Rounder Goes The Distance For Myles

NASHVILLE‹Heather Myles is the first female honky-tonk singer to hit Nashville since‹when? It's been so long that nobody remembers anymore.
Myles certainly cuts an impressive profile. At a recent Nashville showcase at the Exit-In‹whose air conditioning blew out on a 98-degree evening‹she was hotter than the temperature. Stripped down to jeans, a tank top, and a cowboy hat, Myles sizzled with her urgent, original, and earthy songs.
WZZK Birmingham, Ala., music director Scott Stewart says, "If you're a fan of real country, she's the real deal. She is definitely the real thing."
She's also the first artist to benefit from the new distribution/promotion agreement between Mercury Nashville and Rounder Records, to which she is signed and which will release her label debut, "Highways And Honky Tonks," Sept. 11. She wrote most of the album and sings a duet with Merle Haggard on "No One Is Gonna Love You Better." And how did she get Haggard on the album? "I asked him," says the Southern California native, who originally planned to be a jockey and still rides.
Myles recorded two albums in the early '90s for HighTone Records, which were released in Europe on Daemon Records and came to the attention of Rounder founder Ken Irwin. After touring in Europe, Myles had bought a flat in London and planned to stay. "Traditional country music is really received well over there," she says. "I mortgaged my house in Southern California so I could afford to take my band to Europe."
She still played some dates in the U.S., she says, but "quit playing the honky-tonk scene on a nightly basis. I started getting some Lee Greenwood dates, Charlie Daniels dates, and then I started getting some Merle Haggard dates. I thought, 'Do I really want to live in London?' No. I cannot believe that my kind of music is not appealing to the masses [in the U.S.]. I have to believe in my heart that there are people out there who appreciate my kind of music."
That's what Rounder and Mercury are doing. Rounder VP of promotion Brad Paul says, "Ken had met her and let her know that if she were ever interested, to call Rounder. A couple of years ago, she called and said she was ready."
Although Myles is not a typical Rounder folk-oriented artist, Paul says that her roots orientation makes her and the label a perfect match. "She has a real rootsy sound, very much in the Rounder tradition. We're grounded in roots music, whether it's bluegrass or blues or country.
"We pride ourselves on our artists having artistic control," Paul notes, "and Ken told her pretty much to do what she wants. So she came into Rounder last January with a DAT that was not mastered, but it was mostly mixed, and we sat down and played it and my jaw just about hit the floor. It was great. Before the day was over, I had her booked into a showcase. We were really fired up."
Rounder's marketing campaign, Paul says, has two goals in mind. "We're going after the grass-roots following she has already, based on her touring and the two HighTone records. That audience is the sort of music-intensive fans who follow hip trends and listen to eclectic radio and read eclectic music magazines. We'll do everything we can to make them aware of the project. We'll do direct consumer mailings, with her fan base list, and she's well-connected with Dwight Yoakam's people, so they're graciously sharing their fan-base list. And then, we're doing a mailing to our own mail-order database list."
He adds, "We'll be advertising in publications like No Depression, American Songwriter, and Dirty Linen. We're working the record to alternative country stations and public, community, and college stations. Then, in an effort to cross over to a more mainstream country audience, we'll be heavily courting mainstream country radio. Heather has been on a national radio promotion tour since June. [In August] she'll be up and down the West Coast, starting in Bakersfield [Calif.] and working up through Oregon and Washington."
John Grady, senior VP of sales, marketing, and promotion for Mercury, says that Myles will be worked like any Mercury country artist. "There's room here for Shania Twain and Heather Myles, which I think is a wonderful situation. This will give Rounder more extensive distribution from a major distribution company and gives us another A&R source. That also brings the Rounder catalog into the Mercury system and brings their new acts to us."
In terms of promotion, Grady says, "they prepared their marketing plan, and we're helping them implement it through [PolyGram Group Distribution]. This is a bit different from what they've gone after before. We're approaching this as a flat-out country release, working the same accounts and going through the same radio channels. I'm not painting any delusional schemes for them, but I think we can get some bites on it. Depending on what radio says they want this week, it's leaning a little more traditional and basic and away from the AC side of life. Formula-wise, this record should fit. Sort of Dwight Yoakam in female clothes."
Myles is managed by Gehl Force and booked by APA. Her songs are published by Myles O'Melody (BMI).