Videos: Dierks Performs at The White House!

How appropriate for our president of the Dierks Bentley Congress (Dierks), to open the "Country Music: In Performance at the White House" show with his newest single, "Home."   The PBS music special aired last night from the East Room of the White House, hosted by President and Mrs. Obama.

What an honor for Dierks to represent country music in our nation's home, along with eight other artists who performed: Lauren Alaina, who did a duet with Dierks (see video below), The Band Perry, Alison Krauss, Kris Kristofferson, Lyle Lovett, Mickey, Darius Rucker and James Taylor.

"Standing in the East Room of The White House last night rehearsing ‘Home’ was a surreal feeling,” Dierks said. “No matter who you vote for or what you believe, it is one of the greatest symbols of our country. It is our nation’s ‘Home.’ I’m honored to have been asked to perform there, and tonight when I sing this song, I will definitely be thinking about all of the men and women in the military.”



What's Your Favorite Song?


From The Washington Post:

Dierks Bentley on being excited to be here:

"On my phone... I keep going to down to my Google maps, trying to get my blue dot to go on the White House. Hey! It worked! ... I guess ‘cause we’re outside... [Let me] take a screen saver shot of that blue dot.”

Bentley on why we should support our returning veterans:

“Now is the time that these guys are coming back, you know, with health problems and obviously they’re trying to put their families back together. And the economy’s crap. Now is the time to really show your patriotism, your support, and do something... It’s more than just a yellow ribbon... How do we incorporate these folks back into our society, into our economy, so they can have productive lives?”

In case you missed the show, here are a few videos for you. 

1-Behind the scenes, with DB interviewing the other artists.  Check out the "hugs" at the end!

2-President Obama's opening remarks

3-Dierks performs "Home," and dedicates it to the guys and girls in the military who are coming "home." (Thanks to Janet, NJ rep)

4-Lauren Alaina performing the Willie Nelson classic, "You Are Always On My Mind," duet with Dierks.













The show ended with Kris Kristofferson singing "Bobby Magee" and all the artists joined him on stage and sang a line or two.  Then, as the credits rolled, President and Mrs. Obama thanked each performer by shaking hands and freely giving out hugs.  Another great feat for the history books!

HEY DIERKS, IS BLUEGRASS-"ISH" A WORD?

According to oregonlive.com, "Dierks Bentley made a bluegrass record. Sort of. It arrived billed as a bluegrass record, and his publicist emailed the title track, Up On The Ridge, ahead of the interview, and, as bad as I felt to be the one to break it to Bentley, it didn't sound like that radical a departure from, say, his first big hit -- What Was I Thinkin'.

"I hate to put a label on it, because when people hear the record, it's definitely, there's a big lack of electric guitars," he said.

But an abundance of many of the instruments that form the foundation of his best songs. And, it turns out, there is some pretty serious bluegrass on the disc, too.

The kind of stuff that attracted him away from the classrooms of Vanderbilt when he first got to Nashville. It wasn't the Music Row stuff that grabbed him, it was the house band at Station Inn -- the Sidemen.

"They turned me on to a whole new world," Bentley said. "When I got there, the whole country scene, I was a little turned off by it. It wasn't me. They weren't writing their own songs. It was artificial to some degree. It was different than I thought it'd be. I walked into the Station Inn and discovered real people playing real instruments."

After coming off his last tour, he was playing with a couple of different projects, but this album, let's call it bluegrass-infused, took hold. He ended up pulling in top-end players like the Del McCoury Band and the Punch Brothers. He loaded it up with singers and players like Alison Krauss, Vince Gill, Jamey Johnson and Miranda Lambert.

He and his pals made interesting song choices. They do a Bob Dylan tune -- Senor (Tales of Yankee Power). They do a U2 tune -- Pride (In the Name of Love). They do a Kris Kristofferson tune -- Bottle to the Bottom.

They got Kristofferson to sing on that one.

"He lives in Hawaii and I thought, Maybe we can fly to Hawaii," Bentley said. "But that wasn't in the budget."

Fortunately, Kristofferson was going to be in Nashville and in a studio, so they barged in on that. Unfortunately, the film guy who'd been recording a lot of the recording of the album couldn't make it, so Bentley was trying to capture it all on his iPhone, because, how often are you in the studio with Kris Kristofferson playing one of the guy's perfect songs?

"Next time I'm not going to write a song with so many words in it," Bentley recalled Kristofferson saying as they worked."

Read the rest of the article here.

DIERKS' THIRD 'THREAD' IS 'PRICELESS'

This week, Dierks Bentley's WSM radio show was "Priceless," as in legendary Country Music Hall of Famer Ray Price. "We're gonna do a whole show on Ray Price's music and his influence on me and a lot of my contemporaries." Dierks says.

The Thread is stringing us along, from DB's Station Inn roots, to his Lower Broadway antics and now the third show in the series demonstrates how the history of country music legends are all connected.

Although Lot of Leavin' Left To Do began the hour, it was the only Bentley-penned song played. Instead, Dierks took us for a ride in Ray's old buick, showcasing a lot of the songwriters that had hits with Ray Price, from 1956 forward. Like Crazy Arms, You Done Me Wrong (George Jones and Ray Price co-wrote), and a Bill Anderson penned tune--City Lights.

Bentley played Invitation To The Blues written by Roger Miller, matter -of-factly letting us know the song peaked at #3, but it just goes to show you don't need a #1 hit to have a big hit.

A natural story teller, he goes on to outline Ray Price's 1953 band - The Cherokee Cowboys. Who knew Roger Miller, Willie Nelson, and Johnny Paycheck were all in one band! What a treat for the 1950's audiences!

Dierks reminded us that even though we're all used to hearing Crazy sang by Patsy Cline, (a big hit in 1962 for her), that Ray Price recut it in 1967; his version only went to #73 but the cool piece of trivia is that Willie Nelson wrote it.

One of Bentley's favorite singer/songwriter's of all time, Kris Kristofferson wrote, For The Good Times, and it won Price a Grammy for Best Male Vocal Performance. The song went #1 in 1970.

Next on the Price play list is The Lonesomest Lonesome, written by Mac Davis. "I love the word lonesome," Dierks admits. For those of us who are lucky enough to own his 2001 independent album, "Don't Leave Me In Love," that word - lonesome - is laced between every other lyric on the CD!

Ray Price has had 109 charting singles in his career and might have a few more in him! He's one of our true icons, still singing on the Opry stage! Dierks obviously has a lot of respect for the great Ray Price.

This week's episode of THE THREAD, presented by Dierks Bentley, is now available for download from the audio archive on the Dierks Fans Message board. You will need to be registered to access this free audio. The show has been edited to remove advertising and lasts 48 minutes.