Many country music fans of music from the late 1980’s through the 1990’s possibly remember our featured artists this week, the band Shenandoah. The group is from Muscle Shoals, Alabama and truly epitomize American country music. Lead guitarist Jim Seales and drummer Mike McGuire formed Shenandoah in 1984 as a house band in Muscle Shoals, with bass guitarist Ralph Ezell and keyboardist Stan Thorn, as well as lead singer Marty Raybon, who had been in his father’s bluegrass band since childhood called American Bluegrass Express, as well as Heartbreak Mountain. Before that, Seales, Thorn, McGuire and Ezell were session musicians. McGuire invited songwriting friend Robert Byrne to one of the session band’s shows. Byrne then invited them into his recording studio to record a demo, which he then pitched to Columbia Records’ CBS Records division. The band first wanted to assume the name The MGM Band, a name which was rejected for legal reasons. CBS suggested Rhythm Rangers and Shenandoah as possible names, and Raybon chose the latter because he thought that the name Rhythm Rangers “sounded like an amateur band.”
They made a very wise choice. There are some word experts who believe the word “Shenandoah” means “spruce river” because the waters of the river run through great forests of spruce trees. As I thought about the visions associated with the name Shenandoah, I could see rolling lush green hills wrapped around a lake. Truly a beautiful scene. The music created by the band would be very good. However, the name Shenandoah would prove to be quite popular and costly.
In 1987, Shenandoah released its self-titled dĂ©but studio album, which Byrne and Rick Hall produced. This album accounted for the band’s first two charting singles in “They Don’t Make Love Like We Used To” and “Stop the Rain”. The Road Not Taken was the band’s second album, released in 1988. This album’s first two singles — “She Doesn’t Cry Anymore”, previously found on Shenandoah, and “Mama Knows” — brought the band to the Top Ten for the first time. After these singles came three consecutive Billboard number-one hits: “The Church on Cumberland Road”, “Sunday in the South” and “Two Dozen Roses”. “The Church on Cumberland Road,” with its two-week run at Number One, marked the first time in country music history that a country music band’s first number-one single spent more than one week at the top.
The band achieved its biggest hit in 1990 with the three-week number-one single “Next to You, Next to Me.” Written by then-solo singers Robert Ellis Orrall and Curtis Wright, this was the first of five singles from Shenandoah’s third album, Extra Mile. “Ghost in This House,” “I Got You” (co-written by Teddy Gentry of the band Alabama) and “The Moon Over Georgia” all peaked in the Billboard top ten between late 1990 and mid-1991, with the latter two reaching number one on Gavin Report; “When You Were Mine,” the fifth single, stopped at number 38 on Billboard in 1991. Also that year, the band won the Academy of Country Music’s Vocal Group of the Year award.
Following the release of Extra Mile, a band from Kentucky threatened to sue Shenandoah over the name Shenandoah. After a financial settlement was made with the Kentucky band, two other bands filed lawsuits over Shenandoah’s name. The lawsuits depleted the money earned by the band on the road, which led to the band asking the label and their production company to all pay one-third of their legal costs. The production company refused, and Shenandoah was forced to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in early 1991 after paying more than 2 million dollars on court settlements and legal fees. Although the lawsuits allowed Shenandoah to keep its name, the bankruptcy filing terminated the contract with Columbia after a 1992 Greatest Hits package.
The next close to twenty-five years would include a disbanding, reunion, several record company changes, band member death, many group member changes and a lot of great music. In preparation for this post I went back and listened to a lot of Shenandoah music. Of course, there are some songs that I liked better than others, but overall the group was consistent with their signature sound. That’s always the sign of a band of very good musicians. Logan Smith of the St. Petersburg Times said that the band has “woven together a highly polished sound built around precision musicianship and pristine harmonies, very much a hybrid of Raybon’s bluegrass roots.” Alanna Nash wrote that the band’s work relies on “sentimental lyrics revolving around the Southern experience,” and said that Shenandoah “forged its very commercial reputation on a soulful gospel-and-bluegrass blend, with lead singer Marty Raybon’s searing sincerity making even the tritest songs about small-town Southern values and attitudes memorable.”
Now, Shenandoah is back on tour. It celebrates their 30th anniversary in the business with a new album, Reloaded, scheduled for release March 16, 2018. Shenandoah will celebrate RELOADED, along with several surprise guest performances, during an album release party March 20 at City Winery in Nashville.
I remember some years ago a reader commented after I wrote a post featuring a country music musician that the genre was not really in my “wheelhouse”. I assured him that I indeed listen and enjoy a lot of country music. Shenandoah is one of those groups whose music I like. As I complete this post, I sincerely wish the best for Shenandoah as they tour and present new music. Hopefully they will find some new fans of their music. Perhaps, there might be some reading this post who, although knew little about the band previously, might grow to like Shenandoah as well.