Country group formed by former Back Porch Picker’s Doug Eder (lead guitar), and Tim Chiaruttini (rhythm guitar), with John Keeney (drummer from Owings Mills), and Bill Chanel (bass guitarist from Westminster). After a couple months Chanel was replaced with Chris Beyard (bassist from Emmitsburg). Guitarist Dave Smoot from Reisterstown joined the group, and also Smilin’ Jack Hamlin (pedal steel from Aberdeen). Hamlin was also a radio disc jockey during the ‘60s, and used to do a lot of remote broadcasts from the WBMD log cabin trailer.
Tim recalled that “we played a lot of jobs for WPOC, openings up clothing stores (can’t remember the name of), but it was during the big C&W boom in the late ‘70s and early ‘80s. We did several WPOC inner harbor cruises on the Lady Baltimore. We played the City Fair… We played the Naval Academy, the March of Dimes benefits downtown every year…”
“In 1982 John Keeney, David Smoot and I were approached by a promoter named Benny Higgs. He asked us to be the band for Mark Brine. He was a singer-songwriter from Boston who had just come to Baltimore from Nashville. He was a hell of a songwriter and could, of all things, yodel like Jimmie Rodgers (and had won several awards for doing so). Benny and Mark said country was going back to its roots and we were going to go back with it. Well, you know that country music didn’t go that way and we didn’t either.” Tim and John then formed the rock group Straightaway.
