dierks bentley takes a risk on his rootsy new album

Begins at 2 p.m. Fri.,
11 a.m. Sat.,
11 a.m. Sun.
Hart Plaza, Detroit
riverfront
wycd.radio.com
Free
FREE-FOR-ALL
COUNTRY
The upbeat country
music sounds. The
brand-name national
acts and eager local
musicians. The impressively diverse
crowd and good-time
vibes.
There aren’t a lot of
Detroit traditions
quite like the WYCD
Downtown Hoedown.
If you’re a country
fan — or just someone
who likes a big party
— you’ll probably be
digging out your Stetson and scooting your
boots down to Hart
Plaza for the 28th
edition of the riverside bash.
Dierks Bentley
(Friday), Uncle
Kracker (Saturday)
and Zac Brown Band
(Sunday) top the registry of acts, with music getting under way
at 2 p.m. Friday.
“There still aren’t
many places you can
go in this country and
get this much entertainment for free,”
says Steve Grunwald
of WYCD’s “Dr. Don
Morning Show.” “It’s
really exciting that
our station, with the
support of so many
other people and the
City of Detroit, can
put on something this
huge and do it for
free.”
WYCD
Downtown
Hoedown
CAPITOL NASHVILLE
MUSIC
Dierks Bentley
was 19 when
he first heard
bluegrass in a
Nashville bar
and fell in love
with it.
Tried and true bluegrass
DIERKS BENTLEY TAKES A RISK ON HIS ROOTSY NEW ALBUM
BY BRIAN McCOLLUM
FREE PRESS POP MUSIC WRITER
hen you’re reigning atop your music field,
you’ve got two ways to go.
You can keep playing it safe, trying not
to disrupt a good thing. Or you use your leverage to take some risks, hoping to pull fans along
W
10 P L AY DETROIT FREE PRESS MAY 13 - 19, 2010 WWW.FREEP.COM
on your adventurous ride.
If you’re in the latter camp, you’ve got a
friend in Dierks Bentley, the platinum-selling
country radio fave who’s decided to take a dramatic detour.
Bentley’s upcoming sixth album, “Up on the
Ridge,” is a collection of real-deal bluegrass
MATT SAYLES/ASSOCIATED PRESS
and Americana music, peppered with covers of tunes by
Bob Dylan and U2. Due in stores
June 8, it includes guests such as
Alison Krauss, Miranda Lambert
and Kings of Leon’s Angelo Petraglia and features the instrumental work of top-shelf roots
musicians such as the Punch
Brothers and Del McCoury
Band.
“I walked into a Nashville bar
when I was 19 and heard bluegrass, and it changed my life,”
says the 34-year-old Phoenix
native. “It’s the power of those
instruments with that three-part
harmony. I’ve been telling my
crowds, ‘I hope it blows your
mind the same way it did mine.’ ”
For an artist who propelled
himself up the Nashville hierarchy with rollicking radio fare
like “What Was I Thinkin’ ” and
“Feel That Fire,” the new album
is a bold statement: a declaration
that Bentley hasn’t abandoned
the music he long ago fell in love
with.
But getting there forced
Bentley to don his salesman’s
cap.
Dierks Bentley performs for U.S. Air Force service members and their families at Nellis Air Force Base in Las Vegas last month.
“People in the country business, we all deal with the country music stereotypes. And then
“It’ll be a straightforward Dierks Bentley show —
we’ll turn around and stereotype bluegrass to some
thing drastic like this. But I think it’s great that
uptempo, rocking and fun, all the hits,” he says. “The
degree,” says Bentley. “So there was some coaxing
Dierks, as an artist, can do what he wants to do. This
Hoedown is a party environment. I want to make
here and there. But Capitol Records has always been
is his own personality.”
sure people are having a good time.”
good about going along with my harebrained
Bentley’s billing at the Hoedown is a coup for
Such morphing isn’t tricky for Bentley, whose
schemes. It was a matter of showing people that this
WYCD, which often must convince acts to ditch
versatility has helped him fit on stages at both the
was not going to be just some side project, that we’re
$100,000 paying gigs elsewhere “to come up here for
Grand Ole Opry and the Bonnaroo hippie fest. A busy free or next to nothing,” as Grunwald says. Alongside
breaking the rules and trying to make a record withweek earlier this month was neatly symbolic: Two
out any genre limitations.”
fellow headliners Uncle Kracker (Saturday) and Zac
days after basking in the bright spotlights of Jay
What the album most definitely is not, says BentBrown Band (Sunday), he represents a Hoedown bill
Leno’s “Tonight Show,” Bentley was in the heart of
ley, is a gimmicky record in the mold of the “Pickin’
— and country music landscape — that continues to
North Carolina for MerleFest, a rustic roots-music
On” cover-tune series, which puts a bluegrass stamp
become musically diversified.
event.
on material by acts like Coldplay and the Beatles.
It’s an open-ended approach that Bentley would
“I’ve always been very fortunate to straddle the
He’s confident that his cover of U2’s “Pride (In the
like to retain through his career. He’s already planlines of the commercial world and this other world
Name of Love)” avoids coming off as a novelty, manning a fall tour that will assemble the best of all his
that a lot of people don’t get a lot of access to,” he
aging to convey the song’s depth and majesty in a
worlds — “leaning heavily on volume and energy, but
says.
unique musical voice.
also really broken down where we’re playing the
While the album’s title track has crept into the
“There’s a huge void when you take that electric
grassy stuff.”
Top 40 of Billboard’s country chart, it’s not yet clear
guitar out. So the question becomes: How do you fill
“To be able to combine those two is my ultimate
how the new material will fare at country radio over
that void with the right flourishes of acoustic indream,” he says. “I just hope every record is never
the long haul. But WYCD-FM (99.5) morning host
struments?” he says. “You can’t just hit a power
playing it safe. I don’t want to get stuck in a rut
Steve Grunwald applauds the move by Bentley, a
chord on the guitar. You have to work a little harder
where you’re going out with the band and the tour
personal friend who has hosted Grunwald at his
in how you get to the right spot, and hopefully at the
buses and the trucks just to feed the machine and
Nashville ranch.
end, it’s equally as interesting and powerful. The key
keep it going. You don’t want to lose your momen“He’s just one of those artists. He’s got a lot of
is that it’s not just fun on the second or third listen,
tum, but your musical decisions can start getting
good songs, and he keeps going up and up and up.
but that the depth is still there on the hundredth.”
affected by that pressure. I just hope to always make
After a month of touring to promote the upcoming The ladies love him — he’s a nice guy, and he’s goodrecords that are honest and true.”
looking,” says Grunwald. “I’m sure it scares the peoalbum, playing bluegrass-oriented gigs with mem❚ CONTACT BRIAN MCCOLLUM: 313-223-4450 OR
ple around him when he wants to go off and do some- BMCCOLLUM@FREEPRESS.COM
bers of McCoury’s group, Bentley will largely slip
back into standard mode for his Friday set at the
WYCD Downtown Hoedown, sprinkling the new
HOEDOWN HIGHLIGHTS AND DAILY SCHEDULES, PAGES 12-13.
material into an otherwise familiar performance.
WWW.FREEP.COM MAY 13 - 19, 2010 DETROIT FREE PRESS P L AY 1 1