Clint Will Keep Battling On
Illawarra Mercury
Saturday June 19, 1999
WHO'D be a parent? You're like a football coach. You get the blame if things go bad and no thanks if things go well.
Country singer Clint Beattie wonders how his parents persevered with him.
The Tamworth Golden Guitar winner of a few years ago remembers how they despaired of his early childhood crazes.
``I'd go mad on soccer or rugby league or whatever and they'd buy everything for me and send me to coaching classes but I'd never see anything through," he recalls of his days growing up on the NSW North Coast. ``I'd soon get tired of it all.
``The football or the cricket pads or the hockey stick would be thrown into the cupboard. They'd be almost brand new but I'd moved on to some new fad.
``I must have cost them a fortune."
Eventually dad and mum (Col and Pat) called a halt.
When Clint announced he was no longer going to be a great footballer but had instead decided to become a country music star they shook their heads as one.
They weren't paying for a guitar. They weren't paying for music lessons.
``I was about 10 years old and I didn't know what to do," Beattie recalls. ``My parents were reluctant to see it through this time.
``But Grandma (Rita Berry) came to the rescue. After all, we'd been a musical family. My grandfather played the guitar and would always sing at parties. It was fun for him. Lots of fun.
``I borrowed a guitar and Grandma paid for my first music lessons."
There was a local country music club in his hometown of Gloucester and in 1987, at the age of 11, he went along with his mum to watch a talent quest.
Actually she manoeuvred him along because of her parental pride in his efforts.
`She persuaded me to get up and sing," he recalls. ``I was frightened - scared stiff. There was no way I was going to do it. But Mum offered me 50 bucks if I did."
It was a good investment.
He won the talent quest, even though to this day he reckons his performance was woeful.
But he persisted, and this persistence eventually led to his success at the country music mecca, Tamworth.
``There has always been a talent quest circuit around NSW and Queensland," he explains. ``Mum and Dad started driving me to all these shows. And I started to win a lot of them.
``They went without things for themselves to get me started. Dad was a bricklayer. He wasn't in the money. But there the two of them were, driving me everywhere. They spent a lot of money on accommodation, food and travel.
``They sacrificed a lot for me. It wasn't until I eventually got married and our little son appeared that I realised what things cost.
``I'm embarrassed to say I took so much for granted."
Tamworth, of course, was the goal.
Beattie went there every year. He'd busk in the town's main street. He'd try out in a few of the minor talent quests. Hoping and praying.
In 1994 he entered the Starmaker quest. Young hopefuls would send off a tape of their work, a CV and some photos.
He was one of the 20 chosen for the short list. He sang two songs and found himself called back for the final. Ten would-be stars singing another two songs at the Tamworth Town Hall. And he was adjudged the best.
Among the prizes was a record company deal to release one single. A chance to get airplay on radio stations and sell to the country music aficionados. Sadly, it would be many months before the record would see the light of day.
``I didn't want to wait," Beattie recalls. ``I wanted to strike while the iron was hot. I didn't want to be yesterday's news.
``So I borrowed money from friends and family - about 5000 bucks - and made a professional recording of my own.
``I managed to line up a producer, studios and so on at mates rates otherwise the venture would never have succeeded."
His actions put a few noses out of joint, but the single certainly got off the ground. ``Learning How To Live" reached number three on the country music charts.
At the next Tamworth Country Music Festival Beattie was awarded the Golden Guitar for the New Talent of the Year.
The world seemed to be his oyster.
However, for every Lee Kernaghan and Gina Jeffreys who make it to superstar status there are hundreds who struggle.
And Beattie admits he is one of those.
But he doesn't give up his day job, especially now that he has wife Sondra and seven-month old son Brock to support.
Day jobs, actually. Plural. He drives a courier van during the day and some nights fills in as manager at the Henson Park Hotel in Sydney.
``I met Sondra at a club in Forster on the North Coast," he says. ``That's my best memory of the town. My worst is slipping on some spilt beer on a dance floor there 18 months ago and breaking my left leg in seven places.
``I've had three operations on the leg already. And doctors say I'll have to have at least a couple more.
``It makes it hard when I'm up on stage. The leg begins to ache badly after a while. But I've got to keep going. I'm a bit of a rebel in life. And that rebellion makes me want to show Australia just how good I am as a singer."
© 1999 Illawarra Mercury
