MARK MCGEE

Staff Writer

For Woody Bomar it has been a long and successful musical journey.

Starting at age 15 with guitar lessons in the basement at the Shelbyville Record Shop where a number of musicians of all levels got their start, Bomar has been involved in most aspects of the music world.

A prominent part of that journey is celebrating two milestones this year. Route 66, known as “The Mother Road” and “The Main Street of America” is celebrating 100 years.

In 2011 the International Route 66 Association named The Road Crew as the “Official Music Ambassadors of Route 66”.  The Road Crew, in which Bomar is  a member, is  enjoying its 20^th year together.

In addition to his work as a guitar player and singer he also spent a great deal of his career as songwriter and a music publisher in Nashville.

Bomar, who grew up in Wartrace, Tennessee with his wife Carol (Gentry),  graduated in 1963 from Shelbyville Central High School. Music was always a part of his life, but it didn’t become his career for several years.

The connection with Route 66 which extends west from Chicago, Illinois to Los Angeles,  begins in an unlikely spot – Vietnam.

Bomar and Joe Loesch performed together during the Vietnam War. Loesch was born in Maplewood, Missouri on Route 66. The two continued to perform together after returning to the United States in a group called The Boomers In 2006 they flew to California and drove from Los Angeles to Oklahoma City, Oklahoma on Route 66. In 2007 they drove from Oklahoma City to Chicago, the end of the historic road.

“Being a songwriter I wrote a song, “That Old 66” ” and said everything and said everything I needed to sat about Route 66,” Bomar said. “And Joe said, ‘you should write an album, so I wrote about 10 more songs about Route 66.

“We went into the studio and created the album “Songs From The Mother  Road”. That was the nickname John Steinbeck gave the road in “Grapes of Wrath”. We used mostly studio musicians but I had to put an artist’s name on it so we used The Road Crew and decided then The Boomers would become The Road Crew.

Loesch started marketing the band, which also includes guitarist Don King and drummer Jason Harmon. Their first Route 66 performance was at a festival in Clinton, Oklahoma in 2008.

“Since then we have started playing at all festivals,” Bomar said. “We love the people and the places. There is so much passion ?? and preservation on Route 66. We enjoy the association and the opportunity to play music.

“Being from small town America I just have a love for Southern culture, small town culture and an admiration for the people who are so passionate to preserve Route 66. It is niche market. We just became a part of that culture.”

The beginning for Bomar

“I was at church camp and I saw this guy playing the guitar,” Bomar said. “I was 14 years old. Girls were standing around and really enjoying him playing the guitar.

“I thought, hmm, that seems like a good idea. Most guitar players have that basic story, but it wasn’t entirely that. about impressing girls.  I just loved the music of the day.”

Bomar got his first guitar on his 15th birthday. The Shelbyville Record Shop, owned by Austin “Pinky” Davis, offered guitar lessons. Bomar was an eager student.

“After about six months my teacher quit and I became the teacher in the early 1960s,” Bomar said. “I worked there until I went to college. I started my first band in high school and we played at the American Legion Center.

Eventually the Shelbyville Record Shop would stop selling records and tapes and concentrate solely on musical instruments. Bomar had a major hand in helping to start the transition.

“I wanted to get a white Fender Stratocaster guitar like Al Jardine of “The Beach Boys” played,” Bomar said. “I asked Mr. Davis, ` if I write a letter to the Fender guitar company in your name would you sign it and see if you can get me one of those guitars’?

“He signed the letter. A couple of weeks later a representative from the Fender Guitar Company showed up and asked Mr. Davis if he would like to have a dealership. That is how he got into the music instrument business. He had the dealership for life.”                                                                                                                 

In high school Bomar was part of a band known as The Mystics. Other members were Tommy Forrester, Tommy Noah, Jack Jones and Bob McLean.                                        

Making his mark

After college and the military Bomar worked at an advertising agency for 10 years where he wrote jingles. He had been writing songs since his teenage years so he decide to seriously pursue his music.

He has written songs for artists such as Conway Twitty, Hank Williams, Jr., Jim Glaser, Loretta Lynn, T.G, Sheppard, Lee Greenwood and Lynn Anderson.

“I had some hit songs, but they didn’t become standards,” Bomar said. “I had No. 1 hits with Conway Twitty, Jim Glaser and Loretta Lynn. I worked with a lot of the big

stars of that time.”

As a publisher with Sony Music Publishing he was Senior Vice President in charge of the creative department.

Some of the stars he signed are Blake Shelton, Dierks Bentley, Miranda Lambert, Eric Church and Rascal Flatts.                                                                                                          “I became an advocate for other song writers and kind of set the writing aside,” Bomar said. “I didn’t try to compete commercially with the people I was working with.”

One day a young high school student from Hendersonville, Tennessee dropped by his office with her mother. He knew this young lady was going to be something special but he had no idea just how big she would be.

“I signed Taylor Swift to her first songwriting contract,” Bomar said. “I was working at Sony  Publishing at the time.

“She was 14 years old. She just sat there and played and sang original songs, She was obviously a very,very special talent. She was very self-confident and very professional from the beginning. That doesn’t make me brilliant to have signed her. Anyone would have signed her. I just happened to be the one she came to first.”

Not slowing down

The Road Crew plays a variety of local venues like the Puckett’s restaurants, Fox and Locke in Lieper’s Fork and The Salt and Pepper Grill  in White Bluff.

This fall they are booked to be part of the launch of  the “Texas Motor Tour”  in Shamrock, Texas, the location known as “one of the most iconic neon stops” on Route 66.

“Music has always been a part of my life,” Bomar said. “The Road Crew doesn’t have a plan to stop. It is something we do for fun, but it is something we do that is very important to us. We are really a brotherhood.”

“We all have other careers, but The Road Crew just became a big part of all of our lives. Every year is a special year. We love it. We enjoy being together and traveling together. I think nature will tell us when it is time.”