really happy with the end result.”

“I was also fortunate enough to get some great songs from Nashville writers including newcomer Chris Cavanaugh for this album. ‘I’ll Bring The Peaches’ is a really fun tune that most guys could relate to – being led to believe something is going to happen only to find out it was all a misinterpretation. ‘I’m In Love And It’s Getting Worse’ and ’Don’t Give Up’ which I wrote a few years ago are the more serious tracks on the album which I still feel both guys and girls will easily identify with.”

‘The Regular Guy’ film clip was recorded in Brisbane under the direction of ‘Pie Full of Blackbirds’, a Sydney based production company. “I was fortunate enough to use a friends house in Dayboro for this shoot – for those of you have seen it (the clip features Rob being paid an unnatural amount of attention by a large number of attractive women) you could appreciate what a tough day at the office this was. But reality set in when the cameras stopped rolling with dirty nappies to change! I think this was my wife’s way of punishing me.”

The clip went to air on CMC about a week later and spent roughly three months in the top 30, as well as the National Radio Airplay top 20.

While in Sydney finishing the album, an opportunity arose when Adam Brand was putting a new band together for his 2008 touring schedule. Being on the same label with a new album to promote, Rob jumped at the opportunity to jump aboard the bus, and not only play in Adam’s band but open the shows as well. “This will be a fantastic opportunity to get my music out to the Country Music audiences throughout Australia, and hopefully they’ll relate to the songs like I have”.

Rob Black’s debut album ‘Regular Guy’ will be released on Compass Bros records on January 12th, with the official launch being held during the Tamworth Country Music Festival.

For further information please contact:
Ms Kris Katsanis
Compass Bros Records Publicity
32a Halloran Street, Lilyfield NSW 2040
kris@compassbros.com.au
Ph: 02 9555 9144
fax: 02 9555 9188