WORDS BY JACK WATKINS
As a child in the New Forest, Clint Bradley’s life was consumed by the old west, listening to western music, western movies and western novels
Pasi Rytkonen
When Clint Bradley, probably best known in roots circles as the lead singer of neorockabillies The Blue Cats, released his first western album Riding After Midnight in 2014, he could have been forgiven for being slightly taken back by the warmth of its reception, not just among devotees of cowboy music, but also in rockabilly circles. For virtually his entire life, Clint has nurtured a passion for western music, often ploughing a lone furrow in his appreciation of the songs of the likes of Marty Robbins, Bob Nolan, Ken Curtis and Gene Autry. But the title track of Riding After Midnight was so punch-the-air exhilarating, and his versions of the Robbins classic Doggone Cowboy and Call Of The Far Away Hills, the theme tune from the Alan Ladd western Shane, so convincing, only a block of stone could not have been moved. Here was a man brushed by the spirit of past heroes who seemed to be able to write western songs in a sincere rather than tongue-in-cheek tone, and geared for the modern age.