Overdrive Magazine | Trucking Business News & Owner Operator Info
Issue link: http://read.dmtmag.com/i/305892
48 | Overdrive | May 2014 Diversions By Tara Bullock When Brad James realized one of his favorite downtime hobbies – singing kara- oke could be done on his iPhone – he was excited to spend his rest breaks that way. But James, who drives a 2013 Freightliner Cascadia for Barr-Nunn Transportation, didn't know those songs posted automati- cally to his Facebook page. "I went to check my Facebook, and I was afraid I was going to lose all of my friends" after seeing the karaoke vids dominate his timeline. He then created a Brad James Facebook page devoted to his singing (facebook.com/ thesingingtruckdriver, with 13,000- plus likes), leading to the Brad James YouTube channel (with nearly 3,000 subscribers). Fans then caught the singer in person as he performed at the Mid-America Trucking Show in Louisville, Ky., in the Papa John's truck parking lot. James posts videos of his singing several times a week, usually covers of popular songs such as "Lady" by Kenny Rogers and "Home" by Alan Jackson. However, James gained more widespread attention with "Detention (You Ordered It, You Unload It)," a clever detention-themed rewrite of Otis Redding's classic "(Sittin' On) The Dock of the Bay." At press time it had garnered nearly 40,000 views. "I tried to make some of the songs more about trucking by changing up some of the lyrics," he says. "I was going to sing the original, but some- thing about the words 'sitting at the dock' kept bouncing around inside my head. Twenty minutes later, I had written it." His posts have drawn comments from as far away as the United Kingdom and Australia. To watch the video via Overdrive- Online.com, search "Brad James." 'Singing Trucker' goes from karaoke to viral hit various disagreements and infidelities, etc. All of this might come off as stereo- typical in different hands, but Newman's a fine writer. In the beginning, Charles is finishing college with dreams of writing poetry the rest of his life. He's got a girlfriend he claims to truly hate, but keeps com- ing back to. He's become quite attracted to the dive barrooms of his town, where he and his older brother brawl and concoct a scheme. His sibling convinces Charles that hard-driving OTR work could help finance a startup supply- ing an industrial widget. Charles would be cut in as a principal in the end, but until then, he could "see the country" – through the windshield of a line-haul tractor. There's some romanti- cism in that for the young Walt Whitman devotee, though it dims considerably once he's been out on the road for weeks pushing himself too hard. It's a wild ride, pep- pered with no shortage of humor to boot, though in the weeks of chaos lead- ing up to the final break from the business it looks like things might work out. For Charles, truck- ing is preferable to the day-to-day factory grind that's in store for him, but sometimes what we prefer most is the worst thing possible for sanity. This epiphany comes on slowly, and it's not churched up as in a melo- drama or your run-of-the- mill sort of literary novel. Here, the big realization is downplayed, a matter of course, and feels true to the way such things play out in the real world for most of us. Brad James, of Port Orange, Fla., got his start in church youth choir at age 15 and started singing karaoke about 15 years ago. James tends to mimic the styles of Garth Brooks and Keith Whitley, but his favorite vocalist is Christina Aguilera. Having more than 80 songs in his repertoire, he's considering letting his Facebook fans pick which songs he should sing when he auditions for NBC's "The Voice." Search "Brad James" on Facebook to follow him. Dave Newman's "Two Small Birds" is available in Kindle and print editions via Amazon.com and other retailers. You can find Newman himself via DaveNewmanWritesBooks.net. DO YOU LIKE TO SING? Turn on your phone's video or memo recorder, belt out a song and submit to our contest, sponsored by Chevron Delo, by May 26. Details at TruckerTalentSearch.com. Overdrive-Red Eye Radio s Diversions_0514.indd 48 4/30/14 3:22 PM