Boys in Carolina Rain Find Security in their Work

GAC Music Beat

By Ronna Rubin

The country group Carolina Rain: from left, Jeremy Baxter, Rhean Boyer and Marvin Evatt.

Sept. 25, 2006—It was job security that brought together the three members of country music up-and-comers Carolina Rain. Actually, it was jobs in security.

Singer/songwriter Rhean Boyer had taken a job as a security guard at Belmont University near Music Row in Nashville when he met fellow guard (and baritone singer, guitar and banjo player) Marvin Evatt. The two were soon patrolling together in a squad car, writing songs.

Enter Jeremy Baxter, a friend of Boyer's who was also a singer, songwriter and mandolin player and who also landed a job as a security guard at Belmont.

"We rode around in the patrol car, writing songs instead of tickets," Boyer recalls. Their first songwriting collaboration was a tune called "Carolina Rain."

Though instant friends, the three men could not have been more different: Baxter was reared in Tennessee and played in his family's bluegrass-gospel group; Boyer grew up in Virginia, earning rock star status by the time he reached high school, and Evatt grew up in South Carolina, attended college on a voice scholarship and was being groomed for the Broadway stage.

In 1999, shortly after the start of their creative collaboration, the trio was offered a management contract and mistakenly thought they were on the path to easy street. Instead, their first showcase for a major record company turned disastrous when both the lighting and sound systems failed.

A second record company offered them a deal, but it fell apart because the two parties were unable to come to terms over the contract.

"The seven years we've been together have certainly had their share of hills and valleys," Boyer says. "The music and our faith in each other and in God would always remind us why we were doing this."

The third time was the charm for Carolina Rain. They sang their songs for the head of a third record company and were offered a deal on the spot. Their debut disc is appropriately titled "Weather The Storm," and 11 of the disc's 12 tracks were written or co-written by Boyer.

Their debut video, "Get Outta My Way," currently can be seen on Great American Country.

"Fans want to hear the real deal," the 35-year-old lead singer says of the trio's distinct sound. "They know that some bands are built from the top down and are just put together to fit a trend." Not so for Carolina Rain, a trio that has endured seven years of struggles yet never lost sight of what they were after.

"We wouldn't trade the experiences for anything," Boyer says. "Because during that time we became friends. We have fun together, and that's one of the coolest things about this group."

(Ronna Rubin, a 21-year veteran of the music industry, can be contacted at ronna@gacmusicbeat.com. Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service.)