Randy Lewis Brown shares his perspective on the music business and the stories behind some of his favorite songs.
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Mike Landess: For UT Tyler Radio, I’m Mike Landess. The East Texas music scene has a rich and vibrant history that includes country, blues and rock, and we’re blessed to get to enjoy these artists up close and personal at a variety of venues in our area, artists like Randy Lewis Brown. Welcome.
Randy Lewis Brown: Glad to be here.
Mike Landess: Good to have you here. Right off the bat, let me just say that your name makes me think of a 1950s heavyweight fighter here. Coming into the ring now is Randy Lewis. .
Randy Lewis Brown: Well, I went by Randy Brown for years, and then the streaming services came into vogue. And once upon a time your name was filed under the genre you’re in. Well, in the streaming world, it’s just your name. There happened to be several other Randy Brown’s in the music industry, an artist from the seventies. And another Randy Brown out of Fort Worth, that’s a hardcore country artist. So, in order to protect myself and them also, I added Lewis my middle name.
Mike Landess: That’s a great story. You grew up in Louisiana and Texas. And your first $10 guitar and the $1 a week lessons have served you well, I gather.
Randy Lewis Brown: They have.
Mike Landess: But you had another career as well as music, right?
Randy Lewis Brown: I was in IT for many years here in the East Texas area, as a matter of fact.
Mike Landess: So, well, now you’ve opened for acts like Ray Wiley Hubbard and David Olney and Jim Lauderdale. You play all across the country. Home is Mineola. For how many years now?
Randy Lewis Brown: Almost 50.
Mike Landess: Oh my gosh. You’ve really made a home here. The bio on your website features a quote. It says, “I love good stories. Stories that make me think that, stick with me and haunt me.” How many songs have you written over the years?
Randy Lewis Brown: I don’t know. I’m teaching, a songwriting class in Winnsboro at the Center for the Arts right now. And I had to come up with that number and somewhere probably above 600. I would guess 600 songs. Yes. Not all good. That doesn’t mean they were all good songs. Some of ’em I probably won’t lay claim to.
Mike Landess: What’s it been like to have that kind of a life now you have, as you say, a day job that you were involved in for many years, but having this passion and this desire to write and to perform and to be a part of this artistic musical scene?
Randy Lewis Brown: It’s really the engine that’s kept me going throughout the years. I didn’t always love what I did. Well, I loved what I did. I didn’t always love the situations it put me into. I’m a very much want to please people. In the professional world, you can’t please most people. You have to, it’s a lot of compromise involved and, you have to stick by your gun. So that part was difficult for me. I learned how to do it. I was very successful there. But, as I’ve retired, it’s been a savior for me because it gives me purpose and an arrow basically to follow.
Mike Landess: How has your family dealt with all of this? I know that a lot of people don’t care for the breadwinner, the head of the household out on the road.
Randy Lewis Brown: Well, my wife goes with me most of the time. And we we’re celebrating our 50th anniversary in just a couple months. So, my wife Barbara goes with me. My children — that’s what they knew. Their dad was gonna be gone on Friday or Saturday night most of the time. And I did miss some things because of that, but I was very involved. I was involved in Scouts with my son and a lot of different things.
Mike Landess: So when you play on the road, is all of your material original or do you ever do the dreaded covers?
Randy Lewis Brown: Well, covers aren’t dreaded, and I mean, there’s a place for ’em.
I played in a country cover band once we moved to East Texas because I did all original music in the Dallas area when we lived there right before we moved Mineola. And, in those days we kind of did the college circuit. It was my brother-in-law and I, we had a duo. We did all original music. The Dallas County Community Colleges all had coffee houses in the late sixties and early seventies. And, then we moved to East Texas and the only place that had music was the VFW’s, American Legions and a few country clubs because all the places were dry. And folk music really didn’t have a place here.
So I played in a country band for like, probably 14 years. Pretty much two nights a week. And it was all covers. I wrote music, I wrote songs, but the folks wanted to hear what they do, and that’s understandable. But now, since then, since probably ’89, I think is when I stopped doing that.
I’ve only played original music. I might do the very, very occasional cover, but they’re very specific songs that kind of fit a need. And for the most part, it’s original stuff. If I don’t play ’em, nobody’s gonna hear ’em.
Mike Landess: Right. It is interesting that even, even people like James Taylor, have done covers.
Tell us about the inspiration for your newest album, “Wind of Change,” and the song itself.
Randy Lewis Brown: “Wind of Change” is a song that’s been around for quite a while. I wrote it as a protest song.
Mike Landess: You seem a little long in the tooth to be writing protest songs, but, but that’s OK.
Randy Lewis Brown: We all have things that bother us. And so I wrote this, and I’ve probably written 40 verses to it. When something comes along that upsets me, I write a verse to it.
Most of the verses have never been recorded. I decided to put this song on the album ’cause I felt like it was time, though the verses that are contained in there are not controversial at all. I’m not picking any sides. I’m just saying what most people would agree to, and that the time changes.
And as I’ve gotten older, I see that even more as time changes. One thing that people in my generation, and I think we’re probably in the same generation. As a friend of mine says, “I’ve seen a lot of change in my life and I’ve been opposed to every bit of it.” Times change, and we can either bow our backs or just accept it.
Mike Landess: Share with us your favorite verse from “Wind of Change.”
Randy Lewis Brown: My favorite verse? “That wind was always blowing, blowing. It was blowing from the first…”
Mike Landess: Gotta love it. What’s your advice for a young singer-songwriter?
Randy Lewis Brown: Stay true to yourself. Don’t follow trends. Do exactly what you feel is right, and you’ll do fine.
Mike Landess: Our guest has been singer-songwriter Randy Lewis Brown. For more information about Randy, we have a link on our website, KVUT.org.