A country way of life, Episode 45 (Paul Leim, Marv Green & Jason Sellers)
Author: Jonny Brick.
Player: Paul Leim
According to his official website, Paul Leim (pronounced ‘lime’) has played drums on over 2,000 albums, 100 of which have gone to number one. Surely his most heard recording is (I’ve Had) The Time of My Life from the Dirty Dancing soundtrack, although his contributions to Shania Twain’s album Come On Over might well rival it. ‘Play it Neanderthal, man!!’ was producer Mutt Lange’s instruction to Leim.
Born in Michigan but raised in Texas, his credits are eclectic: Lionel Richie, Kenny Rogers, Belinda Carlisle, Billy Ray Cyrus, Barry Manilow, Sammy Kershaw and the modern incarnation of The Monkees. Leim also played on Amy Grant’s Christian and country recordings, as well as on albums by Collin Raye, Tracy Byrd, Chris Young, Reba McEntire and Faith Hill. You can hear his ‘popcorn snare’ on several mid-period albums by Kenny Chesney.
Leim was behind the kit for the 2006 iteration of Tim McGraw and Faith Hill’s Soul 2 Soul tour, in a break from playing drums in a concert which memorialised Elvis Presley and his TCB Band. Leim has kept the beat in the live shows of an eclectic mix of stars, ranging from Tom Jones and Neil Diamond to Randy Travis and Tanya Tucker.
This accurately maps Leim’s path from a drummer in LA to one in Nashville. He told one interviewer, that country producers advised him to bring out the bass drum which he had previously only kicked softly; ‘the simpler I play,’ he worked out, ‘the more money I make!’
Songwriters: Marv Green and Jason Sellers
Marv Green once told an interviewer he has ‘one of the greatest jobs in America, in the world’; he writes from Monday to Thursday and uses Friday as his ‘idea day’. Perhaps he enjoys the job because he co-wrote (and received a lot of royalty payments for) Amazed, the wedding song which Lonestar took to the top of the country charts and the Hot 100.
Even before Amazed, George Strait gave Green his first number one with True. Strait also took It Just Comes Natural to the top, as did Reba McEntire and Carrie Underwood with Consider Me Gone and Wasted respectively. Tim McGraw recorded Shotgun Rider and I Called Mama, two more chart-toppers from Green’s pen.
Eric Church brought him in to write Creepin’, the opening track of his album Chief, while Morgan Wallen included Silverado for Sale on his chart-topping double album Dangerous. Rodney Atkins (Farmer’s Daughter), Joe Diffie (It’s Always Somethin’) and Brooks & Dunn (Proud of the House We Built) also recorded Green’s songs, while both Wrong Song and Trouble Is were both sung in the early seasons of the TV show Nashville.
Green co-wrote Love This Pain for Lady A and Who I Am With You for Chris Young alongside Jason Sellers. Born in Texas, Sellers was a musician in his family gospel band before first working as road manager for Ricky Skaggs and then signing a deal as an artist in his own right, where he enjoyed several minor hits in the late 1990s.
He was far more successful as a songwriter. Rascal Flatts took I Won’t Let Go to number two, as did Randy Houser with Goodnight Kiss. Sunny and ’75 went one better for Joe Nichols, while Don’t You Wanna Stay, a duet between Jason Aldean and Kelly Clarkson, was propelled to the top after it was debuted during the 2010 CMA Awards. Sellers has said it was Aldean who had the idea to turn the song into a duet.
If his surname seems familiar, it is because his daughter Aubrie is also a country singer. Sellers was married to her mum, Lee Ann Womack, for five years before Lee Ann started having hits of her own. The pair wrote If You’re Ever Down in Dallas, which appeared on her second album Some Things I Know, and I Feel Like I’m Forgetting Something, which was on the album I Hope You Dance.
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