Thank God I’m a Contry Boy Wayd Battle talks about the music that is his passion. by Lauren Mutter orn country, raised country, and living country, Wayd Battle knows nothing but. “Country is the thing I do,” he says, stretching out in a patio chair at Buffalo’s Cafe. “I write, I sing, I play country. It’s my passion.” Battle, 23, is taking a break before his Friday-evening run at the Hickory Hill restaurant. His appearance doesn’t really exude “country” like his words do. Battle has that red-headed Irish paleness, and he’s wearing blue jeans and a Hawaiian shirt. But then the gold guitar pendant he has on a chain around his neck comes into focus. And there are his orange cowboy boots – they match the orange beaches in his shirt. He truly is a country boy. PHOTO BY ROY CAJERO Battle has been playing at the cafe for four years every Wednesday and Friday evening, and in that time, it has become more than just a weekly gig. “We’re all kind of a big family around here,” he says, taking a swig of his Bud Light. As he is talking, two burly men wearing black bandanas shout “Hey, Wayd!” and wave to both Battle and his wife, Amy, and 2-year-old daughter, who are sitting nearby. He recognizes them and waves, and the two men return to their feast of beer and buffalo wings. Battle continues, smiling, “It’s a big family. And regulars are great. They make it fun! They know what I play and they know what they want to hear.” His repertoire includes everything country from Jimmy Buffett to Alabama, which is where he is from originally. His influences are just as varied, from “all the honky-tonk guys, of course,” to Elvis and Keith Whitley (Battle honored both of them by naming his daughter Whitley Erin – “We spell her middle name differently, but that’s who it’s for”). And don’t forget Hank Williams Jr.: “Where I’m from,” Battle explains, “if you didn’t go to Hank Jr. concerts, you’d best not show up to school the next day!” Growing up in such an environment fostered Battle’s love of music at an early age. At 5, he picked up his father’s guitar and played it upside down, and at 13, he got his first electric guitar. By the time he was 14, he was playing in bars. He was still playing there four years later when he moved to Memphis, having become “saturated” with small-town life and the same places. Battle’s family was supportive of his ambitions, although others in the town discouraged him. “People said, ‘Oh, you need to go out and get a job, and get serious,’ and all that,” he says, waving his hand in dismissal. “But I had just as many people trying to encourage me. They all knew that this is what I was gonna do and that I was gonna do what I had to do to do it.” For the last two years, that has meant traveling to Nashville for studio work at least a week out of every month, often more. At first, Battle was discouraged. “It was always about ‘How much money can I get out of you?’” But he finally found some “good, honest people” such as Mark Lambert, a producer with whom Battle has worked ever since. He has recorded 25 songs for this first album in a year and a half. Though he knows he must record, what Battle really enjoys is touring. He has opened for George Jones and Charlie Daniels, and he often plays events for the city of Olive Branch. “That’s the fun time for me, is playin’ live,” he says, again waving to other regulars. “It’s all about connecting with people.” Battle makes that connection through rich imagery. “When I’m singing a song,” he says, “I want you to see it.” His song “Rural Route,” for instance, begins, “I like driving down a country road the county hasn’t paved,” setting the scene of a slower pace of living where everybody takes the time to get to know one another. He also uses themes familiar to him and his fans. Keith Whitley “sings to the common man,” he says, “and that’s what I like.” Battle’s own songs are “real rural, blue-collar, life-like. ... I try to write about situations I’ve been in, to make my songs real.” The strongest connection Battle feels to his own music is through one individual: God. “I’m not much of a person on luck,” he explains. His father is a Baptist minister, and Battle was raised in the Baptist faith. Since then, he has relied on God’s guidance of his career, for “God gave me the gift to play music and to write down songs and to play guitar. This is God’s plan.” Ultimate success in fulfilling this plan, he says, will be “when some writer is interviewing some new musician 20 years from now and he mentions me as one of the guys who influenced him.” Ultimate happiness, however, will always be about the people. “I’m people-driven,” he says, gazing for a moment at his wife and daughter. “Whether it be playin’ for people, makin’ records for people, playin’ at people’s barbecues. If I’m makin’ them happy, I’m happy.”