The Contenders, 1970s: Tommy Goldsmith, Walter Hyatt, Steve Runkle, Jimbeau Walsh, Champ Hood
On Friday, North Carolina-based Southern Moon Records will reissue on CD The Contenders, a long-out-of-print album that represents an important piece of Nashville’s rock history. The record is significant because it was the one and only album made by The Contenders, who arguably were the best rock band in Nashville for a couple of years in the mid-1970s. The group — made up of Tommy Goldsmith (guitar, vocals), Champ Hood (guitar, vocals), Walter Hyatt (guitar, vocals), Steve Runkle (bass, vocals) and Jimbeau Walsh (drums, vocals) — earned its reputation as one of the city’s best bands on the strength of artful songwriting, tight musicianship and soulful vocal harmonies.
Rising from the ashes of a pair of groups that tried unsuccessfully to get traction in the city a few years earlier, The Contenders were born in February 1976 when Hyatt and Hood from Uncle Walt’s Band and Goldsmith and Runkle from Pritchard Avenue Band teamed up with Walsh, a rock and blues drummer they knew from Chicago. It wasn’t long before they were wowing audiences in Nashville with regular appearances at Exit/In and other local nightspots. They also took their act on the road and packed houses from Texas to the Carolinas.
Although a major-label deal eluded the band, The Contenders were offered the opportunity to make a record by Dave Robert, who was then the owner of the Cat’s Cradle, a popular club in Chapel Hill, N.C. Robert loved the band and essentially started the independent label Moonlight Records in order to release their LP. The eponymous album, which was recorded at LSI Studio in Nashville in September 1977 and released in January 1978, had the catalog number MR-001. As it would turn out, the album was more or less the group’s swan song. By the summer, The Contenders had disbanded, and the members went on to various other musical pursuits. Among many highlights, Walsh and Goldsmith both worked with David Olney at different times, and the Oak Ridge Boys had a hit with Runkle’s “Love Song” in 1983. Sadly, Goldsmith and Walsh are the only remaining original members of The Contenders; Hyatt perished in the May 1996 ValuJet plane crash, while Runkle and Hood both died of cancer in 2001. The reissue of MR-001 was spearheaded by Runkle’s brother Ben, who co-produced the new version with Goldsmith.
The Contenders outside Exit/In, 1970s: Jimbeau Walsh, Steve Runkle, Walter Hyatt, Champ Hood, Tommy Goldsmith
“It was something I had wanted to do for a long time,” Ben Runkle tells the Scene from his home in North Carolina. Runkle tracked down Robert in 2021 and learned he still had the original multitrack tapes. After a few discussions about what he had in mind, Robert — who died in 2022 — decided to essentially give the tapes to him for the reissue. Runkle then sent the multitrack masters to Sonicraft A2DX Lab in Redbank, N.J., where they were restored and digitized.
“One reason I wanted to do [the reissue] so badly was because the LP had tons of reverb and real heavy compression,” Runkle says. “You listen to it and say, ‘Oh, hell, why did they do that?’ I was so pleased when the transfers came back and none of that was present.”
“There were no effects built into the tracks at the time,” Goldsmith explains. “So we really had leeway to take it and make something that sounded as good as we wanted it to sound.”
Goldsmith and Runkle remixed the record with engineer Dick Hodgin at his Osceola Studios in Raleigh, N.C. The reissue features one bonus track not included on the original LP: the CD’s final track “Getaway.” Goldsmith says it wasn’t originally included on the album because the band wasn’t satisfied with the recording. But after hearing the song during the mix sessions, Goldsmith decided it could be improved and included on the reissue.
So he enlisted the help of some old friends — Marcia Ball (piano, vocal), Hood’s nephew Warren Hood (fiddle, vocal), Willis Alan Ramsey (vocal), Jeff Barnes (saxophones) and The Lunsfords (vocals) — to revitalize the track, which Goldsmith jokingly refers to as the reissue’s “big single.” In the run up to the release, Steve Boyle was called on to direct and edit a cool music video, which includes the song’s lyrics, vintage photos of The Contenders and footage from a reunion show.
A release party for the reissue — featuring Goldsmith and Walsh with The Contenders’ family, friends and longtime associates — was originally scheduled for July 15 at Springwater, but due to illness has been rescheduled for Aug. 12 from 4 to 7 p.m.
