Rodeo Queen

music / musicians / rodeoqueen

Daphne wails on the saw at Vaudeville, Tucson, Winter 2003.

Is she channeling a 1940s mountain singer? Sweetly swaying with the microphone, lead singer Miss Daphne evokes another era, and you almost see it. Until she starts jamming on the saw, bending it until it's almost an electric-sounding instrument. Rodeo Queen's solid set of country and western is beautifully colored by Daphne's sultry, Faulkner-on-drugs persona.

NAME:

"Miss Daphne."

OCCUPATION:

"Hard country music sung by a softhearted lady."

QUOTE:

"A saw-spankin' good time!"

BAND:

"Rodeo Queen."

OTHER CO-CONSPIRATORS:

"WC Rasmussen/pedal steel, guitar; T.L. Morris/bass; Jenna Sather/drums; and Skid Severson/guitar, vocals."

LIFE STORY IN BRIEF:

"She was a stranger, dark and foreboding, forging her lone way out of an unknown past in the utter loneliness of her own immovable and instinctive defiance. OK, so that was how Jack Schaefer described 'Shane' but it's really about me! I rose from wisecracking waitress to college instructor to country chanteuse. Look for my next fantasy incarnation: Housewife. I am burning with the flame of American dreams!"

BORN IN:

"Augusta, Georgia: Garden City of the South ."

HOW LONG IN TUCSON:

"Eight years."

ONE WORD TO DESCRIBE TUCSON:

"Succulent(s)."

WHAT YOU WOULD LIKE TO SEE HAPPEN ON THE LOCAL SCENE:

"I imagine a desert jamboree where local bands perform sweet songs in a dry wash with Christmas lights strung around the cacti and there is a huge BBQ boar pit and the old people are dancing in a romantic way. The ladies wear flowers tucked behind their ears and sway gracefully to the beautiful music. The men have massive hard-ons and baste the suckling pig."

CONNECTING POINTS:

"We play, and sometimes sleep with, Topless Opry, Al Perry, Ms. Rivers, Richmond Fontaine, Troy Olsen, Railbenders, and Cadillac Angels."

ARTIFACTS:

"A demo CD, a fancy sticker designed by Ron Spencer, plus a tight boob-revealing T-shirt for the ladies (ask Lisa B. at Safehouse) and a sultry wife-beater for the gentleman (Hank Topless wore his with snakeskin boots, mirror sunglasses, a black hat and the tightest pants this side of the Dwight Yoakam County line and looked like a man-whore!)"

CONTACT:

dvywriter1@aol.com