Wayne ‘The Train’ Hancock: Tonka!

Wayne ‘The Train’ Hancock plays the Pioneer Village Country Music Club, Petrie on March 29 and the East Coast Blues & Roots Music Festival at the Red Devil Park in Byron Bay on March 30 and 31.

Roots and rockabilly, blues, country and Western swing all find a home in the honky tonkin’, foot tappin’ tunes of South Texas native, Wayne ‘The Train’ Hancock. Gigging 250 dates a year, four acclaimed albums to his credit and a pathological dedication to music that’s real, have ensured Wayne has amassed a fan base hooked on his flat-out and reckless approach.

Heavily influenced by Jimmie Rodgers, Woody Guthrie and Hank Williams, Wayne has always had the music coursing through his veins.

As Wayne explains: “I’ve always been into it. We used to do a lot of travelling. My dad, he’d work a job for two or three years and get tired of it and go someplace else and work another job. We sang a lot. There are long highways out here and it was way before you had any sort on entertainment in the car except for a radio. If we didn’t like what was on the radio, which usually we didn’t, we usually just did a lot of singing. So I got good at doing a barber’s shop quartet. After four hours of that, and singing all the time, you get pretty good at it after a while. Music goes with the road, and it seems to be what I’m good at, so I’m doing it.”

A-Town Blues is Hancock’s fourth release, following Thunderstorms and Neon Lights, That’s What Daddy Wants and most recently Wild, Free and Reckless. The album features 14 tracks, stripped down, raw and gutsy.

Wayne explains how this release differs from Wild, Free and Reckless: “It doesn’t have seven instruments playing at the one time on every song. The studios are different. I used the same studio that I cut Thunderstorms and Neon Signs in. That’s actually Lloyd Maines’ studio. He’s the producer. He’s real familiar with the controls and everything there. The album itself is just a better sounding album all the way around. Because there’s not a lot of guys playing on every song, it was very smooth. That definitely dictates the music because it has a real relaxing feel to it.”

“I went in on Monday and I was done Tuesday evening. I’m not sure what the dates were on it, but it was done in two days. We probably could have got done with it even faster than that but some of our people had to play that night. We got in and got out fast. You can spend a lot of money in the studio, man, being in there everyday. Every time you’re in the studio a dollar sign goes up, plus every day you’re in there recording, that’s a day you’re not out there touring.”

“I’m hoping that my records are going to start sounding more like what I sound like when I tour. Less baloney you know. I just want to put out a record that I can do. If you saw me, if I could do redo that on an album for you, with two pieces or more. I don’t know too many bands that can do that - just walk into your office and just start playing.”

It was 1994 when Wayne won a part in the theatrical production of Chippy alongside Terry Allen, Butch Hancock, Joe Ely and Robert Earl Keen, that he crossed paths with Lloyd Maines.

“I was doing the play with those guys. I got to be pretty good friends with Lloyd. He was playing this six-string lap steel and he was doing it really well and he said he hadn’t played before. So I showed Lloyd this little Hawaiian slant thing on the steel guitar and anyway we got to be good friends.”

“When I was gonna do an album, they were looking for someone to produce it that had a name. Supposedly, I guess, if you don’t have any talent whatsoever, if the producer has a name they might listen to it. They asked me to pick a producer, so I tried to pick someone I knew wasn’t going to be conflicting with me in the control room, somebody I knew who knew what they were talking about and knew I could work with. The only one I could think of was Lloyd Maines. I’ve worked with a lot of guys and I think Lloyd’s the best, at least for this.”

Already Wayne is looking ahead to the next album, ready to squeeze it among a hectic touring schedule that will bring him to Australia and beyond.

“I think I want to do it next year. It’ll be more of the same but you know me, there’s always some new stuff. All my albums all have something different about them. I don’t have a record company pushing me in any direction so I’m free to do what I want to do. It’s wonderful. I can go any place I want to play and I don’t have to worry about my record company not liking it.”

“I never have to make my bed. I can put my feet on the couch and nobody cares. You can live like a king everyday and not have to worry about it. It depends how long you stay but at least the last four years of touring, my hotels have gone up from motel sixes to Holiday Inns, so I’m happy with it.”

If you’re ready to take a chance on Wayne Hancock, leave your preconceptions at the door and steel yourself for some high energy, fun tunes.

“Expect a lot of music and expect to have a good time. Bring your dancing shoes and forget whatever you heard about country music, just forget about it, because I’m going to re-educate everybody on it.”