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"That's just the way it played out. I got bumped off Warner and I was on my own. Publishers have a lot of say in what goes on. They want you to explore certain roads you may not want to go down. They hook you up with another songwriter, sit you down in a little room, and within four hours you have a bunch of songs.
"I mean, what's that exactly?" Ball laughs.
The 48-year-old, playing a show that's likely to be a knockout at Cook County Sunday, calls from Oregon, his accent a funny mix of Californian and Texan. He's lived both places, though right now he calls Franklin, Tennessee, just outside of Nashville, home.
Freed from the label's demands, he landed at a smaller label and made the Album Amigo, which has just the right mix of Willie Nelson, Merle Haggard and Dwight Yoakam, plus enough Texas swing to knock your hat off.
I ask him if it's heartening that radio and awards shows like the Grammys are growing interested in old-time country and well-written songs.
"Well, I hope so! I'm just out there looking for good music, whatever form it may take. And I love the brilliance of the Cohen brothers' films. Some of the things in Fargo ... hahaha. But that O Brother (Where Art Thou?) soundtrack was something else, and if it gets radio interested, I'm all for it."
Radio has already been interested in Ball, thanks to Riding with Private Malone, that ghost song we were talking about, where a soldier is saved from the wreck of his Camaro by its former owner who died in 'Nam. Though it exploded in popularity after Sept. 11, Ball says it isn't a patriotic song about going off and killing people.
"Not really, it's a story song about a modern-day American hero, which has the effect of healing a lot of old wounds over Vietnam. This wouldn't have been a hit if not for the terrorist attacks, but it's not about that. We've heard about a lot of people that were in bad car wrecks where somebody helps them out of the car and then disappears. A lot of times they're dressed weird, like an ice-cream salesman. You hear all this funny stuff."
Ball's bringing a five-piece band up with him, and might even get some songwriting done up here. It is, after all, within the parameters of when he can now write songs: "When I feel like it," he smiles. "Hot damn!"