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Article published Oct 8, 2008 Hometown boys make good: Dixie Highway Band to set the stage for rock legends at festival
By Steve Wildsmith of The Daily Times Staff
The guys in Blount County’s own Dixie Highway Band, an aw-shucks collection of good ol’ boys if there ever was such a thing, have no desire to get up on stage at the Foothills Fall Festival on Friday night and overshadow the band that goes on after them.
After all, the night’s headliner is Foreigner, and The Dixie Highway Band, guitarist Brian Jones told The Daily Times this week, knows its job — get the crowd pumped up and ready for some classic rock.
The problem is, The Dixie Highway Band has as much of a rabid following, at least around these parts, as any big-name, big-time band ever did. When the guys play Two Doors Down in downtown Maryville (as they’ll do on Oct. 17 and 18), there’s usually a line out the door and around the block, and by the end of the night, owner Jeff Breazeale is nervously counting heads so as not to violate any city fire codes.
“It’s always packed when we play there, which is pretty unbelievable,” Jones said. “It’s our hometown, so whenever that happens, it makes it even more special, I guess. It’s just something else to see, to look up and all of the sudden the place is packed. And the Foothills Fall Festival — well, every year this thing has been going on, if we weren’t playing somewhere, we were there. And every year, we kept saying, ‘Next year, we’re gonna be on that stage.’
“This year, we got the call, and we were all like, ‘No way!’ It was unbelievable — I can’t describe it, really. It was just another step of seeing our dreams come true, and we’re all excited about this opportunity.”
Opportunities, it seems, have been plentiful for the guys in The Dixie Highway Band over the past year, starting with the release of the group’s most recent album, “Highways and Heartaches.” Make no mistake, however — the boys worked hard to get where they are, and their musical roots date back to before their families set up residence here in Blount County.Band of cousins
All of the members are cousins (except for vocalist Justin Reynolds, who’s been friends with most of the guys since the third grade). All come from a musical background that made a lasting impression on them as youngsters. All of them hang out together when they’re not on the road, and except for one, all live within a 10-mile radius of one another.
The band’s roots go back to Indiana, where Jones’ father, Steve Jones, formed a band with his brother called Steve Jones and Winchester. After moving to Blount County, the elder Jones started a group called Heart and Soul, and Brian Jones and his cousin Kris accompanied their fathers on tour.
It was a natural thing for the boys to take up music as a pastime — along with their other cousins and Dixie Highway bandmates Derek and Bret Jones, and they’ve been playing together since grade school.
Almost 15 years ago, Bret and Derek moved to Blount County from Indiana, and the guys made Dixie Highway an official outfit. From porch-front hoedowns to winning the Colgate Country Showdown a few years ago that earned them an opening slot for Sawyer Brown, the band has steadily honed its chops.
“We’ve been playing together for so long, and I guess we’re all better musicians in terms of what we’re doing, but where I’ve seen the change is that we’ve all matured,” Brian Jones said. “Instead of just getting up there and playing music and wanting to have fun, we’re one whole unit now.”‘16 Tons’
And together, they won’t back down from a musical challenge. When an inebriated fan challenged the boys at a Nashville show to do one song five different ways, they went home and pulled out “Tennessee” Ernie Ford’s “16 Tons.” They worked it up, incorporating five different genres — traditional country, hip-hop, bluegrass, rock and a barbershop quintet take on it — and now, the song is a staple of the live set.
“I think it shows our versatility, and we pretty much do that song every time we play,” Jones said.
Such a song shows a natural affinity for music that the boys all have, and given the high-energy rowdiness that comes from the live show, it’s no wonder the band seems destined for bigger things. They all have their hopes and dreams about what the future might bring, Jones added, but they’re also hoping to sit still long enough to enjoy the ride — especially climbing on stage Friday night to get the crowd ready for Foreigner.
“We don’t wanna go up there and act like superstars,” he said. “We’ll just go up, put on a show and get the crowd pumped up. Foreigner is Foreigner, so they’re going to be good anyway. We’ll just get up and do what we do and try to get our name out there a little more. But man, being up on that stage is going to be fun.
“It’s something, at least for me, that I just can’t get off my mind, even when I lay down at night and especially now that it’s getting closer. You imagine yourself up there, so you can’t hardly sleep for thinking about it — how it’s going to go, wondering what all you’re going to do, coming up with new ways to entertain people.”