Great Plains was a
progressive country
A country is a distinct part of the world, such as a state, nation, or other political entity. It may be a sovereign state or make up one part of a larger state. For example, the country of Japan is an independent, sovereign state, while the ...
pop band that formed in 1987. The band comprised Jack Sundrud (currently, as of 2015, of
Poco
Poco was an American country rock band originally formed in 1968 after the demise of Buffalo Springfield. Guitarists Richie Furay and Jim Messina, former members of Buffalo Springfield, were joined by multi-instrumentalist Rusty Young, bassi ...
), Russ Pahl, Denny Dadmun-Bixby, Michael Young, and Lex Browning. In their career, they recorded two studio albums and had four singles enter the ''
Billboard
A billboard (also called a hoarding in the UK and many other parts of the world) is a large outdoor advertising structure (a billing board), typically found in high-traffic areas such as alongside busy roads. Billboards present large advertise ...
'' country charts. Their highest charting single, "Faster Gun", peaked at No. 41.
Early days
The band began with Jack Sundrud, Russ Pahl, and Michael Young, who were all working in
Michael Johnson's ("Bluer Than Blue") backup band. Sundrud was a seasoned professional, having toured with various acts such as
Poco
Poco was an American country rock band originally formed in 1968 after the demise of Buffalo Springfield. Guitarists Richie Furay and Jim Messina, former members of Buffalo Springfield, were joined by multi-instrumentalist Rusty Young, bassi ...
,
Nicolette Larson
Nicolette Larson (July 17, 1952 – December 16, 1997) was an American singer. She is perhaps best known for her work in the late 1970s with Neil Young and her 1978 hit single of Young's "Lotta Love", which hit No. 1 on the Hot Adult Contem ...
, and
Allman Brothers Allman may refer to:
Music
*The Allman Brothers Band
The Allman Brothers Band was an American rock band formed in Jacksonville, Florida in 1969 by brothers Duane Allman (founder, slide guitar and lead guitar) and Gregg Allman (vocals, keyboa ...
guitarist
Dickey Betts
Forrest Richard Betts (born December 12, 1943) is an American guitarist, singer, songwriter, and composer best known as a founding member of The Allman Brothers Band.
Early in his career, he collaborated with Duane Allman, introducing melodic tw ...
.
Brent Maher
Brent Maher is a producer, engineer, and songwriter currently residing in Nashville, Tennessee. He has produced and engineered six Grammy-winning records and received awards from the CMA, ACM, CCMA, ASCAP, SOCAN and NSAI. Maher engineered cl ...
was producing Johnson and was looking for a new band to produce. Maher liked the sound of Michael Johnson's backup band. Sundrud was playing bass at the time, so Maher asked Austin Cunningham to join the band in the studio to do some experimentation. The band recorded a few tracks, mostly Cunningham's songs with himself on lead vocals. The band lineup / instrumentation at that time was Austin Cunningham on acoustic guitar and lead vocals; Jack Sundrud on bass and vocals; Russ Pahl on lead guitar, steel guitar and vocals, and Michael Young on drums. After recording a few sessions, Cunningham decided that he wanted to pursue a solo career and left the band. Sundrud then played some of his own songs for producer Maher and his daughter, Dianna, who ran Maher's publishing company, Moraine Music. They liked the songs and signed Sundrud to their publishing company as a
songwriter
A songwriter is a musician who professionally composes musical compositions or writes lyrics for songs, or both. The writer of the music for a song can be called a composer, although this term tends to be used mainly in the classical music gen ...
. Maher and the band then recorded more tracks of Sundrud’s material, with Sundrud on lead vocals.
The band showcased for RCA, and they passed. It was around this time that the band decided to hire a regular bassist and move Sundrud to acoustic guitar and lead vocals, so in 1989, the band added Denny Dadmun-Bixby to join the band on bass and vocals. Sundrud first met Bixby when the latter was recording with
Wild Choir
Wild Choir was an American country music band. It consisted of Gail Davies (lead vocals), Larry Chaney (guitar), Pete Pendras (guitar), Denny Dadmun-Bixby (bass guitar), and Bob Mummert (drums).
Davies thought of the idea upon returning from a tr ...
,
Gail Davies’ band (Sundrud's first road gig was with Davies in 1982.) The recording of the first record was slow and piece-meal since the band all had other gigs and needed income — Pahl was working with
Don Williams
Donald Ray Williams (May 27, 1939 – September 8, 2017) was an American country singer, songwriter, and 2010 inductee into the Country Music Hall of Fame. He began his solo career in 1971, singing popular ballads and amassing seventeen number ...
, Bixby with Wild Choir and Gail Davies, and Young was doing sessions and had a growing custom-car business building cars. The band recorded when they could until 1989, but in early 1990, Sundrud was asked to join
country rock
Country rock is a genre of music which fuses rock and country. It was developed by rock musicians who began to record country-flavored records in the late 1960s and early 1970s. These musicians recorded rock records using country themes, vocal s ...
band Poco after
Richie Furay
Paul Richard Furay (born May 9, 1944) is an American singer, guitarist, songwriter, and Rock & Roll Hall of Fame member (with Buffalo Springfield). He is best known for forming the bands Buffalo Springfield with Stephen Stills, Neil Young, Bruc ...
had left the Legacy tour (the Legacy tour and album initially featured all 5 original Poco members.) This was Sundrud's second stint with Poco, having been a member of the band from 1985–87; Sundrud's first professional band, the Minnesota-based Podipto, a regional band signed to GRT Records, had opened for Poco in 1971. Sundrud's Poco gig put off the finishing of the Great Plains project for a year.
Record deal
The band finished the recording in 1991, showcased for Sony/Columbia and got a record deal. The début album was produced by Brent Maher and
Don Potter
Donald Steele Potter (21 April 1902 – 7 June 2004) was an English sculptor, wood carver, potter and teacher.
Don Potter was born in Newington, near Sittingbourne, Kent, the son of a school teacher, and attended a private school. He joined ...
, assisted by Brian Maher. The first single, "A Picture of You", written by Sundrud and songwriter
Gary Burr
Gary Burr, born in Meriden, Connecticut, is an American musician, songwriter, and record producer, primarily in the country music genre. Many of the songs he has written have become Top-10 hits, the first of which was " Love's Been A Little B ...
peaked at No. 48. "Faster Gun" was their highest chart entry at No. 41.
The first album failed to bring in large sales numbers and both Russ Pahl and Michael Young left the band in 1992. Sundrud and Bixby hung on, using studio musicians to record most of a second album, but during the recording process, their record label, Sony, had a changing of executives and the band was dropped in 1993.
Also in 1993, they were nominated by the
Academy of Country Music
The Academy of Country Music (ACM) was founded in 1964 in Los Angeles, California as the Country & Western Music Academy. Among the founders were Eddie Miller, Tommy Wiggins, and Mickey and Chris Christensen. They wanted to promote country music ...
for Top New Vocal Group or Duet, along with
Confederate Railroad
Confederate Railroad (originally known as "Confederate RR") is an American country rock band founded in 1987 in Marietta, Georgia, by Danny Shirley (lead vocals), Michael Lamb (lead guitar), Mark Dufresne (drums), Chris McDaniel (keyboards), Warr ...
and
Little Texas, but lost to Confederate Railroad.
It was around this time that Brent Maher became involved with what would become Magnatone Records, an independent label financed by Roy Speer, who founded the
Home Shopping Network. Other artists included
Shelby Lynne
Shelby Lynne (born Shelby Lynn Moorer, October 22, 1968) is an American singer and songwriter and the older sister of singer-songwriter Allison Moorer. The success of her pop rock album '' I Am Shelby Lynne'' (1999) led to her winning the Grammy ...
,
Billy Montana
Billy Montana (born William Schlappi on September 28, 1959, in Voorheesville, New York) is an American country music singer-songwriter. Between 1987 and 1995, Montana released one studio album and charted six singles on '' Billboard''s Hot Coun ...
,
Rich McCready
Rich McCready (born February 9, 1970, in Seneca, Missouri) is an American country music singer-songwriter. McCready signed to Magnatone Records in 1995 and recorded two albums for the label. Rich McCreadyat Allmusic
AllMusic (previously kn ...
, and
Caryl Mack Parker.
Another chance
Sundrud and Bixby decided to make Great Plains a band again and brought multi-instrumentalist / singer Lex Browning on board. They scrapped what they had been working on during the second album and started over, with Brent Maher and Don Potter producing again. The result was 1996's ''"Homeland"''. The label released 3 singles from that album, all of which once again failed to move beyond the 40s in the charts, including "Dancin' With The Wind", written by Sundrud and long-time Nashville songwriter / performer Craig Bickhardt; "Healin' Hands", written by Sundrud and Chuck Cannon; and "Wolverton Mountain", written by
Claude King
Claude King (February 5, 1923 – March 7, 2013) was an American country music singer and songwriter, best known for his million selling 1962 hit, "Wolverton Mountain".
Biography
King was born in Keithville in southern Caddo Parish south ...
and
Merle Kilgore
Wyatt Merle Kilgore (August 9, 1934 – February 6, 2005) was an American singer, songwriter, and manager. Born in Chickasha, Oklahoma, he was raised in Shreveport, Louisiana. At the time of his death, he was the personal manager of Hank Wil ...
. "Dancin' With The Wind" and "Wolverton Mountain" also had videos produced. The band then recorded a couple of songs with Sundrud's friend, producer Michael Clute (
Diamond Rio
Diamond Rio is an American country music band. The band was founded in 1982 as an attraction for the Opryland USA theme park in Nashville, Tennessee, and was originally known as the Grizzly River Boys, then the Tennessee River Boys. It was foun ...
). Magnatone released a single, "There's More Where That Came From", written by Sundrud and Tia Sillers, but they dropped the band the day after the single was released. Great Plains played some prior-committed dates for a few months and disbanded for good in 1996.
After disbanding
Jack Sundrud rejoined Poco in 2000 and is still with the band as of 2015, once again playing bass and providing vocals. Sundrud co-wrote the hit "
Cain's Blood" with Michael Johnson for the vocal group
4 Runner, which peaked at No. 26 on the country charts in 1995. He also co-wrote (with Craig Bickhardt) the No. 1 country hit "
It Must Be Love" for
Ty Herndon
Boyd Tyrone Herndon (born May 2, 1962), known professionally as Ty Herndon, is an American country music singer and songwriter. His music career began in the 1980s as a member of the Tennessee River Boys, a predecessor to the country band Diamon ...
. Sundrud recorded a solo album, ''By My Own Hand'', in 2005, and a second album effort in collaboration with Craig Bickhardt called ''Idlewheel'' in 2006 which morphed into a full band with tour dates through 2008.
Lex Browning returned to
Portland, Oregon
Portland (, ) is a port city in the Pacific Northwest and the largest city in the U.S. state of Oregon. Situated at the confluence of the Willamette and Columbia rivers, Portland is the county seat of Multnomah County, the most populous co ...
, where he had previously played with
Jeffrey Frederick's band,
Les Clams. He is a member of the
Freak Mountain Ramblers, with whom he has recorded four albums, and in 2009 released his first solo album, Good Rain on
Red Newt Records. As of September 2018, Browning joined his ex-bandmate Sundrud in Poco, where he plays guitar, fiddle and vocals.
Dadmun-Bixby sang backing vocals on
Suzy Bogguss' 1998 album ''
Nobody Love, Nobody Gets Hurt''. He toured with Suzy Bogguss and Rodney Crowell playing Bass and adding backing vocals before returning to Portland, Oregon where he often performs with Lex Browning. He has also released two CDs of his own, ''Fish Out Of Water'' in 2002 and ''JOYRIDE'' in 2017.
Discography
Albums
Singles
Music videos
Nominations
Academy of Country Music
The Academy of Country Music (ACM) was founded in 1964 in Los Angeles, California as the Country & Western Music Academy. Among the founders were Eddie Miller, Tommy Wiggins, and Mickey and Chris Christensen. They wanted to promote country music ...
*
1992 Top New Vocal Group or Duet
References
External links
Jack Sundrud's official web sitePodipto's official web site
{{Authority control
Country music groups from Tennessee
Columbia Records artists
Musical groups established in 1987
Musical groups disestablished in 1996