It’s been nearly a decade since Surrey-raised country musician Lisa Brokop released an album, but a batch of new songs is on the way.
Due out Sept. 15 is the 10-track LP Who’s Gonna Fill Their Heels?, the title song of which is a remake of the George Jones-sung ballad from 1985, “Who’s Gonna Fill Their Shoes?”
While Jones’ version of the Troy Seals-written hit reminisced about the male legends of country music, Brokop gives the song a female-focused twist with nods to Patsy, Dolly, Tammy, EmmyLou, June and Dottie.
Brilliantly, the new song is a duet with Georgette Jones, daughter of country legends George Jones and Tammy Wynette.
Brokop talked about the origins of her “Heels” in a phone call from her longtime home in Nashville, where she lives with singer/songwriter husband Paul Jefferson and their 14-year-old daughter, Ivy.
“Quite a few years ago now, I was actually about to get on a plane to head to Calgary for a show,” Brokop recalled. “I had this idea of, you know, George has this great song but he only mentioned the males of country music. That’s great, and I love them all, but I thought that it’s just too bad that he didn’t mention any of the female greats because there’s so many that also are important.”
Without skipping a beat, she went ahead and rewrote the lyrics, for fun.
“So I sat on the plane and wrote it and actually played it in my show the next night,” Brokop revealed. “It was like, oh, wow, this is actually pretty cool. So I’ve had it in my back pocket for a while and then I played it for my business partner, Chuck Rhodes, and he loved it — he totally got it. He loved the old-school Nashville vibe and the empowerment of women and honouring those who came before us.”
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Fellow Nashville-area resident Jones got involved in recording after Rhodes introduced the two.
“Chuck knows everybody, and he’s been kind of the leader in all of this,” explained Brokop, now repped by Nashville-based PLA Media. “We both thought it would be great if she could sing the part in the song that talks about her mother, Tammy, and she did. And when I first heard it… I don’t really tear up that much with music, but when she sang her part, she sounds just like her mama and it was so cool, and other people had the same response. We knew it was something very, very special.”
The vocals of Brokop and Jones blend well on “Who’s Gonna Fill Their Heels?,” released on Aug. 18.
Out now is the album’s lead single, “Come Back Bobby Gentry,” a Brokop/Williams original that has a Carole King vibe.
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Echoing her recent concert productions (The Legendary Ladies of Country Music, The Patsy Cline Project), Brokop’s new LP aims to celebrate “the traditional music that shaped her as an artist and cutting-edge originals that embody her new creative direction,” according to a news release.
Other songs include covers of Tanya Tucker’s “Delta Dawn,” Jeannie C. Riley’s “Harper Valley P.T.A.” and Cline’s “She’s Got You,” paired with originals including “So Far” and “The Same.”
“I didn’t realize it had been that long since I released an album,” Brokop said, “because I’ve been busy with things, performing and traveling, but yeah, it’s been a while. I mean, a decade goes by fast these days, so quickly. But it’s time, let’s do this. It kind of just fell into place, and it felt right.”
Surrey-born Brokop, who graduated from Princess Margaret Secondary in 1991 and turned 50 on June 6, sounds excited about releasing the new album and touring Canada’s western provinces this fall. Show dates include a pair in mid-October at Langley’s The Bunkhouse Bar, at George Preston Centre, with Brokop doing Cline and Jefferson jamming Hank Williams in his “Hank Lives” show.
This summer Brokop played a couple of concerts in Alberta but none in her native B.C.
“I decided last summer that I wasn’t gonna stay in Tennessee with the heat for the entire summer this year, so we planned to get out of the south and into the north this summer,” said Brokop. “My daughter and I, we went up there and it was mostly a family vacation, seeing a bunch of cousins and stuff like that. But I did have two shows because of course, you know, you gotta have a little bit of that.”
Online, learn the latest about Brokop on lisabrokop.com.
tom.zillich@surreynowleader.com
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