The State
INSIDER
A Band Roped into Success
“Every Labor Day, my cousin put on this two-day, round-robin, team-roping event, which was basically just a big redneck beer party and an excuse to rope,” Lester says. “He said, ‘Hey, man, why don’t The Great Divide, one of the first Red Dirt you come over and play at my groups to hit it big, celebrates its Labor Day ropin’?’ long-shot start with a 25-year “We said, ‘We only know about 12 songs, and 11 of ’em compilation album. are originals. We’re not planning on being a performing band.’ And he said, ‘That don’t matter. Come on over.’ “So we went over and played our 12 songs, and after we were done we were loading our one monitor in the truck when my cousin came up and said, ‘We passed the hat, and you made $78.’ We were all like, ‘You can make money doing this?’” He laughs, then says, “It had never occurred to us.” Perhaps it had something ith a brand-new, double-LP, to do with the way they began, but as those four men vinyl album – and accompanycoalesced into the Great Divide, they never went the acing digital download – called cepted route of getting country dancehall jobs by playing 25 Years of the Great Divide, covers of popular songs. From the beginning, they did a groundbreaking Oklahoma mostly their own music. band has officially kicked off the celebration of its silver “We got the privilege of playing the Wormy Dog, that anniversary. little upstairs bar in Stillwater,” McClure says. “It was And while there was some separation and even dorvery small, so we drew enough people to pack it out. We mancy along the way, the Great Divide has persevered just had a crowd, and that first crowd started following and built upon the reputation it started earning in the ’90s, us. That was way before radio started working for us. But when it became the first of the Stillwater-based Red Dirt you know, they [bar owners] don’t care what’s going on acts to sign a major-label deal. as long as they’ve got people there buying their beer. Not bad for a band that wasn’t even supposed to be a “Sometimes we would do like three originals, and if I band – at least, not in the beginning. sensed the crowd was wandering, we’d maybe do a little As drummer JJ Lester recalls it, all he and vocalistsomething they knew. And on more than one occasion, I’d guitarist Mike McClure originally wanted to do was sell say, ‘Here’s a new George Strait song’ – and play one of their songs to other people. our own,” he adds with a laugh. “I remember having a conversation with Mike, before As everything shook out, McClure emerged as the priScotte [Lester, JJ’s brother] and Kelley [Green] were even mary songwriter, lead singer and frontman for the Great in the picture, and our thought processes were, ‘Well, Divide. And while you can hear his songwriting evolve on we’re going to write songs, and then Garth [Brooks] or 25 Years of the Great Divide, it’s clear that he excelled at George Strait or somebody’s going to cut ’em, and we’ll it from the beginning. go get our paychecks once a month at the mailbox and The songwriter himself, however, doesn’t exactly save country music,’” he says with a chuckle. “That was agree. kind of our philosophy.” “I still believe in a lot of those songs,” he says, “but By the time Lester was approached by a cousin in Perry some of ’em look kind of sophomoric, or freshman-ish, to about playing a Labor Day gig in 1993, Scotte, on guitar, me. I mean, I was 19 when we started. That’s just where I and Green, on bass, had joined the loose-knit group. was at the time.” Then came their first gig. It’s likely his evaluation of his earlier writing is colored
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GUITARIST MIKE MCCLURE MAKES UP ONE-FOURTH OF THE GREAT DIVIDE.
PHOTO BY CLAY BILLMAN
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OKLAHOMA MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2018
