PREVIEW
STACEY EARLE AND MARK STUART
Wednesday, June 18
Uptown Stage
It was love at first waffle. When Mark Stuart and Stacey Earle met each other at a songwriters’ night in Nashville in 1992, there were no first-date jitters. Each of them was too focused on their songs and the audience to realize that by 5 a.m. they’d be a couple. The musicians would be married on Christmas Eve the following year, and would eventually make a pact to work and tour only in tandem.
"It’s just amazing that we both were at the same songwriters’ night," says Earle from a tour stop in Northern California. "It cleared up a lot of things that night. We knew that we were both songwriters, we were both struggling artists, and we both knew each other’s dreams and paths. And we both knew we liked road food, so we hit it off!"
The couple takes their working relationship so seriously that Earle halts the interview until she can find a second phone line so Stuart can join in.
As a single mom supporting two boys, Earle came to Stuart’s hometown of Nashville in 1990 with stars in her eyes. Times were not easy, and the couple’s yearly benefit for Second Harvest Food Banks is one way that Earle acknowledges the help she received during her own food-stamp years.
Such life experiences keep Earle and Stuart down to earth – you couldn’t talk to a nicer pair – and that grounded feeling permeates Never Gonna Let You Go, their first album on Gearle Records, the label they started together. The two-disc set includes a produced version of each song as well as a stripped-down rendition so that fans can have their cake and eat it, too. They record their songs based on fan response at live shows, and consider the album to be like a party favour from the live performances.
It was while Earle was on tour, opening for her famous brother Steve, and Stuart was touring his music on the other side of the continent, that the couple realized that their sum was greater than its parts.
"I always joke and say that she went on a tour and I went on a detour," says Stuart before Earle adds, "We can take care of each other onstage and on the road. And not only that, but when two people play together it literally becomes one – the guitars, the vocals and then the songs."
While Earle’s 21-year-old son tours as the drummer for the punk band Love Is Red, she and Stuart reflect on the fact that neither of them got to make an album until they were over 30 years old.
"We’re late bloomers, but because of that we appreciate it so much more. Young can be dangerous. There’s some that take care of it, but if you stand in the grocery store line on the front cover of People or one of those, they’re always in trouble," she says.
Some of the trouble that young ’uns meet is too well documented in Lauren St. John’s new Steve Earle biography Hardcore Troubadour. A mention of the book brings a definite response. "Ouch, that’s a sore subject," Earle says. "I like Lauren and I think she was a little bit overwhelmed. I can’t tell you how far off some of it is."
Stacey Earle says one of the problems with the book is that the author never interviewed Stuart, although she thanks him in the credits. She says there are other errors, too, but the sorest point is the fact that Stuart is accused of selling the Chevelle that Steve gave to Stacey. Fact is, Stuart wouldn’t meet Stacey until three years after she had to liquidate the car to pay for groceries and electricity – all because Steve had used up all the household’s money.
"We felt like putting on our Web site, ‘Mark did not sell the Chevelle," says Earle, laughing.
"It is an unofficial book," she adds. "I know Steve never could read it. None of us could – none of us have read it fully. My parents opened it and could only get through a little bit. It’s where we don’t want to go back. For us, we want to move forward. We want to enjoy each other as a family. The hurricane is over. It sits there, we see copies of it lying around and we shiver, and you notice we stutter when people say ‘The book.’ I haven’t read it, but I think she was just overwhelmed. Steve does have a great story. And look where he is now, in full recovery." |
Copyright ©2003 FFWD. All rights reserved.