![]() This is a monster.' I just decided at that point. Finally, I went to a writer's night where he played it, and it brought the entire room to tears. I was afraid that people wouldn't get it and that it would break his heart. "It took me awhile to come around on that song. I didn't want to kill his career, and he didn't want to kill mine," Mattea says. Mattea's other signature song is "Where've You Been." The song wasn't a big smash on the charts - it only reached number 10 in 1989, but fans really relate to the song written by Vezner.Ī loving relationship between husband and wife (actually Vezner's grandparents) through the years - even in their later years in a nursing home - is recounted in a touching song where Mattea's voice shines. He stopped the tape, and he said "isn't that great? I said, who should we pitch that too - how about you? - It was a trucking song. We listened to a couple of songs and he thought they were interesting. They were brothers, and I thought their stuff was really fresh. I started listening to this tape and I thought these guys wrote from a completely different perspective. "He would send them out every couple of weeks. "A friend who worked at a publishing company was sending out composite tapes of writers," she says. Mattea almost didn't think "Eighteen Wheels." was for her. In fact, Mattea landed 15 straight singles in the top 10 between 19. ![]() That was a very hot period for Mattea, winning CMA female vocalist of the year in 19. That broke open the doors for a slew of hits, including her first number one, "Goin' Gone," in 1987, one of her signature songs, "Eighteen Wheels and a Dozen Roses," the following year (the song won the Country Music Association single of the year) and subsequent number ones "Come From the Heart" and "Burnin' Old Memories," both in 1989. The third album finally yielded her first hit, Nanci Griffith's "Love at the Five and Dime," which reached number three. There was a sense that I was fighting the good fight." "It wasn't easy, but I believed in myself, and I had people I respected believe in me. Her first album, the self-titled "Kathy Mattea" came out in 1984 followed by "From My Heart," the following year, and "Walk the Way the Wind Blows" in 1986. The demo work attracted interest from Mercury Records, which inked her to a contract in 1983. Demos are rough versions of songs that are pitched to artists to record. "I did some jingles, some background work, but mostly demos," she says. Eventually, I could make my living doing studio work." "I came and played writers' nights, and I saw publishers during the day, and I wrote songs. Mattea worked at the Hall of Fame for about a year, "until I almost lost my voice, and I had to get out." "I would watch them over and over on my lunch hour." "It was awesome." she says of the films kept in a back room. Mattea even hung out during her lunch break watching old movies. I had learned to play Travis style guitar when I was 10, but my teacher never told me why it was called Travis style picking." (It was named after guitar great Merle Travis) "Anybody who wants to be a country star should have to work at the Hall of Fame first," says Mattea.
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