Stacie Collins | WHAT'S UP

January 2010

Howdy friends,

I hope this finds you all in good health and spirits. It’s easy for things to get ‘a little’ crazy these days as I’m sure you can relate. I am more determined than ever with my music and in life to keep after it and I’m really looking forward to this coming year and seeing many of you on the road. I’d really like to thank all my wonderful friends and fans from around the world and let you know that I appreciate the love and support you show for me and my music. I can’t do what I do without you and when you help spread the word, come to shows and open your wallets at the merch table, it makes the music possible. I know you’re out there and love ya for it!

Well, it’s been along time in coming and I’ve wanted to do this for awhile so now is as good a time as any to start up my monthly newsletter 'Greetings From Collinsville'. This first edition letter is chocked full of information so thanks for sticking with me. Lot’s to cover but from now on I’ll try and update ya on all the hip happenings for 2010 every month or so unless something really cool comes up. We'll be posting 'Greetings From Collinsville' here on the homepage or you can get it sent directly to your mailbox if you sign up for the mailing list.

A lot has been going on in Collinsville these days so I’m gonna jump in with the most important news first followed by some stories and events from 2009.

New music is on it’s way baby! Yepper… I’ve recorded a brand new record titled ‘Sometimes Ya Gotta…’ and it rocks! It's a barn burner mix of rock ‘n’ roll, hard country and blues and we really pushed the envelope in all directions on this one. Dan Baird (The Georgia Satellites, Homemade Sin) was back at the helm and my band for this record includes Warner E. Hodges (Jason & The Scorchers, Homemade Sin), and Eric “Ebo” Borash (Radney Foster, Randy Rogers Band) on guitars, Al Collins (Jason & The Scorchers) on bass, Jimmy Lester (Webb Wilder, Los Straitjackets) on drums with Mike ‘8:05’ Webb (John Fogerty) adding keys and accordion and the one and only Jonell Mosser frosting the cake with some amazing harmony vocals. It's twelve tracks of mmmmmm gooood coming your way and I can't wait to share it with ya!

Now comes the sad part… We only had enough money to record and mix twelve songs and now must find the cash to finish the mastering, CD artwork and duplication. This shouldn’t be a problem thanks to my recent partnership with a brand new company called Kickstarter. They are changing the face of the music business by helping independent artists like myself without financial backing get their music heard! The basic idea is, through pre-orders and pledges in exchange for super cool “thank you” gifts, we’ll swap a few bucks for cool stuff, then the record gets finished and everyone’s a winner! I’ll send ya a special update with all the details on how you can cash in on iPods, video cameras and autographed Fender telecasters in a few weeks. Plus you’ll have access to get my new music first. Power to the people!

'The Lucky Spot' CD is still getting a lot of love, especially in Europe and Scandinavia and it really shows at the gigs. When I look out in the crowd and see people singing the lyrics back to me, it’s quite special. It don’t get any better.

I am lucky to have such a great rock ‘n’ roll band filled with a ‘bull pen’ of awesome players including my songwriting partner and bass player husband Al Collins. We all had a great time playing five European tours and many of U.S. dates this past year. I’ve recently teamed up with U.K. booking agency JCPL and look forward to working even more in 2010 including lots of repeat visits to the places we’ve already been.

The first 2009 tour started off in Paris, France. It was a quick trip, but special as I was able to fly my mom in from Las Vegas to join us. She went as our merch gal and got to experience the ups and downs of touring first hand. We all had a great time and have been invited back so we’ll keep ya posted France. Next we were off to Sweden and then Spain. We played our first show in a small club called St. Gertrude before heading off to Barcelona. Boy, do those folks in Spain like to party late or what! At one point before the first show, it was 11:45pm and no one had shown up to our gig at Sala Corleone. At 12:15am still no one. The club manager says it’s cool, let’s wait another 15 minutes. So we all headed on back to the green room to hang a bit more and wouldn’t ya know it, 15 minutes later we walked out on stage and the place was packed! Hail yes! I don’t know where they all came from but they were there ready to rock and that’s exactly what we did!

After that came Switzerland. Like a Technicolor postcard, “spectacular” is all I can say. We actually had a few days off on this tour so Al and I jumped on a train and then a bus (and then another train and another bus) and went to visit some long lost relatives up in the Versasca Valley at the base of the Swiss Alps, close to Italy.

Live in Belgium

Next we went to Norway and Belgium for the first time where we played the fantastic Varenwinkel Blues & Roots Festival. We headed back to Nashville to take care of some business for a few days and then went back to Norway and Germany for three weeks. The most peculiar show of that whole tour was at this Chinese restaurant in Nittedal, Norway called Lee’s Restaurant. The venue was located in this little bitty town and turned out to be an awesome gig. The stage was in a large room off the dining area and surprisingly looked like your typical rock club attached to a Chinese restaurant. Weird. Thanks to our gracious hosts / promoters Kåre and Anette the place was at capacity - as in sold out! By the third song the crowd was smashed up against the stage and kept on waving their glasses of ale in the air, all the while spilling puddles of Ringnes and Carlsberg everywhere. We had to mop a few times and I thought for sure one of us was gonna get electrocuted. That’s rock-n-roll baby!

Our tour manager / driver Andree from Hot Rock Agency was also a gracious host and tour guide. We had a few days off after we played in Lillehamar (his home town) so he took us site seeing. Visiting the 1994 Winter Olympics Ski Jump and the Viking Museum were particularly cool. We also met some really great bands like Turnip Greens and Tina Lie at the Odda Festival. Norway is yet another breathe taking country with all it’s lakes and fiords, although I did spend most of my time in the back of the van with my eye’s closed when we were driving because of the steep cliffs and one lane roads. Scandinavia welcomed us in a big way and I’m excited that we have several dates on the books for later this year with more to come. Check out my shows page for more details.

They say imitation is the ultimate form of flattery so perhaps one of the coolest things to report about 2009 is the first ever Stacie Collins tribute band from Japan called the Suteishi Collins Band. I must admit it’s kinda strange to watch another girl dress like me, play harp like me and move like me while singing my songs. I am certainly blown away knowing that my music has that kind of effect on people. What a huge compliment. You can bet I’m gonna make it to Japan one of these days and who knows, maybe we’ll do a double bill with the Suteish Collins Band.

Stacie & Greta Gaines

Meanwhile back in the good ol’ USA we continued to rumble and rock our way around this great country of ours playing a bunch of new venues and some of my favorites. Although I live in Nashville, I don’t perform here too often. I love to play when it works out ‘cause we have a lot of friends, fans and extended family that come out to the shows. One night after playing a show along with Greta Gaines here in town, we were talking about all the cool music this place has to offer, especially from kick-ass women. We decided it would be interesting for our crazy asses to team-up to ‘bring it’ as a collective with a once a month show we call Crazy Bitch Night. Each show is filled with an always eclectic line up of female driven acts and brings a unique cross pollination of fans. Don’t nobody have to wait for permission to rock these days and we prove it. It’s been a lot of fun and in a town that has fifty plus acts playing on any given night, we have made a name for ourselves as ‘a cool hang’ and we even broke the bars sales record one night. I’m doing the booking for awhile and although I’d like to do the show every month, I sometimes have to miss one due to my busy schedule, but that’s a good thing. The next CBN will be Feb. 4th at The Basement at 8pm. Special guests this month are Show Dog Recording Artists and friends of mine, Trailer Choir along with Carter’s Chord .

Here’s some trivia for ya –

I played the harmonica on Trailer Choir’s ‘Off the Hillbilly Hook’ song on the demo that got ‘em their record deal. When it was time to cut the song for real, ‘the powers that be’ decided it would be great to use their session guy to cut my part. Well, not one but two of the best players in town were called in to track it but it turned out neither one could cop my feel and the band wasn’t happy so guess who got the call? I’m not sayin’ I’m better than those cats. It’s not about being the best, it’s about feel and playin’ from the heart. I’m glad they fought for me.

More juicy trivia -

For those of you who don’t know, my bassist / husband Al Collins and drummer Pontus Snibb are the newest members of a band called Jason & The Scorchers. Along with my pal Mr. Warner E. Hodges, they have just recorded their first record in eleven years called “Halcyon Times” due out this February. I’ve heard the tracks and I can tell ya, this record is special. Congrats to Jason, Warner and the boys for making it happen. The fans are gonna love it! Pontus also has a kick-ass band called Bonafied. Aside from being one of the best drummers I’ve ever had the pleasure of working with, Pontus also sings and plays great guitar in that band. So if you love hard-driving rock ‘n’roll, check them out.

Well, I guess that about covers it. If you’ve made it this far you are hard core. Until next time, take care of yourself and each other and we’ll catch ya on the flip!

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