"Holler Back" boys graduate from honky-tonks

By Ken Tucker

NASHVILLE (Billboard) - The Lost Trailers, a band whose moniker is more than a catchy name, are finally reaping the rewards of years on the road, hard work and an innate sense of what their music should sound like.

"Holler Back," the group's highest-charting single to date, is No. 29 on Billboard's Hot Country Songs chart.

Group members Ryder Lee and Stokes Nielson met in a church band as teenagers, and in high school they convinced drummer Jeff Potter to join the band, then known as Ryder Stokes. Soon, Nielson's younger brother Andrew came onboard, followed by bassist Manny Medina.

The band, whose name is derived from the fact that its equipment trailers had been stolen on three separate occasions, made its debut at Willie Nelson's annual Fourth of July picnic in 2001. Afterward, "we just called every honky-tonk in America and would do shows for 50 bucks or gas money or whatever," Stokes Nielson says. "Looking back on that now, it helped forge a band of brothers."

After two independent albums, the band released "Welcome to the Woods" on Universal Republic in 2004. The set sold 13,000 units, according to Nielsen SoundScan.

Hooking up with producer Blake Chancey (Montgomery Gentry), the Trailers then signed with Nashville-based BNA Records in 2005. Its 2006 self-titled BNA debut sold 16,000 copies, but none of the three singles from the set made it out of the lower regions of Hot Country Songs.

Things have changed under the guidance of producer Brett Beavers (Dierks Bentley), who helmed new album "Holler Back," tentatively due in late summer. "He told us, 'Guys, your recorded music needs to be as powerful as your live performance,"' Nielson recalls. "That was the mission of this record, to make that happen."

Nielson says the song "Holler Back," which he co-wrote with Tim James, represents real life. "I wanted to write a modern country song that celebrated the lifestyle that we grew up in and where we grew up -- south Georgia for me and eastern North Carolina for Ryder. It was very rural, and the high time on the weekends was to go out in the pecan fields and have a party out in the woods. We would go back to the holler every weekend."  Continued...