Highway 101 Hopes Album 3 Is Up to Speed

Curtis Stone had a double case of the jitters last Monday night in Nashville--one for himself and one for his dad.

It was awards night for the Nashville-based Country Music Assn., the annual televised ceremonies in which the kudos-conscious country music business distributes degrees of honor and prestige among its top-echelon acts.

Stone says he was edgy, and a bit doubtful, about the prospects that his band, Highway 101, would be voted country music’s top group for the second straight year. But, speaking over the phone from Nashville last week, the Highway 101 bassist said he was even more nervous about what would happen with his father.

Cliffie Stone, a longtime presence on the Southern California country scene as a musician, radio and television host and song publisher, was being considered for election to the Country Music Hall of Fame, vying against four other nominees in the Hall’s non-performing category.

The Group of the Year award came first, and Highway 101, which plays tonight and Tuesday at the Crazy Horse Steak House in Santa Ana , won it again over a field that included the Desert Rose Band, Shenandoah, Restless Heart and Alabama.

Later, Stone was returning to his seat after a photo and interview session outside the hall when he heard the Hall-of-Fame presentation being announced with the usual biographical preamble.

“(The announcer) was talking about this guy who did 14,000 television shows and 25,000 radio shows. I said, ‘I guess dad didn’t get it.’ I had no idea he had done that many.”

Speaking two days after the awards night, Stone said he still hadn’t had a proper chance, amid all the awards-week bustle, to give his father proper congratulations on his Hall of Fame honor.

“I haven’t really been able to sit down and express how proud I am of him, but he knows that.”

Cliffie Stone, who grew up in Burbank, started playing stand-up bass on the radio in 1932. He became emcee of his own Southland shows: “Wake Up Ranch” on radio, then “Hometown Jamboree,” a country music television program that aired on KTLA from 1950 to 1961.

Yet Cliffie wasn’t the first musical Stone.

“My grandfather played bass and was a world champion banjo player for five years in a row,” Curtis Stone said. “He was the comic relief of my dad’s show. He went by the name Herman Hermit. He looked like a hobo, with real long hair and a real long beard. In the ‘50s, that was pretty rad. He would make musical instruments out of car bumpers and vacuum cleaners.”

Cliffie Stone, now 72, taught his son his first guitar chords, but Curtis says that while his father always offered guidance, he didn’t try to push him into any musical line.

“I played a lot of rock in high school. Then my dad said, ‘I’ve got a job for you. I can put you together with this girl who is going to go out and play rodeos.’ He said that in country music, you’ll always be able to work for a long, long time, but the rock thing might only last a year.”

Given his origins, it is natural enough that the younger Stone, 39, would wind up with a high-profile spot in country music. But his band’s origins are not quite so organic. Highway 101 is not a group of old comrades who slogged their way up through the bars and honky-tonks. Instead, it was the creation of a Colorado-based music business manager, Chuck Morris, who had the concept for the group before there was a group.

“He had this idea of putting together a country band with a girl singer,” Stone said. Morris, who also manages the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, the Desert Rose Band and Leo Kottke, found his singer, Paulette Carlson, via an unsolicited tape. Carlson, originally from Minnesota, had tried to establish herself as a solo performer in Nashville during the early 1980s, but without much success.

Morris teamed Carlson with veteran drummer Scott (Cactus) Moser. Stone says he entered the picture because Jerry Cariaga, a songwriting partner of his, knew Carlson and put in a strong word of recommendation. After the three had auditioned several other musicians, Stone brought in guitarist Jack Daniels, an old performing buddy from California.

Highway 101’s first release, a pop-flavored single for Warner Bros., turned out to be a commercial flop. “They said ‘We’ll release another song, and if that doesn’t work, you’re dead,’ ” Stone said. “We decided to add a steel guitar and be more country. That’s kind of what made the difference.” Recording with a more traditional approach, Highway 101 came up with “The Bed You Made for Me,” an autobiographical song that Carlson had written about being betrayed by a former flame.

With Highway 101 barely rolling up the on-ramp of success (at that point, it existed only as a studio band), Stone said he began thinking about finishing his college degree and finding a more reliable means of support as an English teacher or music instructor. But that changed when “The Bed You Made for Me” became a hit in the spring of 1987, rising to No. 4 on the Billboard country chart. Since then, Highway 101 has cruised along nicely, notching seven more Top 10 country singles (including three No. 1 hits--”Cry, Cry, Cry,” “Somewhere Tonight,” and “(Do You Love Me) Just Say Yes”) and back-to-back group-of-the-year awards from both of country music’s major industry groups, the Country Music Assn. and the Los Angeles-based Academy of Country Music.

The band has just released its third and most traditional-sounding album, “Paint the Town.” While honky-tonk predominates, the album still shows glimmers of the country-rock side of the band’s personality. Thematically, “Paint the Town” offers a steady diet of heartbreak, although not of the soppy, tears-in-your-beer variety.

“We said, ‘Let’s take a chance and do a lovelorn album,’ ” Stone said. “But there are no victims on the album. We’re conscious of having (Carlson) come across as stronger than that. The (theme of) the first album was a woman not being a victim in love, taking a strong stance”--a role that Carlson plays well by moving from classic country catch-in-the-throat hurt to a brassier, more insistent persona.

Stone says that Highway 101 was too hurried on its 1988 album, “2,” to consider the sort of thematic and stylistic unities that crop up on “Paint the Town.” Group members had written or co-written four of the 10 songs on the band’s first album--a respectable creative showing in country music, where performers commonly rely on outside songwriters for material. On “2,” all of the songs came from outside the band, except for one tune co-written by Carlson. Stone says the band’s touring schedule hadn’t allowed the members time to write.

For “Paint the Town,” he said, “we took time out to write and rehearse. Between the four of us, we wrote 20 songs for this record, of which two made the album. I can safely say it’s a little disappointing for all of us when we don’t get particular songs we believe in on the record. But the bottom line is the final product. Everything is a little disappointing for about 10 minutes when the final decision is made.” (Stone says song selections are made by a vote of Highway 101’s members, its two producers, its management and its record company.) “Then the disappointment is over, and it’s ‘Let’s get on, and for the next album let’s have all original songs.’ But they’re going to have to hold up and fit in.”

Some of the strongest originals axed from “Paint the Town” might have tilted the album too far toward Highway 101’s rocking side, Stone said, and not blended well with the record’s traditional emphasis.

“It would be very easy for us to go one way or another, to go out and be real straight-ahead rock, or straight-ahead country,” he said. “But the band was cognizant of not doing anything outside of what we do. The third album is critical--it could make or break us.”

The immediate goal, Stone said, is for Highway 101 to move up from its status as a show-opener for some of country’s biggest names and begin headlining the larger theaters on its own. But that push will have to wait until next year. After a few more dates, the band is going to stay off the highway for a while.

“It’s a rough time to take off with the album just coming out. But we haven’t really been off in three years,” said Stone, who lives in San Diego with his wife, a law student. “This will be our first real break. Paula’s getting married (to an Alaskan developer), and she wants to take off, and the rest of us just want to get home. I’m going to take my dogs to the beach and probably write some songs.”

Highway 101 plays tonight and Tuesday at 7 and 10 at the Crazy Horse Steak House, 1580 Brookhollow Drive, Santa Ana. Tickets: $26.50. Availability may be limited. Information: (714) 549-1512.