Listen Up: Davy Ray Bennett

By Michael Donahue

Tuesday, March 31, 2009

Davy Ray Bennett's first stage performance was singing in a talent show in the fifth grade.

"My mom wanted me to do a religious tune," said Bennett, 36. "It was some tune called 'Let Them Know,' which was out of a movie they used to show kids to scare them about the rapture."

He didn't win. "They didn't give us prizes. It was really a display of what fifth graders were doing at Highland Heights Elementary School. Lebanon, Tenn. Home of the Cracker Barrel."

When he was 13, Bennett bought his first guitar. Two years later he began writing songs. "Sitting around in study hall I'd write these songs and go home and put three chords to them. All my skateboard friends -- straight edge hardcore kids -- would just laugh at me. They just thought it was silly that I'm trying to sing."

He dropped out of high school and got a job as a short order cook at a truck stop. After passing his General Educational Development (GED) test, Bennett enrolled at Middle Tennessee State University, where he began studying classical music.

While playing in a cover band, Flash Point, Bennett began wondering why he couldn't just sing his own originals by himself. "The thing that sealed it for me was one night we ate at Krystal's before a show and the drummer spilled ketchup on my brown-and-black wing tip shoes. He had it all over the front of his shirt. And he was like, 'Well, look at me. I gotta play in this.'

"Then during the show they kept wanting us to do Bob Seger's 'Old Time Rock and Roll.' I really like Bob Seger, but I cannot stand that song."

Bennett refused to sing it and was kicked out of the band. "I've never done it again since."

He got a steady gig playing his own songs at a bar.

In 1996 Bennett moved to Memphis, where he and Misty Rae Warren formed a band. "We were Rae-Ray 'cause we had the same middle names. We did some of her songs and a lot of my songs. It was kind of funny, quirky stuff."

The band released a self-titled CD, which includes five of their originals.

Describing his music, Bennett, who now plays solo as well as with a band, said, "My style has always been really eclectic. Whatever I'm listening to I try to incorporate that into what I'm playing. Sometimes people ask me, 'What inspired you to do that song?' And I'll say, 'I was listening to Chet Baker and I just thought it was so beautiful I wanted to try to write something that sounded like that.' So, from song to song, my voice is not exactly the same."

Listen Up spotlights area performers. Michael Donahue can be reached at 529-2797.

Davy Ray Bennett

Performance at 9 p.m. April 9 at Memphis Mary's, 345 Madison. Cover: $5. Call 507-2720.