In 2008, Lee Kernaghan was named Australian of the Year. This was due in no small part to the fact that in 2007, he performed in Longerenong.
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The Spirit of the Bush concert attracted more than 20,000 farmers affected by crippling drought. Kernaghan said meeting a few of them gifted him the song of the same name.
"The way the whole community came together in support of the farming families. Just talking about it puts goosebumps up my arms all these years later," he said.
"That's where the song was born: I was meeting several farmers and their families after the concert, and one had lost his farm that had been in his family for a couple of generations."
"He said to me 'Lee, we've lost it all, and there have been times I've felt like just giving it all up, but I won't, because my wife and two little girls are depending on me'. I shook the big fella's hand, and I knew that was the spirit of the bush."
He's staring down the barrel of another desperate day / Pulls on his boots, he can't walk away / He's running on empty, he's knocked about and bent / But he'll still be standing when the river runs again
- Spirit of the Bush, Lee Kernaghan (2007)
The song has since gone on to become his signature tune, and Kernaghan has been all too happy to use its popularity to support those doing it tough. In 2013, he re-released "Spirit of the Bush" to support people in NSW who lost their homes in bushfires.
Later this year, Kernaghan will return to the Wimmera, with more songs inspired by the people he's met in his travels.
The country music legend will bring his Backroad Nation tour to Horsham Town Hall on Thursday, June 13, one of 45 shows he'll play with special guests the Wolfe Brothers and Christie Lamb.
His new album of the same name is due for release on May 10.
"I did another show up in Marble Bar, in the Pilbara region of WA, and the Wolfe Brothers and I did a show at the Iron Clad Hotel," Kernaghan said, reflecting on one of the stories that made it to the album.
"After the show we were hanging out with everybody and I was talking to the manager of Hillside Station, which is a hundred miles east of the venue, and I asked him 'Mate, what do you do for entertainment out there?'.
"He said 'Mate, it's mustering cattle 24/7, but when the wet season comes, the rain comes down, the river goes up, we turn the generators off and me and my missus sit on the front verandah watching lightning'. And I knew when he said that, it had to be a song."
This will be the second time Kernaghan has performed at the venue, after he was one of the first acts to play it on May 26, 2016.
"I remember playing the old town hall for many years, and we had some good old nights there, but this new venue is one of the top places on the Australian touring circuit now," he said.
He also headlined last year's Lake Charlegrark Country Music marathon.
UPDATE: Kernaghan's first show has sold out. A second show on Wednesday, June 12 is now on sale.
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