Charlie Daniels says he has
‘mellowed’ in recent years
The well-known fiddler
has eliminated drug
references and profanity
from many of his songs
By Joe Edwards
The Associated Press
NASHVILLE, Tenn. — Charlie
Daniels has performed every
where, from smoke-filled, beer
stained honky-tonks to Billy Gra
ham crusades to most major
arenas from coast to coast.
Daniels, a fiddler and guitarist
who hits the road almost every
week with his five-piece band, has
performed twice at the White
House, once at the Super Bowl
and throughout Europe. He has
done a casino in Council Bluffs,
Iowa; a yacht club in Cape Coral,
Fla., and a chocolate festival in
Burlington, Wis. He has traveled
97,000 miles this year alone, al
ways on a bus.
He’ll play any place, he says,
that offers a good crowd and a
good paycheck.
But those who associate Daniels
with provocative, in-your-face
lyrics should know that at 61, he
has softened a bit.
His “Simple Man,” recorded in
1990, suggested lynching drug
dealers and using child abusers as
alligator bait. “In America,” re
leased in 1980, delivered a harsh
directive to the nation’s enemies.
It was this kind of stuff that got
him guest spots on ABC-TV’s "Po
litically Incorrect” and the G. Gor
don Liddy radio show.
But he has cleaned up the lan
guage in “The Devil Went Down
to Georgia,” his signature song,
about a fiddling duel between the
devil and a guy named Johnny.
And in “Long Haired Country
Boy,” he no longer sings about be
ing "stoned in the morning” and
“drunk in the afternoon.” Now he
sings, “1 get up in the morning. I
get down in the afternoon.”
He even released a gospel al
bum two years ago, leading to his
appearance with evangelist Gra
ham. “1 guess I’ve mellowed in my
old age,” Daniels says.
One recent Monday, he took
time out from touring for an inter
view. He had played in Pittsburgh
the day before and was headed for
Gray, Tenn., the next day. Then it
was on to Louisville, Ky.
Daniels’ Southern boogie, blues
and country-rock celebrates the
South, individualism and patrio
tism. He has made more than 30
albums. The latest, “Fiddle Fire,”
features blazing fiddle tunes like
“The South's Gonna Do It
(Again)” and “The Orange Blos
som Special.”
And, of course, there’s “The
Devil Went Down to Georgia,” but
now the devil has been toned
down from a “son of a bitch” to a
“son of a gun.”
Interviewed on the second floor
of his log-cabin office 20 miles east
of downtown Nashville, Daniels
looks like a character right out of
the Louis L’Amour novels that he
reads voraciously. He wears a sky
blue Western shirt with longhorn
designs, a huge silver belt buckle,
black jeans and his trademark
bull-rider hat. “We’ve grown gray
together,” Daniels remarks to an
old acquaintance.
An acoustic guitar sits against a
wall near an old-time floor radio.
Animal skins are spread through
out the office, whose windows
look out over lush green fields and
sprawling shade trees near his
Twin Pines ranch.
Daniels takes a seat at a desk and
reflects on one of country music’s
most enduring careers.
The son of a North Carolina
lumberjack, he started playing gui
tar when he was a teen-ager and
then went on to the fiddle and
mandolin. Hegot into rock 'n' roll,
recorded with Bob Dylan and
Ringo Starr, and was featured on
albums by artists like Tanya Tuck
er, Earl Scruggs and Papa John
Creach.
His first solo effort came in
1970, and he put together the
Charlie Daniels Band. It released
its first LP in 1972 and had its first
major hit with “Uneasy Rider”
from the second album. With
“Million Mile Reflections” in
1979, the band exploded to world
wide recognition and went on to
win a Grammy award.
The following year, Daniels ap
peared in “Urban Cowboy” with
Debra Winger and John Travolta,
and became closely identified
with the rise of country music gen
erated by that film.
Daniels will continue to be out
spoken and he’ll continue to tour.
“I have never played those
notes perfectly,” he says. “I’ve
never sung every song perfectly.
I’m in competition to be better
tonight than I was last night and to
be better tomorrow than tonight. ”
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