The Road Hammers are back, and they’re not afraid to get a little messy.
The popular country band returned from a three-year hiatus in a big way at Rimbey’s Central Alberta Raceways this week. A big, muddy way.
The 2006 Juno-award winning trio was at the track to film the video for the second single from their upcoming album. With the rain falling on Monday and 40 trucks throwing up mud as they made their way down two drag pits, the track made for the perfect setting as the band gave their song Mud the video treatment.
“I’ve probably showered half a dozen times in the last two days, and I’m still pulling mud out of my ears,” laughed Clayton Bellamy, who is in the band with Jason McCoy and Chris Byrne.
Bellamy had a friend who was involved with the Rimbey track’s mud bogs, and the idea for staging the video at the site came together quickly. On Monday, drivers from as much as six hours away came out to tear up the track and appear in the video, despite the “crummy weather” on the day.
“Mud is kind of focused on everything that has to do with four-by-fouring and being a kid and just getting in the dirt and getting messy and having fun,” said Bellamy of the song.
He said Rimbey and the driving community rallied around the video shoot to make it possible, with fans of the band across North America responding with excitement towards the prospect of a new record. Central Alberta Raceways president Cory Kincaid said he is expecting the music video will provide great exposure for the rural track.
“It’s going to be a real good promotion for our racetrack and facility, that’s for sure. We’re hoping to get them back here next summer to do a show,” said Kincaid.
The band stopped touring in 2010 and went on a hiatus while solo projects were worked on. This year, they started writing together again.
“We just decided rather than keeping going for the sake of keeping going, we wanted to put the brakes on it and make sure that the fun was still in The Road Hammers, because if that leaves there’s no Hammers,” he said.
Will they be producing the same kind of music this time around, though? Bellamy says no, sort of.
“Better!” he exclaimed, “This album has an energy like the first record. It’s really going to catch people’s ears and get them to want to crank it up and speed down the highway. That’s what The Road Hammers do.”
The first single, Get on Down the Road, which Bellamy described as “just a good ol’ fashioned road song,” will be released on Tuesday. Mud will be released shortly thereafter, and the full album is expected early in 2014.
Bellamy said a tour to promote the album is in the works.
mfish@www.reddeeradvocate.com