Big Ran Feuers tells it like it is.

Tell us about yourself and your music

My name is Randy Feuers and I got my music stage name Big Ran Feuers from my high school nick name where I was the Starting tackle on the football team at Slater High in Slater Missouri! I am about 6’5″ so I also played basketball all four years in high school with my best friend Jonathan White. Jonathan started playing Bass Guitar for the Slater High School Jazz Band and I grew up on a farm in the Missouri River Bottoms East of Slater Missouri as did Steve McQueen the old Movie Star from the 50’s and 60’s. While Jonathan was learning to play the Bass Guitar I was learning to play the guitar out on the farm with a learn to play record and my first elelctric guitar I got for Christmas. It was a white Fender Mustang. Later Jonathan Whites Cousin Richard Wayne White who was like three years older than use and played in the Slater High School Marching Band had moved to Kansas City, Mo to go to barber school, and later moved to Warrensburg Mo where Central Missouri State University is located and started playing guitar keyboards and Bass with a lot of old well known College Bands like The Broadway Click. Later Richard Moved back to Slater and put a new band together with Me playing Guitar and his Cousin Jonathan playing the Bass Guitar. Richard also got one of his old Slater Alum buddies named Donnie Tennal to play drums who was also from Richards class of 1965. We got the first band together that I had ever played in together my Jr year in high school like 1966. That band played all kinds of old Rock N Roll and the top hits from the 1960’s that where playing on WHB radio out of Kansas City, Missouri. During the my last two years at Slater High School Jonathan White and I both played basketball, football and in this band together doing gigs for parties after football and basket ball games, proms and the like as well as some gigs at the Rec Center at Missouri Valley College located 12 miles West of Slater in Marshall Missouri. After Jonathan and I got out of high school the band broke up and we all went our own ways. I ended up going to Moberly Jr College and got in a late 60’s Rock N Roll band playing Bass Guitar for the first time until I transferred to Central Methodist University in Fayette Missouri and got into a local band with some Fayette High School guys that played a lot of gigs for the College as well as other gigs in Boonville and Columbia Missouri. That band was lead by Earl Turner Jr who is now one of the top R&B Entertainers in Las Vegas and on Cruise Ships. After College I moved back to Marshall Missouri and sold Insurance and got in another local band playing

I am the man and I started playing the guitar out on my dads farm with a learn to play record and a guitar I got for Christmas at age 14 from the Sears Catolog. I later played in a Soul Band at Slater High in Slater Missouri the boy hood home town of the old 1960’s movie start Steve McQueen. I played both Lead guitar and Bass guitar after high school and in College in Rock N Roll and even Country bands. After College I sold insurance for a while as well as a few local bands where I sold insurance in central Missouri until I enlisted into the U.S. Army and become a Personnel Records and Management Specialist . While Stationed in Heidelberg Germany I was ask to play Bass Guitar by Ken Rondell Winkles that was also serving in Heidelberg Germany as an MP. Ken is one of the worlds top Elvis Sound a likes and we went on to put a 8 piece band together called Ken Rondell and The Country Rock Revue that become the number one band on the Military Club Circuit all over Europe from like 1977 thur 1980 until we all decided to get out of the Army. After we got out of the Army I moved to Greenville SC while I waited for Ken to call me to his home town in Thomaston GA where our Army band was suppose to met and go on the road together, but I never got that call and ended up getting a divorce from my first wife. This was one of the lowest parts of my life so I moved back to my home town in Slater Missouri and my old Slater Band buddy Richard White contacted me about playing Bass Guitar in a new band that was being formed in Saline County Missouri called Street Talk. Thjis band got together and become very popular not only in Saline County Missouri but for miles around West Central Missouri. After this band broke up I got a job with the U.S. Postal Service in Jefferson City , Missouri where I put my own band together called Big Ran’s Missouri Rock Opry after I had my old Army Buddy Ken Rondell come to Missouri and produced him on a cd with songs I wrote in my home studio playing most of the tracks on Guitar and Bass and using local Musicians from some of the best bands in the Jefferson City, Missouri area. I later released this self published cd on www.cdbaby.com and sold several cds and give away many of them to radio stations where they got quite a bit of air play. While Ken Rondell was in Jefferson City , Missouri we never did get a working band together to go out and do live shows to back up this cd so it kind of faded away and I took it off www.cdbaby.com and stopped selling cd’s. After Ken moved back to the State of Georgia I finally got my own band together Called Big Ran’s Missouri Rock Opry while I was still working full time at the U.S. Postal Service and played about a 100 mile radius around Jefferson City , Missouri for over three are four years until that band broke up some time in 2013. I still have a few songs I wrote with Ken Rondell singing from that cd on my music site at https://www.reverbnation.com/bigranfeuers

Talk to us more about your latest release

I have not released any more cd’s since the last cd I released call “Bear Creek Blues” by Big Ran Feuers with me doing the vocals on all the songs, but I also stopped selling those cds because I did not have a working band going. I first released that cd like in 2007 after my band Big Ran’s Missouri Rock Opry had broke up. Since that time I have retired from the United States Postal Service and I recorded enought tracks playing all the instruments on my 8 track digital recorder to play 4 hours worth of music in a one man band. I did this for a number of years until I got a divorce from my second wife Dorothy. At the present time I am in the process of buying a condo and moving to the beach near Hilton Head Island SC where my son lives in the town of Bluffton SC. I plan to start doing my one man band again after I move to the beach and might even try to put a new band together are join a working band from that area.

What inspired you to write this release?

I just got an email to do it and since I have been thinking about making a comeback in the music business at age 70 I thought why not.

Describe the writing and recording process

I write my songs by making a tune up in my head by strumming different Guitar Chord Progressions together. Some times I have to put the Chords together after I get the tune in my head. After I get this tune in my my head together where I can hum it and  play along with the melody on my guitar I start making up a story for the Melody for the Chourus and then all the Verses.  When I record the song I put the first three tracks to the recording together by playing guitar and singing along with the beat I want for the song with my drums Machine.  After I record the first track with guitar vocals and drums I just rewind and add the lead guitar , bass guitar and keyboards one track at a time. I use this same process to my up my back up tracks for my one man band.

Any plans to hit the road?

If it happens it happens.  What ever will be will be and I am single and free.

As an indie artist, how do you brand yourself and your music to stand out from the rest of the artists out there?

I play my own for of Country Rock and Blues. I sound Like I have a Elvis type of Country no matter if I am singing an old Rock N Roll hit are a Blues song.

Who have you been listening to lately?

I have been listening to every kind of music out there to include Rap and I go out to hear a lot of young live bands play to see what is going on in the Music world in live Clubs.

Who are your biggest influences?

B.B. King, James Brown, Elvis Presley, The Beatles , Chuck Berry, and Eric Clapton and Jimmy Hendrex

Tell us about your passions

Sex and Country Rock N Blues

What else is happening next in your world?

I will be moving from Jefferson City , Missouri to the Hilton Head Island SC area at the end of Feb 2020.

 

 

Thanks for an awesome interview, Big Ran Feuers

 

 

Connect with Big Ran Feuers

Website: https://www.reverbnation.com/bigranfeuersReverbnation: https://www.reverbnation.com/bigranfeuers

Genres: Acoustic

Source: ArtistPR Indie Artist Interview