Crystal Wise
The fact that even rock stars grow up is proof that, beyond any reasonable doubt, like death and taxes, we all got it coming — growing up.
Wives, kids, early bedtimes, producing income outside of touring and record releases, flat-out responsibilities — priorities change and, if you’re lucky, start stacking up.
This April marked the first time in eight years that Green River Ordinance, the rock band that toes two lines — Americana and remaining a Fort Worth band (more on that later) — released new music.
Why has it been so long, you might ask? Well, they grew up.
The aptly titled For Old Time’s Sake is the band’s fifth full-length album and plays as a brilliant meditation on life post-35. You know, when gray hairs start popping up, things start getting pretty darn serious, and reflections supplant angst as the primary driver of inspiration. When men of a certain age write music, there’s an obvious evolution. Personal songs and personal lyrics become pure nostalgia and have more to do with others or a collective than oneself. The album’s title track, which also happens to be its opening track, is a perfect example of this maturation.
“Boys, it’s been a long while, been a long time since I sat down tried to write a song,” head songwriter Josh Jenkins sings in crystal-clear twang, clearly addressing his longtime bandmates, in the tune’s opening lines. “Meet me down in Fort Worth, we can let our guitars fly. Sing the songs that we sung a million times.”
Crystal Wise
The band — Josh, Jamey Ice, Geoff Ice, Denton Hunker, and Joshua Wilkerson — have been playing together, the five of them, for nearly 20 years. Josh, Jamey, and Geoff have been at it even longer — since Josh was 15 and Jamey and Geoff had bell bottoms and long hair and Green River Ordinance took its cues from Creedence Clearwater Revival.
After the lineup was set, they’d build an independent following over a couple years while balancing school — three of the guys went to TCU and Josh went to junior college — earning their keep traveling the state of Texas.
“We played every dive bar, pizza joint, and birthday party that would have us,” Josh says. “And we built enough of a following to garner some attention to hopefully get a record deal.”
Which they got.
The band has no doubt had success. And when considering the fate of most bands, they’ve had massive success. They signed a record deal with Capitol, and their subsequent 2009 album, Out of My Hands, while more a straight pop album than crossover, landed a couple singles on nationwide radio rotation. They toured with early aught juggernauts Switchfoot, Train, and Goo Goo Dolls and got substantial MTV play. But their 2012 album, Under Fire, which they released independently, saw perhaps their biggest success when “Dancing Shoes” became a bona fide hit — it remains their most streamed song on Spotify.
But they didn’t quite break through. They flirted with but, ultimately, never reached the stratospheric and sometimes delusional heights any musician dreams to achieve — sold out arenas, multiple Grammys, sessions with Rick Rubin.
“We’d had a lot of success but never had a massive hit,” Jamey, the band’s lead guitarist says. “We could go anywhere in the country, any city, and 500 to a thousand people would show up. But still, we never had that massive wave. And then we’re also having kids around that time, and then we also were all kind of dabbling in different things.”
Around this time, Jamey’s Fort Worth-based remodeling company, 6th Avenue Homes, would start to take off, which would lead to success in an entirely different field from music. Josh, meanwhile, double-downed on his music career, moved to Nashville, and now has his name attached as a co-writer on a few chart-topping songs, including Jordan Davis’ “Buy Dirt,” which won the CMA Song of the Year in 2021. Jamey’s brother, Geoff, is also in Nashville, and also married with children and is putting the MBA he earned on the road to good use running a stylish goods company called Gentleman’s Hardware. Denton Hunker, the band’s drummer, moved to Rhode Island with his wife, Ashley, where he owns a clothing and leather goods company, Dunker Goods. And Joshua Wilkerson is the only other member, aside from Jamey, who remained in Fort Worth, where he works for a property management company.
“[Initially], we were doing [the band] full time, not being in school and just being on the road,” Josh says. “And then early 30s, we start getting married and kids are either on the way or kids have already come. It just got more complicated. And I think all of us were like, man, it feels like the home life is so important to us. And, so, we slowed way down.”
According to Jamey, “We just said, let’s take a pause. Let’s take a break.”
But they’d stay in contact and would even play an occasional show, including a slate of three 2022 reunion shows at the newly opened Tannahill’s, which sold out in 24 hours.
Crystal Wise
“It was kind of this classic old band gets back together for some shows, and they’re, like, ‘Hey this feels good again. Let’s do an album,’” Jamey says.
Josh had an arsenal of songs at his disposal — personal tunes he elected not to offer fellow Nashville artists, keeping them in his back pocket for Green River Ordinance. The band would get together in Nashville to record a couple songs but wound up recording a whole album. Sometimes inspiration strikes.
They’d play an album release show in the very place that kickstarted this whole album idea in the first place, Tannahill’s, on April 6. Despite being spread out across the nation — a couple here, a couple there, one in Rhode Island — when they played at Tannahill’s, they considered it playing at home. They are still a Fort Worth band.
“I still claim Fort Worth,” Jamey says. “Everyone’s from here, so everyone’s families are here. We were here for years and years and years. It’s what we call home.”
But don’t expect the quintet to play a plethora of shows around Cowtown anytime soon. It’s clear the group has found its groove, at least momentarily, and is pretty comfortable with where it’s at, both geographically and otherwise.
“Everybody’s kind of found their place, and it’s been really fun to see everybody kind of at this stage of life getting back in town,” Josh says. “And when we played, and our kids get up on stage, it’s just like I told the guys, ‘These shows are some of my favorite.’”
I’d say to hell with Rick Rubin. They reached the stratosphere.
