The Pullman Porters' country cool

When a work transfer brought pedal steel guitarist Jim Novak to Atlanta from Los Angeles three years ago, he was sure he'd find a thriving country music community here.

He was wrong.

"A lot of my friends in L.A. were moving to Nashville, but I thought, 'This is the South — there'll be plenty of venues and original country bands down here.'"

"When I was in the country scene in L.A., there were lots of fine musicians doing original stuff," says Novak, who has performed with the Plowboys, Marty Stewart and Gary Allen. "But here, the country music clubs all seem to want you to play Skynyrd and rock."

Undaunted, Novak and his wife, singer Laura Tyler, formed the Pullman Porters, a traditional country act. After several successful Star Bar gigs, the duo — with Atlantan Ben McAllister on guitar and vocals — has readied an album for release. Falling somewhere between the sass of Greta Lee and the lonesome moan of the Star Room Boys, When the Last Teardrop Falls is a slice of honky-tonk heaven that could easily pass for a '70s-era Shelby Singleton-produced Sun release.

So far, Novak is pleased with the local reaction to the band. "After we play, we get a lot of people who aren't really country fans saying, 'Man, I didn't know this stuff was so cool,'" Novak says.

The Pullman Porters' CD release party is slated for Saturday night at The Earl. And Novak is confident East Atlanta rock fans will enjoy the show. "If you do classic country and do it well, people are gonna like it, no matter what," he says.

The Pullman Porters play The Earl Sat., April 27.??





Comments

There are no comments at this time.