Nashville Scene, July 2001

COVER STORY
A few Tuesdays ago, singer/guitarist Tim Keegan and his band Departure Lounge were playing their biweekly gig at East Nashville's Slow Bar when they dusted off an obscure song called "If It's Monday Morning," from a 1971 album by superstar ‘60s songwriter/producer and cult hero Lee Hazlewood. Shouts and applause greeted the number. But the response that pleased Keegan most was the upraised thumb of the man in the back of the room - Lee Hazlewood.

It wasn't just the celebrity sighting that impressed the Slow Bar crowd. Since Dave Gehrke and Mike Grimes opened their tiny East Nashville watering hole and listening room last winter, the establishment has had more than its share of notable visitors, including Ryan Adams and Badly Drawn Boy. But any sighting of Hazlewood, perhaps best known for his string of hits with Nancy Sinatra in the 1960s - including "These Boots Are Made for Walkin' " and "Jackson" - qualifies as something special. For one thing, he spent much of the past 25 years living in Sweden.

So what was he doing in Nashville? Hazlewood, whose legendary solo records were recently reissued by Sonic Youth drummer Steve Shelley's Smells Like Records label, is the subject of an upcoming overseas tribute album - for which Keegan and remixer/producer Kid Loco cut a version of "If It's Monday Morning." When Keegan was visiting his native England a few weeks ago, the mutual friend compiling the tribute asked if he wanted to meet the song's author. They ended up drinking and talking in a hotel bar.

Keegan says Hazlewood was impressed not only with their version of the song but with their choosing it in the first place. "He said, 'I only like about three or four songs I ever wrote,' " Keegan recalls, " ‘and that's one of my favorites.'" Knowing about the band's Slow Bar residency, the mutual friend invited Hazlewood to see them play.

That he actually showed up wasn't the only surprise. After the set, Keegan went up to talk to Hazlewood at the bar, and the elder musician gestured to a man sitting next to him. "Hi," he said, "I want you to meet my friend Duane Eddy." Hazlewood discovered the guitar legend as a teenager - he co-wrote Eddy's classic "Rebel Rouser" - and their friendship goes back more than 40 years.

Next Tuesday marks the end of Departure Lounge's regular Slow Bar dates, which Keegan says have been "a good excuse to learn lots and lots of songs, because people always want to hear songs at parties." Thus bandmates Keegan, Chris Anderson, Lindsay Jamieson, and Jake Kyle have been tackling anything from Kirsty MacColl's "They Don't Know" and Nick Drake's "Hazey Jane II" to Atlantic Starr's "Always," augmented by guests like Fleming & John, Josh Rouse, and The Pierces' Allison Pierce.

In September, Departure Lounge will release an instrumental LP called Jetlag Dreams recorded in Nashville. Until then, the band will continue to spin cool tunes this summer on its weekly "Departure Lounge" radio show, 8 p.m. Sundays on WRVU-91.1 FM.

Jim Ridley