Phil Davis

The first country-and-western recording I ever dug was Leroy Van Dyke’s “Walk on By.” I was 10 years old and growing up in New Jersey. The recording was broadcast on New York City’s WABC radio, a pop music station to which I listened religiously. “Walk on By” was a “crossover” hit on the country and pop music charts. Similar country crossover recordings grabbed my attention over the next few years: Claude King’s “Wolverton Mountain,” Skeeter Davis’s “The End of the World,” Bobby Bare’s “Detroit City,” The Statler Brothers’ “Flowers on the Wall,” and the many recordings of Roger Miller. Then, The Rolling Stones arrived in my life and pushed country aside, followed by a tide of “progressive rock” and blues. I returned to country when I moved to Denver, where, unlike the New York City area, there were at least a couple of AM country stations; the rockabilly of country charter Billy Swan lured me into this return. Today, I owe my love of “classic country” to the music of Willie Nelson, Waylon Jennings, Jerry Lee Lewis, and Elvis Presley and to a brief but spectacular late-70s AM radio show called “Night Ride” on Denver’s KLAK. Finally, geography means a lot to me, and my brand of country-and-western music reminds me of the wide open spaces . . . and the friendly roadhouse just beyond the lights of town. I’ve dj’d “classic country” on radio stations KRZA, Alamosa, Colorado and KMRD Madrid, New Mexico. Thanks for listening.

email: phil@ksfr.org