Meet Charley Crockett
The Texas musician isn’t a household name, but he’s risen the ranks through ceaseless touring and catching the ear of Okie talent. Nathan Poppe shares his interview.
Charley Crockett carried moving boxes from a trailer hitch and was digging for the right outfit.
The singer-songwriter, who resembles the throwback, honky tonk approved, button-up shirt he picked in both musical form and fashion, calls Texas home. But he belongs to the road these days. It’s a chilly Tuesday evening in November, but he’s sold out the Blue Door. Pulling in roughly 100 concertgoers on a weeknight is no small task. So how did this bluesy performer, a claimed descendant of the storied Davy Crockett, wind up back in Oklahoma with such an eager crowd?
The easy answer would be to talk about the names he’s opened for throughout the Oklahoma music scene. The Turnpike Troubadours have toured endlessly to crowds of thousands and it’s often Charley and Co.’s job to warm up listeners. He’s also about to head overseas in 2018 with Tulsanative JD McPherson for a lengthy European tour. Crockett’s own name is making splashes on the national scene by catching the attention of Thirty Tigers, a Nashville-based label that’s got a knack for finding and amplifying the stories of Americana songwriters that have something worth singing about.
It’s probably not just one thing. Either way, that packed Blue Note concert was more than a decade in the making. Crockett sat down with me in the Oklahoma City venue’s green room to share his journey from playing to anyone who’d listen in New York subway platforms and the streets of Louisiana to finding an audience of his own in Dallas’ Deep Ellum district.
It all started in the kitchen
Crockett’s mother loved singing throughout their singlewide trailer, especially in the morning. The pair lived in a rural part of South Texas. Charley would join in with her soulful voice.
“She doesn’t sing in front of me anymore,” Crockett said. “I guess I’ve gotten older, and she thinks I’m a star. She’s like embarrassed or something. When I was a kid, she wasn’t embarrassed at all.”
She embedded a confidence in Charley at an early age. However, he wasn’t dead set on becoming a musician until later in life, but he learned an important lesson.
“I didn’t ever have any fear about singing,” Crockett said. “If your parent is singing, you start singing with them and they never tell you otherwise, then you think you got it. That’s a good thing. In life, most of it’s just believing that you got it. It doesn’t matter what it is.”
Believe it, and it happens, he said. Even when you’re hopping trains and hitchhiking to make a living? Charley would make that argument. His travels have taken him all around the world, but no place has been as influential as Louisiana.
That’s where he met his trumpet player and longtime bandmate Charlie Mills Jr., who’s got some great advice if you ever find yourself in New Orleans: Don’t drink the water. “Think about it, man. Everything from all the rivers, refineries and farms meets down there,” Crockett said. “The flip side of that logic explains why the music is so amazing in Louisiana. You could be listening to swing jazz or traditional honky tonk bands all on the same block. There’s also so many kinds of hiphop that came from those neighborhoods.”
It’s a melting pot of genres. Everything from Louis Armstrong to Big Freedia has found a voice in New Orleans. Charley’s passion is born from the styles of yesterday. He couldn’t help but soak in traditional music while making ends meet as a street performer. So when it was time to make a covers album, Crockett sat down and made a list of nearly 20 songs.
“If I’d picked a different day to really nail down the track list, then they could’ve all been different,” he said. “A lot of them are love songs that make you so sad that you feel good. You have to hear them over and over again in the bar. That’s why I recorded those. Isn’t it strange how some of those really sad honky tonk, drinkin’ songs make you feel so good?”
“Charley Crockett presents Lil G.L’s Honky Tonk Jubilee” landed in September, and Crockett built the record’s playlist from his favorite versions of his favorite songs. He mostly avoided over played tracks. Old-school cuts from Hank Williams, Loretta Lynn, Ernest Tubb and one modern number from Brennen Leigh made the 16-song collection. The classic country playlist feels almost off the cuff, like the way his band sounds in concert.
“I don’t ever rehearse. This band doesn’t rehearse,” Crockett said. “All the guys who end up playing with me end up the same way. We play all the time.”
Charley originally had planned to release his covers record under the obscure “Lil G.L.” nickname. After all, the record was mostly just for him. However, after returning to Texas, his sophomore LP “In the Night” started building momentum on public radio and Thirty Tigers knew adding “Charley Crockett presents” could stoke a fire.
A new record
If that wasn’t enough, Crockett’s putting the finishing touches on an album full of originals called “Lonesome as a Shadow.” It’s due around April, and does what Charley does best: It sticks to simple stories from his own life. He gave the Blue Door crowd an early taste of the record when his band left the stage and he played a song solo.
He dedicated the acoustic number to his late sister. It’s called “I Wanna Cry,” and the track respectfully mixes a painful story with the energy of tender songwriting.
“My newer work is my best effort at trying to write songs that can last and mean something,” Crockett said. “I’ve got this old timey Cajun and rockabilly thing rolling through it. I’ve also got stuff on there that brings out the Bill Withers side of me. But it’s still my deal.”
With such a drive to move forward, it’s almost uncanny to see how much Crockett respects the past. He name-checked American songwriters such as Woody Guthrie, Irving Berlin and Leon Payne, not just because of their popularity but also because their songs have withstood the test of time.
“We have not outdone those people,” he said. “Maybe we’ve added layers, but we haven’t outdone them. Think about film. I think that the narratives of old films, just like the narratives of the old songs that Hank Williams made popular, haven’t evolved so much that our stories are any different.
“The feeling of being on a lost highway or having that ramblin’ spirit … there’s something about the sadness of the song makes you happy by getting it out.”
If your parent is singing, you start singing with them and they never tell you otherwise, then you think you got it. In Life, most of it’s just believing that you got it. It doesn’t matter what it is. CHARLEY CROCKETT