Valley country singer on brink of nationwide success
By CHRIS HANSEN ORF
Get Out

After leading the way-ahead-of-their-time Valley cow-punk outfit Chaingang in the 1980s, Dave Insley put down his guitar and began climbing mountains, testing his skills in solitary man-versus-nature contests against some of the West's most fearsome rock formations.

Now, nearly two decades later, Insley is climbing another mountain on his own: His first solo record will be celebrated with a CD release party Friday at the Yucca Tap Room in Tempe.

“I was very into being an athlete and doing difficult and scary things,” Insley, 43, says of his days as a rock climber and white-water rafter. “The adrenaline rush that I get to this day from leading a difficult rock climb is very similar to the feeling you get from being on stage. You become a junkie for that adrenaline.”

The singer/songwriter has refocused his energy on creating his classic country sounds sung in his patented warm, rich baritone. Insley has led some of the more memorable and influential Valley bands since his return to local stages in the mid-’90s, including newgrass band Nitpickers and wild country-rockers Trophy Husbands, but now Insley is poised to break into national prominence with his brilliant solo release, “Call Me Lonesome.”

“I needed to make a record with 10 songs on it that were all songs that radio could use,” Insley says of his new CD. “I didn't have somebody looking over my shoulder saying, ‘You can't put a harmony there’ or ‘You can't put a banjo on that, it's a rock song.’ ” Insley grew up in a musical family — his brother Mark is a Tucson-based country artist of national renown — on a Kansas wheat farm where guitars and pianos were prevalent and the sounds of country greats such as Buck Owens, Marty Robbins and Insley's idol Johnny Cash echoed throughout the household.

“I've always listened to country music,” Insley says. “I used to play (old Western swing artist) Bob Wills and the Texas Playboys records for my friends. I had good long-haired buddies who'd bring their Led Zeppelin albums over, and they'd turn me on to Zeppelin and I'd turn them on to Bob Wills.”

A move to rural Arizona in his early teens — the Insley family lived in Yarnell, Wickenburg and Payson — brought the budding singer-songwriter to the West, a place he envisioned as rolling pastures of sand dunes, an image gleaned from the old playbills of his rodeo cowboy uncle O.K. Insley.
“I was quickly disabused of that notion,” Insley laughs.

After a move to Tempe in 1979 to study at ASU, Insley formed Chaingang in the early ’80s, a cow-punk trio that dressed in black-and-white-striped jail uniforms that would make Sheriff Joe Arpaio grin.

When that band called it quits, so did Insley — he opted to live out of his truck in Colorado, Utah, Wyoming and California, playing guitar and writing songs solely for his enjoyment.

“I just hit the road and went climbing for a bunch of years,” Insley says. “My lifestyle became hard-core adrenaline sports. It's like dancing with the powers of the universe — we started putting up first ascents, things that hadn't been done before.” When Insley, who often entertained at cookouts and Jeep tours during his climbing years, moved back to Phoenix in the mid-’90s, he was ready to put another band together. The resulting group, Nitpickers, were a fun collective that melded rock and country with bluegrass instrumentation, releasing a CD before the members went off in their own directions.

After Insley's next project, the critically acclaimed quartet Trophy Husbands, dissolved acrimoniously after releasing two brilliant CDs, Insley decided to rely on the one person he knew could get things done they way he needed them done.

“That whole experience motivated me to never go out and do anything that doesn't have my name first,” Insley says. “Now, if somebody wants to quit, my investment isn't thrown away. I am not going to put out something with a band name on it, because I'm doing all the heavy lifting — I'm putting up the money, it's my songwriting and it's my career.”

The singer went back to the drawing board, taking his best songs and hiring members of popular Valley band The Peacemakers to back him for the recording of “Call Me Lonesome.” He then hired bassist Mickey Farrell and drummer Jesse Navarro, both late of the once-promising Valley country outfit Grievous Angels, to hit the road with him as Dave Insley's Careless Smokers.

While Insley has traveled many paths to get where he is today, he seems to finally be on the road to musical success. He has signed with a high-powered publicity firm, has people working the record for radio and will have a showcase at the prestigious South by Southwest music conference this month in Austin, Texas.

“The national press stuff is just starting to roll in, and I can't believe how generous they are being,” says Insley. “It went out to 450 American and college radio stations, and I'm getting indications of who is adding it. (The publicists) assure me that we're going to chart the record and do real well with it.

“I am just thrilled to death.”

Dave Insley and The Careless Smokers
With: Tramps & Thieves, Adam Jacobson
When: 9 p.m. Friday
Where: Yucca Tap Room, 29 W. Southern Ave., Tempe
How much: Free
Info: